Page 32 of A Flaming Lady's Secret Valentine
Raphael was no stranger to being used.
“You accompanied me,” Edward slurred at last, “because you feel you must.” He straightened and drew in a breath, his hair hanging over his eyes. “That is all right. I am just glad you have come, Travers. London is full of people, yet so lonely.”
Edward tottered to the carriage, seeking purchase on its roof. Raphael ordered Clemens to say put, opening the door himself. Edward slumped into his seat, knocking his hat off against the door jamb. The sooner they were back at Lantham House the better.
“Your family is too large for you to be lonely,” Raphael suggested. He crouched down to pick up Edward’s top hat, which had rolled beneath the carriage. He grappled for it with a grunt.
“Lonely, so lonely…” Edward muttered faintly. “Perhaps it is in my best interest to marry after all. Cecilia is the black sheep of the family, not me.”
Raphael’s fingers curled around the brim of the hat. His breath caught at the mention of Cecilia. “What would make you think that about Lady Cecilia?”
Nothing more came from Edward, so he hopped up. The lord was softly snoring in the carriage, and Raphael breathed a sigh of relief.
His relief did not last long.
A woman was standing on the other side of the open door, watching Raphael. Her features were indiscernible in the darkness, but she exuded an air of tasteless wealth, with the feathers in her hair, with her clinking jewellery… She took another step forward, swathed in the yellow light from White’s.
“I thought that was you,” she said. A smile twisted her heavy jowls.
Raphael sprang into action. He placed a finger before his lips, setting Edward’s hat beside him on the seat. Closing the door gingerly, he whistled for Clemens to take off without him post-haste.
The horses thundered down the street, leaving nothing between him and Lady Kinsmere. His chest swelled with anxiety as he forced a smile, overwhelmed by the past he had tried so desperately to forget.
“How wonderful it is to see an old friend,” Lady Kinsmere said, closing the space between them. The heady blend of her perfumes wreathed around him. “I see you have done well for yourself, Raphael.”
“Not as well as one might think. What are you doing in this corner of London?”
“My son—you remember George?—he is come into a hobble at White’s. A footman arrived with a note for me, something about a duel, I cannot recall.” Her gloved hand rolled in the air. “Yourself?”
“Helping a friend.”
“I was wondering whether you were still in this business offriends.” She clicked open her reticule and tended him her calling card. “I am wanting for company.”
The card was slipped between his fingers, stinging like a paper cut. “Not that sort of friend,” he corrected, handing the card back to her.
She refused it. “Keep it in case you change your mind. I am curious to know what has become of you in all the years since our acquaintance. Annabelle and Virginie still speak of you at length.”
Raphael felt his daemons on his shoulders, slowly clawing for his neck. He shirked them off. “As flattered as I am, I walk a different path now.”
Lady Kinsmere smiled mirthlessly and stepped beside him. “There is only one path, Raphael. And you do not walk it alone.”
Chapter 11
“His Grace mentioned that you were an excellent rider, Lady Cecilia, but to witness the glory of your equestrian exercise with my own eyes… It beggars belief!”
Cecilia halted her mare clumsily with a “Whoa!”, almost catapulting herself forward. She glanced over her shoulder at Lord Radcliff, who was riding up the hill behind her atop a brilliant white gelding.
He had overstayed his welcome by three days, but the duke was too gracious to say anything. In that time, Cecilia had managed to ward off his advances aptly enough. Her mother had kept Cecilia and Daphne busy with preparations for their Valentine’s Day ball, which was too fast approaching. There was nothing left to plan, no gowns left to select, no excuses she could wield to refuse Radcliff’s invitation to go riding with him through Hyde.
It was a dreary Sunday morning, and the hem of Cecilia’s riding coat was wet with morning dew. She rode astride, and her thighs were burning. Another horse drew up behind them, saddled with Edward. Her brother rode a safe distance away as their begrudging chaperone, mumbling to himself.
“Did you hear what I said, Lady Cecilia?” Radcliff reared up beside her. He shook out his bright blond hair. “About the glory of your equestrian exercise?”
Edward burst out laughing behind them. Cecilia ignored him.
“I heard, Lord Radcliff, though I can assure you there is nothing glorious about my riding skills.” The mare bucked beneath her as if to prove a point. Cecilia wrangled with the reins, her boots slipping from the stirrups. “To that end, perhaps we might begin the journey home.”
“For our next outing, I shall arrange a less taxing activity for us. A gander through the pleasure gardens, perhaps?”
