Page 69 of A Daring Desire

“Catherine, stay out of this. I saw him, saw their fond farewell. He’s barely been in your life a few weeks and already—”

“She’s not my mistress!” Ciarán bellowed, his strident voice so loud and ferocious both Cat and her father fell silent. “You really think I would pay a visit to my mistress while my wife was visiting friends down the road?” he demanded, and Cat’s heart ached for the despair she heard in his voice.

“I’ve heard too many stories of the things you are capable of to dismiss the possibility,” her father said coldly.

“I didn’t,” Ciarán replied, clenching his fists. “I wouldn’t.”

“Then who the devil is she?” her father demanded.

“Well, if you’d all like to stop shouting the odds and making a spectacle of yourselves on my front lawn, you might come in and I could tell you,” remarked a tart voice from behind them.

Cat turned to see a lovely woman dressed in a fashionable morning gown, tumbled brown ringlets framing her pretty face. She was short and voluptuous, and her accent proclaimed loudly enough that she had not been raised a lady, for all that she looked like one.

“Louisa, I’m sorry,” Ciarán said, turning back to her.

“Nothing to be sorry about, my lord,” the woman said, walking briskly to the gate and tucking a fat pug under her arm as she reached to open it. “My Lord Montagu,” she said, dipping a curtsey.

Cat watched her father with interest, understanding his dilemma. Greeting a woman he considered to be her husband’s mistress would fly in the face of the passionate fury she could see burning in his eyes, yet he was a gentleman to his core, and one who would never vent his anger on any woman, certainly not one who might have had no option but to make her way in the world in such a manner.

“Madam,” he said, bowing slightly. “I do not believe we have any reason to importune you.”

“Importune my eye,” the woman said with some asperity. “You’ll come in and hear what I have to say, my lord, for I shan’t air my dirty laundry in public, for all there’s not a soul about but for that young post boy, and he is all agog, I can tell you.”

Her father shot a withering look at the unfortunate postilion. “Take the carriage into the village,” he directed. “And mind your tongue or you’ll regret it.”

“Y-Yes, my lord,” the young man said, turning a sickly shade of pale green before moving his horses forward and trotting down the lane without a backwards glance.

The woman who seemed to have taken charge of this little scene moved then to greet Cat, holding out her hands and beaming as though she had known her all her life. “Oh, and you are even lovelier than I imagined. My Lord Kilbane, you lucky fellow,” she said, with a conspiratorial wink at Ciarán.

Cat, rather diverted by this and the look of combined mortification and pride in her husband’s eyes, took the woman’s hands and smiled warmly. “You have me at a disadvantage, madam,” she said softly.

“Oh, does no one here have any manners?” the lady said, darting a frustrated look at Ciarán, who cleared his throat.

“My Lady Kilbane, may I present to you, Mrs Louisa Clifford. Louisa, my wife, Lady Kilbane.”

“You dare,” her father growled, glaring at Ciarán with contempt.

“My Lord Montagu,” Mrs Clifford said, squaring up to her father with more courage than Cat would have granted her at first glance. “You’re right enough in thinking that I am not entirely a respectable woman, but I never have been, nor will be, Lord Kilbane’s mistress. At least… not this Lord Kilbane,” she replied with a smirk as she saw how this information had sunk in.

“Oh!” Cat said, raising her eyebrows. “His brother?” she asked with interest.

“No, dear, his father,” Mrs Clifford said conversationally. “I wouldn’t have touched his brother with a ten-foot pole. Now, do come in, for its perishing cold and I shall catch my death standing about like this. Come along, Lord Montagu, don’t dillydally. My gardener will see to your horse, so you may stop worrying about that too.”

Cat bit her lip, watching with amusement as Mrs Clifford herded her father inside. She doubted anyone had ever spoken to him so in his life. She turned to look at Ciarán, who hadn’t moved and was staring at her, he looked pale and tense. Cat tucked her hand into his arm and smiled up at him.

“It’s all right. I’m sure Mrs Clifford will explain things to my father. She seems a very forthright sort of lady in any case, so I don’t think he’ll have a choice but to listen,” she added with amusement.

Ciarán stared down at her. “You believed me,” he said, his voice low and shaken. “You didn’t… you didn’t think that I—”

“No, not for a moment,” she said crossly, and then sighed, deciding she ought to be honest. “Well, it did cross my mind, but only for a moment. I knew you wouldn’t do that to me, but I did assume she had been your mistress when I saw her, and I apologise for that. But she’s very pretty, Ciarán, and would not have blamed you if—”

Her words were stopped as she was pulled ruthlessly into his arms and thoroughly kissed.

“Oh,” she said when he released her, readjusting her bonnet, which had been knocked askew by the sudden assault. “Thank you,” she added breathlessly, taking the kiss as a reward for having had faith in him.

He gazed down at her, his eyes a bright violet against the grey skies that loomed behind him, his arms still tight around her, holding her close.

“I love you,” he said, and with such conviction Cat could not doubt the sincerity behind the words.