The Reluctant Earl

by C. J. Chase

  “Another man’s shortcomings don’t excuse mine.”

  “Nor do they compel you to atone for the rest of your life for his mistakes.”

  “Dear Leah.” Alec reached for her hand again, but Leah retreated a step. “You’ve carried this burden alone for far too long.”

  His words called to mind Chambelston’s professed admiration for her independence. How strange the sensation felt—unless he only claimed so to manipulate her?

  Alec settled a gloved hand on her shoulder and drew her back to the present. “We could marry.”

  “We—what?” She halted and stared at her cousin, unable to construct a complete sentence.

  “I see my proposal renders you silent. I said we could marry.”

  Marry? Alec? “But we’re family.”

  “The law allows for marriage between cousins.”

  She smiled to ease the sting of her rejection as she slipped away from his touch. “Wisdom forbids the marriage of these cousins. Alec, you are like a brother to me.”

  “And you were very fond of your brother, as I recall.”

  She studied his countenance but saw no eagerness, only the same determination that drove him to assist with Phoebe’s expenses and the same familial affection she felt for him. “Be serious. How would we survive? We can barely support ourselves even now. Besides you might meet someone and I—” Warmth invaded her face. How silly that a woman of her age and station would wish for a quiver of the anticipation she felt whenever she was with... Once she’d thought a man loved her. And perhaps he had, at least until he’d learned Leah came encumbered with a sister confined to an asylum. She glanced at the stone church, again feeling the pain of rejection.

  “I am being serious. At least wed, you would be safe.” Dear Alec, always trying to protect others. “I fear for you, Leah. A defenseless woman, your livelihood tied to the whims of that dragon and your very person at the mercy of any males in the household.”

  Fortunately Alec didn’t know the worst, lest his volatile, half-Scots temper lead him into trouble. More trouble than Leah even. “But I need my income—both of them—for Phoebe. I fear for her. If something should happen to me—”

  “Now my proposal renders you morbid. I liked it better when you were mute.” His smile flickered, then disappeared behind a somber examination of the darkening sky. “You know I’ll ensure Phoebe gets the care she needs, no matter what. Now it is time for you to return to the dragon’s lair. I fear we may see more snow tonight.”

  “Will you come to the asylum Sunday?”

  “If at all possible.”

  With a final wave she pointed her feet toward Rowan Abbey and a return to her responsibilities. By the time she reached the door, the cold had numbed her nose and toes, and the churning gray clouds had nearly swallowed the last of the day.

  “Ah, Miss Vance.” Molly appeared as Leah unhooked her scarf from her neck. “I feared you wouldn’t return in time.”

  “In time?” Why did Leah’s every encounter with Molly seem to coincide with her...second career?

  “Lady Sotherton requests you join the family for dinner.”

  An invitation Leah couldn’t refuse, of course. Not even on her afternoon off. “I presume Lady Sotherton has guests?” Why else would she demand the governess’s presence for dinner but to even the numbers?

  “Viscount Killiane and his brother brought a friend.”

  The cold in Leah’s extremities radiated upward and circled around her heart, and the blood drained from her face, leaving her light-headed and weak. “Lord Killiane’s brother is here? Now?”

  “Aye. Mr. Fleming.”

  Dinner. With Reginald Fleming.

  The man who had attacked her in this very house three years earlier.

  * * *

  Julian paced before the salon’s fire as he waited for dinner. The blaze highlighted tapestries cloaking the walls, their once-bold colors of ancient Sotherton triumphs now muted with age. One such scene shivered, bringing the knight and charger momentarily to life as they danced to a winter draft.

  “Another cold night.” As if to punctuate Sotherton’s words, a gust of wind whistled along the glass. “You know my nephew Killiane and his friend Mr. Warren, Chambelston?”

  Julian nodded to both gentlemen. “I believe we’ve met at my club.” Briefly.

  “My sister married an Irish title, but I have great hopes for my nephew’s career in politics,” Sotherton said.

  The young lord ambled closer to Julian, drink in hand. Despite Killiane’s age—four or even five years below Julian’s—the viscount schooled his face in the careful ennui of the London set. “Sorry to hear of your loss, Chambelston.”

