Lady Caroline leaned forward, as if she were planning on shooting to her feet. “Good heavens.”
With a cry, Lady Philippa surged from her chair.
Adrian rushed to snatch Gus from the floor, the child’s body limp in his grasp. “What’s wrong?”
“Hurts,” the boy groaned.
“Where? Your head?”
“Yes.”
Sadie laid a hand on his arm. “I p’rhaps has a remedy for what ails him. Fletcher, he suffers his share o’ headaches.”
Again, Adrian hesitated. No doubt Fletcher’s headaches derived from an overenthusiasm for the bottle, and Sadie’s remedies contained more alcohol to stave off the aftereffects.
“He ought to go straight back to bed,” Lady Caroline said from her throne. “He got up too soon. I’ll send a maid up with a powder.”
“Perhaps we ought to send for Dr. Fowler,” Lady Philippa suggested.
“No.” Lady Caroline punctuated that denial with a firm shake of her head. “I don’t believe Dysart would approve.”
Adrian lifted the boy. “Come along, Gus.”
“Don’ wanta,” Gus slurred.
Just before turning for the door, he caught Lady Caroline’s gaze. We’re not through discussing this, her expression read. Good, then, because Adrian wasn’t through discussing the situation, either. As he strode for the staircase, Sadie caught up to him. “What should I do? I don’t think she wants me.”
“Follow me and sit with him. I’ll sort matters through with Lady Caroline.”
Five minutes later, Adrian had placed Gus in bed, collared a maid, and ordered a headache powder. He left Sadie in the bedchamber and made his way back to the sitting room. Lady Philippa had collected her watercolors, and trailed after Sadie to keep an eye on the boy—which left him alone with Lady Caroline.
“About Sadie…” He suppressed an urge to bow himself into her presence.
“Under whose authority did you tell that girl she might work here?”
Good Lord, he’d overstepped, and not just the width of a toenail. No, he’d leapt wholeheartedly over the line. “Last night you discussed having a caretaker for Gus. I happened to find you one.”
“Without an interview, without references.”
“By gum, I had no idea you’d wish to stand on ceremony.” He paused to collect himself. This was not how he’d intended to approach the topic. Not that he had any clear idea of how best to proceed. “Your pardon. The lass is in a bad way, though. You mun have noticed her cheek.”
Lady Caroline nodded.
“Do you know who planted her a facer?”
“No.”
“The man she lives with.”
“Man she lives with? What sort—” She closed her mouth. Opened it again. “I realize this is going to sound hypocritical coming from me, but I do not think Sadie is the sort of person who should be in a position of influence over Gus. I know he speaks like an urchin from Seven Dials, but that is due to his upbringing. His father wants better for him.”
Adrian drew himself up. “I cannot in good conscience send her from this house. Not after what I witnessed this morning.”
Caroline raised her chin. “Go on.”
And so he told her about Fletcher’s claims, about his treatment of Sadie, about how Fletcher wasn’t even related to her. About his designs on her. “Do you understand now?” he finished.
“She might stay for her own safety.” Lady Caroline pleated the folds of her skirt between her fingers. “As long as no one else in the household develops designs on her. The male servants don’t need that kind of distraction.”
“What makes you think they’d allow that to happen?”
“Good gracious, did you see the way Gus reacted to her? And he’s just a boy. I daresay, he won’t be too much older before he gets a better idea of what to do with those urges.”
All of a sudden the conversation had veered into dangerous territory. Adrian felt as if they were reliving the previous evening—except instead of politely discussing the breeding habits of equines, they’d moved on to humans. A prickle of heat crept up the back of his neck, and he nearly set a hand to the spot. “An unmarried lady of your standing is supposed to know nowt of that.”
“After all that’s happened, you’re concerned about my innocence?”
Good God, she was making actual heat rise to his face, as if he were some boy with no more experience in the world than Gus. “That is none of my affair.”
