“That is appreciated, for I doubt I can throw an arrow and hit the target.” He leaned in close as the maid turned a corner and moved out of sight. “Fare thee well, Adeline.”
“And you, Jasper.”
He turned, strode toward the foyer, and departed the Melton townhouse with a grin that had been absent when he entered not long before. His coach waited in the drive, George in his place with the reins.
“Kebberstone Townhouse,” Jasper shouted, climbing into the coach.
“Kebberstone?” He ignored the surprise in George’s tone. “Right away, m’lord.”
Jasper had little doubt his servant knew the way well. He’d served his father for several years before his sire’s death and had even made the journey to London to collect Jasper’s solicitor when the need arose.
Settling back against the seat, Jasper turned his stare to the fabric-covered ceiling of the coach as it moved evenly back onto the lane and headed toward his townhouse on St. James, the magnitude of his rash—though conscious—decision settling heavily upon his shoulders.
Returning to a townhouse that had been all but deserted since his parents’ deaths, commissioning a proper wardrobe for his stay, and attending his first London ball. A few days prior, Jasper would have never thought to find himself away from the Abbey, let alone making the journey to town.
And it was as if Lord and Lady Melton hadn’t so much as noticed his scars—nor questioned Adeline’s arrival home in the company of a stranger. And how had Adeline not told him her birthday was only a few days off? Not that he’d have done anything with the information. For, certainly, it would be scandalous for him to buy her a gift: flowers, new hair ribbons, a necklace. That was not a stranger’s place.
Perhaps a note of congratulations would be appropriate, for he would have been in Faversham, and she in London.
He could not deny how drastically their situation had altered since that very morning.
“M’lord?”
Jasper opened his eyes and glanced in the direction of George’s voice to find him standing in the open doorway of the coach. Jasper’s mind had wandered so far he hadn’t noticed the conveyance had pulled to a stop, nor George climbing down from his post, or the opening of the door and the light that flooded the interior.
“We have arrived, m’lord.”
“As I can see.” He departed the carriage and glanced up at the three-story townhouse before him. If he’d been here in his youth, he had no recollection of it. “Do you think the servants will be shocked?”
“I won’t be say’n that, but happy they certainly be.”
Happy? To meet a lord they’d never served? To remain all but forgotten in London as Jasper continued on at Faversham?
No, he could not fathom them being happy about getting called into action with no warning by an absent master.
“Let us get on with this,” Jasper mumbled. “I have agreed to attend Miss Adeline’s birthday celebration, and it is imperative I am ready before tomorrow eve.”
Before he reached the set of double doors, they swung open.
Jasper narrowed his eyes, praying they would adjust quickly to the dim interior of the home, to see who stood within.
“Lord Ailesbury? Is that you?” a voice called out. “Well, I’ll be a holly sprig in July.”
A familiar voice. A comforting voice. A voice that even after all these years, Jasper could never forget.
“Conover?” Jasper’s chest tightened, afraid he’d mistaken a distant memory for the present. “It cannot be.”
“It is, my lord, it surely is.” His father’s valet stepped over the threshold of Kebberstone Townhouse, and Jasper wrapped the man in a tight embrace.
“I had no idea you were in London.” Jasper had wondered for years what had happened to his father’s most trusted servant. “I must admit, I am overjoyed to see you.”
“And you, my lord,” Conover bowed. “You have grown into a fine man, if you don’t mind me saying so.”
“I don’t mind at all,” Jasper said with a chuckle. “And your wife, is she within?”
The man nodded, his jowls jumping up and down. “She is, she is. She took over the housekeeping here at Kebberstone. And Mrs. Bays moved with us, too.”
At the mention of Mrs. Bays, his old nursemaid, his stomach rolled, and unease filled him. Her husband, who’d served as the steward in Faversham, died in the fire—because Jasper had been too weak to save him. Unable to save anyone.
He’d always wondered what had happened to the woman. He’d been too young to question her disappearance then, but as he aged, Jasper had assumed she returned to her family—perhaps even remarried and had children.
“We are pleased you are here, my lord.”
Jasper clasped the man on his shoulder as they turned to enter the house. “You might not say that after you hear what is needed and with all due haste.”
“Oh, I assure you, nothing will lessen our excitement to be of service to you, Lord Ailesbury.”
A line of servants stood at attention in the foyer, though Jasper was unsure when they’d been summoned or how they all arrived so quickly. He smiled to Mrs. Bays and Conover’s wife and nodded to several others who were vaguely familiar to him from his youth.
“Delilah, have a room readied for Lord Ailesbury. The master’s room,” Conover commanded. “My lord, can I presume you still enjoy duck soup and apple pie?”
He hadn’t seen the servant in nearly fifteen years, and the man had never been responsible for Jasper, yet he remembered his favored childhood meals.
“Yes, you presume correctly.”
“I will have Cook prepare both.” Conover beamed. “Is there aught else I can do for you, my lord? A bath, perchance? Or…a drink. Yes, I can have whatever liquor you favor brought to…the study, the library, or your chambers—immediately.”
