Page 64 of The Gentleman’s Leading Lady

Something held her back—her sense of duty to the acting company, a sense of decorum at remembering she was under the roof of an earl, a scolding she’d received from one of the other women, perhaps. She held herself on a leash, resisting the pull she felt toward him, the same pull that tugged him toward her.

The longer she withheld herself, the more determined he was to win her. And not for a sole night of passion or fleeting affair. He wanted more breakfasts and nuncheons and dinners and nights in the parlor. He wanted to see every play she performed in. He wanted to hear her thoughts on his latest designs. He wanted her to meet his sisters.

He wanted her to fall in love with him.

He straightened from sweeping a fall of spring buds off the porch when the stomp of horse hooves and the creak of a turning wheel announced a carriage on Cirencester Road. The avenue saw steady traffic, not just to Cirencester but to the sprawling estate of Charlton Park, which lay not half a mile to the south. He would plant a shrubbery, like the one at Suffolk House, to keep the curious from peering into the windows as they passed. But a certain carriage and its occupants, he intended to welcome. Particularly one of them.

“Ahoy!” Andover approached first on a large bay gelding. “Whoa, Titus. Manelli, you make it easy to find you. West on the High Street, just like you said, and don’t take the road to London. Why, you’re nearly done.”

“Ready to move in soon, and relieve you the burden of a houseguest who has lingered too long.”

“For God’s sake, don’t depart until we’re certain Mama is pleased.” Andover dismounted with the easy grace of a man accustomed to horses. The mark of a gentleman. So were the riding coat and breeches, the tall boots with spurs, and the top hat he removed to peer up at the building.

Dante was dressed much the same as the viscount, only with long pantaloons tucked into his tall boots, and no spurs. His coat cut away at the waist in a style similar to Andover’s, though the viscount’s waistcoat fastened with a double row of buttons and sported a notched lapel, while Dante’s was a plainer design. Andover’s neckcloth climbed to his jawline, but Dante hated the sense of being strangled and wore a much simpler twist than Andover’s complicated knot. He wondered if Cerys would mark his lack of fashion, and disdain him for it.

Dutton, riding up on his own mount, endeavored to outshine them both, making a fashion plate with his striped pantaloons, the red waistcoat with a shawl collar that offset the olive green of his riding coat, and a stock that encased his neck, the points rising toward his cheek. Dutton was no rival, Dante reminded himself. Cerys was polite to him but showed nothing of invitation or interest in her manner toward the baron’s heir.

Andover handed the reins to his mount to the boy who ran up, tugging the brim of his cap in deference. Dutton gave the lad a shrewd look, then handed over his ribbons, too. He joined Andover in surveying the tall, plain cornice that ran beneath the hipped slate roof.

“I think you’ve outdone Suffolk House,” Dutton remarked. “Miss Evans certainly ought to be impressed.” He cast a sly glance at Dante, who stiffened his back.

“That is not the point. I simply thought the women might enjoy an outing.” The whole point of inviting the group en masse was so that he would not be seen as, and mocked for, deliberately courting Cerys. He knew how men like Dutton worked; when they saw another man’s interest in a woman, they were compelled to make their own play for her. Even Andover, for all that he seemed inclined to honor his marriage vows, might likewise be moved by a spirit of competition.

Dante didn’t want to compete with them for Cerys’s attention. Not today.

Not ever.

The Andover town coach rolled into the drive, the coachman in Suffolk livery bringing the four matched blacks to a halt. Dante made a mental note that, when it came time to furnish his own stable—for a gentleman must have a horse—he would ask Andover for advice. A footman hopped down from the back, slid the small wooden stepstool in place, and opened the door with a flourish, releasing a tumult of feminine laughter and a riot of floral scents.

And there she was.

She wore an ensemble he hadn’t seen before, a day gown of creamy muslin with a smart jacket of dark blue velvet, cut in a severe style, with vaguely military embroidery marching up to a tall collar, but the tassels dangling from the waist added a flirtatious, feminine touch. Her bonnet had a high, open brim that framed her face charmingly, the inside lined with silk and the feathers atop dyed to match her jacket. She smiled at the footman as he offered his hand to steady her descent, then stood chatting with the other actresses as they wriggled out of the coach, where they’d squeezed five women into a space designed to accommodate four.

Dante’s chest swelled with an uncomfortable feeling that was painful and welcome at the same time. Cerys Evans was a woman who could circulate through any type of company and feel at home. She could go into dinner on the arm of an earl’s son as easily as she laughed with a group of actresses, common women drawn from the lower orders of society. She was as experienced at navigating different worlds as he was, but she did so as easily as silk thread drawn by a sharpened needle, making the delicate balancing act look effortless.

He started forward before the thought touched his mind, urged by an instinct as pure and strong as any he’d known. He wanted this woman at his side, and he would do whatever he could to keep her there.

The problem was, he’d never wooed a woman in his life, and he had no idea how to go about it.

“You came,” he said.

Ah, wonderful way to commence a wooing, with stupid remarks like that. When Mame had come into the library to tell him Cerys had been dispatched to interview investors, and Mame was there in her place, Dante knew something had happened to warn the girl off him. He’d frightened her somehow, or her friends were intervening, thinking she’d carried her flirtation too far.

But he already knew that Cerys was not the type of girl to be easily spooked, and he wanted to know why she’d pulled back. With Bathsheba, when she’d jilted him, he’d simply gritted his teeth against the humiliation and moved on. He didn’t follow her, didn’t beg, didn’t challenge her decision. He raged only to himself.

And he hadn’t pursued a woman since, content to take the opportunities when they came his way for a discreet liaison with a visiting widow, a neglected wife, a spinster determined not to compromise her independence for a man. He’d not been the least affected when they all moved on.

But if Cerys Evans left his life, something would vanish that could never be replaced. Her, he would follow. He would demand an accounting. If he had done something, he would amend his ways. If it were a flaw in his character, he would change.

He stretched out his palm to her, and without hesitation, she laid her gloved hand in his. “I am here,” she said, and she smiled, and that smile was an arrow that shot through his chest and pinned him into her orbit forever.

“I wanted you to see.”

She turned to look at the house. “It’s nearly finished?”

“The main block is built. Three stories and a lower ground floor. What they are building there is the service wing.”

Would she find it too plain? As at Suffolk House, he had built two symmetrical bays in the front, centering the small porch. The windows of each successive floor descended in size, a move made for practicality as well as temperature control, but perhaps she would find the façade too plain, with the simple string course and the uncarved cornice.