If He's Tempted

by Hannah Howell

  “Why are you here?” he asked again, not caring if he sounded somewhat rudely blunt, and then he suddenly recalled how she was now closely related to one of his oldest, dearest friends. “Has something happened to Ashton?”

  “Aside from having a very fertile wife who will soon present him with yet another child? No,” she replied and moved to answer the soft rap at the library door. “We will talk about my reasons for being here in a moment.”

  She opened the door to let in a small boy and a nervous maid both carrying trays, one with tea and one with food. Brant fought to recognize his own servants, to thank them by name, and failed. He murmured his appreciation as the boy handed him a tankard filled with Matt the stablemaster’s famed cure for the effects of too much drink. Ashamed that his servants were so well aware of the wretched state he was in, Brant concentrated on drinking down the potion. By the time he finished the servants had prepared him a cup of strong tea and filled a plate with food, food clearly selected with care to soothe a drink-battered stomach. Just as he felt he could speak without Matt’s potion rushing back out of him, a frowning Olympia stepped up to the boy, gently took the child’s slightly pointed chin in her hand, and touched his cheek with her other hand.

  “This is new,” she murmured and gave the boy a stern look. “Who and why?”

  “Cook’s helper. Molly,” the boy replied without hesitation, responding quickly to the tone of authority in Olympia’s voice. “I washed my hands.” The boy looked at Brant. “T’ain’t supposed to touch the soap since Molly thinks it is all hers, but I knew you have a liking for the ones who bring you your food to be clean and all.”

  “Wait here, Thomas,” said Olympia even as she strode for the door.

  A little voice told Olympia that this was none of her business. This was not her home and these were not her servants. That truth did not slow her steps at all, however, as she continued to march toward the kitchens. No child deserved a slap so hard that it marked him just because he tried to wash his hands to please his lordship.

  “Which one of you is Molly?” she demanded as she strode into the kitchen and startled the three women working there.

  “I be Molly,” said the woman by the stove, pausing in the stirring of something that smelled like a lamb dish. “And who be you then?”

  Molly looked a little long in the tooth to be no more than an assistant to the cook. She also looked as if she sampled far too much of what she cooked. The insolent tone of the woman’s voice was a surprise for any servant would know, with just one look at Olympia, that she was quality. Either Mallam entertained a high quality of mistress or Molly was so certain of her place at Fieldgate that she did not care if or whom she might offend.

  “I am Lady Wherlocke, the Baroness of Myrtledowns, and I wish to speak to you about your treatment of Master Thomas Pepper,” Olympia said as she walked over to stand by the woman.

  “Filthy little brat,” muttered Molly as she wiped her hands on her dirty apron.

  “So, you think him filthy yet you deny him, even punish him, when he attempts to clean the dirt away?”

  “He touched my soap with them dirty hands.”

  “I believe most people who touch soap do so because they have dirty hands. ’Tis often why they reach for the soap to begin with.” Olympia ignored the badly stifled laughter of the other two maids in the room as she fought to control her rising anger at Molly, but it was a losing battle. “And any soap within this domain is most certainly not yours alone. You had no right to strike the boy.”

  “I had every right. He be in my charge. And just who be you to be telling me what to do? Just another one of his lordship’s trollops, I wager. Aye, ’tis why ye stand here to defend that wee bastard. He be naught but the old lord’s by-blow by the stablemaster’s daughter. No need for you to be trying to pamper him to win his lordship’s wandering eye.”

  “I believe it would be very wise if you ceased to speak,” said Olympia, knowing she was but one more crass word from knocking the woman down.

  “Oh, ye believe, do ye? Thomas,” she spat. “Such a grand name for a lad what was born in sin. He should have died with his mother and joined her in hell. And I doubt ye are all that much better because no true lady of quality would come to this house. Why not get yourself on back to that whoremonger and do what ye came here for so that ye can get your shameful self gone all the quicker, ere you stink up the house. Aye, and why not take that little bastard Thomas with you if’n you be caring so much about how he is treated?”

