It was difficult, but she managed to plaster a welcoming smile on her face. Damn the newspapers. She held out her ungloved hand and Lord Eastham promptly drooled on it. “How lovely to see you, my lord.”
“But why didn’t you send me a note telling me you were in town? I thought we had a special relationship?” he chided her. It was only then that he noticed Jasper standing off to one side, conflicting emotions washing over his handsome face.
“You know Mr. Tarkington, do you not, my lord Eastham?” she said with resignation. It appeared to be a question of feast or famine when it came to marriage, and at that point she was much preferring famine. She couldn’t marry either of these men, no matter how wise it seemed.
She took a deep breath. “Gentlemen, I hate to be ungracious but I was just on my way out…”
“Nonsense, my dear,” Eastham said. “What could be more important than your future?”
It was her future she was thinking of. She swallowed her instinctive retort.
Eastham reacted more quickly, turning his back on the interloper. “My dear, allow me to take you out to dinner this evening, and we can talk about the future.”
“She can hardly go out alone and unchaperoned!” Tarkington snapped.
Eastham turned on him, a venal little toad up against youth and propriety. “We all know just how alone and unchaperoned she was right before you left for South America, young man. You were the one who ruined her for marriage, not I!”
“Ruined me for marriage?” Maddy said blankly.
Eastham turned back to her, an uneasy expression in his faded eyes. “My dear, you can’t have expected me to offer marriage? I have my family name to protect. You’re soiled goods, but lovely and charming for all that, and I was planning to settle a house in Mayfair on you, as well as a generous allowance…”
“You bloody son of a bitch!” a voice roared, and Maddy wondered if now was a good time to faint. All she’d needed to make this comedy of errors complete was the arrival of the pirate captain.
She was aware of a number of things, all observed as if from a great distance. First, that Lord Eastham sailed through the air quite gracefully for a squat, toad-like figure, landing in the rose bush with a comically high-pitched
scream. Dismissing him, she turned back to see Luca confronting Jasper, another shock. She’d always thought Jasper was so tall, so handsome. He looked pale and weedy next to Luca, with a weak chin, a pale mustache, narrow shoulders, and an expression of almost pathetic fear.
“Who the hell are you?” he demanded, his voice quavering just the slightest bit.
“Her husband.”
Maddy jerked her head toward him in shock. Husband? What the bloody hell was he talking about? He hadn’t even asked her, much less actually gone ahead and married her.
Tarkington was looking at him in disdain. “Don’t be absurd. She’d never marry a filthy gypsy.”
She was at last beginning to enjoy herself, despite what lies Luca was spinning. In the background she could hear Collins extricate Eastham from the rose bush, with the old man muttering threats and imprecations towards all and sundry as Collins steered him away from the garden.
“Actually he’s a very clean gypsy,” she pointed out, feeling devilish. “And he’s also a pirate.”
Luca didn’t turn to look at her—all his attention was concentrated on the trembling Tarkington. “So you’re the man who decided to seduce her and then run off. Quite the gentleman, aren’t you?”
“It’s none of your…”
“I told you, she’s my wife.”
“Excuse me,” she broke in, more interested in Luca’s claim than Tarkington’s reaction, “but I don’t remember getting married.”
“I’ll refresh your memory,” he snarled, his eyes still boring into Tarkington’s. Maddy had experienced the full force of that black gaze, and she was surprised Tarkington’s knees weren’t knocking together. “Now I can’t decide,” he continued to Jasper, “whether I should kill you or simply beat you to a pulp.”
“You can h-h-have her,” Jasper stammered. “Not w-w-worth the trouble.”
In the next moment he was on the ground, having been the recipient of Luca’s fist. Maddy walked over to Tarkington’s motionless form. She gave him a sharp little kick. “You’re very good at rendering people unconscious, aren’t you?”
Finally he turned to look at her, the fury slowly fading, and for the first time since she’d known him the devilish pirate captain looked almost uncertain. “You have truly terrible taste in men,” he said flatly.
“I know,” she agreed, giving him a speaking look. “When did we get married? I don’t happen to recall it.”
“When I stole you away and took you to bed, and then later we were joined by blood. Among gypsies that constitutes a wedding twice over, and you’re now a runaway bride.” He was watching her closely. “And there’s no such thing as a gypsy divorce.”