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  He ignored the jab behind her politeness. Now that he had her where he wanted her, he could test her. “I am told you write a good hand. I have pressing correspondence that needs attention. Can you spare a moment?”

  “You have no secretary?” she inquired with honest curiosity.

  “I threw an inkpot at him, and he took umbrage. Stupid man. I would have bought him two new suits in apology.” He leaned forward just enough to catch another whiff of her fragrance.

  “I’ll remember that, my lord. I’m wearing an old gown today, and two replacements would be very pleasant. What must I do to earn them?”

  He could swear he detected laughter instead of fear in her voice. “Do not argue with me, to start with. I do not like to explain myself.”

  “Of course you do not,” she said soothingly. “Tyrants generally don’t. Where is this correspondence, my lord? I will endeavor to see how quickly I can earn two new gowns.”

  His lips twitched at her insolence. “My study. We will leave the door open to observe all propriety.”

  “I generally have no fear of improper advances,” she said with dryness.

  He could hear her petticoats swishing as she followed him down the corridor. “Why? Do you carry a pistol and shoot your suitors?”

  Her chuckle was low and sensuous and roused a part of him that he’d thought dead. Ash nearly walked into his own damned door.

  “Had I any inopportune suitors, I’d no doubt break their fingers or crack their toes. I am not a lightweight, and as a female, I have not been trained to fight fair.”

  Did she think him a eunuch? Or just helpless? Ash’s dangerous lust for knowledge got the better of his good sense. Once they crossed the threshold into his study, he swung around, caught Miss Lying Christie in one arm, and dragged her up against his chest.

  She was a rare handful, and his cock rose to full mast with those high, firm breasts crushed into his waistcoat. She smelled of aroused woman as well as lilies and tea, which made him even hungrier for a female caress. He traced the outline of her face with his fingers, as he’d been longing to do since they’d first met. A beautiful oval, with strong cheekbones, a nice narrow nose, and a wide brow. He wished he could see her eyes, but her lashes were full and long.

  She did not protest his pawing, as if she understood his need to know her appearance.

  Unable to resist the incredible pleasure of long-denied feminine proximity, hoping for a reaction from her, he pressed his lips to the line where her jaw and throat met. The muscles were firm, and her skin was like rose petals. Or lilies. Impetuously, he found her plush mouth.

  Still, she didn’t fight him. Her lips responded, presumably out of a curiosity as strong as his. She held herself stiffly, though, as if debating whether to break his fingers. But she kissed him back. And the more he asked, the more she gave, until they were both hot and gasping. Miss Christie was not an experienced kisser, but she was a quick student.

  The clatter of paint cans and ladders down the hall forced Ash back to sensibility. His cock protested, and he had to hastily take a seat behind his desk, amazed she had not slapped him into the next room. Or crushed his toes. “I should apologize, Miss Christie.”

  “But you won’t,” she said in a tone he could not quite decipher. “You are already telling yourself that you were doing the poor spinster a favor, and I practically asked for it.”

  Ash leaned back in his chair and frowned in contemplation. “No, not that precisely. We both asked for it. And seemed to enjoy it. But it was ungentlemanly of me to impose on a lady under the protection of my roof.”

  “If you would please to remember that from henceforward, I might be able to help with your correspondence. But should there be any repeat occurrence, my lord, I shall have to remove myself from your presence.”

  She did not offer to leave the house, he noted with interest. She had said she had a home to go to. But she was not eager to go there. Or could not? Or had that been another of her lies? Not that he had proof yet that she’d actually been lying, just instinct.

  “With the understanding that my correspondence is often of national importance and of confidential nature, I bid you read the names of the correspondents on these letters so I know which to answer first.” He pushed the stack of mail across the desk.

  Suspecting that the marquess heard more than most, Harriet tried to slow her ragged breathing as she picked up the letters he thrust toward her.

