But how?
In a sudden flash of insight, she had the answer—assuming she could convince Lord Drake that is. Drawing herself up, she met his gaze. “Your lordship, there is one more thing before I depart.”
His brows arched this time. “Oh?”
“I couldn’t help but notice the state of the room.”
His scowl returned.
“That is to say you must be aware it could do with a good cleaning and polishing.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. “Perhaps, but I like it the way it is. As I’m sure you’ve heard already, I don’t allow anyone to touch the things in my workspace.”
“Of course not, and I would treat your possessions with the utmost respect and the care they deserve. But even you must admit that every room requires a deep cleaning every now and again, even this one.”
“I let Parker sweep and run a cloth over the bare spots on occasion,” he grumbled, shifting his stance from one foot to the other. “That’s sufficient.”
“I beg pardon, but I must disagree, my lord, given the dust I can see on the books and many of the shelves as well. And from the smudges on the windows, they look as if they haven’t been washed in several months.”
His jaw tightened. “Be that as it may, I can’t have the maids in here buzzing around disturbing me, not to mention disturbing my things.”
“Then I shall arrange for a time when you are not present.”
He shook his head. “I used to have similar discussions with Mrs. Beatty, and we agreed that the servants could clean every room in the house. Every one except this one.”
“Correct me if I am wrong,” she persisted, “but I am given to understand that you did let Mrs. Beatty inside to tidy up every now and again.”
“She took care not to rearrange my papers and such,” he admitted begrudgingly.
“As would I,” she said, her heart beating out a hopeful tattoo. “Why do we not have the same agreement as you did with Mrs. Beatty? I shall do the cleaning myself, and should you discover anything missing or out of place, you may reprimand me and dock my pay.”
“Or sack you,” he mumbled under his breath as if he had already contemplated such a thing.
She made no effort to pretend she had not heard. “You may do that as well should you find yourself displeased.”
And then wouldn’t I be in the broth, she thought, her chest suddenly tight with fear. Tossed out of the house without the cipher. But she sensed this was her best chance, and if she didn’t find a way now, getting back into the room to search would be nearly impossible and doubly dangerous.
He studied her for a long moment, his brows furrowed over his penetrating eyes. “You’re to leave the books and papers exactly as you find them. You’re not to straighten or organize or rearrange in any manner whatsoever. You’re not to clean or polish any of the tools or fiddle with the bottles since some of them contain potentially harmful substances.”
Fitting her hands at her waist, she suppressed a smile.
“And you are never—and I mean never—to smudge, wipe or erase anything you may find written on the slate board. Some of those calculations are months, if not years, of work and you will be dismissed if they are tampered with.”
“I shall give the slate a wide and reverent berth,” she promised, forcing the inner elation from her voice.
A long moment of silence fell before he spoke. “Very well. You have my leave to clean and polish when it does not disturb me. See to it I have no cause to regret my decision.”
“You won’t, my lord, I promise. Now, I will leave you to your repast before your tea grows cold. Should you require anything further, you have only to ring.”
One corner of his mouth curved up. “Thank you, Mrs. Greenway. I shall be sure to keep that in mind.”
Giving a polite nod, Sebastianne turned on her heel to leave. As she did, a sharp rap of knuckles sounded at the door, and a tall, well-dressed man strode confidently over the threshold. Seconds later, he appeared to stride in again—or rather a duplicate of him did—the second man a seemingly exact copy of the first.
Twins! she realized, blinking at the unexpected sight. And not just any twins but a pair who bore a striking familial resemblance to Lord Drake. Young, handsome and strongly built, they were leanly broad-shouldered, with wavy golden brown hair and irreverent smiles. A devilish light glinted in their arresting green-gold eyes, their identical expressions giving her a disconcerting sense of seeing double. Which actually, she supposed, she was.
“Hallo, Drake,” one of the young men drawled in a pleasant baritone. “Hope you don’t mind us dropping in.”