  Olympia slapped the woman, knocking her back against the ovens. It did not really surprise her when Molly, screaming invective and insults, lunged at her. The woman had made it very clear that she did not see Olympia as her better. This could end up being very embarrassing, she thought as she moved to skillfully defend herself.

  Brant frowned and slowly stood as the door shut behind Olympia. “What is she about now?” he muttered.

  “I be thinking she is about to have a talk with Molly, the cook’s helper,” replied the boy.

  It was then that Brant noticed the bright red mark of a hand on the boy’s cheek. The woman Molly had obviously hit the boy very hard for some small infraction and that was not behavior Brant would allow in his home. He started toward the door, intending to have a word with Molly and thinking that Lady Wherlocke was taking a lot upon herself to meddle in the workings of his household.

  Just as he stepped out into the hall he could hear loud female voices drifting up from the kitchens. He hurried down the stairs only to come to an abrupt stop when he saw his butler Wilkins sprawled out on the floor of the foyer. He looked at the burly man who was clearly standing guard over Wilkins.

  “What happened to Wilkins?” he asked.

  “He would not let Lady Olympia in to speak to you,” the man replied.

  Before Brant could ask what the man meant by that more screeches echoed up from below stairs. Alarmed, he raced toward the kitchens, not even pausing to tell Thomas and the young maid, both close at his heels, not to follow him. He burst into the kitchen to see one of his servants attacking Olympia. Even as he stepped forward to help Olympia, he realized she did not need any help, and was in truth defending herself with an admirable skill.

  It was tempting to stand there and watch Olympia, a baroness, brawl with a kitchen maid, but Brant decided he had best stop it. The only problem was, he was not sure how to break up a fight between two women as it was not something he had ever done before. When he stepped toward the women, a sharp tug on the back of his coat brought him to a halt and he looked down at Thomas.

  “I would wait, m’lord,” Thomas said.

  “But I do not wish for Lady Olympia to be hurt,” Brant said.

  Thomas snorted. “She is doing right fine, she is. But, not to worry. Old Molly is fair winded and will go down soon.”

  Brant was just thinking it would be absurd to take advice from a boot boy when Olympia neatly pinned the much bigger Molly against the wall. The look of fury and hate on Molly’s florid face made him uneasy. How long had the woman worked for him despite feeling such obvious distaste for the ones she served?

  “You may consider me something less than you, my dear woman,” said Olympia, “but I am actually a baroness and I might remind you that physically attacking one of the aristocracy carries a very heavy penalty.” Olympia nodded when Molly grew pale. “I will, however, forget this undignified tussle if you apologize to young Thomas.” She nodded toward where a widely grinning Thomas stood beside Fieldgate. “He is right there so you need not go far to do so.”

  Molly’s eyes widened so much at the sight of Fieldgate that Olympia thought they had to sting. The woman also grew very pale. Since Fieldgate looked more confused than angry, Olympia was not sure where Molly’s fear came from. She was just about to ask the woman if she was worried about what Wilkins would do, even assure her that Wilkins would soon be no problem when a sly look came over the woman’s face and Olympia tensed.

  “I wil
l not apologize to that misbegotten brat,” Molly said. “I did as I ought when I set the lad straight about touching my things.”

  Olympia stepped back and frowned at the woman. “You had no call to strike him so hard that the mark still lingers upon his face.”

  Molly brushed down her skirts. “And I do not need to be lectured by you about how I treat the lad. If anyone thinks I am not treating the boy well, then they should be talking to the only one who has a right to say something.”

  Suddenly recalling what the woman had said about Thomas being the old lord’s by-blow, Olympia had a very bad feeling about what was about to happen. She took a step toward Molly only to have the woman neatly dance out of her reach with a speed and grace that was rather surprising in such a large woman. Olympia felt a brief pang of sympathy for the woman as she recognized what was a skill learned from many years of dodging the fists of the men in one’s family.

