Lucinda suddenly felt warm, despite the cool breeze that heralded the approaching evening. She looked away, to where Heather was talking animatedly to Agatha.
“If you’ll forgive the advice, Mrs Babbacombe, I would not consider it wise for either you or your stepdaughter to be upon the road, unescorted, at night.”
The soft drawl focused Lucinda’s mind on her options. Both appeared dangerous. With a gentle inclination of her head, she chose the more exciting. “Indeed, Mr Lester. Doubtless you’re right.” Sim had finished stowing their baggage in the curricle’s boot, strapping bandboxes to the flaps. “Heather?”
While his siren fussed, delivering a string of last-minute instructions, Harry lifted her stepdaughter to the curricle’s seat. Heather Babbacombe smiled sunnily and thanked him prettily, too young to be flustered by his innate charms.
Doubtless, Harry thought, as he turned to view her stepmother, Heather viewed him much as an uncle. His lips quirked, then relaxed into a smile as he watched Mrs Babbacombe glide towards him, casting last, measuring glances about her.
She was slender and tall—there was something about her graceful carriage that evoked the adjective “matriarchal.” A confidence, an assurance, that showed in her frank gaze and open expression. Her dark hair, richly brown with the suspicion of red glinting in the sun, was, he could now see, fixed in a tight bun at the nape of her neck. For his money, the style was too severe—his fingers itched to run through the silken tresses, laying them free.
As for her figure, he was having great difficulty disguising his interest. She was, indeed, one of the more alluring visions he had beheld in many a long year.
She drew near and he lifted a brow. “Ready, Mrs Babbacombe?”
Lucinda turned to meet his gaze, wondering how such a soft drawl could so easily sound steely. “Thank you, Mr Lester.” She gave him her hand; he took it, drawing her to the side of the carriage. Lucinda blinked at the high step—the next instant, she felt his hands firm about her waist and she was lifted, effortlessly, to the seat.
Stifling her gasp, Lucinda met Heather’s gaze, filled with innocent anticipation. Sternly suppressing her fluster, Lucinda settled herself on the seat next to her stepdaughter. She had not, indeed, had much experience interacting with gentlemen of Mr Lester’s standing; perhaps such gestures were commonplace?
Despite her inexperience, she could not delude herself that her position, as it transpired, could ever be dismissed as commonplace. Her rescuer paused only to swing his greatcoat—adorned, she noted, with a great many capes—about his broad shoulders before following her into the curricle, the reins in his hands. Naturally, he sat beside her.
A bright smile firmly fixed on her lips, Lucinda waved Agatha goodbye, steadfastly ignoring the hard thigh pressed against her much softer limb, and the way her shoulder perforce had to nestle against his back.
Harry himself had not foreseen the tight squeeze—and found its results equally disturbing. Pleasant—but definitely disturbing. Backing his team, he asked, “Were you coming from Cambridge, Mrs Babbacombe?” He desperately needed distraction.
Lucinda was only too ready to oblige. “Yes—we spent a week there. We intended to leave directly after lunch but spent an hour or so in the gardens. They’re very fine, we discovered.”
Her accents were refined and untraceable, her stepdaughter’s less so, while those of her servants were definitely north country. The greys settled into their stride; Harry comforted himself that two miles meant less than fifteen minutes, even allowing for picking their way through the town. “But you’re not from hereabouts?”
“No—we’re
from Yorkshire.” After a moment, Lucinda added, a smile tweaking her lips, “At the moment, however, I suspect we could more rightly claim to be gypsies.”
“Gypsies?”
Lucinda exchanged a smile with Heather. “My husband died just over a year ago. His estate passed into his cousin’s hands, so Heather and I decided to while away our year of mourning in travelling the country. Neither of us had seen much of it before.”
Harry stifled a groan. She was a widow—a beautiful widow newly out of mourning, unfixed, unattached, bar the minor encumbrance of a stepdaughter. In an effort to deny his mounting interest, to block out his awareness of her soft curves pressed, courtesy of Heather Babbacombe’s more robust figure, firmly against his side, he concentrated on her words. And frowned. “Where do you plan to stay in Newmarket?”
“The Barbican Arms,” Lucinda replied. “I believe it’s in the High Street.”
“It is.” Harry’s lips thinned; the Barbican Arms was directly opposite the Jockey Club. “Ah—have you reservations?” He slanted a glance at her face and saw surprise register. “It’s a race week, you know.”
“Is it?” Lucinda frowned. “Does that mean it’ll be crowded?”
“Very.” With every rakehell and womaniser who could make the journey from London. Harry suppressed the thought. Mrs Babbacombe was, he told himself, none of his business. Very definitely none of his business—she might be a widow and, to his experienced eye, ripe for seduction, but she was a virtuous widow—therein lay the rub. He was too experienced not to know such existed—indeed, the fleeting thought occurred that if he was to plot his own downfall, then a virtuous widow would be first choice as Cupid’s pawn. But he had recognised the trap—and had no intention of falling into it. Mrs Babbacombe was one beautiful widow he would do well to leave untouched—unsampled. Desire bucked, unexpectedly strong; with a mental curse, Harry shackled it—in iron!
The first straggling cottages appeared ahead. He grimaced. “Is there no acquaintance you have in the district with whom you might stay?”
“No—but I’m sure we’ll be able to find accommodation somewhere.” Lucinda gestured airly, struggling to keep her mind on her words and her senses on the late afternoon landscape. “If not at the Barbican Arms, then perhaps the Green Goose.”
She sensed the start that shot through him. Turning, she met an openly incredulous, almost horrified stare.
“Not the Green Goose.” Harry made no attempt to mute the decree.
It was received with a frown. “Why not?”
Harry opened his mouth—but couldn’t find the words. “Never mind why—just get it into your head that you cannot reside at the Green Goose.”