Redeeming Lord Ryder

by Robinson, Maggie

  He had very fine lips between his clipped moustache and beard, full and firm. She liked his ready smile and the mischievous spark in his dark eyes when he turned everything into a joke. His eyelashes were longer than hers, which was annoying, but then so many males of the various species out-prettied their female companions. His shiny hair was over-long and had a bit of curl to it, and his nose was appropriately aristocratic.

  And those were only what were visible above his stiff collars. If his broad shoulders were any indication, the rest of him was museum-worthy. Nicola had made the requisite visits to the British Museum with Frannie and had seen what the Greeks and Romans bequeathed to the wider world and wondered how Jack compared.

  Her thinking was going in a very naughty southerly direction. Knowing she was blushing, she bowed to Mrs. Stanchfield and hurried out of the shop. It was a gray day and the scent of snow was in the air again. Just a few days to Christmas, and it looked like it would be a white one.

  Though the sidewalks were swept, the cobblestones glistened with ice, and Nicola was mindful of her mending ankle. Best she got on with her exercise—the weather did not look promising for tomorrow, and she might be housebound. Each day in Puddling was much like the next, and her little intrigue with Jack had been the bright spot of her time here.

  She’d missed him in the churchyard yesterday, which was probably just as well. No point in setting tongues wagging even more than they were already. Nicola wondered what he was doing right this minute. Complaining over the quality of his lunch and his upcoming dinner? She had hoped he’d leave a note for her too under the bench, but the only things inside the folded oilcloth were sealed letters to his associates. She hadn’t wanted to pry, but two were to London addresses, and one to Ashburn in Oxfordshire. He’d mentioned a country estate, and Nicola wondered if that was its name.

  She was stepping gingerly on the pavement when a large square of slate skidded off a roof and landed right in front of her, shattering into a hundred pieces.

  “Oh, God! Watch out!”

  The warning came much too late. Her heart thudded at the near-miss. Looking up, she saw a worker on top of one of the new cottages under construction. Why, she might have been knocked in the head by his carelessness! Wouldn’t she love to give him a dressing-down.

  If only she could. He’d have to be scared by her scowl. She arranged her face into what she hoped was a menacing glare.

  He clambered down the ladder, losing his checkered cap in the process. That too tumbled to the ground, with much less potential harm. There was something familiar—

  “Forgive me, Nicola. I am absolutely useless at the task the Puddling Rehabilitation Foundation has given me.”

  Nicola could only gape in wonder. It was Jack, dressed as a shabby workman, soot smudging one chiseled cheek. She assumed his clothes were borrowed, since they did not fit to his usual standard. She’d come out without her notebook, so there was nothing she could do but nod and stare.

  “It’s for my Service. I’m sure they have you doing something too. One of the regular work crew fellows broke his arm—falling from the roof of this very cottage—and I’ve been drafted to take his place. Somehow they thought because I was reasonably intelligent and could draw, I was handy with a hammer. They are very much mistaken.”

  “Oi,” came a voice from above. “Time’s a wastin’. It will be dark before you know it.”

  “I nearly killed this young lady, Tom. The least I can do is walk her home.”

  “You’ll only have to make up the time tomorrow,” Tom shouted down around a mouthful of nails.

  “I’ll be more than happy to,” he shouted back. Jack took her arm and winked. “Not. This is the best thing that’s happened to me all day. Not the bit about almost killing you, though.”

  Nicola rolled her eyes. She did that a lot when she was with him.

  “I wasn’t paying attention to old Fitzmartin yesterday, and to my great surprise this morning, Tom and the other men turned up to roust me out of bed. It wasn’t even daylight, and just look at what they gave me to wear.”

  A rough homespun shirt. Torn jacket and tight pants in two different plaids. Thick hobnail boots that looked like they were pinching. Still, nothing could cloak Jack’s innate attractiveness.

