Mary Jo Putney

by Sometimes a Rogue

  Sarah frowned thoughtfully. “We have a good deal of the passion, and also the companionship, I think.”

  “Yes, not to mention the fact that you’re my wife.” He laughed a little. “I still have trouble believing that! But it means that everything between us is shaped by the knowledge that we have made lifetime vows to each other with all the joys and responsibilities that go with those vows.” He kissed her chin. “I refuse to get drawn into a discussion of beauty, charm, and allure! That wouldn’t be fair to anyone.”

  “Wise man,” she said, smiling as they relaxed together. She suspected that he’d been with other women as well. A mistress in India, perhaps. More casual encounters that hadn’t left much of a mark on his life.

  Now there was Miss Sarah Clarke-Townsend, who by luck and circumstance had become his wife. If he’d rescued a different woman and returned to England to find himself a lord, might he have married that woman? Perhaps, if they liked each other and were both in the mood to marry. It was a rather unromantic view of marriage.

  Yet the fact of marrying did change the situation. She and Rob had pledged fidelity and responsibility. He was right that doing so affected the intimate side of their marriage, though she wasn’t knowledgeable enough to define how.

  Rob said with regret, “I hate to move, but the duties of the day are calling.”

  Equally regretful, she rolled off him. “Tonight is another night.”

  He sat up and kissed her. “And tomorrow will be another morning.”

  She made the kiss more than casual, amazed at the thought that she’d been skittish about marrying. If marriage was a gamble, she’d won her bet.

  Rob was able to join Sarah for lunch that day. He enjoyed sharing the details of their days. This was another of the bonds of marriage, he was learning. Day by day they were becoming closer. Building a life as a couple.

  It was a pleasant spring day and windows were open, which is why they heard the sounds of livestock as they lingered over tea. A bellowing bull, the baaing of sheep, and cackling roosters, followed by the quacks and honks of waterfowl.

  “What on earth?” Rob rose and looked out the window, Sarah joining him.

  Outside the castle was a convoy that included two men on horseback and two wagons, each with a bull tethered behind it. The first wagon contained sheep, goats, and pigs in separate pens. The second carried caged poultry and rabbits. At least two roosters were included because they were crowing at each other.

  “They seem to be all males,” Sarah observed. “And very fine beasts they are! Did you order breeding stock and forget to mention it?”

  “No.” Rob broke into a smile. “But I think I know where they came from. See that man riding at the end of this parade?”

  “Murphy!” she exclaimed with delight. “Adam’s head groom. I think that other man might be one of the Ashton cowmen.”

  Rob caught her hand and headed for the door. “Let’s see if this is what I suspect.”

  They reached the drive in front of the house as wagons, bulls, and horses rumbled to a stop. Murphy swung off his mount and approached, a letter in his hand. “Good day, my lord,” he said formally.

  “I believe you were calling me Carmichael when last we met. Why not go with Rob?” Rob offered his hand and a smile. “This lot must be a nuisance for a man who works with horses!”

  Murphy grinned back. “It was an interesting trip. Took three days. The bulls are not fast walkers.” He handed over the letter.

  Rob broke the seal and read:

  Rob and Sarah—

  As I said before, the service you performed is beyond price and deserves a payment in kind. Your estate needs first-class breeding stock, and these are some of the best beasts in Britain. I’d never sell them, so I suppose that makes them beyond price. Please accept this breeding stock as a token of my undying gratitude.

  Ashton

  Rob handed the letter to Sarah. “Wonderful!” she exclaimed. “Much of Adam’s original stock came from Coke of Norfolk, and he’s been improving it ever since.”

  “Aye, my lady.” The cowman joined them. He bobbed his head. “You won’t find finer breeders anywhere in Britain. Where shall we put the stock? I want to get them settled properly. A journey like this ’tis hard on the poor beasts.”

  This was a man who obviously loved his work and his animals. “I’ll show you to the barns,” Rob said. “I assume you’ll stay the night, maybe another day or two? I’m sure my stockmen can learn from you.”

  “Aye, his grace said we were at your disposal for as long as you want.”

