Goddess of the Hunt (The Wanton Dairymaid Trilogy #1)

Lucy swallowed her objection in a great, bitter lump. When had pretending to flirt with Jeremy become pretending to marry him? “My full name is Lucinda,” she said. “Lady Lucinda Trescott sounds much nicer, don’t you think?” She could barely pronounce the name without cringing.

“LadyLucinda Trescott, the Countess of Kendall,” Sophia corrected. “I hereby invite you to my wedding. But since this letter will not reach you for an age, I also hereby accept your regrets and express my fondest wish that you might have been in attendance. I am certain it will have been a lovely occasion.”

Lucy laughed despite herself. Still, she was eager to change the subject. “But what about the pirates?”

Sophia dipped her quill again and furrowed her brow. “A warning to pirates,” she said sternly. “Although my new husband is one of the richest men in all England, he is also among the most fearsome. If you have any ideas of kidnapping the author of this letter to hold her for ransom, I advise you to abandon them. Blackbeard himself quakes in his boots—”

She stopped writing and looked to Lucy. “Is it boots, or boot? Did Blackbeard have one leg, or two?”

“I believe he had two.”

“Blackbeard himself quakes in hisboots,” she continued, “at the merest mention of Evil-Eye Jem, the Plundering Earl.”

Lucy clapped both hands over her mouth to keep from laughing aloud. “The Plundering Earl? People don’t really call him that?”

“No, I made it up just now. But he does have the most scandalous reputation. My mother forbade me to waltz with him. Not that he ever asked.” Sophia glanced toward Jeremy and lowered her voice to a whisper. “Has he tried to plunderyou?”

Actually, Lucy longed to confide,it was rather the other way around .

Marianne beckoned Sophia to the pianoforte. Toby approached with an outstretched hand, and Sophia reached to accept it. As she stood, she leaned over and whispered in Lucy’s ear—

“If I were you, I’d let him.”

CHAPTER SIX

“All Englishmen salute the hound,” Henry belted out in a mocking baritone, nudging his bay into a trot. Felix matched his pace, adding his tenor to the song.

“Who, when his lady runs to ground, gives dogged chase o’er dell and knolllll …” They pulled their horses to a stop and drew out the note in a two-part harmony that strained the meaning of the word. “To burrow in his vixen’s hole!” they bellowed at last.

An airborne pinecone knocked the triumphant grin off Henry’s face.

“Watch yourself, Waltham!” Toby called. “We’ve ladies among us.”

Henry looked over his shoulder with an expression of feigned innocence. “Ladies?” His glance fell on Sophia. “So we have.” He tipped his hat, arching an eyebrow in Lucy’s direction. “My apologies,ladies,” he said sardonically, weighing heavily on the dubious plural. Then he touched his crop to the gelding’s flank, heading into the woods. The pups raced ahead of him, ears flopping in the wind.

Jeremy saw Lucy wince, and he beat down the surge of sympathy that rose in his chest. Really, what could she expect? For eight years, she’d wheedled her way into the company of gentlemen and demanded equal treatment. On any previous autumn day, she would have paced Henry across the fields, riding astride in borrowed breeches and gilding the profane verses with her clear soprano.

Now Lucy wished to be a lady. She’d donned a russet velvet riding habit and brown leather gloves, piled her curls on top of her head, and somewhere, somehow conjured up a sidesaddle. It was, he owned, a vast improvement over her jewels-and-silk folly a few days previous. But she couldn’t expect the men to change their behavior as quickly as she changed her clothes. She certainly had no business feeling affronted if they didn’t.

She sniffed. “I knew I ought to have worn breeches. Do I look so ridiculous, then?” She glanced at Jeremy. “You’ve been staring at me all afternoon.”

Staring? He hadn’t been staring. Had he?Damn .

“Not ridiculous,” he said, accepting the invitation to appraise her form openly. “You look …”Soft. Lovely. Strangely delicate and quite frankly, bewildering . “Different.”

She gave him a rueful look. “And those are the words of a besotted man. No wonder Henry’s mocking me.”

Jeremy sighed. He wished he could ride ahead with Henry and Felix and leave that pained expression behind. But a besotted suitor, as Lucy decreed, would ride alongside his lady. For once, her notions of courtship proved correct. Toby had not strayed from Sophia’s side since the party departed the stables. The four of them skirted the edge of the woods, the gentlemen flanking the ladies as they rode through the fringe of a mowed barley field.

With reluctance, Jeremy nudged his mount closer to hers. “Henry is an ass.” Not the most conciliatory phrase he might have uttered, but it was sincere.

Shrugging, she tucked a wisp of hair behind her ear. “Henry is Henry. And he may be an ass, but he’s also my brother.”

“Precisely.” He lowered his voice. “He should treat your feelings with more care.”