  “Apparently I signed myself up to help finish this cottage before the new year so more of us can be locked up here. It’s ironic, isn’t it? Like prisoners expanding the jail cells, or zoo animals building cages. And I’ve rediscovered I suffer from more than a touch of vertigo. No, don’t pity me. The job needs to get done before it snows, but Tom’s a hard worker. I have every confidence in him. Tomorrow we’ll be laying tile inside. Much more my thing. Two feet on the ground. A bucket full of muck and a trowel. What could go wrong?”

  Nicola had never given any consideration to construction. Her neighborhood in Bath consisted of lovely Georgian houses that needed no further embellishment. The ceilings were high, the long windows sparkled, the floors were waxed to a high finish. Her parents’ home was graciousness itself. Her father was a very successful solicitor and lived accordingly, though finding a cure for her predicament had taxed his financial resources.

  Living in Puddling was like visiting an ancient fairy village constructed for gnomes. Even the new cottages conformed to their smaller brethren, blending into the landscape with weathered golden stone and a space for a small front garden. She wondered what it would be like in the spring, and hoped she wouldn’t be around to find out.

  Where would she go? Where should she go? Obviously today she was bound for Stonecrop Cottage, Jack’s bare hand firmly over hers. Some of his fingernails were dirty and broken, but he didn’t seem to notice. He was cheerful, whistling as they walked down Honeywell Lane.

  “Do you think we can persuade your Mrs. Grace to give me a cup of tea? I’m half-frozen,” he said as they neared her gate.

  If Mrs. Grace objected, she’d brew the tea herself. Jack had been on that roof for hours, poor man.

  They entered the cottage to find a merry fire in the parlor and Mrs. Grace arranging the tray for Nicola’s tea. The housekeeper sniffed a bit when Jack requested an extra cup, and gave both of them a penetrating look.

  Oh dear. But Nicola was twenty-six years old, mature enough to choose her own company. She wasn’t afraid of Jack, although perhaps she should be. He looked a little wild at the moment, wind-blown and flushed. He warmed his hands by the fire while Nicola dismissed Mrs. Grace to do whatever she had to do in the kitchen. There was some slamming of cupboard doors and what was surely a quiet curse.

  “Witch, just as I said,” Jack whispered. “I hope she’s not stirring up a potion to kill me.”

  Nicola nodded in agreement, although generally Mrs. Grace was as pleasant as could be.

  Except when it came to Jack.

  “We’ve done nothing to be ashamed of. They can’t keep us apart if we don’t want them to.”

  Couldn’t they? Nicola had been lightly and politely lectured by the vicar on keeping her distance from Jack. She was a sensible young woman, he’d said. No reason to deviate from her well-ordered, normal, middle-class life. She didn’t want to be a disappointment to her family and arouse gossip, did she? And the young man was a troubled soul, not ready to be released.

  Jack didn’t seem troubled, just tired and shaking with cold. She passed him the delicate china cup, which looked incongruous in his work-roughened hand. He drank it in one swallow and held it out for more. He must have a cast-iron tongue.

  This time, his sip was more constrained. “Where’s your notebook?” he asked, after stuffing a piece of gingerbread in his mouth and seemingly swallowing it without chewing.

  Nicola went to the desk and opened a drawer. The notebook Jack had given her lay under her Puddling journal, and she fished it out, along with a colored pencil. Green for the season this time.

  “How a
re you spending Christmas?”

  Nicola felt a twinge in the area of her heart. She would miss her nephews tearing open their gifts, eating Seville oranges, wearing their paper crowns. Bertie would probably try to eat that too.

  But, as she remembered, Aunt Augusta’s Edinburgh mansion was usually cold enough to hang meat indoors, even in the summer.

  Right here. My family is not allowed to come in case my progress is disrupted. Puddling rules. Nicola paused. What progress? If she was making any, it was only because of Jack’s kiss, and an “oo” wasn’t much. They will go to Scotland for Christmas, she wrote.

  “You know my mother’s in France. We’ve been abandoned, haven’t we? Two orphans in a snowstorm. Let’s club together. Surely the Puddling powers that be cannot object to that. It’s Christmas, after all.”

  What do you mean?

  “Why can’t we have Christmas lunch together? We can do it ourselves. Give the witches a day off.”

  I don’t know.

