The Earl Next Door: The Bachelor Lords of London

by Charis Michaels

“By no means,” said Piety. “I have dallied too long. With some difficulty, I am settling into a routine of accountability—to a chaperone. I am accustomed to more freedom. However, Miss Breedlowe has sacrificed a lot to take me on, and I do not wish to take advantage. She and Marissa had planned a trip to the market for four o’clock, so I bade them go and took the opportunity to come here alone.” She looked at the floor beside the chessboard. “We must know what’s to be done with the stairs.”

  Trevor nodded and shoved out of his chair. “Yes, the stairs. I came home after your tour and drew up more specific designs, you might as well know. Now that I’ve seen the space. Still, measurements are required. Your man Mr. Burr can begin taking those and call on me with questions. In the meantime, it is imperative that you hire an actual working architect to direct the project.”

  “You’ve done more?” She stood. Her eyes shone with surprise and gratitude, like he’d just told her he managed to save a sick friend.

  The tight coil within his chest unspooled again. He hadn’t realized how anxious he had been to please her. He coughed and shoved to his feet, scrambling for a new topic. “You’re beating me in chess. My brain is gruel. It has been since meeting your Lady Frinfrock.”

  She smiled again, the most genuine he’d seen in a day of smiles from Piety Grey. He looked away. It occurred to him that Joseph was gone. Conspicuously gone.

  “The drawings are in my library.” He took a step away from her, although it felt wrong, like stepping from an umbrella into the rain.

  “After you,” she said.

  Trevor nodded and went, leading her from the kitchen, up the stairs to his library, checking every room as he went for his mutinous serving boy.

  He went to his desk and rolled the drawings, tying them with a string. “I should have given this to you when you walked through the door,” he said. He held out the parchment.

  She reached for it.

  He didn’t let go.

  “What’s wrong with them? These stepbrothers? Why are they not fit to marry?”

  Piety released her end. “Primarily?” she asked softly. “I do not love them—not any of them. I do not even like any of them. To a man, they are repugnant, really. And unhappy. And cruel.”

  “Ah,” he said. “Of course. To whom, Miss Grey? To whom are they repugnant and unhappy and cruel? To you? In what way? Won’t they bend to your iron will?” He heard himself growing louder, more demanding. He dropped the rolled parchment to his desk.

  “My only will for them is to stay far away, but they are relentless. They work very hard to, er, make an impression on me. By the time I left New York, preening for me had become their sole, dogged occupation.”

  “What?” he heard himself ask. “Flowers, sonnets, nights at the theatre? Too much of the same? A woman of your means and appearance must see that all the time.”

  Piety shook her head. “On the contrary, my mother did not allow me to receive gentlemen for courtship until only recently. My dowry was—is—substantial, and she was not prepared to part with the money. But since the Limpetts . . . ”

  She trailed off then, and he waited. He would not allow himself to ask the question, but he could wait.

  When she continued, her voice was gruff. “With my father gone, there is so much more money. This should afford me the possibility of real freedom. And it brought me here to England.” She gestured broadly to the room. “But my mother cannot bear it, and so she has devised another way to control me. And the money.

  “And no, the brothers have not courted me with flowers or poetry,” she went on. “It’s been mostly boasting and lordly behavior. Long, painful dinners around my mother’s table while they drone on or tease.”

  “Perhaps they are young.” The words were out before he could stop them. “Boys more than men.”

  She shook her head. “They are not young; they are ungracious. Two of them are shrewdly judgmental of nearly everyone, from the servants to their own petty friends. They gloat in the face of anyone less fortunate.

  “Four of them aspire to nothing greater than prestige in New York’s social whirl, propelled along by liquor and gambling and nightly excess, whatever it may be. They openly brag about their exploits and gloat about their lack of curiosity or outside interests or charity or, God forbid, enterprise. They have empty managerial positions in their father’s stocking mill, but they ignore the company, even though it is rumored to be in deep debt.”

  He laughed. “Stocking mill?”

