He took two steps to stand right next to her, since the upper hand had to be reestablished, manners be damned. “Dueling went out of fashion thirty years ago.”
And this entire conversation had blundered into something very like an argument with a lady, which Tye could not in his entire adult memory recall ever having engaged in before. It was almost… arousing.
“You’re in the Highlands, my lord.” She closed the remaining distance between them and stuck that arrogant nose in his face. “We settle our differences here in as expedient a fashion as necessary.”
“And this is Highland hospitality? Railing in the garden at guests who come in good faith, guests who take tender care of injured children like, like a Good Samaritan?” Ah, that was gratifying, to flourish the biblical term and see her righteousness falter.
“Fiona would not right this minute be watching her ankle swell up with pain if your blasted horse hadn’t necessitated that she jump down from a dangerous height. Good Samaritan, indeed.”
Tye was formulating a riposte to that inanity when a quavery voice sang out over the roses.
“Why, Hester, we have a guest. Always so nice when friends come to call. Perhaps you’d introduce us?”
A Lilliputian in a purple turban advanced on them, if such a doddering progress could be called an advance. That turban bobbing along was all Tye could make out at first, until stooped shoulders and a frail personage came around the corner of a bed of roses. She leaned heavily on a thick, carved cane that looked to be more counterweight than support, and her face had the papery smooth transparency of great age. Her smile was sweet and slightly vague, but her green eyes bore more than a spark of intelligence.
“My dear girl,” said the old woman, “you must introduce me to such a handsome fellow. Merely beholding him adds years to my life.”
Old women could be great flirts. Tye had learned this startling fact while lurking on the edge of many a ballroom. They could also be powerful allies to their favorites, having connections that went back to Mad King George’s day, and a knowledge of family history—family secrets—that went back even further.
He turned his best, most enchanted smile on the old dear. “Miss Daniels, I agree. you must introduce us this instant, that I might pluck for the lady a rose worthy of her attention lest she continue to bedazzle my feeble sight with her smile.”
Miss Daniels heaved a great sigh conveying nothing so much as long-suffering.
“Lady Ariadne MacGregor, may I make known to you the Earl of Spathfoy, though I can’t recall the man’s name if he deigned to part with it. Your lordship, Fiona’s great-aunt, possibly great-great, and a woman not to be underestimated. Fiona intends to grow up to be just like her. I warn you solely out of a sense of pity for helpless creatures.”
“Oh, now, Hester. You’ll have the man thinking you’ve no manners.” But being a flirt, Lady Ariadne extended her hand to Tye for a gentlemanly bow, which he bestowed in lingering, adoring fashion.
“Spathfoy is the title for the Quinworth heir, am I right? And how is your dear mother, my boy? She was such a pretty girl. And you must call me Aunt Ree. Everybody does—I insist.”
A slight trickle of unease percolated through Tye’s vitals. He let the lady retrieve her hand and kept his smile in place. “My mother fares well.” As far as he knew. He offered Lady Ariadne his arm, though it was about the equivalent of offering his arm to little Fiona, so tiny was his new, honorary aunt.
“I saw you galloping over the fields, Spathfoy. That black of yours looks like a handful.”
And when she wasn’t flirting or gossiping, an old woman might talk horses and hounds as well as many a squire. Tye relaxed his guard and prepared to move very slowly toward the house. “Flying Rowan is young, and he needs to work the fidgets out regularly, but his sense of distance to a jump is faultless, he has tremendous bottom, and he has a good heart.”
“He has potential, then.” She stopped and craned her neck to peer up at him. “My late husband—my second late husband—often remarked that a man will choose his dogs to complement his personality, but his horse must be a direct reflection of him.”
He wasn’t going to go near that sally—he rode a gelding, for pity’s sake.
“And what of his cats, Lady Ariadne? On what basis does a man choose his cats?”
