Page 27 of Miss Dauntless
“What you say is true. I was overly trusting of the world and other people, and now I am under-ly trusting of myself. What sort of fool gets herself into a situation where marrying a confidence trickster looks like the answer to her prayers? I want to blame my folly entirely on Harry, but I can’t.”
“He’s dead,” Tremont said, smiling slightly in the gloom. “Blaming him works marvelously because he’s not here to defend himself. Given my sentiments toward the man, that is rather a good thing. I don’t approve of violence in the normalcourse, and I grow positively pedantic about the stupidity of dueling—from wretched experience, let it be said. For Harry Merridew, I might once again prove that I am capable of breaking my own rules.”
“I’m about to break one of my rules, my lord.”
Despite that warning, Tremont remained calmly gazing down at her as the snowflakes danced onto his shoulders and the wind soughed around the corner of the house.
Matilda braced herself with a hand on Tremont’s shoulder and kissed his cheek. She lingered near for a moment, catching a whiff of jasmine and green grass—a delicate fragrance for such a substantial man.
In Matilda’s lexicon of broken rules, that kiss should barely qualify. Tremont’s cheek was cool and a little rough, and he remained unbending in response.
“That kiss was not for my rapier wit or devilish charm, was it?” he asked.
“Nor for your sparkling repartee, my lord, and while I find you more than passingly handsome, I did not kiss you because I was overcome with animal spirits.” That Tremont had inspired Matilda to even acknowledge animal spirits aloud was another marvel.
He took off his hat and ran his hand through his hair. “Please do tell me what inspired your display so I might earn a similar reward under circumstances where I’m in a better position to reciprocate.”
Matilda took courage from that speech. Tremont resorted to rhetoric when emotion threatened his reserve.
“You listen to me,” she said. “You talkwithme, notatme. When you invite me in for tea and conversation, that is precisely what you have in mind. Discussion with you does not mean gossip about others or platitudes about the weather. You are the opposite of a confidence trickster.”
Tremont put his hat back on, and Matilda resettled it on his head at a slight angle.
“Into the house with you,” he said. “Much more of your flattery, and my hat will no longer fit.”
And yet, he had once again taken her hand.
Between one chilly sweep of the wind and the next, Matilda realized that his lordship was asking her a question. He was skilled with high-flown discourse, and he also knew how to use a silence.
“Yes, my lord,” she said. “If you were to kiss me back, I would be pleased. Disconcerted, bewildered, and a bit unnerved, but pleased.”
“Then I must choose my moment carefully, such that the pleasure is sufficient to overcome your misgivings. Parting on a frigid stoop is not, alas for me, such a moment. You have set me a challenge, Mrs. Merridew, and I relish a challenge.”
“Matilda.”
His smile was sweet and a little devilish. “Marcus.”
They goggled at each other for a moment—not quite fatuously—before Tremont unlatched the door. Matilda slipped into the house and watched his lordship march off into the shadows.
The house smelled good, of conscientious cleaning and a roast in the oven. The foyer wasn’t warm, but it was a welcome respite from the elements. From the library came the strains of a fiddle lilting along in triple meter.
Home, at least for now. Matilda took off her cloak, scarf, and bonnet and reviewed the afternoon’s events. She looked for the trap, for the clue that Lord Tremont wasn’t who and what he appeared to be, and she found no such indications.
She looked for the mistake—kissing Tremont had been the next thing to an impulse—and impulses led to painfulconsequences. What she’d gained had been a sweet moment and a promise of more sweet moments.
Matilda was listening to Tommie’s voluble description of Jensen’s offer to take him to the lending library when she finally found a label for what was so attractive about Marcus, Earl of Tremont.
He was simplyhonorable. A younger Matilda would have found him unremarkable—once she’d stopped admiring his fine tailoring, broad shoulders, and exquisite manners—but the older and wiser lady knew him to be a rare gem.
He was kind and honest, and he was planning to kiss her at some opportune moment, and that made Matilda more happy than worried. Perhaps she was truly accepting the reality of Harry’s death after all this time, and that was a very, very good thing.
Tremont lasted exactly one week before he was back at the soldiers’ home, though seven days and nights of pondering and cogitating and wondering had brought him no closer to understanding how he ought to next approach Matilda.
So here he sat in the kitchen, without a plan or a clue, and without catching sight of his quarry either.
“Mrs. Merridew knows things, my lord,” Mrs. Winklebleck said, taking a loud slurp of her tea. “Magic potions to stop a stain from setting, boot polish that don’t stink of lard. She says I can learn all that from books, but I’ve already learned a power of tricks from her, and she’s been here only a fortnight.”
Tremont had come in the back hallway door, as was his wont when he’d cut through the garden. Mrs. Winklebleck and Cook were enjoying a cup of tea at the kitchen worktable—as seemedto be their wont at any given hour—and Mrs. Winklebleck had poured him a cup before Tremont had stomped the snow from his boots.
