Meg was a baron’s sister, not a maid, but it was futile to argue with her when she was in this mood. He’d try to talk some sense into her later.
* * *
“You are as stubborn as a mule,” Elliot said, the following morning as he sat across from his sister, eating breakfast.
She spread marmalade on her toast and grinned.
“It’s not funny, Meg.” He reached across the table and turned her hands palm side up. “You have blisters.”
“Tell me something, Elliot. When I read your letter last month, I could sense the pride you felt after you and Mr. McWilliams transplanted bushes and planted bulbs. Admit it. Admit the satisfaction you felt afterward. When I look at the library, I feel the same way. Tell me why you’re dressed in rough wool trousers and a Guernsey sweater this morning?”
He opened his mouth, but she held up a hand. “I know why. You intend to go into the garden and work there because it gives you a sense of accomplishment.”
True. “Have you ever thought of becoming a barrister?”
Meg frowned. “You know women are not allowed.”
“I bet if you argue that injustice, you might win that point as well. You’re too damned stubborn for your own good.” He stood. He was getting nowhere arguing with his sister. Needing to burn off some steam, he strode from the room. As he stepped outside, he pulled his leather work gloves out of his back pocket. The scent of grass and freshly turned soil filled the early morning air.
Even in his piss-poor mood, he smiled at the sight of the garden below the terrace. Meg was right about one thing, seeing what he and Mr. McWilliams had done over the last few months did give him a sense of pride. The crushed-stone walkways were lined with flowering bulbs; while some spring bushes dropped spent flowers, others were budding. Seeing a shovel leaning against a concrete bench, he picked it up, and with the heel of his boot, Elliot jabbed the metal edge into the ground around a dead bush.
An hour later, he glanced up at the back of Ralston House. From where he stood, he could see Meg inside the blue drawing room again, washing the windows.
As a child, Meg had been stubborn, but now she acted simply unreasonable. He mumbled a curse.
Zeb, who laid a couple of yards away in a patch of grass, opened one eye.
“I thought you were stubborn,” Elliot said to the animal. “But my sister has you beat by a mile. She cannot stay here.” He thrust the shovel farther into the soil and tried to lift the root ball out of the ground. “Perhaps I should drag her back to school before I attend the Hathaways’ house party.” He peered at the dog, who now had both bloodshot eyes open. “What do you think?”
“Does the dog usually answer you, my lord?” Mr. McWilliams asked.
Elliot glanced over his shoulder at the gardener, who strode toward him, pushing a wheelbarrow. The man’s weathered face donned a wide smirk. Over the last several months, Elliot and the old geezer had attained a more relaxed relationship with each other. The man knew a great deal about gardening and had taught Elliot everything from composting to transplanting.
“I don’t want to hear any of your sarcasm today.” He rammed the shovel deep, releasing the bush from its underground tethers.
The man laughed. “In a testy mood, are ye, laddie?”
“If you had a mule-headed sister like mine you’d be cranky as well.” Elliot put his weight into prying the root ball out of the ground. The dead bush toppled over. The brittle branches snapped as it landed on its side.
“I’ve got seven sisters, my lord. All still living, too.”
“Good God, seven? They should canonize you.”
Together, they lifted the dead bush and placed it into the wheelbarrow. Elliot drew the sleeve of his shirt over his damp forehead.
“Worse, I was the only boy,” McWilliams said. “You know what it’s like to have seven older sisters who all think they are your mother?”
“I can imagine. Purgatory?”
“At times, but I wouldn’t have traded any one of them for the world.”
“I don’t want to trade Meg; I only want her to return to school. Is that such a terrible request?”
“I don’t see her as much different than you, my lord.”
Elliot stared at the man as he brushed the dirt off his leather work gloves. “How is that?”
“Everyone wants to feel useful. I think this is her way of feeling a sense of accomplishment. She’s probably been told most of her life that she cannot accomplish tasks. She wants to prove she can.”
“I never told her she couldn’t do things.”
