Snowbound Wedding Wishes: An Earl Beneath the MistletoeTwelfth Night ProposalChristmas at Oakhurst Manor (Harlequin Historical)

by Allen, Louise

  When he’d appeared out of the darkness on his big horse, she’d thought, Here is another enemy. A man, an arrogant man, and their new lord...

  He’d had a knock on the head, that was all. He was big and strong, he’d quickly get over it. And then he’d be ruling the roost, as gents like him always did.

  But...his face. He had a face you wouldn’t forget, with a long, straight nose and a mouth that would look lovely if it was smiling. His hair was dark and unruly; beard growth was starting to shadow his lean jaw, and...

  And men were trouble, always. And best to be avoided at all costs. Resisting the inexplicable urge to smooth his dark hair from his forehead, she turned and calmly said to the children, ‘Help me, Jed and Simkin, to lift him on the cart. The rest of you, take the holly out—carefully!—and carry it to the village.’

  ‘What are you goin’ to do with him, Miss Jenna?’

  ‘I’m going to take him to Northcote Hall, of course.’

  Where he was expected. She, of all people, knew that.

  And a rough ride in a handcart would certainly put this new arrival in his place.

  Chapter Two

  Theo opened his eyes to find that he was being bounced about on something very hard and very uncomfortable. He turned his head sideways to realise he was lying in a handcart, being trundled into the forecourt of an ancient manor house.

  My God. By the illumination of a few faintly lit windows, Theo could see the place was completely unkempt, with ancient chimney pots clustered atop steeply angled roofs and tangles of ivy growing haphazardly up an old stone turret.

  Everything came flooding back. The children. The girl, Jenna—a rustic maid in a man’s coat, whose scorn for him had been transparent. That barking dog, and the horse throwing him...

  He struggled to sit up. The girl, her voice very clear, was saying, ‘We’re here, my lord. Northcote Hall.’

  Theo heaved himself out of the cart, stretching each limb to make sure nothing was broken and touching the bruise on the back of his head rather carefully. He noticed that the children had vanished into the darkness with the greenery and their lanterns, all except for a young lad who hovered by the cart, and the girl, of course, and—the dog.

  The blasted dog.

  The girl must have seen his expression; she said, ‘I’m sorry about Bess—she thought you were threatening us, you see. But we’ve brought you here safe, so will you still promise to do what you said?’

  Theo’s head momentarily spun. He began, ‘It depends on what...’

  Her face changed. Those thick-lashed eyes looked stricken; her fists were clenched. ‘You’d break your promise!’

  ‘All right,’ he said curtly. He couldn’t even remember what he’d promised, if indeed he had—it was about holly, or wells, or something equally pagan. ‘All right.’

  Suddenly he jerked his head round as the great front door of the Hall began to open. The dog—Bess—growled softly. Theo frowned, reaching for his pistol. A man—a rough-clad, black-bearded man—strode out into the yard.

  ‘What in thunder—God’s teeth, it’s you!’ He was glaring at the girl. ‘What the devil brings you here?’

  The girl stood there, pale but proud. The dog was alert at her side. ‘I have someone for you,’ she answered him. ‘Someone you’ve been expecting, Hewitt.’

  Theo frowned. Clearly the girl knew, and despised, Hewitt; and now it was the man’s turn to go pale. ‘Hell. Not Lord Dalbury!’

  Theo stepped forwards to stare him down. ‘I’m Dalbury, yes. Who the devil are you?’

  It was the girl who answered. Tossing her head scornfully, she said to Theo, ‘This is Joseph Hewitt—supposedly the steward of Northcote Hall. Which accounts, my lord, for the state you see it’s in.’

  Hewitt looked enraged. ‘Why, you...’

  Theo looked at him, then turned to the girl. ‘And you are?’ It had occurred to him a while ago how well she spoke for a rough country girl.

  ‘I am Jenna Brook,’ she answered steadily. ‘I live with my mother in Northcote village, half a mile from here.’

  ‘And you’re a damned troublemaker,’ Hewitt was muttering.

  She spun back to Hewitt, anger sparking. ‘I’ve spoken with his lordship, Hewitt. And he agrees with what I’ve always told you—that the land at Hob Hurst’s Gate belongs to the people, and it’s their right to collect greenery every Christmastide! Is Aggie there?’

