The days were even longer than the nights. When he had fled London, he had dreamed only of escape, not of what he might do to occupy his mind and his hands during the interminable hours between dawn and dusk. Until he had resigned from the Company, his every waking hour had been consumed by board meetings, appointments, teas, balls, delicate treaty negotiations, and speeches before Parliament. Even during the longest, dullest sea voyages, there had been figures to study, memorandums to dictate to his secretary, languages to master, and business ledgers to fill with his precise scrawl.
Now he spent his days stalking along the cliffs, trying to convince himself it wasn’t too late for the salt-edged wildness of the wind to blow the cobwebs from his brain. He would walk for hours only to find himself standing once again on the very spot where Angelica had taken flight, gazing down at the churning whitecaps and the sea crashing against the rocks below.
After nearly a week of such aimless ramblings, he made a rather startling discovery. For the first time since losing Clarinda, he was hungry. No, not just hungry . . . he was bloody well famished. Yet whenever he returned to the house for lunch or supper, he was met with fare even more bland and tasteless than what he had endured for breakfast.
It wouldn’t have been so galling if his housekeeper didn’t walk around smelling like a bakery. Mrs. Spencer might be cool and distant, but the aroma clinging to her was warm and irresistible.
Max was seated at the head of the dining-room table one night when Dickon lurched clumsily through the door, a silver tray rattling in his hand. Max took a sip of sherry to hide his disappointment. If Mrs. Spencer had delivered his supper, he might at least have been able to steal a whiff of something that smelled like actual food.
As Dickon leaned over to place a plate in front of him, Max caught himself staring at the boy’s powdered wig. No . . . it wasn’t his imagination. The wig was most definitely on backward.
Max waved a hand toward it. “Do you like wearing that ridiculous thing?”
Dickon straightened, eyeing him mistrustfully. “No, m’lord.”
“Then why do you?”
“Because Annie . . . um . . . Mrs. Spencer says if I’m to be a proper footman, I have to wear the proper attire. It’s only proper.”
Hunger had sharpened Max’s temper to a dangerous edge. “From this day forward, I’m the one who will decide what’s proper around here, not your Mrs. Spencer. Please remove it. At once.”
“Very good, sir.” Dickon dragged off the wig, looking so relieved he forgot to scowl for a minute. His hair was a tawny brown, plastered to his head by sweat except for an irrepressible cowlick at the crown.
The boy bowed his way from the room, leaving Max all alone with a plate containing a few shriveled potatoes and a kidney pie. Max pierced the pie’s crust with his knife. Not a single enticing tendril of steam emerged. Why should it when everything in this accursed house was served at a lukewarm temperature that was somehow less appetizing than if it had been served cold?
Max had yet to lay eyes on the mysterious Nana. He was beginning to wonder if he had inadvertently done something to offend the cook—like defiling her daughter or murdering her firstborn offspring. Why else would the infernal woman torture him day in and day out with her appalling dishes? Or perhaps they were all in cahoots and had decided that slowly starving him would leave less evidence for the constable than shoving him out a window.
Max picked at the pie’s dry crust with his fork, growing both hungrier and angrier by the moment. He finally summoned up the courage to try a forkful of the meat but was forced to spit it out with his next breath—not because of its taste but because it had none.
Deciding it was far past time for Nana to make the acquaintance of her new master, he tossed down his napkin and went storming from the room.
MAX HAD NO TROUBLE locating the basement kitchen. All he had to do was follow the cheerful clink of silver against earthenware and the sound of voices raised in happy chatter. As he approached the doorway, a husky ripple of female laughter assailed his ears, infectious and irresistible.
“Oh, do go on, Dickon!” someone else cried, clapping her hands in anticipation.
Max arrived in the doorway of the kitchen to find his staff gathered on benches around a crude pine table. Mrs. Spencer sat on the far side of the table, a genuine smile exposing that fetching little gap between her front teeth, making her hazel eyes sparkle, and erasing a decade from her age. As another throaty giggle escaped her, he realized with an all-too-pleasant shock that it had been her laughter he had heard.
