“You almost did,” he replied grittily; then, grinning, he wrapped his arms around her and rolled them both onto their sides.
“It’s amazing how well we fit together, don’t you think? Considering how very large you are and all.”
“Mmm.”
She snuggled into his chest and let a languorous sigh of fulfillment escape. “When can we do it again?”
Noble drew a deep breath. “I might have recovered enough to give it another try in eight or nine years. We’ll have to see how it goes.”
Gillian tipped back her head to see whether or not he was jesting. His eyes were closed, but the corners of his mouth were quirked.
She snuggled back onto his shoulder. He was jesting.
***
“…and that is how I met your father. Isn’t it a romantic story?” Gillian strolled with Nick and the two dogs around the rose garden early the following morning. Nick peeked at her out of the corner of his eyes and shrugged his shoulders. Gillian had realized that something was seriously troubling her new son but was content to let him come to her with the problem rather than force him to tell her his woes. Mothers, after all, had an instinct about such things. He would come to her in his own time and explain everything.
“Oh, dear, Piddle, I don’t think the gardener is going to appreciate that.” Gillian ignored the soft snicker beside her and avoided looking at the dogs altogether. She loved them dearly, but they did have a penchant for embarrassing her at the worst time. All she needed now was for Noble to pop up and notice the gift the dog…oh, no, both dogs, had left in the middle of the formal, pristine, not-a-leaf-out-of-place garden.
“My lady—”
Gillian shrieked at the deep voice behind her and spun around, clutching her heart to keep it from flinging itself out of her chest.
“Lord, Tremayne…er…which Tremayne are you?”
“I am Tremayne the butler, my lady.”
“Oh, Tremayne Two. Well, Tremayne, you startled me. Has Lord Weston sent for me?”
The butler looked outraged over something. Perhaps he had noticed the dogs’ activities. “No, my lady. His lordship has returned to town. He asked me to—”
Gillian turned a blind eye to what Erp was doing to a particularly fragrant pink rosebush and frowned at the butler. “He what? You must be mistaken; we have just arrived from town. Perhaps he went into the local village or out to visit the tenants.”
Tremayne Two shook his head. “I’m afraid not, my lady. His lordship ordered his things packed and he left early this morning with his valet. He left this letter for you—”
“He left me? The day after we were wed, he has left me?”
Gillian stared at the man in front of her with an expression that mingled horror with a magnificent display of anger. Tremayne watched her, fascinated by the ability of her eyes to darken from brilliant green to almost black.
“After the most satisfying wedding night in the entire history of the world, he left me, Tremayne?”
“I’m afraid I know nothing about your wedding night, my lady, indeed I do not, but his lordship did leave you a—”
“That poor man!” Gillian shouted at the top of her lungs.
Tremayne blinked at her in surprise. “I beg your pardon, my lady?”
“That poor, misguided, foolish man!” she bellowed in return.
“Misguided, my lady? That man left you after your wedding night! You, an innocent young bride!” Tremayne was yelling just as loudly as Gillian, a point that did not escape her attention. She motioned her stepson back into the house, took a deep breath, and addressed the agitated butler in soothing tones.
“Tremayne, calm down, it’s quite all right. I understand his lordship’s reasoning—”
“He left you, my lady! Just up and packed his things and left you like you were yesterday’s breakfast! Such a callous, uncaring man doesn’t deserve your kindness!”
“Tremayne, I understand—”
“He’s got to be mad to leave a bride alone the day after he wed! Especially you, my lady! Especially after the most satisfying wedding night in the entire history of the world! He’s lost his reasoning, that’s what it is!”
Lord, she’d soon be deaf if he continued to defend her. “Tremayne!”
He stopped his tirade and stared as Gillian stomped her foot on the soft grass. “You will stop this slanderous talk about Lord Weston immediately. He is your employer. He is an earl. And he is my husband—I won’t have you chastising him when he’s not here to defend himself.”
