Seducing the Beast (22 page)

Maddie took a quick dislike to the man and knew instinctively the feeling was mutual.

“There’s no need for you to come to the cookhouse, my lady,” Gregory reminded her. “Simply pull the bell chord by the fire in your room, and Jennet will come to see to whatever you require.”

Aware of that bell, she never used it. Bells were for cattle, not for her or for Jennet.

He shooed her back to the great hall. “Perhaps you might feed the swans on the lake, my lady,” he muttered, before scuttling off to his master’s library, humming nervously and checking those white strands of hair with anxious hands. She watched him knock upon the library door and enter. A moment later, her ear was pressed to the same door.

Gregory’s voice was muted, but
his
was loud, imperious, wanting to know why she wandered around his house again, as if she was a stray piglet trampling the vegetable kitchen.

“Do I need to post a guard outside her room?”

She heard Gregory respectfully reply he didn’t think the young lady meant any harm and it wouldn’t be kind to keep her confined.

Every person in the house heard what came next, even without their ear pressed to his door. “Has this world gone mad or did she bewitch you too? If we’re not careful she’ll leave her wretched sticky finger-marks all over the place. I find myself surprised the house still stands!” She heard the piteous, complaining creak of an old, worn-out chair, the low thunder of pacing footsteps. A heavy item slammed hard against the door, making her jump back. “I wouldn’t trust her as far as I can spit. Have you counted the silver lately, Gregory?”

She glared at the door, wishing she could indeed cast a spell upon him--turn him into a toad, or a worm.

“She’s certainly clever,” he went on. “I almost believed her little performance. Almost. Women, of course, are consummate deceivers. It comes naturally to them as Daughters of Eve.

Gregory sounded confused. “My lord, if I might be so bold, I do think the young lady is genuine.”

Dear Gregory! Her heart swelled with gratitude for the poor steward who endangered his life by contradicting the great spoiled baby.

The earl huffed scornfully. “Of course you do. You’re easily taken in by a lovely pair of bubbies.” Now she heard his big feet rattling the floor boards again. “As was I. Briefly.”

“Thank goodness you recovered, my lord.”

The pacing continued.

Gregory ventured, “The lady is a caution, my lord. The things she comes out with…”

“A caution?” the Earl muttered dryly. “A cautionary tale perhaps. Women, Gregory, are like pomegranates.”

“Pomegranates, my lord?”

“Too many hard little pips and not nearly enough sweetness to recompense.”

The door swung open abruptly. Alarmed, Gregory tried to signal with his head, gossamer wisps of hair standing upright, but it was too late--not that she had any intention of retreat. The Beast, directly behind him, didn’t look too surprised to see her there.

“Pomegranates?” she demanded.

He muttered some command to Gregory and the old man, heavy eyelids drooping wearily, shuffled off.

“I tend to business in my library each morning,” he said. “Duty always comes first, play later. I trust you can find other things to occupy your time until I require your presence?”

“What would you suggest?”

“Whatever little thing it is that treacherous, deceiving wenches do, until their company is required.” He blinked and there went the mischievous spark again, the reminder of why she once thought she loved him, when he was another man, of course, not this pompous ogre who might “require” her presence.

“Why can’t I sit with you? Perhaps I could…”

“No woman enters my library. Especially,” he added, “when she won’t even tell me her name or anything else about her.”

“Do you truly believe I’m part of a scheme to harm you?”

He grinned, wolfish, one shoulder propped against the door frame. “I’ve no doubt some villainy is afoot, madam and I will uncover the truth before I let you leave.”

“I could walk out of here. I could take one of those fine horses and ride away. I’m not afraid. I’ll take my
lovely pair of bubbies
and leave!”

His stark features were calm, but the menace in his tone undeniable. “Try it. See how far you get.”

“Oh I’d be far, far away,” she said smugly, “before you even knew I was gone.”

“I daresay I could still hear your tongue flapping.”

She gasped. “You’re an uncivil brute with less good manners than a goat.”

Like a bonfire on a windy night, the gold in his eyes flickered fitfully. “You do want to persuade me of Captain Downing’s innocence do you not?” Still leaning against the door frame, he swept her, head to toe, with another long, steady, appreciative perusal. “You’ve got your work cut out for you. I suggest you get some rest for now.”