  Seeing the conversation sliding toward the agricultural, Sarah said, “Mr. Murphy, I’m glad to see you again. I owe you thanks for what you did for me and my sister. Rob, I’ll see you later.” She gave a dazzling smile to all the men, including the drivers, and returned to the house.

  As they walked toward the barns, Murphy fell in beside Rob. “His grace said you could also have this stallion I’m leading if you’d like it. Rojo is a first-class stud.”

  Rob took a closer look at the stallion, a handsome red chestnut. “He’s magnificent! Why would Ashton think I might not want him?”

  “Some men might feel insulted at the idea they need help with their horseflesh,” the groom explained.

  “Anyone who wants to insult me with a horse like this is more than welcome,” Rob said with a grin. “This old estate is well on its way to getting on its feet again.”

  “Onto a lot of sets of four feet, and some two footers as well,” Murphy said, a twinkle in his eyes. “You’ll have a fine lot of new stock next year.”

  “And better yet a year later.” Rob cast an admiring glance over all his new stud animals. Sheep and cattle were impressive, but rabbits and pigeons were a good source of meat, just as good roosters and ganders could improve the quality of eggs and poultry.

  He stroked the silken neck of his new stallion. Trust Ashton to come up with a unique and perfect payment for the mission Rob had accomplished.

  Chapter 41

  The varied breeding stock animals were not the only beasts to arrive. A week later, when Rob was off acquainting himself with other Kellington properties, Sarah headed for the stables to go riding.

  She was looking for Jonas when she saw that Rob’s man Harvey had returned from Ireland and was grooming a tall pony in a stall. Sarah barely knew him, so this seemed like a good opportunity to remedy that. “Good afternoon, Mr. Harvey.”

  Then she recognized the pony he was grooming. “Boru!” she exclaimed with delight. “Is that really you?” Cooing, she offered the pony part of the apple she’d brought for the gelding she’d planned to ride.

  Harvey touched his cap respectfully. “Rob asked me to see if I could find your pony after I finished at Kilvarra.” He nodded toward the next stall. “He also said I should look for another pony that would do for Miss Bree.”

  “What a beauty!” Sarah leaned against the stall door, admiring the placid dappled gray pony. “Bree will love her.”

  Harvey patted the pony’s neck. “She’s a patient girl. Good for a new rider.”

  “How did things go at Kilvarra?” Sarah asked. “Are any tenants interested in emigration?”

  Harvey nodded. “Aye, some are eager to try their luck in a new land. That was a good thought. I also discharged the old steward and hired on Father Patrick’s brother. Much remains to be done, but the tenants’ lot is improving.”

  As with Kellington Castle, it was a start. Sarah studied Harvey from the corner of her eye. He was a few years older than Rob, wiry and weathered. There was intelligence in his face, and a weary sense of experience. “How did you and Rob meet?” she asked. “If you don’t mind my asking.”

  Harvey shrugged. “Don’t mind. It was in India. I was a sergeant in the East India Company army. One night when I had too much to drink, I walked down an alley where there were some locals who didn’t like foreigners. They attacked and would have killed me if I hadn’t been yelling. Rob heard and came t
o investigate. Drove them off and did considerable damage. ’Course, they messed me up pretty bad first.”

  “So badly you had to leave the army?” she asked quietly.

  “Aye.” Harvey stamped his wooden peg leg on the floor. “Lost my leg below the knee. I almost died when the wound turned putrid. Rob saw that I was taken care of, then offered me work when it was obvious I wasn’t much more use to the army.”

  “You might not have been much use to the army, but I gather you’re good for other things,” she remarked. “Rob values you as both associate and friend.”

  “ ’Tis mutual.” Harvey glanced at her askance. “Are you good enough for him, my lady?”

  She smiled. “Probably not. But I’m working on it.”

  He laughed softly, and she knew that in the future, they’d be friends.

