The Passion of an Angel. Kasey Michaels

swiveled around to look up at him, her hands deep in the basket as she went about unearthing the roasted chicken the marquess had promised her she would find there. “That doesn’t seem very Christian.”

      “Neither does Henry VIII’s edict dissolving the monasteries, but that’s what it says here. It seems the monk, who was driven out of Battle Abbey, was ejected quite personally by the first owner of Cowdray House. Obviously the monk wasn’t about to simply forgive the man and turn the other cheek. It took a few centuries, but the curse finally worked.”

      “Well, I think that’s stupid,” Prudence declared, un-daintily but effectively ripping the legs off the roasted chicken and placing one on each of the two plates she had spread on the blanket. “More than two hundred years passed between the laying on of the curse and the destruction of this place. That would be the same as blaming the discovery of the American continent for the war that eventually severed the colonists’ ties with England.”

      “Logic, from an infant. Angel, I am impressed.” Daventry came to join her on the blanket, kneeling beside her—too close beside her, for she could once again smell the cologne he wore, its scent tickling her nose and doing something extraordinarily strange to her insides.

      “Have a chicken leg,” she ordered, picking up his plate and nearly jamming it against his nose. Damn her short-sighted brother! Didn’t he know he’d picked her a rutting old man for a guardian? And how could he have forgotten that she was no longer a child, but a woman, a woman who had seen precious little of handsome, charming men? Why couldn’t her brother have given her over to Wellington or some sympathetic peeress? But no. He had to pick the Marquess of Daventry. A worldly, witty, at times bitingly sarcastic, yards too self-assured man with entirely too-intriguing green eyes and a boyish smile that turned her knees to water…

      First he shows up almost nine months too late to be of any help at all, and now he makes noises like he can barely abide me half the time, while he is not only being nice to me but is also near to drooling over me the other half of the time. Let him buy me gowns? Oh yes. But first I want a night rail—one that covers my toes and buttons all the way to my ears!

      “Shall I continue to read as we eat?” Banning asked, removing himself and his plate to the far side of the blanket, his expression telling her that he was questioning why he had knelt down beside her in the first place. “I could tell you about the sadly mutilated carving of the arms of King Henry—who actually visited on this spot in 1538—that is still visible above the entrance arch of the hall porch. Or perhaps we could do as is advised on this page, and stroll down to Benbow Pond after our meal—there, to the east, along that footpath—and indulge in partaking of the delightful views visible across the valley of the Rother.”

      “I’d rother not, thank you,” Prudence told him cheekily, pleased to see that he, too, was disconcerted by the events of the past few minutes—if she wasn’t totally overreacting to what she believed to be his very unguardian-like behavior. “I’d much prefer to sit here and listen to you tell me how long it will be before we reach London. Lightning is in no danger now that your man has found a mare to feed him, so I figure on three or four days and nights on the road, as the poor little thing still can’t be confined to the wagon for too many hours a day.”

      “That’s about right, three days and two nights. We’ll pass the nights in Milford and Epsom, and arrive at Freddie’s by nightfall of the third day. It will be a slow progress, but we’ll get there eventually.”

      “Each mile that takes me farther from MacAfee Farm is cause for rejoicing. Goodness, I’m thirsty!” She was feeling slightly more in control of herself now that the marquess was not so close, but watching him eat, delighting in gnawing at the chicken leg as if he were a schoolboy on holiday, was not making her attempts at general conversation easier.

      Banning set down the chicken leg, wiped his greasy fingers on a linen serviette, and reached inside the basket for the bottle of wine she had seen there, nestled beside a small jug of lemonade she supposed he expected her to drink. She watched him struggle to uncork the bottle, then she quickly held out both glasses, daring him to deny her what he was taking for himself.

      “You are too young for anything save watered wine,” he said, holding the bottle upright. “Or are you now going to tell me that Shadwell refused to clothe you yet kept you in strong spirits?”

      “I drank what was to hand,” Prudence told him, feeling herself growing angry, and thankful for the feeling because it seemed easier to deal with the marquess from the position of adversary. “Ale, wine, port, brandy, even gin. Although I heartily dislike port, and too much ale makes my teeth numb and my nose itch. Still and all, plenty were the times it was safer than the water from the well. Come on, Daventry, pour me a glass. I won’t disgrace you by falling into my cups so that you have to fling me over your shoulder like a sack and haul me back to the inn. Besides, you’ve already broken one rule of guardianship by bringing me out here without a chaperone. What’s a little wine after that?”

      Banning tipped his head to one side, his green eyes twinkling in a way that made her wonder if, perhaps, somewhere deep inside himself, he was as young as she. “Very well, Angel, if you promise to breathe most heavily directly in Miss Prentice’s face once we get back to the inn. I believe I’d rather enjoy watching her blanch.”

      Prudence held out the glasses again, stubbornly keeping them there until he’d filled both of them to the brim. “Blanch, is it?” she said, giggling. “And how do you suppose we could tell? She’s already as sickly white as the underbelly of a fish. How does your sister abide such a dedicated pain in the rump? I’d had tossed the woman out dog’s years ago if she were mine.”

      “You’d have to know my sister to understand. If there ever was a woman who should be called ‘angel,’ it’s Freddie. Rodney, Freddie’s late husband, had employed Miss Prentice as housekeeper before the wedding, and when Rodney died Miss Prentice saw the chance to move herself up a notch, to become Freddie’s companion. She doesn’t like the woman, and never did, but if Rodney chose her, then Freddie doesn’t believe she can get rid of her. My sister is sweet and loving and gentle—but if she were to develop a bit of a backbone, I wouldn’t complain.”

      Prudence took a deep, satisfying sip of the still cool wine. “Put some starch in her spine? I’ll take care of it,” she said in all sincerity, believing she should offer something in return for her rescue from Shadwell. “It’s the least I can do, seeing as how your sister offered to take me in. And,” she added, feeling daring, “in return, you can take me to St. Bartholomew’s Fair. My brother says—said it’s magnificent, and would suit me to a cow’s thumb.”

      “If you like crowds, the smell of unwashed flesh, gaudy trinkets, fakers, pickpockets, and rancid kidney pies, I suppose it is magnificent,” Banning said before sinking his white teeth into the glistening red flesh of an apple he’d pulled from the basket. “However,” he continued moments later, speaking around a mouthful of the fruit, “as your time is going to be filled with dancing lessons, fittings, morning visits, and the like, I believe we shall both simply have to forgo partaking of this particular delight. As your guardian, although I will not be in your company more than I have to be once I deliver you into Freddie’s hands, I cannot approve. Sorry.”

      And with that single statement, Prudence felt all her enjoyment of the morning disappear.

      “No, you’re not in the least bit sorry, so don’t lie to me! Leave it to a man to ruin everything—as men always do! Just when you start feeling comfortable, they take themselves off!” Prudence shot back at him, scrambling to her feet and giving the picnic basket a quick kick. She tossed off the remainder of her wine, just daring him to say something cutting about her manners, and ordered him to repack the basket, as she was anxious to get back to see if Lightning was faring well under the coachman’s care.

      She had taken no more than three steps when she felt Daventry’s hands come down on her shoulders, halting her where she stood. “Let me go, my lord, before I do you an injury,” she warned, unshed tears stinging her eyes because she had begun to like him, just a little bit, and now he had gone and turned