  “Yes, the man my mother remarried is Owen Limpett. The stocking king of New York. The boys—Eli, Emmett, Ennis, Everett, and Eddie—”

  “You cannot be serious.” Trevor rubbed his jaw.

  She nodded. “The next bit is silly, even superficial, I suppose, but all of them have abhorrent hygiene. Their complexions run from ruddy and shiny to pale and ashy. They smell of last night’s bender; they have flaky hair, soft hands, watery eyes . . . Should I go on?”

  Trevor couldn’t speak. He wandered around the desk and propped his hip on the corner, crossing his arms over his chest.

  “I tried to abide them, truly I did.” She raised a hand to her cheek and closed her eyes for a moment. “Eventually, after repeated embarrassing outbursts and insults to friends, abuse to servants, rudeness to total strangers, I came to understand that theirs is a kind of inherent meanness. They seem to revel in it. They cannot be helped. Or abided. Not by me, anyway.”

  Trevor dropped his head and rubbed his eyes. He hadn’t wanted to know. He could not care about this woman, her circumstances, her shiny-faced suitors, or their cruelty to housemaids. He had his own bloody problems.

  Still, he found himself unable to turn away. He looked up, willing her to go on.

  “They’ve struck a deal, my mother and the five of them. Whomever succeeds in making me his bride will control half of my fortune. The other half of the money will go to Idelle.”

  “Idelle is your mother, I presume? You don’t refer to her as ‘mother?’ ”

  “Not often,” she said sadly.

  “But she does not have money of her own? And these brothers, are they not heirs to the, er, stocking coffers, however indebted?”

  Piety shrugged. “My father left enough money for my mother’s comforts, which are extravagant. I added to that by transferring even more to her accounts. I sold much of our property and gave all of those earnings to her as well. But it wasn’t enough. She knows there is more—much more—and that I have it. The mere knowledge of this drives her. She wants the money and the power. She is . . . I believe her own childhood was troubled. She is not a happy woman.

  “As to the Limpetts, I cannot say. She found ready allies in them. She was misled about the wealth of her new husband—their father—and all of them appear to be desperate for funds.” She shrugged. “Is this why they agreed so readily to her scheme to marry me? This is a mystery, because truly they don’t even like me. But this has been our guess. Tiny’s and mine.”

  She took a deep breath and shook her head, clearly reaching for calm. “Regardless of their individual regard for me, which seems to range from salacious to envy to disdain, each of them leaped at the chance to make a deal with the devil, er, my mother.” She looked away for a moment, and he realized she was fighting back tears. Oh, God, now she would cry?

  Before he realized it, he had shoved off the desk and moved closer to her. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, swiping a finger beneath each eye. “I never intended to burden you with such excruciating detail. You needn’t pity me, my lord. I have so much more than most people in the world. I’m . . . I’m a very lucky girl.

  “And this is not my style.” She chuckled through tears. “I am not above demanding, wheedling, or wearing someone down. But please know that I generally do not vie for sympathy.”

  The urge to reach out and touch her was nearly overwhelming. He fought it, occupying his hands with the handkerchief, thrusting it to her. She smi
led and took it, pressing it gently to her lips.

  Trevor shut his eyes and turned away. He would not reach for her. He would not care about her situation, or her future, or even her stairs—not anymore.

  He cast around the room and caught sight of the drawings. He snatched them up and thrust them at her. “I intended to send Joseph with these,” he said gruffly.

  She took the parchment and held it to her chest. “You asked earlier about why I came?”

  “Oh, I think I have some idea now.”

  “Not why I came to England. Why I am here. In your home. Now.”

  “Oh, yes,” he said, his heartbeat accelerating, “that.”

  “I came because I enjoy you, my lord.”

  “You don’t.” A whisper.

  The room around them felt suddenly small.

  “Last week,” she said, “in your, er, music room, I enjoyed myself. Spending time with you was diverting. Lord knows I could use a diversion.”

  He had no response to this, and they stared at one another. The only sound was the ticking clock. He felt himself drift toward her.

