A few minutes later, the carriage pulled onto the drive and the change in the terrain from dirt road to crushed oyster shells immediately woke the children, who looked about them in amazement.
“Look, there are thervanth thanding at the door.” Marie leaned out of the window, trying to get a closer peek. “One, thew, three, four, five, thix, theven…” She turned to her mother. “Mama, there are tho many!”
Elizabeth glanced outside and swallowed. Indeed, a sea of people wearing white and grey were pouring from the front door to meet the carriage.
“This is a much larger home than we are used to. It will take more to keep it in order,” she tried to explain, but her own level of excitement forced her closer to the window to peep over Marie’s shoulders. “This is our new home, children.”
The ground beneath the carriage wheels changed once more to smooth pavement and within minutes, the conveyance came to a stop and a small step was placed in front of the door before it was opened. A rather buxom man, with a bulbous nose and greying temples, greeted them with a slight bow. “Lord Bergen, Lady Bergen, welcome home.”
Bergen stepped out of the door and helped Elizabeth and the children from the carriage. The senior servants were quickly introduced, and the children were soon made known to their new governess, Miss Simpson.
“How did you accomplish a place for the animals and a governess, all in such a short time?” Elizabeth inquired, smiling warmly at her husband.
“She is my old governess. I hope you do not mind, but since she lived nearby, Aunt Faith and I thought she could be of help, even on a temporary basis.” He leaned down and kissed the top of her head. “If you are not comfortable with her appointment for any reason, you may interview to refill the position. Miss Simpson was wonderful when I was a child—strict but fair, and very engaging with her learning techniques.”
Elizabeth watched the smiling older woman scoop up Ruth and take Marie’s hand. Josiah hugged her and then, wearing a grin from ear to ear, followed Miss Simpson and his sisters to the nursery.
A groom stepped forward. “My lord, shall I take the animals to the stables?”
“All except for the cat.” He turned to his wife, as he spoke. “Snowflake is accustomed to living in the house and shall stay with the family.” Hannah moved up with the small basket containing the cat. “My lady, shall I take Snowflake to your rooms?”
“Yes. Thank you, Hannah. I will join you both shortly.” As the maid left with the cat, she turned to her new husband. “I do have one small request, my lord.”
“Your wish is truly my command, my love. Ask it.” Bergen beamed at her.
“I would like for us to share your rooms—always. I did not enjoy such intimacy with Horace, and much has now become clearer to me since my first marriage. I want to share your bed and everything about you.” She locked eyes with her husband, happy and feeling gloriously emboldened in this union.
With a wicked grin, Bergen reached down and scooped her up. Allowing herself a mock squeal, Elizabeth clung to his neck as he carried her upstairs and kicked the bedchamber door closed behind them.
“Your wish, my beautiful bride, is my command.” Gently, he laid her down upon the bed. “I want to savour each moment, but first…” As he spoke, he reached over to his night-table and pulling a velvet box towards him, handed it to her.
“I have never accepted a gift while in bed, ready to make love, Thomas.” She giggled, accepting the box. Carefully, she opened the box and gazed at the blue sapphire and diamond necklace and earrings displayed exquisitely in a platinum setting. “Oh, Thomas. This is beautiful. I will not ask how you were able to place that there,” she said, laughing and pointing towards the table.
“Allow me, my lovely.” He reached up and placed the necklace around her neck. “You look radiant. The diamonds and sapphires suit you.” Bergen’s mischievous grin sent a fluttering feeling throughout her body, igniting a warmth she rather liked. Tentatively, she touched the necklace, relishing the cool feel of it against her heated skin. She wanted more. Boldly she caught her husband’s gaze, crooked her finger and wantonly invited him onto the bed. As he moved closer, she clasped her arms around his neck and pulled him down to her. “I want, Thomas, and I have waited for so long to know love like ours.” She felt deliciously spoiled by her husband and the promise of their new life together. Bergen caught her hands and held them. “I shall forever endeavour to please you, dearest. You are the love I have always desired but never thought I would find.”
