A Midsummer Night's Sin. Kasey Michaels
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complimented as the coach pulled into a narrow alleyway and stopped just outside a stable. “Perhaps even too good. You’ve the makings of a commendable liar, Regina.”
“Yes, I know. It’s in my blood,” she said forlornly as he opened the door and jumped out, even before the coach had come to a complete halt.
While Doris Ann sat sniffling, Regina did her best to concentrate on the fib—the great, big, whopping lie—she would tell her mother. Except that her mother had been left alone with her “company,” and even if the wine had been watered, by this time of night she would be of no help to Regina or to anybody.
And her father? Regina felt her stomach turn over inside her. No, her father wouldn’t be at home when she arrived in any case. How she loathed the man. He was as base and as common and as uncouth as … as any man who would sink to attending such a licentious ball.
She reminded herself that Robin Goodfellow had been there.
This did nothing to lighten her mood, which was rapidly descending into the very depths of desolation.
Yet Miranda’s brother had received an invitation. There were bound to have been other men, supposed gentlemen of the ton, in attendance.
Were all men so base?
It really was too bad she had no desire to enter a nunnery….
“Miss Regina? How can we go home without Miss Miranda? Her mama will be that upset, and his lordship will go spare, he really will.”
Regina reached up and at last untied her mask, tossing it out of the dropped-down coach window with some force. “My uncle Seth will have every right to go—that is, to be angry. Terrified. But we must think of Miss Miranda, Doris Ann. We will think of her, and we will be brave. If not entirely honest,” she added, squeezing the maid’s hand.
“Yes, miss. And how will you explain Mr. Goodfellow?”
Regina opened her mouth to answer and then shut it again before making a decision. “He said he would handle the broad strokes. We’ll leave that up to him, shall we? Now quiet, please, I hear footsteps. Yes, here he comes.”
Regina sat forward on the cushion seat and squinted into the darkness, waiting for him to step into the moonlight so that she could finally see his face without that extraordinary mask. She probably would one day convince herself that it was the mask that had destroyed her common sense, that its odd design had somehow enthralled her into doing something she would otherwise have never considered. That her compliance had nothing to do with his pleasant, cultured voice or the way he had placed his hands on her shoulders and nearly caused her heart to stop or the mischief she’d seen in his intelligent blue-green eyes.
It was either that or believing that Grandmother Hackett had taken up permanent residence on her shoulder.
“Oh …” Regina blinked, looked again. “Oh, my goodness.”
He was the most handsome man she’d ever seen. Now that she could really see him. He was still dressed mostly in black, but his shirt and his faultlessly tied cravat were startlingly white in the moonlight and he had tied back his long, blond hair somehow. He was English, she was certain of that, but he had a nearly foreign look to him: so very neat, sophisticated, compellingly romantic. The gold-lined cloak was gone, as was the beribboned walking stick that had dropped to the ground when he’d been kissing her, to free his hands so that he could— No, she would forget that, too. She would forget all of that!
He stopped, bent down and picked up the discarded mask before opening the door of the coach. “Lesson number two, fair Titania. Never leave incriminating evidence strewn about for all to see. If you’d kindly pass over the two dominos and your cousin’s mask? Ah, thank you. Gaston!”
A second figure appeared, seemingly from nowhere, and Mr. Goodfellow tossed the evidence at him as the fellow exclaimed in French, scrambling for the green mask, which had eluded him and fallen to the ground.
“My apologies, Gaston. I have no experience in throwing clothing. Only in catching it, si vous prenez ma signification. Burn them, and stir the ashes,” he instructed the servant, who then hustled back into the shadows.
Inside the coach, Regina had recovered herself sufficiently to roll her eyes at the man’s outrageous behavior. But any feelings of superiority vanished immediately when he bounded into the coach and plunked himself down beside her.
He looked good. He smelled delicious. This was no boy; this was a man. Very much a man. And he was gazing at her in open appreciation.
“Stop looking at me that way. My cousin has gone missing,” she reminded him.
“And yet I have not been struck blind,” he responded just as quickly. “You are as beautiful unmasked as you were mysterious half-concealed. Doris Ann, close your mouth. Your mistress and I are flirting. Aren’t we, Regina?”
“We most certainly are not! And you aren’t to call me Regina, any more than I will agree to continue addressing you as Mr. Robin Goodfellow. What a ridiculous name.”
He put his crossed hands to his breast as if mortally wounded. “You mock my name? My not precisely sainted mother will be devastated, I’m sure, as she so loves it.”
Regina didn’t know if she could believe the man, even if he’d told her the sky was blue. “Oh, she did not. I mean, she does not. Stop grinning like that! You’re an impossible man.”
“Yes, I know. Very well, you may call me Mr. Blackthorn. Robin Goodfellow Blackthorn.”
Regina felt hot color flooding her cheeks. “Then you weren’t lying?”
“Not completely, no. And now if you will return the favor?”
“Return the— Oh. Hackett. I am Regina Hackett. My cousin is Lady Miranda Burnham, daughter of Viscount Ranscome and granddaughter of the Earl of Mentmore.”
“E-gods, all of that? And yet we’re still missing one important fact. Two, actually. Where should I be instructing my coachman to drive us, hmm?”
Regina had been giving that some thought. Her mother was less than useless by this time of night, and with luck could be persuaded upon rising tomorrow that she had indeed accompanied Regina and Miranda this evening. She’d feel more confident if she had a few lemon squares tucked up in her reticule, but her mother could be convinced she’d already eaten them. Regina wasn’t proud of these facts or of using her mother’s problem so shamelessly, but these were desperate times, and desperate measures were in order.
“I reside for the Season in Berkeley Square, but we will be dropping my mother off there and continuing on our way, seeing as how the poor woman is completely overset by the recent terrible events and must take to her bed with a strong dose of laudanum. We will then drive directly to my grandfather’s domicile at Number Twenty-three Cavendish Square, where we will explain all to Miranda’s parents. My grandfather, I’m relieved to say, remains in the country, suffering from the gout, so we may see either Aunt Claire or Uncle Seth or, if we are to be extremely unlucky, both of them. What is the other important fact?”
“I’m not sure. I’m still attempting to wade through all those names and titles. Oh, I remember now, and you’ve already answered it. Your mother accompanied you and your cousin this evening? I look forward to hearing how you’ll convince her to go along with your lie.”
Regina shot a quick look at Doris Ann, who was coughing into her fist. “That is my problem, Mr. Blackthorn, and I will handle it. Now, please instruct your coachman, as I wish to arrive in Cavendish Square to hear what information it is you learned at the ball and have thus far refused to share with me.”
“It’s a tale that should not have any telling, not even in Cavendish Square, but if you will allow for some small changes and keep your silence except to sniffle sorrowfully a time or two in the correct spots, it is one I wish to tell only once.”
“I am sorrowful! I’m frantic.”
“You