A Rogue of Her Own

by Grace Burrowes

  “Does Sherbourne ride to hounds?”

  Sherbourne had collected a pile of papers from the longest table in the tent, and Jones was apparently explaining something to his employer.

  “Sherbourne is a very competent horseman,” Radnor said. “Why do you ask?”

  Because making money off of Sherbourne was all well and good, but too much socializing with him would not do.

  “One doesn’t want to create awkwardness,” Brantford said. “Can’t invite the man to ride in my flight if he’s likely to tumble at the first fence.”

  Veronica rode with the first flight, and the dash she cut in the saddle had drawn Brantford’s notice even before he’d realized the ambitions her family had held for her. He’d received a letter from her that very morning, and she was having a grand time in the company of her cousins at the family seat.

  Without her husband.

  “If you’re still in the area once the weather settles down,” Radnor said, “I’ll happily take you out shooting. At least you have the famed Haverford library to entertain you until then.”

  Brantford had done more reading in the past several days than in the previous five years. Her Grace of Haverford did not believe in allowing a guest to while away an afternoon with a plump, pretty chambermaid when Sir Walter Scott was available instead.

  The duke didn’t believe in allowing anybody or anything—much less a mere titled house guest—to upset his duchess. Their Graces’ mutual devotion was nauseatingly sincere.

  Also slightly enviable.

  “What can Sherbourne be going on about?” Brantford asked. “Tramping around in the mud has worked up my appetite, and I’d rather not linger in this wind and court another illness.”

  He’d rather not have come to Wales, and had almost put that in a letter to his wife.

  “Sherbourne is at these works in all kinds of weather,” Radnor said. “He’s here morning, noon, and night, and if you are to profit from his labors, then you can spare him a few minutes with his engineer.”

  So the handsome marquess wasn’t all fine manners and starched linen. “I heartily agree,” Brantford said. “Sherbourne is willing to get his hands dirty, but then, that’s what the merchant class is for, isn’t it? Getting and spending, filling the pews, minding the shops while we mind the business of the nation. He doesn’t always keep to his place, but he’ll make me a decent sum before too long.”

  The wind shifted, catching a flap of the tent and ripping it loose from its ties. Radnor captured the canvas and tied it back with a perfect bow.

  “You cannot in one breath castigate Sherbourne for tarrying here when there’s work to be discussed, and then applaud him for having the ability to earn you substantial coin, Brantford. This mine is not a hobby for him, nor will it be for the people hoping to work here.”

  Though Brantford had no idea what made a mine thrive or fail, he did perceive that Sherbourne had an ally in Radnor, and Radnor was a marquess who commanded the friendship of a duke.

  “I mean Sherbourne no insult,” Brantford said. “I remark upon my own frailty. When do you expect this place will start turning a profit?”

  Now Jones raised his voice, barking something about bloody damned figures. Sherbourne touched Jones on the arm, and the older man grew quiet.

  “Didn’t you read Sherbourne’s financial plan?” Radnor asked. “Revenue should begin flowing by midsummer. The initial investments will earn out over five to ten years, depending on how quickly the mine repays the initial principal and at what percentage interest.”

  Sherbourne tucked some papers into a satchel and left Jones to fuss with the parlor stove.

  “My apologies for detaining you both,” Sherbourne said. “Brantford, any other questions?”

  By rights, no commoner ought to have used such familiar address. My lord, your lordship, Lord Brantford were acceptable, but Radnor was two yards away, tying the tent flap closed, so Brantford kept his scold behind his teeth.

  “I believe I’ve seen all there is to see at this point,” Brantford said. “I hope you intend to set a fine table this evening, Sherbourne, for hiking about has left me famished.”

  In fact, the relentless smell of mud had all but obliterated his appetite.

  “Then I’ll be happy to take you back to Sherbourne Hall. My wife is looking forward to meeting you, and I’m in need of sustenance myself.”

  Radnor walked with them to Sherbourne’s waiting gig, where a boy stood holding the marquess’s horse. Brantford would cheerfully have waved good-bye to the Marquess of Meddling, but his vexatious lordship merely steered his horse to walk along beside the carriage.

