An Unwilling Conquest (Regencies 7)

He strolled slowly on, letting the peace sink into him, keeping his mind purposely blank.

Until a cricket ball hit him on the side of the knee.

Harry stifled a curse. He stooped and picked up the ball, then hefted it in one palm as he looked about for its owner.

Or owners, as it happened to be.

There were three of them, one slightly older but even he was barely seven. They sidled around a tree and approached with great caution.

“I—I’m most fearfully sorry, sir,” the eldest piped up. “Did it hurt terribly?”

Harry sternly quelled an impulse to laugh. “Horrendously,” he replied, lending the word maximum weight. All three faces fell. “But I dare say I’ll survive.” They recovered—and eyed him hopefully, large eyes fringed with long lashes, faces as innocent as the dawn.

As his fingertips found the ball’s seam, Harry gave up the struggle and let his lips lift. He squatted, coming down to their height, and held out the ball, spinning it so that it whizzed like a top between his fingers.

“Oh—I say!”

“How d’you do that?”

They gathered about him, polite reticence forgotten. Harry showed them the trick, a facility learned over the long summers of his childhood. They oohed and aahed and practised themselves, eagerly seeking advice.

“James! Adam? Where on earth have you got to? Mark?”

The three looked guiltily about.

“We have to go,” the ringleader said. Then smiled—a smile only a young boy could master. “But thanks so much, sir.”

Harry grinned. He stood and watched them hurry around the tree and over the lawns to where a rotund nurse waited impatiently.

He was still grinning when Mrs Webb’s words floated through his head. “One just has to decide what one wants most of life.”

What he most wanted—he hadn’t thought of it for years. He had once, more than ten years ago. He had been very sure, then, and had pursued his goal with what had been, at that time, his usual confident abandon. Only to find himself—and his dreams—betrayed.

So he had put them away, locked them in the deepest recess of his mind, and never let them out again.

Harry’s lips twisted cynically. He turned away and resumed his stroll.

But he couldn’t turn his mind from its path.

He knew very well what he most wanted of life—it was the same now as it had been then; despite the years, he hadn’t changed inside.

Harry stopped and forced himself to draw in a deep breath. Behind him, he could hear the piping voices of his late companions as together with their nurse they quit the park. About him, youngsters cavorted and played under watchful eyes. Here and there, a gentleman strolled with his wife on his arm, their children ranging about them.

Harry let out the breath trapped in his chest.

Other lives were full—his remained empty.

Perhaps, after all, it was time to re-examine the possibilities. Last time had been a disaster—but was he really such a coward he couldn’t face the pain again?

HE ATTENDED THE THEATRE that night. For himself, he cared little for the dramatics enacted on the stage—and even less for the histrionics played out in the corridors, the little dramas of tonnish life. Unfortunately, the lovely Mrs Babbacombe had voiced her wish to experience Edmund Kean; Amberly had been only too happy to oblige.

Concealed in the shadows by the wall of the pit, opposite the box Amberly had hired, Harry watched the little party settle into their seats. The bell had just rung; the whole theatre was abustle as society’s blessed took their seats in the tiers of boxes, the girls and ladies ogled by the bucks in the pit, whil

e the less favoured looked on from the galleries above.

Hugging the deep shadows cast by the boxes above him, Harry saw Amberly sit Lucinda with a flourish. She was dressed in blue as usual, tonight’s gown of a delicate lavender hue, the neckline picked out with silver thread. Her dark hair was dressed high over her pale face. Settling her skirts, she looked up at Amberly and smiled.

Harry watched, a chill slowly seeping into his soul.