The Youngest Dowager: A Regency romance(28)
‘His new lordship is not going to know, any more than my husband did.’
‘Yes, but, ma’am, his late lordship was away as often as not and this one isn’t. What’s he going to say if he finds out you are riding at night, by yourself and astride?’
‘Do not worry, John, I will take care.’
‘If you say so, ma’am. I’ll see to the saddle myself. And I’ll have a word with Shaw. He’s a good lad, he’ll keep his mouth shut and not go gossiping.’
Marissa let Peters toss her up into the saddle and held Tempest with a firm hand while she arranged the long skirts of her habit to her satisfaction and the groom adjusted the girth and stirrup leather.
The mare was skittish and determined to see what she could get away with. She took exception to the muck barrow which Sim was wheeling across the yard, behaved as though the stable cat was a dangerous tiger and tossed her head impatiently at being made to stand.
Deliberately Marissa forced her to walk out of the yard and across the spread of gravel before the house, concentrating hard on the horse, on ensuring that her seat on the side saddle was perfectly balanced after long months when she had not ridden.
‘She hasn’t seen me.’ Nicci stopped waving from the window. ‘Oh, see, Marcus, doesn’t Marissa look fine? I wish I had a habit like that.’
‘I wish you had a seat on a horse like that,’ Marcus retorted as he watched the slender figure in the fir-green habit. ‘I hope Peters knows what he is about, letting her out on that mare and without even a groom.’
‘Is that the one you said I must not ride because it was so wild? It seems very docile this morning.’
As she spoke a pheasant erupted with in panic-stricken flurry right in front of Tempest. Marcus grabbed at the edge of the window frame as the mare threw up her head and backed rapidly in a crab-like movement. Marissa sat tight and calmly brought the mare under control, urged her into a trot and disappeared from sight round the curve of the drive.
He relaxed his grip. ‘That is why, my dear Nicci, I said you were not to ride Tempest.’ Even though Marissa was out of sight he remained at the long window, his eyes fixed on the spot where he had last seen her. The sight of the slender figure in green controlling the animal with such ease and grace had stirred something deep within him. Instead of going down to the estate office to spend an hour reviewing leases, what he really wanted to do was send to the stables for his stallion and follow Marissa into the park.
‘What are you doing this morning, Nicci? I have to see Poole for a while, but I can take you driving later.’
She gave him a brilliant smile, ‘Oh, thank you, Marcus, but there is no need. It is such a lovely morning, I thought I would take a walk.’
She’s up to something, Marcus thought as he crossed the courtyard to the steward’s office, although what the devil it could be, he had no idea. The sooner they were in London and that little madam saw the importance of behaving herself, the better. Although for the life of him he could not think who he could get to chaperone her.
If he hadn’t seen what he had the night of the soirée he might be betrothed now and Marissa would be the one launching his sister into Society. The shock of seeing her standing there in front of the portrait, the tears running down her cheeks as she gazed up at her dead husband, kept coming back to haunt him. He had stood stock-still, his hand on the doorknob, the slight draught he caused in opening it still eddying around him.
Somehow he had checked his instinctive desire to gather her in his arms, kiss away her pain. But he had no right, he had known that as he had known that she would not welcome his intrusion into her grief. How could he have been such a fool as to think that the mere passage of time had healed the loss? And how could he ask a woman who was so obviously in love with her dead husband to marry him?
He had backed quietly away, cursing himself for a fool. He could not offer her anything to make up for the love she had lost and it seemed cold-blooded in the extreme to suggest to Marissa that a marriage between them might be mutually convenient.
He shook off the feeling of depression that settled on him every time he recalled those moments and opened the steward’s room door.
One of the footmen was setting out a tray with sherry as he entered. ‘Please send to the stables and tell Peters to bring round my horse for eleven, James.’ He would have his ride after all and combine it with a visit to look at that drainage ditch Poole had been worrying about.
Chapter Ten
An hour later, after a long gallop through the park, Marissa reined in on the rise which gave her a view across the back of the house and the formal gardens. The golden stone shone in the spring sunlight, the gardens lapped green at the foot of the terraces and the garden boys were out raking the gravel walks into a perfection that would be entirely lost on their new master.
How her lord would have disliked her riding without an escort. How he would have disapproved of her habit, just the wrong shade of green against the new foliage. And how wonderful it was not to have to care what anyone thought. Tempest snorted and shook her head, but Marissa kept her standing, enjoying the warmth of the sun on her back, uncaring that her hair was coming down and that her cheeks were flushed with the exhilaration of the ride.
As she surveyed the distant gardens she became aware of a black-clad figure, small in the landscape, making its way through the rose garden. As the man came within sight of the house the doors from the small salon opened and Nicci ran down the steps and joined him.