  Just then a plump, grey-haired woman wearing a big apron and white cap came rushing out. ‘Miss Jenna. I heard Bess, and... Oh!’

  Her eyes had alighted on Theo.

  ‘Lord Dalbury,’ said Jenna swiftly, ‘this is the housekeeper, Aggie. Aggie, you will see that his lordship is well looked after, won’t you?’

  The housekeeper was blushing and curtsying. ‘Oh, my lord! You’re welcome indeed. If you’ll come this way...’

  Theo followed, but turned one last time to look at the girl, who was still in altercation with Hewitt.

  ‘You knew he was coming,’ she was accusing the steward. ‘Yet you’ve done nothing, and you made poor Aggie’s life a misery when she tried to prepare the place...’

  ‘I never thought he’d really arrive mid-winter!’ Hewitt was muttering. ‘I just thought his lordship’s letter was maybe one of yours and Aggie’s tricks!’

  The girl answered scornfully, ‘If you’d ever learned to read properly, Hewitt, you’d have known exactly what that letter said. And I hope that one of the first things his lordship discovers is what an incredible rogue you are.’

  With that she went to join the lad waiting by the cart and together they began to pull it across the cobbles and out of the yard, with the black-and-white dog trotting behind.

  * * *

  Clearly there was more going on here than met the eye. That girl had spoken to Hewitt with scorn, and even authority—why? Once inside Theo took his time gazing round the huge hall with its vaulted ceiling and stone-flagged floor. The place was chilly and distinctly damp. The few candles that had been lit showed furniture and wall-hangings that looked as old as the building itself.

  Aggie, the housekeeper, was saying anxiously, ‘I’ve kept it as clean as I could, my lord! But it’s difficult... If you’ll excuse me, I’ll just go and light a fire in your bedroom.’

  ‘By all means.’ As Aggie headed off up the big staircase Hewitt sauntered in, scowling; an odour of mingled tobacco and brandy hung about him.

  ‘She’s a local troublemaker, that girl Jenna, milord,’ he muttered. ‘Her mother was a foreigner, came from Germany...’

  ‘Germany?’ Theo was surprised.

  ‘Aye. Came here to pick up what she could.’ Hewitt spoke louder. ‘She was nothing but a whore, and the daughter’s set to go the same way—you don’t want to go believin’ a thing she says!’

  ‘I want the fires lit down here, Hewitt,’ interrupted Theo. ‘The place is freezing. And you’re the steward, is that right? I want to see all your accounts, now. Including the rent books.’

  ‘Now? But...’

  ‘Right now, if you please.’

  Hewitt sloped off, muttering under his breath.

  Aggie had come down again. She, unlike Hewitt, was desperately anxious to please. ‘I’ve just lit the fire in your bedchamber, my lord, and should I set some food out for you in the dining parlour? There’s soup I can heat, and cold mutton pie.’

  ‘That sounds wonderful,’ said Theo. ‘Thank you. Did Lady Hasledene never visit you here?’

  ‘Why, no, my lord,’ said Aggie. ‘Nor ever sent anybody for the last ten years, just her agent now and again. Which is why... Well, things aren’t as they should have been.’

  She led him up to his bedchamber—a chilly, dark-panelled room almost filled by an ancient four-poster bed—then fussed around, lighting candles. ‘Will this do for you, sir?’ she asked anxiously.

  He gave her a brief smile. ‘Aggie, I’ve slept in far worse places than this, believe me.’

  ‘We heard you were an
officer in the army, sir. But...’ she hesitated ‘...were you closely related to the old lady? None of us knew she had family.’

  ‘She didn’t,’ said Theo. ‘But she knew my father.’ He eased off his big coat and slung it over a chair.

  ‘Knew your father. I see, sir.’ Then Aggie went downstairs, clearly not seeing at all, and she wasn’t alone there, because Theo was equally bemused by what had happened to him in the last few weeks.

  Quite simply, Theo had got back to England with Gilly to find that he’d inherited a fortune. From a very awkward, very old aristocratic spinster called Lady Hasledene—who wasn’t even a relative, but had been godmother to Theo’s long-dead rake of a father.

