She smiled. “Thank you. Even so, it would be decidedly unwise to wait much longer. The stable roof is a sieve, and I’m afraid the north wall might collapse in the next strong wind. So, I was wondering whether you were still willing to consid—”
He stood, the speed of the movement startling her. “Speaking of your aunt,” Haverly rushed, striding around the desk and sitting again, “I’m—I’m going to have to raise the Academy’s rent.” He pushed a paper toward her. “Here are the calculations and the terms. If you’ll sign at the bottom, we can conclude this as painlessly as possible, and then we can have some apple tarts in the garden. I know you like apple tarts. Regina had Mrs. Muldoon bake them especially for you.”
Emma looked at him. The earl seemed utterly serious, and yet…she forced a laugh. “My goodness. If you keep this silliness up, I shall have to make you pay a shilling to see our play.”
“It’s…well, it’s not silliness, Emma. I hate to do it, but it’s become unavoidable.”
Emma glanced down at the paper he’d placed in front of her. Her heart skipped a beat as she read through the figures and the precise, legal-sounding terms. “This is triple what the Academy’s been paying.”
“Yes, I know, but I haven’t increased the rent in…in a very long time.”
She shot to her feet. “That is certainly not my fault!”
His ruddy complexion darkened. “Now, now,” he said, patting the top of the desk, “I know that. Calm yourself, Emma. Please.”
Emma forced herself to sit again, despite an unladylike urge to throw something. “You and my aunt, and you and I, have had a very cordial relationship. I consider you a dear friend, Lord Haverly.”
“And I you,” he returned in a soothing tone. “This is not personal, I assure you. If it makes you feel any better, Wycliffe has had me increase the rent of all my tenants. Everyone’s been quite understanding.”
So this was that Wycliffe person’s idea. Handsome or not, Emma decided that she didn’t like the golden lion at all. Not one whit. “If your other tenants are paying you more, there’s very little reason for the Academy to do so,” she said, trying for her calmest tone. She was very logical; everyone always told her that was her strongest suit. “We are an institution of learning. Surely for that reason alone the Academy deserves special consideration.”
A muscle in his round cheek twitched again. “Well, I—”
“And Miss Grenville’s Academy has earned a fine reputation for itself in London,” she continued quickly. Overwhelming him with facts seemed her best chance. “Just in the last two years, we’ve seen our graduates marry a marquis, two earls, and a baron. That can only reflect well on you, as our landlord. We could never have fared so well under some harsh dictator’s hand.”
“I’m hardly a dictator, Emma.”
She smiled, squeezing his hand. “No, you aren’t. You are very kind, and helpful, and understanding. Which is why I won’t press you any further than to ask that Haverly take in the Academy’s horses while we repair the stable roof. I hope that is agreeable—and I won’t ask you for anything more.”
“I—no, that’s—that’s not a problem. Of course.”
The earl looked befuddled, which Emma took as her cue to retreat with as much speed as she could manage. She needed to think up a strategy before Haverly’s new rent ruined her plans for the Academy. She stood, nodding. “Thank you, my lord. I trust I’ll see you and Lady Haverly on Thursday evening, for Romeo and Juliet?”
“Ah, yes. Yes.”
Hardly daring to breathe, Emma escaped out of the office, down the hall, and through the front door with no one calling her back to empty all of the change out of her pockets. This was a disaster. Worse than a disaster. The groom was nowhere in sight to help her into the saddle, so she grabbed Pimpernel from a pen and led the mare back toward the Academy as swiftly as she could. Her tactics, though not the most scrupulous, would at least give her until Thursday to come up with a way of countering this Wycliffe person’s idiocy.
At the sound of the front door closing, Greydon set aside the Hampshire planting almanac he’d been reading and rose. He could sympathize with his uncle’s reluctance to increase the rent of Haverly’s tenants, in all instances but one. A finishing school for females—bah. They might as well have named it the How to Trap a Husband Academy. He could vouch for how successful the damned establishment was; Caroline had attended it, and she’d nearly gotten the wedding shackles locked around his neck.
