Chapter One
Spring 1813, Nottingham, England
Taffeta looked out the window as their well sprung carriage rumbled languidly over the country road. It was a cool spring day, and the air held a fresh crisp scent. She looked at her brother and uncle across from her. Although she could see they hadn’t paid the least heed to the sweet breeze as it wafted through their open window, she breathed it in and prepared for battle.
“Don’t pout, Taffy! It ain’t like you, and it won’t change my mind,” snapped Lord Nigel in a tone obviously meant to be suitably firm and effective.
She wasn’t pouting, but she couldn’t pull herself out of her ‘dream’ to tell him. She was too deeply engrossed in the vision being enacted in her mind as though actors were on a stage right before her eyes.
She saw a huge, muscular, and beautifully naked man with dark eyes that burned through her as he looked right at her—at least the ‘her’ on the stage. His black hair fell in waves around his handsome face, and she watched herself as she glanced at him from top to bottom and allowed her gaze to linger on his ready manhood.
Lady Taffeta lived in the country and from time to time had witnessed a stallion breeding. This incredible man was much like a stallion. She felt herself blush and wondered who he could be, and why she wasn’t shocked in her dream vision.
She had to get out of this vision. It was wrong—all wrong. She sucked in air and broke out of the dream as she pushed her golden tresses away from her face and tried to concentrate on the present. She didn’t know where this vision had come
from—she was sure she had never seen such a man … yet. “What did you say? Pouting? I … I am not pouting,” she announced, doing a very good imitation of it. Taffeta had to direct her attention to the present.
Sighing, she focused on the conversation at hand. “Nigel, why you are suddenly taking on this attitude, is more than I can fathom. You may be my uncle, but you are only two years my senior and not fit to tell me what I should or should not be doing.”
Nigel turned to her brother beside him. She knew he was looking for help. Her brother, the young Duke of Grantham, had been more friend and confidant than nephew to Nigel since the first day they had gurgled together on the lawns of Grantham Castle, she’d frequently been told.
“What are you grinning about, Seth? I should think you would lend me your aid in this. After all, she is your sister!”
Taffy watched her brother as he eyed his uncle doubtfully.
“Don’t look to me for help with the brat. Papa was the only one able to control Taffy, and this muddle is all your doing, you know.”
Lady Taffeta eyed her brother ruefully and then her young uncle and guardian. She knew it had been difficult for him. Nigel had been born to his parents late in life. After his parent’s death, his care and upbringing had gone to his older brother, and he had grown up with Seth and her, so the job of guardianship was forever in conflict with the position he held as their confident and friend. There was scarcely a month in age between her brother and Nigel, but that month had been enough to award Nigel guardianship of both her brother and her upon the death of their beloved father. She didn’t know what she would have done without both of them.
However, it was getting close to the day when Seth would be of age and take the reins of his own and her legal interests. It is sad really, she thought idly, how little women are allowed.
“You know Seth, when we started this thing with the Luddites, well … I allowed myself to be drawn into it, even allowed you to drag Taffy—” Nigel said.
This brought her out of her reverie, and she raised one brow as she eyed them. “I wasn’t dragged.”
“Very well, I allowed Taffy to join in the thing because she—we—needed a diversion. We were all so glum when we lost your father … but dash it, man, I didn’t think it would go this far. It just isn’t the thing for Taffy to be involved in … all of this now. In fact, it is time for us to withdraw as well.”
“Taffy always gets into everything we do. Always has,” Seth answered with a wide grin in her direction. “And we are withdrawing.”
“Well, fond of her … we are both fond of her … spirited thing…” Nigel conceded, talking about her as though she weren’t there. “And yes, thank goodness, we are withdrawing.”
“You have never minded before, Nigel,” Taffy said with hurt in her voice.
“As to that, don’t mind now, quite the opposite really. You have been helpful, in fact, but that isn’t the point, is it?” Nigel answered irritably.
“That’s right. You’re a great ‘un, and I’m proud to own it!” answered Seth.
“Well, but you shouldn’t, Seth. You are a duke. One day you will owe it to the line to take a wife and beget an heir. Your sister needs to marry to suit her station and have a life. You should not be referring to her as a great gun!”
