Princes Trilogy: The Leopard Prince Part 16

He replaced the teapot on the shelf. "Your brother."

HER BROTHER HAD TO BE the one person in all the world a woman didn't want to meet directly after a night of ecstasy. George fiddled with the ribbon at her neck.

Tiggle batted her hand away and set a last pin in her hair. "There you are, my lady. As ready as you'll ever be." At least the maid was no longer sending her mournful looks.Instead, she was now commiserating. Did everyone know what had happened last night? She really should've been more discreet than to spend the night. George sighed and contemplated feigning a headache. But Tony was nothing if not stubborn. He might not drag her from her room to interview her, but he'd be right outside the minute she tried to emerge. Best to get it over with.

She threw back her shoulders and marched downstairs like a Christian going to meet a particularly irate lion. Greaves sent her a sympathetic look as he held the breakfast room door for her.

Inside, Tony was standing by the mantelpiece, staring down his bony nose into the fire. He evidently hadn't touched the food on the sideboard. Tony was the spitting image of their late father, tall and angular with a face dominated by prominent cheekbones and heavy eyebrows. The only difference was the auburn hair he'd inherited from their mother. That, and the fact that he was a much nicer man than Father had been.

Usually, anyway.

George noticed that Violet was conspicuously absent. She had a very good idea why, too. She'd corner the minx later.

"Good morning, Tony." George strolled to the sideboard. b.u.t.tered kippers. Even Cook knew. She helped herself to a large serving. She was going to need her strength.

"George," Tony greeted her coolly. He advanced swiftly to the door and flung it open. Two footmen looked at him, startled. "We won't be needing you. Make sure we're not disturbed."

The footmen bowed. "Yes, my lord."

Tony closed the door and yanked down on his waistcoat to straighten it. George rolled her eyes. When had her brother become this stuffy? He must have been practicing in his room at nights.

"Are you having breakfast?" she asked as she sat down. "Cook has made some lovely kippers."

Tony ignored her pleasantry. "What could you have been thinking?" His tone was unbelievably dour.

"Well, really, if you want to know the truth, I wasn't thinking at all." She took a sip of tea. "I mean, not after the first kiss. He does kiss very well."

"George!"

"If you didn't want to know, why ask?"

"You know very well what I mean. Don't play the flibbertigibbet with me."

George sighed and put down her fork. The kippers tasted like ashes in her mouth, anyway. "It's no concern of yours."

"Of course it's my concern. You're my sister and you're unmarried."

"Do I poke into your affairs? Do I ask about what ladies you see in London?"

Tony crossed his arms and stared down his large nose at her. "It's not the same and you know it."

"Yes"-George poked a kipper-"but it should be."

He sighed and took a chair opposite her. "Maybe so. But that isn't how the world works. We don't deal with how society ought to be but rather how it is. And society will judge you rather harshly, my dear."

She felt her lips tremble.

"Come back to London with me," Tony said. "We can forget about this. There are some fellows I can introduce you to-"

"It's not like choosing a horse. I don't want to exchange a bay for a chestnut."

"Why not? Why not find a man from your own cla.s.s? One who could marry you and give you children."

"Because," George said slowly, "I don't want just any man. I want this one."

Tony slammed the flat of his hand down on the table, making her jump. He leaned over her. "And the rest of the family can just go to h.e.l.l? You're not like this. Think about the example you're setting for Violet. Would you want her doing what you're doing?"

"No. But I can't live my life as an example for my sister."

Tony pursed his lips.

"You don't," George accused. "Can you honestly say that with every action you take, you stop to think, 'Is this a good example for my brothers?'"

"For G.o.d's sake-"

The door swung open.

They both looked up in surprise. Tony frowned. "I thought I said to admit no-"

"My lord. My lady." Harry closed the door on the two hara.s.sed footmen outside and advanced into the room.

Tony straightened away from the table. He was easily half a head taller than Harry, but the shorter man did not break stride.

"Are you well, my lady?" Harry spoke to George, but his eyes never left Tony.

"Yes, thank you, Harry." She'd a.s.sured him back at the cottage that Tony would never hurt her, but he must have decided to see for himself. "Would you like a kipper?"

A corner of Harry's mouth twitched upward, but Tony forestalled his answer. "We have no need of you. You may go."

"Tony," George gasped.

"My lord." Harry inclined his head. His expression was once again carefully blank.

George's heart felt like it was breaking into tiny pieces. This isn't right. She started to rise, but Harry had already turned back to the door.

Her lover left the room, dismissed like a common servant by her brother.

NOTHING LEVELED A MAN QUITE like being unable to protect his woman. Harry jerked on his tricorn and cloak and strode to the stables, the heels of his boots kicking up gravel. But Lady Georgina wasn't really his, was she? She wasn't bound to him by law or society. She was a woman who'd allowed him to make love to her. Once.

And maybe only that once.It had been her first time, and inevitably, he'd hurt her. He'd given her pleasure before, but was it enough to make up for the pain afterward? Did she understand that only the first time was painful? Maybe she wouldn't let him prove that he could give her pleasure with his flesh inside hers.

Harry swore. The stable hand holding his mare's head eyed him warily. He scowled at the boy and took the reins. The fact that he wanted Lady Georgina didn't help his mood. Now. Under him or above him, it didn't matter; he just wanted to sink his flesh into hers and feel the world fall away again.

"Mr. Pye!"

