Mad About the Earl

by Christina Brooke

  “Hallo, sleepyhead!” Cecily walked in, brandishing the latest issue of La Belle Assemblée. “Are you ready for a big fat orgy of shopping today?”

  “Oh, yes! I’d forgotten,” said Rosamund, stretching luxuriously and wiggling her toes. If anything had power to rouse her from sensual daydreams, it was the promise of new gowns. “I shall be ready in a trice.”

  Ophelia had lumbered in at Cecily’s heels. With a sigh, the old dog collapsed on the hearth rug and propped her head between her paws. Her eyebrows lifted in turn as she looked from Cecily to Rosamund and back again, as if following their conversation.

  Cecily maintained that Ophelia understood a smattering of English, even if Danish was her first language. The Great Dane seemed to find their topic of conversation too frivolous, however, because soon she fell asleep, emitting her habitual doggy snore.

  Stifling a sympathetic yawn, Rosamund dragged herself out of bed. She bent for a quick scratch behind Ophelia’s ear, then padded over to her washstand.

  “Now, before we begin, I propose we make a list of what you’ll need for your trousseau,” said Cecily. With a mischievous grin, she added, “There is a modiste in Bond Street who keeps special nightwear for her clients in the back room.”

  “I am not even going to ask how you know that,” replied Rosamund, pouring water from a ewer into the basin.

  “Jane told me,” Cecily said. “She has become a veritable fount of information on the subject of dalliance since Constantine came along.”

  “He is a wicked, wicked man,” said Rosamund with a chuckle.

  “Yes, but quite deliciously so, don’t you think? Although a little too intense pour moi.”

  “It is fortunate, then, that he fell in love with Jane.” Rosamund splashed tepid water on her face.

  “Oh, what’s this?” said Cecily. “There’s a letter on your mantelpiece. Aha! Do you think it’s a love poem from your giant?”

  “A letter?” Turning, Rosamund saw Cecily pluck a sealed envelope from the mantel.

  Excitement clutched Rosamund’s stomach. She took the letter from Cecily and ripped open the seal, not caring that her damp hands made splotches on the paper.

  As she read the contents, her brows contracted. The final mists of sleep burned away as the bold, slashing words seared her brain.

  Hardly aware of what she did, she crushed the letter in her hand and let it fall to the floor.

  “What is it, Rosamund?” said Cecily. “What’s wrong?”

  She shook her head, her eyes blind.

  “Rosamund?” Cecily’s voice turned sharp. She bent to pick up the letter and smooth it out.

  Rosamund put a trembling hand to her chest. “It’s Griffin,” she said. “He’s gone.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  … What have you been about in London, dear brother? Cutting a dash with your heiress? I know too well what my esteemed guardian Lord deVere has been up to: auctioning me off to the highest bidder, the horrid old Devil.

  That must explain why Lady Warrington has suddenly become so insistent. She wants me to marry her son without deVere’s consent, if you please! She plans to shepherd us all the way to Scotland!! Warrington, poor soul, has not the backbone to say boo to a goose, much less stand up to his mama. So it comes to this: I must leave here at once.

  I miss Pendon and you and the horses and the sea and the dear pigs in the sty (in no particular order). I even miss Peggy’s singular way with tripe. I cannot stomach stuffy old Bath nor the Warringtons any longer.

  Don’t be cross, will you, dear boy? By the time this reaches you, I shall be home.

  Yours, etc.

  Jacqueline deVere

  “He said he has family business to take care of,” said Rosamund, laying the badly creased letter aside. “He doesn’t take me into his confidence.”

  Her gaze flickered to Montford and away again. “I do not count as family, it seems.” Rosamund tried to keep the bitterness from her voice. She doubted she succeeded.

  Griffin had left her. Again. And after the shattering, revelatory experience they’d shared, his abandonment seemed doubly hard to accept. He’d penned not one word of affection or reassurance to her in that brief note, of course. But then, she ought to have given up hope of gallantry from him by now.

  Worst of all, he hadn’t confided in her or asked her to share in whatever trouble took him back to Cornwall in such haste. That hurt more than she could have dreamed.

