Village of Trentham
Elinor washed the blood from her hands and turned back to the young boy. His eyes were crusted with dried tears and his lids had become heavy. He would sleep soon enough. She motioned to the boy’s mother to step outside.
“He’ll be fine, Mrs. Carruthers. It was only a shallow cut. The skull tends to bleed quite freely, so it appeared worse than it was. He will sleep the day through from the small amount of laudanum I gave him. Tomorrow he can resume his normal diet but keep him indoors and quiet for a few days.”
“Oh thank you, Lady Trentham!” The older woman wiped tears from her weather-reddened cheeks and took Elinor’s hand and kissed the back of it before Elinor knew what she was doing. “I was that frantic when I went to Doctor Venable’s house and learned he was off helpin’ Squire’s eldest with her first labor. But for you my boy would have died. I know he would.”
Elinor gently tugged her hand away from the woman’s viselike grasp. “No, no, he most certainly wouldn’t have. It was only a small cut, ma’am, nothing life-threatening. Now, you should take him home, before he wakes up.”
“I’ve got no money, my lady.” Her ruddy cheeks darkened even more.
“Please don’t concern yourself with that, Mrs. Carruthers.”
“Mr. Carruthers is fixed to bring in the lambs soon. I’ll bring you a fine leg of lamb.”
“That will be lovely.”
Mrs. Carruthers finally left, taking her sleeping child and embarrassing gratitude with her, leaving Elinor to tidy up her surgery. She’d learned to take the gifts her patients offered, even when they couldn’t afford to give such things away and Elinor didn’t need them. But she didn’t wish to insult the goodhearted folk and she always found a place for the offerings, usually in some other needy household; God knew there were enough of them on the current Earl of Trentham’s lands.
Elinor frowned as she bundled up the soiled linen. She liked thinking about her dead husband’s nephew—the current earl—almost as much as she liked thinking about her dead husband, which was to say not at all.
Instead, she turned her mind to the work she had yet to finish today. She was studying the human digestive system and had not completed the essay Doctor Venable had assigned her.
She finished cleaning the small surgery and was about to commence her studies when Beth bustled in, her plump, rosy cheeks bright with two spots of color.
“You must come with me, my lady. Quickly now. His lordship approaches with a guest.” Beth glanced around the room, her mouth tightening with disapproval. “You know how the earl feels about, well . . . about what it is you do here.”
Elinor closed the medical text she’d only just opened. “Fortunately I don’t need to concern myself with his lordship’s likes or dislikes, Beth. I am free of all male interference and direction in my life until I shuffle off my mortal coil.”
Beth frowned. “Well I don’t know nothin’ about those kinds of coals, my lady, but I do know you’ve blood on your second-best muslin. Come now, we must make haste.”
Her maid scolded Elinor nonstop as she dragged her from the outbuilding that served as her surgery toward the Dower House, which was her home. Beth did not stop when they reached her chambers. Instead, she yanked off the offending gown and then clucked and fussed as she garbed Elinor in her third-best morning gown.
“This dress is shameful, my lady. I can’t turn the hem again, it’s all but threadbare.”
“Where did you speak to Lord Trentham?” Elinor asked, before Beth could launch into her favorite topic: the dismal state of Elinor’s wardrobe.
“He was bound for town when I was coming back from the market, my lady.” She paused in the act of fastening the small buttons to cast a rapturous glance at Elinor. “With him was the most handsome man I have seen in . . . well . . . maybe ever.”
“Oh? Who is this paragon?”
“He’s not a foreigner, my lady, but a proper gentleman.”
Elinor bit back a smile. “A paragon is something of unsurpassed excellence, Beth, not a foreign dignitary.”
“He has the most beautiful green eyes,” Beth continued, not interested in a vocabulary lesson. “And hair the color of polished copper. He was dressed bang up to the nines, my lady, and made his lordship look quite dull. His coat was a dark mustard shade with—”
Elinor held up one hand. “Green, copper, mustard? He sounds quite vulgar. Did his hat have bells?”
