“I cannot give you my word,” he said, his grin mischievous, and Jane knew she had lost. She wondered if Molly was right. If he loved her.
As he poured her coffee, automatically adding cream, she saw he was reading a letter. “Who is it from, Nicholas?”
She felt the easy carefree attitude evaporate. Seriously he replied, “It’s from my parents. In Texas.”
Jane sensed something amiss and did not understand. “How wonderful. What news?”
He smiled then, slightly. “It seems my roguish brother has finally been snared—by a suffragette, no less. He got married this spring.”
Jane knew a little bit about Nick’s younger brother, Rathe. She had been told that he was charming, handsome, and a very successful businessman, as well as an unrepenting ladies’ man. But, apparently, his womanizing days were over. “It must be a romantic story,” she said, a touch wistfully. “He doesn’t sound like the type to have fallen for one of those Bloomer girls!”
Nick’s smile was wry. “No, he doesn’t, does he.” Then he growled, “The little bastard! He must be in love—not to write me himself!”
“You love him very much,” Jane said softly.
High up on his cheekbones, the earl reddened. “He’s my brother,” he said gruffly.
“And your sister? The one in San Francisco? Storm?”
“Happily married, two kids, just moved into another mansion.” Nick smiled. “Probably still making Brett crazy with her wild ways.”
“She’s wild?”
He softened. “She was quite the tomboy, Jane, and totally stubborn. How she ever became the lady she is today is quite beyond me.”
“You miss them.”
He avoided her gaze.
“Let’s go visit.”
The earl looked at her, saying nothing, but Jane saw something dark and disturbed in his eyes; worse, she felt it. “Shouldn’t Chad meet his aunt and uncle, his cousins, his grandparents?”
The earl toyed with his knife, eyes upon the table. “Yes.”
Jane said nothing. What was amiss? She didn’t want to pry, not yet, their relationship was too fragile, yet she sensed his need and desperation— that there was something deep and malignant which needed healing.
The earl sighed, the sound heavy. “I’ve been thinking about taking Chad to Texas. It’s his heritage as much as Dragmore.” His gaze, pain-filled, touched Jane’s. “It’s where I was born and raised.”
Jane said nothing.
“It’s been a long time,” the earl said thickly, and Jane knew he was talking about himself and the last time he’d been to his parents’.
“Are your parents well?”
“Yes.” He managed a rough smile. “They want me to come home. They’ve been begging me to make a trip west for years.”
“It sounds like they miss you very much,” Jane said. “Do you want to go?”
He hesitated, turned to look out the window at the immaculate lawn. “Yes. No.”
Jane touched his hand, covering it with her own. “Whenever you want to go, I will be ready.”
His gaze held hers, filled with relief and gratitude. “Thank you.”
47
Later that night, the earl paused in the threshold of his wife’s room. She sat reading in bed, a vision in diaphanous white French lace, her long platinum hair cascading about her. She had left one lamp on, so the room was dimly illuminated. She was Beauty Incarnate, and he loved her.