He made no attempt to disguise his presence, but they were all too engrossed in the proceedings taking place in front of the stone hearth to take notice of him.
Dickon was holding court there, his powdered wig once again perched precariously on top of his head. Piddles sat at the boy’s feet, gazing up at the boy as if equally mesmerized by his performance.
“So then he said”—Dickon fixed his face in a ferocious scowl and deepened his voice to a menacing upper-crust drawl—“ ‘Do you like wearing that ridiculous thing?’ to which I replied, ‘Of course I like wearing it, my lord. Who wouldn’t want to wear a deceased hedgehog on their head?’ ”
Two of the Elizabeths collapsed in fresh titters while another was forced to wipe a mirthful tear from her eye with the hem of her apron. Hodges pounded his open palms on the table, chortling like some great overgrown baby.
“What happened next?” Pippa demanded. “Did he insist that you be carted off to the dungeons or thrown to the dogs?”
Tucking his thumbs in the waistband of his breeches, Dickon puffed out his scrawny chest to a ridiculous degree. “That was when he said, ‘From this day forward, I’m the one who will decide what’s proper around here, not your precious Mrs. Spencer. Please remove it. At once!’ ”
With that, Dickon swept the wig from his head with a flourish and dropped it on Piddles’s head. The dog endured the indignity with grace, looking exactly like a jowly barrister Max had once debated in Parliament.
Max waited until the fresh round of laughter had died out before putting his own hands together in a slow round of applause. “A creditable impersonation, young master Dickon. Your talents are obviously wasted here. You should be treading the boards at the Theatre Royal.”
Chapter Fourteen
MAX’S STAFF WHIPPED THEIR heads around as one, their faces reflecting a mixture of horror and alarm at finding their employer leaning against the door frame, surveying them through dispassionate eyes.
Dickon immediately snatched the wig off Piddles and thrust it behind his back, ducking his head sheepishly. The only one who seemed unfazed by his appearance was an ancient woman rocking to and fro in a cane-backed chair in the corner. Judging by the heaps of multicolored yarn piled at her feet, she had spent the last hundred years knitting a scarf for a giant. Since Max had never laid eyes on her before tonight, he could only assume she must be the elusive Nana, the author of all his culinary misfortune since arriving at Cadgwyck.
Mrs. Spencer rose, her charming smile replaced by the tight-lipped expression he was coming to hate. The smile that wasn’t a smile at all, but something designed solely to placate others. “Why, Lord Dravenwood, is there something you require?” She gave the row of rusting bells over his head an accusing look. “We didn’t hear you ring.”
As Max’s gaze traveled the circle of wary faces, he recognized his staff for the first time for what they truly were—a family. When his own family had gathered for supper, it had been in a formal dining room much like the one he had just left. Conversation had been limited to his father’s bombastic pronouncements on whatever politician had most recently provoked his ire and their mother’s sympathetic murmurs. Most meals were eaten in a tense silence broken only by the clink of silverware and the muted breathing of a battalion of servants standing behind their chairs, waiting to attend to their every need.
Occasionally, when their father would turn red and start to sputter, Ash would
kick Max under the table and pull a funny face, but Max would keep his eyes carefully fixed on his plate, knowing he would be the one to suffer for their insolence should the duke take notice of it.
Max had vowed to himself that when he was master of his own house, his family would gather around a table much like this one to eat and talk and laugh and savor the pleasure of one another’s company. But that dream was done now. He might be master of this house, but he would never be anything more than an outsider in the eyes of those gathered around this table—an intruder on their happiness.
The bench across from Mrs. Spencer had an empty place, and for one crazy moment Max wanted nothing more than to ask if he could join them. But he simply straightened and said stiffly, “I was wondering if you might have some salt.”