“Cats?” She twitched a little straighter as they meandered along. “Cats are like women, Spathfoy. They do the choosing. Come along, Hester. We must inform the staff we’ll be providing hospitality to a guest.” She stopped again, as if thinking, talking, and moving forward at the same time exceeded the energy she could muster in one moment. “How long can you stay, my lord? I’m sure Fiona will want to get to know her uncle, particularly when you will one day be the highest ranking among them all.”
* * *
Hester watched as Aunt Ree hobbled and swayed along on That Man’s arm. While her body was frail, Aunt’s hearing was remarkable, as was her eyesight. Without doubt, she’d overheard that unseemly disagreement Hester had undertaken with the earl.
Of Spathfoy, which Aunt had recognized as being an heir’s courtesy title, and if the courtesy title was an earldom, then the man’s father was a marquess at least, or—Merciful Powers, deliver me—possibly even a duke.
No wonder he had arrogance to spare and condescension oozing from every syllable. Hester considered lingering in the garden to cool her temper then discarded the notion.
Aunt Ree had joined the household to provide proper chaperonage for Hester, while Hester had joined the household to look after Fiona in her parents’ absence. They formed a little parade of the cast-off and inconvenient females of the family, put in train to keep their eyes on one another.
And if anybody required supervision, it was Aunt Ree in the presence of a handsome and unsuspecting man. With a reluctant nod to duty and decency, Hester plucked herself a bud from a Bourbon rose, treated herself to a whiff of its fragrance, and made her way into the house.
She caught up with Aunt and her escort outside the library doors.
“His lordship tells me our Fiona has wrenched her ankle, Hester. I can sit with the child while you alert the housekeeper to our good fortune. Spathfoy says he’s at leisure.” Aunt beamed a guileless smile at the man. “He can stay with us for quite some time. Isn’t that marvelous?”
Marvelous?
Marvelous! To have such a great, arrogant, interfering, argumentative excuse for a—
But Aunt was aiming her smile at Hester, communicating a more immediate message than how marvelous his lordship’s company was going to be.
Hester smiled right back at Aunt Ariadne. “I’ll confer with Mrs. Deal. I’m sure she’ll be as happy as I am at the prospect of his lordship staying with us.” She tossed a curtsy in the direction of His Marvelousness and ducked down the stairs to the kitchen before his two-inch inclination of a bow was even fully executed.
Aunt had known Spathfoy was Fiona’s uncle, and there was some warning for Hester in that final observation—Spathfoy was the most powerful among Fee’s uncles.
This was enough to give Hester pause at the foot of the steps. Fee had three, possibly four maternal uncles, each of them every bit as handsome and physically imposing as Spathfoy.
Connor MacGregor was married to a wealthy Northumbrian widow, one whom he was making wealthier still, if the family gossip could be believed. A man who commanded wealth had significant power in these modern times.
Ian MacGregor was currently styled Earl of Balfour, though family gossip also suggested an older brother thought dead in the Canadian wilderness might yet be lurking among the provincial pines. Ian also knew how to make an estate profitable, and his wife, Augusta, was both titled in her own right and abundantly landed.
Gilgallon MacGregor was sporting about London as husband to Hester’s own sister, and if he wasn’t exactly wealthy, he was canny, ruthless, and quick with his fists.
And Spathfoy was going to be more powerful than any of these
three?
Than all of them put together?
“Mrs. Deal?”
A woman built roughly along the proportions of a plow horse looked up from where she was pummeling a batch of dough at the wooden counter. “Miss Hester.” A great, toothy smile creased Deal’s ruddy face. “Are we to be serving up another round of tea? Damned English do love their tea.”
And Deal loved her work. She was more cook than housekeeper, since Mary Fran’s notions of how to run a household left little room for delegation. Deal personified the old-fashioned Scottish notion of “family retainer.” She served MacGregors, and the specific capacity mattered less than the resulting loyalty and mutual obligation.
“We don’t need another tea tray,” Hester clarified, “but Aunt Ree is inviting Lord Spathfoy to stay with us for a bit. We’ll need to serve more than bannocks or scones for breakfast, because he’s one of Fiona’s paternal uncles.” By Highland standards he was family, as incongruous as that notion felt.
