Tremaine's True Love Read online

  Very likely the horse was too lazy to buck or spook, though he applied himself to his fodder with singular diligence.

  While Lady Nita’s eyes were shadowed with fatigue.

  “Your absence was remarked at dinner, my lady.”

  “You know who I am, then. Nobody warned me you were coming, Mr. St. Michael, or I might have sent my regrets to dinner.”

  Suggesting her ladyship would not have attended, even if she’d known the family was entertaining.

  “May I escort you back to the house?” Tremaine asked. “I’ve assured myself William’s not kicking down a wall or dying of thirst, and the day has been wearying.” Dinner with the Haddonfields had been every bit as wearying as the trip down from London, though significantly warmer.

  “My thanks for your courtesy.”

  Her ladyship’s thanks were tired though sincere. Why had no one come out from the house to see to her well-being?

  Tremaine took the lantern down from its peg, causing shadows to grow and dance. He did not offer his arm. A woman who could ride the countryside by moonlight was well equipped to negotiate the paths of her own garden.

  “Is my presence at Belle Maison an unpleasant surprise, my lady?” he asked.

  Her sisters would have turned Tremaine’s question into a joke or a flirtation. The Haddonfields seemed much given to joking and flirtation, with the exception of present company.

  “Please do not be offended if I say your presence is a matter of indifference to me now,” her ladyship informed him as they left the stable for the chilly air of a winter night. “Not so very long ago, I was the one who would have made sure your room was prepared, a bath waiting for you, refreshment and cut flowers in the chamber I’d selected for you.”

  Tremaine appreciated honesty more than he did the laughter and banter of the Haddonfield dinner table.

  “I do not presume to know you, my lady, but arranging flowers and ordering a tea tray could not be much of a challenge for you.”

  His observation pleased her ladyship enough that a hint of a smile flitted across her features, while somewhere in the distance, a dog commenced barking. In the manner of winter nights, the sound carried, lonely and annoying.

  Lady Nita moved along the garden path far more slowly than she had hours earlier. Either she was exhausted, or she wasn’t looking forward to returning to her home.

  “I’d like to sit for a moment,” she said as they approached a gazebo. “Seek your bed, if you wish. I’ll be fine alone.”

  She believed this, despite the cold, despite the hour, despite her obvious fatigue. Tremaine took a seat beside her, ignoring the siren call of his quilts and pillows because, in another sense, she was not fine.

  Lady Nita was quite alone, however, and Tremaine knew how that felt.

  A half-moon hung above the horizon, stars shone in frosty abundance, and the dog had gone silent.

  “The child lived,” Lady Nita said. “I want to wake up each and every member of my family and inform them of that. The mother was also resting comfortably when I took my leave of her.”

  “You attended a birth.” The only acceptable reason for bloodstains on a lady’s attire.

  “The midwife can only attend one birth at a time,” Lady Nita said. “The babies are rude though. They do not appear one at a time. I have explained this to my brother repeatedly. In fact, when the weather changes, the babies conspire to arrive all at once, and the midwife, understandably, will go where her services are remunerated. The women with the least consequence deliver with the least support, and yet they need the most help.”

  Despite Lady Nita’s calm and euphemistic summary, she was all in a lather. Her emotional fists were raised, and she would make her blows count.

  Though she wouldn’t rain them down on Tremaine.

  “You are a reproach to your family, then,” Tremaine concluded.

  The lantern sat on the bench opposite them, casting little light because the wick was low. Even so, Tremaine had the sense his words earned him the first smidgen of genuine regard from the lady beside him.

  “I am a reproach, Mr. St. Michael? They’ve certainly become free with chides and scolds aimed in my direction.”

  Now they were. Now that she’d been deposed as lady of the manor. Bellefonte probably had not the first inkling of the hurt he’d done Lady Nita when he’d acquired a countess.

  Tremaine’s backside ached from hours in a cold saddle, and yet he remained on the equally cold bench a moment longer. He withdrew the lady’s gloves from the oversized pocket in which she’d jammed them and passed them to her.