“Bit out there Nigel, Taffy has a life. Deuce take it, what maggot’s got into your head, with all this talk of marriage and heirs? None of us are ready for that.”
“That is just it … we should be getting ready for it. We all owe it to our names. Taffy may only be nineteen, but next month she will turn twenty, and she needs to attend the London cotillions and … not have these escapades hanging over her head. They may rear up and haunt us.”
“Oh pooh, as though I care for such things,” she said.
“Well, you should care for such things,” replied her uncle. “The job of guardian wears heavy on my mind lately.”
“I am happy here at Grantham with you and Seth, I don’t want to troll about for a man in London.”
Her brother barked a laugh, and Nigel shook his head. “Troll about, indeed. Taffy, don’t you want to be courted?”
“Have enough of that right here in Nottingham,” she said with a giggle. “Your friends have been doing a bang up job of courting me these last few months.”
“Really?” Her brother was moved to exclaim. “Never say so, Taff … who?”
“Trevor Harley for one. He has been making up to me for the last three months. And Sir Edward tried to kiss me in the rose garden yesterday, and Jeffry did kiss me the day before…”
“Edward tried to kiss you? Jeffry did kiss you? I’ll run them through,” declared the young duke quite properly and then immediately burst into laughter. “Pon my soul, Edward and Jeffries…” He went off into a rollicking course of mirth, and he slapped Nigel’s knee, who was also chuckling with amusement.
She waited patiently while it took them some moments to catch their breath again before returning to the issue at hand. “So, I am perfectly content to stay at Grantham and not bother with a London season.” She shook her head, “Don’t want to add my name to the lists of debutantes and stand in line waiting to be noticed…”
“You may be my sister, but I ain’t blind, girl… You wouldn’t be waiting in line, you would stand out… Have you looked at yourself lately?” answered her brother with another chuckle.
“Taffy, you are naught but a green girl,” pronounced her uncle Nigel.
“Take care, Nigel,” warned Taffy. She lowered her voice in annoyance and was satisfied to see they knew her well enough to know she was in a temper about to boil over.
“Oh, now Taff, take a damper,” said her brother. “What Nigel means is that you will want a house of your own one day. You know Papa always said two women could not comfortably rule one household, and if one of those women were you … whoa.” He smiled at her and took her chin. “In order to make a suitable marriage, you are going to have to out strut the best of them at Almack’s and choose the man of your dreams, not go wildly about with Nigel and me.”
“But, I am a part of it all…” said Taffeta on an obstinate note. “And I shan’t allow you to shut me out at this stage. I want to see it through.”
“We allowed you to join us to shake you out of your depression over Papa’s death. We had to do something about your blues, and you seemed to take a keen interest in the Luddite movement. But then that first harebrained fetch came up, and we all did so splendidly, we never gave a monkey for the consequences.” He shook his fair head of curls ruefully. “No, we didn’t think then of the future. But Taff, Nigel is right. We are taking you to London, and you will take your place amongst the haute ton.”
“Tonight has nothing to do with tomorrow. London is something we will do if it will please you and Nigel, but tonight we will go through with our rig, just as planned,” Taffy said with some determination as she folded her arms across her middle.
Their carriage had approached a long winding drive cutting through neatly clipped lush green lawns. Flower beds of daffodils were in riotous bloom. Tulips of rich shades gently flowed in the breeze, and with a sigh of resignation, Lord Nigel pointed out the fact they were fast approaching Lady Watson’s front drive.
“So then, it is settled?” Taffeta pursued quickly. “We go as planned?” She watched as her uncle and brother exchanged defeated glances. She knew they were honor bound to proceed as they had promised. They had given their word, and she was sure they would never renege. She was also sure they relied on her very unique and secret abilities which had been of service to them in the past. Taffy’s ‘gift of sight’ had saved them already more than once.
They nodded at her, and her brother said, “Aye then … this last time, vixen.”
She smiled, pleased enough, and hoped these strange dream visions of the handsome stranger would stop and allow her to concentrate on the job at hand.
~*~