The butler stared at her in disbelief.
“But, my lady,” he said weakly, waving his hands about in a helpless manner.
Gillian noticed the cream envelope clutched against a silver tray. “Is that for me?”
“Er—yes, my lady. It is from”—he took a steadying breath and spat out the words—“his lordship.”
Gillian read the brief contents of the note. It consisted of three lines, stating that Weston felt it important that he be in London while Parliament was sitting, and since he knew Gillian would be infinitely happier in the country with her dogs, he trusted she would amuse herself until his return.
She carefully folded the note and, ignoring the expectant look on Tremayne’s face, turned her back and scanned the lush, perfect grounds of Nethercote. Life was funny—one moment you could be deliriously happy with everyone and everything, the next moment that happiness seemed to crumble and fall to pieces. Gillian felt as if she was standing on a threshold: one step forward and her life would follow one path, a step backward and it would go in another direction. The question of which path to choose was not at issue—she would follow Noble. He needed her, whether or not he knew it. Last night’s intimacies made that quite clear in her mind. No two people who could share the experience they shared could doubt that they were soul mates, intended from the very beginning of time for each other. She sighed heavily. Bringing the Lord of Obstinacy around to see that truth was another matter. The walls he had erected around his heart were formidable ones, and she wasn’t quite sure how she was going to scale them.
She sighed again. “I am, however, quite good at climbing trees, and I shouldn’t think there is too much of a difference.”
“Beg pardon, my lady?”
Gillian turned back and met his confused countenance. “It is of no consequence. Tremayne, would you have my maid pack my things in preparation for a trip to London?”
“I will indeed, my lady, with all due haste. And may I say, good for you, my lady?”
She matched his jubilant smile. “Would you also have my son’s things packed? Nick will be accompanying me. I believe we will ride rather than take the carriage.”
“Very good, my lady, I’ll order…did you say you would ride rather than take the carriage?”
She nodded and started toward the house. “We shall leave in an hour. You can follow later with the trunks and any servants who are needed at the town house. Oh, dear, Piddle and Erp; I forgot about them. It wouldn’t be fair to leave them here with strangers…Tremayne, I don’t suppose—”
“No, my lady, I couldn’t. Please don’t ask me to.”
“But they are very well-behaved dogs, and I could not stand the thought of leaving them behind.”
“It’s not their behavior I object to, my lady.”
Gillian sucked on her lower lip for a moment. “Has Lord Weston an old carriage? One that is not used frequently?”
The butler met her gaze with a slow smile. “He does, my lady. I shall see to the hounds’ removal to London myself.”
“Pettigrew likes them,” she said as they strolled toward the house. “Tell him we’ll need a boots in town, and send him to guard over their safety.”
“As you wish, my lady.”
Gillian paused at the bottom of the steps leading up to the veranda and looke
d up at the warm stone of the house. “Don’t worry, Tremayne Two. I’m not giving up on him.”
“I’m eternally grateful for that, my lady.”
The two shared a brief smile, then Gillian skipped up the stairs and into the house to change into her old green velvet riding habit. A brisk ride was just what she needed to clear her head.
Four
Gillian swung her leg over the perch of the sidesaddle and slipped down to the ground in a manner reminiscent of a sack of bulldogs plunging the same distance. She stifled the groan that threatened to escape as she hobbled over to help Nick from his horse. The lad leaped down without assistance and looked about him with interest, as fresh as a daisy despite the grueling four-hour ride.
“Children,” she grumbled under her breath and handed the reins to the groom who had accompanied them on the journey.
“Nick, please use the knocker,” she instructed and, hobbling to the front steps, attempted to straighten her appearance into something resembling that of a countess. A perspiring, dusty, unkempt countess whose riding habit had an unfortunate tendency to rick up on one side, but still, Gillian reminded herself as she raised her chin and tried to summon a haughty look, a genuine countess.
