Brave New Earl

by Jane Ashford

  “That’s not fair.”

  “It’s the truth.” Mrs. Wandrell paused, then added, “Once you have a creature you love dearly, you’re trapped, because it can be taken away from you.”

  “You can’t take Fergus!”

  “No, I can’t. And I wouldn’t, even if I could.”

  Geoffrey looked confused.

  “So, no pony for two weeks,” Mrs. Wandrell said. “And of course you must never do anything like that again.”

  “I wouldn’t!”

  “Good. I expect your father will have more to say to you about that. I’ll leave it to him.” Mrs. Wandrell looked up at Benjamin and raised her eyebrows. “You agree to impose this punishment?”

  “Yes.” It didn’t seem unfair. And he would continue their discussions about proper behavior as well.

  “Then we’re quits on the matter.”

  Benjamin nodded. He didn’t feel like thanking her, though her judgment wasn’t unreasonable. “Let’s go, Geoffrey.”

  His son’s small frame relaxed. He scampered toward the door.

  “We all have our hostages to fortune, as I think you know quite well now,” said Mrs. Wandrell before Benjamin could follow. “My daughter would have made you a fine wife. And she’d have lived next door to me rather than…wherever she ends up. However far away.”

  Benjamin spread his hands. He had nothing to apologize for on that score, but he understood her better now. Jean would say that was a good thing, and he supposed it was.

  Father and son rode back to Furness Hall side by side. Geoffrey dawdled a bit, probably because this was his last ride for a while. “Did I do all right?” he asked.

  “You did splendidly.”

  “It that how an honorable gentleman makes things right?”

  “It is. An apology and actions taken to correct the matter. You’ve redeemed your honor.”

  “What’s re-deemed?”

  “Restored, er, gotten it back.”

  “So she had my honor until I said I was sorry? Until I do my punishment?”

  “In a way.”

  Geoffrey frowned. “I don’t like her having it.”

  He hadn’t put this well, Benjamin thought. Should conversations with a five-year-old be so complicated? He wished for Jean, to help him explain. “She didn’t really have it,” he began. “That’s not right. Your honor is always your own. It means the way you treat other people. And keep the promises you make. The only person who can take it away is you.”

  “By making mistakes,” said Geoffrey. “But you said everybody makes mistakes.” He sounded apprehensive.

  “Most everyone does,” Benjamin agreed. Hadn’t he been mired in a large mistake for most of his son’s life? “But we can make up for them, as you did today. Your honor is lost when you do bad things, and you aren’t sorry or willing to set them right.”

  “And you just keep doing them,” Geoffrey said.

  “Yes.” Benjamin was glad to see Furness Hall up ahead. This talk was feeling like hard work. He wanted Jean more than ever. Fortunately, Geoffrey seemed satisfied by his explanation.

  “I can give Tom carrots to take to Fergus,” the boy said as they rode into the stable yard. “And tell him they came from me.” He glanced at Benjamin, testing out this scheme.

  “I think that would be all right.” At some point, they would have to talk about the letter of the law and the spirit, but not today.

  Geoffrey seemed inclined to linger in the stable as long as possible, but Benjamin sent him off to change out of his best clothes. Then he went to find Jean in the library and tell her how the visit had gone.

  “Geoffrey is an amazing little person,” she said when he’d finished.

  “By his own efforts. I did so little these five years.” Regret still tinged Benjamin’s regard for his son. He hoped that one day it would be gone.

  “We’re not looking backward. That is agreed.”

  He put his arm around her and pulled her closer on the sofa. “It is.”

  “You’ve done wonders for Geoffrey lately.”

  “As have you.”

  She smiled. “I’m almost sorry Miss Warren is coming. But not quite. How will she get along with Tom, do you think?”

  “Ah.” Benjamin shrugged. “Apparently Tom is going with my uncle when he leaves. I gather he’s been promised adventures.”

  Jean sat straighter. “Oh, Geoffrey will be so unhappy.”

