An Unexpected Title (Suspicious Circumstance Book 1)

by Jackie Williams

  “I apologize, my Lord. I don’t know what came over me. I am simply worried about the horse. I know she is important to you.” He made his excuse, the only one he could give, as his gaze dropped to the floor.

  The earl sniffed, sat back down heavily and took another gulp of brandy, letting the mellow liquid ease the ache behind his eyes.

  “Well, yes, of course. You will have to forgive me also. You know what today’s date is? Yes, the anniversary of my wife’s death. I cannot tolerate being disturbed tonight of all nights. It has been bad enough with my daughter’s outburst.”

  Thomas watches as the man rubbed his temples and drank more deeply. He felt his heart throb. Outburst! As if being if being forced to marry a man you had never met wasn’t good enough reason for one. His anger grew unbidden.

  “You can hardly blame her, my Lord. I doubt I would want to be married off to someone I have never met either.” He regretted opening his mouth as soon as the words fell from it. Why couldn’t he keep his thoughts to himself? But it was too late to take them back. The earl appeared to swell, his face becoming a horrible shade of red.

  “Good God man! You were eavesdropping at the door! How dare you! My affairs are no business of yours! You know nothing of the matter and your opinion is both unwarranted and unwanted. Do what you must with the mare, but get out of my sight! And tell that idiot Flack to make sure no one else disturbs me this evening! I’ll sack anyone who does!” He suddenly picked up his now empty glass and threw it in the fireplace where it crashed into a tinkling of crystal shards.

  Thomas glared at Derwent for a few seconds longer, wondering if he dared speak again, but the earl stood up and swayed as he crossed the room to his drinks cabinet, fetching both a new bottle and glass.

  There would clearly be no talking to him tonight. Best save any further insults for when the man could appreciate them. Thomas turned on his heel and stormed from the study, almost crashing into the aforementioned Flack as he crossed the hall.

  The butler glared at him.

  “Was that raised voices and a glass I heard breaking? And what the devil are you doing in there anyway? His Lordship was not to be disturbed.”

  Thomas lifted his chin. He wasn’t about to be berated by any slack-jawed butler.

  “Yes, but you needn’t panic. He has already retrieved another glass. Another bottle of brandy too. And I know about his orders, but I had to speak to him about his mare. We have settled the matter and I will be on my way now. I won’t bother the household again tonight.” He made for the door under the stairs.

  Flack sniffed at the man’s retreating back and then glowered as he noticed the trail of muddy footprints across the polished wooden floor. Intensely annoyed, he reached out and rang the bell. After a short delay, a young woman came from the door beneath the stairs.

  “You rang, Mr. Flack?” She rubbed her hands down her apron as she bobbed the man a small curtsey.

  “This floor needs polishing. See that someone gets it done immediately.” He waved his hand towards the marks on the planking.

  The maid frowned and pressed her hands to her hips as her gaze followed his gesture.

  “But I only scrubbed and polished the floor this morning.” She glanced back towards the under stairs door and glared as she recalled almost being knocked over by an irate stable master. “Oh, I see! That Thomas Leyman walks about this house like he owns it! Traipsing filth from the stables all over the place. Like I don’t have a hundred other things to do! I’ve a good mind to...”

  Flack interrupted impatiently.

  “No one cares what you have mind to do or not, Mary. I dislike the man as much as you but his Lordship seems to have faith in him.” He thought about the raised voices he had heard, but instantly dismissed them. It was a bad day for his Lordship. The man took umbrage at anything on this anniversary. Not that he blamed Leyman for answering back. The earl had become more than a little infuriating recently. He almost wished he had been as brave as the errant stable master on the subject of his own sister’s funeral. But that was in the past and over with. There was no point in resentment now. And it wasn’t as if he was about to walk out. Claiborne was his home. He had lived there almost his whole life. He sniffed dismissively and glanced up and down Mary’s dusty apron. “Just see that the floor is cleaned again before dinner. Or ask Gertrude to do it as it appears that you are already busy.”