  She thought—hoped—they’d reached some level of deeper understanding since that afternoon in Berkeley Square. He’d accepted that she wasn’t his enemy.

  But he didn’t trust her, for all that.

  Why couldn’t he believe she had no hidden agenda in all this? He was her chosen mate, and she would stand by him through thick and thin, as any good wife should.

  She knew Montford watched her closely, but even under his scrutiny, she couldn’t summon the will to conceal her disappointment.

  “All I want is to be a wife to him,” she said with a helpless gesture. “Do you think I did the wrong thing setting those conditions? Perhaps I should have married him immediately, as he demanded.”

  I could be with him now if I hadn’t been so puffed up with pride.

  Montford’s brows lifted. “I think that if a ward of mine displayed so little backbone, I’d wash my hands of her.”

  His cool rejoinder warmed her inside. The duke was not a demonstrative man. He would not give her the hug she so badly needed. Yet his unemotional support bolstered her courage as an embrace could not have done.

  “What do you propose to do?” he inquired.

  She blinked at Montford as the realization hit her. “I must follow him, mustn’t I? It’s the only thing I can do.” She sat up as a sudden anger flared. “I’ll—I’ll be damned if I sit here and wait for him any longer.”

  “Such language,” commented the duke. “I believe I am shocked. But I approve of the sentiment.”

  He eyed her for a few moments, pulling the feather of his quill through finger and thumb. Lowering his gaze, he said, “I am not a man who is fulsome in my praise or offers anyone mere flattery, so you may believe me when I say this. You had no hand in creating your beauty, so that is not to your credit. To some women, such beauty can be a curse.”

  Rosamund thought of her mother, growing more desperate as the years rolled past.

  Montford lifted his gaze to hers. “But you, Rosamund, have qualities that are far more important than a dazzling form and face. Intelligence, grace, kindness, strength of character, and elegance of mind. I trust Tregarth is not such a fool that he cannot recognize them and value them as your husband should.”

  She was so overwhelmed by this speech, she didn’t know what to say.

  He regarded her with understanding in those dark, hooded eyes. “You will go to Cornwall and give Griffin one more chance.” The corners of his mouth lifted in a slight smile. “And if he hurts you, I will cut out his heart and feed it to Ophelia.”

  His final words surprised a laugh from her, but she was obliged to blink away tears. “Thank you, Your Grace.”

  And because he had said exactly what she’d needed to hear at that moment, she took her courage in her hands and went to him.

  He’d risen when she did, so she had to place a hand on his arm and reach up to press a kiss to his cheek. “Thank you,” she whispered in his ear.

  Drawing back, she searched his face, concerned that she’d overstepped some invisible boundary he’d erected between them long ago. The surprise in his expression was swiftly veiled, but the suspicion of a smile lingered on his lips and lit those dark eyes. A hint of color crested his sharp cheekbones.

  Good God! Had she embarrassed him? The thought was as absurd as it was novel.

  He cleared his throat. “Yes. Well. I’ll make the arrangements for your journey.”

  “Thank you, Your Grace.”

  He tapped his lips with a finger. “Tibby will go with you, and your maid, of course.”r />
  She nodded. While she’d prefer to go alone, she had no desire to court scandal. She could work around Meg and Tibby if need be.

  “Oh, and Dearlove must come, too.” She gave a shaky laugh. “The poor fellow is utterly despondent because Griffin left him behind.”

  “I’ll see to it.” He paused. “You will put up at an inn, of course.”

  “Of course,” murmured Rosamund.

  Pendon Place was essentially a bachelor household, so it would be improper for her to visit Griffin there. She didn’t intend to let that stop her, but she wouldn’t tell Montford that.

  The duke might well suspect her plans, but as long as she maintained the appearance of decorum, he would not complain—if her actions got him the results he wanted. She understood him rather well, she thought. Particularly after observing the way he’d handled Jane’s romance with Constantine.

  Besides, she would not need to remain at the inn for long. If she had to force Griffin to the altar at pistol point, she would do it.

  One thing was certain: She would not leave Cornwall again until she was the Countess of Tregarth.