  “That’s what I thought. But it seems Tom has been telling him all along that he wouldn’t stay. From the very beginning. So I hope it won’t be too bad. I thought I’d give Geoffrey Molly.”

  “A second pony in exchange for a human companion? Like a kitten in exchange for a marriage?”

  “Only my first idea.” He gave her a rueful smile. “I’m finding my way.”

  “He needs other children to play with.”

  “We’ll find him some.” Benjamin waggled his eyebrows. “One way or another.” And there was the flush on her cheeks that never failed to beguile him. “But I want to talk about you. Are you truly all right after that bout in the storeroom?”

  “I am.” Jean smiled back at him. “It turns out that rescue comes from the inside, not the outside.”

  “Ah.” He gazed at her, his heart full of admiration and love. “I can’t say ‘too bad.’ But I should have liked to be your knight in shining armor.”

  “Oh, you’re that all right. My own Galahad. It’s just that the dragon has…changed his spots.”

  “Wouldn’t that be a leopard, my adorable biologist?”

  Jean nodded. “My metaphor, er, metamorphosed in midsentence.”

  Laughing, he kissed her. And kissed her again. After that, there was no further conversation for quite some time.

  “When you kiss me, I just melt,” Jean murmured.

  “We must get married at once,” Benjamin declared. “If we could go down to the church right now—”

  “We must post the banns.”

  “Weeks too long!”

  “I need some time to get ready for my one and only wedding day,” she told him.

  “One and only indeed!”

  Benjamin was kissing her again when the library door burst open and Geoffrey scampered in. “They’re hanging my picture. Come and see.” He danced from foot to foot in front of them. “They’re doing it now.” When they had disentangled themselves and stood up, he ran out again.

  “I must check the locks on all the bedchamber doors,” said Benjamin as they followed him to the stairs. “Do you suppose he can pick locks?”

  “No.” Jean considered and added, “And if he can, you must tell him it is a matter of honor not to do so.”

  “Good idea.”

  Arm in arm they walked up to the gallery where the ancestral portraits of Furness Hall hung. Tom’s portrait of Geoffrey was being placed next to his mother’s.

  No one, looking at the two, would doubt that they were related, Jean thought as she gazed at the two pictures. The red-gold hair, the celestial-blue eyes, the piquant shape of their faces. “Cousin Alice was so very beautiful,” she said quietly. That glowing perfection was a bit intimidating.

  “She was, but not quite as beautiful as that,” Benjamin murmured near her ear. “The painter improved on nature. I think he was a little in love with her.”

  “Why is my picture lower down?” Geoffrey asked the crew placing his portrait.

  “We want an equal distance at top and bottom,” answered Tom, who was overseeing the process. “Looks best that way.”

  “That lad is a treasure trove of hidden talents,” said Benjamin.

  “I’m glad your uncle has taken him up.”

  “Indeed, I’m eager to see what he makes of himself.”

  “Where is Lord Macklin?”

  Benjamin sho
ok his head. “He received an urgent letter. And then he had to speak to Mrs. Thorpe at once. I have no idea why.”

  “Another benevolent mystery?”

  “Very well put.”

  The picture was hung, adjusted, and approved. Everyone stood back to get the full effect.

  Jean felt small fingers curl around hers. She looked down and found Geoffrey holding her hand. “She’ll be up here, and you’ll be downstairs,” he said.

  “That’s right,” she managed, her throat tight with emotion.

  “Are you going to sleep in my mother’s room?” the boy went on.

  “Not if you don’t like it.”

  “I don’t mind.” He looked at his father. “I took those things away.”

  “Did you?”

  Geoffrey nodded. “To my own room.”

  “Good.”

  “Good,” Geoffrey repeated, satisfied.

  With her free hand, Jean reached for Benjamin’s. The three of them stood together, hand in hand, gazing at the past and toward the future.