  Rob had planned to return from Devonshire the next day, but instead he pushed on, anxious to see Sarah. It was near midnight when he and Crowell returned. A tolerant gleam in his eyes, the steward said he’d take care of the horses and sent Rob off to join his bride. Rob found it wryly amusing that he was the cliché of a besotted bridegroom, but there was no denying the reality.

  When he entered the master suite, he went direct to Sarah’s room. The earl’s room had yet to be slept in. He entered the chamber quietly, not wanting to startle her awake. A dimly lit lantern gave enough light to show his wife sleeping innocently on her right side, her right hand under her cheek. She looked like a sleeping angel, her exquisite features serene and her blond braid falling over her shoulder.

  “Sarah?” he said softly.

  There was a flash of movement and suddenly his wife was sitting up in bed, a cocked pistol held steady in both hands, the barrel aimed at his chest.

  Rob froze, his hands in the air. Startling a barely awake woman with a gun aimed at him would not be wise.

  “I thought I’d receive a warmer welcome,” he said in his most soothing voice.

  She recognized him in an instant and uncocked the pistol. As she set it on her end table, she exclaimed, “Rob, I’m so sorry! With you away, I’ve been having nightmares of the abductors coming after me again.”

  She slipped from the bed to wrap herself around him. He enveloped her in his arms. She was trembling.

  He felt like the greatest fool on earth. “I’m the one who needs to apologize. I shouldn’t have gone away, and I certainly shouldn’t have startled you awake! I missed you too much to stay away for a minute longer than was absolutely necessary.”

  She tilted her face up and he kissed her. Passion seared, swift and shocking. He swept her onto the bed and tumbled down beside her. As he frenziedly unbuttoned his breeches, her hands and mouth and teeth were all over him, as urgent with need as he was.

  She was ready, more than ready, her body hot and slick and demanding when he thrust into her. She was his home, not this great pile of rocks. In Sarah he found peace and joy and shattering fulfillment.

  Culmination was as swift and uncontrolled as their joining. Guessing that he’d have nail marks on his back, Rob rolled to his side and drew her close, gasping for breath, his cheek pressed to hers.

  Sarah said with unsteady amusement, “Well, that was a fine way to wake up!”

  He gave a choke of laughter. “I’m sorry. I really didn’t intend to ravish you.”

  “I think the ravishing was mutual.” Her arms tightened around him. “I kept myself very busy, but I still missed you dreadfully.”

  “As I missed you. I never really understood the madness of the newly married. I feel like an idiot—but I wouldn’t have it any other way.” He kissed her temple.

  “Nor would I.” She made the soft humming sound that reminded him of a contented cat.

  “I hate to think I’ll have to go off on another manor visit in a few days, but I need to do what I can while it’s early enough in the year to implement changes.” He sighed. “And I should go to London for a few days, too. I may need to kidnap you myself.”

  “Tempting, but not sensible.” Sarah thought for a moment. “How about after Bree’s birthday, the three of us go to London together? You can take care of business while I can show her the sights and take her to a modiste. I’d also like to engage a governess who could teach Bree and the Holt children. Mrs. Holt is a good teacher, but she has so many other duties that she’d be happy to give up that one.”

  “I like that idea,” he agreed. “Have you found local teachers for the estate schools you want to start?”

  “I’ve hired two infant teachers, but I still need a master and mistress for the older children. I’d prefer local people.” She grinned. “I’m thinking of calling these the Kellington Hedge Schools with the motto ‘education for all.’ ”

  He laughed. “I like the name, but we don’t want parents refusing to send their children because they fear lung fever from studying under the hedges.”

  “I expect you’re right.” She sighed happily. “So many of the things we can do to improve the tenants’ lives cost so little. A year of education for all the children on the estate for less than the cost of a grand lady’s court dress or a good hunting horse for a sporting gentleman.”

  As Rob rubbed her back, he said slowly, “I’ve begun to be grateful for the difficulties of my younger years because I lived life as very few aristocrats ever do. I’ve learned that people of all ranks of society have hopes and fears and dreams. They feel happiness and despair. Now I’m in a position to help some of them.”

  “I wonder what you’d be like if you’d been raised as a typical aristocratic younger son,” Sarah said. “Much less interesting, I’m sure. I like you very well as you are.”

