My Kind of Earl

by Vivienne Lorret

  Frowning, Raven asked, “But what does Mayhew have to do with any of it?”

  “Only time will tell. He could be the key to everything, or it could come to nothing.” The earl shrugged, unconcerned. “Regardless, you’re still my grandson.”

  Raven expelled an impatient breath.

  Warrister chuckled and slapped the meat from the nutshell into his palm then popped it into his mouth, chewing it with a twinkle-eyed grin. “You’re just as stubborn as your father.

  “I remember the day Edgar came into this very room to tell me he’d decided to marry a French girl he met by happenstance,” Warrister continued, a reminiscent smile on his lips. “His mother and I had chosen a debutante from a good family, but he wouldn’t have her. Edgar and I had our share of words that day, but he’d never wavered. Just stood there with his fists and jaw clenched.” He arched a brow and made an offhand gesture to Raven’s own posture. “But it turned out that he was right all along. Arabelle proved to be a kind, caring and loyal woman. She looked at my son as if the heavens and earth had converged to form one perfect person. Much like the way Miss Pickerington looks at you, I imagine.”

  Raven forced himself to keep a neutral expression. But in the center of his chest, he felt that painful, burning harpooning again. “I’m sure I wouldn’t know.”

  Warrister chuckled again. Easing back against the leather upholstery of his winged-back chair, he steepled his fingers. “Are you going to marry the gel? If you are, you’ll need the title to satisfy her father. And she has plenty of brothers and sisters for whom to set an example.”

  “You’ve been spying, it seems.”

  “I have my sources.”

  “Well, you can’t use her to badger me into being introduced as Merrick Northcott at Aversleigh’s ball,” Raven said, straightening his shoulders. “I’ll go there as myself and as your grandson, if you like, but I don’t want the title. And I don’t need it either because I’m not planning to marry. At all.”

  For the first time all afternoon, Warrister’s smile fell. “It will be your duty to carry on the Northcott line with legitimate heirs. Miss Pickerington comes from a robust family line. However, if you don’t want her, I’ll find someone else for you.”

  “I don’t want any wife,” Raven said with an irritated swipe of his hand in the air as he began to pace the floor. “I’ve been intimately acquainted with a number of them and, let’s just say, I wouldn’t be willing to share. I keep what’s mine.”

  The years he’d been the plaything of Mrs. Devons and her friends had left a sour taste on the back of his tongue when it came to the notion of marriage. In addition, there were countless society wives who’d whispered propositions in his ear at Sterling’s while their husbands played hazard in the next room.

  “I see,” Warrister said, thoughtfully staring into the fire. “Then I suggest you end your acquaintance with your . . . Jane, as you called her. She’s likely to have misunderstood your intentions. And too long in any gentleman’s company, without explanation, will not bode well for her reputation.”

  After last night in the library, Raven knew the earl was right.

  He couldn’t risk seeing Jane again. If she’d meant nothing to him, he never would have stopped. He’d have taken her, there on the map table. But the very fact that he had stopped told him that his initial feelings of merely liking her had turned into a genuine affection.

  If he gave himself over to it, he’d become vulnerable. There’d be no telling when the rug’d be pulled out from under his feet. That’s what would happen. That’s what always happened.

  So, from now on, it was better if he just kept his distance.

  “It’s already done and over,” he said with a tight shrug and went back to the window to stare blindly at the traffic in the square.

  Behind him, Warrister cracked another nut. “I’m sure Aversleigh will be delighted to hear that. He has a son your age, Lord Manning, a widower without an heir. He doesn’t keep much society, though. Bookish sort of fellow. From what I gather, however, Miss Pickerington had made quite an impression on him this past spring. Apparently, she said something or other that inspired an idea to improve the condensing engine he’d been building for some time.”

  Raven twisted around, biting back a low growl in his throat. “And why are you telling me this?”