  Mary gave an irritated huff.

  “No point in even trying. Cook is already in a flap about our visitor tomorrow. She just sent Gertrude out to gather vegetables for tonight and tomorrow’s meals. And with Mrs. Grenfell on the war path over all the extra arrangements for Mr. Derwent, I suppose I’ll have to do the blasted floor again.” She turned tail and departed the way she came.

  Flack instantly forgot about her and walked across the hall to the drawing room. Mrs. Grenfell, the housekeeper could be over particular at normal times. With an important visitor about to arrive, Flack thought it prudent to make sure everything was in readiness. It wasn’t as if the earl or his daughter would use the drawing room again that night. The anniversary of the mistress’s death meant a quiet night for all, usually. He tilted his head as he heard noises behind the drawing room door. Was the woman moving the furniture? A smile played across his lips. Perhaps she might need some help. And he might be able to spend a few minutes alone with the alluring Tabitha Grenfell.

  About to turn the door handle, a sound in the hall had him turning on the threshold. Phillips, the master’s valet stood nervously at the bottom of the stairs.

  “I wondered if you had spoken to his Lordship. I don’t want to disturb him if he has left instructions with you.” The man shuffled from foot to foot, a nerve ticking at the corner of his eye, his agitation obvious.

  Flack nodded while almost sneering at the man. He never stopped sweating, shuffling, or twitching and rarely showed his face below stairs except to sneak a bottle of brandy from the study. Phillips refused to eat with the rest of the staff, only appearing for a few seconds each mealtime when he collected his tray before disappearing back to his own quarters next to the master’s suite. He probably thought no one knew of his weakness for spirits. It irritated the butler decidedly and he wondered how the earl put up with it. Flack knew he would have dismissed the man well before now.

  Not that it was any of his concern. The earl could employ whomsoever he pleased. Flack just wondered at the man’s choices. Take the new maid, and the two urchins from town. Gertrude was a simpleton, a hussy, out to grab any man she could, and even a few she couldn’t.

  Flack thought of the proud stable master. Gertrude had set her sights on him within minutes of seeing the fellow, but he was holding strong and not giving in to temptation. Not that the maid was any kind of temptation. The butler swallowed and shuddered as he thought of the woman’s sparse eyelashes and narrow face. And the twin boys were something else. Flack wasn’t sure what. The earl had taken them on in some kind of rush of charity after they had been caught scrumping apples the year before. Flack thought they both needed a good whipping, but after a tearful discussion with their widowed mother, the earl had decided they could work off the cost of their thievery. They simply hadn’t gone home since.

  Phillips’ nervous cough brought Flack from his reverie. He nodded back at the valet.

  “I will take the master his supper later. Not that I think he will eat it. He has apparently already finished one bottle of brandy. I doubt he will make it to his bed tonight. I’ll check up on him before I turn in, but I think it safe to say that you won’t be wanted again before the morn.”

  Phillips pranced some more and glanced anxiously at the closed study door before coming to some sort of decision.

  “I’ll take myself back to my room then. I have a book I want finish. I’ll come down for my own supper tray later.” He turned and made for the stairs.

  Deciding to check that no one else was about before he attempted to beguile Tabitha Grenfell, Flack walked back across t
he hall and opened the under stairs door, just as Mary came back with a scrubbing brush and a steaming bucket.

  Flack gave her a nod.

  “I’ll be back to check the floor in half an hour. See that it’s sparkling. Don’t forget that we have Mr. Derwent arriving for breakfast with the earl, and I am sure that we would all like to keep our jobs when the man eventually takes over.”

  “Don’t worry about that, Mr. Flack. I swear that you will be able to see your face in it by the time I finish.” Mary pushed up her sleeves, dropped down on her knees, and set to work.

