DD-Michaels-END.rtf (21 page)

"I'm becoming both more flattered and more intrigued by the moment. Please, do go on."

"I'm attempting to do that, Aylesford, but it isn't easy, asking a favor from the likes of you."

"Oh, better and better. I really should be keeping a list somewhere, of all the accolades you insist upon heaping on my head."

The minister's face was flushing an angry red, from his considerable jowls to his badly receding hairline. "Just make it a point to keep your eyes and ears open, that's all I'm asking."

"Certainly, sir. I will be all attention. In aid of what, precisely?"

"Watching for signs of smuggling, of course. As I sai
d
—
I
think I sai
d
—
B
ecket did some snooping for us in the general area
last year, and
a certai
n
...
violence
that
had been reported to us has not reoccurred. Nasty busines
s
—very nasty, and potentially embarrassin
g
—
b
ut over now. According to Becket
,
who speaks with his family on our behalf, there are no longer any problems. But lately there have been rumors that have reached our ears."

"Rumors. Really. Of what?"

"Rumors that smuggling is still going on in the area, of course. And where there are free traders, there are often spies."

Ethan laughed softly. "And you want
me
to poke about, looking for these spies, these smugglers? Oh, I don't think so, my lord. I wouldn't have the faintest idea how to begin. Send Becket back there, as it sounds as if he was successful last year."

The minister shook his head. "No, can't do that. He's married now, for one, and the rumors..
.
well, they seem to possibly implicat
e
—
a
h, there's my clerk, waving to me. Perhaps his royal highness can see me now. Never mind what I said, Aylesford, I certainly couldn't have meant anything. Simply too much work, too many worries, too little sleep
th
ese past days. Don't know why I thought you'd be of any use. The communiqu
é
will be delivered to Upper Brook Street in the morning."

He gave Ethan a hearty slap on the shoulder. "Don't fail
us!"

Ethan stepped back, bowed, then watched the minister hurry away. He stood where he was, mentally reviewing both his conversation with Becket and this last one, with the minister. Becket had said that smuggling was not a
problem.
The minister had said that Becket had told him smuggling was not a
problem.

But Becket hadn't said, to either man, that smuggling did not still
occur
in the vicinity of Becket Hall. A matter of slicing up words?

But the minister had also mentioned rumors.

"Rumors of smuggling still going on, obviously.
 
Rumors implicating...
w
hom
,
my lord?
"
Ethan asked the air before turning once more for the staircase. "Bloody hell. Don't I already have enough problems?"

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

"...Ninety-eight, ninety-nine,
one hundred!
I'm coming to find you, you little dickens!" Morgan dropped her hands from her eyes and turned about in the drawing room of the Upper Brook Street house..
.
to see Ethan leaning against the archway, his arms crossed on his chest, an unholy grin on his face.

"What, may I ask, are you doing?"

"You obviously had no brothers or sisters, or you'd know," she said, kneeling on one of the couches, then quickly leaning over the back of it. "No, not there."

She looked at Ethan as she walked over to poke behind the draperies on either side of the large windows facing the street. "Not here, either. Clearly they're trying harder this time, the buggers."

Ethan heard a quick, girlish giggle from somewhere behind him
,
in the foyer, and prudently moved farther into the drawing room.
"
Clearly,
there is a game afoot," he said as Morgan flung open the glass doors separating the drawing room and dining room, then disappeared inside.

"Yes, and you can't help me look," she told him, bending to peek under the large, cherrywood table. "And what are you doing here, anyway?"

"Being terribly in the way, obviously," he replied, wondering if she would be angry or pleased if he told her she looked absolutely delicious to him, dressed as she was in a simple gown, her long hair loosely pulled back at her nape with a
pale blue bow, the thick
,
straight ebony length of that hair cascading down her back. "But, in point of fact, my mother is outside, in her coach."

"Your mother?" Morgan, who had been down on her knees, peering into
a
dark cabinet, raised her
head quickly
,
bumping it on the wood. "Ouch!" She got to her feet.
"
Why didn't you bring her in? Why is she here? I didn't know your mother came to town. I didn't think she did."

She rubbed the top of her head. "Oh, that hurts."

Ethan took her face between his hands, then bent to place a kiss on the spot she'd been rubbing. "There. All better now. My mother came to town yesterday, to select fabric for costumes, which is the only reason she ever comes to town. She and Algernon will be performing
A
Midsummer Night's Dream
next, you know. Our extremely large and ungainly cook will be playing Nick Bottom, and I'm nearly heartbroken to possibly miss his moment upon the stage."

Morgan gave up her search for a moment. "Nick Bottom? He's the weaver who plays Pyramus. Puck turns his head into that of an ass. Doesn't your mother
like
your cook?"

"You know the play?"

She pulled a
face at him. "Don't sound so surprised, Ethan. Of course I know the play. 'Lord, what fools these mortals be!' Now please go fetch your mother in here. Leaving her outside in her coach. Shame on you."

Ethan shook his head. "She won't come.
Ma
m
an
doesn't care for London, and only stopped to see you as she races back to the safety of her castle and her comfortable, make-believe world. So," he said, indicating the doorway to the foyer, "if you wouldn't mind?"

"Of course I don't mind," she said, already on her way to the door.

Ethan stopped her, snagging her arm at the elbow as he pulled her close, to whisper in her ear. "Haven't you forgotten something. Some
one
something?"

