Kitty by Elizabeth Bailey

Author:Elizabeth Bailey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2013-09-25T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Seven

No two people could have sprung apart more swiftly. At the instant Kitty tried to disengage herself, she found her fingers released as if they were red hot. And the gale of laughter that followed did nothing to relieve her feelings.

‘Confound you, young Tess, I could willingly throttle you!’ growled Claud.

‘Well, but—’

Tess’s protest was lost as the door once again opened. Claud turned, still in no little annoyance, to find Lord Rothley on the threshold. Relief swept through him. A more timely entrance could not have been desired! Before he could speak, Kate was up and crossing to her brother at the door.

‘Ralph! Has Mama recovered? What is happening down there?’

The Baron entered in a leisurely way and closed the door behind him. ‘Mama is closeted with Aunt Lydia in her boudoir. Our uncle Heversham has captured Uncle Blakemere and dragged him off to the library. Aunt Heversham is prostrate upon her bed, I understand. And the rest have sensibly made themselves scarce in double-quick time.’

A trifle of Claud’s earlier triumph resurfaced, and he heard the excited exclamations of the girls with growing pleasure at the havoc he had wrought. The greater the uproar, the more the Countess would bring up her batteries against him. But he would be ready for her!

Claud absently watched his sister and cousins huddle in the space between the furniture, their chattering voices subdued for the moment. His attention was claimed by his cousin Ralph, who lifted an eyebrow at him.

‘You promised me hell in a tea cup, dear coz, but I never dreamed you meant it! Won’t you present me to your bride?’

Claud looked to Kitty, and found her eyes shifting from the female coterie in close conversation to Ralph’s remarkably similar features. He almost went to her, but in time recalled that ridiculous assertion made by his young cousin Tess.

‘Kitty!’

The brown gaze met his warily. ‘Yes?’

‘My cousin Ralph. He’s Kate’s brother and the head of the Rothleys.’

Kitty found herself looking into a face that seemed all too familiar. There was a gleam at this man’s brown eyes, which she saw with a little shiver of remembrance, though she could not have met him before. Then he smiled, and the cynical look gave way to one of amusement.

‘Well, well. Had I met you as Claud did, I’d not answer for it that I wouldn’t have taken you for my sister too.’ He held out a hand. ‘How d’you do? Not that I need ask. You’d have to be a saint not to sink under the shenanigans Claud has unleashed in this house!’

She took his hand, but was prevented from replying by the expletive issuing from Claud’s lips.

‘Hang it, Ralph, I’d have thought you at least would have appreciated the beauty of it all! Am I the only one to wish to see the Countess served in her own coin?’

‘She is not, I thank God, my mother,’ returned his cousin. ‘It has a certain appeal, for all that. If only I had not been chosen for the role of general comforter.

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