  Theo himself had only met Lady Hasledene once. It was when he was on leave from the army; she’d asked him to call on her at her Grosvenor Square mansion, and either he or his uniform had made quite an impression. For that mansion was now his, together with a considerable fortune, and a place in Derbyshire called Northcote Hall.

  For Theo, son of my godson, her will had said, who is so clearly everything that an English gentleman should be...

  An English gentleman? Theo felt he was certainly typical of his kind. Like many of his army comrades, several close brushes with death meant that he took life, money and women lightly. With no vast fortune to pass on, he’d been in no rush to marry; he’d intended to go travelling again come spring, but now...

  Now, everything was different. He washed quickly, then went downstairs to eat alone at the big oak table in front of a reluctant log fire. When Aggie took away the final dishes and asked if he wanted anything else, he took a quick look at the scruffy account books left on the table for him—by Hewitt, presumably—and said, ‘Yes. I want to talk to you. Who was that girl who brought me here?’

  She tensed. ‘Just a village girl, my lord. A good girl, whatever Hewitt says!’

  ‘Why do she and Hewitt detest each other so?’

  Again, the hesitation. ‘Mr Hewitt, my lord—has he said anything?’

  Yes. Hewitt told me she was the daughter of a whore—a German whore—and was set fair to go the same way... ‘What should he have said?’ Theo enquired evenly.

  ‘I doubt if he’d tell you anything like the truth, my lord!’ Aggie said bitterly. ‘But the fact of the matter is that Miss Jenna’s mother was housekeeper here at Northcote Hall, ’til the old lord died ten years ago and Hewitt threw Miss Jenna and her dear mother out! Lord Northcote used to keep Hewitt in his place, you see—but once his lordship was gone there was no stopping Hewitt. Such a lovely little girl, Miss Jenna was... I used to be cook here, sir, then I took on the post of housekeeper, and my son, Rob—he’s a good lad, but a little slow, my lord—does the heavy jobs round here. I don’t know where else we’d live, if...’

  ‘You won’t lose your job, Aggie,’ Theo told her.

  ‘But Mr Hewitt—’

  ‘I think,’ Theo cut in icily, ‘that I have rather more to say on that matter than Hewitt.’

  ‘I hope so, my lord,’ said Aggie. ‘Indeed, I very much hope so! I hear your horse ran off, sir. My Rob’ll find it for you first thing in the morning, never fear!’

  Theo thought of the miles of deserted moorland and raised his eyebrows. Aggie gave him a tentative smile, bobbed a curtsy and left, with her arms full of dishes.

  * * *

  Theo took his glass of brandy and went to sit by the fire, deep in thought. So Jenna’s mother had been Lord Northcote’s housekeeper, and a foreigner—that German heritage went some way, perhaps, towards explaining why the girl puzzled him so.

  In fact, he’d been intrigued by her the minute he saw her, trudging through the mud in her boots and long man’s coat, with her blonde hair falling carelessly round her shoulders, and that expressive face that at times looked so scornful, at others almost—vulnerable.

  She was just a country wench who’d got ideas above her station because her mother used to be housekeeper here. Yet how could Lady Hasledene have abandoned Northcote Hall to the care of a man like Hewitt?

  Why had Lady Hasledene left Theo—amongst everything else—this ancient pile that she’d not bothered to visit, ever?

  Because she had the fickle power of the truly rich, that was why. In the last few months Theo had rapidly found that, with money, the world was a different place and not necessarily a better one. Before, he’d been carefree. Now he was rich, with a fortune carefully invested, a London house full of servants and all the damned hangers-on in the world.

  As for the women—well, Theo and Gilly had broken many a heart between them in the past, no denying. But Theo’s parents’ own marriage had been a total disaster—in fact, his mother had been driven to an early grave by his father’s drinking, womanising and steady gambling away of the estate.

  No marriage for me, Theo had always sworn. Not until I’ve had as much fun as I want.

  But since September he’d found himself under siege from the matchmakers. Gilly had offered practical advice. ‘Tell the girls and their mamas you’re not in the market yet for marriage, old fellow. Keep the women at bay—and you’ve got ’til spring before the Season really gets under way.’

  But that autumn Theo had found, to his cost, that quite a few eager parents had hit on the idea of giving their daughters early come-outs, to steal a march on next spring’s batch of debutantes. All of these marriageable misses had their eyes firmly fixed on Theo, Lord Dalbury. And the worst of them was Lady Celia.

