Lizzie slipped an arm about Caro’s waist and helped her up. “I’m happy to hear it.”
Leaning against her sister, Caro took a tentative step. The path from the sitting room up to her bedchamber suddenly felt endless. “At least you were clever about things and married a younger son.”
Lizzie arched her brows. “I’m not sure how that makes me clever.”
Caro hobbled a few painstaking paces. “No one’s expecting you to produce an heir before you’re ready.”
Lizzie looked away, a blush rushing up her cheeks. “Sometimes these things happen, ready or not.”
“Are you—”
“I don’t know yet, but you might say certain activities ensure a particular outcome sooner or later.”
Caro smiled. Though she couldn’t possibly imagine having a child of her own, she would be happy for her sister. But then another thought occurred. “What if you have one like Gus?”
Lizzie laughed. “I’ve already planned for that. I’ll let his father deal with him.”
Chapter 11
Lady Caroline was trouble, pure and unadulterated. Naturally Adrian couldn’t stop thinking about her. Beyond all reason, he wanted to know more than just the feeling of her lithe body cradled to his chest, the trusting weight of her head on his shoulder. The thrust of her hip into his waist. The firm curve of her arse within reach.
God. It was bad enough her family had witnessed him carting her around like some starry-eyed suitor. At least they didn’t know he’d come within a whisper of kissing her. If anyone learned that, he’d be out on his ear. No excuses, no questions, simply out, with nowhere to go but back to Wyvern, in defeat.
Anywhere but there. He’d take a job as the lowest stable boy at the meanest of manors first.
All night, he’d tried to free his mind of Lady Caroline, but she still haunted him this morning. She’d become a ghost he could not outrun, no matter how hard he galloped toward the tenants’ cottages, a ghost who made the saddle particularly uncomfortable.
He reined to a halt in front of the closest dwelling and swung to the ground. A few chickens scratched in the packed earth before the graying front door. They scattered, clucking peevishly at his approach.
He raised his hand to knock, but before his knuckles could hit the worn plank, a shriek followed by a crash sounded from inside.
“That’ll teach ye to stay out all night wif yer whoring,” a masculine voice thundered.
Shite. A bolt of sheer energy shot through Adrian, and he smashed his fist into the wood.
Silence fell in the cottage. A beat passed before the dull thud of footsteps presaged the door whipping open. Eyes rimmed with red, Fletcher swayed slightly on the threshold. “Mornin’, Crosby.”
“Fletcher.” Adrian wasn’t inclined to favor the man with a nod.
“What brings ye by this early?” A stale, yeasty smell, like the bottom of an old beer barrel, rose from Fletcher. “Need to dig out another ditch?”
Adrian craned his neck, but Fletcher’s body blocked his view of the dwelling’s interior. “Not today. Do you think I might come in?”
Fletcher stiffened, and Adrian braced himself for a refusal, perhaps even a fight. Well, let the man try. Adrian would welcome the opportunity to pound anyone cowardly enough to take his frustrations out on a woman.
But Fletcher merely shrugged. “Suit yerself.”
Adrian pushed past him into a dingy kitchen. An empty tankard lay on its side on a weathered tabletop, a plate bearing a half-eaten hunk of bread beside it. At the hearth, Sadie crouched next to a cast-iron pot, concentrating fiercely on whatever she was stirring. Her free hand covered her cheek.
“Do you have any other bairns, Fletcher?” Though he addressed the father, he kept his eye on the daughter. She went right on stirring.
“How’s that any business of yers?”
If Fletcher wanted a fight, he’d most certainly have one. By wits or by blows, the manner didn’t matter a whit. “Trust me when I say it falls within my duties as estate agent. I’m trying to get to the bottom of some goings-on at the manor last night.”
“What makes ye think I know anything about that?”
“I’ll be asking everyone. It just so happened I started with you.” He kept his tone low and lethal. Though he didn’t enjoy employing such power, if he had to, he could come up with an excuse to see Fletcher evicted. “If you refuse to answer a simple question, that only serves to make me think you had something to do with it.”
