Meet the Earl at Midnight

by Gina Conkle

  “Please,” he added, tipping his head in gentlemanly fashion.

  His high and mighty lordliness had the upper hand, but he’d softened the advantage with that “please.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Why not come here and find out?” Eyes sparkling, he challenged her.

  She gave in to the invisible pull, very much like a moth fluttering helplessly, perilously into a flame. Mesmerized, she held eye contact with him. Warm, swirling sensations built inside her body as she closed the distance to him. Lydia stopped a safe, respectable arm’s length from the earl, but the dangerous glint in his eye hypnotized.

  What he did next astounded.

  Lord Greenwich bent on one knee before her. He tipped his head and almost bumped her abdomen. His hands hovered close to her thighs. He put both hands on her skirt, grabbed the fabric—and gently pulled.

  She looked down at her dress, horrified to see the faint outline of her thighs through her underskirt. The brief exposure was fleeting as Lord Greenwich lowered her dress skirt, a falling curtain to what was on display.

  She moaned. Her skirt must have caught on her underskirt when she dried the map.

  The earl knelt before her like a chivalrous knight of old and settled the hem around her ankles. His fingers skimmed the tops of her unshod feet as if testing the feel and shape of her. Heat grazed her, her lower body, her thighs and knees precisely where his hands had hovered, leaving a mark of warmth as he set her skirt to rights, shooting awareness everywhere.

  “Your skirt was stuck above your knees,” he said, explaining the obvious with a mischievous glint. “I couldn’t let you go on with an unseemly display of undergarments.”

  Oh, he was not bothered by her unseemly display of anything.

  Parts of Lydia flushed hotly again as it dawned on her: they’d conversed with the cloth bunched and riding an indecent height, all while she was rather bold with him. Her underskirts hung the proper length, thank goodness, and covered her legs, though their silhouette was clearly visible.

  Lydia shut her eyes and groaned again at the indignity. Lud, she could be a piece of work.

  His lordship had pushed the edge of propriety, and well he knew it. What’s worse, her body had reacted—from his brigand’s smile or his hands on her skirt, she wasn’t sure. Lydia pressed a protective hand to her midsection.

  “Thank you.” She stepped back, needing some distance.

  Lord Greenwich stood up and towered over her, and on purpose, she was sure.

  His thumb and forefinger tweaked her chin. “Don’t think you’re off the hook for this uninvited foray into my room. You need to atone for this grievous behavior, Miss Montgomery, and flashing your underskirts won’t suffice.” His eyes sparked with a dangerous, playful light. “Everything has its price.”

  Her eyebrows shot up at his daring tone, and Lydia planted a hand at her hip. “Is this all some kind of game for you?”

  “Game?” One side of his mouth, the scarred side, curved up. “If this is sport, then you’re the most diverting woman I’ve had the pleasure of sparring with in a very long time.”

  Every nerve in her body shot to life again, sensitized, just when she’d calmed the riot inside her. Her quick inhale gave her away, telling him, she was sure, that he threw her off balance with his unusual compliment. Again. Lord Greenwich likely wasn’t the type to wax poetically about the gentler sex. A woman would have to make do with his brand of verbal surprise. His slow smile spread to the smooth, unscarred cheek with what she guessed was satisfaction at silencing her.

  “I’ll give you ’til dinner to come up with three ways to make amends for coming in here uninvited.”

  “What?” she asked, her eyes rounding. “You want some kind of atonement for my looking around your room?”

  “Yes, three. That way I can choose whichever is most advantageous to me. This will give you a sporting chance to please me.” His brigand’s smile widened. “Perhaps I’ll choose all three. I never said I was a nice man, especially with women who don’t follow the rules.”

  This situation had sped out of control like a horse galloping too fast. And what happened all too often with a rider who let a racehorse have his head? Disaster. She needed to rein in this maddening nobleman and this maddening situation. Lydia’s gaze dropped to his exposed neck and the exposed fraction of his chest. His pulse ticked a rapid cadence against the skin at the base of his neck. His lordship was not immune to the excitement either. She was about to give him a starch set down, when someone coughed from the doorway.