  Julian answered with a polite nod. “How is the situation in Ireland this winter?”

  Killiane’s lips flattened. “Worse than England, I fear.”

  “I’m sorry to hear it.”

  “We hope for some promising news in the future.” Killiane withdrew a snuffbox from his coat. “I shall be traveling to London for the opening of Parliament’s new session. I assume you will be taking your father’s seat?”

  “Ah, yes. Parliament.” Another duty Julian could scarcely avoid. “Perhaps we shall encounter each other again there.”

  “A necessary obligation, Chambelston.” Sotherton chuckled. “But perhaps you will grow to enjoy politics the way Niall and I do.”

  Or perhaps not. Julian hadn’t Sotherton’s...enthusiasm for power. “War is so much more straightforward. I prefer enemies who shoot me in the face to friends who stab me in the back.”

  The quip produced an outright guffaw from Sotherton and even earned a smirk from Killiane.

  “Will this interminable winter never end?” The Dowager Countess Sotherton marched into the room, her cane tapping against the parquet floor that framed the plush blue rug. The heavy odor of her perfume reached Julian before she did. “A drink, Benedict. And one for Miss Godwin also.”

  “Just so, Mama.” Sotherton rose from his chair and moved toward the sideboard.

  “Good evening, Niall.” She helped herself to Sotherton’s fireside chair. Her companion followed glumly in her wake, then halted, sentinel-like next to her mistress.

  “Grandmother.” Killiane leaned closer and offered the dowager a peck on her cheek.

  “You look well.” She patted his arm, then peered at Julian as if she were inspecting her linens for flaws. “Good evening, Chambelston. For a minute, I thought you were your father. You really do have the look of him, you know.”

  “Thank you, my lady.” Julian accepted her words as a compliment, whether meant as such or not.

  “Unlike some in this household, I was sorry to hear of his demise.” Her watery blue eyes focused on her grandson’s friend. “Will you be staying long, Mr. Warren?”

  “Only until Friday, my lady.” He offered her a bow, then returned to his silence.

  “Here you are, ladies.” Sotherton approached the two women with goblets.

  The dowager sniffed her appreciation as she accepted her due. Though of an age with Julian’s mother, the woman’s years sat heavily on her face in wrinkles and frowns and discontent. Despite some three decades of widowhood, she yet wore unrelieved black that contrasted harshly with her pasty skin and rouged cheeks. Her fierce countenance found an echo in the sour features of the companion who hovered behind. A niggling of sympathy fluttered through Julian for his sister Elizabeth’s lot here. Perhaps surrounded by such disagreeable dispositions, he would have developed a like aversion to familial relationships.

  A feminine giggle echoed from the hallway. The dowager’s frown lines deepened as Lady Teresa and her governess slipped into the room.

  “Ah, Teresa.” Sotherton ignored his mother’s grumblings of annoyance. “Chambelston, you know my daughter. Allow me to present her governess, Miss Vance.”

  “Miss Vance.” Anger and awareness warred within him as he drank in her gleaming tresses, her perfect posture, her subtle—and now familiar—sc
ent of lavender. The rich chocolate of her dress complemented the variegated browns and greens of her eyes while an ivory shawl found a counterpart in the creamy glow of her cheeks.

  “My lord. I’m delighted to make your acquaintance.” Cynical amusement flickered in the gaze that met his before she dipped her head and dropped into a deferential curtsey, as if they were strangers only newly met.

  “Miss Vance.” Killiane edged between Julian and the governess and offered her a bow. The bored indifference fell away, replaced by genuine interest and...admiration? “It’s been too long since I last saw you.”

  “Lord Killiane.” Surprise and pleasure softened her lips into a smile that revealed an intriguing dimple on her right cheek. “How pleasant to meet you again.”

  Irrational jealousy fed Julian’s frustration. At her. At Killiane.