He’d left the library door open, hoping to hear the exchange between Miss Grenville and Uncle Dennis, but they’d managed to keep it fairly civilized, and he’d only discerned an occasional murmur of raised voices.
Dare and the others had deserted Haverly for the day, ostensibly to tour Basingstoke and the surrounding countryside. He knew better, though; Tristan had gone looking for the pert miss from the roadside. He wouldn’t have minded running across her himself, and he added the lost opportunity to his list of Miss Grenville’s faults. Crossing the hallway, he rapped on the office door and strolled inside. “I assume your news displeased the old spinster?” he asked, unable to keep the satisfaction out of his voice.
The earl stood by the window, gazing into the garden. “You don’t need to enjoy it so much,” he grumbled.
“You’re a better man than I am.” Grey joined him, shifting a white pawn on the chess board to counter his uncle’s move. “Nevertheless, being compassionate won’t save Haverly. Did you schedule the payments?”
Dennis frowned. “No. I—” He stopped, and to Greydon’s surprise, chuckled. “Outmaneuvered me, she did. Outsmarted me, really.”
“What are you talking about?” With a scowl of his own, Grey strode to the desk and grabbed the agreement he’d painstakingly drafted last evening. “She didn’t sign,” he said unnecessarily. He glared at his uncle. “Why didn’t she sign?”
“I believe it was because she was more concerned with having me board the Academy’s horses while she repairs the stable roof.”
“Damnation! Haverly’s not entailed, Uncle. And I doubt the rich merchant you end up having to sell to will be as generous with his tenants as you’ve been,” Greydon growled.
“She makes a good argument.”
“I don’t care. You would allow a female to bring your estate to ruin?”
“It’s not as desperate as—”
“It will be, if you allow this to continue!” Folding the paperwork, he jammed it into his pocket. “I won’t allow this to continue.”
He strode out of the office. A barked inquiry to Hobbes informed him that the headmistress had arrived on horseback, so he commandeered one of his uncle’s mounts and went after her.
She had apparently decided to take the morning to savor her victory, because he caught up to her less than a mile from the manor, on foot and leading a small sorrel mare.
“Miss Grenville!” he bellowed, charging up behind her on his uncle’s big bay gelding, Cornwall.
She jumped, spinning around to face him with one hand to her breast. And Greydon forgot what he’d been about to say.
Large hazel eyes, wide and startled, gazed up at him, and her soft, full lips formed a perfect, soundless oh. The chit from the roadside. The one he hadn’t been able to get out of his thoughts. The one Tristan had gone into Basingstoke this morning to find.
“You’re Miss Grenville?”
The oh snapped into an annoyed line. “I am Miss Emma Grenville. Miss Grenville was my aunt.”
Was. “You’re the headmistress of that blasted Academy.”
It wasn’t a question, but she nodded anyway. “Yes. And thank you for your condolences about Aunt Patricia.”
Grey narrowed his eyes. He had no damned intention of being chastised by a chit who looked barely out of the schoolroom. “You’re just…a girl. You can’t be old enough to—”
One fine eyebrow lifted, mocking him. “I am five and twenty—a grown woman, by any definition. I suppose, though, that you didn’t cha
rge out here to inquire after my age. Or did you, sir?”
“Your Grace,” he corrected.
The surprised look came into her eyes again. She should never play cards, he thought abruptly. He could read her from a mile away.
“You’re a duke,” she said dubiously.
He nodded. “Wycliffe.”
Miss Emma Grenville stared up at him for another moment, while an absurd feeling of triumph ran through Grey. He’d found her, and Tristan hadn’t. She was his. As he had the first time he’d set eyes on her, he knew precisely what he wanted to do with her. And it would involve silk sheets and naked skin.
“Wycliffe,” she mused. “Greydon Brakenridge. One of my friends spoke of you.”
“Which friend?” He doubted any of a glorified governess’s friends would be acquainted with him.
“Lady Victoria Fontaine.” She revised that. “I mean Victoria, Lady Althorpe.”