  “The only one that has a right to say what happens to the brat is his brother, m’lord.”

  All sympathy fled and Olympia glared at the woman, aching to wipe the smug look right off Molly’s face. Brant had gone very pale. Young Thomas had obviously known exactly who fathered him as he watched Brant with an odd mix of bravado and sadness. Olympia suspected Thomas waited for Fieldgate to toss him out as many another lord would do.

  “What did you say?” he demanded of Molly.

  “I said you be the only one who can decide what to do about your brother.” Molly nodded toward Thomas. “That be him right there. Born not long after the old lord died, he was.”

  Brant stared at Thomas and slowly began to see the familial resemblance. He had the Mallam eyes and looked very close to having the Mallam nose as well. “Is what she says true?” he asked the boy.

  “It is,” replied Thomas.

  “Are there others lurking about my household whom I should know about?”

  “Not anymore. Not in the house.”

  That statement struck Brant as somewhat ominous but he turned his attention to Molly. “And you never saw the need to inform me that my own sibling was the boy cleaning my boots?”

  “He be a bastard and we all know how the gentry feel about them,” Molly said.

  “You may leave now.”

  “What?’

  “I said, Molly the cook’s helper, that you will leave now. I do not recall hiring you or even approving of your hire, but I can make you leave. So, go.”

  “You would toss me out for telling you the truth?”

  “No, I am tossing you out for not telling me the truth sooner and, I begin to think, for not actually being in my employ.”

  Brant turned to walk away but paused to look back at Molly. “You may collect what little is yours, and do not think I will not know if you help yourself to few extra things for I will as I have a very precise accounting of all I own.” The fact that he had had to do so to stop his mother from robbing him blind was not something anyone else needed to know. “I would suggest that you wait outside for a while after you pack and leave the house. I believe there will soon be a few more on their way out of Fieldgate soon. Very soon.” He looked at Thomas. “Shall we return to the library?”

  Olympia watched Brant and young Thomas leave and then looked at Molly. “That was a particularly witless thing to do. Just why has Thomas been kept a secret?”

  “Because Lady Mallam told us to keep the secret.”

  “Lady Mallam does not rule here.”

  Molly laughed as she tore off her apron and tossed it on the floor. “No? Do you really think that maudlin, drunken fool holds the reins here?”

  Olympia watched the woman stride away and shook her head. It appeared Brant had been carefully watched and controlled by his mother. Considering the man supported Lady Mallam far more generously than many another son would, especially one as grievously wronged as he had been, it made no sense that the woman would keep such a close eye on him. There was more to this than a mother who wanted to control her son and whose greed plainly ran so deep she was willing to sell her daughter to a perverted swine of a man. Olympia took a deep breath and started back to the library. She had told Agatha she would help and so she would. She just hoped whatever needed doing did not pull her too deeply into the Mallam family’s trouble.

  “Still here, m’lady?” Brant asked when Olympia stepped into the library.

  “I have yet to actually discuss what I came here for,” she replied and could tell by the look he gave her that he was very close to trying to throw her out.

  “And what would that be?”

  “That your sister has been trying to reach you because she fears your mother is about to sell her in marriage to Lord Horace Minden.”

  Chapter 3

  Brant stared at Olympia, opened his mouth to speak, could think of nothing to say, and closed his mouth. It was rude but, despite the fact that Olympia was still standing, he slumped down on the settee. It was as if all the strength had left his legs. He glanced longingly at the brandy decanter.

  “That will be no help at all, m’lord,” Olympia said, pausing in her pacing to stand before the large stone fireplace. “You do not need it.”