Acknowledgments
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
There are always many people to thank when a book gets written. There are my friends who always cheer me on….
Betty Phillips, Elizabeth Johns, Jessica Cale, Myra Platt, and Lauren Smith.
A great big ‘thank you’ goes to my team of readers who spent time and gave up evenings to help me smooth out the rough edges. Thank you. Your help is always greatly appreciated.
And last but never least, my own hero, Roger. He reads every one of my stories and gives me feedback.
About the Author
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Anna St. Claire is an avid reader, and now author, of both American and British historical romance. She and her husband live in Charlotte, North Carolina with their two dogs and often, their two beautiful granddaughters, who live nearby.
Anna relocated from New York to the Carolinas as a child. Her mother, a retired English and History teacher, always encouraged Anna’s interest in writing, after discovering short stories she would write in her spare time.
Her fascination with history and reading led her to her first historical romance—Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With The Wind. The day she discovered Kathleen Woodiwiss,’ books, Shanna and Ashes In The Wind, Anna became hooked. She read every historical romance that came her way.
Today, her focus is primarily the Regency and Civil War eras, although Anna enjoys almost any period in American and British history. She would love to connect with any of her readers on her website – www.annastclaire.com, through email—[email protected]., Facebook – www.facebook/annastclaireauthor/about/.com/ or with BookBub – www.bookbub.com/profile/anna-st-claire.
Preview The Earl of Charm
December 1823
It was a dark, starless night when Alexander Gordon, The Earl of Charmian, let himself in through the front door of the family townhouse in Mayfair. The hour was late, and Alex expected his sister and the servants to be asleep.
This was not the case.
Music coming from the drawing room made him pause with the door half cracked before a blistery wind hurried him inside. He gaped at the lit candles lining the hallway as though the entire household was still wide awake.
Shrugging out of his overcoat, he removed his hat. That was when he heard the sound that hadn’t graced these halls in the nine months since his elder brother’s tragic death.
Laughter.
His younger sister’s familiar laugh, along with another—a musical sound that seemed to rival the pianoforte as it trickled into the hallway.
What on earth?
He’d bent down to remove his snowy boots when a far more mysterious sound reached his befuddled ears.
Barking.
No, not barking. Snuffling. It was the crude sound of labored breathing and clogged sinuses, and it was the only warning he received before two little balls of fur and fat barreled down the hall in his direction.
His housekeeper Mrs. Lange appeared behind them, frazzled and out of breath as she scurried behind them, coming to a halt and dropping into a hasty curtsy when she spotted him standing there, his snow-covered coat dripping onto the foyer’s rug as he tried to make sense of the spectacle before him.
“What—?” was all he managed before one of the pugs stopped running in a tiny circle and lunged for his ankles.
“Oh heavens,” Mrs. Lange cried, her wide eyes filled with horror at the sight before her. “We did not expect you home until the morrow.”
“Yes,” he said, as he stared down at a panting little face. “I’d hoped to return before the snowstorm.”
“Of course, of course,” she muttered, distracted by her attempts to corral the two dogs.
“Who is here?” he asked.
“Oh!” She straightened, abandoning her attempts to garner control over the pups and they both watched in horrified fascination as the smaller of the two sniffed the other one in the most unseemly manner.
“I do apologize, my lord,” the housekeeper said softly.
He remained quiet. He did not believe the dog’s current fixation on sniffing was Mrs. Lange’s fault, but he assumed the less said to acknowledge this situation the better. “Our visitors?” he prompted.
There it was again. Laughter. He turned his gaze toward the drawing room, and Mrs. Lange did the same. “The Duchess of Redmayne, my lord,” she said, her voice still breathless from her earlier run across the foyer.