No matter how much he’d like to make it his affair. Damn it all, where had that thought come from? The same place, no doubt, as his urge to kiss her last night under the stars. Bloody useless fantasy. He had no call to entertain such thoughts.
“To return to the subject at hand, Sadie can stay as long as she comports herself with proper decorum, which means I do not wish to hear of her attempting to improve her standing by any scandalous means.”
He raised his brows, a silent challenge to explain herself, but one that wouldn’t cross the boundaries of their respective positions. She could ignore the look if she chose, pretend she hadn’t seen it.
“What?” Lady Caroline mirrored his expression, yet she maintained her façade. She occupied her place, regal and distant. Untouchable. “You don’t think her capable?”
A small spark ignited inside him, admiration and recognition entwined, that she should take up the gauntlet he’d cast. He pushed the feeling aside. For the sake of his sanity, he needed to hold tight to this current image of Lady Caroline—the cool queen, not the woman he’d nearly kissed. “I don’t imagine she’s any more or less inclined to jeopardize her place here now that she’s won it. Why would she, faced with the prospect of going back where she came from?”
God help him, he’d never spoken truer words. He ought to heed them for his own situation.
“You don’t think that girl views you as a savior? Did you see the way she was looking at you just now?”
He hadn’t, actually. His gaze had strayed inerrantly to alight on Lady Caroline, but he could never admit as much. “I suppose she might, at that, but I’m not convinced that mun invariably lead to impropriety.”
Lady Caroline let out an indecorous splutter, one that belonged more to the stable than the sitting room. That noise quite shattered his vision of her as someone untouchable.
Damn it all.
“And if she decides to convey her gratitude, Mr. Crosby?”
—
Caro waited until Mr. Crosby withdrew before working her painful way out of her seat. She needed to go check on Gus. If she’d let on as much, Mr. Crosby would have insisted on helping her up the staircase. Though the feeling of his steadying arm about her would have been pleasant, she could not permit him to drop everything for her sake.
He had duties, estate duties that had nothing to do with her. She’d pulled him away from them long enough. And so she’d let him go back to what he’d been doing when he’d come across Sadie—searching for a clue as to which of the tenants’ boys had delivered the message last night. Which of the boys might have, once that small mission was accomplished, slunk to the stables.
Hardly an estate duty, that, but he was better off outside than in her extended company. No matter what sort of intriguing, delicious sensations his proximity engendered, she could not indulge herself. Sooner or later, one of them would slip. She knew as much with the same kind of dead certainty that she’d use to declare her own name.
By insisting on decorum just now, she’d sounded like one of those sniffy matrons who ruled society from behind a lorgnette and a heavy helping of arrogance, but that declaration had been a warning to herself as much as anything. Only the worst sort of hypocrite would stipulate one set of rules for a servant and then turn around and toss herself at Mr. Crosby on the slightest provocation.
And that was the danger. Deep inside, she wanted to toss herself at him. She wanted his strong arms supporting her. She wanted to see just what it would take to make him give in and set his lips to
hers. Though a lady of her standing should never even entertain such a notion.
Something fundamental about him called to her, though. It intrigued, and it prodded at her to throw all caution aside and simply give in.
One painful, hobbling step at a time, she made her way through the corridor and up the staircase to Gus’s bedchamber. Steadying herself against the doorjamb, she peered into the room. The boy lay beneath the covers, his eyes closed, his face every bit as pale as when he’d first had his accident and wouldn’t awaken.
Damn and blast.
Sadie looked up from her post next to the bed, Pippa having apparently vacated the chamber. At least Sadie was taking her new position seriously—for now, at any rate. Not that she had anything more pressing to do than watch the dust motes drift through a shaft of sunlight.
Caro eased forward another step. She’d seen this girl somewhere before.
Well, naturally she had. She’d encountered any number of the estate’s tenants on her jaunts across the fields, though mainly she saw the men as they toiled under the sun. The girls would bring them water, but Caro generally galloped past too quickly to pay attention to individual faces. And the tenants generally stayed out her path so as not to be trampled.