“There’s only him and me.” Sadie said the words so softly, Adrian might have missed them if he hadn’t been watching her. She still refused to look at him.
“Which tenants would have a boy about ten or twelve?” Adrian asked. “One who might have delivered a message to the manor yesterday evening?”
“Any number of ’em might’ve done it,” Fletcher said. “Why do ye want to know?”
“Because Boudicca got out last night, and I want to know if the two events were related.”
“I wouldn’t know anything about that.” Despite Fletcher’s general uncooperativeness, Adrian believed that statement.
“What about any mysterious activities going on in the woods? Have you ever heard of anyone digging holes?” He’d send the stable lads out to investigate by daylight—both to see how widespread the digging was and to discover any evidence of the reason behind it.
“Now, why would anyone want to go digging holes in the woods?” Fletcher’s splutter proved how ridiculous he found the notion. “Someone wants a rabbit, they’d set a snare. They wouldn’t bother wif no digging.”
Adrian had to concur. Even if one of the tenants had taken it into his head to poach something larger than a rabbit, he wouldn’t have used such a chancy method as trying to trip it up.
“There was one other thing.” He stole a glance at Sadie. She still refused to look anywhere but at that damned pot. “It’s about your daughter.”
Fletcher’s brows lowered. “I don’t see where she’s any of yer affair.”
God help him, Adrian knew Fletcher would make something less than innocent out of his interest, but he couldn’t leave her here. Not after the bruise he’d noted yesterday. Not after what he’d overheard just now.
“There’s a position opened up at the manor.” He’d no idea how Lady Caroline would take to this idea, but he’d worry about that later. For now he had to get Sadie out from under her father’s thumb. “I thought Sadie might be interested.”
Fletcher crossed his arms. “I can just imagine what sort of position an estate agent might offer one such as Sadie.”
“I’ll take it.” She had to have stood, but Adrian kept his gaze trained on Fletcher now.
Fletcher stepped toward the hearth. “Didn’t ye hear what I just said?”
“I don’t care what he wants me to do, I’ll do it.”
Fletcher lunged at the lass, but Adrian anticipated the move. He jumped in front of Fletcher and fisted his hands in his shirt. “If you want to hit someone, hit me. Just be warned—I hit back.”
He held Fletcher with his glare as much as his strength. Try it. Try anything. After traipsing about the woods half the previous evening chasing an escaped horse, after the night he’d spent turning on his mattress in frustrated longing, Adrian was itching for a fight. He’d happily rearrange the tenant’s face for him.
“Sadie,” he said, “gather your things and wait for me outside. I’ll make certain no one stops you.”
Without warning, Adrian felt the tension drain from Fletcher’s body. Perhaps he was too cowardly to take on a man who would most definitely punch back, but perhaps he also realized how close he stood to eviction. If Sadie had a position in the manor, he could not use her as a shield to keep himself from being thrown off the land.
Adrian released his grip and backed toward the door, yet he maintained his warning glower and kept his body tensed, ready to spring should Fletcher move against Sadie.
Before long the lass reappeared, a sm
all bundle in hand, a fresh bruise blooming on her cheek. A single tear track glistened beneath her right eye. “I’m ready.”
Adrian ushered her out the door. He’d intended to visit the other tenants, but he’d have to put that off until he could get Sadie safely to the manor. “Do you ride?”
“I can walk.”
He took the reins of his mount and fell into stride beside her. “I want you to know it’s not what your father was implying. The position, I mean. We’ve got a boy needs looking after. Do you think you’d be up to that?”
“He’s not my father.”
“Fletcher?”
“Me mum took up with the rotter after me dad died.”
Adrian hesitated. The answer to his next question was obvious, but he posed it nonetheless. “And your mum?”
“She’s no longer with us, either.”
“I’m sorry.”
She halted. “It’s not what ye think. She took off a year or so back. Left in the night. Left me with him.”
