The manservant stared down at her, awaiting some explanation for her visit.
Which in actuality, posed no problem for Lydia. She straightened her spine and lifted her chin. She was a Cockfield, after all.
“I am Lady Lydia Cockfield, sister of the Duke of Blackheart.” She summoned some of her brother’s demeanor. “I am here to meet with Ollie, the young boy Lord Tempest took in recently.”
The butler stared down his nose at her, but then stepped back, widening the door and bowing. “Of course, My Lady. This way, please.”
Lydia craned her neck around, taking in her surroundings. This was where Jeremy spent most of his time.
The foyer’s decor was very representational of him: subdued but decorated with tasteful paintings, quiet-colored moldings, and shining wood floors. There were several rugs, with simple but elegant floral accents, placed about.
The scent of lemon oil hung in the air as she followed the butler into a drawing room where the walls were painted an eggshell blue and the furnishings upholstered in matching blues and golds. A very expensive-looking vase was propped on a table behind the long settee.
This room, she decided, would have been decorated by his mother.
“How is Lady Tempest,” she asked impulsively.
The butler frowned as though uncertain of divulging his employer’s personal information.
“My dear Aunt Emma asked me to inquire.” Involving one’s dear aunt into any occasion was certain to lend an air of respectability.
And apparently it did.
“She is improving. Her doctors are cautiously optimistic.” And then the butler clutched his hands behind his back. “Do make yourself comfortable, My Lady. I’ll have the boy brought down immediately, and if it is to your liking, your maid may wait in the kitchens with Mrs. Crump. Do not hesitate to use the bell pull if you have need of anything. I am Mr. Bartholomew, at your service.”
Louise glanced questioningly over at Lydia.
“I am not in need of a chaperone while visiting with a nine-year-old boy.” She smiled, knowing her maid would likely take tea with the servants below, and that she would enjoy that far more than sitting in a corner watching her fuss over Ollie.
As Louise all but flew out of the room, Lydia turned back to Mr. Bartholomew. “You said he would be ‘brought down’?” She’d have thought he’d be working below stairs.
“From the nursery, my lady.”
“Oh… thank you, Mr. Bartholomew.” Surely, Ollie would not be spending time in the nursery if he was also a servant? Pleasant tingles swirled in her chest as she contemplated the various possibilities of what this meant.
She could not sit down. She could not relax.
This was Jeremy’s home. A home she might once have become mistress of but for some unknown reason that was being kept secret from her.
If she was to suffer because of it, for goodness sakes, she deserved to know the details.
If Lucinda was here, she’d surely find out. Lucinda would make everyone miserable until she had every last detail.
A sudden wave of longing crashed over her; there were times when her twin sister’s absence felt like a missing limb—or, at least, how she imagined one would be. She wondered if Lucinda was feeling the same way or if she was too distracted with her new husband…
With some effort, she forcibly shifted her thoughts away from the lingering melancholy and back to the matter at hand. She was here now to check on Ollie and possibly Jeremy, if he was at home, that is, and if he would let her.
Lydia paced across the floor and then stopped to stare out a window facing the gardens. It was three in the afternoon. Was Jeremy meeting with one of his employees at the warehouse without her? Or was he at his office, going over numbers and contemplating new ventures to keep himself distracted from annoying ladies he’d once nearly been engaged to?
Lydia wouldn’t put it past him to be tucked away in his study, hiding from her.
Because surely, if he was here, his butler would inform him that he had a guest.
She sighed just as the door opened and Ollie appeared. Wearing short pants and a white shirt with a laced collar, he was accompanied by a tall, slim woman who looked to be in her late forties. Lydia had seen enough women in this profession to know his companion was a governess. She had that air of authority combined with a no-nonsense presence. Ollie moved to lurch forward but was caught firmly by the woman’s hand on his shoulder.
“Make your bow to Her Ladyship, Master Oliver.”
The woman’s voice commanded, but Lydia was pleased to also hear a note of affection.
Jeremy had hired a governess for Ollie!
All the warmth of summer swept through her.
Ollie bowed low, folding over completely to where he nearly lost his balance, and then rose. He glanced backward then as though asking his governess if he’d performed the gesture appropriately.
“Very good, Master Oliver.” The governess nodded in approval.
Lydia rose. “Thank you, Miss…?”
“Mrs. Mumford.”
“You are Ollie’s… governess?”
“I am, my lady.”
This was most unexpected!
As much as she wanted to pick the woman’s mind as to how she’d come by her position and what her instructions were regarding Ollie, her purpose for coming was to ask Ollie how he was doing. He might not be straightforward with her when another adult was present.
“I thank you for bringing him down, Mrs. Mumford. I’ll send him back upstairs to resume your daily schedule as soon as Oliver and I are done chatting.”
“Very well, my lady. We have not yet completed our handwriting exercises today.” She stepped backward. “I will take my tea and return to collect him.”
Lydia smiled down at Ollie as the governess took her leave. So many changes might be exciting for him but might also be overwhelming.
Lowering herself onto a settee, she gestured for Ollie to take the place beside her. “Won’t you sit down with me?.”