  Lydia jumped from the noise.

  Miss Mayhew, rigid and proper in housekeeper gray, stood in the hallway just outside the door.

  “My lord,” she said and gave a proper curtsy. “Mr. Ryland waits for you in the study.” Miss Mayhew looked at Lydia with cool features. “Miss Montgomery, your things have arrived. I thought you’d want to change, possibly have a bath.”

  “Yes, thank you.”

  Curiously, if the beautiful housekeeper had any designs on Lord Greenwich, she hid them well. The housekeeper likely detected some of the charged interplay, yet Miss Mayhew’s face remained a mask of demure, unemotional decorum.

  Lydia needed to extract herself from the earl’s surprising effect on her—like a strong drink one was unsure of but kept consuming. She needed badly to set this man on his ear and stop his assumptions about her. But first things first.

  A good clean up and the right dress made all the difference for a woman.

  “A bath would be perfect,” she said, trying for control.

  Miss Mayhew disappeared in a rustle of brisk steps and stiff skirts. The stunning housekeeper’s dress would never catch on anything; surely those starched skirts didn’t bend or wrinkle. Lord Greenwich started to exit, but he paused at the doorway.

  “We shall continue this later.”

  “And I’ll use the time wisely to consider my ways.” Lydia folded her hands at her waist, smirking at him.

  “And come up with three, as you put it, atonements.” He gave her a cheeky grin. “You’ll make my trip up here worthwhile.”

  Lydia’s eyebrows scrunched together as she remembered that something had taken Lord Greenwich from his work. “Why did you come here in the first place? You said something about making amends to me.”

  His hand rested on the doorjamb. “I was going to take you on a tour of the estate’s art gallery, but we’ll postpone that for after dinner. I need to meet with Mr. Ryland, and I saw the way your eyes lit up at the mention of a bath. Enjoy your respite, and you have your things to settle.” He glanced at her bodice. One side of his mouth hitched up. “And you won’t have to roam about corsetless.”

  Her arms covered her chest in a loose X. “And I was beginning to believe you’re a true gentleman.”

  “Dangerous notion,” he teased, and his dark eyes smoldered above his dangerous smile. “Remember, I expect no less than three choices from you.”

  With a slight bow, he quit the room. Lydia’s arms slid down to her sides. Beyond the open adjoining door, she heard the maids chattering and pouring water into a tub. No one came to shoo her from the earl’s room. Studying the restrained disarray that was his room, Lydia tapped her mouth, deep in thought.

  In some ways she was more informed yet more mystified by the man she’d come to investigate. Her gaze landed on the large messy table where maps and books sat. Ideas for his required atonements sprang to mind with ease. She circled his domain, smiling to herself: he’d left her alone in the very place he’d forbidden her presence.

  Her smile spread. That mental image of a racehorse, near out of control, played in her head again. The earl had better hold on tight. With what she had in mind, his chaotically ordered world was about to change.

  Nine

  Conversation has a kind of charm about it,

  an insinuating and insidious something

  that elicits secrets from us just like love or liquor.

  —Senecar />
  Edward rubbed his forehead and tried again to read the intricate diagram. Focus eluded him; instead, his mind wandered abovestairs to a dark-haired woman in a bath. Schematics and chemistry turned fuzzy when pitted against the naked woman in his head.

  “Is there a problem?” Cyrus Ryland’s firm voice doused cold water on that inviting image.

  “Problem?” Edward repeated, rifling through the sheaves. “Not at first glance.”

  “You’ve been glancing at the documents over half an hour.”

  Edward gave his guest a rueful smile. “Apologies. My mind is otherwise occupied.” He stacked two thick documents on the side table. “I’ll give them a read first thing tomorrow and send my response in the post.”

  As he sipped tea, Ryland sat with the ramrod discipline of a general. One expected a master of commerce to drink something hard and bracing, but Britain’s leading citizen claimed he rarely imbibed. Rumors abounded on how he’d gained his wealth. One didn’t rise from son of a humble midland pig farmer to own half of England without a cloud of questions. Edward grasped the murky nature of rumors. Ryland’s correspondence came direct and to the point. In person, Edward could say no different.