“The Vixen?”
She must have heard the disbelief in his voice, because she put her hands on her hips. “Yes, Vixen.”
“And what did the Vixen say about me?”
A touch of amusement entered her eyes. “She said you were arrogant. Now, I’m pleased to have made your acquaintance, Your Grace, but I do have a class waiting for me. Good day.” She walked on.
“You didn’t sign my uncle’s rental agreement.”
She stopped, then looked up at him again from beneath the brim of her prim green bonnet. “That matter, Your Grace, is between Lord Haverly and myself.”
His towering over her didn’t seem to be intimidating her in the least, but it was making him feel like a bully. Grey swung out of the saddle. “If you don’t wish to pay the increased rent,” he continued, torn between irritation at her statement about his arrogance and the desire to untie the green bow under her chin and pull off that ridiculously strait-laced bonnet, “you can find another location for your school.”
The petite headmistress lifted her chin. “Did Lord Haverly ask you to ride me down and threaten me?”
Somehow this wasn’t going quite the way he’d envisioned. “I’m stating facts.”
“Hm. The fact, Your Grace, is that you obviously don’t approve of the education of women. The fact is, Haverly belongs to Dennis Hawthorne, and I will conduct any and all negotiations with him. If you’ll excuse me.”
With a flounce of her green riding skirt, she stalked off down the road again. Grey watched for a moment, admiring the angry sway of her hips. After her bonnet, her dress would be the second thing he removed. A girls’ school headmistress. She probably starched her shift. The thought had the unexpected result of arousing him, and he tugged on Cornwall’s reins to follow her.
“For your information, I do approve of educating females.”
She kept walking. “How wonderfully condescending, Your Grace.”
Greydon swore under his breath. “Your Academy,” he continued, trying to maintain a grip on his temper and his damned unexpected lust, “doesn’t educate females.”
That got her attention. She faced him, folding her arms across her small, pert bosom. “I beg your pardon?”
Her breasts were just the right size to fit a man’s hands. His hands. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but—”
“Oh, I intend to.”
“—But you instruct your students in etiquette, do you not?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “And dance? And polite conversation? And dress?”
“Yes.”
“Aha. You know as well as I that all that nonsense is for the ultimate purpose of enabling your students to marry—and to marry well. You, Miss Emma, are a paid matchmaker. And in less polite circles, you would be called worse.”
Her face went white. He hadn’t meant to be so biting, but she kept making him lose his train of thought—he had no idea why he was lusting after a prim headmistress. Now, he supposed, she would swoon and expect him to catch her. Grey sighed, taking a step closer in anticipation.
Instead, she laughed. It wasn’t an amused laugh, by any stretch of the imagination, but it was the last thing he expected to hear. Women, as a rule, didn’t laugh at him.
“So, Your Grace, if I might reiterate,” she said, her voice clipped, “you disapprove of women who feel they need a husband to make their way in the world, despite the fact that this is exactly what society has dictated since before the Norman Conquest.”
“I—”
She jabbed a finger in his direction. “And at the same time, you deride me for taking up a career which leaves me completely independent from the male of the species.” She stalked closer, glaring up at him. “What I think, Your Grace, is that you like to hear yourself talk. Thankfully, that does not require my presence. Good day.”
He suddenly realized they had reached the Academy grounds, and swiftly stepped back as the heavy wrought-iron gate banged shut with a clank Miss Emma Grenville must have found utterly satisfying. A moment later she and her horse vanished behind the high, ivy-covered walls.
Grey stood where he was for a moment, then turned and swung into the saddle to head back to Haverly. He couldn’t remember ever having been shut down so efficiently, even by his mother—who was renowned for her razor-sharp tongue. And surprisingly enough, he was as amused as he was infuriated and aroused.
One thing was for damned certain. He was going to see Romeo and Juliet on Thursday. Miss Emma Grenville was not going to escape that easily.
Chapter 3
“Men perform only one necessary function in the world,” Emma growled. “I have no idea how they managed to convince themselves of their superiority in every other aspect of creation, just because of a stupid accident of biology.”
