Page 16

P atrick watched as grooms led the matching blacks out of their stall.

To anyone looking, he was merely enjoying the horse sale and scent of excitement that was always on offer at Tattersalls.

His eyes, however, were another story entirely—they were alive with the anticipation that always heated his blood before he purchased horses.

After inspecting the pair upon his arrival, Patrick had known they would be an excellent investment. He wanted them, and he would have them.

What he also wanted was the Countess of Monmouth more every time he saw her. Clearly, he was losing his mind, because she’d warned him to stay away from her. No one warned him and got away with it, but she would.

Because when you are around her, she makes you lose reason.

Patrick was sure that should terrify him far more than it did, considering he’d vowed never to allow a woman any hold over him.

“Do you know what that bloody Tompkins just said?” growled Stephen as he joined Patrick.

“Any chance you can hold your tongue for five minutes?” he said as he felt his heartbeat increase when the first bid was called. The tougher the haggling, the more he liked it.

“He inferred she had thrown herself at his feet and that she was a harlot.”

Ignoring Stephen, Patrick nodded to indicate his interest. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see two other men bidding.

“A woman of loose morals, and he, the pious little bastard?—”

“Shut up,” Patrick said softly as he nodded to show another bid.

“Anyone can see she is hardly that.” Stephen ignored the warning and continued on with his story.

“I know I wasn’t sure about her at the beginning, but I soon changed my mind when you pointed a few things out to me.

’Tis my belief she tweaked Tompkins’s pride or rebuffed him, but of course the others will believe his word, and the story will be bigger than Lady Toon’s knickers before sunset. ”

Patrick always fixed a purchase price in his head and never advanced beyond that. That amount was approaching.

“The Countess of Monmouth is not now, nor ever will be, a harlot. I’ll add to that, I thought about breaking the man’s nose?—”

“What?” Patrick dragged his eyes from the bidding to look at his friend. “Did you just say Tompkins called the countess a harlot?”

“I say,” Stephen said, looking at the horses that were being led around the pen before him. “Aren’t those the ones you wanted?”

“Sold! Congratulations, Your Grace.”

Patrick ground his teeth as he watched the Duke of St. Bride wave at him with a huge smile on his face. Spitting out a chorus of oaths, he then pinned Stephen with a stare that would have felled a lesser man. “What about the countess?” he gritted out.

“Tompkins was surrounded by his usual pack of mealymouthed cronies,” Stephen said, looking serious, which instantly put Patrick on alert. Stephen never looked serious about anything.

“He said that your countess had made several very suggestive remarks to him about entertaining him in her rooms. However, a reliable source told me it was he who approached her and that she turned him down, so that is why he is blackening her name with this foul story. It honestly is sickening that with a few words, a man can ruin a woman’s reputation and others will believe him and turn on her. ”

“Is he still here?” Patrick asked, looking over the heads of men standing about to wait for the next auction.

“Ah—”

“Stephen. You interrupted me to tell me. Don’t back down now. Is he still here?”

“Yes.”

“Show me.”

“Perhaps it would be prudent to wait before seeing him.”

“You know me better than that,” Patrick said as he strode away from Stephen.

After winding their way through people, Patrick saw the man laughing in a gaggle of his friends.

Lord Tompkins—Tommy to his intimates—was happiest when surrounded by his cronies and boasting about his latest feats.

Patrick neither liked nor disliked the man; they’d just existed in the same social sphere…

until now. He watched as Mr. Brownley noted him coming in their direction.

Heard him say, “I say, is that Coulter coming this way? He looks a trifle out of sorts.”

Idiot. He wasn’t out of sorts. He was furious.

“Tompkins!” Patrick barked, closing the last few feet between them.

“I say, Coulter! Steady, old man. Anyone would think you were angry with Tommy,” said Mr. Hanson, one of Tompkins’s friends.

“N-not purchasing today, my lord?” Tompkins said, his voice rising so the words came out with a squeak.

Patrick had always found men who boasted and bragged were often cowards when confronted.

“I’ve heard a rumor I would like to have a word with you about, Tompkins,” Patrick said, moving to stand directly in front of the man after parting his friends.

Stephen snorted at the look of panic that crossed Tompkins’s face. Patrick, however, was far from laughing; in fact, he had to unclench his fists so he didn’t simply punch the man and be done with it.

“Your gossip to date, Tompkins, has never bothered me. It is something bored men who have little or nothing to recommend them to either their peers or women do.”

A round of horrified gasps greeted Patrick’s words. By sunset, everyone would be gossiping about the altercation between Tompkins and the Earl of Coulter.

“I say, steady on, Coulter,” Mr. Tweetie spluttered.

Patrick ignored everyone else; his eyes were still on the man before him as he took a step closer. “You will never speak of the countess again, is that understood?”

“Y-yes,” Tompkins stuttered, wiping his brow with his cuff.

“Your malicious words are the result of Lady Monmouth’s refusal to take up the insulting offer you issued her two nights ago, and I will not have your petty wounded pride blackening her reputation.” Patrick’s tone was like a distant roll of thunder. “Do I make myself clear, Tompkins?”

“I say, that’s not on,” Tompkins blustered. “My word is?—”

“I said, do I make myself clear?” Patrick added, leaning in closer so their eyes were now inches apart.

“Y-yes, my lord.” Tompkins nodded furiously, looking like a turkey with his jowls wobbling.

A few men in the crowd clapped, and a few defended their friend. Patrick just turned on his heel, ignoring them, and stalked away.

“Well, for someone who loathes being talked about or making a scene, you just ensured the first and participated in the second.”

“It’s about time someone told that idiot to shut up.”

“Oh, I agree. I just never thought it would be you,” Stephen said.

He wanted to hit something. Unfortunately, Stephen was closest.

“Let’s go.”

After collecting their horses, they began to wind their way through the streets of London.

“Shall we go a few rounds at Jackson’s boxing saloon?” Patrick inquired in a deceptively mild voice that fooled no one, because his friend snorted loudly.

“I think you have caused enough scandal for one day, and I, for one, quite like the shape of my nose,” Stephen said, running one finger down the long, aristocratic length.

“Coward,” Patrick grumbled, but there was no heat in his words.

“Of course, you realize that your defense of the countess, while very heroic, will now give rise to further speculation about your relationship with her,” Stephen said, lifting his leg clear of the stirrup as Patrick’s big beast of a horse tried to nip him in the calf.

“Good boy.” Patrick felt himself smiling for the first time that day.

Nothing further was said as they headed back to Patrick’s town house, though both men had plenty to think about. His friend was right; he had all but openly declared he had an interest in the Countess of Monmouth. Now he just had to work out what he wanted to do about it.