“Ach, aye. If the English couldn’t get a proper breakfast, they’d starve but for their tea. That lot knows nothing of sauces and subtleties. Which bedroom shall we put his lordship in?”
She smacked the dough down with particularly fierce enthusiasm, as if showing his lordship the error of English culinary failures was going to be the satisfaction of a life’s work.
“Let’s use the corner bedroom in the east wing. It boasts nice views of the garden, and the chimney doesn’t smoke.”
Deal nodded as she started separating the dough into long, thick sections. “Putting him in the guest wing will keep him out of everybody’s hair. I suppose you’ll be sending a note over to Balfour House?”
“Of course.” Belatedly, Hester realized this was the mission Aunt had tried to communicate between all those smiles. “At once.”
“You, Dinlach.” Deal barked at the potboy, who was doing a desultory job at the main sink. “Tell Festus we’ll want a rider over to Balfour soonest. Miss Hester needs to warn the earl that Lady Mary Fran’s worthless former in-laws have come skulking about at last.”
“Mrs. Deal, you shouldn’t say such things.”
Deal deftly braided the dough into a fat loaf. “Flynns is border English, which is the worst kind. They recall enough of their Scottish heritage to hold their whisky and reave what they want, but they’ve got English titles, and English wealth to protect them from the consequences. Ask auld Ree. She’ll explain it to you.”
Deal used a pastry brush to dab melted butter over each loaf in curiously delicate movements, while foreboding settled cold and queasy in Hester’s innards.
“He’s a titled English lord, Deal. He won’t be stealing cattle, trust me on this.”
Deal set the butter and brush aside. “I’m just the help, Miss Hester. Far be it from me to speak ill of a guest. Hadn’t you best be writing that note?”
Hester headed back up the stairs, but Deal, plain-faced, phlegmatic, and loyal to her bones, had suggested a potential threat to the household coming from the most likely quarter.
A perishing son of a titled family, as if Hester hadn’t suffered enough already at the hands of the very same.
* * *
Being the Earl of Balfour was a damned pain in Ian MacGregor’s muscular backside—his muscular and, according to his wife, adorable backside. The title involved responsibility for family members both cantankerous and unruly, stewardship of difficult and rugged land, and a bloody lot of ceremony and pomp for which no self-respecting Highlander had much patience.
In other regards, though, Ian was a very, very patient man.
His countess pinched the part of him she found so adorable.
“You’re teasing me, Husband. I am not in a mood to lollygag.”
“Hmm?” He kissed her ear, then bit down on the lobe. “My hearing is a wee bit off today, most likely as a result of all that exercise our son gave his lungs before going down for his nap.”
He plied her gently with his cock, listening for the telltale sighs, both audible and corporeal, that would signal that she was growing desperate. Augusta grew greedy and wonderfully passionate when she was desperate.
“You are teasing me, Ian. This is not well done of you. The baby will awaken, and then you’ll wish you’d applied yourself with a little more—oh, my goodness.”
He applied himself with a little more, not faster, just a trifle more. Too much more, and his self-discipline would go down in the flames of his wife’s passion, but a little more, a few sparks on the dry tinder of her arousal, and she’d start up with those soft moans that inspired him to great feats of forbearance.
“My wife is given to chatter. I will kiss this tendency away.”
He made her wait for even his kisses, running his nose along her jaw, then dragging his lips over each eyebrow. Beneath him, Augusta shifted her hips, catching him at a slightly deeper angle.
In their year of marriage she’d learned how to toss a few sparks of her own.
“So impatient, Wife. ’Tis a failing in you English. Always plundering when you could barter.”
He eased a hand up and gently closed it over one full breast—very gently. Maddeningly gently. She sighed against his neck and bartered her luscious mouth right over his, an openmouthed, seeking kiss involving her tongue and his few remaining wits.
“Naughty girl. How I treasure you.”
She sighed into his mouth, anchored a hand on his bottom, and then—oh, have mercy upon a poor married man—got her internal muscles into the negotiation.