“We were taking a turn in the neighborhood—” the other began in his equally deep, melodious voice.
“—And decided to see if you were home,” finished the first.
They smiled, their eyes turning toward her. The young men, who looked as if they were of university age, gave her a keen, head-to-foot perusal.
She straightened her shoulders and sent them a stern look for their boldness.
Rather than their being fazed, however, their smiles only widened. The one on the right even had the nerve to wink. “And who might this lovely specimen of womanhood be?” he inquired, before making her an elegant bow.
“Yes, do tell,” the other said, following his brother’s lead. “Had we known you had such a charming visitor, Drake, we would have called on you earlier.”
Drake snorted under his breath and stepped forward. “She is not a visitor, she is my housekeeper, and I’ll thank you two not to work your nonsense on her.”
The winker laid a hand on his chest. “What nonsense? We’re merely overwhelmed with admiration.”
“Quite overcome,” his twin agreed. “You leave us breathless, ma’am.”
She couldn’t but laugh, unsure whether to be offended or flattered.
Lord Drake, on the other hand, growled low his throat. “Well, I’m sure Mrs. Greenway has no need to listen to your guile.” Standing now at her side, he met her gaze. “You are to pay no heed to my raffish younger brothers. Flirtation is their favor pastime.”
“Second favorite,” the winker said with an impish humor dancing in his eyes, which she suddenly noticed had slightly more green than his twin’s. “I’ll leave you to guess the first.”
She glanced down so they wouldn’t see her smile, looking up again only when she had control over her emotions. “Well, it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, my lords—”
“Leo,” the winker said before gesturing toward his twin. “And this is Lawrence.”
“Lord Leo. Lord Lawrence,” she greeted. “I was just on my way to the kitchen. Might I bring you some refreshment?”
“Yes,” they chimed together.
“No,” Lord Drake said at the same moment. “That is to say, you may send one of the footmen up with another pot of tea. I’m sure you have other matters to which you need attend.”
“Indeed I do. However, I believe I can find a moment to ask Mrs. Tremble to prepare a few more sandwiches along with the tea,” she ventured.
“Capital! You’re as kind as you are gracious, dear ma’am,” Lord Lawrence said, making her an elegant bow before stepping forward to help himself to one of the biscuits on the tray. “In the meantime, Leo and I will have to content ourselves with sampling Drake’s portion. Tell Cook I look forward to more of her delectable fare.” Smiling, he bit into the snack.
“Pray extend my regards as well,” Lord Leo said, sending her another roguish smile.
Drake shot his brothers a dark look before returning his gaze to her. “You may go, Mrs. Greenway,” Lord Drake told her. “Thank you for the tea.”
“Your lordship.” With a respectful smile, she turned and walked from the room.
Chapter 6
“Always knew you were deep as the Baikal Sea
,” Leo remarked the moment Mrs. Greenway’s footsteps faded away, “but this goes beyond even my expectations. Be honest, is she really your housekeeper?”
Drake’s jaw tightened. “Of course she is. Have I not just said so?”
Leo exchanged a quick glance with his twin, whose face wore an expression of equal amazement. “Well, I must say I can’t fault your taste,” he continued. “She’s nothing like Mrs. Beatty.”
“As I recall,” Drake said, “you always liked Mrs. Beatty.”
“Oh, I did. Lawrence too. Didn’t you, Lawrence?”
“Most definitely,” his twin agreed. “She was an excellent woman.”
“Sweet as our own grandmother were she still alive,” Leo went on. “But I never had the least interest in admiring Mrs. Beatty. The moment I saw your new housekeeper, it was as if I’d wandered into a garden and accidentally discovered a lush, fragrant rose in full and glorious bloom.”
Lawrence gave an appreciative smile. “Exactly.”
Drake’s brows shot skyward. Full and glorious bloom, my eye! What rubbish!