  “A great debate ensued after the fish course, my lady, as to whether country assemblies should permit the waltz when so few know how to dance it properly. While this inanity held the company’s entire attention, you helped a new life get a start in the world. Yes, you are a reproach to your family, and to all who think Christian charity is a matter of Sunday finery and Boxing Day benevolence.”

  A great sigh went out of her ladyship, interrupted by a sneeze. She leaned her head back against a support and closed her eyes. She hadn’t put on her gloves.

  “You’re Scottish,” she observed.

  What Tremaine was, was cold. He put his handkerchief on the bench between them, in case the sneezing, tired, honest lady had need of it.

  Despite Lady Nita’s willingness to wrestle demons on behalf of the newborn parish poor, she was attractive. The local beauties would refer to her as “handsome” in an effort to denigrate her features politely, but she was lovely nonetheless. Her brows were the perfect graceful complement to wide, intelligent eyes; her eyes, nose, and mouth were assembled into a face that deserved excellent portraiture and needed no cosmetics.

  The beauty of her features was such that even weariness was becoming on her.

  “I can sound Scottish,” Tremaine said, “particularly when in the grip of strong sentiment. My mother was born in Aberdeenshire.” He could hold a grudge like a Scot too, and endure cold and handle strong drink.

  “And your father?” She had a good ear, did Lady Nita. Also pretty ears.

  “French.” Tremaine waited for her to put more questions to him, but she instead turned the lamp wick down until the light extinguished.

  “We were wasting oil,” she said.

  “The hour is late and the night cold. We should go in. If you’d like to linger here in solitude, I’ll bid you good evening,” Tremaine said, rising.

  To be found alone with him in the dark would cause greater problems for the lady than to be found alone with her discontents.

  He bowed over her bare, cold, elegant hand. “A pleasure to have made your acquaintance, my lady.”

  Tremaine left Lady Nita the unlit lamp and his handkerchief and made his way to the house. Nita Haddonfield was an earl’s daughter who understood the practicalities, and she didn’t dress her sentiments up in tedious dinner conversation. She was easily Tremaine’s favorite Haddonfield of the lot.

  What a pity he’d have no time to get to know her.

  * * *

  In Nita’s experience, the best intelligence officers in any big family were found among the younger siblings. They began their careers while small, nonthreatening, and unobtrusive. By adolescence, they developed formidable powers of observation and recollection, to say nothing of an ability to lurk at keyholes and befriend the servants.

  Thus, Nita started her morning with a visit to Della’s room. Her youngest sister liked to sleep late, a habit Della claimed would stand her in good stead when she made her come-out in the spring.

  “Wake up, baby Sister,” Nita said, exchanging a look with the chambermaid adding coal to the hearth. “It’s a new day and breakfast awaits.”

  “Spring?” came from the tangle of pillows and blankets.

  “Not yet, but Nicholas and George will eat up all the oranges if you tarry abed, and Kirsten will swill every last drop of chocolate.”

  Nicholas, Kirsten, and George would gobble up every crumb
on the breakfast sideboard given the opportunity. Ethan and Beckman were similarly fond of their victuals—as was Nita.

  “Tray.” A croak that nonetheless sounded imperious.

  “Leah permits only tea trays in the bedrooms in the morning,” Nita said, climbing onto Della’s bed. “She thinks we should join each other for the morning meal.” A fine theory, though Nita typically made it a habit to come down earlier or later than her siblings.

  “Hate you.” Della’s dark crown disappeared beneath the covers.

  Nita took an orange from her pocket and began to peel it while she waited for the maid to leave.

  “I have a few questions, and I’m willing to bargain for the answers,” Nita said when privacy was assured and the peel stripped from the orange.

  “Go away, Nita.”

  “I’ll bargain with fresh sections of a sweet, juicy orange.”

  Della flipped the covers down to peer at her sister. “Fiend. What do you want to know?”

  Nita held out a bite of fresh fruit, which was like dangling a bit of haddock before a barn cat.

  “Tell me about Mr. St. Michael.”

  Della took the piece of orange. “He’s here to transact business with Nicholas, at least nominally. Something about the woolly sheep Papa bought from the King all those years ago. This is a divine orange.”