Beth grunted. “Oh you do like to tease, my lady.” She gave Elinor’s shawl a few twitches before stepping back to admire her handiwork in the mirror. Her smile faltered.
“Poor Beth,” Elinor chuckled, patting her maid’s hand. “I don’t give you much to work with, do I?” She stumped toward the door, her leg heavy and awkward from standing too long in her surgery.
“Oh, my lady, what a thing to say. Why, you’ve a sweet figure and such lovely eyes. And beautiful, thick hair, if you’d only let me—”
“I suppose I must offer them tea,” Elinor said, stopping her maid before she could get started on yet another of her favorite harangues: Elinor’s person and how she failed to make the most of it. “Will you have Hetty send in some of her currant buns. They are just the sort of thing to appeal to gentlemen. I shall receive them in the library,” she added, closing the door on her servant’s protests before limping down the narrow stairs to the second floor.
She would receive her visitors in the book-lined room no matter that it defied convention—or maybe because it defied convention—and would irritate her dead husband’s successor.
Elinor loathed Charles Atwood, the Fifth Earl of Trentham, and he loathed her right back. He was a greedy, self-absorbed man who did a dreadful job caring for the estate and its people. He’d never been satisfied that he’d inherited the title, the properties, and the bulk of the wealth from his dead uncle—the fourth earl—and he still resented Elinor’s meager jointure of a thousand pounds per annum and the use of the Dower House.
The man would like nothing better than to see her cast out of house and home. Luckily for Elinor, the only way he could get his wish was if he sold off the estate; finding somebody willing to purchase the dilapidated house and estate would be next to impossible in the current environment.
Elinor pushed the matter from her mind as she dropped into her chair and began to tidy the clutter that seemed to accrete on her desk no matter how hard she tried to be neat.
She’d just finished re-shelving a pile of books when the library door swung open.
“The Earl of Trentham and Mr. Stephen Worth,” Beth announced, flinging out the names with enough pomp to satisfy a prince.
Charles strode into the library as if he owned it. Which he did, of course. Behind him came the most striking man Elinor had ever seen. His hair was the burnished hue of copper and his eyes were the vivid green of emeralds. If that wasn’t enough, his features and person were the stuff of mythic heroes. It was hard work dragging her eyes back to the earl’s less-than-appealing figure.
Charles gave her a perfunctory bow. “Good afternoon, Elinor. You are looking lovely today.” He smirked at his own lie. “Mr. Worth, may I present to you my aunt, Lady Trentham. Elinor, this is Mr. Stephen Worth.”
The paragon towered several inches above Charles, his broad shoulders, buckskin-clad thighs, and highly polished boots dominating the room. He fixed his beautiful eyes on her face and his full lips curved in a way that resurrected her long-slumbering heart and set it hammering against her ribs like a lunatic pounding on a cell door.
“It is a pleasure to meet you, my lady.” His accent was unusual and Elinor struggled to place it as he took her hand and bowed over it. She refused to wear gloves, much to Beth’s chagrin, and her hands were not those of a lady. For the first time in memory, Elinor felt the urge to hide her calloused, chapped fingers from this perfect, elegant creature. She settled for removing her hand as quickly as politely possible.
“You are not from England, Mr. Worth?” She was pleased to hear her voice sounded normal, no matter how strangely the rest of her body was behaving.
His teeth were a flash of white in his tanned face. “No, my lady, I’m from England’s prior upstart colony.” His cocky smile belied his humble words.
“One could hardly call the United States an upstart.”
His smile turned wry. “I thought the same thing until I spent a Season in London.”
Elinor couldn’t help smiling. What a shock the burnished, gorgeous creature must have given the pale aristocrats who dominated the ton.
“Mr. Worth is here on business, Elinor,” Charles broke in, clearly in no mood for social banter. “He represents Siddons Bank of Boston.” His pale blue eyes, so like those of Elinor’s dead husband, watched her with the cold intensity of a snake.
“Naturally I’ve heard of Siddons,” Elinor murmured. Did Charles mean the man was in England for business? Or in Trentham for business? Just what was Charles up to?
