When to Engage an Earl

by Sally MacKenzie

  “Respect won’t get you Miss Wilkinson. You have to tell her you love her, Uncle Alex. Women like to know they are loved. Then she’ll marry you.”

  His heart gave a most inappropriate leap.

  No. This would never do. He had to nip this particular line of speculation in the bud if he didn’t want his life to become unbearable.

  “Perhaps I don’t love Miss Wilkinson.” He couldn’t bring himself to lie and insist he had no feelings at all for her.

  “Oh, puh-lease!” Another exaggerated eye roll.

  He was getting rather tired of Rachel looking at him as if he were a knock in the cradle.

  “You should see how you look at her when you think no one’s watching. Your mouth goes all soft and silly like it wants to grin, but you won’t let it. And your eyes go soft, too, and dreamy—when they aren’t staring”—she grinned—“sort of like the way Stinky looks when he’s starving and Mama opens her dress.”

  Good Lord! He stared at his horses’ arses and willed himself not to turn a hundred shades of red. Surely Rachel was mistaken.

  “And she looks at you the same way.”

  His head snapped back toward his niece, blast it. “She does?”

  Rachel nodded. “Oh, yes, except she looks more confused because she doesn’t understand what she’s feeling, not having any marital experience.”

  His heart wasn’t the only organ to lurch at Rachel’s words. To think Jane—

  Wait. Rachel’s words? “Rachel!” Diana and Roger did let the girls run a bit wild, but Rachel was only eight. “What do you know of ‘marital experience’?”

  “Nothing,” Rachel said cheerfully. “I just heard Mama tell Papa that.”

  “In front of you?”

  “Of course not, silly. In back of me. I was reading, curled up in one of the library’s wing chairs, so they didn’t know I was there.”

  “And you didn’t let them know?”

  “Why would I do that?”

  Right. Rachel had already told him she was a skilled eavesdropper.

  “But I do know that marital experience leads to babies,” she said, smiling brightly. “And you want babies, don’t you?”

  Lord, yes.

  It was difficult being around Diana’s family now that he’d started to consider marriage. The girls stirred such a jumbled stew of emotions in him—amusement, pride, annoyance, awe, love, worry, happiness. And holding Stinky—that is, Christopher—had made him ache, literally ache deep in his soul to feel the small, warm body of his own son or daughter in his arms. He wanted an heir, of course, to continue his line, but more, he wanted children to love and protect and guide into adulthood.

  He cleared his throat. “This is a completely inappropriate conversation, Rachel.”

  “Why?”

  “You’re a child.” Not that he’d want to have a conversation about babies with anyone except a wife.

  Jane?

  No. Jane wasn’t interested in him, no matter what Rachel said. If she was, she wouldn’t have shoved him away last night.

  Rachel sniffed. “Children are very smart, you know. Smarter than some”—she gave him a pointed look—“adults.”

  Clearly, he needed a distraction. “It’s time to head back to the house. Would you like to try handling the ribbons now that you’ve discharged your promise to Bea?”

  “Yes!”

  Thank God. He spent the next few minutes concentrating on keeping Rachel from ending them in a ditch.

  Chapter Eleven

  Loves Bridge, Mid-February 1818

  Jane stood in the Spinster House study, books to her left, old harpsichord to her right, and looked out on the bleak landscape. The garden that had been so green and wild in the late spring and summer was shriveled and dead in the chill, gray February light.

  She felt a bit shriveled and gray and dead, too.

  Poppy jumped up on the window seat in front of her and leaned over to butt her head against Jane’s limp hand.

  “Oh, Poppy.” She started stroking the cat. As her fingers moved rhythmically over the soft fur, the knot in her chest began to loosen.

  She knew part of what was causing her low spirits. She wasn’t lonely, precisely, but she definitely missed her friends. Anne had moved away entirely, and Cat might just as well have, being so busy at the castle.

  No, that wasn’t quite it, either. Jane had been avoiding Cat, because, well, she didn’t want to talk about babies. Even Randolph and Imogen were infant-mad.