  “Where is your next destination, Brantford?” Sherbourne asked, giving the reins a shake. “Will you return to London, tarry here in Wales, or repair to your family seat?”

  “I haven’t decided. The hospitality at Haverford Castle is outstanding, and I’m not anxious to subject myself to another week on the king’s highway so soon.”

  Sherbourne drove well, and he was turned out in the first stare of casual gentlemanly fashion. The beast in the traces was sleek and muscular and the gig well sprung. Resentment welled because a small, irrational part of Brantford had been hoping to see Sherbourne fail.

  Why should wealth come to a man who had no great standing, no particular learning, no family of any consequence? Why shouldn’t Sherbourne have to struggle a bit, or more than a bit? Though not too much—Brantford did need rather badly for this investment to be profitable.

  “That’s your home?” Brantford asked as they topped a rise and a stately country house came into view.

  “My home, and the former dower house for Haverford Castle. We purchased it from the St. Davids in German George’s day, and each generation has kept the house modernized in every particular.”

  How proud he was of a mere jumped-up manor house, though his residence did have rather a lot of windows. Also a fine formal garden that led to a park, which transitioned to cultivated land and pastures. The outbuildings were nicely placed behind the main house—a carriage house and a sizeable stable, a summer kitchen, laundry, and spring house, among others.

  Gravel walks joined the buildings, and trimmed hedges marked off the gardens. The premises were, in fact, about the same size as the Brantford estate in Yorkshire.

  “Will you join us for dinner, Radnor?” Brantford asked.

  “Alas for me, no. I’m expected to relay a report of the day’s business to Haverford before I join my lady wife for supper.”

  Brantford hadn’t exactly made a map of the neighborhood, but surely Radnor’s errands took him in the opposite direction—back to Haverford Castle—rather than along this bucolic lane?

  “You could send a note,” Sherbourne said. “Have Lady Radnor join us. Mrs. Sherbourne would be delighted to have her ladyship share another meal with us.”

  Another meal…Meaning Sherbourne regularly entertained the marquess.

  Radnor had a hand in running the mine, Sherbourne had married the duke of Haverford’s sister-in-law, and by escorting Sherbourne back to his home, Radnor was sending a clear signal to any presuming earls: Sherbourne had allies, close at hand, and well placed.

  And yet, the duke had not invested in this mine, while Brantford had. Perhaps dinner would afford a tired, hungry earl far from home several opportunities to remind his host of that salient fact.

  * * *

  “His lordship is a bumpkin,” Charlotte said, setting a pot of heartsease on the bedroom mantel. “He talked about nothing save his collieries in Yorkshire and his sporting acquaintances. Was he much of a pest at the works?”

  She should have written to her family and gleaned their opinions of Brantford, for he’d been a disappointment in fine tailoring.

  Sherbourne closed and locked the bedroom door. “Radnor nannied us at every turn, which I gather was at Haverford’s insistence. My sense is that Brantford knows little of mining, and while he could have interrogated me at length for the benefit of his
own education—which would have earned my esteem—he wasn’t about to appear ignorant before Radnor or before you.”

  Charlotte stood in front of her husband and slipped the pin from his cravat. “For his pride, he does not have your esteem. Sleeve buttons, please.”

  Sherbourne offered her his right hand, then his left, and she slipped the fastenings at his wrists free. “Pride doesn’t offend me, Charlotte. I’m proud. I hope I’m not arrogant. I can undress myself.”

  She undid his pocket watch next, then set his jewelry on the vanity and went after the knot in his cravat.

  “I am your wife, and undressing you is my pleasure.”

  He tipped his chin up. “You mean that.”

  “I spoke vows, you did too. Shall I order you a bath?” She folded his cravat over the back of a chair.

  “No, thank you. I did nothing today that came close to qualifying as physical exertion. My thanks for a fine meal. You have quite the treasure trove of recipes.”

  “Our cook has recipes too, but she was loath to try them on you without an invitation. Shall you take off your shoes?”

