A Most Unconventional Courtship

‘Only Corfiot dress, ma’am.’

‘I wish you to call me Aunt Honoria. The elder Miss Trevick is much of your size; perhaps she will lend you something until we can find a dressmaker. I will ask Lady Trevick while I am speaking to her about your room.’

‘Thank you, Aunt Honoria. Should I come back tomorrow morning?’ Her aunt was right to expect her to stay, and surely the children would understand if she was only away a few days.

‘Certainly not! Why are you running off? Now you are here, you must stay.’

‘No, ma’am. I am sorry, but I borrowed the mule, and I cannot just walk off without letting everyone know where I am. I will return tomorrow.’ The older woman stared at her, obviously taken aback by this show of independence and Alessa felt a qualm about just what she was letting herself in for. ‘Good afternoon, Aunt, and thank you.’ She bent forward and kissed the smooth cheek, startling herself almost as much as Lady Blackstone by the gesture, then turned and was out of the door before any further objections could be made.

In the hall she hesitated. What to do now? She had no idea how one went on in a big house with servants. Should she wait for someone to appear and ask for her mule to be brought round? Or leave by the front door and walk round to the back? Or perhaps she could slip out through the servants’ entrance, the way they had come in.

‘Alessa!’ It was Chance, beckoning her out on to the terrace. ‘It is all right: they have gone to look at the sailboat the Count has sent for. Lady Trevick cannot decide whether to approve it for a pleasure trip.’

‘Thank goodness, I was afraid they would all be out here talking about me.’ Her knees felt weak now and she sank gratefully on to a cushioned bench under the shade of an arbour.

‘I imagine they are talking of little else.’ Chance hitched one hip on to the balustrade and grinned at her. ‘How do you feel?’

‘Confused, overwhelmed, undecided.’ Alessa glanced along the broad sweep of the terrace, but all the doors were closed. ‘My aunt is not very pleased to see me. Relieved, perhaps, that she has found me, and that I am accounted for. But you know, if she had discovered that I had died as a child, or drowned in the boat with Papa, I believe she would have been—not pleased, but guiltily relieved about that too.’

‘I am sure that cannot be the case, and she is simply naturally reserved.’ Chance frowned. Suddenly he seemed distant and starchy, disapproving of her coolness about her aunt. But why should she be a hypocrite and pretend she did not notice Lady Blackstone’s lack of enthusiasm? Or did he expect her to be such a conventional little miss, so lacking in self-sufficiency that she would simply throw herself uncritically on her relatives’ protection? She had expected him to understand and offer some support after that difficult interview. ‘It is just that you are strangers and you do not know her yet,’ he added. Alessa was aware of a glow of anger overcoming her momentary weakness.

‘There is money, as you thought.’ She pushed her papers more securely into her leather pouch and secured the toggle. ‘My aunt suggested she would make arrangements for it to be paid to me here, so I could stay on the island—presumably so I would not be an embarrassment to the family in England. Then when everyone appeared she seemed to change her mind. She wants me to stay here at the villa for a few days at least.’ She hesitated, her gaze fixed on her clasped hands as she thought. ‘It is very awkward.’

‘I am sorry!’ Chance made a move to hold out his hand, then jerked it back. ‘I should never have kissed you like that. I had no wish to make things more complicated for you.’

‘Oh, that,’ she said flatly. Did men think that the entire world revolved around them? Probably, she thought irritably. ‘No, that was not what I meant. I mean it is awkward about the children.’ And it had been what she was thinking about, if only to prevent her mind dwelling on that hectic, crowded, insane minute in the dusty storeroom. Which made her a hypocrite for being angry with him for leaping to the conclusion that she had been thinking about it…Oh, damn and blast!

‘I see.’ Now she had wounded his pride. In some ways it was much easier to deal with Chance when she was cross with him and the desire to be in his arms was buried. Over-amorous, arrogant male aristocrat. Oh, but I love you. ‘I suppose you do not have any concerns about sleeping and living in the same house as me, after what happened?’

‘None at all.’ She got to her feet, smoothing down her skirt with a decisive sweep of her hand and managing to look at him without focusing on the tiny details that were beginning to obsess her: the arch of his brow when he was thinking, the tiny scar on his left temple, the whorl of his ear. ‘I will, after all, be very adequately chaperoned here.’

She realised that she had done nothing to deal with the events in the bay yesterday—and look where that had led her. She should have said something at the time, made it quite clear that she was chaste and fully intended staying so.

Yesterday. Yesterday they had probably done what any two people with a moderate degree of attraction to each other would have done if they found themselves without clothes, shaken by the shock and uninhibited by fear of discovery. And he had not, after all, pressed her once he had realised she was a virgin.

‘So you will be safe from me, you mean?’ His voice was suddenly harsh and Alessa glanced up to meet angry brown eyes. Her own smouldering temper and embarrassment flared up.

‘Yes. I believe it should be quite clear now that I am not going to accept being any man’s mistress. I would not have considered it before, and now, after all, I have the protection of my family, the Commission, my own money.’

‘Who said anything about mistresses?’ Chance demanded. They were both on thei

r feet now, facing each other, only some residual awareness that they could be overheard keeping their voices down to an angry hiss.

‘That was what you thought, was it not? Why you wanted to make love to me in the bay yesterday? You thought that I was a widow and that I might be willing.’

‘Damn it, you were willing, virgin or not. And the thought of making you my mistress never entered my head!’

‘Really? So if you came across Maria Trevick or Frances Blackstone swimming in the bay, you would make love to them?’

‘No, I would not!’ He was furious now, and so was she, even if she was dimly aware that it was herself she was most angry with. ‘But then I do not—’ Chance broke off, glaring at her, the colour high on his cheekbones, his eyes hard.

‘Do not what?’

‘Desire them, damn it.’ Was that really what he had been about to say? ‘Alessa, why are you so angry now? It was all right between us afterwards yesterday. It was all right an hour ago when you were kissing me. What has changed? The acquisition of some rich relatives and an inheritance? Do you expect a proposal of marriage now when you did not before? Well, you can join the house party here and learn the art of flirtation, and who knows what might happen. The Count is looking for an English wife, I believe.’

‘Why, you arrogant—’

‘Your mule, Miss Meredith.’ It was Wilkins the butler, face impassive. What had he heard? Alessa got to her feet, looking at Chance, but he appeared merely a trifle bored, lounging against the balustrade.