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Mark gave Smite a long, measuring look, and then walked forward to greet his guests.
“Robbie Barnstable,” Smite said. “This is Sir Mark Turner.”
Robbie looked up at Mark. “He didn’t say you were a sir.”
“Just call me Mark. I was knighted a handful of years past. I keep hoping everyone will forget it, but alas.”
Smite drew a deep breath. “And Miss Miranda Darling. This is my brother. Mark, this is…” He paused, not knowing how to go forward. He didn’t think Mark would be shocked if he introduced her as his mistress. Still…
Mark solved the dilemma of his introduction by taking Miranda’s hand and shaking it. “I’m delighted to meet you,” he said.
“Miranda has been caring for Robbie,” Smite said. “But he’ll need somewhere safe to stay temporarily. I thought of you.”
“Welcome,” Mark said simply, and that was that. He glanced at Smite. “Are you coming in? Jessica will be furious if I let you run off without saying a word to her.” He glanced around. “But it’s a fine day. We could stay outside.”
It wasn’t. It was gray and cloudy. “It looks about to drizzle,” Smite said. “I won’t perish if I enter. Besides, I would hate to interfere with your marital tranquility. We can come in for a short space of time.”
“Ha!” Mark said. “She’d be angry at you, not me, for dashing off. First order of business.” Mark took Robbie by the arm. “I’ll take you upstairs and introduce you to my wife. Lady Turner is a lovely woman, and she’ll get the servants started on obtaining you a bath.”
“A bath?” Robbie said scornfully. “I just fell in the Floating Harbour yesterday. I don’t need a bath.”
Mark wrinkled his nose. “Ah, so that smell is algae.” He turned to go in the house.
“I’ll—I’ll just stay out here, then,” Miranda said.
Mark swiveled back and took Miranda’s arm. “No,” he said cheerfully. “You’ll come inside. Jessica would have my head if I left Smite’s…” He paused and glanced at Smite—just long enough for Smite to know that he’d heard every word that he hadn’t said. “Smite’s friend outside. Come, now, Smite. Did you not prepare her for anything?”
Smite shook his head and watched his brother bend his blond head close to Miranda’s fire-orange hair. He whispered something; she laughed in response.
In the end, it was Smite who held back, watching from a distance as his brother introduced Jessica to Miranda. It was Smite who concentrated on his breathing. He’d wanted Mark to know Miranda, if only for a few seconds. Mark knew everything important to him, even if he never spoke of it. But this house…it overwhelmed him. He focused on the window to the yard outside, ignoring the cellar that lurked beneath.
The two women exchanged greetings and then took Robbie upstairs, leaving Mark and Smite alone. The smile slowly slid off Mark’s face, and he turned to his brother. “Come,” Mark said. “Let’s go for a walk in the back garden before you cast up your accounts in the house.”
Chapter Eighteen
MIRANDA WATCHED ROBBIE DISAPPEAR behind a door, half-dragged by an upstairs maid.
“There,” Lady Turner said beside her, brushing her hands. “The servants will see to his bath.” She sighed. “I have to admit, I have always hoped that Smite would fall in love, but you are not what I expected.”
Miranda choked. “Pardon?”
“I’ve never been certain he would marry. He’s rather odd,” Lady Turner was saying. “Once you get past his frightening exterior, he’s actually quite kind. But I suspect you know that.”
“He feeds stray cats in Bristol,” Miranda heard herself offering.
“Of course he does.” Lady Turner pinched her lips together. “He’s very sweet, no matter how he tries to hide it. He never doubted me—not once—and I daresay my past is more checkered than yours.” She looked down and drew in a deep breath. “They’ve managed to obscure the matter quite a bit, but I was a courtesan for years before I met Sir Mark. The Turners are something out of the ordinary. All of them. It has taken me some time to grow accustomed to the fact that I am not the oddest one in the room when they’re around. You’ll begin to understand, eventually.”
“You shouldn’t imagine this is anything other than temporary.”
Lady Turner’s eyes met hers. “Nonsense. Smite hasn’t been back to Shepton Mallet in twenty years. Mark goes to Bristol to see him because he won’t come here. Smite knows perfectly well that bringing you here is tantamount to a declaration.”