But with Sadie, there was something more—something Caro couldn’t quite put her finger on. A chat might trigger her memory.
“What have you given him?” Caro asked.
“Me, me lady? Nothin’.” Sadie kept her head lowered, her hair straggling across her cheek, as if that might cover the purplish swelling that disfigured her. “Lady Philippa, now, she come in and insisted on laudanum. Don’t suppose I can do much for him as long as he’s asleep.”
Caro inclined her head in acquiescence. “No, I don’t suppose you can.”
“Beggin’ yer pardon, me lady.” Sadie eyed Caro through a tangle of trailing hair. Something about the movement called to mind the image of a much different girl, one who spoke loudly, whose smile shone with good-natured brashness. “But I’m not entirely clear on what my job here is.”
Caro considered the girl. Insolence? No, her statement had rung with sincerity, and her eye held no hint of mischief. “Did Mr. Crosby tell you what happened to Gus?”
“No, me lady. Just said a nursemaid was needed.”
“He injured his head when he fell from a horse. He was insensible for more than a day, and he’s still in delicate health, as you’ve seen. We require someone to sit watch, make sure he stays abed, make certain he eats, and above all keep him out of trouble. I suspect boredom has taken over. You may have to find a means of keeping him entertained.”
“Entertained, me lady?” An uncertain line formed between Sadie’s brows.
“I don’t suppose you read.”
Sadie looked down at the coverlet. “No.”
“Perhaps you can persuade him to read to you, then. When he wakes up, of course.”
“Yes, me lady.” Sadie didn’t sound convinced in the slightest.
Not that Caro blamed her. Eleven-year-old boys who liked to careen about on horseback did not tend to be overly enamored of lessons. “We’ll think of something.”
“We, my lady?”
Caro shambled closer. Though she kept her weight centered on her good leg—her bad one had had quite enough activity for the next while, at least. Her ankle throbbed dully, a constant reminder of her infirmity.
You won’t be going out any time soon. If her limb could speak, it would have said as much and in no uncertain terms.
With a sigh, she settled into a chair. “I’m not in any better condition, am I? I could look after the boy myself, except I’m in no state to chase him down should he make a bid for escape.”
“I could do that much, at least.” Sadie’s lips stretched toward a smile, but before the expression could bloom, she winced.
“I could give you something for that,” Caro said.
Sadie raised a hand to cover her cheek. “It ain’t nothing.”
“If it pains you, we might have a soothing cream to put on it. My papa—his grace—has a veritable collection of remedies, and my sisters possess all manner of powders that would hide the mark.”
Sadie shook her head. “Oh, I couldn’t ask for anything so fine.”
“You’re not asking, are you?”
“My lady?” The voice behind her indicated a footman had just entered. “You’ve a visitor.” The servant circled her chair to produce a salver holding a calling card. “A Mr. Pendleton. Will you see him?”
Chapter 13
Caro stared at the calling card proffered on its salver. Marcus Pendleton stood out in bold, black letters against the white cardstock.
Damnation. The gall of the man, turning up here. Without doubt he meant to berate her about Boudicca, in person this time. As if she hadn’t set him down firmly enough on the previous occasion.
A thread of fear cut through her irritation as she recalled that previous occasion. Enclosed in the yew hedges of the maze during a game of hide-and-seek at a house party, he’d confronted her, and she’d stood up to him, yes. But his fury had set her heart pounding, especially when Lizzie had warned her of the specific dangers this man posed to women. Servants, to be certain, but Lizzie had had word from an equally adamant Dysart that she should go nowhere alone with Pendleton.
None of them should.
She’d gone into the maze and come out safely, though now she could only call to mind the seething anger coming off him in waves, his clenched fists, and the tense set to his jaw that had lent a terseness to every syllable of his demands. Thank God Dysart and Lizzie had followed her in, or worse might have happened.
She’d only realized as much after the fact, and she was damned if she’d meet him alone now.
“My lady?”
