December
Later that morning, Raven discovered that negotiating with the Earl of Warrister was like dealing vingt-et-un to a seasoned Captain Sharp.
They sat across from each other in the library as they’d done on the first day, each one carefully sizing up the other.
There was a triumphant gleam in the old codger’s gaze. “That’s all settled, then. I’ll give a formal announcement at Aversleigh’s ball next week.”
That would be perfect, he thought, already imagining Jane’s reaction as he was introduced as Merrick Northcott. He would keep it a surprise until then. And after the ball, he would ask her to marry him and they would begin a new life together.
He wasn’t afraid of the unknown any longer. There was nothing waiting to pull the rug out from under him. Jane would never be this certain of his true identity otherwise. He trusted her unequivocally and knew that she would never lead him astray if she had the smallest doubt.
So, he was taking the plunge.
“But no sooner than that,” Raven said, keeping his elbows perched on the armrests. He knew that if he gave in too easily, Warrister would only ask for more.
“Then you’ll live here starting that night.”
They’d had this particular discussion several times in the past weeks, but Raven was always firm. “No. I’m keeping my own house. I’m a grown man, after all.”
The earl shook his head. “No. There’s just too much for you to learn. Or were you under the impression that gentlemen of the peerage fritter about all day, ringing for their servants and riding through the park? Spend their nights gaming and whoring?”
Well, actually . . . Raven thought wryly but he earned a dark, exasperated look.
“Just as I thought,” Warrister said. “You’ll have investments and estates to manage, tenants to look after, farms to oversee, along with a hundred other things. I’ll need time to teach you.”
Estates and lands? That sounded like an inheritance that he didn’t really earn. “I don’t want to be handed anything. That isn’t why I’ve come here.”
“You’re a Northcott and my heir. Whether you like it or not, these responsibilities will fall to you,” he said, his features set and immovable. “Had I found you as an infant, you would have been raised in my house. I’d have had a lifetime to prepare you, but that time is coming swiftly to an end.”
Raven didn’t want to think about losing the man he’d only just discovered. But even he knew death was an inevitable part of life. And, during whatever time they had left, he realized with a pang of yearning, he wanted to make the earl proud.
He drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I wouldn’t know the first thing about estate management.”
“You have a sharp mind from the work you’ve done for Mr. Sterling. And from what Sanders tells me about your house, you’ve got a good head for property and for knowing what repairs would need to be done. I used to manage it all on my own,” he said, looking down at his gnarled hands only to shake his head. “But I’ve had to rely on my stewards for too many years.”
Raven offered another short, conciliatory nod. “I’ll need to give proper notice to Reed Sterling. He is not only my employer but like a brother to me. I won’t abandon him.”
“Understandable,” Warrister said, then sat forward with a glint in his eye, as if he felt he’d gained the upper hand. “And you can keep your house as long as you hire servants.”
He paused, considering. “I will concede only to hiring a cook for the time being.”
“I want you here in the mornings to break your fast and we’ll discuss your duties while my mind is still sharp.”
“My lord, I highly doubt there is a time of day when your wits are not edged with the precision of a cutpurse’s blade,” Raven said, surprised his palms weren’t sweating by now.
“Grandfather,” he said with resolute tenacity. “You’ll call me grandfather from this point forward. Is that clear?”
The old codger was always pushing for a bit more. But a grin tugged at Raven’s lips nonetheless. “Very well . . . Grandfather.”
Even after such an intense debate, Raven felt lighter somehow when he left the room. As if a great stone had been pried from his chest.
He had a grandfather now, and he had Jane. They were all the family he needed. All he ever wanted.
Knowing he would see her again this afternoon for tea, his thoughts were distracted as he walked down the stairs to the foyer. He nearly collided with a man stepping in from the rain.
The figure in the doorway paused, back turned to shake the droplets from the brim of his beaver top hat. “Take my coat, will you? And fetch me a whisky while you’re at it.”
Raven remembered the voice and instantly bristled, the hair on the back of his neck standing on end. Staring at the sharp profile, the hawklike nose and silver streaked sandy hair, he recalled the man from a confrontation at Sterling’s.
Straightening his shoulders, Raven growled, “Take off your own bloody coat.”
The man whipped around, blue eyes flashing daggers. They widened in twin recognition. “You! What are you doing in my uncle’s home?”
“Paying a call on my grandfather.”
It felt good to say it aloud to another person.
It felt even better to see the shock on this prig’s face.
Raven said nothing more and simply walked past him, through the open doorway. Yet, it didn’t escape his notice that the man was likely Lord Herrington, his father’s cousin—the same man who’d been campaigning for years to be named Warrister’s heir.
This was Raven’s first lesson that, while a man might wish to have a family, he could not always choose them.
* * *
Jane put away all the jars, vials and gallipots from the trestle table in the conservatory, then dressed it in linens and her mother’s finest china and silver. She baked a special cake for Raven’s birthday tea, and Mrs. Dunkley set it on a porcelain pedestal in the center of the table, enrobed in pink icing and sugared flowers.