The door opened and Beth entered bearing a large tea tray.
Elinor gestured to her desk and Beth’s frown told Elinor what her servant thought of such a barbaric notion, but Elinor ignored her. For some reason, she was not inclined to leave the safety of her desk to serve tea today.
“Mr. Worth recently assisted the Duke of Coventry with his, er, entail issue,” Charles said the instant the door closed behind Beth.
Elinor’s hand shook at the word ‘entail’ and tea sloshed over the rim of the cup and pooled in the saucer.
“How clumsy of me,” she murmured, her hand trembling as she lowered the teapot. She looked up to find two sets of eyes on her. One pair was, predictably, malicious and the other? Well, she didn’t know what she saw in the American’s eyes. Curiosity? Boredom? Thirst?
“Do you take milk or sugar, Mr. Worth?”
“Milk and two sugars, please.”
Elinor fixed his tea, filled a plate with an assortment from the tray, and looked up. The American rose and came to take the cup. He was tall and well-formed and moved with the grace of an athlete.
“Much obliged, my lady,” he said, his unusual accent pleasing to her ear. Indeed, there was nothing about him that did not appear pleasing; except perhaps his reasons for coming to Trentham.
Elinor turned away from his disturbingly appealing person and prepared Charles’s tea. She was relieved to have something to busy her hands with as she asked her next question.
“But Blackfriars is not entailed.” She lifted the cup and saucer toward him, grateful her hand was no longer shaking.
Charles took the proffered cup and waved away the plate of food.
“No, it is not. But that is not the only service Mr. Worth’s bank offers.”
A sick feeling began to expand in her stomach. “Oh?”
“I need to consider my options,” Charles said with a smirk. “You, more than anyone, should know the property is a horrific drain on my purse, Elinor. You watched for almost a decade as it drained my uncle of his resources. It will hardly get better as crop prices continue to fall. We beat the French in battle but they will have their revenge with the plow. We simply cannot compete with them when it comes to agriculture and it is foolish to try.”
Elinor ignored his self-serving argument.
“The property is vastly underutilized, Charles. Blackfriars would provide far more revenue if you made the necessary repairs to attract more tenants. Easily half the land goes un-worked and many of the cottages are—”
Charles waved his hand, his thin lips twisting into a condescending smile. “Things are far different now than they were even five years ago. Landed gentry are an anachronism and the sooner men of sense and vision recognize that fact, the better it will be for all of Britain. Farming is a thing of the past, isn’t it, Worth?”
The American set down his cup and saucer and gave a slight shrug of his broad shoulders. “Perhaps you have oversimplified the matter, my lord.” He turned to Elinor, his smile apologetic. “Even so, I’m afraid the earl has the right of it, Lady Trentham. English agriculture was under assault even before Waterloo. The economy is far from robust and the great landed estates of England can no longer survive decades of mismanagement as they have in the past.”
Charles blinked at the other man’s words and then frowned, as if he couldn’t possibly have heard the American correctly. He turned from the American to Elinor and continued with his argument.
“It is manufacturing we should turn our attention to now. I say let the Frenchies do the farming.”
Elinor ignored the earl’s foolish bravado and smoothed the fabric of her skirt. Beth was correct; her blue muslin was no longer fit to be seen. The seams had been turned so often they were visible even from a distance. She must seem like a ragamuffin to the wealthy, beautifully attired American.
She looked up and caught the object of her ruminations staring, his green eyes intense with something that looked like . . . fury? Elinor flinched back and he dropped his gaze to his plate, depriving her of a better look. He picked up a piece of biscuit and placed it between his shapely lips before looking up again, his expression as mild as milk.
Elinor realized she’d been holding her breath and exhaled. She must have misread his expression; what would he have to be furious about? It was Elinor who should be angry with him, particularly if he was here for the reason she suspected.
“You helped the duke break entail? Is that something bankers do in your country, Mr. Worth?”
He didn’t smile, but somehow Elinor knew he found her rather tart question amusing.