“’Ere, what’s that noise yer makin’? Can’t you see the knocker’s off the ’ouse? Don’t that mean nothin’ to ye? We don’t want ye hereabouts!”
Nick, faced with a door without a knocker, had effected entrance by simply pounding on the door with his fists. He was as startled as Gillian when the door suddenly swung open and a monstrous figure appeared, one huge hand on his hip as he glowered at the three people standing before him.
God’s ten toes, the man was huge—even bigger than Noble. He was as dark as sin, with a frown that could scorch the sun, but what really worried Gillian was the strange apparatus that lay glinting against his hip.
In place of his left hand was a highly polished bright brass hook.
“Good lord, pirates have taken over the house!” Gillian yelled, snatching her son back and pushing him behind her in a protective gesture. “What have you done with Lord Weston, you reprehensible, dastardly brute? By all that’s holy, if you’ve harmed him, I’ll do you bodily injury!”
The giant’s scowl deepened. A gold hoop hanging from his ear swung gently as he shook his head at her. “I ’aven’t done nuthin’ to ’is lordship, lady, I works for ’im. Ain’t much ye could do to me, either, ’cept maybe to rabbit an’ pork me to death.”
He took a step toward her and waved the menacing hook in her face. Rabbit and pork? Why was the huge, behooked pirate meandering on about supper at a time like this?
The giant gave Gillian a look that could only be described as disgruntled. “Ain’t no one mentioned supper, missis, nor meanderin’ fer that matter, whatever that might be. If’n ye don’t want to feel the flat of me ’and on yer bottle and glass, ye’d best be quick with tellin’ me who ye is, and what ye want with ’is lordship. I don’t ’ave all day to natter with ye, no matter how fetchin’ ye are.”
Gillian’s stomach contracted into a ball roughly the size of a runtish walnut. The barbarian was threatening to do some physical harm to her, of that much she was sure, even if she was confused by his sudden reference to bottles and such. Well, he certainly was due for a stern lecture about his manners with guests. She was convinced Noble had no idea his pirate was answering the door in such a surly manner.
“I am Lady Weston. Please stand aside and allow my son and me to enter our house.”
The pirate looked taken aback for a moment or two. His massive black brows actually retreated to either side of his forehead as he carefully studied Gillian, absently rubbing his jaw with the wickedly sharp end of his hook. She watched the tip of it, mesmerized. “Well, I’ll be blowed! The Duchess of Fife!”
Gillian frowned at him. Although she didn’t, as a rule, approve of employing pirates to answer one’s door, he was now a member of her staff and, as such, she was responsible for his well-being, both physical and moral. It was obvious to her that worry over his unfortunate infirmity had caused some damage to his mental state. Keeping this fact in mind, she corrected him in a gentle voice. “No, the Countess of Weston. I’m Lord Weston’s wife. Gillian, Lady Weston, to be precise.”
“That’s what I said. Yer ’is lordship’s trouble and strife.”
Gillian forgot to be mindful of his defective mental humors and bristled at the uncalled for accusation. “We’ve only been married one day, sir; I hardly feel that gives me time to be of any trouble to Lord Weston, let alone cause him strife. And whether or not I am, that is certainly none of your affair. You will cease making such ridiculous and completely unjustified judgments and allow me to pass by your large and, I regret to say, uncouth person.”
The giant looked confused. “Don’t get yerself riled up now, m’lady. I wasn’t makin’ no judgments against ye.”
“You said I was nothing but trouble and strife!”
“Aye, and ye are. Trouble and strife. Gooseberry puddin’.”
“Pudding! Did you just call me a pudding?”
“Aye, gooseberry puddin’!” The scowl was back on the pirate’s face as he shook his hook at Gillian. “Are ye daft, woman?”
Gillian took exception to his manner of debate on the front steps. This was not how she had envisioned making her entrance in her new home, in front of her new staff. “I am not the daft one here, Mr. Pirate. Will you please stop waving that thing in my face? Didn’t your mother ever teach you it was impolite to point your hook at others?”