  Thomas Leyman strode around the house, his temper still flaring, his heart still aching. Goddamn it! What had he been thinking? He shouldn’t have answered back. Shouldn’t have argued. The earl was ill. Thomas could see it if others couldn’t. Why would the man have given up riding, one of his pleasures, if there hadn’t been good cause? His daily visits to the stables had dwindled to perhaps one a month, and the man’s hands shook like autumn leaves still hanging onto a tree in a storm.

  Tonight it appeared that the earl’s head pained him more than usual. All that squinting, rubbing his forehead. And the argument with his daughter couldn’t have helped. Despair swept through Thomas again. How could he have been so rude? He would be lucky if he still had a job come the morning. And then he might never see Madeleine again.

  His body shook. Could he live without seeing her, knowing her, speaking to her? No, it would be only half a life. But how could he live, seeing her every day and yet not be able to possess her? He didn’t know, but had to try. The alternative was unbearable. He had to return to the earl’s study and apologize. And pray that his Lordship would forgive him.

  The thought of going cap in hand to the man stuck in his craw, but he knew it would have to be done however much he hated it. He railed at the fates that dictated she could never be his. Damn the circumstances of his birth! Damn the earl for his arrogance, and damn Madeleine for controlling his heart! And damn the damned horse too for forcing him to go to see the earl on this night, the very worst night of all!

  Thoughts of the ailing horse brought his mind back into focus. What the hell was he doing? Not his job, that was for sure. He had to put everything else from his mind and send one of the lads for help. But who knew more about foaling than he did? No one close enough to make a difference. He had to calm down and think. What did he need to do to save the horse and her foal?

  His mind on other things, he was almost upon the woman before he noticed her. Damn! Was she following him? As if his day could get any worse! Gertrude stared at him as she stood on the path by the vegetable garden. He couldn’t bear the thought of talking to her again, of her brushing against him as they passed on the path. If he let her come anywhere near him, she he would assume the wrong impression. Would take it as encouragement, which was the furthest thing from his mind. It wasn’t as if he hated the woman, but he wished she would take all the hints he had given her. He would never succumb to her advances, but she was so wrapped in her own desires that she had ignored every rebuff. He might have laughed at the irony of it if he hadn’t felt so bad for himself.

  He turned swiftly. Now he would have to go the other way around to get back to the stables. The longer way. Back past the study window. But perhaps that was to his advantage. He could call in on the earl again and make his apology. Ten minutes wasn’t going to make any difference now. And there was not much point in saving the foal if he couldn’t save the mare. Foals rarely survived the first few days without their mother’s milk. He didn’t know why, just knew it was a fact. It was both or neither of them. What could he do to save Milady? He had to think...

  Chapter Two

  An Unexpected Title

  Benjamin Asher Derwent, better known as Ash, stared incredulously at the beautiful facade that faced him. Never had he expected to see such a building from the description Richard Derwent, Fifth Earl of Claiborne had given him. Ash seemed to recall old pile and bit of a ruin being mentioned when they had met in Bath a few years previously. He must have been mistaken, but the trouble was that his mind had been filled with the miniature the older man had shown him, and he had been beyond concentrating on much of the conversation after that.

  One glance at the tiny portrait of the man’s beautiful daughter had quite stolen every rational thought. Ash had kept the image with him ever since and gazed at it probably far more often than he should given that he still desired his former fiancée. His former fiancée, the one who had left him at the altar. Well, not quite at the altar, but close enough. A mere four weeks before their wedding, The day he was meant to become the happiest of men. But she had cried off and ripped out his heart instead.

  He might have contemplated longer on the fickleness of women but the house in his vision forced all thought of anything else from his mind. Ash closed his open mouth as his horse carried him closer to the house. House? If one could call it that. He cast his eyes right and then left. Russet coloured bricks stretched across the lush landscape, complimented by the pale lilac blooms of age old wisterias clinging to the ancient walls. The place was certainly no old pile, and definitely not a ruin.