  “No?” He sighed. “I barely finished breaking my fast when you arrived. My butler is now laid out cold on the floor in the hall, you have had a fight with the cook’s assistant, whom I have just dismissed, and have had it made known to me that the boot boy is actually my half brother.” He glanced at Thomas who gave him a big grin. “Now you tell me my mother is trying to sell my sister, a mere child, to the worst, most depraved debauchee in the aristocracy. A drink might be just what I need.”

  “I doubt that Minden is truly the worst debauchee in the aristocracy,” Olympia murmured and leaned back against the wall next to the fireplace.

  She tensed as images flickered through her mind. A blond woman pressed against the wall. Brant rutting fiercely with the woman. His eyes closed. There was another half-naked woman behind him running her hands all over his body. Olympia quickly stepped away from the wall.

  “Men,” she said, disgust weighing her tone. “The wall? Against the wall, Fieldgate?” She shuddered, silently admitting that part of her disgust came from the sharp stab of furious jealousy that had struck her heart. “And two at a time?”

  Brant blinked slowly in confused surprise. Then he recalled what Olympia’s gift was. He nearly cursed when the heat of a blush seared his cheeks. Some of the embarrassment he suffered was from the fact that he had only the haziest of memories about what she had seen. If he recalled her particular gift as well as he believed he did, Olympia probably knew more about that incident than he did and that was even more humiliating.

  “Shall we return to the subject of my sister?” he asked and waved a hand toward a chair opposite him in a silent invitation for her to sit down.

  Olympia eyed the chair a little warily before she sat down. She wanted no more images of Brant’s dissolute behavior crossing her mind. Sitting down cautiously, she breathed a sigh of relief when no memory of some past scandalous event entered her head.

  “I met your sister Agatha a fortnight ago when she came to the Warren in an attempt to find Radmoor. Since she arrived alone, I knew there was some trouble brewing. It took awhile to get the whole tale from her.” Olympia helped herself to some tea. “As I said, your mother is bargaining with Lord Sir Horace Minden, the Baron of Minden Grange, for young Agatha’s hand in marriage. Your sister is utterly terrified that a deal will soon be reached and she will be forced to marry the man. ’Tis quite bad enough that she is being offered to a man old enough to be her grandfather, but he is . . .” Olympia groped for a word that was bad enough to describe Sir Horace yet not completely profane.

  “A swine,” Brant said and dragged his hands through his hair. “I do not associate with the man but know enough about him to know that no mother should ever wish to give the man her daughter.”

  “I fear yours does.”

  “There will be money in it for her. I send
her a most generous allowance but she has ever been greedy.” Brant made himself more tea but doubted it would do much to ease the rage burning ever hotter inside him. “The need for more has always led her.”

  “And I believe your dear mother and Minden deal for far more than a simple payment for a sacrificial virgin.”

  It pained Brant to hear the child he recalled, one who had been all smiles and curls, being named so, but he suspected it was close to the truth. Agatha had barely taken her first steps into womanhood. It was true that many girls had been married at very young ages for centuries, but that practice had begun to fade away. It was also true that marriages amongst those in society had little or nothing to do with love or romance, or even compatibility, but to marry a girl barely out of the schoolroom to an aging roué old enough to be her grandfather would be frowned upon by most all of his contemporaries. It was not even excusable by Minden desperately needing a fertile young wife to breed him an heir for he already had several.

  “Mother is evidently not seeking out the approval of society with such a match.”

  “Nay.” Olympia idly finished off a piece of shortcake as she thought over all Agatha had said. “I believe your mother seeks Minden’s help in some business venture. Agatha complained that much of what she overheard sounded more like merchants bartering than the settling of a betrothal agreement. ’Tis true that many betrothals are little more than business arrangements, but there had to be something unusual in the discussion she heard to make her think such a thing.”

  “Whatever business Minden is in can only be a sordid one.” He softly cursed when Olympia simply cocked one delicate black eyebrow as she sipped her tea. “But, of course. As I have learned to my cost, the stain on the money does not trouble my mother at all.”