  “No reason,” Warrister said flippantly. “Other than knowing that the two of them will be attending the same dinner at the Duke of Tuttlesby’s tomorrow evening. If you like, I could garner you an invitation. Tuttlesby is an old friend.”

  Incredulous, Raven almost wanted to laugh. “I don’t need an invitation. As I said, there’s nothing between Jane—Miss Pickerington,” he corrected, “and myself.”

  The old codger merely smiled in response.

  * * *

  Dearest Jane,

  Your last letter saved me from another visit with the widow and her spinster daughter down the lane. As I write this response, I am blissfully alone in the parlor where I can pretend this is a mere visit with my aunt and uncle instead of a life sentence.

  As you may have surmised by my lack of mentioning the topic of Lord F— in these past four letters, I have been at sixes and sevens since his unexpected presence in the village. His pursuit has been nothing more than a plague upon my conscience.

  Thankfully, I need not worry about him any longer. After our last meeting, he went away without a word, and his lack of correspondence indicates that I shall never hear from him again. I am relieved, of course. Indisputably relieved.

  Your friend,

  Prudence Thorogood

  Standing in the pale November light, Ellie lowered the letter and crumpled it to her bosom. She stepped away from the garret window in slow, mournful steps. “My heart is breaking for her. To have this terrible man pursue her at such lengths goes beyond the pale! Well, that settles it—I shall speak with my aunts about a long visit with Prue when winter ends. And I shall write to her more than thrice per week.”

  “I shall do the same.” Jane nodded and continued perusing the assortment of trunks in search of the one containing the ball gown from her presentation at court two years ago.

  However, in the back of her mind, her thoughts were similar to Prue’s.

  Raven hadn’t returned. She thought that, after the evening they’d shared, he would have awakened yesterday morning wanting to see her with the same yearning that she felt.

  For the purpose of the primer, she tried to describe the sensation. But there were no words. It was more of a feeling. She likened it to being one of the clematis vines that covered trees in the corner of the conservatory. They grew quickly, tendrils reaching out blindly to seek purchase on the branch of a neighbor tree, connecting them both in an autumn flowering arch.

  Logically, she knew she wasn’t a vine on a tree. Even so, she felt herself reaching out blindly, waiting for Raven to take her hand.

  But deep inside, she feared that he would stay away again. He seemed to only want to get so close before he put distance between them.

  “How is the scoundrel portion of our book faring? Did you receive those chapters that Winnie promised?” Ellie asked, trying on a feathered bonnet from atop a dressmaker’s dummy. Tying the green ribbons around her neck, she stepped over to the oval standing mirror to pose like a sketch from La Belle Assemblée.

  “I did, and they will be quite useful. However, I am not of the belief that Lord Holt belongs in the scoundrel portion of the book,” Jane said, avoiding mention of her own study of a true scoundrel and the worries that were plaguing her. “And what about your hunt for a certain gentleman neighbor?”

  Ellie issued a disconsolate sigh in response and began searching through another trunk. “George recently returned from the country and he has been in a fractious mood ever since. I don’t know what to make of it.”

  It seemed that all three of them—Jane, Ellie and Prue—were having similar experiences with the men in their lives.

  B
ehind her, Ellie clapped and said, “Jane! I’ve found your gown!”

  Turning, her breath caught as her gaze skimmed over yards and yards—well, perhaps not too many yards considering she was so short—of pale silvery-blue taffeta, spilling down to a Vandyked hem. “I’d forgotten how lovely it was.”

  “You’re so silly,” Ellie commented with a grin on her lips. “Don’t you realize that this is the precise color of your scoundrel’s eyes?”

  Jane blushed, only now realizing why she’d been determined to wear this gown to the ball. Because it reminded her of Raven.

  But was he her scoundrel?

  When she first began her research for the primer, she never would have wondered such a thing. Her study of scoundrels had begun with perfectly sound reasoning.

  Now, she worried that she was perilously close to losing her head.

  Therefore, she decided at once that it was time to resume her dedicated focus on the primer.

