Page 7 of The Lyon Deception

“It isn’t very nice,” Prudence assured him, giving her sister a warning look.

“I’m only telling the truth,” Harriet retorted, pouting. “What’s wrong with that?”

The gentleman interrupted what threatened to become an argument. “I only know this fellow slightly. I have seen him at the . . .” He stopped abruptly. “I mean to say I have seen him occasionally when I am out.” He turned back to the carriage. “Should I arrange for the wheelwright? If you will wait here a moment, I can send someone to fetch him?”

The coachman announced he would stay with the women, and the gentleman gave them all a smile as he hurried off. Cat realized then she hadn’t even asked him his name or thanked him, but it was too late now. He had turned a corner and was gone. She felt . . . Well, it was the strangest thing, but despite him being a stranger, she felt as if she had known him. There really had been something very appealing about him, and trustworthy. She told herself she could never be attracted to a gentleman who spent his nights out on the town, and yet here she was attracted to him!

The Snowden sisters were whispering furiously together, probably Prudence castigating Harriet for saying too much, but Cat ignored them.

“That is a good-hearted young gentleman,” the coachman said, following her gaze to where the gentleman had disappeared.

Cat smiled in agreement and asked, “Do you think the carriage will be fit to take us on to Harley Street?”

He shook his grizzled head. “I’ll ask the wheelwright when he comes, but I ’ave my doubts, Your Ladyship.”

In the end, they didn’t have very long to wait for the bad news. A middle-aged man with a younger apprentice who looked like his son arrived in a cart with a box of tools, informing them they were here to look over their carriage. It didn’t take long for him to announce the damage was too great for them to continue on with their journey.

“I’ll need to take your vehicle back to my workshop,” he said.

“But how will we get home?” Harriet wailed. “We can’t walk!”

Cat smiled to herself. It wasn’t all that far to her aunt’s house in Mayfair, and she walked farther than that when she was at home. But she suspected the girls were steeped in London ways and rarely bothered to walk anywhere, apart from a stroll in one of the many parks perhaps.

Before she could answer, something quite astonishing happened. A high perch phaeton and two gray horses came around the corner and began trotting elegantly toward them. Cat had never seen one of the fashionable equipages before, although she had heard about them from her brothers. As it approached, she admired the construction of the vehicle and the well-bred horses, but when her eyes lifted to the driver in charge, she really was lost for words. Unusual for her. Because it was the same handsome curly-haired gentleman who had a moment ago come to their aid.

He drew up behind the wheelwright’s cart, and a young lad jumped down from the back and hurried to hold the horses’ heads. Cat remembered enough to know this lad was called a tiger.

“I thought I could take you home,” the stranger called down from his high seat. There was a questioning lift for his brows and his eyes sparkled. “There is room for all three of you if you bunch up. What do you think?”

“Oh!” Prudence exclaimed excitedly. “I have never ridden in a phaeton before.”

“It looks very high,” Harriet added nervously. “Are you sure?”

“You’re quite safe,” was the calm reply. He reached down with his hand to Cat. “Up you come.”

Cat might have demurred, but the two Snowden girls were already crowding up behind her, ready to be helped up.

“Don’t you worry, missus,” the tiger spoke. “The master’s a prime ’un. You won’t tip over with ’im in charge.”

His words were barely comprehensible to Cat although she got the gist.

“We don’t even know your name,” she said, as her hand was clasped by his. His fingers were strong and warm through her glove, and he seemed to have no trouble supporting her weight as she made the climb up to the seat beside him.

“I don’t know yours either,” he said teasingly. “Let me introduce myself. Mr. Robert Sutherland at your service, Miss . . .?”

He gave an awkward bow from his seat beside her. Cat settled herself—it was a long way up!—before she held out her hand, “How do you do, Mr. Sutherland. I am Lady Catriona MacKenzie, and these are my friends, Lady Prudence Snowden and Lady Harriet Snowden.”

He blinked, probably at meeting so many ladies at once. “I am privileged, Lady Catriona,” he said quietly, his gaze on hers.

Cat wasn’t sure what that meant, although his eyes seemed full of admiration and something more that made her face heat. Luckily, they were interrupted by Prudence and Harriet being helped up into the seat beside her with the assistance of the coachman and the wheelwright. Cat found herself squashed between them on one side and Mr. Sutherland on the other.

Having grown up with three brothers, she was not at all uncomfortable when it came to the company of males, but there was something different about Mr. Sutherland, and not just because he was not related to her. As he spoke, explaining that he had purchased the phaeton from a very large man, and it had been designed for his girth, so the seat was wider than most, she pretended to listen, but at the same time she was letting her senses take him in. His carefully knotted neckcloth was a little limp now after his night out, and fair whiskers, a little darker than his hair, were beginning to show themselves along his jaw.

His thigh within his pantaloons pressed to hers, the muscles moving as he moved, and there was something about that she found . . . well, exciting and novel. But there was no way she could move farther away to a respectable distance, not with the four of them crammed in together.

He seemed unaffected by the situation, calling down to the tiger.

“I don’t know if we should be doing this,” Harriet murmured uneasily, her eyes wide. “Hugo might not like it. He seems easygoing, but he can get tetchy if he thinks we might cause a dent in his consequence.”