  She liked her independent, orderly existence. She was in complete control of her days. She arrived at Randolph’s office precisely at the same time every morning and left at the same time in the evening. She set her schedule at the lending library. She ate what she wished when she wished. If she wanted to go to bed early, she did—or she could stay up most of the night reading. No one would comment or complain or offer any sort of an opinion on her choices.

  Well, no one but Poppy.

  But if she had a husband, she’d have to consider his wishes. Even worse, husbands led to babies—she had plenty of evidence of that around her, didn’t she? And then her precious independence would fly out the window. Babies ruled a mother’s life completely.

  “Being independent needn’t mean being lonely, Poppy.”

  “Merrow.”

  Of course Poppy would agree. Cats were at heart solitary creatures. Jane just needed to find new friends, people she could discuss books and current events and other non-baby topics with. But who was there? Loves Bridge was a small village. Every woman her age was married, and she certainly couldn’t join a group of men.

  And that made her think of Lord Evans. She’d thought of him rather too often since she’d come home from Chanton Manor.

  Of course she had. He was an intelligent, articulate man. It was a pleasure to converse with him.

  And he made her feel oddly alive.

  What would have happened if I hadn’t stopped his kiss in the garden?

  An unpleasant mixture of regret, desire, and nerves twisted in her chest.

  She made a dismissive sound and looked away from the window. The reason for her blue-devils was clear—and it had nothing to do with the earl. A dark sadness permeated the entire country. They’d only just put aside formal mourning for Princess Charlotte, who had died three months earlier after giving birth to a stillborn son. The succession was in shambles. The three royal dukes who were free to marry were scrambling to find a wife and produce a child.

  And beyond that, everyone in Loves Bridge was on edge because of the curse. Cat’s baby was due at the end of the month. The village was holding its collective breath, waiting to see if the duke would live to see his heir. Poor Cat was shredded with worry, afraid she and her baby would die like the princess and little prince or her precious Marcus would.

  Cat could be carrying a girl.

  “Merrow.”

  Jane sat down next to Poppy. “You’re right. It would be better to learn now that the curse is broken.” She looked carefully at Poppy. “The duke will live, won’t he?”

  “Mer-row.” Poppy appeared to nod.

  Jane released the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. “Good. That’s what I was hoping you’d—”

  Good Lord, had she completely lost her mind? It was bad enough talking to a cat—she’d been doing a lot of that recently, now that her friends and her brother were married—but to think that the animal was actually replying . . .

  She got up and walked into the sitting room. She still intended to redecorate, but the only change she’d made so far was to replace the hideous picture of a hunting dog with a painting she’d found in the cluttered room where the puppet stage had been.

  She studied the new picture. A tricolored cat—which looked remarkably like Poppy—watched a brown bird intently.

  Poppy passed between her and the painting, heading for the front door.

  “So you want to be let out now, do you? All right, I’ll—” Jane jumped in surprise as
someone knocked. Who could that be?

  Poppy looked at her as if to say “What are you waiting for?” and then sat down and proceeded to clean her paws.

  I swear that animal is supernatural.

  She threw open the door to find an extremely pregnant Duchess of Hart on her doorstep.

  “Cat!” Jane looked behind Cat and then right and left. “Where’s the duke?”

  “Visiting Baron Davenport. I drove in with Mary.”

  Mary, one of Cat’s younger sisters, was married to Theodore Dunly, the duke’s assistant steward, and was expecting her first child at about the same time as Cat.

  “Not in the pony cart, I hope?” Jane could not think it wise for two very pregnant ladies to be rattling around in such a conveyance.

  Cat laughed. “Yes, in the pony cart. If we’d been rash enough to try any of Marcus’s carriages, we’d surely have ended in a ditch.”

  “You could have had John Coachman drive you in.”

  “Oh, pooh! Why bother him?”

  Everyone said Cat was carrying well, but she looked enormous to Jane. She stood back—way back—to let Cat waddle past her. “But the baby—well, the babies”—she shouldn’t forget Mary—“are due so soon.”