He squirmed and tugged at his collar but did as she asked, those violet eyes flashing around the room and filled with curiosity.
“All of this is very different from what you are used to, isn’t it?”
He turned his gaze back to her. “I didn’t expect none of this.”
Taking responsibility for an orphan could not be so simple as this. “I’m glad you decided to stay with his Lordship. I would have worried if you’d done otherwise.”
Ollie bounced restlessly, his hands flat beside him on the cushions. “When’s he sendin’ me back, do ya ken? I have to make sure me brother ain’t gettin' into too much barney.”
“Barney? I don’t know what you mean.” Nor had she realized he had a brother. “Does Lord Tempest know about your brother?”
“He does, m’lady. Says he’ll find him too. But I don’t think he can. If Buck don’t wanna be found, ain’t no one who can. Except for Farley. He can find anyone. He knows all the bloomin’ hidin’ places.”
“Does Buck need to hide a lot?” Ollie had mentioned this Buck boy before.
Ollie plucked a small figurine of two small boys off the table and rubbed his fingertips along the smooth carving. “Yeah, he does. He’s older than me.”
Ollie was worried about his brother. A brother, who, apparently, got into a good deal of barney.
“How old is Buck?”
“He’s four and ten.”
Five years older than Ollie; he must be considerably larger. And she remembered Ollie telling them that Buck had been the one to cause the bruises when they’d discovered him in the warehouse. “I’m sure Buck is fine, then. And if Lord Tempest says he’s going to find him, I’ve no doubt that he will.”
Ollie tilted his head sideways. “Buck’s always messin’ up. And fightin’ when I’m not there to talk him outta it. Got his face right cut up past winter.”
“You are not responsible for what your brother does,” Lydia said, patting his leg.
> Ollie sighed, eyebrows crinkled in an expression that looked too old for his small face. “He’s my brother, I can’t help it.”
The floor creaked, and Lydia glanced up. She had not heard Jeremy enter the room. For a moment, his eyes looked almost haunted, but the expression flickered and disappeared when he dipped his chin in her direction.
Lydia licked her lips, staring at his bared arms where his shirt sleeves were rolled up. He must have been working in his study after all.
Every button on his silk gold waistcoat was fastened, and the bottoms of his buff breeches were neatly tucked into shining Hessians.
“Mr. Bartholomew informed me that you…” Jeremy gestured behind him, almost as though providing a reason for his appearance. “I did not realize we had a meeting.”
“We did not,” Lydia answered.
Jeremy cocked a brow.
“I came to have a visit with Master Oliver,” Lydia explained.
Nothing in the world could hold back her pleasure at Ollie’s elevated circumstances. But she could not tease Jeremy about this or gloat. What on earth had transpired to cause Jeremy to decide to raise Ollie as a ward and not a servant?
“Mrs. Mumford is waiting in the foyer for you, Oliver.” Jeremy’s voice was cool and commanding.
Ollie hopped up, but when he moved toward the door, Jeremy stopped him with a question. “Did your letters give you as much difficulty this morning?”
Ollie shook his head. “Not so hard as the day before. Yer tricks ya told me helped.”
“Very good.” Jeremy’s lips twitched, and Ollie’s mouth stretched into a wide grin before he scrambled across the room. After struggling only slightly to pull the heavy door open, he exited and then very purposefully pushed it closed behind him, leaving Lydia alone with Jeremy for the first time in nearly a week.
Jeremy had not moved from where he stood, feet planted wide, hands behind his back.
He looked very much the Earl of Tempest today. Imposing, haughty…
Adorably austere.
“Please, don’t tell me you came here without a companion,” he said.
“My maid is in the kitchen with your housekeeper, taking tea.” And since he appeared to be quite at a loss, Lydia folded her hands in her lap graciously. “Won’t you sit down?” she invited for the second time in less than a quarter of an hour.
…while sitting in a drawing room that was not her own.
She wasn’t going to allow him to chase her away so easily this time. She never ought to have allowed him to chase her away to begin with.
To her surprise, Jeremy took the place Ollie had vacated. If he’d wanted to continue avoiding her, he easily could have claimed the winged-back chair on the opposite side of the room.
“Ollie says he has a brother. Have you had any luck finding him?”
“Buck. And yes, I have.” Jeremy stared down at his hands and her gaze followed.
Slim and masculine with a few curling tendrils of black hair on his knuckles, she couldn’t help but notice how sinewy muscle flexed and moved beneath his skin. Lydia clutched her hands tightly in her lap, squashing the desire to trail her fingers along his forearm… all the way to where it disappeared beneath the folds of his sleeves.
“Lydia?” He was watching her now.
She sat up straight and pressed her knees together. “I’m sorry. You were saying?”
But he was watching her knowingly. Of course, she could never hide her feelings from anyone.
“You found Buck?” she persisted.
“Ah, yes.” Jeremy frowned. “He’s… trouble. Far more trouble than Ollie ever would have been. If Ollie’s going to stand half a chance at a proper life, the older boy can’t remain a part of his life.”
