“Yes, I will.” Rose waited in the doorway until Abby had hobbled down the hallway to her bedchamber and disappeared inside, closing the door behind her.
Then she flew back into her own bedchamber and peered out the window.
The carriage had come to a stop halfway up the drive. She stared down at it, her heart pounding hard enough to reduce her rib cage to a powder. Abby was right. It was no ordinary carriage, but a vision in glossy black lacquer, with shiny black wheels, gold spokes and fittings, and a sleek pair of matched bays dancing restlessly in the traces, their dainty feet pawing at the ground.
The word “grand” didn’t even begin to describe it. It was the sort of elegant, fashionable equipage one might find promenading in Hyde Park. At least, she imagined it was, having never set foot in Hyde Park herself, or anywhere else in London.
There was a crest on the door, too, something in black, gold, and royal blue. She couldn’t make it out from this angle, but that combination of colors was familiar. Hadn’t she seen something similar on some of Ambrose’s correspondence?
She waited for the occupants to emerge, her breath held, but no one came out. A minute passed, then another, but just as she’d begun muttering a prayer that they’d go away again, the driver descended from the box, leaped out onto the drive, and opened the carriage door.
Whoever was inside felt no urgency to alight, but left his coachman standing on the drive, his greatcoat flapping about in the wind, and snowflakes gathering on his shoulders, until finally,finally, a long leg encased in a pair of fitted, dark gray pantaloons appeared, ending in a shiny black boot with handsome gold tassels.
A large, immaculately gloved hand landed on the top edge of the door, and then the rest of the man unfolded himself from the carriage. He turned to say something to his coachman, then marched up the drive until he was standing directly below her window.
Rose sucked in a breath. This man was undoubtedly the owner of the carriage.
He was . . . goodness, she’d never seen anything likehimbefore. His face was partially obscured by the brim of an elegant beaver hat, but she caught a glimpse of a straight, aristocratic nose and a mass of thick, dark hair. He was exceptionally tall and broad shouldered as well, perhaps the largest and most ideally formed gentleman she’d ever laid eyes on, the power of his body tightly leashed, like a coiled spring.
He marched toward the house, his stride loose limbed and confident, like a man who was accustomed to everyone scurrying out of his way. A moment later there was a brisk knock on the front door, the thud echoing throughout the house.
She waited, her every muscle tensed, her hands clenched, fingernails biting into her palms.
Go away, damn you. Just go—
Her only answer was a second thump, this one louder and more impatient than the first, and then, after a few moments of decidedly ominous silence, there was another thud, followed by a cracking noise like wood splintering.
Her hand flew to her mouth to smother a shriek. Was he attempting to break down the door? No, surely not! Even the most determined of Ambrose’s creditors wouldn’t dare to force their way into—
Thump!
She gasped, her heart vaulting into her throat.
Dear God, hewas! He was breaking intoherhouse, forcing his way inside like a common criminal. She backed away from the window, her legs shaking, and crept toward the clothes press on the other side of the bedchamber.
Ambrose’s pistol was already loaded. After their last unwelcome visitor, she always kept it so. She threw her cloak on over her nightdress, stuffed the pistol into the pocket, and slipped from her bedchamber in her stockinged feet.
She paused when she reached the landing, taking care to keep out of sight, and froze, listening, her fingers tight around the pistol.
The noise had ceased. She peeked around the corner, then darted back out of sight behind the edge of the wall. The front door was wide open. It appeared to be still intact, but goodness only knew what his next target would be. He hadn’t barreled his way inside with such viciousness only to give up now.
This man . . . he was the sort accustomed to getting what he wanted. His carriage, with that elaborate crest, his arrogant stride, that costly beaver hat, and those gold-tasseled boots—anyone could see at a glance that he wasn’t the sort to trifle with.
But then, neither was she.
CHAPTER2
It had taken fifteen years, one battered carriage, two lost horseshoes, and irreparable damage to his right arse cheek for Maxwell Alastair Hammond Burke, the Tenth Duke of Grantham, Viscount Hammond, to return to the village of his birth.
Fifteen years and eight hours, that is. Eight interminable, bone-rattling hours of travel from London to Fairford, the carriage tilting crazily with every inch of rutted road that passed under its wheels, his body aching and his backside battered beyond the telling of it, only to find ruin at the end of his journey.
Not figurative ruin, either, butactualruin.
A heavy blanket of snow covered the gardens, but choked weeds and gnarled roots jutted up from underneath the thick carpet of white like bony fingers, and the once-tidy pathways were now a wilderness of overgrown shrubs and untrimmed hedges.
It was positively uncivilized to a gentleman accustomed to the manicured grounds of Hyde Park, but if possible, the house was in even greater disarray than the gardens. Crumbling stone walls staggered under the weight of a sagging roof, and three of the four bedchamber windows on the third floor were cracked, the slashes in the glass like ugly scars on an otherwise smooth cheek, the raw edges glinting in the weak light.
If he’d had a smidgen of forbearance left, even the thinnest thread of good humor, the sight of the old place after all these years would have extinguished it in an instant.
