Talk of the Ton (Free Fellows League 5)

“As soon as you’re ready,” he said. “And my name is Jonathan.” He looked at her over the back of the horse. “When two people have given and received kisses and overcome a great many of their demons on a red silk pallet in a stable with only a horse for a witness, I believe it’s permissible to address one another by their given names, don’t you?”

“A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Jonathan,” India said shyly. “And to receive your kisses. My name is India.”

“Beautiful, vibrant, exotic India. It suits you.”

“Jonathan. God’s gift. To those in need.” She smiled at him. “Very heroic.”

“Just remember,” he warned in his rumbling baritone voice, “only my mother calls me Johnny.”

“You’ve a mother?”

“Most people do.”

India reddened. “I meant alive.”

“Very much alive,” he said. “And apart from her ambitions for me and her adoration of the ton and her penchant for committing Debrett’s to memory—and for forcing me to do the same—she’s a very good mother. And would make a very nice . . .” He’d almost said, mother-in-law, but Jonathan caught himself in time and amended it to, “ally.”

“I hope I shall have the opportunity to meet her,” India murmured.

“If you’ll hurry and get dressed while I saddle our noble steed, we can be in London in time for me to make my breakfast meeting and for you to be delivered safely to Lord Davies’s house. Then, if you’re a good girl, you may get the opportunity to join me and my mother for our weekly nuncheon.”

“We’re that close to London?”

Jonathan nodded. “The only reason I didn’t continue on my journey last night was because I feared the horse might be permanently lame if I didn’t stop for the night. But as you can see, he’s none the worse for wear for having thrown his shoe.”

“It was fate,” she said. “You were fated to rescue me.”

“That I was,” he finally agreed. “And part of that rescue includes delivering you to London . . .”

India took the hint, hurrying out of the stable, down the gravel path, and into the cottage.

Mustafa hurled invectives at her as she entered the back door. He still lay exactly as they’d left him, just as Jonathan had promised. The only difference was that he was awake and furious. Squelching the almost overwhelming desire to kick him, India ignored the angry eunuch, raising her chin a notch higher as she made her way through the kitchen to her bedchamber.

She exited the cottage some ten minutes later carrying the black burnoose over her arm.

Jonathan, properly attired in shirt, waistcoat, cravat, and coat, was leading the gelding from the stable when he glanced at the back door of the cottage. He gasped when he saw India standing there in the early morning light, dressed in sapphire-blue brocade from the ridiculous little hat, worn at an angle and decorated with a king’s ransom in precious jewels, to the tips of her blue kid shoes, also decorated with precious gems. There were pear-shaped sapphires in her ears, and he’d bet his title they matched the one affixed to her navel. She sparkled like the constellations in the morning sky. All of her outer garments were embroidered with gold and jewels. Even her buttons were made of precious gems. But the most spectacular piece of the ensemble was an old-fashioned girdle worn over the garment she called a caftan, for it rode low on her hips and was constructed entirely of gold, diamonds, and sapphires.

Jonathan despised the sultan and everything he represented, but he had to admit that the man knew how to dress his women. His body tightened in response. She looked like a queen standing on the gravel path, and Jonathan was struck by how proud of her he was and how much he wanted to have the right to stand by her side.

“I’m sorry,” India said, grimacing as she glanced down at her costume, “but this is the only thing suitable for travel. The sultan made me a gift of it when he released me.”

No doubt to impress her grandfather and the prince regent, Jonathan thought. And although he couldn’t say whether it would impress India’s grandfather, the prince regent, who loved beautiful things and was perpetually short of blunt, would be dazzled—as much by the vast wealth she wore as India herself.

She was wise to refuse to wear that into London, for thieves and beggars would set upon her before she reached the city gates.

“The sultan is a fool,” Jonathan pronounced. “No man seeing you like this would ever let you go.”

Will you? India wanted to ask, suddenly realizing that she felt safe for the first time in years and that Jonathan Manners, eleventh Earl of Barclay, was the reason. “He never saw me wear it. He sent it to the harem the morning I left. Besides . . .” She shrugged her shoulders. “All the ladies in the harem dress this way.”

Jonathan laughed. “So much for making a quiet entrance into the village. The good folks of Pymley will turn out like children following the Pied Piper to see this.”

“I brought my burnoose.” She lifted her arm to indicate the black robe. “But it goes over my head, and I need help putting it on.”

He crooked his finger at her.

India moved closer and handed him the robe.

Jonathan dropped it over her head.