  “Not for another week or two. Everyone says first babies are late.” Cat was panting slightly, her hand on her belly. “And it’s not like I traveled a great distance.”

  Any distance was too great, in Jane’s opinion. “If you’d sent word, I would have come to the castle.”

  Cat lowered herself carefully onto the settee. “Oh, I didn’t come in to see you—I came to see Mama. But then I saw the Spinster House and decided to stop here while Mary went on ahead to the vicarage.” She smiled. “We haven’t had a comfortable coze for the longest time. I don’t know why.”

  Perhaps because I’ve been trying very hard to avoid one.

  Jane sat in the armchair across from the settee—she didn’t want to risk bouncing Cat and somehow hastening the emergence of the large melon in Cat’s belly—and watched Cat look around the room.

  “I thought you were going to redecorate.”

  “I’m still deciding what I want.” There was no rush. She had the rest of her life here.

  Her gray feeling grew a little darker.

  “You know you can choose what you want and send the bills to Marcus.”

  “Yes.” She did know that. She just couldn’t find the energy to care much about her surroundings.

  Cat’s eyes focused on the new painting. “I see you at least got rid of that horrible hunting picture.” She grinned. “Though I think perhaps this animal has hunting on its mind as well.” She squinted and tilted her head. “Is it my imagination or does that cat look very much like Poppy?”

  They both looked at Poppy.

  Poppy raised her leg and started licking her nether regions.

  They averted their gazes.

  “I’ve made a lot of changes at the castle,” Cat continued. “You must come out and see the place. Maybe you’ll get some ideas for improvements here.”

  “Um. Yes. That would be nice.”

  Cat shifted on the settee as if she wasn’t quite comfortable and tried again to find something they could discuss. “Did you hear Miss Franklin—I mean, the Duchess of Benton—had a healthy boy last month?”

  “No.”

  Cat frowned. “I’m sure it was in all the papers.”

  Jane had stopped reading the papers. The news was too depressing, and her feelings were low enough. And, to be brutally honest, she didn’t want to risk stumbling across mention of a certain earl linked to any Society woman. “I must have missed it.”

  Cat nodded doubtfully, and then changed the topic again, this time disastrously. “You’ve never really told me how your visit to Chanton Manor went.”

  Lud! Jane felt her face flush. She looked down quickly to hide her expression. She didn’t wish to discuss that subject.

  She cleared her throat. “It was fine.”

  Cat waited. Jane kept her lips firmly closed.

  “How romantic that Randolph met Imogen again. And they didn’t waste any time, did they?” Cat rubbed her belly. “To think Randolph will have a child six months younger than mine and Mary’s—and Lady Davenport’s. Lady Davenport’s baby should arrive any day now.”

  Everyone is having babies.

  Which was fine, of course. That’s what married couples did. She was the Spinster House spinster. She wanted nothing to do with babies, though she would try her best to admire any that were presented for her inspection.

  Poppy, having finally groomed herself to her momentary satisfaction, came over and jumped up into Jane’s lap. She settled down, warm, heavy, and available for petting. Gratefully, Jane buried her fingers in the cat’s fur.

  There was something very calming about stroking a cat, even one with vaguely supernatural qualities.

  “I wonder if Randolph and Imogen’s baby will be a boy or a girl?”

  This really was getting tedious. Jane understood babies were on Cat’s mind and—Jane’s eyes dropped again to Cat’s enormous belly—other organs, but one would hope she might be a little more sensitive to Jane’s position. Not that her baby-less future dismayed her. Not at all. She just found the topic deadly dull.

  “It will be one or the other.” Jane forced herself to smile. “Would you like some tea?”

  Cat’s face froze—and then fell into a polite, if hurt, expression. “No, thank you.”

  Lud! Cat had been one of her closest friends, and now it felt as if they were mere acquaintances.

  It wasn’t Cat’s fault. Yes, her life had moved on in ways Jane’s hadn’t, but if Jane had been completely happy as the Spinster House spinster, it wouldn’t have mattered. She would have been able to roll her eyes—figuratively speaking—and listen to Cat drone on about babies while she thought about something else.