“She left you?” Adrian burst out. He shouldn’t make it his business, but he couldn’t stop himself. “Your own mother?”
“I don’t blame her.” Her voice shook, and she paused to collect herself. “When she left, we still believed I was to marry, but it didn’t work out. Now I can only wish she’d’ve taken me with her.”
He wanted to pat her on the shoulder, but just in time awareness washed through him. Sadie might take a simple touch for more than he intended. He curled his hand at his side. “A man can be sorry for that, as well.”
She strode off again, her steps firm. “I’m not what Fletcher says I am, even if he’d like me to be. He’s wanted to take up with me since Mum left, but I won’t let him.”
Adrian had known in the pit of his stomach that something like this was coming. He’d seen enough others like Fletcher. Still, the thought didn’t prevent a fresh wave of anger from cresting inside him. “And that’s why you stay out all night.”
“Ye heard that, did ye?” At his nod, she went on. “So why did ye offer me a job?”
“After what I heard, how could I not?” In fact, he wished he’d spoken up yesterday, and to hell with how the other tenants viewed him. “I know what it’s like to be stuck in a bad situation and want to take any escape route possible.”
Even as he voiced those words, they sounded hollow. Whatever he’d endured, it was nothing close to what this lass had experienced over the past twelve months.
—
If Caro could walk properly, she would have paced across the sitting room, to the window overlooking the formal gardens and back. But then, if she could walk properly, she would have gone to the stables, ordered a saddle for Boudicca, and taken her out.
As long as that stallion wasn’t still about.
Damnation, but even if she had been healthy, she couldn’t have gone riding today. She slumped against the back of the brocade couch, her ankle propped on cushions, as it had been the previous night. The same way Mr. Crosby had arranged it.
For a long moment, she silently reveled in the care he had shown her, remembering his gentle touch on her injury, his painstaking care, and the strength of his arms about her. Lingering on those thoughts was far more interesting than the novel she was pretending to read. She’d stared at the open page before her for half an hour, at least.
Next to the window, Pippa set aside her watercolors. “You had the most faraway expression just now. One might even accuse you of mooning. What are you thinking about?”
After the spectacle she and Crosby had made of themselves last night, after Lizzie’s admonishments, Caro couldn’t admit to the truth. So she cast about for a safer subject. “Mama, actually.”
Damnation, that was a topic she’d rather avoid, as well, but the thought of Lizzie’s potential condition had set it in her mind.
Pippa’s knowing smile faded. “Mama?”
“Yes. I cannot help but think how things might have turned out differently had she not died.”
Pippa sighed. “Or if one of the boys had survived.”
After Caro and her sisters were born, Mama had made a valiant effort to fulfill her principal duty as duchess and produce an heir. For much of Caro’s childhood, her clearest recollection had been visiting her mother in her spacious apartments, a tiny woman dwarfed in the midst of an enormous bed, her skin pale, her eyes heavy with exhaustion, sadness etched in the deepening furrows of her forehead. Her arms empty when they should have been full of a squalling baby, heir to the entire estate.
Over and over, the scenario repeated itself, and Mama faded a bit more with every passing year—until a decade ago, when she’d faded altogether. The day Mama was carried out with a sheet over her face, Papa had taken to his bed, certain he would follow his beloved wife before long. Or perhaps he’d been willing himself into an earlier grave.
Caro shoved those memories back into their compartment and turned the key.
“Papa wouldn’t be so blasted set on us marrying, for one thing.” There, she’d said that casually enough that Pippa ought not pick up on her inner turmoil.
Half of Pippa’s mouth quirked upward. “Mama would never have let you tear around the estate like a hoyden.”
“What would she say about your painting?”
“Nothing at all. It’s a perfectly respectable feminine accomplishment.”
“I’m not so certain of that.” Caro leveled her sister with a look. “Greek Gods? Have you seen some of those statues? Positively scandalous.”
Pippa grinned. “Aren’t they, though? And so intriguing.”
“I suppose.” Yet again, the image rose in her mind of Mr. Crosby’s naked back, slicked with sweat. “But I think I prefer the flesh.”