“No.” Miranda stared at the wallpaper. “He’s quite precise in everything he does. I have no doubt that he cares for me. He may even love me. But he sees what is between us as fleeting.”
“I’ve never known him to be fickle.”
Miranda shook her head. “It’s not that. I know when a man is saying good-bye.” She thought of the way he’d held her last night, and the dire look in his eyes in the phaeton this morning. “Even if he doesn’t say it directly, Smite is most assuredly telling me farewell.”
Lady Turner gave her a long, level look. “That, I can believe. He scarcely lets Mark close. I was so hoping…”
“What? That he’d fall in love and turn into an ordinary man?” Miranda choked on the words. “Anyone who loved him would never want that. It would be like loving the ocean, but wishing it would change into a glass of water.”
“No. I rather think it would be like loving the ocean and wishing it could feel a little sunlight.” Lady Turner adjusted a vase on a shelf. “When I first met Mark, he told me that I reminded him of his brother. At the time, I didn’t realize what a compliment he was paying me. He was saying I was difficult, but worth the trouble.”
It had never occurred to Miranda that Smite was on good terms with anyone in his family. He was so extraordinarily solitary, and he’d argued so ferociously with his brother, the duke. She’d supposed that his relationship with his siblings was as fraught as his time with his mother. But that wasn’t so. He was loved.
It made his solitary life seem all the starker.
“Come,” Lady Turner said. “They’ll be in the garden. Let’s go find them.” She led Miranda downstairs and out the front. But Smite and his brother were nowhere to be seen; Lady Turner frowned and then took Miranda along a path of slate stones along the side of the house. Miranda heard male voices before Smite came into view.
“Aren’t you going to lecture me?” Smite was saying.
“What about?”
“Chastity.” Leaves rustled. “Miss Darling. I know what you must be thinking.”
“I’m thinking that there’s no need for me to lecture you, as you appear to be lecturing yourself quite effectively.” Smite’s younger brother spoke with an easy air.
“Did you know she was a virgin when I met her?” Smite threw out. Miranda knew that tone of voice; he was daring his brother to quarrel with him.
“Tsk, tsk.” Sir Mark didn’t sound disappointed in the least. “You terrible man, seducing an innocent young lady. Is that what you want me to say?”
“Say something. Say anything. I can’t argue with you if you won’t even put up a good show.”
“I refuse to quarrel with someone who wins arguments by profession. It seems rather imprudent.”
“Ha,” Smite replied grimly. “It’s never stopped you before.”
There was a long pause. Then, in a low voice, Mark spoke again. “Is it so bad, then?”
Lady Turner rounded the corner just ahead of Miranda. At the rustling of the underbrush, the two men looked up. They were seated facing one another on a bench. Smite looked up at Miranda. His eyes caught hers, darted to Jessica, and then he looked back at Mark.
“No,” he said. “Which makes it utterly impossible.”
Sir Mark seemed to think that this answer made perfect sense. He rose from his seat and smiled cheerfully. When Miranda held back, he cocked his head at her. “Smite surely didn’t tell you that we’re sticklers for propriety. It’s rather misleading, that A
sh ended up a duke. We’ve been anywhere and everywhere between. Ash says that the notion of social class is a delusion. At some point, someone will figure out that he really means that.”
She’d never thought about what it meant, that Parford had left home at fourteen, that Smite and this man had ended up on the streets of Bristol as children. She’d never thought about the bewildering change of events that had struck them. And Sir Mark had married a courtesan.
“What does it mean, then?”
“It means,” Sir Mark said, “that I’m quite pleased with you. I consider it my personal mission as younger brother to keep my elders out of sorts. You’ve been doing a beautiful job of it.”
“Nonsense.” Miranda drew herself up. “I do nothing of the kind. Smite keeps himself out of sorts all on his own.”
Sir Mark let out a sharp crack of laughter, and behind him, a rueful grin spread across Smite’s face.
“Tell me,” Miranda said, “how do you handle his sentimentality quota?”
“That?” An airy wave of Sir Mark’s hand. “I simply refuse to acknowledge its existence.”