“I’ll have Lisbeth bring it to you,” Mrs. Spencer promised, relief evident on her face. Apparently, she thought him heartless enough to sack them all just for having a bit of fun at his expense.
He was about to beat a less than graceful retreat when he spotted it—a loaf of freshly baked bread sitting in the middle of the table. The golden loaf must have emerged from the oven right before his arrival. Steam was still rising from its crusty, perfectly browned top, taunting him with the very scent that had been driving him mad since his arrival at Cadgwyck. A small earthenware crock of freshly churned butter sat next to it, just waiting to be slathered over all of that warm, yeasty goodness.
It was nothing but a humble loaf, perfectly suited to a tenant’s cottage, not the master’s table. Yet the mere sight of it made Max feel savage with want.
His hands curled into fists. He was the master of this house. The bread belonged to him. He slowly lifted his eyes to meet his housekeeper’s wide-eyed gaze.
Everything in this house belonged to him.
Something dangerous must have been in his expression. Her lips parted as if she was suddenly having difficulty drawing breath. One of her pale hands fluttered nervously to the scrap of lace at her throat.
If he hadn’t had a lifetime of practice denying himself the very thing he wanted the most, Max might not have been able to muster up the fortitude to turn his back on both her and her damned bread.
But after taking only two steps, he stopped. Without a word, he pivoted on his heel, marched straight back to the table, and snatched up the enormous carving knife resting next to the bread. One of the Elizabeths squeaked in alarm, and another shrank back in her chair as if he were going to murder them all. Giving his housekeeper the same look Hades had probably given Persephone before sweeping her away to his underworld lair to have his way with her, he brought the blade of the knife down in a shining arc, impaling the loaf of bread with a single savage motion.
He made it as far as the door with his prize before returning for the butter and a plump sausage. The servants were all gaping at him as if he’d gone stark raving mad, but in that moment he didn’t care what anyone thought of him as long as his appetites were satisfied.
He paused in the doorway just long enough to give his housekeeper a curt nod. “Thank you, Mrs. Spencer. That will be all.”
IN THE MONTHS SINCE Clarinda had jilted him at the altar, Max had grown accustomed to paying the price for embracing dissipation. He would wake at midday with a pounding head and unsteady hands, his gullet still burning from all the brandy he’d poured down it the night before. He would stagger out of bed and to the convenience, one hand raised to shield his bleary eyes from the merciless rays of the sun. Then he would crawl back into the bed and wait for dark to fall so he could do it all over again.
What he was not accustomed to was waking at dawn with a full belly and a smile curling his lips. He rolled to his back and stretched like a tomcat after a night of successful prowling, a satisfied groan escaping him.
After sitting at the dining-room table all by himself and gorging himself on bread, butter, and sausage, he had retired early and slept like a babe. During his years with the Company, he had dined at the tables of both lords and princes, but none of their exotic delicacies could compare to the hearty goodness of that simple meal.
Hoping to steal a few more hours of sleep, he drew in a deep, contented breath redolent with the scent of baking bread. At first he thought the enticing aroma had clung to him, but as the haze of sleep faded, he shot to a sitting position, yanked open the bed curtains, and poked his head out, sniffing at the air.
Five minutes later, Max was hastening down the stairs, tying his cravat as he went. He soon found himself leaning against the kitchen door frame, his gaze drinking in all the details he’d been too hungry and angry to notice the night before.
The kitchen was tucked away in the basement of the manor, but a high row of windows along the far wall welcomed in the hushed glow of the dawn light. Here, there was no sign of the dust and decay that seemed to plague the rest of the manor. A cheerful fire crackled on the grate, its warmth smoothing the edge off the morning chill. Gleaming copper pots and bunches of dried herbs tied up with frayed ribbons hung from iron hooks set in the exposed rafters. The flagstone floor and low ceiling made the room feel like a large, cozy cave.