  Twenty

  “It’s a disgrace!” declared Clayton. “A member of the peerage to be married—before all his people—looking like an unshorn sheep.”

  “Mr. Clayton!” Sarah was shocked at his outspoken criticism. Especially here and now. They sat in one of the rear pews of the village church near Furness Hall.

  “I beg your pardon, Miss Dennison, but I feel the matter deeply,” replied Lord Macklin’s valet.

  “Lord Furness isn’t your charge,” Jean Saunders’s lady’s maid pointed out to him.

  “In a way he is. Or has been, I’m relieved to say, as we depart tomorrow.” Clayton seemed unable to let go of his grievances. “Because he is my lord’s nephew, I extended myself to help. It’s not a thing I would do for just anyone, you know.”

  Sarah acknowledged his condescension with a nod.

  “If he had been willing to listen to me… But he seemed to take the matter as a joke. Or an irritation, depending on the day.” Clayton’s lips thinned. “And I have to say, Miss Dennison, that your suggestion about his hair was useless.”

  “I am sorry, Mr. Clayton. I didn’t know then that my young lady thinks Lord Furness looks like a knight of old.”

  “With his hair straggling down his neck and about his ears?” Clayton sniffed.

  “Seems they wore it longer in ancient times.”

  “It seems they were careless in their personal habits.”

  “Well, they had to wear suits of armor, didn’t they? Helmets and all. Perhaps their hair was a kind of padding.”

  “That would explain it, I suppose,” answered Clayton grimly. He shrugged. “It’s your problem now. I wash my hands of it.”

  “We’ll find a likely young fellow and train him up to be a decent valet,” Sarah answered.

  “Train,” repeated Clayton. “More like keep him under your thumb.”

  “Why, Mr. Clayton, I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Don’t you just.”

  Sarah suppressed a smile. “Shh. They’re starting.”

  Benjamin took his place at the altar of the village church, waiting for his bride to come to him. Only a few more minutes, and they would be married at last.

  “Nanny said I mustn’t fidget,” declared the small figure at his side. “I don’t fidget.”

  Glancing down at his son and groomsman, Benjamin smiled. In his new coat and breeches, Geoffrey looked like a miniature town beau.

  “What’s ‘fidget’?” Geoffrey added, somewhat spoiling the effect.

  “Moving about, making faces, twiddling your fingers.”

  “Oh.” The boy put his hands behind his back. “Nanny said I would do fine.”

  Miss Warren was settling in well, Benjamin thought, and seemed likely to be a fine addition to the household. “And so you will.”

  “But I don’t really do anything, do I? I just stand here.”

  “You are lending me your support.”

  Geoffrey gazed up at him with inquiring blue eyes. “Are you going to fall down? Do you feel sick?”

  “No. I feel…quite wonderful.”

  “Because of her.”

  His son hadn’t quite settled on a label for Jean as yet. Benjamin hoped that eventually he would say—as well as feel—mother. “Yes.”

  “She’s good.”

  “She is. But we must be quiet now. The music is starting.” And there she was, finally, at the other end of the church. Benjamin’s breath caught.

  “She looks pretty with flowers in her hair,” Geoffrey said in his high, clear voice. Wedding guests in the pews smiled.

  Benjamin gazed out over his neighbors and chief tenants and a few friends who had come down to Furness Hall for the celebration. He acknowledged the smiles and nods as his gaze encountered theirs. It was past time to rejoin society, he thought. And because he was the luckiest man in the world, he got to do so with Jean at his side. “Lovely,” he whispered wholeheartedly. “Now shh.”

  Holding Lord Macklin’s arm, Jean took a deep breath. As she had no close family, Benjamin’s uncle was leading her down the aisle. “It’s only right that you should be here,” she murmured to him. “You set all this in motion.”

  “No, you did.”

  “I?”

  “Some spark was set alight when I first talked to you and saw that you were a woman of intellect and spirit.”

  “You’re too modest.”

  “Not I,” he murmured. “Are you ready?”

