A Rogue in the Making (Forever Yours Book 11)

by Stacy Reid

  The tone was almost accusatory. Bloody hell! How had he not noticed? Almost a damn week? “Who hired you?”

  His valet edged toward the door, eyeing him warily. Wentworth gathered he was startling him with his gruff questions.

  “The housekeeper, Mrs. Dawson, milord.”

  That was his housekeeper in Town.

  “Mrs. Dawson sent me down with a letter which I presented to the butler of Norbrook Manor.”

  Wentworth frowned. “What is your name?”

  “Julian…Pryce, Sir.”

  The boy was nervous, for he worked his bottom lip, and Wentworth noticed their sensual lushness. That tingle low in his belly became more pronounced. What in God’s name was this? He took a steady breath and slowly released it. “How old are you, boy?”

  A small rounded chin, absence of any hair lifted. “Four and twenty, milord. I’ll be five and twenty in a few weeks.”

  That surely must be a fib. The lad looked no more than sixteen years of age. He was very slim, his clothes, while fitted, still gave the impression that they swallowed his frame. The only thing that seemed…a handful was the boy’s arse. It had been high and well-rounded and would overflow even in his large hands. Wentworth closed his eyes briefly, gritting his teeth in disgust. To be lusting after a servant in his household was reprehensible. “You’re fired. I’ll have the butler provide you with a month’s wage.”

  Pryce jolted as if he’d been punched, and his eyes widened, clear panic setting in those lovely depths. “My lord! If I have done something wrong, please, my lord, I most sincerely apologize. But I need this post, my lord.”

  The panic in those words tugged at Wentworth’s conscience, and he mentally cursed. It was not the boy’s fault that his master’s body had been unruly and very ill-disciplined. It was Wentworth’s responsibility to ensure nothing untoward happened under his roof with any of his servants.

  He still recalled the distaste he’d felt upon encountering his friend, Simon Drake, Viscount Clayton, dallying with his housekeeper. The man had been unapologetic and unconcerned that he took advantage of someone in his employ who, with all probability, feared refusing his advances. It was a common enough practice in society, where men of consequence and rank saw nothing wrong with dallying with a maid or footman if they were pretty enough. Not Wentworth. He had never been a libertine, and he was not about to start now.

  “Leave my rooms,” he clipped. “I am well able to finish my nightly routine. Have someone send up a basin with warm water, and the fire needs to be stoked.”

  His valet hesitated. “Am I…am I still fired, my lord?”

  This Julian Pryce had tended him for a few days now, and there hadn’t been an issue. His skills must have been in the similarly remarkable realm of Jeffers who previously tended to all of Wentworth’s needs diligently and meticulously while being invisible.

  He hadn’t found any fault with his clothes these few days, not that Wentworth was a man who noticed these things to his Aunt Millicent’s great distress, considering she often lamented that he was a man of poor fashion. Wentworth hardly required a valet to assist him in dressing unless he attended a formal event. And he hardly needed his assistance to bathe, simply because he would languish in the large copper tub for an hour with a book in his hand.

  “You remain hired.”

  The ‘for now’ remained unspoken, but it lingered in the air.

  His valet hesitated, a raw but unidentifiable emotion flashing across his face. His stance…was one of anger or perhaps frustration or defiance. As if he wanted to say more, much more but held himself in check. Unexpectedly a warning kissed over Wentworth’s spine, and his suspicions stirred.

  “Are you waiting for something, Mr. Pryce?” he asked with cool civility.

  The lad bowed. “I bid you good evening, my lord. And thank you for the opportunity to serve you. I’ll not disappoint you.”

  Then he opened the door and slipped away. Wentworth unbuttoned his shirt and stared at the door for quite a long time. His senses were sharp and well-honed, and they had never led him astray. He was simply used to directing them to his studies and whatever problematic question plagued his brain. Yet now they were telling him that something was decidedly odd about his new valet.

  Why had he been hired? Wentworth did not concern himself with staffing beyond hiring a competent housekeeper and a butler at his various estates, and where required, a steward. And even then, his Aunt Millicent saw to those household duties on his behalf.