  “You amuse and interest me, my lord.” She spoke softly. “It is inconvenient, I know. But I cannot seem to help it. I cannot seem to stay away.”

  Now, he stepped up, his eyes not leaving hers.

  A half-step more.

  He was upon her. He towered, looking down. She did not move.

  Without breaking her gaze, he nudged against her, pressing her to the wing-back chair in the center of the room. She allowed it, falling softly against the leather and turning up her face. Her eyes were closed.

  It was enough.

  He ignited, swooping down to kiss her.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Piety wrapped her arms around Lord Falcondale’s broad shoulders and held on. The parchment fell from her hands, slid down his back, and rolled to the floor.

  It was an instantaneous kiss. No playful nibbling, no closed-mouth prelude. He took her in his arms, and their lips collided.

  They tumbled against the chair, tumbled into the chair—she didn’t know and didn’t care. In her mind she floated, she flew. She had the fleeting thought: relax, slow, savor. But his nearness only made her want to pull him closer, to kiss him more fiercely. She wanted to devour him.

  He kissed her deeply—not punishingly like before, but hard and sure and focused. He left her lips only to scrape the stubble of his emerging beard across her cheek, her ear, to breathe in the scent of her hair, and trail back.

  “This is madness.” His tried to catch his breath between kisses. “Piety, please.”

  “Yes,” she agreed. Madness.

  “Please.” He growled again, but he did not release her. He deepened the kiss, nudging his boot between her feet and his knee between her legs, lifting gently against the chair. She gasped at the intimate closeness, shocked and excited, barely able to keep up with the cascade of new sensations. She hooked one foot around the back of his boot. He groaned.

  “Piety,” he said lowly, “this cannot happen again.”

  “Too late, I’m afraid.”

  He raised his knee, hoisting her higher still, and she gasped again, blinking at the contact of his thigh.

  “It’s the last thing we both need.”

  “Why does it feel like the only thing?”

  He groaned again, and Piety dropped her head back, allowing him access to her neck. She opened her eyes, only half seeing the dim library around her. Her breathing came in quick, desperate pants. He kissed his way back to her mouth, sinking his fingers into her hair, working the pins free.

  “Trevor? Where’d you put the . . . Oh!” Joseph’s voice sliced through their revelry, and they froze.

  Piety squeezed her eyes shut. Falcondale dropped his face beside hers, shielding her.

  “Out, Joseph, now,” he said to the floor.

  Piety heard a strangled yelp and rapidly retreating footsteps.

  Falcondale held her against him a long, still moment. The only sound was their labored breath. Finally, he raised up, pulling her gently from the arm of the chair.

  When she could stand upright without swaying, he stepped away.

  “I apologize,” he said. “Joseph has failed to keep us decent, and then he failed to allow us to . . . well, he failed us.”

  He retrieved the drawings from the floor and handed them to her.

  She hesitated for a moment, hoping he would say something more.

  He stared back in silence.

  She took the rolled parchment, nodded mutely, and forced herself to put one shaky foot in front of the other. She walked unsteadily to the door.

  I need more time, she thought, looking up and down the hallway.

  Everything she wished to take slowly was glossed over: discovering Falcondale, gaining some trust with the marchioness, not lying to Jocelyn.

  And everything she wanted to hurry along—the construction on her house—was taking forever.

  Time. It was the one thing she could not buy.

  “Piety, wait,” called Falcondale from somewhere behind her.

  “I’m going,” she said, and she moved at a pace just shy of a sprint down the hall, down the main stairs, down to the kitchen. When she reached the back door, she tossed the drawings on the counter beside her gloves and snatched her cloak off the peg.

  “Piety?” Falcondale came down the kitchen stairs. She turned away.

  “You’re cross,” he said. “I’ve ruined your hair.”

  She raised an idle hand to her hair, pulling at the pins, releasing the scrambled knot down her back.

  “This was Joseph’s fault.” His eyes were on her hands in her hair. “If he had not left us, then I would not have reached for you.”