  There was a wall between them, a wall Jane had built.

  “I’m sorry,” Cat was saying. “You were busy. I shouldn’t have arrived unannounced.”

  “I wasn’t busy.”

  Cat ignored her. “I’ll just be going.” She put her hands on either side of her and tried to push off the settee.

  Nothing happened.

  “Oh, blast. I should have known better than to sit here. I’m like a beached whale. You’ll have to haul me up if you want me to leave, Jane.”

  “I don’t want you to leave.” Oddly, she wasn’t just being polite. While a moment ago she would have cheered Cat’s departure, now she wanted her to stay. Clearly, she was becoming unhinged.

  Poppy jumped off Jane’s lap and eyed the place where Cat’s lap used to be.

  “I’m afraid, you’ll have to sit here, Poppy.” Cat patted the spot next to her on the settee.

  Poppy decided that was acceptable and leapt up.

  Cat looked at Poppy, but spoke to Jane. “Well, you probably will send me packing when I tell you Marcus and I had hoped something romantic might happen for you, too, at Chanton Manor.”

  Something romantic had happened, if one considered her two awkward fumblings in the vegetation romantic.

  No. They had been far more than fumblings.

  Jane forced herself to laugh—and then had to fight not to grimace at the weak sound that emerged. “Something romantic at that gathering? The male attendees—besides my brother—were all married, betrothed, or barely out of leading strings.”

  Cat’s eyes held hers. “There was Alex.”

  Her treasonous body hummed at the sound of his name. It remembered in exquisite detail every touch, every brush of his lips.

  No. He was an interesting companion, but that was all. She could not let her animal instincts rule her. If she did, she might end up giving everything to the earl. She would marry, and that would be far worse than living with Randolph. She wouldn’t have to tidy up after Lord Evans—there would be servants to do that—but he would invade her life in far more intimate ways. Even her body wouldn’t be hers
any longer.

  She eyed Cat’s belly.

  The thought of losing all control like that was terrifying.

  “Lord Evans?” she said while pretending to pick a bit of lint off her skirt. “Yes, he was there, as was Lady Charlotte.”

  Cat scowled. “Who eloped with Septimus Grant. How did Alex take that?”

  It was safer to look at Poppy than Cat. “I have no idea. I left with Randolph and Imogen in the morning while the earl was still in bed.” Oh, Lord. Don’t think about the earl and beds. “Don’t you know? I thought Lord Evans corresponded with the duke.”

  “He does, but they never discuss anything interesting.” Cat gave her a searching look, but then, thankfully, moved on. “Speaking of correspondence, Anne has been asking after you. She said she wrote you months ago and has not heard back.”

  Anne had written before Jane went to Chanton Manor. She’d started a reply too many times to count, but she always balled the letter up and threw it out.

  “I suppose I’m just not much of a correspondent.” She sighed and said a bit wistfully, “It was so much easier when we all lived in Loves Bridge and saw one another regularly. How does Anne go on?”

  “She’s well, but Nate, of course, worries about her and the baby.” Cat smiled. “Nate worries about everything.”

  He did. He must be frantic now, concerned not only about his wife and child, but also about his cousin. Very soon they would know if Isabelle Dorring’s curse was broken.

  Unless Cat gave birth to a daughter.

  “Does Anne plan to visit?”

  “Not until after her baby’s born. The physician Nate engaged says travel is too risky, and, well, after poor Princess Charlotte, Nate—and Anne—don’t want to take any chances.” Cat rubbed her belly. “None of us do. Oh!” She grimaced.

  “What’s wrong?” Jane leapt up and came over to her. “Are you all right?”

  Cat smiled, a bit wanly to Jane’s eye. “I’m fine. It was just a little pain.”

  Jane lowered herself cautiously next to Poppy, being very careful not to jostle the seat and disturb Cat. “Are you supposed to have a little pain?” She looked at Cat’s belly and squeaked in alarm. A small tent had suddenly appeared in Cat’s dress as if something was poking out of her. “What’s that?!”