  Solid as granite, Cyrus Ryland commanded respect upon entering a room. And the way Claire’s cheeks flushed when Ryland glanced her way? One could speculate she found Greenwich Park’s guest a far cry from fat, stodgy, or boorish.

  She refreshed the king of commerce’s tea and ignored Edward, not that it mattered. He wasn’t thirsty. Ryland’s slate-gray stare followed the housekeeper’s every move until she exited the room. Apparently, Edward wasn’t the only one sidetracked by a woman.

  Edward cleared his throat. “Let me make sure I understand: Arkwright, inventor of the waterproof periwig dye, wants to partner with you in the manufacture of this new mechanism.”

  He didn’t withhold his skepticism about the vast leap one made from simple chemistry for vanity’s sake to complex machinery for practicality’s purpose.

  Ryland nodded, and threads of silver glinted in his brown hair. “A carding machine. Turns raw cotton into thread. Arkwright wants to relocate to Cromford in Nottingham. He needs capital to build the necessary warehouses.” He tipped his head at the documents. “But I’m intrigued about the possibilities there as well.”

  “You’re interested in the textile business?”

  “I’m interested in growing my wealth.” Ryland settled against the chair and sipped his tea, impassive gray eyes giving nothing away.

  “Of which you hold an impressive amount, by all reports.”

  Ryland’s brain worked like a clearinghouse of decision making, and Edward respected that, could see as much in months of correspondence. And when they’d met face-to-face for the first time that day? Ryland had assessed Edward’s appearance in a split-second glance, and then moved to the business at hand. No probing questions. No bald commentary. Ryland was a walking beehive of pure strategy, all to increase his wealth and expand his business empire.

  He respected Ryland for knowing his limitations: scientific intricacy wasn’t a strong point, but he acknowledged that and sought advice. Now, Edward surmised, his guest had something to say that had nothing to do with the documents on the table. Edward’s fingertips tapped a rhythm on the chair’s arm, waiting. Ryland set down his dish of tea and brushed at an invisible speck on his breeches.

  “I’m not one to pry—”

  Edward stiffened, as much disappointed as anticipating the drollery to follow.

  “—but financial records can be very revealing. Your finances speak well of you, Greenwich. Your priorities, your level head…often missing from men of your class and age.”

  Edward couldn’t help his smile at the unexpected compliment. “Thank you.”

  “You’ve been one candidate I’ve considered for my sister, Lucinda.” Ryland’s gaze flicked to Edward’s scars. “But that’s not plausible.”

  Edward tipped his head, acknowledging the edict. “Understood.”

  He wasn’t bothered by plain speech. Lucinda Ryland had been one name bandied by his solicitor as a possible marriage candidate. There may have even been inquiries, but something stirred at the notion of any other woman occupying the countess suite.

  Ryland gave a relaxed smile, the first crack of emotion since his arrival.

  “I sit on the board of Lloyd and Taylor Bank. Facts and figures, how a man spends his money tells me a lot about his character.” Cyrus Ryland paused, so like a sovereign considering what next to say. “Sanford Shipping needs new blood. With the success of canal building in the North, your schooners may soon become relics of the past.”

  With that blunt pronouncement, Greenwich Park’s esteemed guest rose.

  “Thank you for the insight,” Edward said then motioned to the footman in attendance. “Rogers, please see Mr. Ryland to the door.”

  Etiquette demanded Ryland genuflect first, but Edward bowed. Somehow he couldn’t help but sense he’d spent his afternoon with a great man, and the closed, convoluted nature of English Society had crowned the wrong man king. Even more, the visit laid new burdens and pressure on his already taxed shoulders.

  Edward went to his desk, a hub in his universe of thought, and retrieved fresh parchment.

  Deadlines dictated he put his—what had Ryland said?—level head into the next phase of his plans.

  ***

  Never in all his five-and-twenty years did Edward think the words “woman” and “scintillating” would intersect in his mind.

  Such a notion defied logic.

  He paced the dining room’s massive hearth, his hands clasped behind his back. Oh, he’d met a witty female or two in the past, but this was maddening. No, Miss Montgomery was maddening; she had worked her way under his skin.