  It had been the simpering Lady Celia’s latest ploy, when he was foolish enough to attend her parents’ November ball, to lure him into the conservatory on some pretence of helping her find a missing cat. Cats! He loathed the things! Then she had told him her gown had slipped from her shoulder and asked him to attend to it—at which point, just as Theo was about to beat a very hasty retreat, Lady Celia’s mother had burst in, and...

  ‘I’m going to Derbyshire,’ he’d announced to Gilly later that night as they sat morosely over their brandy.

  ‘Derbyshire!’ Gilly had looked aghast. ‘Of all the bleak, benighted places! Why, Theo, on God’s earth... Unless there’s hunting?’

  ‘I’m not interested in hunting.’ Theo shrugged. ‘But I’ve got an estate. Or so they tell me. And, Gilly, it’s a long, long way from London.’

  Gilly frowned, then brightened. ‘So’s India. How about India?’

  Theo struggled. ‘I really ought to visit this place first.’

  So here he was, and the sooner he sorted it, the sooner he could leave this decaying relic of a house. So when Aggie came in to see if there was anything else he needed, he told her he’d sit by the fire for a while and examine the estate’s papers.

  ‘Where’s Hewitt?’ he asked. ‘I’d like to see him about these accounts.’

  She hesitated. ‘At the village alehouse, my lord. He usually goes there around nine or so. He’ll be back soon. But...’

  He’d be drunk, Theo surmised, and in no fit state to talk about anything. ‘I think I’ve got all I need, Aggie. I’ll see you in the morning.’

  ‘Then I’ll wish you a good night, my lord.’

  A good night? Theo would sooner have been camping out in the mountains of Spain with Wellington’s army—but at least he was away from London and Lady Celia.

  His mouth set in a grim line as he turned back to the accounts. But Theo found his concentration lacking greatly as Jenna’s face played over and over in his mind. She intrigued him, and not only with her beauty. Jenna piqued Theo’s curiosity.

  * * *

  Because of various errands, night had truly settled in by the time Jenna set off for Northcote village, alone. She had plenty to think about as she tramped the familiar path homewards.

  Jenna had hoped, so much, that the arrival of the new lord at Northcote Hall would mean that old wrongs would at last be put right. But she had been foolish to hope. Just as foolish to let something strange churn at her insides when she’d seen him lying there, thrown from his horse. She’d felt pity,
and something else—almost fear—when she struggled with Simkin and the others to get him on that cart.

  He was so big, so male. Yes, a fine-looking man and the local girls’ hearts would be all aflutter for him. But his lordship would doubtless turn his back on Northcote Hall just as soon as he could. Why should he stay? And anyway, men were trouble—she only had to look at her poor mother’s life to see that.

  She was almost home. Their cottage lay a little off the track, with a garden for chickens and vegetables, and some apple trees. The eggs and produce, together with her mother’s beautifully delicate embroidery, brought in just enough to live on. They’d been there ten years now, and she’d have known the way blindfolded...

  But now—dear God, she could smell smoke. She could see flames rising from behind the trees. And soon she was running.

  Those flames—the bright golden flames that she could see so clearly now—were crackling around what was left of her home.

  Chapter Three

  By eleven o’clock Theo gave up on Hewitt and went to bed, where he fell asleep almost immediately, only to wake a little later, wondering for a few dazed seconds, where on earth he was. Northcote Hall, at the back of beyond, that was where. And—what on earth was that racket out in the yard? He glanced at his watch. Half-past eleven. Heaving on his breeches, aware of his head still aching from his fall, he strode to the window to look out.

  Hewitt. Back from the tavern with his friends. They were clearly drunk and making a din fit to wake the devil. And then he saw that the girl was there. Jenna.

  She was wearing that man’s coat again; the moon shone pale on her long, loose fair hair. And she was confronting those men—all five of them.

  ‘I’ve been waiting here for you, Hewitt,’ he heard her say, her fists clenched. There was more, but Theo couldn’t make it out. Something about her mother, and their cottage...

  ‘So you’ve come here to appeal to his fine lordship, have you?’ jeered Hewitt. Theo could hear his voice all right. ‘Already plannin’ on playing the same sort of tricks as your mother, is that it—?’