The old man arched a bushy gray brow. “Maybe you never said it in so many words, but perhaps the way you’ve treated her?”
“I haven’t . . .” Or had he? Elliot glanced back at where his sister continued to scrub at the thick grime on the windows.
“Maybe all she wants is to feel useful. Or prove to you she is capable of what others can achieve.”
Hadn’t Meg told him the same thing? Elliot nodded, set the shovel into the wheelbarrow, and marched toward the house.
Inside, Meg turned when he entered the blue drawing room. Her gaze flicked to his before she continued running her soiled rag over the filthy panes. Rivulets of dirty water slid down the glass.
“I don’t wish to argue with you anymore.” She dunked the rag into the water and wrung it out.
After the accident, since Meg had learned to walk again, Elliot always rushed over to her when he entered a room, so she would not have to limp over to him. He forced his feet to stop and put out his hand. “Please, come here, Meg.”
She set the rag onto the wide sill. As he watched her move toward him, Elliot fought the urge to rush to her side or tell her to be careful. Perhaps McWilliams was right. Perhaps Elliot made Meg feel incomplete. That thought wrenched at his heart. He’d never meant to do that. Perhaps he only tried to shelter her or makes things easier for her because of the guilt that held on to him like a metal clamp.
Meg set her hand in his and frowned as if she thought there would be a repeat of the argument from earlier this morning.
He cleared his throat. “I’ll be leaving in a few short hours for London. I have a business appointment with Talbot, and then I’m to attend a house party.”
She wrinkled her nose, most likely over his mention of Talbot, or perhaps because he smelled of the manure from the garden soil. “I will return in a month’s time. You may stay here while I’m away.”
“Really?” She smiled.
“Yes.” He glanced around the room. “Forgive me if I haven’t told you how proud I am of what you’ve accomplished.”
Her smile broadened. “Thank you.”
“But when I return, we will take up the conversation again about you returning to school.”
Meg’s lips pinched into a tight line, but she didn’t say anything.
Chapter Eleven
The carriage had barely come to a stop in front of Lord and Lady Hathaway’s country residence when two liveried footmen rushed out to assist Nina, Caroline, and James.
“Nina!” someone called out.
She turned. Her dearest friend, Victoria, who was also Lord Elliot Ralston’s cousin, walked arm in arm with him. The memory of his softly spoken words only seconds before he’d exited her family’s London house drifted through her mind. Oh, darling, there is so much I could teach you.
An odd dichotomy of apprehension and titillation coursed through her. The latter another sign that she seemed to gravitate toward scoundrels. If one possessed an inner compass regarding men, hers was broken. Once again, she reminded herself this was nothing more than a game to Elliot. A ruse.
Victoria embraced her and brushed her cheek to Nina’s.
Over her shoulder, Nina heard Elliot greeting her brother and Caroline. Without seeing James’s face, she could imagine the sneer her protective brother was bestowing on the baron.
“I’m so pleased you are better, Victoria.” Nina stepped back and surveyed her friend.
She looked well after having been ill.
“I would have recovered quicker if my mother hadn’t forced me to drink the bitter possets our cook concocted.” Her friend wrinkled her nose.
“Where is your mother?”
“She caught my cold, but after making me drink those unpleasant concoctions, she has refused to even sniff them. I’m here with Great-aunt Gertrude.” Victoria grinned.
Great-aunt Gertrude was close to ninety and napped frequently. She was an abysmal chaperone. Not that Victoria would take advantage of the situation, but it was a break from her domineering mother.
“Hello, Lord Ralston,” Nina said, turning to him. He wore no hat, and his dark hair looked a bit wind tossed, adding to his rakish appeal.
“Lady Nina.” He bowed his head but kept his gaze on her.
Her body tingled, and she forced her regard to return to Victoria.
Her friend glanced at the watch pinned to the bodice of her dress. “Lord Hathaway has planned an excursion to his newest folly. A miniature version of a Greek temple. The tour will start at three o’clock.” Victoria slipped her arm through Nina’s. “Say you will join me. You can bring your sketchbook.”