  He settled into the chair by the hearth, his sigh redolent of weariness…from a man who hadn’t exerted himself.

  “Are you relieved to have Brantford’s visit behind you?” Charlotte certainly was.

  “I should be. Might you sit for a moment, Mrs. Sherbourne?”

  Charlotte took a seat on the hassock, though sitting still was difficult. Her first true guest beyond family had come to dinner, and nothing had gone wrong…or had it?

  “What did you and Brantford talk about over the port?”

  Sherbourne bent to remove his shoes. He set them aside and regarded the fire blazing in the hearth.

  “Brantford is unhappy with the terms of our agreement. He waited all day to ambush me, until neither you nor Radnor could hear him express dismay at the schedule upon which his investment will be repaid.”

  Nothing of Brantford’s displeasure had been evident when Charlotte had rejoined the men for a final cup of tea before sending Brantford back to Haverford Castle. He’d been the gracious, smiling, lordly guest, bowing with friendly presumption over Charlotte’s hand.

  “You are unhappy with Brantford,” Charlotte said, taking her husband’s feet into her lap.

  “Have you a fascination with my feet, Mrs. Sherbourne?”

  Yes. “You might offer to rub my feet at some point if I bring you pleasure often enough by rubbing yours.” Or you might not be upset with me, when I find a moment to tell you about Fern’s son. And the Mrs. Wesleys. All of the Mrs. Wesleys, including the ones I haven’t met yet.

  Now that Brantford’s visit was behind them, Charlotte meant to find that moment soon. Sherbourne was a reasonable fellow, and he was her fellow, and Charlotte detested keeping secrets from him.

  Sherbourne scrubbed a hand over his face. “Brantford signed a contract with me, agreeing that repayment of his investment would be on commercially reasonable terms, determined within my discretion as the owner, major investor, and director of the works, but in no event to involve a period of more than ten years, or less than five percent per annum simple interest.”

  “If he invested ten thousand pounds, then five percent interest per annum on the entire principle over ten years would be another five thousand pounds. Many people go their whole lives without earning five hundred pounds.”

  Sherbourne leaned his head back against the cushions as Charlotte pressed her thumbs against his left heel. Achilles had lost his life as a result of an arrow to the left heel, though why that snippet of mythology should occur to her, she did not know.

  “Some people go their whole lives without entangling a titled snob in their business,” Sherbourne said. “I should not have taken what Brantford was offering. That feels good.”

  Charlotte pressed harder against his callused sole. “Can you untangle yourself from Brantford?”

  “Not soon enough. He’s in the wrong. He signed a contract that many others have signed regarding similar projects. The agreement is legally sound, but if his lordship takes me to court, alleging a defect because the language was too vague, then he can destroy the colliery before we’ve brought out our first ton of ore. He’ll demand all of his money back, plus damages and costs, and make me look like a presuming incompetent.”

  “Give him his money back now and tear up the contract. He’s not honorable.”

  Sherbourne remained quiet, while Charlotte worked her thumbs all over the bottom of his foot. If anybody had told her a month ago that she’d enjoy massaging her husband’s feet, she’d have pronounced that person unhinged.

  The moment was intimate, and she liked being intimate with her spouse.

  “Do you suppose Haverford’s watchdog was spying on me,” he asked, “or keeping Brantford from stepping out of line?”

  “Radnor might have been acting on his own initiative. He is one of your directors. Give me your other foot.”

  “Radnor made it plain he would drop by Haverford Castle to report on the day’s doings before returning home. I know the aristocracy is insular and inbred, but if Radnor sought—ouch.”

  Charlotte eased the pressure. “Radnor and Haverford do not know Brantford any better than you do. I have the sense I might have stood up with him, though I cannot place him. A blond, blue-eyed earl is hardly a rarity. His looks are unremarkable and his conversation uninspired, and yet I do wonder if I met him somewhere previously.”

  “He bored you at dinner?”

  “He bored me within five minutes of the introductions because he can converse regarding only one topic—himself. I like your crooked toes.”

