One Scandalous Kiss (7 page)

Chapter Eight

S
OMEWHERE BETWEE
N THE
platform at Paddington Station and the doors of Hartwell, Lucius finally untangled himself from thoughts of Miss Jessamin Wright and fell asleep. When the train’s whistle roused him at Newbury, he couldn’t recall his dreams, though his overwhelming sense of frustration indicated they’d probably involved the one woman he had to forget.

He hadn’t been away long, not nearly as long as expected, but his telegram must have put Hartwell’s staff in a dither. None but the estate’s long-suffering butler appeared to greet him. The man bowed as low as his years would allow and followed Lucius inside. Considering the hour, Lucius knew his father would have already dined.

The great house was dark. There was no one in the main living area to require light or warmth. Many rooms were shut up and rarely used. Lucius had tired of the pretense, not to mention the expense, of running the estate as if it was a happy home. He kept to his living quarters and his father to his own. Though he missed Hartwell when he was away, there was nothing particularly welcoming about the house when you first approached, even for Lucius, who’d finally come to think of it as home over the previous two years.

A hazy, remembered image, of windows aglow with light and laughter and color infusing every room, tickled at his memory, but those days were long gone. They’d fled Hartwell when his mother died so many years ago. The relationship between his parents had been so volatile that his mother left Hartwell on any pretense she could devise—a trip to the continent, a visit to family in Yorkshire or Scotland, a jaunt down to London, even when the season was over. More often than not, Lucius had accompanied her and enjoyed their travels as any child relishes adventure. But her attempts to cool the conflict with her husband with brief separations had only fired his suspicion and fueled his jealousy.

“How is my father, Melville? Would you ask Mrs. Ives to come to my study and give me a full report in a quarter of an hour?”

“Yes, my lord.”

Lucius didn’t miss how Melville answered his last question and ignored his first. Open discussion of his father’s condition seemed to make the staff uneasy, though some had endured his unpredictable moods for much of their working lives.

“Will you take a supper tray in the study too, my lord, or in your rooms?”

“My study, I think. Excellent idea.” Lucius divested himself of hat, gloves, and coat as he spoke, and Melville dutifully built a pile of his master’s outer garments in his arms.

Before the man could depart, Lucius tried again.

“How is my father?” Worry for his father mounted with each moment Lucius spent within Hartwell’s walls.

Melville’s pause told Lucius what he needed to know and he guessed what the old man would say next.

“He was moved to the blue room this afternoon, my lord. Just this afternoon.”

What Melville avoided saying was that his father was worse and in the midst of one of his spells. The blue room was one of the rooms his father used in Hartwell’s east wing. It had been emptied of most furniture, save for a couple of chairs and a bed, a few books his father loved, and thick quilts hung from the walls. It was the room his father occupied when his nurse feared he might harm himself, as he’d done on several occasions when his forgetfulness was most acute.

“Thank you, Melville.”

After the butler left him, Lucius sensed his body giving in to the need for sleep. If not for the estate’s accounts to review and his father to visit, he would have happily sunk into the comfort of his bed. His empty bed. Though it had been empty for months—no, for over a year—its emptiness was suddenly unappealing.

He made his way to his study and had just crossed the threshold when Mrs. Ives stopped him with her usual effusive greeting.

“My lord, how wonderful it is to have you back at Hartwell. We did not expect you quite so soon, so it is an extra pleasure.”

How could anyone resist such a greeting, not to mention the smell of lemon oil and clean linen that always seemed to cling to the woman?

“Mrs. Ives, I trust you’ve been well and all has been as expected in my absence.”

Other than the nurse Lucius had hired to care for his father, the estate’s staff rarely involved themselves with his father’s illness and unpredictable moods. They were content to pretend for Lucius’s benefit that all was well, and he was usually content to play along.

“His Lordship has been quite well, though he took a little turn today. No rhyme or reason why. But he is tucked in bed now and ended the day quite well. Perhaps he will return to his own rooms more quickly than the last spell.”