  As he passed the hearth yet again, a stray ember skipped from the fire, landing close to his shoe. Vibrant orange light flared in small waves across the charcoaled piece. Fire fascinated the eye, drawing the viewer in close, but one needed to proceed with caution or else get burned. Wasn’t that what had happened with the beautiful, vacuous Eugenia Blackwood? At that, the tip of his shoe kicked the offending ember back from whence it came. He set his hands on the cold marble mantel and let the inferno warm his legs.

  The cavernous room was chilly, and the pretense of warming himself at the fire would force him not to pace and not to watch the door. Around him, footmen moved with efficient steps, lighting candelabra on the sideboard and setting the table.

  Staring into dancing orange and yellow flames, he tried to recall the last time he’d anticipated his evening meal, or the company of a woman, with such thin restraint. To add insult to injury, he dithered over his choice of coat, deciding on a newer brown velvet embellished with gold trim at the wrists. Of course, he stopped short of digging out a waistcoat.

  Where is she?

  He pulled his silver timepiece from his breeches’s pocket. Miss Montgomery would have to understand promptness was a virtue of considerable impor—

  “Good evening, Lord Greenwich.” Her soft feminine voice floated across the room.

  Edward’s head snapped to like a hound on a vixen’s scent as his fingers slipped the fob back into its home.

  “Good evening, Miss Montgomery.”

  She stood in the doorway, hands folded low, all scrubbed clean, and her glossy hair fashioned nicely—minus powder, that was all the rage, probably because there was none in the house. Miss Montgomery had taken some time at her toilet and availed herself to a maid with pleasing results. He couldn’t claim to know the exact color of her dress, but it had a modest bodice and a pleasing dark hue that flowed over her form, nipping at her slender waist. The dark color shaded the graceful arc of feminine cheekbones, casting shadows and light just so. A woman of simple elegance had replaced the cheerful hoyden of this morning.

  He motioned to the round table set very near the hearth. “Dinner awaits.”

  One of the footmen standing at attention helped
seat her, and disappeared into the kitchen. His dinner companion’s head tilted this way and that as she scanned the bare, windowless room.

  “Except for the room’s size, and the footmen in attendance, I could be in a Wickersham dining room,” she said, smiling. Her gaze traveled once more around the room and table. “You have a rather unusual arrangement, my lord.”

  “How’s that?” He flicked his coattails behind as he took his seat.

  Her fingers skimmed the unvarnished table and singular knife and fork beside her plate. “I thought nobility preferred long, rectangular dining arrangements with formal settings. This”—she unfolded her napkin and glanced across the round table—“feels very intimate.”

  A door swung open, and two footmen marched forward bearing silver trays of food and drink from the kitchen. Edward cocked his head at the sound of their heels striking bare marble in the high-ceilinged room.

  “Sounds like a mausoleum, doesn’t it?”

  “I wouldn’t know.” She grinned. “Never been in one.”

  He unfolded his napkin, digesting that difference in life experience. “Well, I prefer comfort first, decorum last.”

  The footmen set wide salvers, polished to a mirror’s shine, on the side buffet. Dinner was simple fare: a generous slice of meat pie, and a tankard of the best local ale, but for Miss Montgomery, red wine from the cellar. Her thick brows arched as she took in the rustic, one-course meal.

  “Do you dine like this every night?” She spiked her fork at the flaky pastry, removing layers of golden crust, on a hunt for what lay underneath.

  When she found the simple meat-and-gravy center, steam curled up like a genie released from its bottle. Her nose twitched as she sniffed the food and speared a carrot slice.

  “I assure you it’s not poisoned.” Edward chuckled as he split his pastry in two. “And yes, I dine this way because I grew up with formality in excess. As soon as it was prudent, I made things more to my liking.” He pointed his knife and fork at the table and made a quick circle. “Are you uncomfortable with this arrangement?”

  “No. Simply surprised.” She lowered her eyes and sipped her wine. “When you say ‘prudent’ to change things, you mean after the period of mourning for your father?”