“What did that … man say to you?” Victoria demanded as the butler handed her and then Amelia-Rose into their coach.
“That he wants to win me,” Amelia-Rose returned, sliding sideways on the seat to make room for her father.
“Ha. He should have kept his mouth shut, then. Lady Aldriss was in the middle of trying to convince us to sign a new agreement to give you to Niall MacTaggert in exchange for a share in her shipping company, until he stormed into the room and declared that we were trying to buy and sell you and he wouldn’t permit that to happen again. As if he has a say in anything the Baxters do. Ha!”
“He … did?” That was where he’d stomped off to, then. To save her again. Even if an agreement would have rescued her from having to decide for herself what she truly wanted.
“Oh, yes. And then he shouted at me that he meant to win you regardless of what your father and I might want for you. The nerve of that heathen. I can hardly believe he’s Lady Aldriss’s son.”
Goodness. Now she wanted to demand yet another explanation from him. His mother wouldn’t have written up an agreement without him knowing about it, so he had thought to simply … purchase her. But then he’d stopped it. He’d listened to her in the garden, and had taken steps to alter what might have happened.
“You are to have nothing further to do with him, Amelia-Rose. Do you understand?”
“We’re certain to meet during the course of the Season, Mother. But you needn’t worry; I may attempt to reason with him, but I am still as set against marrying a Highlander as I was when you bound me to his brother.” There. Not much of a lie at all.
“Don’t be impudent.”
“I’m just saying it may take a bit of effort for me to convince him that we won’t suit, but I will be polite about it because I have no wish to make a second scandal out of this. He did save my reputation last night.”
“Y—”
“Now, now, dear,” Charles Baxter said. “You know that makes sense. Lady Aldriss is a powerful figure, and if we can dissuade her youngest son from pursuing Amy without making a scene, that benefits all of us.”
“Amelia-Rose,” her mother stated, glaring at her husband.
He inclined his head. “Amelia-Rose.”
Yes, that was her, Amelia-Rose Hyacinth Baxter. Mother hated the nicknames, especially “plain” ones like Amy. Victoria would no doubt detest a Scottish nickname like adae even more, but she didn’t know about that one. At the end, that name might be all she had by which to remember Niall.
She supposed she was willing to be wooed to a point, because he was extremely good-looking and clever and irreverent, and she wanted more kisses and more of the way she felt lighter inside when he was about. Truth be told, just last night she’d had a rather heated dream about him that had involved a bed and nudity and more kissing, though the parts she wasn’t certain about had unfortunately been rather nebulous. But unless he could miraculously convince her that the Scottish Highlands was superior to London, and convince her parents that being a mister was superior to being a lord something, it couldn’t go any farther than that.
“There was Lord Oglivy,” her mother mused. “Of course he’s only a baron.”
“And he’s fifty-seven years old,” Amelia-Rose added. “For goodness’ sake.”
“Hush. You could be engaged to a viscount with a future as an earl right now. But you didn’t like the details.”
“The details? I don’t want to live as a brood mare in a stable while he … fornicates with whomever he pleases! And takes any children I might have away from me!” she protested.
“Language, Amelia-Rose! For heaven’s sake.” Her mother fanned herself. “You would have been a countess, though. There’s a difference between a brood mare and a countess.”
“Mother!”
“I think we’ve burned that bridge,” her father put in. “She won’t be our Lady Glendarril, sadly enough.”
“The Marquis of Hanstag’s wife is very sickly,” Victoria went on, half to herself. “That would entail waiting a year for him to put on and cast off his black, though.”
Oh, this was getting worse and worse. “Now we’re hoping people die?”
“Not hoping, dear. But if she does, we should be ready. Just think. A marchioness.”
“I don’t wish to discuss this right now.” She didn’t want to discuss it ever, but that simply wasn’t realistic. It did make her wish she’d gone off walking with Niall, though; his conversation kept her on her toes, but it didn’t make her feel oily and ill.
“No, I need some time to consider our options anyway. You will continue attending all your events, and I will find you someone appropriate. And this time you will cooperate.”
No one said or else, but Amelia-Rose heard it. She’d heard it before. She would end up in a nunnery, or out on the streets, or reduced to being some elderly woman’s companion so her mother could pretend she didn’t have a daughter at all. If only Niall MacTaggert had been an English baron with a small house in Devon or Sussex and just a short drive from London.
The idea of escaping, no matter the consequences, had once been an occasionally visited daydream. With no money of her own, and no references on which she could depend to help her find employment, it had never progressed beyond that. But she kept hold of it anyway.
As they arrived at Baxter House, Hughes the butler met her at the door with a pile of calling cards on his salver. “For you, Miss Amelia-Rose,” he intoned.
She took them. “Good heavens. There must be a dozen here. Who are they?”
“Men, miss,” the butler returned. “Most of them asking if you were free for luncheon, or if they could call later to take you walking or riding.”
Niall had truly saved her. Not only was she not ruined, but as a newly unattached lady with at least one handsome man shadowing her, she’d become … desirable, of all things. She reached out her hand for the stack. “Thank you, H—”
“I see word has already gotten out that you and that barbarian aren’t to be wed after all,” Victoria said, taking the cards from the salver and sifting through them. “Your usual followers, unfortunately. So common. Ah well, answer two or three of them; a woman in a man’s company is always more desirable to other men than a woman alone.” She handed them back, except for one. “I shall keep this one. I need to inquire after Lord Phillip’s mother.”
More likely she needed to inquire of Lord Phillip’s mother whether Lord Phillip’s older brother the Marquis of Durst was still pursuing that heiress in Yorkshire. If Victoria Baxter deserved credit for anything, it was the way she knew who was seeing whom. It was uncanny, really.
Taking the remainder of the cards, she went upstairs to dress for the luncheon she’d already agreed to attend with Helen Turner and her brother Harry. And then she meant to spend her evening reading one of her father’s almanacs about Scottish planting cycles and sheep shearing and weather, and otherwise reminding herself that she had other requirements in a marriage than not being left behind, and that she didn’t want Scotland. She would not be thinking about kisses and Niall MacTaggert. Not at all—except perhaps in her dreams.
“Ye’re truly after Amelia-Rose Baxter, then,” Aden said as he strolled into the breakfast room.
“Aye. If ye’re here to tell me we willnae suit, or she willnae take me if she wouldnae take a viscount, then shut yer gobber now. I already had that chat with the countess.”
“I’ve nae a word to say about it. Ye punched Coll hard enough to convince me.” His middle brother selected a stack of ham and some eggs, then seated himself at the foot of the table. “I’m here for food, and to tell ye I saw Lady Aldriss leaving her room just as I passed Rory on the stairs. Our stag’s wearing earbobs now, did ye notice? I reckon that was Eloise.”
“Shite.” Niall shoveled in the last few mouthfuls of breakfast, pushing away from the table as he chewed. “Ye bastard,” he managed around his ham and gravy, “ye might have warned me about the countess earlier.”