  Nita helped herself to a bite. “It’s quite good. You’re sure Nicholas isn’t matchmaking?”

  “He might be, or maybe Leah is,” Della said, pushing to a sitting position and accepting the rest of the orange. “Kirsten was convivial at dinner, and Mr. St. Michael made Susannah blush.”

  “Kirsten was convivial in a pleasant way or a Kirsten way?” For Kirsten was beset with a restlessness that could make her a difficult conversation partner for the average, unsuspecting gentleman.

  Della munched philosophically on another section of orange. “Kirsten behaved, which was interesting. Mr. St. Michael spouted some poem about a mouse, and Susannah was impressed.”

  Nita was impressed with Mr. St. Michael as well, for he hadn’t had a fit of the vapors when she’d put up her own horse last night. Men, particularly gentlemen, were prone to the vapors, in Nita’s experience. Mr. St. Michael had instead helped when Nita had asked it of him.

  How lovely, to meet a man who helped rather than fussed and scolded.

  Nita had also been impressed with Mr. St. Michael’s voice, which had blended beguilingly with night shadows and winter-brilliant stars. His burr hinted of far-off hills and the canny competence of a man who’d bested life on his own terms, rather than through hereditary advantages. He spoke slowly, though Nita had no doubt his mind was as nimble as a baby goat.

  Despite his canniness, Mr. St. Michael’s company in the frigid little gazebo had been restful. He didn’t presume or put on airs. He smelled good, and he was of a size with Nita’s brothers while being far less inclined to share his opinions uninvited.

  His features were not refined, having already acquired a weathered quality about his eyes, and yet his looks would change little as he aged. He’d become distinguished, and he already managed to be formidable, for all his unassuming ways.

  Nita could not see Mr. St. Michael spouting poetry though, much less about a mouse. Shrewd of him, to realize literary matters were ever dear to Susannah’s heart.

  “I’m glad Mr. St. Michael trotted out his poetry for Susannah,” Nita said. “He’ll remind Suze that the list of eligibles does not begin and end with Edward Nash.”

  Though the present list of suitors for Susannah’s hand did.

  “Mr. Nash is kind to Susannah,” Della said, tearing apart the last two sections of orange. “What’s more, she likes him. Where did you get this orange?”

  “I still have my set of keys to the larders,” Nita said, taking the second succulent portion for herself. “Edward Nash is not a suitable husband for any of you, and that’s an end to it.”

  Della drew her knees up, her dark braid falling in a ratty rope over one shoulder. She was out of the schoolroom but could still look achingly young.

  “It’s not like you to be a snob, Nita. Edward is old-fashioned about some things, but Susannah is too. Help me dress, and we’ll further inspect Mr. St. Michael over breakfast.”

  The offer was generous and would assure at least one other sibling joined Nita at the table. Having rested and considered the previous evening’s encounter with Mr. St. Michael, Nita was not proud of her behavior. Fatigue and delivering another baby doomed to poverty or worse had soured her manners, and a guest at Belle Maison deserved better than that.

  “I’m in a green mood today,” Della said, slogging out of the bed. “Green and warm, not in that order. You were out quite late.”

  That Della would notice was reassuring. “Addy Chalmers had a girl. Mother and child were doing well enough when I left.”

  Della stretched luxuriously, like a small, sleek cat upon rising from a cozy hearth. “I don’t know how you stand it, Nita. Let’s hope this child fares better than the last. Velvet for today, I think, and my paisley shawl.”

  Nita helped Della dress and arrange her hair, but that small comment, about hoping the child fared better than Addy Chalmers’s last baby, stung.

  Della was as kindhearted as the next young woman of means and good birth, but a child’s life and death should be worth more than a passing sentiment expressed between the wardrobe and the vanity.

  * * *

  Tremaine endured as much conviviality from the Haddonfields over breakfast as he had at dinner the previous evening, though the informality of the morning meal meant Bellefonte could bill and coo at his countess even more openly.

  Tremaine’s tolerance for billing and cooing had improved in recent months, with the reintroduction into his life of his late brother’s wife, child, and the wife’s sister, but Bellefonte’s besottedness would strain anybody’s digestion.