  He’d kissed her! As if she were some foolish debutante caught in the garden at her first ball. Worse yet, she hadn’t protested because she’d liked it! Her blood had boiled when his mouth had come down on hers. She still frothed with pleasure. Ashford’s lips had been hungry, forceful, and tender all at once, making her long for more—unlike the limp fish lips she’d experienced once or twice in her younger years.

  She had to stop thinking like that. He was a marquess, and she was a deceitful nobody. Taking a deep, calming breath, she read off the names on the letters he’d handed her. Some of the handwriting was atrocious, and she had difficulty translating, but Ashford guessed much from her stumbling attempts and directed her to lay them on the appropriate stack—to the left for his immediate personal reply, to the right for someone else to answer.

  Almost at the bottom of the stack was one from Townsend. She recognized her stepfather’s handwriting before she’d even read his name. Not giving it a second thought, she dropped that one in her lap and read the next. Ashford had no way of noticing.

  “Start with the one from Earl Grey,” Ashford commanded. He had his chair turned to face the wall and not the desk. She assumed that the placement was meant to make it easier for him to drop down into the seat without fumbling. It was certainly easier on her nerves. Even though she knew he was blind, she felt as if he could see right through her. She rather he glared at the wall.

  She had spent the latter part of her life living lies. She was still uncomfortable with them. It took a great deal of self-confidence to carry off a true lie, and the Harriet she’d been didn’t possess any. She hoped Miss Christie was stronger. The letter in her lap burned a hole in her skirt.

  She read Earl Grey’s letter aloud—an earl. She was reading the private correspondence of one of the most powerful men in England—and he was asking Ashford’s opinion. The same Ashford who had just kissed her. She was in well over her head.

  From this letter, she gathered that the upheaval brewing in the Commons to overthrow Wellington’s administration was vital to the reformists. The unrest among men throughout the kingdom could lead to a revolution as devastating as the one in France had been in her parents’ time. And Ashford and Earl Grey were fighting for the reform necessary to prevent the kingdom’s destruction. She was in such awe that she nearly lost track of his reply.

  “Tell him we need a dozen more votes, preferably two dozen for safety, unless he can bring Lansdowne’s faction around. We cannot promise that the Irish and Scots contingents will arrive in time.”

  “What will happen if Wellington’s party wins?” she asked, swallowing her trepidation in favor of an overwhelming curiosity.

  He sent her an impatient look, even if he couldn’t see her. “Slavery will continue. Men who have gained wealth through their industry but still have no vote will rise up in revolt just as the Americans did for being taxed without representation. Workers will burn manufactories in justifiable rage at their inhumane treatment. Shall I go on?”

  “And the decision could depend on Irishmen or other rural representatives who never come to London?” she asked, understanding finally why her stepfather had actually left his comfortable study in Somerset. He was part of this process.

  “Exactly. It’s not as if we can change minds that have already been made up.” The marquess tapped his walking stick on his knee. “There was a letter from Bryghtstone, wasn’t there? Pull that out next, please.”

  Apparently she was to remember his responses and write them out later. That gave her mind more to occupy it t
han how strikingly handsome he looked with his scarred visage turned away from her. Perhaps that was another reason for his chair placement.

  They had almost reached the bottom of the left hand stack when two young boys raced into the study. Harriet could not call them small boys, for they were tall and husky, but they didn’t look to be above ten years of age. She’d heard them racing about in the schoolroom and on the backstairs, but whoever had responsibility for them usually kept them out of the front where the workmen were.

  “Mr. Baker said we are to take our hoops around the park ten times, then name all the trees and shrubs around the basin. Can you go with us, please? You know the names of everything.” Both boys spoke as one, sometimes in unison, sometimes talking over each other.

  “Hugh, Hartley, there is a lady present,” Ashford said sternly.

  Two identical youths turned and bowed to her. Both looked much as Ashford would have at that age—dancing dark eyes, with too long arms and legs, angular features, and patrician noses they must grow into. Only the dark auburn curls gave a hint of their mother.