  “Completely.”

  He smiled at her, and they started off down the aisle. Jean had never felt happier in her life.

  “Why is she walking so slow?” asked Geoffrey quite audibly.

  There was stifled laughter, but Benjamin didn’t care. Watching them move toward him, he felt his heart swell with gratitude to his uncle, and to Jean, and to all the beneficent powers that had allowed a brave new love to burst into his life.

  For more Jane Ashford check out her next

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  SHANA GALEN

  “Poignant and unforgettable.”

  —Lorraine Heath, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, for Third Son’s a Charm, Book 1 in The Survivors series

  Collette Fortier took a shaky breath and pasted a bright smile on her face.

  Do not mention hedgehogs. Do not mention hedgehogs!

  Collette was nervous, and when she was nervous, her English faltered and she often fell back upon the books she’d studied when learning the language. Unfortunately, they had been books on natural history. The volume on hedgehogs, with its charcoal sketches, had been one of her favorites.

  This ball had been a nightmare from the moment she’d entered. Not only was she squished in the ballroom like a folding fan, but there was also no escape from the harsh sound of English voices. Due to the steady rain outside, the hosts had closed the doors and windows. Collette felt more trapped than usual.

  “He’s coming this way!” Lady Ravensgate hissed, elbowing her in the side. Collette had to restrain herself from elbowing her chaperone right back. Since Lieutenant Colonel Draven was indeed headed their way, Collette held herself in check. She needed an introduction. After almost a month of insinuating herself into the inner sphere of Britain’s Foreign Office, she was finally closing in on the men who would have knowledge of the codes she needed.

  Lady Ravensgate fluttered her fan wildly as the former soldier approached and then let go so the fan fell directly into the Lieutenant Colonel’s path. Lady Ravensgate gasped in a bad imitation of horror as Draven bent to retrieve the fan, as any ge
ntleman would.

  “I believe you dropped this.” He rose and presented the fan to Lady Ravensgate. He was a robust man, still in the prime of his life, with auburn hair and sharp blue eyes. He gave the ladies an easy smile before turning away.

  “Lieutenant Colonel Draven, is it not?” Lady Ravensgate asked. The soldier raised his brows politely, his gaze traveling from Lady Ravensgate to Collette. Collette felt her cheeks heat and hated herself for it. She had always been shy and averse to attention, and no matter the steps she took to overcome her bashfulness, she could not rid herself of it completely. Especially not around men she found even remotely attractive.

  Draven might have been twenty years her senior, but no one would deny he was a handsome and virile man. “It is,” Draven answered. “And you are…?”

  “Lady Ravensgate. We met at the theater last Season. You called on Mrs. Fullerton in her box where I was a guest.”

  “Of course.” He bowed graciously, though Collette could tell he had no recollection of meeting her chaperone. “How good to see you again, Mrs…er…”

  “Lady Ravensgate.” She gestured to Collette. “And this is my cousin Collette Fournay. She is here visiting me from France.”

  Collette curtsied, making certain not to bend over too far lest she fall out of the green-and-gold-striped silk dress Lady Ravensgate had convinced her to wear. It was one of several Lady Ravensgate had given her. She’d bought them inexpensively from a modiste who had made them for a woman who could then not afford the bill. Whoever the woman was, she had been less endowed in the bosom and hips than Collette.

  “Mademoiselle Fournay.” Draven bowed to her. “And how are you liking London?” he asked in perfect French.

  “I am enjoying it immensely,” she answered in English. She wanted people to forget she was French as much as possible and that meant always speaking in English, though the effort gave her an awful headache some evenings. “The dancers look to be having such a wonderful time.” The comment was not subtle, nor did she intend it to be.

  “You have not had much opportunity to dance tonight, have you?” Lady Ravensgate said sympathetically.

  Collette shook her head, eyeing Draven. He knew he was cornered. He took a fortifying breath. “May I have the honor of the next dance, mademoiselle?”