Mrs. Ives was a dutiful caretaker and always strove to return his father to his fully furnished rooms, his books, writing implements, and the specimens he’d collected from around the estate as quickly as possible. His rooms encompassed the increasingly dilapidated family wing where Lucius’s mother and father had lived in happier times. His father refused to move from the space he’d shared with his wife, but Lucius was content to sleep in the renovated portion of the house usually reserved for guests. Back in the days of the country house parties his parents hosted, the many bedrooms had been filled. Now they stood empty, furnishings covered with dust cloths, except for the spacious dark-paneled suite Lucius had selected for himself.

“I hope you’re right.”

“The spells don’t seem to last quite as long lately, my lord. Have you noticed?”

The truth was he had not. The pattern of his father’s highs and lows seemed as unpredictable to Lucius as they ever had. It wasn’t surprising, however, that Mrs. Ives, perennial optimist, would think so.

“Perhaps I should take closer note. They seem quite consistently inconsistent to me.”

Mrs. Ives was too polite to contradict him. “Yes, my lord.”

Melville scratched softly at the open doorway and then proceeded into the room to place Lucius’s supper tray on his desk. Despite his fatigue, the food smelled delicious. Mrs. Ives saw him eyeing him the meal and seemed to take pity.

“I shall leave you to your supper, my lord. You must be famished and exhausted after your journey.”

“Indeed. Tell my father I’ll visit him in the morning.”

“Yes, my lord. He’ll be pleased to see you.”

When his father was in the midst of his worst spells, he wasn’t particularly pleased to see anyone. If he found any pleasure in visitors, he only took umbrage with them moments later. The extremes of his emotions were dizzying. Lucius couldn’t imagine the misery of such riotous feelings. Observing his father’s highs and lows and the travesty of his parents’ marriage drove Lucius to control his own emotions. And it usually worked.

Men should be guided by logic and reason, and reason should always rule over the deceptions of the heart.

He’d read it once, but Lucius couldn’t remember where. Marcus Aurelius, perhaps? Some rational, stoic man who’d never allowed himself to drown in emotion as his father had. Whoever’d written it, Lucius was only certain the man had never been kissed quite unexpectedly by a beautiful bluestocking.

J
ESS WOKE ON
her twenty-third day at Marleston and found her surroundings familiar for the first time since arriving. Every other morning she’d woken early, expecting to be in her tiny room above the bookshop. She missed the smell of book leather and the bustling sounds of London beyond the window glass, but the music of birdsong and the scent of fresh-cut grass was an undeniably pleasant consolation.

As her first weeks at Marleston Hall flew by, Jess and Lady Stamford managed to settle into a comfortable rapport and predictable daily routine. They met in the countess’s sitting room late in the morning to go over the previous day’s post, plan the next day’s meals, and write letters to the countess’s many correspondents. Castor and Pollux had taken to joining their morning sessions, one balancing happily on the countess’s lap and the other dozing at Jess’s feet.

In her evening hours, Jess continued to work on speeches and articles for the Women’s Union, as she’d promised Alice she would. Some days, between Lady Stamford’s extensive correspondence and the writing and rewriting of speeches, her wrist ached and her fingers went numb. At those moments, she’d find a quiet nook and read one of the handful of beloved books she’d brought with her to Marleston. Settling on just a few had been one of the hardest parts of leaving the shop behind, but they were favorites she’d never tire of reading again and again. And the familiar words never failed to soothe her.

Among the staff, she’d encountered a frustratingly mixed reception. For the most part Marleston’s employees welcomed her with kindness and a willingness to impart the rules of correct behavior at a grand estate. It seemed she needed reminding about a few points of etiquette nearly every day. But she was an oddity to some, a working-class woman raised up to be a countess’s companion. If
she
still questioned why Lady Stamford had given her the position, Jess could hardly blame the lady’s maid, Miss Dawes, for snubbing her at every turn, or the butler, Mr. Noon, for slanting a gaze at her now and then as if she might abscond with the silver.

Her mood soared on days she managed to remember which spoon to use, how to properly address each of Lady Stamford’s correspondents, and how to be more help than hindrance to the other staff. But she missed Jack and Alice and her circle of friends in the Women’s Union so fiercely that the hours filled with foibles, missteps, and the chastising glance of Mr. Noon made her itch for her first month’s wages so she could buy a ticket and take the next train back to London.