The giant gawked at her, a dull red washing over his cheeks.
“That’s better. You should be more careful with that…that…apparatus. You could put someone’s eye out with it. Now please move aside, and then you may explain your propensity to speak in riddles.”
“Er…if I might intercede, my lady. He means you’re his lordship’s wife. Trouble and strife, gooseberry pudding, and Duchess of Fife are all popular cant used to mean wife.” A short, round man pushed the behemoth aside and bowed at what would be his waist if he weren’t shaped like an orange. “I’m Devereaux, Lady Weston, your husband’s man of affairs. Welcome to Britton House. I wasn’t aware that Lord Weston was expecting you, however I’m sure the news merely slipped his mind.”
As he spoke, the dapper little man waved her and Nick around the now mute gargantuan, politely escorting them into an oak-paneled hallway. Gillian gave the pirate a good glare to let him know she was not happy with him, then peeled off her gloves and looked around her. The hall was tastefully paneled in a warm honey oak, and had the loveliest parquet floor she’d ever seen.
“You must forgive Crouch, my lady. He meant no harm; he was as taken aback as I was by your unexpected, albeit welcome, arrival.”
Nick was standing next to the looming colossus, admiration clearly evident in his eyes as he watched the man nonchalantly pull out a cloth and, spitting on the hook, polish it with a grand gesture. Gillian was aware of her stepson’s approving eyes and made a mental note to discuss the impropriety of expectorating in public, let alone doing so upon one’s personal apparatus.
“Indeed. Well, Mr. Devereaux, would you please take me to Lord Weston? I shall discuss Crouch’s behavior with the butler at a later time.”
The giant smiled. It made the jagged scar running across the bridge of his nose pucker, pulling the corner of one eye down slightly. The result was not one to inspire hilarity.
“Crouch is the butler, my lady,” the round man said softly, wringing his hands in apparent distress over this news.
“Aye, m’lady. I’ve been with ’is lordship nigh on five years now.”
He nodded so forcibly that his earring swung madly back and forth. Gillian smiled broadly, gave a little mental shrug over the eccentricity of her husband’s staff, and turned back to the soft-spoken round man. “My husband?”
“Is not here, my lady.”
“Will he be back soon?”
“I’m afraid I do not know, my lady.”
“Where has he gone?”
“I cannot say, my lady.”
“Cannot or will not?”
“Alas, cannot, my lady. His lordship is on the reticent side when it comes to sharing information.”
“I see. When exactly did he leave?”
Devereaux shot her a pitying glance. “I am unsure of the exact time of his departure, my lady, as he left instructions for me and did not meet with me in person.”
Gillian felt oddly disappointed at the news, although she had prepared herself for Noble’s absence, knowing he had returned to town for the sole purpose of conducting business. Still, she would have liked to see her bridegroom again, especially when she had spent most of the agonizing ride into town reliving just how she came to be so uncomfortable in the saddle. It was worth every twang and ache, she reflected idly as she allowed the pirate butler to introduce her to the house staff and show her around the ground-floor rooms. She was very much looking forward to seeing whether another intimate encounter would prod her husband into bellowing at her about being only human. She hoped it would. She felt certain it was good for him to lose his vaunted control now and again. Especially if she was on the receiving end of his magnificent display.
“My lady?”
She blinked and looked around as the butler twitched dustcloths off delicate rose-colored furniture.
“What display would that be?”
Oh lord, would she never learn to think without involving her mouth in the process?
“’Tis nothing. You were saying?”
“This is yer sittin’ room, m’lady.”
She looked around and flinched visibly. “It is pink, Crouch?”
The pirate surveyed the room, hand and hook resting on his hips.
“Aye, that it is. A right nasty shade of pink too, I’m thinkin’.”
“I am agreeing with you, Crouch.”