“I’d love to.”
“Anyone else?” Victoria asked.
James stared at Elliot as if waiting to hear if he intended to participate in the outing before he responded.
“I’ll have to pass. I’ve promised Lord Chambers a game of chess,” Elliot said.
“Do you wish to go, dear?” James asked Caroline.
“No, I’d like to rest a bit.” As if queasy, Caroline set a hand over her stomach.
Nina wondered if Caroline had told James she was most likely with child.
James and Caroline strode toward the country home.
A crested carriage pulled up behind theirs, and the driver jumped down from his perch to assist the occupants.
Lady Amelia Hampton and her cousin Priscilla Grisham alighted the vehicle.
A tight coil of tension twisted at Nina’s muscles. Remembering what the mean-spirited woman had said at the modiste made her hands clench. She forced them to relax.
As if Victoria and Nina were invisible, Amelia greeted Elliot. “Lord Ralston, fancy seeing you here.” The words came out like a purr.
Could the woman be any more obvious? Doubtful.
“Lady Hampton.” He bowed his head.
“Victoria. Nina,” Amelia said, the sensual lilt of her voice absent.
Both Nina and Victoria greeted Amelia and her cousin, who seemed more timid than usual when she mumbled a low hello, while offering a tentative smile. An atrocity that Priscilla allowed her unkind and overbearing cousin to cower her.
“Will Lord Hampton be joining you?” Victoria asked.
Amelia waved a hand in the air. “My husband is busy with estate business in Wiltshire, so I am without him this weekend.” She glanced coquettishly at Elliot.
The thought of Amelia and Elliot together made Nina’s skin crawl. She hoped he had better taste than that. But what did she care beside the point it might spoil her plans to make Fernbridge think Elliot was his competition? Yet, her stomach fluttered as she waited for Elliot’s reaction.
His mouth remained in a straight line.
From what Victoria told her about her cousin, he didn’t dally with married women. Ever.
“I need to get settled,” Amelia said. “I hope I have a bedchamber with a canopy bed. I love the privacy they offer when the curtains are pulled closed. Even servants cannot see you in bed if you don’t wish them to.” She smiled at Elliot again.
Nina realized her mouth was gaping as wide as Victoria’s and snapped it closed.
“Come, Priscilla.” Amelia tapped the area over her thigh as if calling a loyal lapdog to attention.
Amelia strode away, Priscilla trailing after her.
* * *
A half hour later, Caroline’s lady’s maid helped Nina unpack her clothes from her trunk.
“Now, miss, let’s get you out of that dusty traveling dress,” Maggie said. “Do you know what your host and hostess have planned for the day?”
“Lord Hathaway is taking several guests on a tour of the parklands and to visit the new folly he’s had built.” Nina noticed the slight wrinkling of Maggie’s nose at the mention of their host’s name.
“Yes, I know he’s a bit pompous.”
The little lady’s maid’s eyes widened. “Oh, no, miss, I wasn’t thinking that.”
“Ha! Yes, you were, and so was I. And both our thoughts shall not be mentioned outside of this room.”
Grinning, the lady’s maid placed her fingers before her lips as if locking them with a key. She lifted a yellow walking dress out of the trunk. “I think this would be perfect.”
“Yes, I agree.”
The maid pointed to the blue ironstone pitcher and bowl on one of the low mahogany dressers. “There’s fresh water in there, miss. I’ll take this gown belowstairs to run an iron over it and be back shortly.”
The door clicked closed behind the lady’s maid. Nina unfastened the row of buttons lining the front of her traveling dress and stepped out of the garment. After wetting a flannel, she drew the cloth over her arms and face. The cool water felt good against her dusty skin.
Hearing voices outside the open window, Nina parted the sheer under-curtain slightly. Below the window, Amelia Hampton stood on the terrace talking with two other women. From this distance, she couldn’t hear what the nasty gossipmonger was saying, but most likely something disparaging against another guest, perhaps her.
Maggie entered the bedchamber. The smile on the young woman’s face faded. “Something wrong, miss?”