  “You are astute at assigning blame,” she said.

  “Oh, I can assign blame. You want me to say the words? Fine, I’ll say it: it’s my fault. Look, Piety—Miss Grey—there is no denying that I am attracted to you.”

  “You know that you may call me Piety.”

  “I may call you ‘Miss Grey,’ as I should have done in every instance.”

  “Fine. I am Miss Grey.”

  “I don’t think I have to tell you that you are a beautiful woman.”

  “Oh, no, please, may you never tell me that.”

  “You have a captivating smile and a body that would tempt any man. And I’m not able to resist you. It’s a weakness—my response to you.”

  “You’re not weak, my lord,” she said, walking to the door. “You are lonely.”

  “You would see it that way. Wait,” he called, and he reached for the knob at the same moment, covering her hand with his own. “We cannot carry on like this.”

  She did not remove her hand. She drew a breath and turned her face to him. His lips were mere inches from her own, and she heard him swear before he dipped down to kiss her again.

  Here was the soft kiss they hadn’t time for before. Slow. Lips closed. Nibbling and teasing. In seconds, it grew deeper, and she fell back against the door. He closed in over her and grabbed her up. For a long moment, she kissed him back. The tentative shyness from their previous embraces replaced by intuitive rhythm and an achingly familiar sort of possession. They belonged to each other. They suited. Together, they were better. This would good. They would be so good.

  When his mouth left her lips to trail kisses down her neck, she turned her head and burrowed into his shoulder. She smelled the cotton of his shirt and his skin beneath. She nuzzled her cheek against his neck, reveling in the roughness of the stubble on his jaw. She pulled him closer, fusing them, but she ceased the kisses. She simply held him.

  It took a moment for him to catch up, to stop kissing and hold her in return; but oh, when he did—the embrace was like coming home.

  When had she last been held like this? When had she ever been held like this?

  He lifted his head from her hair. “Marissa is in your back garden.” His voice was hoarse.

  “What? How do
you know?”

  “I can see her out the window.”

  Piety nodded and began to pull away. “They have returned. I must go.”

  “She’s in your garden with my manservant.”

  “With Joseph? You’re joking. Really?” Piety shoved off the door and turned around, trying to peek out the portal window. “Lift me up,” she said. “I want to see.”

  “Piety, you test the limits of my self-control,” he said.

  “Oh, you don’t even like me,” she said. “Come on. Let’s have a look.”

  “Right. I don’t even like you,” he repeated. Then he wrapped his hands around her waist and lifted her until she had a clear view. She tried not to focus on the ease with which he held her aloft, or his hard body, warm against her back. He kept his head turned away from her neck, though she could hear him breathing.

  “I should go,” she said, kicking a little. “If Marissa is back, so is Miss Breedlowe.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  “With me to my house? Oh, no. This is my subterfuge, not yours. Isn’t that your battle cry? Let each take care of his own?”

  “If your chaperone decides I’ve compromised you, which God knows I have, then it does concern me—intimately so. Let us go and explain it away together. And then let us put a stop to this. Once and for all.” He took her shoulders gently and turned her to face him. For a moment, she thought he would kiss her again, and she held her breath.

  “Piety,” he said gravely, “I am resigned to never marry.”

  “What?” Piety nearly shouted, jumping back a step. “Who has begun to discuss marriage? I am not looking to marry, my lord. Indeed, I fled New York to avoid marriage.”

  “Proper neighbors do not carry on as you and I have done, Piety. Don’t be coy. This can lead to one of two arrangements. I assume you are opposed to an affair.”

  She stared at him. “You assume correctly,”

  “The other option is marriage.” He shrugged. “And so allow me to repeat, I am resigned to never marry. Not now. Not in five years. Not when I’m old and facing a bitter, painful death entirely alone, cared for by strangers, and without an heir to this earldom.”

  “Well, all right. Good for you.” She snatched up her gloves. Marriage? When had she insinuated even the slightest notion of marriage? Frustration replaced the languid pleasure slogging through her veins.