Tilly, Marleston’s between maid, had found Jess tucked in a library alcove on her fifth day. She’d already swiped away her tears and settled her breathing, but Tilly gently prodded her to confess the rest—her anxieties about being a lady’s companion and a longing for London and the few friends she’d left behind. It helped, especially when Tilly assured her Noon distrusted everyone and Dawes found favor with few.

Tilly queried Jess about the volume of
Oliver Twist
clutched in her hands like a precious talisman, and it eased her mind to talk about books. When Tilly confessed her inability to read and asked if Jess might teach her, Jess had been eager to help. Their lessons enriched her days at Marleston, and despite continued blunders in etiquette, Jess was growing accustomed to the grand house.

The loss of the shop, the scandalous kiss in Mayfair, the man with a voice as smooth as melted chocolate all receded in her thoughts, an occasional twinge in her heart, and she busied herself with teaching Tilly and learning how to be helpful to a countess.

During her hours with Lady Stamford, the countess spoke of Lord Grimsby often, mostly recounting tales from his boyhood. She described her family as full of men, mentioning one son and two nephews. Of the three, it seemed Lord Grimsby held a special place in her heart. Her stories painted a picture of an admirable man—one with a ravenous curiosity, kind toward others despite his quiet, taciturn nature, and whose most reliable trait was a fierce loyalty to his family. He seemed quite a precise gentleman too. Lady Stamford smiled when recalling Lord Grimsby’s insistence that everything on his desk remain in exactly the same position, that chairs in the sitting room be a specific distance apart, and that the art on the walls of the dining room be hung equidistant from one another. The countess spoke of her late husband too and occasionally of her son, who’d inherited his father’s earldom and was on the hunt for a suitable bride to become the next Countess of Stamford. It seemed to Jess that her employer was looking forward to becoming a dowager countess, and even more so to grandchildren.

Jess listened quietly, only interjecting questions when it seemed appropriate, and above all attempting to appear as interested in stories of Lady Stamford’s son as she was in tales of her favorite nephew. It was silly to feel any kinship with the man she’d met on only two occasions and in the most awkward of circumstances, yet Jess found herself smiling more and fidgeting less when Lady Stamford described Lord Grimsby’s boyhood adventures. It was difficult to reconcile the serious gentleman she’d met with the young man the countess described so lovingly.

“Anything interesting in yesterday’s post, Jessamin?”

Lady Stamford spoke to her in familiar terms and had invited Jess to call her Augusta in return, but she’d yet to manage it.

“Yes, actually there is, my lady. A letter from America that smells of roses.”

“Do let me see that one, my dear.”

Lady Stamford held out her hand and Jess glanced at the return address before handing the sealed letter to her. The name Sedgwick was embossed on the paper, and someone with a looping, feminine style of handwriting had addressed the letter. The script was so ornate, Jess struggled to decipher the words.

Lady Stamford unfolded the letter and made a tsking noise as she skimmed the paper.

“Oh my, this will be a challenge.”

“A challenge?” Jess continued to slice open each letter in the small pile on the desk, though the dismayed tone in the countess’s voice set her on edge. In the short time she’d been in her employ, Jess had never known Lady Stamford to be anything but cheerful and carefree. The woman seemed to take everything as a pleasure to be enjoyed or a minor conundrum to be efficiently unraveled.

Jess lifted a cup of tea to her lips and watched as the countess began to pace the length of the intricate floral rug that decorated her sitting room. Her peach-colored gown was a similar hue to one of the half dozen she’d ordered from her dressmaker for Jess. She’d insisted a lady’s companion must have a fashionable wardrobe, though her duties of fetching, writing, and reading to the countess required no such thing. Still, she couldn’t deny the pleasure of sorting through fabrics, sifting the luxurious textures through her fingers, and picking colors that reminded her of flowers she’d seen at the Botanical Garden or the riotous shades of a London sunset.

“This letter is from Miss May Sedgwick. She’s the daughter of an old acquaintance and one of the richest heiresses in America. I met her father in London many years ago. I’ve yet to meet his daughter, but she’s reputedly quite lovely, and apparently very changeable. I expected her for a visit here at Marleston, but she says her heart is set on going straight to Hartwell.”