  “That will do nicely,” she said, adopting a neutral tone. “What do you think I should wear to the Duke of Tuttlesby’s dinner tonight?”

  Ellie scoffed. “I thought you said you were going to claim a headache and stay home. After all, how could either of us be in the room with that horrid Mr. Woodbine after the way he treated our Winnie when they were betrothed? Well, not unless we were planning to poison him.”

  Jane considered the possibility for a moment or two.

  Then she shook her head. “No. Winnie is content. And surely, we must be beyond the timeframe when poisoning would have been appropriate.”

  “Hmm . . . true.” Ellie sighed, forlorn. “I hope I do not look back on a life of misspent opportunities. Then again, who’s to say I don’t have a terrible carriage accident on my way home? It could be that all I’ll have to show for my efforts to marry George is a gravestone in the family plot not too far from his own.”

  “Fear not. I would plant flowers that would bloom all year for you, and design a mechanical watering device that would be powered by the wind so they would never wither.”

  “Thank you ever so.” Ellie laughed and found another gown. “You’d look smashing in the cerise gown this evening. It is the color of love. Perhaps it will inspire one of the gentlemen there to woo you.”

  “I shan’t hold my breath. I recall wearing that last spring with little success, other than an invigorating chat about condensing engines with Lord Manning. And then, afterwards, I never saw him again for the rest of the Season.”

  “Well, with any luck, it will inspire the right man to do more than just talk.”

  “The right man,” Jane murmured, holding the gown at arm’s length as if eyeing it critically. In the back of her mind, however, she was still thinking about Raven.

  “Would you like to hear something amusing?” Ellie asked, digging toward the bottom of the trunk to find the matching slippers. “Ever since I was here for tea with you and your scoundrel, I started to wonder if you were falling in love with him . . .”

  Jane went still, but her head started to spin like a whirligig. She felt giddy and somewhat nauseous as if she were going to laugh and vomit at the same time.

  “. . . he is handsome, after all,” her friend continued, oblivious, her voice echoing inside the trunk. “And scads of rakish appeal. I even admit that my own heart fluttered. But, of course, no one could ever take George’s place.”

  The truth came to Jane in that same mysterious way that brought pages of text to the forefront of her mind. Suddenly she knew an answer without ever having asked herself the question.

  And she, who had begun her research in part to find evidence of love, had somehow stumbled upon it without having taken a single note.

  “Oh, Ellie,” she said, mystified. “I do believe I am.”

  Chapter 26

  It was the most frustrating evening of Raven’s life. He never should have come to the Duke of Tuttlesby’s dinner party in the first place.

  Yesterday, he’d left Warrister’s town house feeling completely sure of himself. Only to return early this morning to beg for a bloody introduction to Tuttlesby and gain an invitation to His Grace’s dinner. The earl hadn’t even bothered to hide his merriment.

  So, before Raven had left, he’d said, “This changes nothing.”

  To that, the old codger had grinned. “Of course not.”

  Arriving at Tuttlesby’s soiree, he’d met a pompous windbag named Woodbine, an assortment of accomplished debutantes—or so their parents said—and a certain Lord Manning.

  But no Jane.

  He felt duped. Manipulated. He thought Warrister had planned the whole thing.

  After dinner, they all gathered in the parlor. Raven’s irritation only mounted as Lord Manning took him into his confidence to wax poetic about the brilliant Miss Pickerington. By all accounts, she was his muse for the engine improvements he’d created. And, while Manning droned on and on, Raven had the unsettling picture in his mind of Jane and Manning standing in the conservatory, surrounded by their dozen children.

  “I’d hoped to see her this evening,” Manning said, cleaning the golden-rimmed spectacles against the knee of his trousers. “But I learned, shortly before I arrived, that Lord and Lady Hollybrook had sent their apologies, stating their daughter was unwell.”

  The news sent a shock through Raven, banishing all the hot irritation and turning it cold. He never even thought she could be ill.