  “What’s to know? We’ve been reheating our suppers since we got here, haven’t we? We don’t have round-the-clock minders, thank God. If we can get the witches to prepare something edible for us—and that’s a big if, if we’re talking about Mrs. Feather—we can have a jolly time.”

  Nicola bit a lip. When Jack was enthusiastic about something, it was difficult not to agree. He was infectious.

  She had pushed Christmas out of her mind, not wanting to feel sorrier for herself than she did already. She’d made no special seasonal requests to Mrs. Grace, although Nicola knew there was at least one fruitcake in the pantry, redolent of brandy, wrapped in cheesecloth in a battered tin. Her nose had led her to the discovery, and she was reminded of her father’s political friends after a spirited (in all senses of the word) after-dinner discussion.

  Alcohol was tricky to obtain in Puddling, not that she yearned for a nightly sherry as she was used to sharing with her parents in Bath. From what she understood, so many of the Guests had overindulged in their previous life that all temptation was removed.

  Nicola wondered if Jack’s problems included drinking to excess. He didn’t bear any of the usual signs, though. His eyes were clear, his straight nose unveined, and if there was a softness about his chin, it was ably hidden by his beard.

  Christmas lunch without wine. It could be done. It should be done. She didn’t want to spend the day alone.

  I can ask.

  Jack beamed. “Better you than me. I don’t think the witches like me very much, particularly your Mrs. Grace. She sees me as a corrupting influence upon you.”

  Are you?

  “Only if you want me to be.”

  Chapter 10

  December 25, 1882

  In the end, it had taken more than Nicola asking. Jack was visited all over again by the doctor, the vicar, and the Sykes fellow who headed up the board of governors. They had made him feel a little bit like a half-dead moth pinned into a cigar box, but he must have flapped his wings enough through the interrogation to prevail.

  He was somehow able to convince them that his motives were pure. That he was just being gentlemanly, taking pity on Miss Nicola, who dreaded being alone for the holiday. That she needed cheering up by a friend—in fact, she’d made a noise in his presence. That tidbit made the doctor perk up and grill him as if he’d murdered someone.

  Well, he guessed he sort of had. Two someones. But Jack wasn’t going to dwell on that now, when a delicious private Christmas lunch was nearly in his grasp.

  He’d expressed his concern for the welfare of the housekeepers too, who surely would rather spend the day with their own loved ones. The doctor had turned scarlet, so something must be going on there. Jack didn’t care which witch the man preferred, as long as neither one of them hovered around Stonecrop Cottage.

  After a day of fierce deliberation on the part of the governors, it had been resolved that the Guests’ Christmas celebration would take place at Nicola’s cottage after the Christmas morning church service. It was larger and the larder was far better stocked. Miracle of miracles, Jack’s dietary restrictions were to be lifted for the day. Mrs. Feather’s contribution was to be a pan of roast potatoes—even she couldn’t ruin so simple a dish, and a ham would be prepared to be sliced. Various side dishes were to be easily reheated, and Jack had a devil of a time not thinking with his stomach when he really wanted to think with his heart.

  He’d have the day alone with Nicola.

  And so he’d sat through Fitzmartin’s sermon—for the second day in a row, as Christmas fell on a Monday—sung carols with abandon, and tried to meet Nicola’s eye across the aisle. She was swathed in a short fur cape and enormous holly-bedecked hat, which should have looked silly but didn’t. She gave him a quick shy smile, then slipped away at the end of the service before he could follow. He’d endured a few more admonishments at the church door, then stopped at home for his surprise contribution to the festivities.

  He hoped it wasn’t dying.

  He’d dug the little bush up from his own unprepossessing back garden yesterday, stuffed it into a bucket, and planned to put it back tomorrow. It wasn’t even a fir tree, but it still had pointy green leaves, shriveled red berries, and a vague holiday air about it. Jack had decorated the branches himself with twists of paper and cast-off odds and ends from the building site. He’d bent some already-bent nails into circles that dangled as he carried it down the lane. Snippets of wire had been tied into rusty bows and formed a tipsy star for the top.