  “There is something odd about him,” he said in the dark, testing his concern aloud.

  What? He couldn’t say, for nothing except his very inappropriate reaction to a well-rounded arse had made itself evident. With a shrug, he dismissed the lad from his thoughts. Almost an hour later, Wentworth closed A Treatise on Plane and Spherical Trigonometry. It was pointless to try and keep reading. It was frustrating and embarrassing that his mind kept drifting to Julian Pryce. With a jolting sense of alarm, Wentworth realized for the first time since he became fascinated with mathematics and science, something else had the power to tease at his brain, infuriating and intriguing him in equal measure.

  As he lay in the dark, staring up at his ceiling, he acknowledged the question beating at him, why had he been so singularly attracted to his valet? What did it mean? Was this a one-time occurrence? And what was he going to do about it, should it continue?

  Bloody hell!

  He pushed to his feet with a silent snarl, removed his nightshirt, and pulled on his trousers and simple linen shirt. Wentworth made his way from his room and down the winding stairs to the lower floors. A light shone from beneath the library door, and he frowned. Wentworth opened the door and faltered. He scrubbed a hand over his face, then lowered his hand slowly. His valet was still there curled onto the chaise longue by the fire.

  Wentworth wasn’t certain if he should be amused or outraged.

  “You’ve availed yourself of my library, I see.”

  The lad squealed and jerked to his feet, his expression one of comical dismay.

  “My Lord!”

  Wentworth entered the library and closed the door behind him. He noted the nervous swallow of his valet and filed away the reaction.

  “I did not mean to intrude—” the man begun.

  “No need to proffer an apology, Julian. I admire those who wish to edify the mind through reading. You may make use of the library when not at work.”

  “Thank you, my lord,” he said with a quick bow, bending to pick up the book that had slipped from his nerveless fingers.

  It still astonished Wentworth he had not noticed the lad before. He vaguely recalled Mrs. Dunn, Norbrook Manor’s housekeeper of twenty years, informing him of his new valet’s arrival. Everything else after that was a blur, for he had been enraptured by the latest papers printed in the British Association for the Advancement of Science.

  “I shall leave and—”

  “Stay, have a drink with me,” Wentworth invited.

  “A drink?”

  The lad appeared as if he would collapse, and to Wentworth’s thinking, that show of anxiety should be investigated.

  “Yes. It would not be remiss if you prepared two glasses of brandy.”

  “Two brandies?”

  “Yes. You’ll be having one with me.”

  The lad blinked rapidly. “It is not fitting, my lord!”

  Another glare that was far too bold but had Wentworth’s curiosity stirring. “If I say it is fitting, then it is,” he said.

  “You often invite your servants to drink with you, my lord?”

  “I believe you are the first, Julian.”

  His valet’s eyes widened, but he seemed to catch himself from protesting. Wentworth padded over to the chaise and picked up the book his valet had been reading. A romance. Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen. Amusement rushed through Wentworth, and he took the glass when Julian brought it over.

  “My good man,” Wentworth said. “This is an inter
esting choice of reading material.”

  What was even more interesting was the dusting of pink that suffused the boy’s face. Well, not a boy, he did say he was five and twenty.

  That stubborn little chin lifted. “Miss Austen is an author I admire for her dry wit and the irreverent way she portrays her heroine. You should try her sometime in the future, my lord.”

  How interesting. His previous valet wasn’t so decided. “Then I shall sit by the fire and you shall read it to me, hmm?”

  “My lord?” his valet gasped.

  “I am unable to sleep,” Wentworth said by way of explanation. “And as you are my man, I believe I will prevail upon you to keep my company, Julian. Or would you prefer to play a game of chess?”

  He wasn’t sure why he offered that option, for it was unlikely his valet knew how to play.

  “Chess, my lord,” Julian said, moving toward the two chairs and a small spindly table on the side of the fireplace.