  “I’m Hugh,” the more jovial one announced.

  “I’m Hartley,” the more somber, mature one said.

  “They’re lying,” Ashford warned, standing. “Hugh is the eldest and actually interested in naming trees. Hartley would rather chase squirrels. You will join us, Miss Christie. Bring the right hand stack, and we’ll work through those as we walk.”

  She liked that he knew his sons so well that he could tell them apart by their voices, especially since they were bastards most men would ignore.

  Admiring my grandson doesn’t mean you must go anywhere he commands.

  The spirit voice confirmed what she already thought—or perhaps that was just her new persona standing up for herself. Harriet remained where she was. “I will answer the letters we’ve already discussed while they’re fresh on my mind. You will enjoy the day with your sons.”

  Ashford gestured commandingly and grasped her elbow. “You need fresh air as much as we do. If you don’t trust me to lead you while you read, then leave the letters here.”

  Put that way . . . She still could not go with them. With her mental door open, she heard his loneliness—and his dread?—but she simply could not be seen in public. She didn’t think anyone had missed her yet, but she couldn’t disguise her size if anyone had. A public park and the marquess at her side—out of the question.

  Harriet removed her elbow from his grasp and slid her stepfather’s letter into her pocket. “Your sons need time with you—alone. I have work here to do.”

  She could sense Ashford’s roiling anger and frustration far better than he expressed it aloud. He was hurt, presumably because she might think him incapable of walking and talking at the same time, or that she did not wish to be seen with him. The marquess existed on the volcanic edge of explosion, simply looking for insults.

  That could not be good for a man with the reins of the kingdom in his hands.

  5

  “Bryghtstone wants to enclose his woods and treat them as his own personal fiefdom, as if he were some medieval baron preventing the peasants from poaching his private stock,” Erran said with disgust, plunking his boots on Ash’s desk.

  Ash was still disgruntled enough over the afternoon’s disastrous outing with the twins that he growled at Erran’s disrespect. He listened for the boots hitting the floor before he replied.

  “Aster’s family says the workhouse in his village is full, since he’s turned most of his fields to sheep.” Ash was a farmer. He understood the desire to cast off the uncertainties of crops and concentrate on the easiest profit, but a man of position had responsibilities to his community. “Lansdowne must believe he doesn’t need more votes if he’s denied Bryghtstone’s request.”

  “More likely, Lansdowne has asked for cash in return for favors, and Bryght hasn’t any. Promise him income, and you’ve gained his vote.”

  “Have you always been this cynical or has marriage made you wise?” Ash asked his newly-wed brother in amusement.

  “I’ve always been this cynical,” Erran said with a verbal shrug. “Why else would I become a lawyer? Once, I was naïve enough to think justice could be had in courts, but now I see the entire court system is corrupt and needs reform. Celeste keeps me from setting fire to wigs.”

  Ash laughed. “Perhaps I need a woman as sensible as your wife. In the meantime, we can’t let Bryght deprive the village of possibly their only source of putting dinner on the table by granting his ridiculous request. Tell him we’ll introduce him to a few wealthy ladies instead, and if none suit, we’ll promise him ground floor investment on the municipal water works we’ll be building near him, in exchange for his valuable time and knowledge of the area, of course.”

  Erran snorted. “Which will ensure he won’t protest if we need to run the canal through his property. Excellent. I’ll learn horse-trading yet.”

  “Only if you join the right clubs and learn the idiosyncrasies of the men with whom you’re trading.” Ashford twirled his stick. “I suppose I can pay your membership. It’s not as if I’m spending time in them any longer.”

  “We can go together. You can introduce me around,” Erran said with a verbal shrug. “I’m seen so seldom that half the town thinks I’m one of father’s bastards. But I need to call it a night and return to Celeste. She’s sent her brother and sister off to school, and she’s moping.”