“Ah.” His aunt. Mystery solved. Though, in fact, she was truly his great aunt, better known as Mrs. Gertrude Trumbolt, Dowager Duchess of Redmayne. Or, as she was known to Alex and his sister—Aunt Gertie.
“Of course,” he muttered to himself as he headed toward the drawing room. Gertie always cause a stir when she arrived. Though they hadn’t expected her here for another week.
Mrs. Lange seemed to read his thoughts. “Her arrival was a surprise, my lord.”
Of course it was. There was nothing Aunt Gertie loved more than to cause a stir…those tiny, fur-covered balls of energy currently chasing one another around his feet was new, however. He hadn’t been aware his great aunt could bring any more chaos into their lives, but it seemed he’d underestimated her once again.
Mrs. Lange took his coat from him, as well as his hat, and he headed toward the sound, oddly intrigued to see what scene was going on in this room that could bring such merriment and levity to a house in mourning.
He strode into the room as befitting the new earl, which was to say, with his chin held high and no hesitation in his steps. In hindsight, he realized he really ought to have paused, if only briefly—but then how was he to know that he would be entering a room filled with a whirling dervish?
It happened quickly. One moment he was standing and the next he was knocked off his feet, landing unceremoniously in a heap, along with two females. He saw his sister splayed beside him, her dark hair a haphazard mess as she grinned at him, breathless with laughter.
If his sister was there, who on earth was this young lady in his arms? His hands automatically came up to steady the girl who’d landed atop him.
No, not a girl. A woman. He became aware of chestnut-colored hair that tickled his nose and smelled of lilacs, and roses, and something fresh and invigorating, like the scent that filled the air after the rain. He was more acutely conscious of delicious curves and the slim waist beneath his hands. Her cheek felt like satin against his neck. Such soft skin. Her nose brushed against his neck as she shifted and another rush of lovely feminine scents overwhelmed his senses.
“Ah, the prodigal son returns at last,” Aunt Gertie called from the direction of the pianoforte.
Her nonsensical statement brought him back to his senses—he was hardly a prodigal son. He made quick work of removing the lovely-scented, soft-skinned strange female from his body. Having deposited her gently to his right, he scrambled up to his feet and then reached down with both hands, one to help his sister to her feet and the other to assist…her.
“Who are you?” he asked.
Polite? Perhaps not. But Alex never had learned how to use words the way others did. His command of the English language was basic—he knew how to use them to ask questions and make statements. Meanwhile, everyone else of his acquaintance seemed to wield words like weapons or they threw them about like frippery and finery—beautifying, covering, and mystifying.
“Really, Alex,” Tess said. Straightening her skirts, his sister tossed him a tolerant smile. “Must you be rude to our visitor?”
“Oh no,” the strange woman interjected. “He was not rude at all. I was the ill-mannered one here.” The brunette turned her smile on him and he felt it to his very core. “I almost always wait to be introduced before careening into gentlemen.”
“Yes, well…” He had no idea what to say to that. Her smile was sweet, but laughter danced in her eyes. For the life of him, he could not ascertain whether she was mocking the situation…or him.
He straightened to his full height. “Yes,” he repeated. “Well…”
Still no idea as to what he was expected to say.
The stranger’s smile grew, and he watched with some fascination as her pretty pink lips widened, dimples appearing like magic as her crystal-blue eyes flashed with amusement. Her face was pretty. Not striking or beautiful, but pretty. Her nose was small, her eyes big, and her chin just a tad too small, giving her an innocent look that belied the mischief in her eyes.
“Alex,” Aunt Gertie called out. “Meet my companion, Miss Clara Lovelace, daughter of the late Andrew Lovelace, The Marquess of Tarlow.”
Ah. It clicked into place, and the moment her name registered with him, she seemed to know it because she flinched—the tiny facial movement there and gone in an instant. He’d caught it, however, because he was watching her closely…oh all right, perhaps he was staring.
Fine. It was possible he was glaring.