The footman still awaited her response.
She couldn’t afford to tax her injury any further by going downstairs to a proper receiving room, and it would hardly be suitable to see him in a bedchamber, occupied or not. Just as well. She could predict what Pendleton had to say to her. “Tell him I am indisposed.”
“Oh, what nonsense.” That statement drifted in from the corridor. Blast it, and why had Snowley seen fit to stick his nose into her affairs? “You look perfectly fine to me.”
Caro twisted in her seat. “Did no one tell you I took a spill?”
“You?” added yet another voice from the corridor. “Took a spill? You ask us to believe that?”
The footman stood aside to admit not only Snowley but Marcus Pendleton.
Caro quashed an impulse to smack her palm against her forehead. Damn Snowley. Damn him. “What made you think you could bring him up here without consulting me?” Rude of her, perhaps, but she was beyond caring. Not when Snowley had laid protocol aside. “After his behavior at the house party, you have to know I’ve nothing to say to him.”
Pendleton advanced into the bedchamber, coming to stand before her until his imposing form blocked out all else. “Be that as it may, I’ve a great deal to say to you.”
“I’m afraid I am in no position to accommodate you,” Caro replied. “We can hardly hold this conversation where it might disturb my patient.”
“Your patient?” Snowley appeared just behind Pendleton. Her cousin cast a glance back at the inert form in the wide bed. “It looks to me as if you’ve hired a caretaker.”
“I am currently not inclined to move,” Caro insisted, “and I will not hold this conversation here.”
“That suits me just fine, my lady.” Pendleton spoke in clipped tones that sent her straight back to the maze. “I do not require a conversation. I only require you to listen. Your mare injured my stallion last night.”
Caro gripped the arms of her chair. Good Lord, a properly bred lady would not even acknowledge the situation, not in mixed company—not in any company.
But his bluntness and his recklessness at putting two valuable animals in danger provoked an eruption of outrage. “Your stallion?” She inched her way
forward in the seat, not an easy prospect with only one good leg, but she most definitely could not hold this discussion here. “Snowley, make yourself useful and help me up.”
If only he’d make himself useful and bring her the poker from the fireplace. Then she could beat both her hapless cousin and Pendleton about the head with it.
Pendleton heaved himself in front of her cousin. “I will not allow you to walk away from me.”
Caro met the menace in his gaze head-on. “Quite bold of you to threaten me in my own home—and before witnesses, no less.”
“Caro?” Snowley asked tentatively from behind Pendleton.
“Help me up, Snowley. I’ve decided I have quite a lot to say to Mr. Pendleton, but not here.”
As Snowley stepped forward to lend her an arm, a new voice broke in. “Beggin’ yer pardon, me lady.”
Leaning on her cousin, Caro eased herself upright. “Is something the matter?”
Pendleton twisted toward the bed, and the movement revealed Sadie, her recent bruise standing out, livid, in a chalky complexion.
She kept her gaze trained on Pendleton, who must be glaring, if Sadie’s answering glower was any indication. “Ye wants ter be careful, ye see. It ain’t always safe ter go off wif certain gentlemen…alone like.”
Caro tightened her grip on Snowley’s forearm. What could Sadie know of Marcus Pendleton’s taste for the help—unless she had aroused his interest? Pendleton would have had opportunity at the house party, if his explorations had taken him far enough afield. And they would have. He’d been conducting his own investigation last June.
“I know all I need to about the present company,” Caro replied. “A gentleman with the least modicum of intelligence would know better than to raise a hand against me in my own home.” The firmness of her tone drew Pendleton’s attention back where she wanted it. “Isn’t that right?”
Pendleton gave a curt nod. “Let’s get on with it.”
With Snowley’s help, Caro hobbled into the corridor as far as the next chamber, but she refused to go through the door. No matter that she’d just laid down the rules, she wouldn’t trust Pendleton in a closed room with her. And if any servants happened by, so much the better. They could stand as witness, along with her cousin.
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