  A feminine hand tapped against his sleeve. “I fear the storm worsens. We may be blessed with your company until spring, Lord Chambelston.” Lady Teresa’s words drew Julian’s stare from her governess—and that ever-present, ever-treacherous bond he felt. His niece’s black hair gleamed with fiery red sparks in the candlelight, and mischief danced in her violet-blue eyes. Bands of painful memory constricted around Julian’s heart as he looked into her face, so like that of his sister of twenty years ago, before disillusionment had hardened her heart and attitudes and features.

  “Teresa is anxious for spring,” Sotherton explained to Julian with an indulgent smile. “This year, she travels to London for her presentation to the queen.”

  “And eligible young men, of course.” The dowager sniffed again. “A lot of expensive nonsense, if you ask me. In my day a young lady’s father chose a suitable match for her, and that was the end of it.”

  An easier option than the elaborate rites of the aristocracy’s Marriage Mart—which were as foreign to Julian as the deserts of Araby. An impecunious younger son, he’d left home, school and family behind for the navy at the tender age of thirteen and never learned to navigate the subtleties of polite society. Or women.

  Senses drawn once again to Miss Vance, Julian watched as she sidled away from the family and found a chair alone by the window. Careful indifference almost—but not quite—masked an aura of loneliness as she drew her shawl more tightly around her shoulders.

  “Ah, Elizabeth. There you are.” Sotherton left Teresa to greet his wife as she joined them in the drawing room.

  Elizabeth’s grimly pursed lips echoed the dowager’s dourness more than Maman’s serenity, as if such expressions were contagious.

  Perhaps they were. Already tension tightened along Julian’s jaw.

  His sister’s gaze brushed past him without acknowledgment before alighting on her daughter. “Don’t slouch, Teresa.”

  Insecurity wavered in Teresa’s violet-blue eyes as she whipped her shoulders to attention like a new recruit. The wind rattled against the window, memories carrying Julian back to his first days as a midshipman, to the uncertainty and anxiety and loneliness of an ignorant boy trying to please a demanding captain.

  He glanced over his shoulder in time to see Miss Vance’s jaw tighten. Julian’s reluctant respect for her rose.

  “Where’s Reginald?” Elizabeth’s querulous tones set his teeth on edge.

  “I’m here, aunt!”

  Miss Vance flinched, as if trying to make herself smaller inside her shawl.

  “Finally.” The dowager’s cane thumped against the floor as she rose from her chair. She tottered for a moment, then clasped her son by the elbow.

  “Late as usual, Reggie.” Disgust darkened Killiane’s eyes as a young man with black curls and an apologetic grin dashed into the room.

  Elizabeth’s mouth flattened into a narrow white line as her glance slid to Julian. As the highest ranking gentleman in the room, etiquette required she take his arm and allow him to escort her to the dining room. Mischief bubbled up in him and he returned her frown with a knowing smirk. Her antipathy tonight couldn’t hurt him more than her twenty years of silence.

  With a lift of her chin she sailed to Killiane’s side. Given the disdain still stiffening the viscount’s lips, the two could share a charming evening of mutual misery.

  Julian strolled toward his niece. “Lady Teresa?”

  “Yes, my lord?”

  “‘My lord’ is so formal, considering our relationship.” Not to mention the specters the title brought to mind. “I would welcome being your uncle in truth as well as in name.”

  “I should like that. Uncle.”

  “I realize I am not exactly an eligible young man, but may I escort you to...” His words died away as he followed the line of Killiane’s narrow-eyed stare to Miss Vance.

  Reginald Fleming waited with proffered elbow and challenging stare to usher the governess to the dining room. Revulsion and...fear?...churned in her eyes, but she lifted her chin and pasted an impassive expression on her face.

  “Uncle?” queried Teresa.

  “Ah...” He yanked his attention from Miss Vance to Teresa. “Yes, dinner. My apologies.”

  A sly grin tweaked one corner of his niece’s mouth and washed the lingering shadows from her eyes as she tugged on Julian’s arm. Not toward the dining room but in the opposite direction. Toward her governess. “Perhaps you can be...the mysterious older gentleman. Uncle, do you know my cousin Reggie Fleming?”