For the occasion, Jane wore a dress of rose-and-white stripes with flounced sleeves. She wanted to surprise a laugh from him with this color scheme, reminding him of the night they’d met.
Busy fussing with an intricately folded napkin, she heard the door to the garden open and then close. Her heart started turning in an endless revolution. She bit down on her lip to keep from grinning too broadly. He was here.
She turned and her breath caught at the sight of Raven entering the light-filled chamber. He wore a fine suit, the charcoal-colored broadcloth tailored perfectly to his form, and his jaw was freshly shaven above a starched white cravat.
Stopping before her, he bowed, then presented her with a bouquet of bright pink flowers.
“For you, Miss Pickerington.” His gray eyes gleamed with mirth as he glanced to the table. “It seems we are of like mind as usual.”
She smiled and took the flowers, her hands trembling slightly. She didn’t know why she was nervous all of a sudden. Perhaps it was because no one had ever brought her flowers before.
“They’re lovely.” She drew in their sweet aroma, gathering them close. Then, without warning, he picked her up by the waist and twirled her around in circles. Her head fell back on a giddy laugh as she clung to his shoulders. “You’re crushing the flowers.”
“A lesson to you to put them down sooner. You should have known I’d need to have you in my arms straightaway,” he said, nipping lightly along her exposed throat. “And you are positively delectable in pink. Then again, you’re quite tasty out of it, as I recall.”
Her body clenched with tender yearning at the reminder. “Hush now. You mustn’t say things like that because Henry is joining us for tea. No doubt Charles, Phillipa, and the twins would already be here, but they are still writing their final examination essays.”
“Then you leave me no choice but to put you over my shoulder and carry you back to my cave so that I can have my way with you.”
As if to prove it, he held her tighter. His grin brimmed with wicked intent as he began to prowl toward the door.
“You wouldn’t dare!”
“With you, I think I would dare to do just about anything,” he said with a mysterious glint in his eyes. Yet, with patent reluctance that made her heart flutter even more, he lowered her to the stone tiles.
They both heard her brother’s disconsolate shuffle in the hall. But, ever the scoundrel, Raven stole a quick kiss the instant before Henry appeared. Therefore, her cheeks were in high color when he ambled in.
He looked between them before rolling his eyes. “I don’t have to be here for tea, you know. I can go somewhere else and be alone in the silence.”
Recovering herself, she dashed over to her desk to put her disheveled bouquet in one of the jars she’d stashed earlier.
She clucked her tongue. “If melancholia were contagious, I should shoo you from the room post haste. But even Doctor Lockwood said that you should move around a bit during the day. He believes that bed rest is important to aid recovery, but so is good circulation. Thirty minutes out of bed and in the sunlight will do you a world of good, I’m sure.”
“She’s a hard taskmaster, this one,” Raven said, commiserating with Henry. “But perhaps this will help to ease some of the ailment you suffer.”
Reaching into his coat, he withdrew a folded packet of papers. He held them out to her brother, who reached reflexively with the arm encased in a sling and winced before remembering to use his other hand.
Henry issued a taut sigh as he took hold of them. “And what’s this, then?”
“Open it and discover the answer for yourself,” Jane huffed.
Her brother slumped down in a chair and spread the pages wide. He stared at them for a moment, then smiled and laughed out loud. “Compositions for the left hand. You’re a right solid fellow.”
Raven shrugged and came around the table to hold Jane’s chair. “I just happened by a little shop this morning and thought these would keep you occupied during your recovery.”
As she sat down, she smiled up at him, her heart twirling again. Her arteries were surely loomed in a tight swirl like ribbons on a maypole by now.
He gestured to the center of the table with a nod. “And what’s this?”
“It’s a fortune-telling cake,” she said as he took the place beside her. “There are small trinkets tucked inside, so be careful that you don’t bite down too hard.”
“Just don’t get a button in your slice—that’s not a proper fortune,” Henry said.
“I dunno.” Raven glanced to Jane. “I wouldn’t mind a button, as long as it had brown thread. What other fortunes are in there?”
Henry listed them with absent finger-taps on the table as if he were already practicing the music. “There’s always a sovereign. Mother used to get a little cherub in hers, but by the time Theodora was born and the nursery expanded to two rooms, everyone agreed that we should lose that one. And cook always puts a ring in Jane’s cake, but she’s never gotten it in her slice. Then last year, one of us—and I’m not naming names—put a spinster’s thimble inside. Unfortunately, she didn’t get that slice either. But her friend did.”
“And it wasn’t very kind of you,” Jane chided and turned the cake, repositioning it to better her chances. “Thankfully, Ellie is rather fond of thimbles and didn’t take umbrage.”
Raven laid his hand over hers and slipped the cake knife free. “So then which slice do you normally get?”
“Nothing,” Henry chortled. “Her slice is always empty.”
“Ah,” Raven said thoughtfully. “The slice of possibility, where your future is what you make of it.”
Jane smiled and lifted her brows smugly at her brother. “Precisely. It doesn’t matter what the slice holds. In reality, we all forge our own paths.”
However, as she watched Raven cut into the cake, she still hoped to finally get that ring.