The twins might be young men of twenty and continually on the prowl for any attractive females that passed their way, but he would simply have to impress upon them that dallying with Anne Greenway was forbidden.
Strictly forbidden!
Without conscious awareness, Drake’s hands curved into fists at his sides. How dare they discuss Anne in such a bold fashion. Leo and Lawrence had no right to think of her like that, let alone flirt with her. Just because he himself had desired her from the first didn’t mean the twins had leave to do the same.
“Mrs. Greenway isn’t a rose, and you won’t be admiring her in any way, shape or form, is that understood?” Drake stated in a chill tone. “She is in my employ, and you will treat her with the respect her position deserves. Besides, she is a mature woman, far too old for puppies like you.”
Lawrence shrugged.
As for Leo, he just grinned, undaunted by the setdown. “Oh, a little difference in age doesn’t bother me. I rather fancy older women, don’t you know.”
Drake tossed up his hands, then stalked to the tea tray, turning his back on them as he fought to regain his usual even-tempered, logical composure. Honestly, he didn’t know why he was having such a strong reaction to his brothers’ overt appreciation of Anne Greenway. Ordinarily, the twins amused him with their irreverent, devil-may-care antics, and he wasn’t the jealous type. He couldn’t remember ever losing his good humor over a woman before. Yet there was just something about her that brought out the most unexpected emotions in him.
The most puzzling emotions.
The blasted woman had even managed to wheedle a promise out of him to let her clean up his workroom when he’d had no intention of permitting any such thing.
Sighing inwardly, he lifted the teapot and poured himself a cup, cursing when a few drops splashed on his hand. Without bothering to offer his siblings a libation, he took a careful swallow of the hot brew in his cup, then reached for a sandwich. Maybe some food would regulate his mind, particularly since he’d only had a slice of toast and a cup of coffee for breakfast.
Turning around, he regarded his brothers. “What are you two doing here, by the way? Aren’t you supposed to be up at Oxford finishing up your term?”
Lawrence sauntered forward and appropriated another handful of biscuits. “Ordinarily, yes,” he said before taking a bite, “but we made special arrangements this year.”
Drake arched a brow. “What special arrangements? Blister it, you didn’t get tossed out, did you? Ned will have an apoplexy.”
“Of course not,” Leo declared with some affront. Stepping forward, he helped himself to a stack of sandwiches. “Term’s nearly over, and we wanted to come down for the Season, so we convinced the dean to let us sit for exams early.”
“Oh? And how did you manage that miraculous feat?”
The twins paused, exchanging a highly charged look.
Leo, who had always tended to be the chief spokesman for the two, continued the story. “Seems Dean Whittlesby owed us something of a favor.”
Intrigued in spite of his better judgment, Drake waited to hear the rest.
“Whittlesby’s son, Bertie, is in our year, you know,” Leo said. “A wild sort, who likes his drink rather more than he ought.”
“Likes bullying people, too, especially the first-termers, whom he delights in cheating out of their spare funds,” Lawrence volunteered. “Mind you, he’s an idiot, who doesn’t have the sense God gave a jackstraw. If he weren’t one of the dean’s sons, he’d have gotten the boot ages ago.”
Leo nodded. “Well said, brother. Anyway, we happened to be walking past an alley one evening not long ago—”
On their way to or from a pub, Drake surmised, though he said nothing.
“—when we noticed ol’ Bertie getting the supper beaten out of him by a trio of none-too-pleasant-looking local journeymen. Seems he’d been trying to dupe them at cards and made a hash of the matter.
“Normally we’d have left him to enjoy the fruits of his labor as it were, but he looked in a bad way and was moaning like he was fit to die. Lawrence and I don’t countenance murder, so galling as it seemed at the time, we stepped in.”
Drake shook his head. “Did you never think to call the constabulary? What if those men had had help from more of their friends?”