  He could hear Erran shove back the chair to leave. After today’s fiasco, Ash wasn’t making any promises to attend his old clubs. He nodded dismissal. “Give her my regards. And ask her to nose around, if she would, and find out more about Miss Christie. For all we know, she’s one of Lansdowne’s spies.”

  He hated saying that, but Miss Christie’s refusal to attend him in the park had added to his misgivings.

  On top of which, he was pretty certain Theo had told him he’d received a missive from Townsend. Miss Mysterious Chris hadn’t mentioned it.

  After spending a perfectly lovely day feeling helpful, Harriet sat in her lonely chamber and fought tears. She crumpled the letter in her hand and let the old rejection swell and spill over, until she held her middle and rocked with the familiar agony of it.

  She had to cast out the old Harriet, who cared what people thought of her, the weakling who yearned to be loved. She had been taught in so many ways—by her stepfather, by governesses, by the village ladies and their sons—that she was apparently too different, too large, too proud, or too clever to be loved, or even respected. So she had to give up these megrims and learn to live on her own.

  She could not let Townsend’s letter return her to a weakling. She knew she had value, if just given a chance. She could make her own life, find a place where she might possibly be useful.

  And she would learn to be proud of herself, do as she saw fit, and stop expecting people to love her for it.

  It was this wretched letter that had brought back all the insults she’d suffered over the years.

  Her stepfather wanted to trade his pocket borough votes for a man who would marry her! That was immoral on so many levels, she could not quite put her mind to it all. Shame washed over her that an intelligent man like the marquess might read such a letter. What kind of beast traded his family like livestock? If he ever found out who she was, Ashford would regard her as contemptible by association to such a man.

  It made her sick to think of what Townsend may have said to persuade her other suitors to court her.

  Are you done feeling sorry for yourself yet? The maternal spirit clucked unsympathetically. Would you care to look at it from your stepfather’s perspective?

  It was hard to keep her mind closed while weeping, so she’d asked for that. “If Townsend had written that letter in an effort to help me,” Harriet argued, “I might find it in my heart to forgive him. But he merely sees my money slipping from his hands.”

  You are fortunate to have your own money, the voice in her head reminded her. And
the baron has paid your support all these years. You cannot blame him for wanting reimbursement.

  Arguing with herself had to be a new form of madness, but anger was more bearable than the agony of self-pity. “I can’t touch my trust fund until I am twenty-five. He has claimed all the income over the years. I keep his accounts,” she whispered, unable to convey her hurt without physical expression. “I know to a farthing how much I cost and how much my mother’s investments and property earn. I could support a village on the difference!”

  Does he gamble or waste the proceeds? You should not judge hastily.

  No, he lined his own pockets. She ought to shut out the voice, but that was the coward’s way out. Harriet rubbed her head and tried to reason with herself as well as the invasive, judgmental spirit. Had she really thought it interesting to hear the voices more clearly? She had attics to let, if so. “Townsend is greedy and dishonest. He intends to dupe some poor man into deeding my mother’s property to him in exchange for me and the investments. Townsend likes land, and mine is productive.”

  The spirit didn’t have an argument for this one.

  She’d known what her stepfather was doing. Humble Harriet had been willing to accept such a marriage bargain as the price of having a family. But this . . . She flung the letter across the room and let anger well up. This was humiliating.

  She had no good means of expressing her anger in the city. In the country, she might have gone for a good long walk. Here—she couldn’t even stride quickly, even if she dared to go out on the street, which she didn’t.

  There are alternatives, my dear, the kindly voice said. Look around you.

  She was angry enough to tell the voice to jump in a lake, but someday, the voices might be her only companions. With a sigh, she looked out the window to the walled garden below.

  Outside the wall was the mews and a tavern. She was still trapped—she didn’t dare let herself out the back gate. These were not the safe environs of the country. Perhaps a stroll in the garden would help.