  His valet took a sip of his drink and coughed a few times. Wentworth noted the flush on his cheeks grew more pronounced, and he couldn’t help noticing just how bloody pretty the boy appeared. Suddenly he wasn’t sure if he wanted to stay behind closed doors with his valet, and that very thought was simply ridiculous! He was not a man ruled by base urgers, nor was he undisciplined.

  Annoyed beyond measure, Wentworth grabbed the carafe of brandy and joined his valet by the fire.

  “Have you played before?” Wentworth asked, sitting down.

  “Yes,” Julian said. “My father taught me. We…we often played together.”

  An odd feeling of kinship surged inside Wentworth, and he cleared his throat. “My father taught me to play as well.”

  His valet offered him a quick smile as if he too acknowledged they shared a similarity. That smile kicked Wentworth in the chest, and his hand tightened on his glass. “Let’s play,” he said gruffly.

  Almost half an hour later, Wentworth laughed, thoroughly delighted. “I believe you might win, my good man.”

  “Hmm,” Julian said, his brows furrowed in concentration. “How surprised you sound. Checkmate.”

  “Your father was a brilliant teacher. This is the first in…I believe ten years another has said checkmate.”

  Julian laughed, the sound low and husky, leaning back in his chair.

  “Tell me about yourself, Julian,” Wentworth invited, leaning back in his chair and taking a healthy swallow of his brandy.

  He flustered him, for once again, the lad seemed nervous.

  “Who did you work with before coming in my employ?”

  “I…I provided Mrs. Dawson with my references, my lord.”

  “Are you suggesting I ask my housekeeper? Shall I summon her from London then?”

  His valet swiped up his glass of brandy and took a careful sip.

  “I worked within Lord and Lady Emerson household.”

  Wentworth was familiar with the viscount and his lady. They also had a daughter of marriageable age who often made a cake of herself over the eligible gentlemen of society.

  “And where are you from? You have a most unique accent, but I cannot quite place it.”

  Julian’s eyes widened. “You have a keen ear, my lord. My mother often told me I sound like any other of the Queen’s subjects. I spent my early years in New York in America. I…we made our home in England four years ago after my father passed, and my mother returned to her birth land.”

  A flash of pain crossed his features before his expression smoothed.

  “You have my deepest sympathies, Julian. I know the pain of losing a parent.”

  His valet made no reply but glanced at the clock on the mantle.

  “I fear I must go, my lord. I do have an early morning, and it is already well past midnight.”

  “You have my permission to sleep in.”

  His valet looked as if he would swoon.

  “I wouldn’t dare, my lord!”

  “You are dismissed for the night,” Wentworth murmured, refilling his glass and lifting it to his mouth.

  A soft, relieved sigh slipped from Julian, and he hurriedly stood, bowed, and scampered from the room. At the edge of the threshold, he looked back, and their gazes collided. Wentworth smiled and lifted his glass.

  “Sleep well, Julian.”

  And to his amusement, his valet quickly closed the door as if he were locking the devil inside.

  How singularly intriguing.

  Juliana dropped her forehead against the large oak door she had just closed. Her heart was a pounding mess, and her knees were weak. It was more than that; Juliana swore butterflies wreaked havoc with her stomach.

  Juliana was struck by the incredible sensual beauty of his smile. It appalled her that she had noticed. The earl was shockingly handsome with his high-sculpted cheekbones, a strong patrician nose, and a full, sensual mouth. Even the wire-rimmed spectacles he wore mostly when reading only added to his unusual appeal.

  He wasn’t handsome in the soft manner or anything like the refined and elegant men of society. He was all hard edges and so compelling she’d stared helplessly the first few times she attended to his needs. Yet he hadn’t noticed her distraction because he was always reading a book or some journal. It was poorly done of her, but whenever her brother talked about the earl’s love of mathematics and his brilliance, she had always imagined someone short, rotund even, with a pair of spectacles perched on a long nose.

  The spectacles were about the only things she got right.

  “Who cares if he is terribly handsome? This is most certainly not why I am here,” she reminded herself softly. “Oh, God, why did you notice me?”