His brother used to tease him about having such an unpleasant facial expression. Not in a mean way, it was just so at odds with his brother’s jovial demeanor. In his defense, Alex was hardly rude, he was rarely angry, and he was never cruel.
He was merely serious. Studious. He always had been more interested in books and analysis than conversation and pleasantries.
Smiling did not come easily to him, and laughter was a rarity in his life.
Clara dropped into a curtsy, before straightening to meet his gaze with that twinkle in her eyes, as if she were laughing at him. Or perhaps she was just acknowledging that she knew that he knew who she was.
Everyone knew, he supposed. If Alex had heard the rumors about her mother’s death and her father’s financial ruin, which had ended most tragically with his death by his own hand—then surely everyone knew. Everyone paid more attention to society’s scandals and gossip than he did.
He tore his gaze away from hers, embarrassed to be caught staring.
Fine, glaring.
“I’m so glad you’re home.” His sister interrupted what might have been an awkward silence by throwing herself into his arms. He held her close, his chest tight with emotion at seeing her again.
Tess was the youngest of the three. Only eighteen and already she’d witnessed far too much death in her life. Their mother to illness when Tess was only a small child, their father less than two years ago after a long, debilitating battle for his life, and then their brother Frederick. The eldest, the leader, and the one who really ought to be earl.
No one said it, of course, but they all knew it. Every day that knowledge weighed on Alex, and every day he struggled in vain to fill the void Frederick had left in his wake.
Tess held onto his arms as she pulled back with a grin. So like Frederick, with her brilliant smile and her easy chatter. She, like their brother, had inherited their father’s way with people. His talent for putting others at ease no matter what the circumstances.
A talent he most decidedly did not possess.
“We’ve missed you, brother,” she said, tugging on his arm to drag him over to Aunt Gertie, who still sat behind the pianoforte, her fingers skimming over the keys as if they were moving of their own accord.
“You are just in time for lessons, dear,” Aunt Gertie said.
“Lessons?” He looked from his great aunt to his sister, and risked a peek in Clara’s direction before looking away just as quickly when he caught her laughing at him.
Or perhaps she was just smiling.
Either way, her smile disarmed him. It seemed to say, I
see you. Don’t bother trying to hide.
He frowned down at his great aunt. “What lessons?”
“Dance lessons, of course,” Tess answered, her arms held out wide as though she were dancing with an invisible partner. She began to move in time with the simple tune their aunt played.
Alex turned to watch her, and then spun back to face his great aunt, and then turned once more to see where the new companion had gone. He stopped and stood still when he realized that he must have looked like a marionette, spinning about in some sort of newfangled dance of his own.
The thought had him glaring at his sister, though she did not seem to notice. Even if she did, she would not mind. Like their brother, she knew that his glares and his frowns were just how his face had been cast. It was rarely, if ever, intentional.
Even now, he was confused, not angry. It was just a case of heavy brows and a severe mouth that made confusion appear as annoyance. “But you’ve already had dance lessons,” he finally said, sputtering a bit as he tried to keep up with the ludicrous scene he’d stumbled upon.
It was the dead of night, after all. Oughtn’t they to be in bed?
That was precisely where he wished to be after a day of travel.
“We didn’t expect you until tomorrow,” Aunt Gertie said.
“Yes,” he agreed. “And I did not expect you until next week.”
She tossed her turban-covered head back with a laugh. “Indeed.”
No apology, and nor did he expect one. She was family, after all. Family was always welcome. Particularly this aunt who could do more to restore his sister’s grieving spirits than he could ever hope to do.
He turned to Tess, who was now joined by Clara. He could now see what he must have interrupted just moments ago. The two women were turning about the room, with Clara taking the role of the man in a fast-paced waltz, thanks to his great aunt’s enthusiastic playing.
Earl of Bergen: Wicked Regency Romace (Wicked Earls' Club Book 15) Page 12