Piddles was curled up on a faded rag rug in front of the stone hearth, his chin resting on his paws while a plump calico cat with tufted, white feet dozed in the cushion of the rocking chair in the corner.
It wasn’t his cook but his housekeeper bending over to peer into the open door of the cast-iron oven. Max sincerely doubted Nana’s rump had ever been that shapely. For once Mrs. Spencer didn’t look as if she’d been dipped into a vat of starch. A large white apron protected her skirts, and her face was flushed pink from the heat of the stove. Several strands of hair had escaped the net binding her chignon and tumbled down to frame her face. Max watched in reluctant fascination as one of them began to curl in the moist heat.
Despite her dishevelment, she looked happier than Max had ever seen her. She was even humming some tuneless ditty beneath her breath.
Just as she closed the door of the oven with a rag-wrapped hand, he said, “An early riser, are we, Mrs. Spencer?”
Straightening so fast she nearly bumped her head on a copper stew pot, she spun around to face him. She looked as guilty as if he’d caught her in flagrante delicto on the kitchen table with some strapping young gardener, an image that gave Max more pause than he had planned.
The rag slithered to the floor. Her hand darted up to tuck a strand of hair back into the net, but met with little success. “My lord, even in London I’m sure it is customary to ring when you need something, not creep up on your servants and frighten them half out of their wits.”
“What do you think you’re doing?” he asked flatly.
She glanced at the table. It was covered from end to end with sacks of meal and flour, crocks of butter and lard, a basket of brown-speckled eggs, bottles of spices, stoneware bowls, and a slew of other utensils and ingredients, many of them unidentifiable to Max’s untrained eye.
Her mouth took on a faintly insolent cast. “Cooking.”
Max advanced on her. “I was under the impression that Nana did the cooking for the household.”
“Nana is feeling a bit under the weather today.” As if to remind him someone was within screaming distance, Mrs. Spencer nodded toward the door. “She can’t manage the stairs any longer so she sleeps in a room just down the corridor instead of in the servants’ quarters.”
Max moved around the end of the table. She turned with him as he stalked her, following him warily with her eyes as if he were a snarling hound and she a wounded fox. “And just how many days of the week is Nana under the weather?” he asked. “Four? Six? Seven?”
“She is getting on a bit in years. We don’t mind lending a hand when we can.”
“We?” Max looked around the kitchen pointedly. “You seem to be the only one here.”
Mrs. Spencer lifted her stubborn little chin. “I’ve discovered that if I rise early, I can work undisturbed for a while before the others awaken.”
“Is there something you need?” she asked.
As he gazed upon her proud visage, Max was surprised to feel a dangerous surge of desire uncoil within him. He needed many things, none of which she could supply.
“If not,” she said, turning away from him with a defiant flounce of her apron, “I have other matters to—Ow! Damn it all!”
He’d gotten her so flustered she had forgotten all about the fallen rag and seized the stove door’s handle with her bare fingers. As she cradled her wounded hand to her breast, gritting her teeth to keep another cry from escaping, Max quickly closed the distance between them. Helpless tears sparkled in her hazel eyes, making them look larger and more luminous.
Cursing himself for distracting her, he gently tugged her hand into his own. “Let me see,” he urged when she kept her fingers tightly curled.
Her breath escaped in a near sob. “There’s no need. I don’t require a nursemaid.”
“It wasn’t a request. It was an order.”
She sniffed. “That’s very high-handed of you. I hope you know I plan to mock you mercilessly over supper tonight, and my impressions are even more spot-on than Dickon’s.”
“Make sure and include the part where I sack you for disobeying a direct order.”
Still glaring at him, she reluctantly unfolded her hand. Each of her slender fingers had an angry red mark on it.
“Fortunately, you let go of the stove before the skin could blister. But it must hurt like the very devil.” He glanced up to catch her biting her lower lip. “You may cry if you like.”
The Temptation of Your Touch Page 11