Harry looked over his shoulder. The Earl of Maitland was hailing him from Woldsly's steps. Jesus Christ, now what?

"Mr. Pye, if you'll wait while my horse is brought around, I'd like to accompany you."

He didn't have much of a choice, now, did he? "Very well, my lord."

He watched the earl stroll up while stable hands ran to do his bidding. Even if the other man hadn't introduced himself at the cottage this morning, Harry would have known him. His eyes were his sister's-clear, piercing blue.

A saddled horse was brought, and both men mounted. They rode out from the stable yard without saying a word. At least the earl was discreet.

Dark clouds glowered overhead, threatening yet more rain where none was wanted.

They were nearly to the gates when the earl spoke. "If it's money you're after, I can give you a pretty purse to speed you on your way."

Harry looked at the earl-Tony, Lady Georgina had called him. His face was stony, but his lips curled ever so slightly at the corners, giving away his distaste. Harry almost felt sorry for him. "I'm not after money, my lord."

"Don't take me for a fool." Tony's nostrils flared. "I've seen the hut you're living in, and your attire doesn't bespeak even modest wealth. You're after my sister's money."

"You see no other reason for me to seek the company of Lady Georgina?"

"I-"

"I wonder if you realize how close you are to insulting my lady," Harry said.

A flush spread over the other man's cheekbones. Harry remembered that the earl was Lady Georgina's younger brother. He couldn't be more than, what, five or six and twenty? His air of authority made him seem older.

"If you do not take my money and leave her alone, I'll see that you're dismissed without reference," Tony said.

"I'm employed by your sister, not you, my lord."

"Have you no pride, man?" Tony pulled his horse up short. "What kind of a cur preys on a lonely woman?"

Harry halted his horse as well. "Do you really think your sister wouldn't see straight through a man trying to take advantage of her?"

Tony frowned. "You've put her in danger. Violet says our sister was attacked while in your company."

Harry sighed. "Did Lady Violet also tell you that Lady Georgina fired a pistol at the attackers?" The other man's eyes widened. "Or that if I'd had my way, she wouldn't have been in the gig with me in the first place?"

Tony winced. "Rode roughshod over you, did she? She does have a persistent streak."

Harry raised one eyebrow.

Tony coughed and started his horse. "Be that as it may, a gentleman doesn't continue to press his attentions on a lady who can't return them."

"Then, as I see it, you have two problems, my lord," Harry said.

Tony's eyes narrowed.

"One, that the lady does, in fact, return my attentions, and two"-Harry turned to meet the earl's gaze-"I am no gentleman."

Chapter Eleven.

"Violet, open this door!" George held her breath and applied her ear to the wood. Nothing. "I know you're in there. I can hear you breathing."

"You can't." Her sister's voice came petulantly from inside.Ha! "Violet Elizabeth Sarah Maitland. Open this door at once or I shall have Greaves take the hinges off."

"No, you won't. The hinges are inside." Violet sounded triumphant.

So they were, the little minx. George inhaled and gritted her teeth. "Then I shall have him bash the door in."

"You wouldn't." Violet's voice was closer.

"I don't believe you should count on that." She crossed her arms and tapped one foot.

There came a sc.r.a.ping from the other side; then the door cracked open. One tear-stained eye peeped out.

"Oh, my dear." George pushed the door the rest of the way open and walked in, closing it behind her. "Time to cut line. Whatever possessed you to write to Tony?"

Violet's lower lip began to tremble. "That man has you in his clutches. He's beguiled you with his caresses and his carnal wiles."

Caresses and carnal wiles? George knit her brows. "What do you know about carnal wiles?"

Violet's eyes widened. "Nothing," she said much too fast. "Well, only what everybody hears."

George stared as her younger sister blushed. It always was a problem, trying to lie with fair skin. "Violet," she said slowly, "is there something you want to tell me?"

Violet let out a squeaking wail and flung herself into George's arms. Oh, dear.

"There, there, sweet." She stumbled back-Violet was an inch or two taller-and sat in the cushioned window seat. "It can't be as bad as all that."

Violet tried to speak, choked, and cried some more. George rocked her, murmuring the inanities one whispers to a distressed child, and brushed the hair back from her sister's damp brow.

Violet inhaled, shuddering. "Y-you don't understand. I've done something really awful." She scrubbed her eyes with a hand. "I . . . I've sinned, George!"

George couldn't help the twitch of her lips-Violet was always so dramatic-but she firmed her mouth at once. "Tell me."

"I . . . I've lain with a man." The words were indistinct because Violet had buried her head, but George couldn't mistake them.

She immediately sobered, dread clutching at her throat. "What?" She pried Violet away from her breast. "Look at me. What do you mean?" Perhaps her sister had mistaken the matter somehow; confused an embrace for something more.

Violet raised a ravaged face. "I gave my virginity away to a man. There was blood."

"Oh, my Lord." No, not Violet, not her baby sister. George felt tears p.r.i.c.k at her own eyes, but she willed them away and framed her sister's face with her hands. "Did he force you? Did he hurt you?"

"N-no." Violet choked on a sob. "It's almost worse. I did it of my own free will. I'm a wanton. A . . . a harlot." She broke down again and hid her face in George's skirts.

George stroked her sister's back and waited and thought. She had to handle this well the first time. When Violet had calmed again, George said, "I don't think we can go as far as saying that you're a harlot. I mean, you didn't take any money, did you?"