“Lass, you mustn’t—”
“Hush, laddie.”
She offered him no quarter, just her luscious, loving body, her heart, and her very soul, and he gave her his in return.
And then… ah, then the cuddling, at which she also excelled, an attribute Ian privately thought was the influence of Scottish antecedents hanging a few branches back on his wife’s family tree. Highland winters sorted out the priorities that effectively.
He tucked his sated wife against his side and hugged her close. “Could the little man be cutting teeth yet?”
“I certainly hope not. Mary Fran says that can presage months of intermittent misery for the child, and Fiona didn’t start teething until she was six months old.”
“So we have that to look forward to.” He kissed her ear—it was a beautiful ear. “You are a wonderful mother, Augusta, never doubt it.” She eased in his arms in some way, suggesting she’d needed the reassurance, but God in heaven, no baby was ever cosseted and cared for more conscientiously.
The entire family, the entire clan, seemed to dote on their son, and it warmed Ian’s heart to see it.
“I want more children, Ian. I want a big family, and we’ve gotten a late start on it.”
“And did you think I was exerting myself so manfully in this bed purely out of selfish motives, Wife?” He dragged her over him, so she straddled his hips and cuddled down to his chest. “If my wife wants more babies, then I will do my utmost to see her pleased in this regard. My marital devotion allows for no less.”
She ran her tongue over his nipple. “Such generosity. What was in the note, Ian? You got very quiet after you read it.”
He rested his chin on her crown and let his hands wander over the long, elegant bones of her back. “We’ve trouble, Wife. Spathfoy has made a surprise raid on your cousin’s household, and we don’t know what his motives are.”
“Spathfoy?” Augusta paused in her teasing to peer up at him. “I don’t recognize the title.”
“He’s heir to the Marquess of Quinworth, and older brother to the worthless, conniving scoundrel who took advantage of my sister and got her with child.” He tried not to let his anger show in his voice or in his body, because Augusta was that perceptive, but Mary Fran had given the faithless bounder her virginity, and Gordie Flynn had given her nothing but pain and humiliation in return.
“Spathfoy lost a brother, Ian. That cannot have been easy.”
“And he has Quinworth fo
r a father, but what if he’s showing up all these years later to snatch our Fiona away, my love? Mary Fran will be heartbroken, and Matthew will stop at nothing to retrieve the child.”
Augusta’s fine dark brows knit, which made Ian want to kiss them. He resisted this notion, because babies slept only so long, and he valued his wife’s counsel.
“Maybe he’s merely showing the colors, Ian. You can’t assume because he’s English his purpose is necessarily nefarious.”
“Nefarious and English are synonyms in the Scottish lexicon, my love. The Flynns made it plain they considered the girl child of a handfast marriage little more than a bastard. They’ve never sent so much as a groat for Fiona’s upkeep or a token for her birthday. I’m not inclined to trust Spathfoy’s avuncular motives very far.”
“Is his father perhaps ailing? That can shift a man’s perspective on family matters.”
Ian let out a sigh of his own. The topic was curdling any notions of further efforts to ensure the large family his wife sought, but Augusta was a good sounding board, and theirs was a marriage without secrets. “I’ll ride over in the morning and get the lay of the land. Hester sounds like she’s in quite a dither, though Aunt Ree will manage the man well enough I’m sure.”
“You’ll behave?” She rose off his chest to spear him with a look. “Charm at the ready, all Scottish good cheer to the fore? You can be very charming when you set your mind to it, Ian. I have your ring on my finger as a result of your charm.”
“There was a bit more to it than that, my love.”
“More, Ian?” She smiled a feline smile, feathered her thumbs over his nipples, and Ian barely had time to send up a prayer that the baby would sleep for at least another hour before Augusta was offering him more, indeed.
* * *
Hester had forgotten the pleasure of spending time with a man on his best behavior, particularly a handsome man with a gorgeous voice. If she’d known scolding a lordling would have this effect, she might have behaved very differently with her former fiancé.
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