Jasper chuckled, a weight lifting from his shoulders. “Neither is necessary. I am in need of a tailor, though. I have been invited to a ball tomorrow night, and I have need of proper attire.”
Conover tapped his chin in thought. “Well, I can summon—“
“I have been given the name and directions for a tailor favored by Lord and Lady Melton if that helps,” Jasper offered. “I know this is short notice, but I will also need other assorted shirts and trousers, for I have little idea how long I will stay in London.”
“Very good, my lord.” The servant clapped his hands, and the line of staff dispensed, all except Delilah, the butler’s wife. “I will send for the man straight away.”
“Thank you, Conover.” Jasper followed Delilah as she headed toward the stairs.
“My lord?” Conover called.
Jasper halted and faced the servant.
“We are ever so happy you are here.”
“As am I, Conover, as am I.” He continued after Delilah—up the stairs, down a hallway, left turn, and down another corridor to stand before another set of double doors. This pair did not open to reveal a friendly face from his past.
“We kept the room nice, as well as the entire house, my lord.” Delilah paused, her hand on the latch as if debating her next move. “It is just as your parents left it. We were not given any other instructions.”
When Jasper nodded, the housekeeper opened the door, and he faced a nearly full-size portrait of his parents. In the pose, his father stood behind where his mother was positioned in a chair, with a tiny boy seated on the floor beside her.
The child didn’t look familiar at all, though he knew the boy to be him at about age four; however, the man and woman were exactly as Jasper remembered, though his father’s jawline and nose were a bit more severe than he recalled. His mother’s neck more swanlike than his memories held, and her hair far darker than Jasper’s was now.
Other than those trivial discrepancies, they were as Jasper envisioned them. The couple he’d nearly perished trying to save from the fire. The parents who’d called him farther and farther into the fire where they’d been trapped un
der a fallen rafter as the blaze consumed the stable.
Jasper knew, with certainty, he never would have been able to save them. He’d been too young and small, the rafter too heavy for him to lift without assistance, and the fire’s flames far too hot for anyone to sustain enough breath to pull the couple free.
Why did he remember the sound of their voices urging him forward, farther into the burning building? It was the nightmare that woke him night after night for more years than Jasper wanted to count. He’d prayed it was a false memory—a boy’s guilt materializing in his dreams—but he clearly recalled his father shouting at him to save them, that if Jasper only hurried, they would all three be rescued.
But Jasper had not been strong enough, had not had the strength to make it far into the stables before his lungs filled with black smoke and his mind grew hazy and slow. His body had followed suit, and he’d lost consciousness only ten feet into the stables. A servant had pulled him from the fire as the flames licked at his neck, arm, and leg—scorching his skin.
He should have been abed, as should his parents, but instead they were searching the house and stables for Jasper. He’d selected the hidden room under the main stairs that night for his reading hour. He hadn’t been the cause of the fire, yet that did nothing to diminish his guilt at the outcome of it all. It was not his candle that started the first but he was the reason his family perished—they would not have been anywhere close to the stables if Jasper hadn’t been found on many a night sleeping in the rafters.
“Can I have a meal brought up, my lord?”
When Jasper brought his stare to the housekeeper, he noted that she kept her eyes trained on the floor at her feet, as if attempting to give Jasper a moment of privacy, yet suspecting he also needed someone there to pull him from the past to his present.
He cleared his throat and blinked several times to dispel the tears that’d clouded his vision. “I think I shall await word from the tailor in the study.”
If his voice cracked as he spoke, she did not react to it.
“Very well, Lord Ailesbury.” She pulled the door shut and gestured with her arm back toward the stairs. “I will show you the way.”
He held back, allowing her to lead the way. It gave him several more moments to compose himself. Never had he thought the mere image of his parents would bring back so many long-buried memories—or emotions he didn’t remember having.
Perhaps sending his regrets to Lord and Lady Melton and returning to Faversham Abbey would be the best choice for Jasper.
With any hope, Adeline would not even notice his absence. And with time, Jasper would bury the memory of her, just as he had his parents.
Chapter 17
“WHAT IN THE bloody hell is going on?” Alistair demanded the moment Adeline slipped back into the room. “Who is that man, and what was he doing accompanying you back to London?”
“Jasper—Lord Ailesbury—was only doing what any man of worth would do when a lady is in peril.”
Her brother snorted and dropped back into his chair.
“My love—“
“Do not my love me, Theo,” Alistair barked. “I cannot have you taking her side on this. You are not fourteen-year-old girls at boarding school any longer. This could very well ruin her reputation.”
Theo flinched at Alistair’s harsh tone, and her brother immediately shrank back in his chair. If there was one constant in her life since her father’s passing, it was Theo’s and Alistair’s love and dedication to one another. At first, it had galled her to see them so close, her brother taking over a place in Theo’s life that had been Adeline’s for so many years.
“There is no harm done as yet,” Theo sighed, easing into her chair before Alistair’s desk. “No one saw her arrive in his company, and if they did, Poppy was with her.”
Alistair scrubbed at his face and gave Theo a weak smile before glancing up at Adeline. For the first time, she noted his exhaustion: the dark circles under his eyes, the hard lines of his face, and his pale skin. How long had it been since he’d found the time to venture outside the house?