“Oh…” She hated that Buck had beaten on Ollie, but they couldn’t very well keep Ollie from his brother indefinitely, could they? “But he’s Ollie’s brother.”
Pain showed in Jeremy’s eyes, and Lydia guessed that memories of his own brother had come to mind.
“I miss Lucinda every day,” she confessed. “But I know she is happy and well. I can’t imagine what it’s like to be denied a sibling.”
She’d stood beside him at his brother’s funeral and watched him grieve. But he had survived. He’d not hated her brothers then—two men who might provide some of the companionship he missed now.
Jeremy’s throat pulsed. “Buck will ruin Ollie if he remains in his life.”
Of course, he must be right. “What will you tell Ollie?”
“The truth—that he has a choice.”
It was a very, very hard choice to present to one so young. In fact, it was a nigh impossible one.
“So, he’s going to have to choose between his own well-being—his own chance at living a meaningful and productive life—and staying at his brother’s side. I’m not sure he’ll be able to do that. I know that I couldn’t.”
“That’s why I…” Jeremy shook his head dismissively. “I’ll send for your maid.” He moved to rise but Lydia stopped him, placing her hand on his thigh.
“That’s why you what?” she asked, sensing he’d nearly told her something very important. “That’s why you what, Jeremy?”
Chapter 8
Jeremy winced.
He’d damn near spilled his bleeding heart.
“Please, Jeremy. I need to know.” Lydia’s hands gripped above his knees. Seeing the lace of her gloves, her delicate hands resting on his thighs, had him… floundering.
A sensation that in anyone else’s presence was a foreign one.
If she moved her hands just a few inches higher… He closed his eyes. “I don’t want you to have to decide. It would not have been fair.”
“Decide what, between my brothers and… myself?” She squeezed hard, her fingers digging into his muscles. “Tell me, Jeremy. Tell me so that I can understand. Tell me so I can either fix whatever it is that’s caused you to hate all of us or move forward without you.”
“You can’t fix it. No one can fix it. Don’t you think that if anyone could, I would have done that already?”
But perhaps he could tell her some of it. He could tell her just enough so that she could forget about him—forget about the past.
He drew in a sharp breath. He’d let go of her four months ago, and it had hurt like hell. Watching her find someone else… The sharp breath evolved into a painful ache.
“I never wanted you to have to choose between your family and me.” He kept his eyes lowered, unable to look at her. But that was all he would say. It was all he could say.
Because the reason had to do with so much more than just himself. It had to do with the honor of his family, the betrayal of her brothers, and most importantly, his brother’s memory.
He’d been livid after hearing Lucas’ suspicions. Arthur would never commit treason. His brother had not been a traitor.
Shame and guilt attacked him for even considering it.
Damn Lucas. Damn Blackheart.
Damnit, Arthur!
“But why…?” The bewildered pain in her voice had him staring into her eyes, glistening with confused tears, making them look more emerald than blue.
She was completely separate from all of those reasons and yet they had changed the course of her life.
“It has nothing to do with you.” His voice caught.
“But, Jeremy. You are wrong.” One of those tears overflowed and trailed down to the corner of her mouth. “It has everything to do with me—with us.”
He sat frozen, loyalty to his brother warring with his heart. Because she was right. Their future together had been shattered by Lucas and Blackheart’s betrayal. By her brothers’ deplorable accusations.
Arthur was his flesh and blood. His brother would never…
Shifting his gaze to the window, the desire to kiss away her tears nearly broke him.
“Please, Jeremy?”
“Your brothers…” It was all he could say. “I can’t—”
“But it
is my brothers you are angry with. It isn’t me that you hate.”
“God, Lydia, I could never hate you.” Quite the opposite.
Was he telling her too much? Was he making this worse than it already was?
“You told me to stay away from you.” A hint of accusation flashed in her gaze. Deserved. Well deserved.
“You need to… allow me to complete the renovations for the orphanage. Allow me to do this for you while you attend balls, garden parties, and river parties. We… Us. Cannot happen. An arrangement between the two of us is impossible.”
He’d said it. So, why didn’t he experience any relief?
“Impossible?”
One of her hands slid up to his groin, and he practically burst into flames. She wasn’t touching him, but she was close.
“Lydia.” He grasped her wrist.
“I am unconvinced.”
She was more stubborn than she had been last spring. In that short time since he’d sent her away, she had changed from a demure young lady to a headstrong woman.
And God in heaven, she was even more tempting now. More beautiful. More powerful.
Utterly irresistible.
Her fingers uncurled beneath his hand and splayed over the fabric of his trousers, dangerously grazing the stretched material confining his damned unruly cock.
She leaned in. “I’m not a child to be kept locked away, to be protected from the ugliness in the world.” Her voice sounded throaty… sensual.
Her pupils were dilated, diminishing the blue so that the glints in her eyes were like stars in a moonless sky. Her softly rounded cheeks were flushed, heated. And her lips…
Her lips were parted, shining, and inviting him to do things he doubted she even knew possible. He stared past them, into the darker reds and tender textures, imagining other flesh he craved to know.
“You don’t hate me,” she insisted, leaning in, her hands resting on his arm, sweet breath fanning his jaw.
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