Her eyes must have widened, her cheeks colored, because there was the nuance of a smirk, evocative of triumph, before he closed his library door, returning to more important matters.

She marched out of the house, Jennet hurrying in her wake.

“You will stay, my lady, won’t you?” the little maid asked.

“Certainly not! When you’re a grown, mature woman Jennet, you’ll learn there must be more to a relationship than….
that
. A woman needs a man who can love her properly--with his heart.” Maddie sighed wistfully. “The Beast has no heart, at least not one he can spare for love. He has one to keep him alive, not to enjoy life.”

Jennet chewed on her lower lip. “Can it be fixed? If his heart is ill, can it not be cured?”

“Thanks to my mother, I know many potions and remedies, Jennet, but I know of nothing that can raise the dead.”

* * * *

From his library window, he watched her stroll across his lawn. He ought to post a guard to watch her, since Gregory was clearly smitten with the wench and the little maid was no match for her.

He yawned. It was damned tiring keeping up with her.

She had, according to Gregory, a disturbing eagerness to help with housework and gardening, which he concluded was merely part of her act. No doubt she studied his house and his staff, looking for weakness, gaining their confidence for some ulterior motive yet to be revealed. Poor fools. They’d learn.

Of all the women he might have, he chose one with an aversion to instructions and commands. She wouldn’t even tell him her name.

Catching his coarse-featured reflection in the window, he scowled deeply. He certainly gave no credence to Gregory’s addle-headed assertion that the nameless wench seemed fond of him. How could she be? Not even his own mother could love that face.

No, he couldn’t trust her. Only a fool would believe anything she said. Evidently she was sent to distract him until the Scarlet Widow spirited his brother out of London. Now she planned to wheedle a pardon out of him on Nate Downing’s behalf. Who knew what else she had up her sleeve, what other demands she might make of him?

He was quite excited already at the mere thought.

Trying to deny it, he shook his head.

Wickes had warned him about her and with his own eyes he’d once seen her fighting off Henry Jessop, who claimed she lied and cheated him.

He also knew she’d taken a knife from the cookhouse. Did she plan to use it on him one night?

More than likely.

But it didn’t stop him wanting her.

She spied Luke’s golden head emerging from the cookhouse. Aha! Her potential ally.

Trotting after him, she was soon at his side, lengthening her steps to match his. “Can I help you, Luke? I should like to have useful chores to do.” She grew bored with wandering about and being waited on. It was not in her nature to sit lazily by with nothing to do, no one to help. “If I don’t have some useful employment, who knows what I might get up to?”

When Luke regarded her in vexation, she added, “I wouldn’t want Jennet to be blamed.”

Weighing the alternatives, Luke decided to sacrifice his own peace to save the rest of the household, Jennet in particular.

They went into the hothouse together and she asked him about the plants as they walked along. Although he used as few words as possible, uttered in a begrudging manner, he slowly came out of his shell.

“Tell me what happened to your brother Matthew,” she said. “I know he was dismissed, Jennet told me.”

No reply.

“Be assured the earl is no friend of mine,” she urged. “You may speak honestly with no fear of retribution.” Still he said nothing and carried on with his pruning. “You may say what you like in my presence,” she added hopefully. “I shan’t tell Gregory. If you wish to talk of what happened to your brother…”

“Can’t hear you, missy. Beg pardon.”

“You do hear me, Luke.”

He blew out his cheeks, raised his eyebrows and shook his head sadly.

“I know you hear me,” she cried.

“Best mind your own business, missy.”

Thus she was to be dismissed, once again, as an inconsequential being. Yet she sensed Luke was an independent spirit, like her, and thus she was determined to be his friend. Whether he wanted it or not. “What happened to your brother was a great injustice and I daresay there have been many such injustices in this house. The earl is a tyrant, is he not?”

“He’s no tyrant, Missy. He’s not a bad man.”

She gasped. “You said he was a hypocrite!”

“Aye. He was, missy. And he knows it.”

Aha! He forgot his deafness now. “Why doesn’t he make amends, if he knows he was wrong?”