“No. Nothing.”
The maid stepped next to Nina and peered out the window. As if smelling refuse floating in the Thames, Maggie wrinkled her nose. “Lady Huntington told me all about Lady Hampton. You pay her no mind, miss.”
Nina forced a smile at the maid. Knowing Amelia might be spreading caustic lies made the gossipmonger difficult to ignore.
Maggie assisted Nina with her walking gown and was styling her hair when a knock sounded at the door.
“I’ll get it, miss.” Maggie slipped the last pin into Nina’s loose chignon.
Almost bouncing on her toes with excitement, Victoria entered the bedchamber. “Nina, are you ready? Lord Hathaway is a stickler for punctuality. If we are not in the entry hall in five minutes, he will leave without us. I don’t want to miss the tour. You know how I love Greek architecture.”
“I do.” Nina linked her arm with her friend’s, and they started down the corridor to the grand, winding staircase. “I hope Amelia will not be joining us.”
Victoria made a face as though she’d been forced to drink another medicinal posset. “Did you see how she blatantly flirted with Elliot?”
“Do you think . . . Well, is it a possibility he is interested in her?” She didn’t care. Really, she didn’t.
“Doubtful. My cousin might be a rake, but he has better taste than that.”
Nina fiddled with the edge of her sleeve. “I think Amelia is spreading lies about me.”
Victoria stopped walking. “What?”
“I overheard her at Madame LeFleur’s.”
“Why, that witch. What did she say?”
“She mentioned something must be wrong with me for her dear cousin not to offer.”
Her friend’s mouth gaped. “The scoundrel did offer. Perhaps if you ignore her, she will stop her vicious prattle.”
“I thought that as well, but in truth, I’d like to wring her neck.”
They stepped into the entry hall. A party of around fifteen people had formed for the outing. Nina’s gaze sifted through those gathered. Thankfully, Amelia was not in the group. With his blond hair, she spotted the Duke of Fernbridge, nearly immediately. Next to him stood Elliot.
What was he doing here? He’d said he’d already scheduled a chess match.
As if feeling the heat of her rega
rd, Elliot looked at her. His gaze traveled from her face down the length of her body, then back. He flashed one of those wicked smiles he’d perfected.
She found herself smiling back.
Next to her, Victoria tightened her grip on Nina’s arm. “Is something going on with you and Elliot?”
Nina shook her head.
“Then why is my cousin smiling at you like you’re the last dessert on the table and he’s about to snatch you up? Please tell me you aren’t foolish enough to think you could tame him.”
The muscles in Nina’s stomach tensed. Perhaps it would be best if she told Victoria about the plan Elliot had proposed. Otherwise, her friend would think she’d gone daft to allow such a scoundrel to give her too much attention. Victoria might think her daft either way.
Without answering, Nina motioned with a slight tip of her head to Lord Hathaway, who was giving them a reproachful glare for whispering while he addressed the group.
“Let us be off,” their host said.
As they walked through the entry hall and down the wide central corridor to the French doors that led to the back terrace, Elliot shifted through the group, positioning himself next to Nina.
A line creased the smooth skin on Victoria’s forehead. She eyed Elliot suspiciously. “I thought you had a chess match.”
“I canceled it.”
“Really?” Her large blue eyes widened. “Since when are you interested in Grecian architecture?”
“I have great admiration for anything Grecian.”
Victoria gave an indelicate snort. “Since when?”
Lady Pendleton stepped beside Victoria. “I hear your mother is not feeling well, dear.”
Victoria slowed her pace and lagged behind Nina and Elliot as she spoke with the elderly woman.
Elliot flashed another one of his slow smiles. “You look fetching, Nina,” he said in a low voice.
Why did he insist on complimenting her when the Duke of Fernbridge couldn’t hear him? She didn’t like it.
Or perhaps you like it too much, an irritating voice in her head said. “Thank you, but as I said before, there is no need for you to flatter me, Elliot, when His Grace cannot hear you.”
Never Conspire with a Sinful Baron Page 9