He felt a rush of tenderness as he gazed into her lovely face, as beautiful as their mother’s but with a sweetness that angry woman had never known. “Yes, Belle,” Alex said huskily. “This time I’ll stay as long as you want me.”
Larger feet thundered down the marble steps and he looked up to see his younger brother skid uncertainly to a halt an arm’s length away. Alex would hardly have recognized Jonathan; at their last meeting, three years before, he had still been a boy. Now he was a gangling fifteen, as blond as both his siblings and bidding fair to be as tall as his older brother. Alex impulsively reached out his hand, and suddenly the three were embracing in one confused tangle of arms and legs and blond hair, laughing and crying together.
For the first time, and against all odds, the three children of Lady Serena Kingsley were a family.
* * *
Half an hour later they were sharing tea and cakes in the small drawing room, where Aunt Agatha had shown the rare good sense to leave them alone. Annabelle automatically fell into the hostess role, pouring tea and offering cakes to her brothers.
Alex saw that she’d grown into a lovely young woman with the height of the Kingsleys and a grace all her own, but there was a shyness and uncertainty in her demeanor that must be the result of too many scoldings and criticisms. His sister still wore mourning for her mother, and he could not decide if her slightly haggard look came from the black dress or from some other source.
“Are you ready to be presented this fall, Belle, during the Little Season? The mourning period for Lady Serena will be over within the next couple of weeks,” Alex said.
His sister wrinkled her nose a bit and handed him his tea. “I suppose I shall have to be. After all, I’m twenty and almost on the shelf. Do you have a naval friend who will marry me sight unseen so I can avoid going to the marriage mart?”
He chuckled. “Really, Annabelle, you can do much better than a salty old sea dog! I expect there will be dozens of swains begging my permission to pay their addresses. There can’t be many prettier girls in London.”
Annabelle shot him a startled look. “It’s kind of you to say so, Alex, though I know that isn’t true.” The last sentence fell away under her breath, almost inaudible.
Alex wondered why she couldn’t believe the evidence of her mirror, but as he studied her more closely, he realized that while the delicate face, slim body, and long golden hair were beautiful, the overall effect did her less than justice. “We shall need to get you a whole new wardrobe. The styles have changed considerably since you first went into mourning after Father’s death.”
“Aunt Agatha didn’t think it right to waste money on mourning clothes when no one would see them.” His sister sighed. “Wilkens says fashionable gowns would be wasted on me. She says I have no sense of style, not like Mother at all.”
Alex raised a brow questioningly. “Have you kept Wilkens on? I know she was Lady Serena’s dresser for over thirty years and you must be fond of her, but wouldn’t you prefer a younger abigail, someone more your age?”
She faltered. “I’m not at all fond of her, actually, but Aunt Agatha said I had a duty to keep her on.”
Alex frowned. Wilkens probably bullied Annabelle unmercifully. She was a bad-tempered old biddy, completely devoted to Lady Serena but loathing the rest of the human race, particularly her mistress’s children since they might be expected to hold some share of their mother’s affection. The dresser’s jealousy was unwarranted; Alex could remember no instance of motherly regard from Lady Serena.
Their father’s sister, Aunt Agatha, had a certain fair-mindedness but was elderly and self-absorbed. She would have made no attempt to enter into the feelings of a shy young girl. The sooner Alex got Belle away from both of them, the better.
“In that case, we shall pension her off,” he said cheerfully. “She can go to her well-earned reward in whatever that place was that she used to mutter about.”
Annabelle giggled. “You mean Scunthorpe?”
“Exactly. It is a good name for muttering. I hope the village can survive Wilkens’s return. If she misses her old life, she can harass whatever relatives she has left. Meanwhile, you shall have a new maid.”
“Shall I have to choose her myself?” Annabelle looked alarmed.
Alex was beginning to suspect that almost everything alarmed his sister. He gave an inward sigh but smiled reassuringly. “I’ll help you. We will advertise for suitable candidates, and you may choose the one you like best—that’s all there is to it.”
Annabelle still looked intimidated at the thought of exercising such control over her own destiny, so Alex turned his attention to Jonathan, who was putting away cakes with the dispatch and vigor that only a growing boy possessed.
Jonathan colored slightly under his brother’s regard and hastily swallowed the rest of his cream cake. “You’re probably wondering why I’m not at Eton.”
“The question had occurred to me,” Alex admitted.
“I was expelled for the rest of the term.” At Alex’s questioning look, Jonathan said with a mixture of pride and embarrassment, “I put a cow in the chapel bell tower. Some of my friends said it couldn’t be done, so I said it could.”
With sudden foreboding, Alex knew what was coming next. “Don’t tell me,” he groaned. “You said it was possible because your brother had done it.”
“Of course!” Jonathan said proudly. “I couldn’t have them making a liar of you, could I?”
Jonathan seemed so proud of his older brother that Alex felt a shade uneasy, fearing that he was not cut out to be a proper hero. Pushing aside the thought, he said. “I presume you discovered the problem with putting a cow in a tower?”
Jonathan tried to look ashamed of himself, but without success. “The cow will walkupsteps, but it won’t walk down. When they sent me home, the cow was still up there.”
Alex started chuckling. “I hope for the cow’s sake that someone remembers the solution Peter Harrington came up with.”