  For a moment Ash wondered if the Fifth Earl of Claiborne had either suddenly come into money or lied when he had described the hall. Lied most likely, as Ash could detect no new brickwork or recent repairs, though for what reason the man had kept up the deception Ash had no fathomable idea. Perhaps it was a ruse to keep him far from the place. When Ash had once suggested a visit, the earl had immediately refused such an escapade, citing the lack of suitable accommodations and general disrepair. Ash’s own shipping business and the effort of drumming up sufficient funds to renovate his future inheritance kept him from ever enquiring again.

  There was of course the possibility that the earl had managed to keep the exterior of the house intact but the interior in a less than habitable condition, giving the impression of wealth though his true poverty was hidden by the facade. Not an impossible notion. He had one good friend in town who on the exterior appeared to be the epitome of wealth and security. His house looked magnificent. His suits were of the first fashion and his boots from the finest maker in London. Behind his front door, the man cooked for himself in a pot over an open fire. His furniture consisted of two chairs, both with a decided lack of horsehair stuffing, and a three-legged table, the fourth leg having been used one freezing winter’s night, to boost the dwindling fire.

  Thinking of his friend, a sudden, unpleasant thought filled Ash. Perhaps the earl had lied about his daughter too. Was she in reality an aging spinster, greying at the temples and with an already sagging jaw? He hoped not, given his promise to marry the woman. Not that he would be held to it if he really couldn’t stand the sight of her. After his one dreadful experience, marriage had no longer seemed important to him, but over the years his attitude had changed. Yes, he could leave the place to his younger brother, or his nephew, but did he really want to do that? He didn’t know, but the earl’s misleading information about the house gave fodder to his suspicions. Made him feel like turning his horse around and heading straight back in the opposite direction.

  Not that he could now. Shielding his eyes from the sunbeams reflecting off the multitude of windows, he could see that his arrival had clearly been noticed. There was a hubbub going on outside Claiborne’s door.

  He lowered his hand from his eyes and set his shoulders as doves cooed from the cote on the manicured lawn and several servants appeared to bustle about the front door, some of them staring in his direction.

  Good Lord! He felt his eyebrows shoot to the top of his forehead. Could they be waiting for him, about to line up and greet him? They wouldn’t, surely! He could barely think of anything more embarrassing. Panic filled him. Yes, he was well educated and had formed a lucrative business through hard work and careful investments, but a nobleman he was not. Not yet. Still couldn’t believe he was the earl’s heir even now.

  It had been several years since the letter had a
rrived informing him of his lofty new position in life. Only shortly after his own father had died. Apparently his father’s sudden and unexpected demise after a fall from his horse left Benjamin Asher Derwent the only heir of a distant cousin. A very distant cousin. One more times removed than he cared to count, but even with the solicitor’s letter in his hand the news had still not seemed real until he had met the current earl in the flesh.

  Responding to the request for an immediate audience while on a business trip to Bath, Ash had no idea of what he was about to be asked until the Fifth Earl of Claiborne had suddenly begged him to look after his only daughter. Ash had instantly refused. Not that he would ever see a woman put out on the street, but a suitable cottage would have to be found for the aging spinster. And aging she would have to be going by the earl and his wife’s own advanced years. The daughter must already be well into her thirties, possibly more, and while Ash wasn’t so heartless as to see the woman made homeless, no convention he knew would allow an unrelated man and woman live under the same roof without the sanctity of marriage.

  Marriage! Never! Anger had instantly filled him at the memory of Miss Jane Fairbanks, his one time fiancée, and of her parents’ fawning attitude to one of the aristocracy. Damn Arthur Kirkdale, his illustrious title, and his pockets full of gold! The most eligible bachelor of the season, the Duke of Kent, had moved in on Jane, had swept her off her feet and out of Ash’s life. And her parents had let Kirkdale do it. Had even encouraged it. The man had lavished her with gifts and flowers and the woman hadn’t been able to resist. She cried off from her engagement to Ash with a scant four weeks to go, and married Kirkdale instead.