  “My lord. Rather cold here, isn’t it?” Fleming bowed with a flourish. His overly bright eyes, faint slur and potent breath bespoke a fondness for liquid warmth. “What brings you to Northamptonshire this winter?”

  “Business.”

  Teresa released Julian’s arm and positioned herself between her cousin and Miss Vance. “You made a grand entrance, Reggie.”

  “I arrived late just to annoy Niall.” Or to swallow a few last drops of brandy, Julian thought.

  “A shame you don’t put your efforts to more constructive purposes.” Teresa grabbed his arm and led him in the direction of her mother. “Imagine what you could accomplish.”

  “And destroy my reputation with respectability?”

  Their playful banter faded as they moved away, leaving Julian alone with Miss Vance. At least tonight he could be assured she wouldn’t search his belongings while he dined.

  A frown drew down the corners of her mouth as she stared after her charge.

  “Come now, Miss Vance.” He extended his arm. “You seemed to enjoy my company on our previous...encounters. Surely a dinner doesn’t warrant such a fierce scowl.”

  “I seem to remember our previous...encounters somewhat differently.” She rose from her seat and reached for him, the shawl slipping off her shoulder.

  He lifted a lacy edge and slid it back in place. “Your handiwork?”

  “My mother’s.” She rested her palm on his arm, her slender, well-formed fingers curling around his sleeve. The chill in her hand permeated the fabric and raised prickles of awareness on his skin.

  Together they approached the dining room. Chairs ringed a long table shimmering with crystal and silver. Without awaiting his sister’s instructions, Julian led Miss Vance to an empty seat and held it for her. Her back brushed against his hand as she sat, the wool warm against his skin. Then he claimed the chair beside her for himself. Right next to his sister.

  “With your permission, Lizzie?”

  “If you insist, Chambelston.” She used his title, not his name.

  “Of course. Why would I wish to forego your gracious company?”

  “So you can conclude your business with Benedict and be on your way.” And here he’d thought the presence of others would minimize the snide remarks he would have to endure.

  “No doubt your husband anticipates many more such evenings of unpleasantness, but I thought I should reserve this one for myself.”

  Elizabeth’s chin rose again. “I believe father got his just reward when he ended up with you as his heir.”

  “Your sentiments no longer surprise me.” Nor did they particularly concern
him—unless his father had shared them.

  * * *

  Wedged between Lord Chambelston and the detestable Reginald Fleming, Leah shifted on her seat and swallowed her discomfiture with a forkful of fish. Unfortunately both lodged in her throat, seemingly determined to destroy her dinner as surely as Lady Sotherton’s sniping. For a woman so concerned with appearances, if not authenticity, she should realize the staff could overhear every taunt. Gossip would supplement the meal below stairs tonight as those servants present during her fit of pique shared the details with their colleagues.

  Leah’s father would have used the opportunity to point her to the appropriate axiom, perhaps one of Johnson’s witticisms or that verse from Proverbs—the one about a dry morsel and quiet being better than a feast and strife. She grabbed a goblet and tried to wash the fish from her throat and the reminders of her parents’ faith from her mind.

  What would they think of her...supplementary income? Of her lies and disloyalty and downright treason? She stole a glance down the table where Lord Sotherton—her employer—engaged his mother in meaningless repartee that had the dowager chortling with amusement.

  “My grandmother seems in rare good spirits tonight,” Viscount Killiane said to the old woman’s companion.

  “I’m glad to see it. She had another episode this morning.” Despite the bleak darkness of Miss Godwin’s dress, her sable hair hinted of former beauty just as the gold locket at her neck suggested a former love. “I thought we should send for the doctor, but her ladyship quite insisted against such a course. I worry for her.”

  And for herself? As a mere companion, Miss Godwin’s future depended on the dowager’s longevity. The poor woman occupied a position even more precarious than Leah’s. And doubtlessly more wearisome, given the dowager’s normally difficult nature.

  Mr. Fleming inclined his head toward Leah, a smirk curling on his mouth. A scar, only partially hidden by the ebony curls, bisected his forehead above his left brow. When she’d last seen the mark, it had been raw, red. Bleeding. “And how have you been, my dear Miss Vance?”