  “You like my crooked toes, while a peer of the realm bores you. You are an eccentric female, and eccentric females have ever been my favorite exponents of the gender.”

  Sherbourne was…he was flirting with her. Charlotte was almost sure of it. “Fatigue has made you daft.”

  “Marriage has made me happy, Charlotte.” He sounded perplexed, and his gaze was on the fire, and yet he sounded pleased, too.

  Charlotte set his feet on the floor and appropriated a corner of his seat cushion. “Might you undo my hooks and stays?” she asked, sweeping her hair off her nape.

  Sherbourne unfastened her clothing, and Charlotte arranged herself in his lap, rather than hurry away to the privacy screen. He wrapped his arms about her, and she cuddled with him before the fire in a state of half-dressed, cozy fatigue. Charlotte drifted off to sleep wondering where she might have seen Brantford before, and hoping she might never see him again.

  * * *

  “Your taste in business partners is disgraceful.” Haverford passed Sherbourne a glass of brandy. “If ever I owed you more than coin of the realm, my debt to you has been settled in perpetuity.”

  “Likewise,” Radnor said, lifting his glass so it caught the afternoon sun beaming through the windows of Haverford Castle’s library. “Here’s to an earl seen safely on his way.”

  Sherbourne took a sip of exquisite brandy—the very vintage he’d sent Haverford as a wedding present, actually.

  “Charlotte pronounced Brantford boring,” Sherbourne said. “My wife is blessed with keen discernment.”

  “Though she married you anyway,” Radnor murmured.

  Charlotte had married him, made passionate love with him, rubbed his feet, entertained his guests, and paraded around the churchyard with him as if she’d happened upon the greatest marital prize of the season.

  All quite…different from Sherbourne’s expectations.

  “And my sister,” Haverford said, “for reasons which defy mortal comprehension, is now the Marchioness of Radnor. Here’s to our ladies.”

  Sherbourne drank to that, and to the peculiar pleasure of being thanked by the vicar, in public, and within earshot of most of the congregation, for “seeing to our long overdue steeple repairs, and with such unstinting generosity.”

  With Charlotte preening at Sherbourne’s side, he’d been giv
en odd looks, tentative smiles, and maybe even a few envious glances from the local squires. Then, in full view of the shire’s biggest busybodies, Haverford had offered an impromptu invitation to Sunday dinner at the castle.

  “How is Her Grace?” Sherbourne asked, as Haverford rolled a ladder along a two-story expanse of bookshelves. “She seemed in good spirits at services.”

  “She is relieved to be shut of Brantford,” Haverford said, climbing the ladder. “What a tedious excuse for a houseguest. He discovered where the maids’ stairs were and frequented them at every opportunity, such that Her Grace decreed the maids and footmen were to switch staircases for the duration of Brantford’s visit.”

  “What’s different about this room?” Radnor asked, steadying the ladder at the bottom. “Something has changed.”

  Sherbourne took his drink up the spiral steps with him, to the section of the shelves reserved for cookery and herbals, for surely Haverford had a volume of recipes Charlotte would enjoy.

  “What’s different,” he said, “is that I have paid to ship half the books that used to collect dust on yonder shelves into the hinterlands of Wales. Somewhere, some tavern maid is struggling through Candide, while her younger brother fancies himself a Lilliputian or a Yahoo.”

  Which was progress of a sort Haverford would never have stumbled on without the aid of his duchess and his neighbor.

  As a result, the library was lighter, airier, less of a cave, more of a gracious retreat. The scent was the same, though—the vanilla fragrance of old books, a tang of peat, and a mellow undertone of beeswax and lemon.

  “I can count on my thumb the number of hours Brantford spent in here,” Haverford said, taking out a book, pushing it back among its confreres, then taking down another. “We still have one of the finest collections of reading material in the realm, and his lordship was more interested in bothering the help or talking me into taking him to a local hunt meet.”

  “He wanted to be seen with you.” Sherbourne selected a volume on French desserts. “He did not want to be seen with me.”