  * * *

  Griffin wiped his sweaty forehead on his shirtsleeve and took a swig from his water flask. It was hot, thirsty work, digging ditches.

  He’d ridden home hell-for-leather upon receiving the tidings that she’d left Bath. He’d alternately cursed and feared for Jacks all the way from Town. Reckless, foolish chit! Why couldn’t she have sent word to him and waited for him to come and get her?

  Being Jacks, she’d challenged him over that. A little shamefaced, he admitted he hadn’t acceded to her pleas to come for her thus far. But she ought to have known this was different. If the Warringtons were trying to coerce her into marriage, he would have rescued her from them without delay.

  Typical of Jacks to take the matter out of his hands. Maddening little baggage!

  Upon arriving back at Pendon Place and finding her there, unharmed and in lively spirits, he’d flown into a rage. She’d accepted his recriminations, patiently waiting for his fury to burn itself out.

  He’d pictured all sorts of disasters befalling a young lady traveling by herself. She’d told him cheerfully not to mind it, for she’d been dressed as a boy.

  Hell! Did she think that would set his mind at rest?

  He still shuddered when he recalled her description of her journey home. Foolish, reckless chit! Thank God she was safe. But safety was a relative term where his sister was concerned.

  His first inclination had been to whisk Jacks back to London immediately, but he hadn’t prepared for an extended absence when he’d journeyed to town to fetch Rosamund. If he were to spend the season in London, he needed to attend to a number of crucial matters of estate business before he went.

  Tossing the empty water flask down, he firmed his grip on the shovel and wedged it into the soil. His aching back muscles protested, but this ditch was needed for the new drainage system he was installing, and he was damned if he’d give up yet.

  Of course, it wasn’t his job to dig ditches anymore. He was the Earl of Tregarth now, owner of all he surveyed. His grandfather was no longer here to set him to menial, Herculean labors like this. The old earl had been fond of saying that mucking out stables was all a big brute like Griffin was fit for.

  Despite his grandfather’s malice, Griffin had taken a grim pleasure in manual tasks, in their usefulness and simplicity. He’d found a measure of peace in using his strength thus that he couldn’t derive from any other source.

  By the age of fifteen, his body had developed a hard muscularity that was profoundly satisfying in its effect on his bully of a grandfather. The earl had taken care never to call Griffin into his presence without a pair of sturdy footmen at hand.

  The old bastard had been dead more than a year, and still Griffin dug ditches. Old habits were hard to break.

  Truth was, he’d come out here to think. Separated from Rosamund’s intoxicating influence, he saw things more clearly now. More objectively. He wondered whom he’d been trying to fool, seducing her in that summerhouse in the dark.

  She was altogether too much for him to handle. So dazzlingly beautiful, vital and sensual and generous. He couldn’t do it to her. He couldn’t keep taking what she gave when he had nothing to offer her in return.

  But he needed Rosamund, didn’t he? DeVere had placed him in an impossible situation. The challenge was still to save Jacks from a horrible misalliance. He needed to get her married and away from Cornwall for good. Nothing had changed there.

  Hoofbeats sounded on the trail that skirted the field. He looked up, squinting against the spring sunshine.

  Two riders on cover hacks emerged from the copse and ambled toward him. A stranger might have mistaken the riders for two men, but he knew better.

  Jacks was at it again.

  Muttering a curse, he threw down his shovel and strode over to the equestrians. “Jacks!” he roared. “What in damnation do you think you’re doing?”

  “Don’t yell at me like that. You’ll spook Lady.” Lady Jacqueline deVere dismounted from the demonstrably placid steed with more athleticism than grace. She wore old, worn breeches and a dun-colored coat that would have appeared proper on a young man, if a little shabby.

  But Jacks was not a young man. She was his pestilential hoyden of a little sister.

  He turned his fulminating gaze on her companion. “Maddox! I might have known.”

  Their neighbor looked the picture of the fashionable sportsman in buff breeches, a blue coat, and shining top boots. The whiteness of his linen was rivaled only by the gleam of his perfect teeth.