  “That’s fortunate, since you’re stuck with me,” he said, his gaze tender.

  They were amiably silent for a few minutes until Sarah asked, “How did you find your manor of Buckthorne?”

  “Rather neglected, but not desperately so. The tenant is a good one who took care of a lot of the smaller problems himself. He was very glad to hear that improvements will be made. Since I needn’t pay the mortgage, I can plow Buckthorne’s revenues back into the manor. In two or three years, it should be profitable again.”

  “If that’s true of the other properties, in a few years you will be very, very rich,” Sarah observed.

  “We will be very, very rich. Remember me saying ‘with my worldly goods I thee endow’?” He frowned. “That reminds me that we need to have marriage settlements drawn up since we didn’t do them before the wedding. Portions for daughters and younger sons, pin money and jointure for you. Whatever else is advisable.”

  “An advantage of all these unentailed estates is that they can be left to those daughters and younger sons,” she observed. “That way they’ll be comfortably established as gentry in their own right.”

  He ran a caressing hand down her side and over her hip. Since she hadn’t been expecting him, she wore a plain, sturdy flannel nightgown. She still looked incredibly fetching. “As a younger son, I would have welcomed land of my own instead of money.”

  “Which you didn’t receive anyhow. If you’d had the deed to a manor, you would have had something your family couldn’t take away.” She nuzzled closer. “We’ll be much better parents than your father.”

  “I certainly hope so. I’ll need to study how to do it right, though, since I’ve had no experience of what a good father is like.”

  “If you need a model, there’s my uncle Peter, who was a wonderful father to his sons as well as me,” she suggested. “Or Adam’s stepfather, General Stillwell. His children and stepchildren are devoted to him.” She snuggled closer. “But I think you’ll manage on your own. You’re doing a good job with Bree.”

  “I’m glad you think so.” He looked at himself ruefully. “I may need aid in being a proper, respectful husband, though. I’m covered with travel dust, which I’ve inflicted on you and your bed.”

  “There’s a cure for that.” She smiled at him mischievously. “Let’s take a bath
!”

  Laughing, he swung out of the bed and lifted her in his arms to carry her off to their magnificent tub. He truly was blessed.

  Chapter 42

  “It’s a beautiful day for a picnic,” Helen Broome said as she surveyed the castle ruins. She closed her eyes to listen to the boom of waves at the bottom of the nearby cliffs, accented by the piercing cries of gulls. “And a beautiful place for it.”

  Sarah agreed. The ancient stones were set in a lush carpet of green spring grass brightened by wildflowers. They’d chosen a quiet site protected from the wind by stone walls on three sides and a hill rising behind them.

  On the fourth side, directly in front of them, a small headland thrust into the sea. Half of the brew house perched precariously on the lip, with remnants of walls and small outbuildings scattered artistically across the grass.

  The dowager countess had come from Bath for the occasion, and she was ensconced in a Windsor chair brought from the house for her comfort. The old woman said querulously, “I thought the boy was supposed to be here today. His own daughter’s birthday, after all!”

  Sarah wondered if Rob realized that his grandmother called him “the boy.” Compared to the dowager’s initial reaction to her only surviving grandson, the words sounded almost affectionate. “Kellington has a lengthy ride home today, but he said he’d try to be here by midafternoon so he could join us.”

  Like Helen Broome and Ruth Holt, the other chaperones, Sarah was perched on a fallen stone. The eight children preferred the informality of sprawling on blankets.

  Picnic baskets contained elegant little sandwiches and delicious pastries accompanied by hot tea or bottles of tangy West Country cider. It was a feast fit for a birthday girl who was also celebrating a new life.

  Bree had been ecstatic to see Alice Broome and her other two friends from Bendan. The girls had been entranced by Bree’s romantic tale of being swept away to wealth and luxury by her lordly father. Her friends were nice girls, genuinely happy for Bree, and only a little envious. Meeting Bree’s father would be the perfect crown for the tale, so Sarah hoped Rob returned in time for the party.