“I assume your conversation with Lord Haverly did not go well, then?”
Glaring toward Haverly didn’t seem to be causing the estate to burst into flames, so Emma stalked away from the office window and plunked herself down at her desk. “They want to triple our rent, Isabelle.”
The French instructor’s pencil tip snapped off. “Zut!”
The curse startled Emma out of her black ruminations. “Isabelle!”
“Beg pardon. But triple? How can the Academy afford that?”
“We can’t. And we won’t pay it.”
Isabelle set down her examination papers. “Did Lord Haverly give a raison? He and the countess have always supported the school.”
“It wasn’t he, I’m sure.”
“I do not understand. Who else—”
“Someone I hope you never have the displeasure of meeting.” Miss Santerre was beginning to look at Emma as though she’d become rabid, but she couldn’t keep the scowl from her face. That arrogant lion of a man was impossible. She had been trying to have a civil discussion with him, and he kept looking as though he wanted to leap on her and devour her for luncheon. For some reason, the thought made her blush. “Lord Haverly’s nephew. The glorious Duke of Wycliffe,” she sniffed.
“A duke? A duke is making us pay more rent?”
Emma clenched her hands together. “He is not doing any such thing.” In the two years since she’d become headmistress, she’d managed irate parents, lovestruck young ladies and their beaux, storms, influenza, and innumerable calamities without ever being this…annoyed. “Do you know what he called me? A matchmaker! A paid matchmaker! He practically accused me of being a…a…procurer of flesh!”
“What?”
“Yes. He obviously has no idea what we do here.” That sparked an idea, and she gave a grim smile. “I shall have to enlighten him.”
She yanked open a drawer and pulled out several sheets of paper. Stacking them neatly on the desk, she dipped her pen in the inkwell. “‘Your Grace,’” she said aloud as she wrote, “‘Our recent conversation has made it clear to me that you have several…misconceptions concerning the curriculum of Miss Grenville’s Academy.’”
Isabelle stood, gathering up her papers and books. “I shall leave you and your correspondence in peace,” she said, her tone amused.
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“Laugh if you want, but I will not tolerate any abuse—verbal or otherwise—directed at this Academy.”
“I’m not laughing at you, Em. I am only wondering if His Grace has any idea what he is in for.”
Emma dipped her pen again, ignoring as best she could the anticipation that coursed through her at the French instructor’s words. “Oh, he will—soon enough.”
Grey glanced up as the office door opened, then went back to his calculations. “How was Basingstoke?”
Tristan dropped into the opposite seat. “Dull as wet sheep.”
A small breath of satisfaction went through the duke. “You didn’t find anyone interesting to chat with, then?”
“I’m beginning to think we imagined her. There aren’t that many places in west Hampshire she could be hiding. Winchester Cathedral’s too far a walk, so she can’t be a nun, thank God. I’d ask your aunt, but I think she’s been corresponding with your mother. Your entire family hates me, you know.”
“I know. And I’m sure you’ll run across your mystery woman sooner or later.” Grey wasn’t certain whether he was simply torturing Tristan, or whether he just wanted to keep the knowledge of Emma Grenville’s whereabouts to himself. Either way, the idea of extending his stay had become much more tolerable.
“Is that what you’re going to be doing the entire time we’re here?” the viscount asked, gesturing at the mounds of paperwork on the desk Grey had commandeered from his uncle.
“Probably.”
“Ooh, fun. We might have stayed in London.”
Grey felt his jaw clench. “No, thank you.”
Tristan lifted an almanac, then with a grimace replaced it on the desk. “You escaped her, you know. It’s not likely that she’ll confront you again.”
No one but Tristan would dare even speak to him about Caroline, and he wished the viscount had chosen a different topic of conversation. “I knew she wanted to marry me,” he said slowly, “but for God’s sake—disrobing in the coatroom of Almack’s?”
“How do you think I felt? I was just looking for my hat.”
A Matter of Scandal Page 3