With a last sortie of mischief, Merrick leaned close to Lady Alixe, close enough to smell the lemon-
lavender scent of her toilette water, and said in a conspiratorial whisper, ‘Don’t worry, we can talk later this evening over the tea cart.’
‘I wasn’t worried.’ She managed to smile through clenched teeth.
‘Yes, you were.’
Lady Alixe turned to the man on her other side but not before her slipper-clad foot managed a parting kick to his ankle beneath the table. He would have laughed, but it hurt too much.
Dinner lost some of its lustre after that. The squire’s wife on his left was quite willing to engage in light flirtatious banter, but it was far less exciting than sparring with the stoic Lady Alixe. It had been a hard-won battle to wring the slightest smile from Lady Alixe, who’d been trying so desperately to ignore him. The squire’s wife smiled rather easily and laughed at everything, a conquest of moments.
After-dinner brandy dragged on with tedium. Merrick spent most of his time attempting to align the pretty but remote Lady Alixe from dinner with the openly curious girl at the pond. There’d been signs of that girl. Lady Alixe’s wit was finely honed and quite humorous in a dry sense when she gave it free rein. But she clearly hadn’t wanted to be recognised and not surprisingly so. If anyone got wind of their encounter the consequence could be dire for them both.
For the record, he’d have to be clear on that point with Ashe and Riordan. He didn’t truly worry they’d match the girl up with Lady Alixe. They’d been too far out in the pond to get a good look at her today and Lady Alixe wasn’t the type of girl either of them would look twice at. Most of that was Lady Alixe’s own doing, Merrick suspected. She had many excellent features. She simply chose not to maximise them and her sharp tongue would deter anyone from looking more closely at what was on offer. Ordinarily, he’d not have looked more closely either if it hadn’t been for the incident at the pond.
But now that he had, he wanted an even closer look at Lady Alixe Burke, who lived in something of a self-imposed social limbo. She had the potential to be pretty, had the propensity for clever conversation and had her father’s money. There was no reason she wasn’t up in London dazzling the ton’s bachelors or at the very least kicking them in the shins. Merrick smiled to himself. Hmmm. A mystery. If there was no reason, then by logical extension there was a very good reason she wasn’t in London. He was eager to get back to the drawing room.
In the drawing room, Merrick spotted Lady Alixe quickly. She was precisely where he thought she’d be, sitting on a sofa with an elderly neighbour, patiently listening to whatever the lady was saying. He filed the information away. Lady Alixe fancied herself a retiring sort, a bookish sort. What was it she’d said at dinner? She worked with local historians? Intriguing.
He approached the sofa and made the appropriate flattering remarks to the older lady, who probably only heard half of them. ‘Lady Alixe, might I steal you away for a moment or two?’
‘What could you possibly have left to say to me?’ she asked as Merrick manoeuvred them over to ostensibly take in a painting on the far wall.
‘I think we need to agree that our encounter is to remain a private event between the two of us,’ Merrick said in low tones.
‘I do not wish to have you blather about it to anyone any more than you would want me to publicly discover that the girl in question was you. We both know what society’s answer to such a scandal would be.’
‘I do not “blather”.’
‘Of course not, Lady Alixe. My apologies. I confused blathering with kicking me under the table.’
She ignored the reference. ‘And your friends, they do not blather either, I assume.’
‘No, they will not say anything,’ Merrick promised.
‘Then we have reached an accord and you need not seek my company out again.’
‘Why so unfriendly, Lady Alixe?’
‘I know men like you.’
He smiled at that. ‘What, precisely, is a “man like me”?’
‘Trouble, with a capital “T”.’
‘That might be because you’re beginning the sentence with it.’
‘Or it might be because you charm women into compromising themselves with you. You, sir, are a rake if ever I’ve seen one.’
‘Have you seen one? A rake? How would you know? Oh, I forgot, you’ve seen the David. Well, for your information, I know women like you, too. You think you don’t have much use for men, but that’s because you haven’t met the right one.’
That sobered her up. ‘You are too bold and you are no gentleman.’
Merrick laughed. ‘No, I’m not. You should have known better, Lady Alixe. Don’t young misses learn in the schoolroom that you can always tell a gentleman by his clothes?’
Her jaw tightened. ‘I must admit, my lord, on that point you have me at a distinct disadvantage.’ Lady Alixe turned on her heel and made a smart retreat to the newly arrived tea cart.
* * *
In a quiet corner of the room, Archibald Redfield watched the animated exchange between St Magnus and Alixe Burke. It was the second such interaction they’d had that evening. He couldn’t hear what was being said, but St Magnus was laughing and Alixe Burke was in a high-coloured huff as she set off for the tea cart. That was nothing new. Alixe Burke was a shrew in his opinion. He didn’t have much use for sharp-tongued women unless they were rich or knew how to use their tongues in other ways.
Fortunately Alixe Burke was quite rich and so he tolerated what he classified as her less-attractive qualities. Redfield tapped his fingers idly on the arm of the chair, considering. Things were not getting off to a brilliant start. He’d come to the house party with the specific intention of putting himself into Alixe Burke’s good graces. She’d shunned his advances earlier this spring and he was hoping to recoup his losses there. He’d arrived early that afternoon, only to discover she was out somewhere. She hadn’t put in an appearance until dinner and then she had been seated too far away from him for conversation. Now, that libertine from London was stealing a march on him.
It was not to be tolerated. He had chosen Alixe Burke as a most specific target. She was the reason he was in this sleepy part of Kent to begin with. He’d done his research in London, looking for ‘forgotten’ heiresses, or wealthy spinsters on the shelf. In other words, women who might be susceptible to a man’s charms, or families desperate to marry them off. That’s when he’d heard of Alixe Burke, from a viscount she’d rejected. She hadn’t been back in town since. So he’d come to her, pretending to be a gentleman. He’d even gone so far as to buy an old manse in the area to complete the charade. After having done so much, he would not lose his advantage to a golden-haired second son who deserved the title of ‘lord’ no more than he did himself.
St Magnus—where had he heard that name? Oh, yes, the son of the Marquis of Crewe. Always in the midst of a scandal—most lately it had been something with the Greenfield Twins. Redfield was thoughtful for a moment. Maybe he could use St Magnus and his wild tendencies, after all. He would wait and watch for his opportunity.
* * *
Alixe had taken the first opportunity to retire for the night, something she should have done hours ago. In the privacy of her room, Alixe pulled the pins from her hair and shook the dark mass free, breathing a sigh of relief.