“He courted her last season.” Elizabeth frowned as her attention fell to the skirt. “Do you like the hem? The pattern is awfully busy. We could ask Madame for a plain one, if you’d rather.”
“It’s fine.” She didn’t care a fig about the hem. What was this about Carlisle having courted someone? “And Miss Morgan?”
“We all thought he’d offer for her.”
A marriage offer from Robert Carlisle? Her chest squeezed, surely in sympathy for the poor girl. Without thinking, she blurted out, “I’m glad she escaped.”
With a gasp, she realized what she’d said. Her hand flew over her mouth in mortification. Heavens, how could she have been so thoughtless? To insult him like that in front of his mother, in such a cruel slap to her kindness—
“Me, too,” Elizabeth agreed, lowering her voice conspiratorially.
Mariah gaped at her. Instead of being angry, Elizabeth looked…relieved. “Pardon?”
“I agree with you completely, my dear. Miss Morgan isn’t at all the sort of woman Robert needs in a wife.”
Her mind reeled as she tried to follow this strange turn of conversation. And with his mother, no less. “Lovely, attractive…?”
“Unsuspecting,” Elizabeth confirmed somberly.
She choked on her surprise. Perhaps Carlisle hadn’t pulled the wool over his mother’s eyes quite as thoroughly as he’d thought.
“Robert doesn’t need a wife who agrees with him. What he needs is one who won’t hesitate to keep him in line, who knows her own mind and isn’t afraid to speak it. I’m hoping that this season he finds just that woman.” She paused, her gaze flicking to Mariah’s in the mirror. “Did you know that he was quite a handful as a child?” A faint smile played at her lips, as if she were amused by his behavior but afraid a full smile would condone it. “Always stirring up trouble of one kind or another, but never getting caught.”
That sounded exactly like him. Mariah couldn’t help the urge to hear more and cajoled, “Tell me?”
Elizabeth hesitated, as if uncertain whether she should give up secrets on her children. Then she lowered her voice and launched into a story about how his tutor had once fallen asleep after stealing a sticky bun from the kitchen, only to wake with his fingers glued to two rulers. “Which were also smeared with icing,” she finished, “so of course poor Mr. Fitzwater couldn’t blame Robert.”
Mariah laughed. It sounded exactly like something she would have done herself at Miss Pettigrew’s.
“And then, there was that incident with the piglets…”
By the time Madame returned, Elizabeth had shared over a half dozen stories about Robert and the tricks he’d played, both as a boy at home and later as a student at Eton and Oxford. Mariah was beginning to see him in a whole new light. One in which he wasn’t the selfish blackguard she so very much wanted him to be.
Of course, that didn’t mean that she would call an end to their war. If he continued to believe he had a claim to the company, then she had a right to fight back. And she certainly wouldn’t let him unsettle her again with any of those sinful kisses that left her weak-kneed and aching.
Madame held up the copper-colored satin and draped it across her shoulders. Her black hair shined exotically next to its shimmer, and her green eyes glowed.
“Ah, mademoiselle,” she purred ingratiatingly. “Très belle, non?”
“It’s lovely,” Elizabeth agreed, her eyes shining with approval. “Make her a ball gown in that, please, with all the accessories. Whatever you think she needs for her introduction.”
Madame smiled. “Of course.”
Elizabeth gestured toward the green-and-cream-silk dress that Mariah held in her hands. “That one, too, and the wrap. And make that one first, will you?” She nodded at Mariah as Madame hurried off to add the latest two outfits to their growing list. “This dress will be perfect for your first soiree.” Then the happy shine in her eyes turned to something even deeper, something Mariah couldn’t quite identify…“All the gentlemen will be flocking to your side after a glimpse of you in it.”
Mariah stared at her reflection and inhaled a trembling breath. It wasn’t the flocks of men who worried her. It was one man who bothered her to distraction, and it wasn’t the good kind of diversion that Elizabeth wanted for her season, either.
Because Robert Carlisle was certainly proving to be a distraction all right—of the worst kind.
CHAPTER SIX
One Week Later
Robert’s jaw tightened as he stared at Mariah. Thanks to that little hellcat, the evening was quickly becoming a disaster.
His gaze never strayed from her as she stood on the far side of Lady Gantry’s music room, not even when he secured a glass of Madeira from a passing footman. If he looked away, God only knew what she’d do. Especially tonight, surrounded by gentlemen eager to curry her favor.
Sheep. The lot of them. And not one had any idea of the she-wolf in green silk she really was.
“Don’t you agree, Robert?”
He was startled back to attention by his sister, Josephine, his gaze darting down to her at his side. “Pardon?”
She sighed at having to repeat herself, and not for the first time during their brief conversation. “The soprano Lady Gantry hired this evening sings beautifully, don’t you think?”
“Yes, fine voice,” he agreed distractedly.
His gaze returned to Mariah just in time to see her smile at a man whom Robert knew to be a fortune hunter with a trail of debts from here to Yorkshire. A man whose suit her father would never accept. And she knew it, too. Which was probably why she was chatting with him.
The entire time Robert had been watching her, she’d never looked his way. But of course she wouldn’t dare. She was purposefully ignoring him, just as she’d done all evening, except for that moment immediately after they arrived when the footmen brought around trays of champagne. She’d certainly paid attention to him then, all right, as she’d spilled her flute down his arm.
The damned minx actually had the gall to look apologetic, although he knew from the gleam in her eyes that she wasn’t at all repentant. Most likely, she’d been waiting for the first opportunity to douse his sleeve so she could send him away and escape. But he didn’t trust her enough to leave and simply shrugged away the spill as inconsequential, even though he could still feel the cold champagne against his forearm.
Leave it to Mariah to have him reeking like a St Giles gin palace. He would have admired her audacity if he didn’t want to throttle her for it.
Josie continued, “The way she sang the Queen of the Night aria was simply breathtaking.”
Robert muttered his agreement, only half listening. One would have thought Mariah was the queen of the night herself from the way she drew attention. From the moment they arrived, she’d garnered the interest of nearly every gentleman in the room and hadn’t lost it since. They’d all wanted introductions to her before the musicale began, and during the intermission, several of the more eager dandies had embarrassed themselves by stealing chairs from one another in order to gain a closer seat.
And speaking of dandies…Whitby.
He’d arrived outfitted in a purple and orange waistcoat and jacket so garish that Robert wondered if Whitby’s valet was going blind. But he seemed to be having a grand time, chatting to everyone in the room and never straying far from Mariah’s side. Anyone who saw the two of them together, so mismatched, would never presume anything more between them than friendship. And yet—
Josie touched his arm.
He glanced down at her. “Pardon?”
“Don Juan,” she said pointedly, once more repeating herself.
“Who?” He jerked his attention back to Mariah. Which one of those sheep had overstepped now?
“Goose!” She laughed at him, a knowing sound that reminded him of all the torment they’d inflicted on each other as children. “Don Giovanni, the opera!”
His shoulders slumped with chagrin, and he shook his head. “I’m sorry, Josie,” he apologized sincerely. “I’m distracted tonight.”
“Well,” she conceded grudgingly with understanding, “you do have your hands full with Miss Winslow.”