He pondered this, scratching his flaxen head. “He’s too proud to admit a mistake, missy. He’s the Earl o’ Swafford, after all.”

“Luke!” she exclaimed, “I’m surprised at you for taking his side.”

“I ain’t taking his side, missy. I said he were wrong. And then I said he knows it.”

“I daresay your brother is less understanding of that foul hypocrite.”

He looked up in faint surprise. “Matthew bears his lordship no grudge, Missy.”

“Even though he was parted from the woman he loves?”

“He were not parted,” Luke chuckled benignly. “He and Meg were wed last summer.”

“But you…”

“My brother Matthew were the best man his lordship ever had and he lost him over that bit o’ foolishness because he were too stubborn to bend his rules.” Luke straightened up. “None of us like to see the earl lose a good friend like Matthew. He has few enough he can trust, missy.”

Incredible! Apparently the earl skillfully manipulated events, until his poor, brow-beaten servants sympathized with him.

“I’d like to meet Matthew,” she said. “I daresay I’d get a truer version of events from him than his brother who remains in the earl’s service.”

Luke reminded her to water the plants, not his foot. “I don’t know where you got your cock-eyed ideas about the master. He’s a good man, but sometimes I think even he doesn’t believe it.”

She remembered what her sister Grace would say.
If you must have opinions, Maddie, keep them to yourself.

Sulking she observed primly, “Luke, I think I liked you better when you wouldn’t talk to me.”

“And I liked you better,” he said with a grin, “when I couldn’t hear a word you said, missy. But someone had to set you right.” His expression became serious then. “His lordship doesn’t know women, missy. He needs time to get accustomed to having one in his house.”

“So he means to make me his prisoner! Like one of these poor plants.”

“If you ask me,” he said amiably, “you’re both too damned stubborn to know what’s good for you. You’re no better than him.”

Of course, she took objection to this. “I’ll leave at the first opportunity. He can’t hold me captive.” She paused, hot and sticky. “What?”

He chuckled. “Go on then. What’s stopping you?”

She scowled.

“Perhaps you’d make a difference in his life.”

“He’s too stuck in his ways,” she argued, “too firmly adhered to the tradition of every grim-faced Swafford before him. What can I do?”

“What have you done already?” he answered, golden head cocked to one side.

“Naught apparently! He doesn’t believe a word I ever said and thinks me part of some elaborate conspiracy.”

His broad face was earnest, his eyes full of warmth, his advice brotherly. “If you leave, he’ll think he was right to doubt you, won’t he?”

But how could she stay?

Hoping to clear her muddled thoughts and stiffen her resolve, she left the hothouse and took a leisurely stroll through the grounds. Before she saw Griff again, she must somehow get her emotions in concord with reality. If he saw any confusion, any weakness, he would pounce upon it.

She paused by the lake to watch the swans floating in and out of the willow branches that snagged on the water, leisurely drifting in a shower of verdigris and sunlight. Below, among the weeds, minnows dashed and darted frantically. How busy they were, those tiny fish, and here she was, with the luxury to be aimless suddenly. No one called for her to come in, stop daydreaming and tend her chores.

Walking to the summit of a slope, she admired the distant, gleaming, silver sea and the edge of chalk hills. Far below, nestled in the dip, there were villages named Mallory Abbas, Mallory Osborne and Mallory Le Willows, little clusters of stone cottages with thickly thatched rooftops and gardens bursting proudly with wild roses. The narrow lanes winding between the villages were flanked by collars of lush green grasses, embroidered with tall, gold-tinted ferns and sprigged with purple loosestrife. She thought how peaceful and serene the sea appeared from that distance. The tide came in now, but later today, as the sun slipped beyond the horizon, it would pull the sea with it, gathering the quiet waves in silken pleats, dragging them back from the beach where curlews could wade in the muddy sands, pecking for their supper.

She strode across the heath, following the sounds that were now familiar--the scratchy song of the warblers and the distinctive, knocking chortle of the stonechats. Overhead, woodlarks fluttered in a spiral dance accompanied by their clear, mellow, liquid song. She watched as one suddenly dived to the ground, wings folded, targeting insect prey.