  The earl lifted a pink Sevres teapot in his countess’s direction. “More tea, lovey?”

  The countess patted his hand. “I’m having chocolate, Nicholas.”

  His lordship took a sip of the countess’s beverage. “So you are. Cold mornings call for the fortification of chocolate. Ah, Nita, and who is that with you? Given the hour, that cannot possibly be our dearest little Della.”

  Two Haddonfield sisters stood in the door, one petite and dark, the other tall, fair, and not as sure of herself as she had been the previous evening.

  “Ladies, good morning.” Tremaine rose and held out the chair next to him, letting the invitation stand or fall on its own merit. Lady Nita obliged him by taking the seat he offered, which put her directly in the path of a sharp beam of winter sunshine.

  The morning light revealed fatigue around her eyes and mouth, and confirmed that she was not in the first blush of youth. A relief, that, for reasons Tremaine did not examine when his eggs were growing cold.

  “Nita reports that Addy Chalmers had a daughter,” Della said, appropriating the teapot. “Nicholas, did you leave me any cream or sugar?”

  A wince was exchanged at the table, between the earl and his countess, and between Lady Kirsten and Lady Susannah. George Haddonfield, who’d been the soul of good cheer the previous evening, aimed a flat stare at Lady Della.

  In the space of a moment, Tremaine gained a clear sense of Lady Nita’s situation. He resisted the temptation to squeeze her hand beneath the table.

  “The cream is in short supply, Lady Della,” Tremaine said, passing the pitcher down the table, “but sugar remains abundant. I can also recommend the eggs, and I’ve seldom had bacon so delectable.”

  George left off glowering, and Bellefonte’s relief was written on his handsome features.

  “Eat up, St. Michael,” the earl said. “If we’re to inspect the sheep, we’ll have a chilly morning.”

  The earl’s observation was a little too hearty, a little too pointless. Tremaine had already been out to check on William, and the morning’s weather made “chilly” the
mother of all delicate understatements.

  “Nicholas, you promised me you wouldn’t leave me to Vicar’s tender mercies again,” Lady Bellefonte said. “Twice now I’ve had to brave his calls on my own, and he’s incapable of leaving while a cake remains on the tea tray.”

  While Bellefonte, of course, would excel at denuding the tray of cakes, such were the accomplishments of the typical peer.

  “I would never abandon you, lovey,” Bellefonte said. “At what time is His Holiness—?”

  The countess clearly was not fooled by this display of guilelessness.

  “I’ll take Mr. St. Michael to see the sheep,” Lady Nita said, when Tremaine had been hoping to see an earl scolded at his own breakfast table. “It’s not that cold out if the wind remains calm. Perhaps we might make a riding party of it?”

  Lady Nita aimed her question at her sisters, who’d thus far been busy demolishing their breakfasts.

  “Kirsten, Della, and I are off to pay a call on Mrs. Nash,” Lady Susannah replied. “We’ll take the coach in this weather.”

  “That leaves me,” George Haddonfield said, “to shepherd the inspection of the sheep, so to speak. Shall we say in three-quarters of an hour?”

  George was a spectacularly handsome young man, in the same blond, blue-eyed mold as most of his siblings. Though tall by comparison to most men, he was shorter than his older brother by several inches.

  George made a more subtle job of exuding jovial harmlessness than the earl did, and he was quieter about it. Tremaine’s instincts suggested George would be slow to anger, formidable when roused, loyal as hell, and attractive even when roaring drunk or in the grip of an ague.

  “Your outing to see the sheep can wait for an hour,” Bellefonte said. “Nita just sat down to her breakfast.”

  Beside Tremaine, the lady silently bristled at her brother’s solicitude, as if she would rather have spoken for herself.

  “Jam, my lady?” Tremaine held out the jar of preserves, and another of those familial awkwardnesses passed in silence.

  “Thank you, Mr. St. Michael.” Her ladyship spread raspberry jam on her toast, her movements relaxed, even graceful, while Tremaine resigned himself to cold eggs. In his thirty-odd years on earth, he’d often been grateful for far worse fare and far worse company.