“We do not envy you your burdens. We would not add to them.”
“I see,” Westhaven muttered, scowling. “And is that all you have to offer me? Burdens? Were you not more knowledgeable than I regarding the harbor at Rosslare? The packet schedule to Calais?”
“Westhaven, we think to spare you, not add to your load.”
“My lord?” Anna Seaton stood to one side, her silly cap covering her glorious hair, her demeanor tentative, and it was a measure of the earl’s consternation with his brothers he hadn’t noticed her on the terrace.
“Mrs. Seaton.” Westhaven smiled at her. “May I make known to you my dear brother, Devlin St. Just. St. Just, my housekeeper, florist, and occasional nurse, Mrs. Anna Seaton.”
“My lord.” Anna bobbed a curtsy while St. Just bowed and offered a slight, not quite warm smile.
“I am hardly a lord, Mrs. Seaton, being born on the wrong side of the ducal blanket, but I am acknowledged, thanks to Her Grace.”
“And I have offered him a place in my household,” Westhaven said, meeting his brother’s eye, “if he will have it.”
A beat of silence went by, rife with undercurrents. “He will have it,” Dev said on a grin, “until you toss me out.”
“Val’s playing might take some getting used to,” Westhaven cautioned, “but Mrs. Seaton takes the best of care of us, even in this god-awful heat.”
“Speaking of Lord Valentine?” Anna chimed in.
“Yes?” Westhaven handed off Pericles to the groom and cocked an eyebrow. The cap was more atrocious than silly, he saw, and Anna seemed tense.
“He writes he will be back from Brighton tomorrow,” Anna said, “and warns you might need to have some other task arranged for Mr. Stenson.”
“I’ll take over Stenson,” Dev said. “My former housekeeper had no skill with a needle, so Mr. Stenson can be set to looking after my wardrobe for at least the next few days.”
“That will help. Was there something further, Anna?”
“I assume dinner will be for two, my lord, and on the terrace?”
“That will do, and some lemonade while we wait for our victuals, I think. Which bedroom shall we put my brother in?”
“There is only the one remaining at the back of the house, my lord. We have time to ready it before this evening.”
He nodded, dismissing her but unable to take his eyes off her retreating figure until she was back through the garden gate. When he turned back to his brother, Westhaven found Dev eying him curiously.
“What?”
“Marry her,” Dev said flatly. “She’s too pretty to be a housekeeper and too well spoken to be a doxy. She won’t be cowed by His Grace, and she’ll keep you in fresh linens and good food all your days.”
“Dev?” Westhaven cocked his head. “Are you serious?”
“I am. You have to marry, Westhaven. I would spare you that if I could, but there it is. This one will do admirably, and she’s better bred than the average housekeeper, I can tell you that.”
“How can you tell me that?”
“Her height for one thing,” Dev said as they made for the house. “The peasantry are rarely tall, and they never have such good teeth. Her diction is flawless, not simply adequate. Her skin is that of lady, as are her manners. And look at her hands, man. It remains true you can tell a lady by her hands, and those are the hands of a lady.”
Westhaven frowned, saying nothing. Those were the very observations he had made of Anna while they rusticated at Amery’s. She was a lady, for all her wielding of dusters and wearing of caps.
“And yet she says her grandfather was in trade,” Westhaven noted when they arrived to the kitchen. “He raised flowers commercially, and she bouquets the house with a vengeance. We’re also boasting a very well- stocked pantry and a supply of marzipan for me. The sweet of your choice will be stocked, as well, as I won’t take kindly to your pinching mine.”
“Heaven forefend,” Dev muttered as Westhaven procured a fistful of cookies.
“We are permitted to spoil our dinner, as well,” Westhaven said. “Grab the pitcher, the sugar bowl, and two glasses.”
Dev did as bid and followed his brother back onto the shady back terrace. Westhaven poured them both a tall glass of lemonade, adding liberal amounts of sugar to his own.
“I haven’t had lemonade since I was a lad,” Dev remarked when he’d chugged half of his. “It refreshes.”
“Tastes better with extra sugar. Val adds cold tea to his. Try mine.”
“As I have had the chicken pox,” Dev said, sipping from Westhaven’s glass. “Give me that sugar bowl.”
They passed an amiable evening, chatting over dinner about the marriage prospects for their sisters, the house party at Morelands, and the state of British government in general.
When the earl was alone in the library at the end of the evening, he found himself wondering why he hadn’t offered his brothers the use of the townhouse earlier. It would have allowed them both to be near their sisters without residing at the ducal mansion, and it would have provided some company.
Anna had been company out at Welbourne, but in the week since their return, she’d faded back into the role of invisible housekeeper. When he walked into a room, she left. When he sat down to a meal, she was nowhere to be found. When he retired to his rooms, she’d been through earlier, cleaning and tidying then disappearing.
The door clicked softly, and as if he’d conjured her with his thoughts, Anna padded in on bare feet, clad only in her night rail and wrapper.
“Anna.” He rose, and she watched as he took in her dishabille.
“My lord,” she said and earned a thunderous scowl from him as he stalked over to her.
“What have I done, Anna, to earn your use of my title?”
“I cannot be sure we are private,” she said then blinked at her tactical error. “And I do not believe such familiarity wise.”
“Ah.” He backed away, leaning on the desk, arms crossed. “Shall we discuss this change of heart on your part? You’ve been avoiding me since we got back to Town, and don’t think to tell me otherwise.”
“You are no longer ill,” she said, raising her chin. “And you are capable of dressing yourself.”
“Barely,” he said with a snort. “So tell me, how am I to court you if you won’t stay in the same room with me? How am I to persuade you to marry me if you maneuver always to have others present when I am about? You aren’t playing fair, Anna.”
She watched him warily, trying to formulate an answer that wouldn’t aggravate him further. If she’d known he was in here, lurking in the solitude and darkness, she would have run in the opposite direction—she hoped.
“Come here.” He gentled his tone and held out a hand.
“You will take liberties,” Anna said, crossing her arms. “And you know I do not encourage your courting. I warned you your efforts would be for naught.”
The difficulty, Anna silently admitted, was that she had made no efforts of her own, efforts to secure yet another position, another identity, another escape route. Like one of her grandfather’s fat, wooly sheep, she’d just gone about her tasks, cutting flowers, airing sheets, and telling herself
A week had gone by, and she’d accomplished nothing, except another seven days of longing for a man she had no business desiring.
“You will make me work for it, won’t you?” Westhaven said with a faint smile. He pushed away from the desk and approached her silently. “That’s as it should be.”
His arms closed around her, and Anna just bowed her head, knowing even more than his kisses and his wicked caresses, the comfort of his embrace had the power to paralyze her. He was warm, vital, and strong, and while it wasn’t his aim to protect her, the illusion that he could was irresistible.
“Let me hold you,” he whispered, “or I’ll have a relapse of the chicken pox to inspire you to closer attendance of me.”
“You can’t have a relapse.”