Morgan slapped a hand to her forehead. "Alice. I've forgotten Alice. Oh, the poor thing, she's probably all cramped and miserable, stuck behind a chair somewhere. Quickly, help me find her."

"It's a large house, imp. Did you put any limits on the game?"

Morgan nodded, heading for the foyer once more. "Only on this floor, because Julia isn't feeling well. I've been entertaining Alice since we came back fro
m
—" She looked up at him, smiling. "From our lovely ride this morning in Richmond Park, my lord. How is Alejandro faring?"

Ethan frowned, since they both knew that Alejandro fared very well, but then Morgan made a great business out of letting her arms hang loose at her sides as she took three faintly clumsy steps, then pulled an imaginary pistol from her imaginary waistband.

Jacob.
He was here?

"Alejandro's much better, thanks to the poultice one of my grooms made up for him, thank you. I am only gratified that you were served no injury, Miss Becket." Then he mouthed the word:
Here?

Morgan nodded furiously, then grinned.

"And you're playing hide-and-seek with
your niece?"

And Jacob,
Morgan mouthed silently, trying not to giggle when Ethan's eyes opened very wide.

"I don't wish to keep your mother waiting, my lord," Morgan added out loud, looking around the drawing room once more, certain she'd checked everywhere. "Still, I probably do need to first find Alice."

Ethan mentally weighed the right and the wrong of the thing, then pointed to the foyer.

"I know," Morgan said loudly, "I haven't checked the entryway, have I?"

Ethan made her an elegant leg, the dramatic flourish of his arm indicating that she should precede
h
im into the foyer, and then he followed, just in time to see her peer behind a huge urn and cry out
,
"Aha! Found you!"

As he looked on, Jacob stood up and moved out from behind the urn, his hands on the shoulders of a small, blond-haired girl of about six.

"You took forever to find us, Morgie," the little girl said in some triumph. "Jacob said it would take you forever because this was just the best hidey-ho
l
e ever, didn't you, Jacob?"

Red-faced with embarrassment
,
Jacob dared a quick, angry look at Ethan before saying, "I'm guessing the game is over, sweet Alice. Miss Morgan's got other things to do now."

"You called her Morgie before," Alice piped, taking hold
of Jacob's hand. "You did
,
so
I am, too. And
I think it's very bad of you, Morgie, to stop our game."

Morgan went down on her knees in front of the girl.
 
"
'I'm sorry, sweetings. But if Jacob takes you down to the kitchens for some jam and bread, would that make you happy again?"

"Can Buttercup come, too?"

"I'll fetch her," Jacob said dully, heading for the drawing room, shooting another chilling glance at Ethan. He was back
in moments, carrying a large, pink
,
stuffed rabbit and looking as if he would rather be roasting chestnuts in hell than be where he was at this moment. "Come along now, Miss Alice."

Ethan watched the two of them head down the hallway, toward the private areas of the narrow house. "How on earth did you talk him into playing hide-and-seek
,
Morgie?
"

Morgan bit
her
bottom lip
f
o
r a mome
n
t, then smiled at him. "On her own, Alice didn't really know how to hide very well, so I asked Jacob to help."

"Be careful what you ask that boy to do, Morgan," Ethan said as one of the footmen held open the door for them. "You may think you have that lovesick fool wrapped around your finge
r
—
b
ut one day you may push him too hard."

"Jacob? No. Jacob would never hurt me. We were just playing a game."

"It wasn't you I was referring to," Ethan said sternly, "and you're getting too old for games."

Morgan stopped short on the second marble step and looked up at him for a few moments. "I didn't mea
n
—I've
never
meant to—"

"I know, and Jacob probably does as well," he told her, lifting her hand to his lips. "Now, smile, and come say hello to
Maman
."

Morgan shook off her sudden, unexpected feelings of guilt and lifted her skirts when a groom opened the door to a huge, luxurious traveling coach. "Countess!" she exclaimed as she stepped up inside the coach and sat herself down on the rear-facing seat, bravely ignoring the enormous ass's head on the squabs beside her. "How good to see you again."

The countess was dressed much more conventionally today, but her smile was just as muzzily delightful. "Ethan explained? I don't show myself in Mayfair if I can help it. I simply sneak in on mice's feet, and then quickly tiptoe back out again. Ever since..." she leaned closer, to whisper,
"the incident."

"Ma
m
an,
I thought you were here to invite Miss Becket to come visit you next month."

"Yes, yes, Ethan, I remember," she said, making shooing motions with her hands. "Now go away for a moment. I don't eavesdrop on you."

"Yes, Ethan, she doesn't eavesdrop on you," Morgan said, longing to kiss the older woman's cheek, give her a tight hug. "Go away."

Ethan looked at his mother, knowing she wouldn't understand an unspoken warning, then closed the door to the coach, already pulling a thin cheroot out of his waistcoat This could be a long wait.

Inside the coach, Morgan had already asked the countess to explain the
incident.

"It was quite wonderful, actually, once you got past the horror of the thing. I was shopping in Bond Stree
t
— this was several years ag
o
—
w
ith Ethan accompanying me. A horrible man, who shall remain nameless, approached us on the street and said something nasty to his companion, loudly enough for us to hear every word. Something that had very much to do with my late husband and how I had tricked him into marriage in order to steal the fortune I was, obviously, spending hand-over-fist now that he was underground."