  He stood and, without begging anyone’s pardon, left to fetch Sterling’s horse from the stables. Then he rode to Westbourne Green in the light of the full moon, under a cold midnight sky.

  He never expected to see a light within the Holly House conservatory, the frosty window glass aglow from within.

  He rubbed his hand in a circle on the pane and peered inside to find Jane at her desk, her pen fervently scribbling over a sheet of paper.

  Tapping on the glass, he saw her head turn instantly. And as she walked to the door, he was perplexed to see her dressed in a deep red gown, her hair gradually coming undone from a coiffure. She appeared as though she’d gone out this evening.

  “I thought you were unwell,” he said the instant she opened the door.

  She looked at him queerly, tilting her head to the side. “That is an odd way of greeting me. What would give you cause to believe I’m ill?”

  “Apparently, everyone at the Duke of Tuttlesby’s dinner party.”

  “Oh, that.” With an absent shrug, she latched the door behind him, then proceeded to walk back to her desk. “I had a pressing matter on my mind so I claimed a headache. But wait.” She stopped on the path and turned back to him, eyes wide. “Were you there?”

  “Is it so hard to believe that I was invited? And besides, wasn’t that the purpose of your lessons?”

  “Well, yes. I mean, no. I—” she stammered perplexedly. “I only wanted you to find a level of comfort in society.”

  Crowded by vines and branches, he took her by the shoulders to turn her around, gesturing with a wave of his hand for her to proceed toward the clearing.

  “Were you aware that I’d planned to attend before you went, or was this mere happenstance?” she asked once they reached her desk.

  Issuing a noncommittal grunt, he walked by her to the stove, sloshing the kettle to ensure there was enough water for a cup of tea. Then he lifted the curfew and stuffed a few fresh pieces of kindling inside.

  When he faced her again, her lips slowly began to curl up at the corner. “You did know, didn’t you? That’s the reason you went to that stuffy old duke’s party.”

  Feeling like seven kinds of fool, he sidestepped the question and jerked his chin toward her desk. “So, what’s your pressing matter?”

  “Oh, simply a chart of progression. It is always difficult to accurately number every part of the process after a result has been unexpectedly obtained.”

  He didn’t know what she was talking about but it was better than him having to explain the reasons he’d gone to the duke’s dinner. “Let
me help, then. Talk through the stages and we’ll number them together.”

  “Hmm. Yes, you would offer the best assistance in this particular matter. Sometimes you know my thoughts better than I do.” Distracted from her interrogation, she studied the page in earnest. “Now, I do not believe it began in the brothel; however, I cannot discount the initial spark of interest. This, as you know, led me to study your person in such depth as to scrutinize your brown thread.”

  He felt his brow pucker in bemusement and he chuckled, still ignorant of her topic. “Yes, I recall the moment.”

  “Then later in your bedchamber,” she continued, “there were those instances when you were attempting to shock me. I admit, I had been shocked. But, more importantly, I had felt another spark. At the time, I’d passed it off as mere curiosity. Until I saw your books. Then I felt something else that I could not define. It was only later that I gave it a label of admiration.”

  “Admiration,” he parroted, feeling the warmth from the stove blanket him.

  “I’ve always admired you for creating a life out of nothing and pushing through every obstacle in your path. You’re quite an exceptional man.”

  He stared down at her profile and knew that it wasn’t the fire making him warm.

  The tip of her finger absently drifted over her notes. “Seeing all your positive qualities, here on the page—not to mention how those sparks of interest turned into something far more earth-shattering on the map table—I cannot fathom how the conclusion evaded my consciousness for so long.”

  “And what conclusion is that, exactly?”

  From over the top of the paper, she blinked at him as if bewildered by the question. “Why, that I love you of course. I’ve been trying to figure out when I first fell. It’s a vital component for my research.”

  She came up to him and shared the page, her puckered brow and pursed lips so earnest that she didn’t seem to realize that he’d gone still. Or that he’d stopped breathing.