“Oh, they did,” Leo said, calmly munching his sandwiches. “Turned into a vicious brawl, two against one. But we knew how to handle ourselves. We didn’t grow up with four older brothers, who were all handy with their fives, for nothing.”
Lawrence grinned.
Leo grinned back, the pair of them clearly having enjoyed the encounter.
Drake lowered himself into a chair and stretched out his legs. “So you stopped the beating and took your . . . well, I won’t say friend—”
“Classmate,” Leo suggested.
“—Classmate back to his rooms?”
The twins exchanged another look. “Not exactly. That’s when the constabulary did show up. We convinced them not to take the three of us down to the gaol but instead over to Dean Whittlesby. Besides, anyone could see that Bertie needed a doctor, and the authorities weren’t too keen on risking the life of an Oxford dean’s son, nor arresting the brothers of a peer. So off we went.”
“And?” Drake encouraged, taking a drink of his now-lukewarm tea.
“And the dean was grateful. Thanked us for saving ol’ Bertie’s life and for keeping the school from facing a potentially embarrassing scandal. He seemed rather anxious not to be in our debt and offered us a reward for our—how did he put it?”
“—‘Brave actions and gentlemanly discretion,’ ” Lawrence quoted.
Leo snapped his fingers. “That’s it. I think he meant to pay us off, but instead we said we could do with a couple of favors.”
“The early exams, obviously,” Drake supplied. “What else?”
“We didn’t think it right to leave Bertie free to continue his reign of terror there at school, so we asked Dean Whittlesby to put the pinch on him and make him stop bullying the first-years.
“He seemed genuinely shocked at that piece of information and said he’d be pleased to do precisely that. The old man was furious over it, I’ll tell you. So I don’t think Bertie will have such an easy time of it next term, even after his broken ribs, fractured jaw and head-to-foot bruises heal. So here we are in Town and looking forward to a bit of fair weather sport.”
“Well, welcome to the city,” Drake said with a wry smile. “Have you stopped at Clybourne House yet, or am I the first to receive a call?”
Leo ran his fingers over his gold watch fob. “Actually about that—”
Just then a knock sounded at the door, and Lyles entered with the second pot of tea, cups and more sandwiches. Once he’d gone an
d another good share of the food had been plated and consumed, Drake continued the discussion. “You were saying?” he encouraged.
The twins exchanged sideways glances.
Lawrence set his plate aside and wiped his mouth with his napkin. “We were thinking of taking up bachelor’s quarters.”
“We’re coming on one-and-twenty soon,” Leo stated, “and what with Ned and Claire adding to their nursery—
“—not to mention she and Mama busy with Ella’s come-out—” Lawrence inserted.
“—We thought it might be a good time to strike out on our own,” Leo continued, as the two of them began talking back and forth in tandem as they had since they were small boys.
“—The only problem is the funds—” Lawrence said.
“—Which we’ll have with next quarter’s allowance, but that’s not until June—”
“—And we don’t want to wait.”
“—Or ask Ned, I presume,” Drake concluded aloud.
They both met his gaze, then shook their heads. “No.”
Drake steepled his fingers and let them wait in suspense a minute more. “Find something reasonable, and I’ll give you what you need for the rent,” Drake told them, wondering if he’d been this adventurous and full of fire at their age. Then he realized he’d been too obsessed with his studies back then to worry over mundane matters such as independent living quarters and how to extract the most fun from the Season.
He was still rather too obsessed with his work, he admitted to himself. But he loved what he did and wouldn’t want his life any other way.
His gaze fell on the tea tray, his thoughts drifting again to Anne Greenway and how quickly and effortlessly she’d fit into his household. As for the way she fit into his life . . . well she’d stirred that up from the instant she’d arrived. And if his response to her earlier was any example, he feared she would continue to do so.
Before he had time to ruminate further, Leo and Lawrence hurried forward and shook his hand. Wearing identical white-toothed grins, they thanked him profusely for his generous assistance.
The Bed and the Bachelor Page 6
