A nervous giggle threatened to escape her, and she pressed her napkin to her lips and lowered her eyes.
It was a relief when George stood up and declared he was ready to go to Magna Midcombe. “Are we riding? I fancy a good gallop,” he said, rubbing his hands together in anticipation.
Valentine finished his coffee and also rose to his feet. This time when he met Marissa’s eyes his expression was coolly polite. “Do you still wish to accompany us, Miss Rotherhild? It may be dangerous if Von Hautt makes an appearance.”
“Of course I am coming with you,” she said, surprised he would even ask.
The brothers shared a look she didn’t understand, but before she could quiz them on it, George came to possess himself of her arm.
“Who would have thought we’d ever go on a botanical expedition together?” he said with mock horror. “Don’t tell any of my friends, Marissa. I’ll never live it down.”
Marissa smiled but she wasn’t as amused as she expected to be. His casual dismissal of what was actually becoming quite an adventure irritated her. “Perhaps you need to change your friends,” she said.
George laughed as if she’d made a joke—perhaps he thought she had—and she let it go. Now was not the time to start an argument with the man she intended to marry.
Valentine decided on the smaller carriage for himself and Marissa, while George rode on horseback. George pretended to complain, demanding to know why his brother had suddenly become one of those boring old country gentlemen who preferred to rattle along in comfort rather than reaching their destination as quickly as possible.
“There’s no hurry, is there?” Valentine retorted. “Magna Midcombe isn’t going anywhere, George.”
George had never been a particularly deep thinker. Life didn’t, in his opinion, require lots of contemplation to be enjoyable. Quite the opposite in fact. But even he could see there was something going on with his brother.
Valentine had insisted on taking the carriage and more or less insisted that Marissa ride with him, at his side. He’d expected her to argue, to demand she ride with George, but she’d seemed deep in her own thoughts and hadn’t said a word of complaint. There was definitely some tension between them; it had been obvious at the breakfast table.
George considered what he should do about it.
He glanced back at the carriage. Marissa was holding her parasol up to the sun, swaying with the movement of the carriage, and trying not to let her eyes close. George found himself wondering, tongue in cheek, if her weariness was due to a wild night of passion with Valentine. But he knew his brother too well. Valentine was so wary when it came to repeating his mistake with Vanessa that he would resist even a woman as beautiful as Marissa.
Vanessa had been a poisonous bitch who made his brother’s life a complete misery. Who could blame him for avoiding even the possibility of making the same mistake again?
“Is that as fast as that dashed thing can go?” he called out. “We’ll never get to Magna Midcombe.”
Marissa smiled back, more like herself. “Do you have an urgent appointment somewhere, George?”
Was there a sting in her question? George wondered. Was she still upset about him neglecting her? But Marissa wasn’t the sort to hold a grudge. “Not at all,” he said. “I intend to spend the entire afternoon being the perfect host.”
At the time he meant it sincerely, but he didn’t know then that there was a boxing match on in Magna Midcombe he just had to see….
Chapter 13
Magna Midcombe had once been the site of an abbey. The Fortescues were very pious and therefore benefactors of the abbey, so when Henry VIII, mad with love for Anne Boleyn, decided to turn his back on the Pope and close the religious houses, they argued against it, and for their troubles they lost everything. According to a Miss Johnson, a local spinster who collected local history, all that now remained of the Fortescue estate was a meadow attached to an old mill.
“The family are long gone, of course,” she said. “But I can direct you to the mill.”
The former Fortescue estate was a little way beyond the village. The mill was neglected and forlorn, the wheel seized up in its pond, while the surrounding meadow was full of flowers, their colorful faces peeping over the long grass.
George, observing the pretty scene from his mount, said, “You should have brought a picnic basket, Valentine. Mrs. Beaumaris always packs the best picnics.”
“Hungry again, George,” his brother mocked. “I’m afraid I had more important things on my mind.”
“What could be more important than a picnic on a summer’s day?” George retorted. “Well, it just so happens I had the forethought to ask Mrs. Beaumaris for a picnic basket. It’s tucked into the back of the carriage.”
Valentine gave him a suspicious look. “Indeed?”
“Someone has to remember to play the host,” George said smugly. “Women appreciate a man with a thoughtful nature.”
While George was collecting the basket, Valentine handed Marissa down from the carriage, and they stood surveying the scene.
“What will we do now?” Marissa used her parasol to shade her face from the sun, but already she could feel perspiration trickling down her back. The air was still and hot, not a breath of wind stirring.