However, Adeline could not let her brother loose without having her own say regarding the matter at hand. “It is your fault I was stranded in Kent, dear brother.”
“How do you support that claim?” He steepled his fingers on the desk, and his glare hardened.
She’d thought long and hard on the journey back to London about how she’d handle Alistair. “If you had not sent Arabella, Ainsley, and me off in that decrepit coach, I would not have found myself marooned along the side of the road without means to fix the thing.” She took a deep breath and continued before Theo and Alistair could cut in. “It was a blessing that Jasper happened upon us during the storm, or it could have been my cold, dead body returned to you, as I would have surely perished in the tempest.”
Alistair shook his head with a chuckle.
“What?” Adeline demanded, her blood fairly boiling at his disregard for her safety.
“There is little need to sensationalize this matter, dear sister, and I insist you cease your theatrics.”
“You think I am overreacting?” she seethed, glancing to Theo for help. However, her friend seemed intent on inspecting the stitching on her pleated skirts.
Alistair raised his hands, palms up, and shrugged.
It was his way of making her answer her own question.
Adeline huffed. She would stomp her foot and demand her brother see reason, yet she assumed he’d see that reaction as childish and it would only serve to reinforce his earlier statement.
It would be in her best interest to calm herself, especially if she thought to meet Jasper at Regent’s Park on the morrow.
She sank into the chair next to Theo and faced her brother across the desk. It was strikingly apparent they were related, as it was with all the Melton children. Their hazel eyes and light brown hair were distinctive to their family.
“Tell me more about this birthday celebration you’ve planned, Theo,” Adeline conceded, deciding to steer clear of any further argument regarding Jasper and Adeline’s time in the country at his estate.
Her friend immediately turned a bright smile in Adeline’s direction. “I cannot say it is I who is responsible for the planning of the party, only the organization of it. It was Josie and Georgie who came to me with the idea.”
“How did you convince Felton and Alistair?” Adeline was well aware that Felton, Georgie’s new husband, was still working tirelessly to make certain he could support his wife in the fashion she was accustomed to. Any funds spent on Adeline’s birthday celebration could very well jeopardize his future business plans.
“Oh, Alistair was easy to convince, and Felton falls in line with whatever Georgie desires.” Adeline laughed along with Theo. If there were a second in command of their foursome, it would be Georgie. Adeline sometimes wondered if her dear friend had been the first to arrive at Miss Emmeline’s School, if things would have been different in their friendship. “Not that my own wishes do not hold significant weight with my own husband.”
Theo winked, and Adeline laughed once more.
How far her shy, reserved, academic friend had come since her return to London nearly two years prior. As far as sisters went, Adeline was thankful Alistair had chosen this woman to join their family.
“What have you planned for the celebration?” Adeline was shocked to realize she’d all but forgotten her twenty-first birthday was upon her. She could remember it being solidly on her mind when she departed London on her way to Kent, but—perhaps because of Jasper?—the special day had escaped her mind. “And who has received invitations?”
“Everyone in bloody town has been invited—and the Lord help us all—but they have all accepted,” Alistair mumbled. “Lord Ailesbury being the last.”
Alistair gave both Adeline and Theo a stern look as if to dare either woman to invite another soul to the party.
“If you are worried about the number of guests, why extend the
offer to Jasper?” Adeline asked.
“If my dear wife—and her friends—seeks to send us all to the poorhouse, who am I to argue?”
“What your brother means to say is, we noticed how you spoke of Lord Ailesbury and his kindness to you, and thought it only fitting an invitation be extended.”
“Yet, Alistair worries over my reputation—and that of our family.”
Adeline glared at Alistair, but he’d returned his attention to an open ledger on his desktop.
“It is not your reputation that worries me, Adeline,” Theo said softly. “Actually, it was your gracious words about Lord Ailesbury.”
“The man saved me from certain death. Of course, I would not speak harshly of him.”
Alistair snorted once again, keeping his eyes trained on his desk.
“You must agree it is a rare occasion indeed when you speak to a person’s merits.” With her words, Theo looked away from Adeline.
“What do you mean by that?”
“You are not known as a…shall we say, agreeable or kind lady, Adeline,” Alistair bit out. “This Lord Ailesbury being the exception.”
Adeline’s stomach hardened, and a sense of betrayal lanced through her. “How can you say that?”
“You spread word at Miss Emmeline’s School that Headmistress preferred the company of animals to people.”
“That was five years ago,” Adeline countered, crossing her arms.
“And what about insisting Amelia would only find a suitor if she painted her face like a harlot and wore clothing to match?” Alistair grumbled.
Adeline suppressed her smile. “Well, the girl is quite contrary and whines more than the stable master’s new lot of puppies when they desire their mother’s tit to feed.”
“Perhaps it is you who should be worried about gaining the notice of potential suitors,” Alistair said, returning his stare to her. “Amelia has yet to be presented to society, while you have been…”
“I have been what?” she demanded when he allowed his words to trail off.
“In mourning this past year,” Theo finished for her husband.
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