Clarissa pursed her lips as the men pulled their horses to a stop, each swung down and handed over the reins to waiting grooms. Sheexamined the earl, especially. He was well-favored, of course. Tall, of lanky build and with dark hair that looked a little mussed from the road since he didn’t wear a hat. His skin was slightly tanned, probably from the travel and when he looked up the stairs with a bored expression, she could not help but notice the finest dark green eyes she’d ever encountered. Ones that slid over her parents and then settled on her for a long moment before he had the audacity to wink at her as he followed her cousin up the stairs.
She huffed out a breath. Rich and powerful or not, this man already had two strikes against him for absolute rudeness. First to arrive without invitation and second to dare to engage himself with a lady he didn’t even know.
“My dearest Uncle Marcus and Aunt Violet, I’m pleased to see you both,” George said as he shook her father’s hand and bussed her mother’s cheek. “I hope you do not mind that I have come with a friend.”
Clarissa saw Lord Kirkwood glance at George swiftly as her mother stepped forward. “Oh no, not at all! We’re so pleased you have increased our party by one so lauded as the Earl of Kirkwood.”
Kirkwood bent his head over her mother’s hand as he lifted it to his lips. It was a showy act of chivalry, but it didn’t ring entirely true. “I see my reputation proceeds me,” he drawled. “Thank you for your hospitality, Mr. and Mrs. Lockhart. Your grounds are spectacular—I was admiring them as soon as we entered the estate.”
“Couldn’t stop waxing poetic about them,” George agreed. Then he turned to Clarissa. “And there is the lady of the hour. Clarissa!”
Clarissa didn’t have to force her smile for her cousin. He was a rapscallion, but she still adored him. Once upon a time her mother had thought she might be matched with him. After all he, too, would one day be an earl. Happily that notion had passed. George was more like a brother to her and he was wild as the day was long. A match would have been miserable.
“Dearest George,” she said, and took his hand with both of hers. “You look a fright.”
He laughed as he reached up to smooth his hair. “Do I? Well, that is only because I’m standing to one of the prettiest ladies in all the country.”
Clarissa almost rolled her eyes, but then stopped herself.The Mirror of the Graceswould never approve such behavior. Even less so in front of a stranger who was her better.
As if he sensed her thoughts about the earl, George turned toward him. “Have you had the pleasure of meeting my dear cousin, Kirkwood?”
“I haven’t,” the earl said, and stepped away from her mother. He smiled at her and she returned the expression with the smallest one of her own she could manage. She still thought this man abominably rude for inviting himself to a party and she couldn’t let it go without some small consequence.
“The Earl of Kirkwood, I present Miss Clarissa Lockhart. My favorite cousin,” George said.
Kirkwood reached out to take her hand and for a moment Clarissa thought he might lift it to his lips as he had done with her mother. Instead she shook it briefly and then withdrew. She thought his lips quirked a little in amusement, which she equally ignored.
“A pleasure to make your acquaintance, my lord,” she said. “Though unexpected, indeed.”
She saw her mother glare at her over the earl’s shoulder and so she added a little curtsey to her comment out of respect to his rank. Mrs. Lockhart stepped forward. “George you will be in your usual chamber, and my lord, I’ll give you the one just down the hall so you two friends may be close. Let me follow you in and tell our butler of the addition.”
She motioned toward the door and George took her arm to lead her in. Kirkwood held Clarissa’s stare a moment and then smiled. “I look forward to getting to know you better, Miss Lockhart. Good afternoon.”
He followed her cousin and mother inside and Clarissa glared after them. When her father touched her arm, she jumped, for shehadn’t realized he had moved closer as she focused on the departing party.
“You’ll wrinkle if you look so cross,” Mr. Lockhart said.
She bit back a little retort. One was to always receive advice from one’s parents with deference, after all. Or so her book stated. She drew a breath. “Thank you, Father. You are likely correct. And I suppose if you and Mama aren’t upset by the earl’s unexpected arrival, then I shouldn’t be either.”
“No, not when he could be the best potential match here,” her father said, and rubbed his hands together.
“But as Mama said when he approached, he doesn’t seek a bride,” Clarissa mused as she returned her attention to the drive and the next vehicle that was rumbling down the packed sand lane.
“By hook or by crook, every man of his rank must marry.”
Clarissa glanced at her father. His eyes were lit up with plans. Even though the earl was a known rake, even though he would be so bold and uncouth. Even though surely a match between them could be nothing but dreadful. She could already tell they were polar opposites, more likely to be enemies than fall in love. Not that she expected love. Marriages were meant to be meetings of name and fortune, but she also hoped temperament and shared values.
But she didn’t say any of that to her father. She couldn’t because it would be going against what propriety demanded in a good daughter. And because she was interrupted by the next in a parade of gentlemen meant to be tempted by what she could bring to a union in her comportment and connection.
But the threat of matching with someone like the Earl of Kirkwood made her focus more fully on the matters at hand. She would just have to make herself even more tempting to the men whodidalign with her values in life. Then her parents couldn’t be so foolish as to foist her off on someone frivolous and inappropriate. Handsome or not.
CHAPTER 2
Roderick strode down the hallway from the fine chamber where he had been placed and rapped on Lockhart’s door, just one down from his own.
His heard his friend’s voice from within. “Enter.”
He did so and found Lockhart standing in the chamber, looking at the waistcoats he had brought with him. His valet held up one after another for George to examine.
