He thought he’d managed an admirable degree of restraint, but even so the butler took a half-step backward, into the shadow of the foyer. “I’m certain it will all appear in the announcement tomorrow, Mr. MacTaggert. In the meantime, I’ll—”
“When did it happen?” Niall repeated in the same tone, centering his gaze on Hughes.
The servant cleared his throat. “Last evening.”
After he’d returned her home. He knew he should have kept hold of her, should never have trusted that her parents wouldn’t immediately track down another title and sell her off for respectability. “Who’s Lord Hurst?”
“I shouldn’t be—”
“Hughes.”
“Lionel West, the Marquis of Hurst. Brother to Lord Phillip West, and son to Mary, Lady Hurst.”
Niall knew Phillip. They’d met at least twice. Doe-eyed lad who seemed to like horses. Whoever this Lionel was, he’d swooped in like a damned vulture. And a marquis, damn it all. “Did she say aye?”
The butler frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Did Amelia-Rose say aye to Lord Hurst? Did he ask her the question, or did they just have her sign her name on a paper? Or shake hands? Did she smile?”
Something that might have been sympathy briefly touched the older man’s face. “I wasn’t in the room, Mr. MacTaggert.”
Nodding, Niall held out the flowers and the cigars. “With my compliments to the Baxters,” he said. He bloody well didn’t want the things. Abruptly they felt like poison, like something he’d been tricked into toting about.
The butler took them. “I will pass them along, sir.”
Looking down, Niall moved off the step and back toward where Kelpie still stood. He needed to think. He needed to drink. And he needed to figure out what the devil he meant to do about this—when he hadn’t the slightest idea where to begin. In the Highlands if one man took another man’s woman, there would be a damned fight at best, and a shooting at worst. Here he was fairly certain he wasn’t supposed to shoot a marquis.
“Mr. MacTaggert?”
He faced the butler and the half-closed door again. “Aye?”
“Miss Baxter has gone out, but she did make a point of telling me that she would be observing her usual schedule today.” He grimaced briefly. “Whatever that might be. She’s never had one that I—”
“Thank ye, Hughes.” She would be shopping on Bond Street at two o’clock. And she’d left that message for him. Hope blazed through him again, heating the dead chill growing around his heart. This hadn’t been her doing. “Thank ye.”
“Mr. MacTaggert.” The door shut.
Heading out immediately to chase Amelia-Rose across Mayfair appealed to him, but it would be useless. She knew far more people there than he did, and could damned well be anywhere. Four hours. He had four hours until he knew where she’d be. Four hours to come up with more information and a plan. And he did know someone who could help him with at least part of that.
He kicked out of the saddle in front of Oswell House, handed Kelpie over to Gavin, and stalked into the house. “That was fast,” Aden observed from up on the stair landing, where he stood draping a gown around Rory’s midsection. “Did ye get tossed out on yer arse?”
“Where’s Eloise?” Niall asked.
Aden’s eyes narrowed a little. “In the music room. Should we be worried over someaught?”
Ignoring the question, Niall headed up to the first floor past his brother and followed the sound of a pianoforte until he found his sister seated alone in the plain-walled music room. “I need a moment,” he said, shutting the door behind him.
She looked up, her light-green eyes startled. “You shouldn’t be back already,” she said, rising and hurrying toward him. “Was it horrid?”
He didn’t want to talk about it, and she wouldn’t want to hear the stream of profanity that would come with the tale if he did tell her. In fact, the fewer words he spoke, the less likely he was to start bellowing and breaking things like a mad, wounded bear. And he felt wounded. Mortally. “Ye’re acquainted with Laird Phillip West, aye?”
“Phillip? Yes. Why? Has some—”
“Tell me about his brother.”
His sister scowled, reaching a hand out toward him and then evidently thinking better of touching him. Smart lass. “The Marquis of Hurst?”
“Aye.”
Her light-green eyes abruptly filled with tears and overflowed down her fair cheeks. Gulping air, Eloise put her hands over her chest, her fists clenched.
That hurt more than anything she might possibly have said. Those tears told him that he’d very likely lost. That whoever this damned Hurst was, his sister reckoned the marquis was a better fit for Amelia-Rose than Niall was.
But his adae had sent him a message. She’d made certain he knew where she’d be. And she had a good idea of what sort of man he was. Not the quiet, subdued type, for certain. Not the type who’d let another man take his woman without a word or a fight.
He nodded. If Eloise had doubts, then he wouldn’t include her. “That answers that, then.”
As he turned, she grabbed onto his sleeve. “Is it settled? Did she—”
“Naught’s settled,” Niall snapped, pulling free of her grip.
Whatever the devil had happened between last afternoon and this morning, Hughes the butler had still referred to Amelia-Rose as Miss Baxter. That, as far as he was concerned, was all he truly needed to know. She might have been pushed or fallen into an engagement, but she wasn’t married. That meant he could still fix this—if she still wanted him. If the Marquis of Hurst wasn’t everything she’d been waiting for when she’d decided to settle for him.
Victoria Baxter let the curtain slip from her fingers. “He’s gone, thank goodness. For a moment I feared he might charge the house yelling ‘For the Bruce!’ or something.”
Seated at her dressing table, Amelia-Rose tightened her grip on the handle of her hairbrush. Niall had come calling just as he said he would, prepared to accept her parents’ ridicule and insults in order to eventually convince them to see reason. Why hadn’t he charged the house? If he’d attempted to make off with her, she was fairly certain she would have gone. “Does it mean nothing to you that I care for him?”
“Of course it doesn’t. If the MacTaggerts hadn’t been attempting to sneak out from beneath their agreement with us all along, you would never have done more than exchange pleasantries with him. Aside from the fact that the Honorable Niall MacTaggert had no business pursuing you for himself, he’s Scottish, untitled, unmannered, and would no doubt whisk you away to live in a house filled with sheep.”
That had been precisely what she’d originally thought about Coll—except for the title, of course. Now she was glad she hadn’t seen Niall from the window. A glimpse of his face would have broken her. As it was, she had no idea what Hughes might have said, or if the butler had delivered the message she’d requested. Did Niall hate her? Did he think she’d betrayed him? That she’d cast him aside without a second thought?
“What now?” her mother prompted into the silence. “Do you mean to stomp your feet? Shout that you won’t go along with this? Run away and join a nunnery? A brothel? Because I have no idea how else you might support yourself when your father and I cut you off for your belligerence.”
“I haven’t decided yet,” Amelia-Rose snapped, tears streaking down her cheeks again. “All of them, perhaps.”
“And yet I would recommend that you consider thanking me.”
Finally Amelia-Rose turned to face her mother. “I am not thanking you for anything.”
“Ungrateful child. Not a year ago you were mooning over Lord Hurst. ‘Oh, he’s so handsome,’ you said. ‘His golden hair and his soulful eyes, I could just swoon.’ Well, now you have him. Golden hair, soulful eyes, and a title. You have nothing about which to complain. I’ve answered all your prayers. Hurst Abbey is only twelve miles from London. You will never be more than a day away from Town.”