“What exactly is your problem with me?”Gemma’s whispered vehemence was getting closer to a shriek, but she couldn’t stop it.She’d never been so insulted and enraged and, and, and…heatedin her entire life.
“My problem,” Hal shot back, “is that your family has owned this place without giving a single thought to it for twenty-five years, and now suddenly you show up and expect everyone to bow and scrape while you turn up your pretty little aristocratic nose at everything.You have no idea what a place like this means to the people who live here.You don’t deserve to own it.You don’t deserve to spend even one night here.You’ll ruin it.”
She gripped the handles of the tea tray more tightly, the weight of it fading under her growing irritation.“You think we’re going to put this place out of business by taking a more active interest in it?From what I can tell, it’s hardly a money-making enterprise as it is.”
“What would a fine lady like yourself know about making money?”
“More than you seem to, Mr.Barman Who Lets the Customers Pour Their Own Drinks!”
Her eyes were beginning to adjust to the dimness, and Gemma could just about make out the hard, stubborn lines of his face.
“We’re doing just fine here without your input and opinions.Five Mile House may not be grand, or fashionable, or an enormous source of income, but it makes enough.We get by.”
“That reminds me,” Gemma said.“When you have a moment, in your busy schedule of loitering about and not doing your job, would you please bring the account books up to my room?I’ll want to look them over to see what we’re working with.”
In the darkness, she thought she saw his large hands tighten where they gripped the tray, but his voice was even when he replied, “You’re not working with anything.You need to leave this place alone.Five Mile House can support itself, but it certainly can’t support the lifestyle you’re accustomed to.And I won’t let you siphon off all available funds when that money is meant to go to people like Bess Pickford, who put their sweat and hearts into this place.”
If Gemma had her hands free, she’d throw them up in frustration.“I don’t know what I’ve done to give you the impression that I am some hardhearted, greedy landlady here to put people out of work and close down a beloved village pub.I can see that you love this place, and while I can’t share your enthusiasm, I can relate to your sense of its importance.You see, Five Mile House is all we have, my mother and my sister and myself.We have nowhere else to turn, and you’re right that the income from this place as it is would not keep us for long.I really see only one solution, Mister…good grief.I don’t even know your last name.”
He hesitated for an instant, then said gruffly, “Deveril.Hal Deveril.And…thank you.Perhaps I’ve misjudged you.”
Gemma smiled, glad of the darkness.It wasn’t a nice smile.“Oh, no.Don’t thank me until you hear my plan.”
Hal stiffened, his brawny shoulders drawing straight.“What plan?”
“I’m not going to run Five Mile House into the ground.On the contrary, I’m going to turn it into a thriving, bustling business,” Gemma clarified, thinking it through as she went.“And I will want your help making certain improvements to this place.”
“Improvements.”Dread suffused his tone, and Gemma smiled wider.“There is no money for improvements.”
“Have you never heard the adage that one must spend money to make money?Yes, it’s a risk, but what is life without a little risk.”
“I won’t let you gut this place in service of some crack-brained scheme.”
Gemma narrowed her eyes.“I really don’t see how you intend to stop me.”
“I don’t need to stop you.”She could hear the sneer in his tone.“You’ll tire of this game and be back in London by May Day.”
“Yes, that is exactly the plan!”Gemma could feel that the smile on her face was not a nice smile.His contempt put some much-needed steel into her spine.“You haven’t entirely misjudged me, Mr.Deveril.I don’t particularly care if Five Mile House becomes a roaring success.But I need to attract a certain sort of clientele to this place.A rich, titled,singlesort of clientele.And if you want to keep your job—and have any sort of say in what changes I make to your precious pub—you’re going to help me do it.”
ChapterFour
A loud banging noise woke Hal with a start.
Blinking his bleary eyes open, he stared in confusion at the bright sunlight pouring in through his curtainless windows.He couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept past sunrise.Unlike his relations, who had routinely spent most of their daylight hours abed.
His brother’s wife had been famous for demanding breakfast in bed around two o’clock every day.His brother, Walter, had usually made it down to the breakfast room, but not until after noon and always complaining of the headache his excesses of the night before had wrought.
Well.Hal supposed when one was up carousing, drinking, gorging, and tumbling anyone other than one’s spouse until six in the morning, it made sense to lie abed the whole day, trying to sleep it off.Hal couldn’t imagine wanting that sort of existence, much less being so unable to let it go that he allowed it to take everything from him.Including, in the end, his life.
And now here Hal was lazing in bed until…what time was it, anyway?
And what in God’s name was making that awful racket?
It was someone knocking on the front door, he realized, shock running through him.But who?No one came to Kissington Manor anymore.
Struggling free of his blankets, Hal padded across the room to the wash basin.He splashed cold water on his face and ran damp fingers through his hair to tame it.Hurrying into his clothes, Hal jerked on his sturdy work boots and cursed when mud flaked off the soles and onto the faded Aubusson carpet.He ought to have cleaned them the night before, but he’d been distracted by thoughts of a certain beautiful, infuriating London lady.
Despite his hard physical labor of the day before, and the liberal glass of whisky he’d brooded over before bed, Hal had lain awake for hours with his mind busily turning over and over every interaction he’d had with Lady Gemma Lively.