Pippa sat forward in her chair. “What do you know about the flesh?”
“What are ye talking about?” said a new voice. A rather young, masculine voice.
Caro pivoted her head toward the doorway and found Gus advancing into the sitting room. “What are you doing out of bed?”
“I’m tired of lying in bed.” The boy crossed his arms. “There’s nothing to do.”
“I’m going to have a hard time amusing you in the manner to which you’ve become accustomed.” Caro indicated her injured ankle. “I can barely walk.” In fact, she’d hobbled her way down the main staircase this morning, holding hard to the carved railing.
“Your pardon, my lady.” A mobcapped maid poked her head into the room. “I only turned my back a moment and he scampered off.”
“That’s quite all right,” Pippa said. “We’ll keep an eye on him.” When the maid withdrew, Pippa added, “Perhaps you’d like to make a picture.” She started rifling through her pile of paper, looking for a clean sheet.
Gus lowered his brows. “That’s for babies.”
“Until you’re better, you’ll have to settle for whatever amusement you can find indoors.”
“Perhaps you’d prefer going over lessons,” Caro added.
“Oh, no. I don’t need no lessons. Me dad says I don’t have to go back to that school.” Dysart had placed him in some public school or other, though not one the sons of the ton were likely to frequent.
Caro exchanged a glance with her sister. “Is that so? I can’t imagine he’ll neglect your education in such a manner.”
A throat clearing announced a newcomer to the conversation. Mr. Crosby stood on the threshold, and he wasn’t alone. Beside him stood a buxom girl dressed in the rough linsey-woolsey the estate’s tenants used for their garments.
Gus’s jaw went slack, as his gaze focused on a point—or two, rather—somewhere south of the girl’s neck. He didn’t say a word, but he didn’t have to. Caro could just about read the word bubbies written across his forehead.
Her cousin Snowley had been of similar age when he’d begun to notice the difference between men and women—or even grown women and young girls. He’d been nothing short of insufferable, and the suspicion grew in Caro that Gus was about to become so.
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And that was to say nothing of Mr. Crosby. Where had he found this girl who was clearly losing her struggle to hide her open admiration?
“I hope you don’t mind me taking certain liberties, my lady,” Crosby said. “I’ve found a nursemaid for Gus.”
Chapter 12
“Nursemaid? I don’t need no nursemaid!”
Adrian should have weighed his words before speaking. Gus’s horrified reaction confirmed as much.
The boy fixed him with a glare. “Who the hell are ye to tell me I need a nursemaid?”
From her place by the window, Lady Philippa gasped, but Lady Caroline did not react to the profanity. She sat on her couch with cool authority, as if she occupied a throne, her pale gold hair shining in the light from the window. When she spoke, she took on the cultured tones of the drawing room. “You haven’t had opportunity to make his acquaintance yet, but this is Mr. Crosby. He helped me bring you in the day you fell.”
His expression resembling that of a mule, Gus stood rooted to the spot.
“You at least owe him your thanks, I would think,” Lady Caroline went on. “Otherwise you might still be out there covered with mud.”
Gus studied the patterned carpeting at his feet and muttered a semblance of gratitude before looking Lady Caroline in the eye. “But I don’t need no nursemaid.”
“I think you need someone to watch out for you,” Lady Philippa added. “Shall we call that someone a caretaker?”
“I think that should be more than acceptable.” Lady Caroline didn’t wait for Gus’s approval. Instead she turned her assessing gaze on the would-be caretaker. “And you are?”
The girl dipped her head. “Sadie, me lady.”
Lady Caroline’s eyes narrowed as she shifted their regard until they fell directly on Adrian. “And you found Sadie where?”
He hesitated, unwilling to discuss the sordid details of Sadie’s life in front of her. “She’s one of the tenants. Might we—”
Before he could finish his question, Gus let out a pitiable moan. In a flash, all his defiance transformed into something else. He raised a hand to one temple and his knees buckled.
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