An Unwilling Conquest Part 3

"Your maid?" When she nodded, Harry offered,

"If she'd broken her ankle she would, I think, be in far greater pain."

The blue eyes came his way, along with a grateful smile.

Lucinda glanced away--and caught Agatha's warning glare. Her smile turned into a grimace.

"Perhaps I should wait here until the cart comes for her?"

"No." Harry's response was immediate. She shot him a startled glance; he covered his lapse with a charming but rueful smile.

"I hesitate to alarm you but footpads have been seen in the vicinity." His smile deepened.

"And Newmarket's only two miles on."

"Oh." Lucinda met his gaze; she made no effort to hide the consideration in hers.

"Two miles?"

"If that." Harry met her eyes, faint challenge in his. "Well..."

Lucinda turned to view his curricle.

Harry waited for no more. He beckoned Sire and pointed to the curricle.

"Put your mistresses' luggage in the boot."

He turned back to be met by a cool, distinctly haughty blue glance.

Equally cool, he allowed one brow to rise.

Lucinda suddenly felt warm, despite the cool breeze that heralded the approaching evening. She looked away, to where Heather was talking animatedly to Agatha.

"If you'll forgive the advice, Mrs Babbacombe, I would not consider it wise for either you or your stepdaughter to be upon the road, unescorted, at night." The soft drawl focused Lucinda's mind on her options. Both appeared dangerous. With a gentle inclination of her head, she chose the more exciting.

"Indeed, Mr Lester. Doubtless you're right." Sim had finished stowing their baggage in the cun'ide's boot, strapping bandboxes to the flaps.

"Heather?"

While his siren fussed, delivering a string of last- minute instructions, Harry lifted her stepdaughter to the curricle's seat. Heather Babbacombe smiled sunnily and thanked him prettily, too young to be fl.u.s.tered by his innate charms.

Doubtless, Harry thought, as he turned to view her stepmother, Heather viewed him much as an uncle. His lips quirked, then relaxed into a smile as he watched Mrs Babbacombe glide towards him, casting last, measuring glances about her.

She was slender and tall--there was something about her graceful carriage that evoked the adjective 'matriarchal'.

A confidence, an a.s.surance, that showed in her flank gaze and open expression. Her dark hair, richly brown with the suspicion 'of red glinting in the sun, was, he could now see, fixed in a tight bun at the nape of her neck. For his money, the style was too severe--his fingers itched to run through the silken tresses, laying them free.

As for her figure, he was having great difficulty disguising his interest.

She was, indeed, one of the more alluring visions he had beheld in many a long year. She drew near and he lifted a brow.

"Ready, Mrs Babbacombe?"

Lucinda turned to meet his gaze, wondering how such a soft drawl could so easily sound steely.

"Thank you, Mr Lester." She gave him her hand; he took it, drawing her to the side of the carriage. Lucinda blinked at the high step--the next instant, she felt his hands firm about her waist and she was lifted, effortlessly, to the seat.

Stifling her gasp, Lucinda met Heather's gaze, filled with innocent antic.i.p.ation. Sternly suppressing her fl.u.s.ter, Lucinda settled herself on the seat next to her stepdaughter. She had not, indeed, had much experience interacting with gentlemen of Mr Lester's standing; perhaps such gestures were commonplace?

Despite her inexperience, she could not delude herself that her position, as it transpired, could ever be dismissed as commonplace. Her rescuer paused only to swing his greatcoat--adorned, she noted, with a great many capes--about his broad shoulders before following her into the curricle~ the reins in his hands. Naturally, he sat beside her.

A bright smile firmly fixed on her lips, Lucinda waved Agatha goodbye, steadfastly ignoring the hard thigh pressed against her much softer limb, and the way her shoulder perforce had to nestle against his back.

Harry himself had not foreseen the tight squeeze-- and found its results equally disturbing. Pleasant--but definitely disturbing. Backing his team, he asked,

"Were you coming from Cambridge, Mrs Babbacombe?" He desperately needed distraction.

Lucinda was only too ready to oblige.

"Yes--we spent a week there. We intended to leave directly after lunch but spent an hour or so in the gardens. They're very fine, we discovered."

Her accents were refined and untraceable, her stepdaughter's less so, while those of her servants were definitely north country. The greys settled into their stride; Harry comforted himself that two miles meant less than fifteen minutes, even allowing for picking their way through the town.

"But you're not from hereabouts?"

"No--we're from Yorks.h.i.+re." After a moment, Lucinda added, a smile tweaking her lips,

"At the moment, however, I suspect we could more rightly claim to be gypsies."

"Gypsies?"

Lucinda exchanged a smile with Heather.

"My husband died just over a year ago. His estate pa.s.sed into his cousin's hands, so Heather and I decided to while away our year of mourning in travelling the country. Neither of us had seen much of it before."

Harry stifled a groan. She was a widow--a beautiful widow newly out of mourning, unfixed, Unattached, bar the minor enc.u.mbrance of a stepdaughter.

In an effort to deny his mounting interest, to block out his awareness of her soft curves pressed, courtesy of Heather Babbacombe's more robust figure, firmly against his side, he concentrated on her words. And frowned. "Where do you plan to stay in Newmarket?"

"The Barbican Arms," Lucinda replied.

"I believe it's in the High Street."

"It is." Harry's lips thinned; the Barbican Arms was directly opposite the Jockey Club.

"Ah--have you reservations?"

He slanted a glance at her face and saw surprise register.

"It's a race week, you know."