  “Well, I suppose you might,” he drawled. “Your sister’s acquaintance in these parts is so small, it could hardly be anyone else, could it?”

  Was that a gibe? If their good and worthy neighbors shunned them, it was hardly Griffin’s fault. “You encourage her in this folly.”

  The dark eyes glinted. “What an odd notion you have of me that you should think so.”

  “You should have told her to go home and change,” snapped Griffin.

  “Ah, but that would argue a far more intimate relationship between us than you would allow, my friend.”

  “You needn’t go on discussing me as if I’m not here,” remarked Jacks. “Tony doesn’t mind my breeches, do you, Tony? Besides, he’s right. He has no authority over me, and I wouldn’t heed him anyway, so I don’t see why you should hold him responsible.”

  Maddox had shown singular interest in Jacks since her return from Bath. While his innocent sister seemed to think their neighbor offered nothing more than the friendship he’d always shown her, Griffin thought otherwise.

  Maddox was Griffin’s friend, too, but he was also possibly the last man on the planet Griffin wanted as a husband for his sister.

  Besides, the fellow encouraged all her headstrong ways, including this mania the girl had for dressing in men’s clothes. It was hoydenish, bordering on the scandalous. If news of her eccentric behavior traveled to London, he’d never marry her off.

  No, Maddox could not be permitted to court Jacqueline. Besides, for a deVere, marriage was never a matter of personal choice. As none knew better than Griffin.

  “Go home and change into a gown,” he ordered her. “And tell Peggy to do something with your hair.”

  “Oh, very well,” she grumbled, swinging herself up onto her horse without even a mounting block or a leg up. Griffin shook his head.

  “She’s no simpering miss, that one,” said Maddox with a smile.

  “What she is, is none of your concern!” flashed Griffin. “My sister is not for you, Maddox, so get that notion out of your mind once and for all.”

  “But as the dear girl so often points out, it’s only nine hundred and forty-nine days until her twenty-first birthday,” Maddox murmured. “And I am a very patient man.”

  The implication made hot blood rush to Griffin’s face. “If she marries you, she won’t get a penny from me.�
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  Maddox’s aristocratic mouth flattened. “You’re a brute, deVere, but I’ve never heard you descend to vulgarity before. I don’t give a damn about your money or hers, and you know it.”

  Griffin would not be fobbed off. Between his teeth, he said, “You’ll not have her, do you hear me?” He’d let deVere marry her to the ancient Malby first!

  “You always did possess an uncertain temper,” said Maddox, leaning forward a little in the saddle. “Small wonder, the rumors that have sprung up about you. Even I begin to question if they’re true.” For a few heartbeats, his gaze locked with Griffin’s.

  No, no, not Maddox, too. Surely he’d believed Griffin’s denial, even if no one else in the county had. Good God, they’d practically grown up together!

  “The coroner entered a verdict of accidental death,” he ground out. “The matter has been put to bed.”

  “Yes, but he can always reopen an inquest if new information comes to light, can’t he?” said Maddox. He hesitated, and although his manner was customarily debonair, Griffin knew Maddox watched him like a hawk. “There are rumors of a witness.”

  White-hot terror shot through Griffin like a flare. He took a few moments to catch his breath. “A witness? Who?”

  “That, I do not know. But I recommend you come out of your cave for a while and show the people you’re not such an ogre as they think. Public opinion is stacked against you here.” Grimly, he added, “They do try peers for murder these days, you know.”

  “Yes. I know it.”

  With a nod, Maddox touched his whip to the brim of his hat and urged his horse forward.

  Griffin stood watching him go. For a few disorienting seconds, he felt as if every ounce of feeling had left his body. Then sensation returned in a surge of furious fear. Swearing viciously under his breath, he turned on his heel and strode off, back to his ditch.

  But the work had lost the power to calm his jangling nerves. He’d delayed far too long and was about to reap the reward.

  He needed to get Jacks away from Cornwall and safely married to a man who was not Anthony Maddox or the pox-ridden old degenerate their grandfather had chosen for her. To do that, he must give Jacks a season—immediately—and he needed Rosamund if he wanted Jacqueline’s debut to be a success.