John rested the walking stick across both shoulders, gripping the ends. He leaned his head back against it and blew out a breath. He drank in the sight of Netta, his muscles loosening with every inch of unscathed skin he saw.
She was safe. She was angry, but that made no matter now that she was back under his roof.
Netta lifted her chin. “Cerise told me that Sudworth has negotiated the marriage contract. His servant laughed about the impending marriage, that his master wanted a taste for the fallen sister before marrying the pure one. I could wait no longer to remove her from home.”
The chit ducked around Netta. “I hope you have chocolate for breakfast. I prefer the kind from Luxembourg, please.”
John closed his eyes. Perfect. Another damned stray to feed.
He looked up and caught the scowl directed at him as Netta wrapped a protective arm around the girl.
And if the younger one was anything like her sister, John didn’t know how he would survive.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
John’s ankle turned under him, and he wind-milled his arms to keep his balance. “Sodding hell.” He kicked the doll he’d stepped on to the side of the hall.
An imp poked his tousled blond head out of the breakfast room. “Ooh, Uncle John said a bad word.”
John made to kick the boy, and with a delighted squeal the future Duke of Montague turned and raced back to his morning meal.
John gripped his hips. How had his home been infiltrated in only a matter of hours? It seemed as though he’d just settled Netta’s sister into her room when Montague and the rest of his friends had reappeared on his front steps. Only this time, they hadn’t come alone.
A thunder of footsteps sounded from the front staircase, so much so that when John turned he expected to find a horde of elephants charging at him.
It was worse.
Four sticky children, eyes wild with the thrill of destruction, pounded around the corner, coming at him as fast as their chubby legs could move. A mangy grey dog nipped at one of the girl’s heels and a black and brown mutt led the pack, knocking into John as he loped past.
He raised his hands above his head, trying to side-step around the beasts that he’d sworn an oath to die protecting. He breathed a sigh of relief as the marauding children turned from the hallway to terrorize the breakfast room.
“Good Lord,” he muttered. His house has been overtaken. It would need to be quarantined after all the snot-ridden disease-carriers had returned to their respective homes.
Netta’s light tinkle of a laugh sounded from the breakfast room, and John straightened his cravat to join the fray. An army of mongrels wouldn’t keep him from Netta, not when she had been decidedly sulky all night and morning. He had his work cut out for him charming her out of her bad mood.
Call a woman an idiot once, and she won’t let a man forget it. Of course, she hadn’t heard when he’d praised her cleverness and fortitude. And wouldn’t listen when he’d try to point out that she’d missed the earlier part of the conversation. Infuriating woman.
She laughed again, giving her smiles to someone other than him, and John squared his shoulders. Right. He stepped towards the door, and something small and furry tangled between his feet.
“Gah!” John tripped, falling into the wall. A small orange-and-white kitten hissed at him before darting under a side table. “What in the bloody blazes is going on in here?!”
“Cotton!” A tiny female child ran forwards and peered at the kitten in its hiding place. Her starched petticoat-covered bum poked up at him, and John grabbed his hair. His home was infested. No wonder Judith had ensconced herself on John’s pillow. That cat was the one sane creature left in his home. He wished that he could drag Netta away and join the feline.
The bastard responsible for three of the havoc-wreakers strolled from the breakfast room, polishing off the last bite ofa roll. Montague plucked the child from the floor and plopped her over his shoulder. “This is real life, Summerset.”
The child kicked her legs close to her father’s face, and Montague secured them with his forearm. “And it’s pretty damn marvelous. I hope you give it a chance someday.”
“Ooh, papa said a bad word,” the future telltale duke squealed from inside the door.
Both men ignored him.
“Your real life is my nightmare.” John pushed off the wall and looked for any more obstacles that could trip him up. “One month ago everything was peaceful.” Boring, but then Netta had arrived. “My home was neat and tidy.” Sterile. He quite liked finding empty wax paper bags of Netta’s sweets in his bedroom, one of her stockings strewn over a chair. “As soon as this is over, I deserve a return to normalcy.” Assuming his new normal included Netta. If she left and he remained as he was before, without occupation, without any fire in his life, he…well, he didn’t quite know what he’d do with himself.
He set his shoulders. As soon as he had his brother’s deed returned and made Sudworth pay, he would have time to devise a plot to keep Netta in his life on a more permanent basis. He’d find lavish apartments for her, have jars full of Pomfret cakes on every table.
“Real life is noisy. Untidy.” The child tugged on Montague’s hair, and he grinned. “And it’s absolutely wonderful. It’s family, and you’re stuck with us.”
John sniffed, trying to look disapproving. But he supposed even though the children were irritating little monsters now, they might grow into interesting adults.