  Lords and ladies of society did not take note of their servants, and this lord did not seem any different. She had quaked in her boots the very first time she had helped him tie a cravat, but the earl hadn’t deigned to glance at her. His eyes had been fixed on some point beyond her, and that suited her purpose well.

  Since living with her stepfather, she had learned that servants were not seen or heard. They moved about their employers’ homes like little elves, working their magic in keeping the mansion cleaned, food ready, clothes laundered and pressed, and always at the beck and call of their mistresses and masters. No matter the hour of the night, her stepfather, and his son, only had to ring a bell and someone would appear, desperately trying not to appear sleepy for fear of being scolded.

  Juliana had used all of that knowledge to her advantage, and everything had been going well. Then a few hours ago, in his chamber, she had seen a revelation on his face. Something about her had rattled him…and there had been another emotion in his eyes that had sent her heart surging with alarm.

  How frightening and strangely thrilling the entire encounter had seemed to Juliana’s overwrought nerves. And then in the library just now! How shocking it had been for the earl to invite her to drink and play chess with him! As if they were acquaintances of similar rank. So many people wouldn’t have deigned to lower themselves to have a drink with people of a class they considered beneath their own.

  Her nerves had almost shattered at their interlude in the library. Despite her nonexistent charms, she had wrapped her breasts with linen and cut her waist-length hair to make it easier to fit a wig. Yet the earl’s probing stare had been frightening. Almost as if he could see through her, see that she was indeed a lady.

  She wondered what thoughts robbed him of sleep and hoped the earl demanding her presence in the late-night would not be a frequent occurrence. Despite his assurance she could sleep late, Juliana wouldn’t dare. This job was too important to her for any missteps.

  “Enough,” she muttered, thoroughly aggrieved.

  Juliana pushed away from the door and hurried toward the servant’s quarters. The rest of the house slept, and she made her way up the winding staircase and to her small chamber that was surprisingly comfortable.

  She closed the door behind her and removed her men’s clothes. With a sigh of relief, she undid the bindi
ngs, opened her small armoire, and took out her nightshirt. Once clothed, she slipped beneath the sheets and turned onto her side.

  Why did you notice me?

  It was then she acknowledged the grave disquiet sitting in her belly. What if the Earl suspected her identity? Surely he would have booted her out of his house or have her arrested for fraud?

  “He did fire me,” she muttered, turning onto her other side. “But I am still here.”

  Perhaps there was nothing to worry about, and she only needed to ensure her duties were executed well. “I am simply to be his personal attendant for the next seven weeks. I’ll ensure his clothes are tip-top, clean his boots, carry up the water for his bath, put out his clothes for dressing, shave him if necessary, assist him in dressing if required, and pack and unpack his clothes when he travels. Also, load his rifle whenever he goes shooting or hunting, stand behind his chair at dinner, wait at his breakfast and luncheon!” Juliana huffed out a groan. “How am I to last for seven more weeks?”

  Bloody hell!

  Chapter 3

  A few hours later, Juliana trudged up the servant’s staircase of the palatial country house, a bit breathless from the exercise. A pretty maid with curly blonde hair under a lacy cap and large gray eyes, deliberately rubbed her hips against Juliana’s as she passed her.

  “Mornin’ Julian,” she said a bit breathlessly. “I didn’t see you at supper last night!”

  “I was reading,” Juliana mumbled, averting her stare from the girl’s flirtation and continuing her trek. And playing chess, drinking brandy, and trying not to ogle the earl.

  “I know I am not supposed to have followers, but…I like you, Julian. Tomorrow is my off day, would ye like to take a stroll with me in the village,” she said expectantly.

  She was gorgeous, and playing a game Juliana did not have the time for. “Look…Molly—”

  “It’s Mary!”

  Juliana stared at her for a few seconds until the girl fidgeted. “Mary, I am not able to walk with you. You should ask Thomas.” That footman seemed madly in love with the girl, bringing her flowers at least twice a day.