  It was altogether the most ludicrous thing he’d ever set his hands to, a far cry from the splendor of his mother’s trees at Ashburn with all the German blown-glass ornaments she’d collected. But hopefully Nicola would give him high marks for his effort.

  Clutching the wretched thing against his chest, he rapped on her door.

  And then nearly dropped his offering. The Countess greeted him in Nicola’s doorway and Jack found he was unable to do anything but stare.

  “I see you were not expecting me. Don’t worry—I shan’t stay all afternoon. But I was persuaded to do my civic duty by providing you both some chaperonage by that divine Mr. Sykes. Such blue eyes. He was very hard to say no to, I’m afraid. Masterful. Well, he’d have to be, considering who he’s married to. What a trial she’s bound to be—he’ll need every scrap of endurance.” She gave him a brilliant smile, as if Jack would know what the hell she was talking about.

  “And one does have to eat, doesn’t one? Especially as it’s Christmas, and Christmas comes but once a year. One becomes accustomed to figgy pudding, etcetera. Lovely overindulgence. I confess I’m really looking forward to it. I do have a sweet tooth.”

  Mouth still open, Jack nodded, feeling crushed by the surprise of the definitely unexpected Countess. She touched his elbow and guided him into Nicola’s parlor, where she was conspicuously absent. He set his hideous bush down in front of the hearth, rather hoping it would catch on fire. The Countess immediately picked it up—she was stronger than she looked—and placed it on top of the piano.

  “Very…festive. Your friend is in the kitchen. I’ve been helping, but find I am quite useless. My family would tell you I have been raised to be entirely ornamental, which is a bore but true.”

  The Countess was much more than ornamental. She was a statuesque brunette, whose skin resembled double cream against the black lace of her gown, her eyes aquamarines, and her lips crushed strawberries. She was possibly the most magnificent woman Jack had ever seen up close, and he’d seen his fair share of magnificent women in his travels.

  “Really, this is where you are supposed to tell me that although I’m lovely, you’re sure I’d have some sort of domestic skill if only I were given half a chance. I know Nicola is mute, but do you suffer from the same affliction?”

  “Uh, no.”

  She extended a slender ivory hand. Every other finger sported a jewel the size
of a large marble. “I believe you’re called Jack? You may address me as Countess. Such quaint Puddling rules. I suppose you know who I really am.”

  “Uh, no.” He was being repetitive. She raised a perfect plucked brow but said nothing for a moment, evaluating him with those blue-green eyes.

  Jack paid very little attention to the misadventures of society despite his mother’s constant nagging. Probably the mysterious countess was notorious, but Jack had never seen her before checking himself into Puddling.

  “How remarkable. Have you been locked away in an asylum this past year? My likeness has been in all the shops.”

  Jack’s lips quirked. “Only here, my lady. But my business keeps me out of London much of the time.”

  “Oh, I believe I’m international. But no matter. What sort of business are you in? I was told you were a baron. No last name of course.” She winked slowly, her long lashes sweeping against the pale cheek.

  “Guilty. I’ve recently divested myself of some investments and manufacturing plants. Going for a simpler life.”

  She gave a world-weary sigh. “Simplicity is not very simple, is it? I’m hiding from my family here in search of it. I drive them mad, and vice versa. They know where I am, but cannot get past the gates, and all their letters are automatically returned. I find that very satisfying. Shall we go into the kitchen to see how we may be of assistance? I suppose I can carry platters to the sideboard, such as it is. I believe its origin is a potting bench. Nicola has laid a table in the conservatory, but I warn you it’s rather chilly in there despite the brazier.”

  Jack had given no thought to where they would eat. He wouldn’t have objected to the small scrubbed pine table in the kitchen, but it would be a squeeze for three plus the Christmas bounty. He followed the Countess into the warm room to find Nicola flushed, a tatty apron tied around her dark-red frock. She smiled distractedly, then turned back to stir something on the range.

  “Happy Christmas!” he said, trying to sound hearty. In truth, he didn’t know how he felt. The Countess had not been part of his mental equation, and lunch was apt to be an awkward affair amongst three strangers, one of them totally silent. “What can I do?”