“Not in the general way, my lady, but I am also a lawyer. As such, I find antiquated property law matters diverting.” His eyes flickered across Elinor, her desk, and the rest of the shabby room, as if entails weren’t the only quaintly amusing thing England had to offer. “You could almost say the topic of entails is something of a hobby for me.”
Elinor opened her mouth to ask him what it was he enjoyed so much about destroying ancient estates but Charles cut in before she could speak.
“Mr. Worth isn’t here to talk about entails, Elinor. He believes his bank might be interested in acquiring Blackfriars.”
Elinor was not stupid. She knew the only reason Charles and his weak-chinned son—a man as devoid of all sense and decency as his father—hadn’t already sold Blackfriars was because of the dearth of eager buyers for such a property. The land was in bad enough condition, but the house itself would require a monstrous amount of money to repair and operate.
She gave the American a coolly appraising glance, hoping it hid the sick feeling that had begun in her stomach and was rapidly migrating out to the rest of her body.
“Is acquiring unprofitable estates another of your hobbies, Mr. Worth?”
He smiled at her chilly tone. “Our bank is always looking for good investments. I will need to do a great deal of research before I can assess a proper value.”
Elinor found his smooth, confident manner more than a little annoying, especially since he was talking of selling her home out from under her, although she wondered if that were legal.
“If the English agricultural model is so antiquated, why is your bank interested in acquiring an agricultural property?”
“We invest in a wide variety of interests, Lady Trentham. I did not say we had decided to offer for the property. It is far too soon to say whether Blackfriars and Siddons Bank will be a proper fit. I will have to spend some time in the area before I can make such a determination.”
His bland expression would have done a parson proud. Why, then, did Elinor suddenly feel breathless and anxious, like she was racing along the edge of a cliff on a skittish and unpredictable mount?
She looked away from his placid but disturbing gaze. “Do try a currant bun, Mr. Worth, they are quite delicious.”
Stephen tossed his hat and gloves onto the rickety walnut console table and yanked on the tattered bell pull. He had only been a guest at Blackfriars a few days but already knew it was best to summon a servant long before you had need of one.
He struggled out of his close-fitting riding coat, yet again cursing the absence of Bains, his valet of six years. He’d hated to leave the man behind in Boston, but he’d had little choice in the matter. His business in England was far too sensitive to jeopardize with loose talk, and nobody knew better than Stephen how servants liked to talk.
No, the only employee he could trust on this venture was Fielding, a man so close-mouthed he might as well be mute. But Stephen had foolishly sent the taciturn man away on a fact-finding mission, so now he didn’t even have Fielding’s rather savage ministrations. It had been a bloody long time since he’d had to valet himself.
Stephen could almost hear Jeremiah, his old mentor, laughing at him. “You are a vain, comfort-loving creature, Stephen,” the old Puritan had scolded him many times.
Even though he’d been one of the wealthiest men in America at his death, Jeremiah Siddons had lived like an ascetic, viewing most luxuries as un-Godly and a sign of weakness.
Stephen did not suffer from such qualms. He’d worked hard and sacrificed much to afford the luxuries he could now command. He frowned at the dusty, yellowed drapes and threadbare carpeting around him and sighed. Well, luxuries he could command everywhere except Blackfriars, a house whose amenities were as gothic as its appearance.
It irked him beyond bearing to sleep on damp sheets and take shallow, tepid baths. Fielding might be a disaster when it came to clothing or barbering, but the man did an adequate job of ensuring Stephen had the bare minimum of comforts.
Still, he’d not hired Fielding to be his valet. He’d engaged the man to manage sensitive business matters, which the taciturn man handled with absolute discretion, tact, and ruthless efficiency.
Stephen had also promised his surly servant ample time to pursue his own affairs. Private affairs Stephen knew little about and wished to keep that way.
No, Fielding was not a valet. He was not even a normal employee. Fielding was not a normal anything.
Stephen pushed away thoughts of his enigmatic servant and surveyed the gloomy, moth-eaten chamber, no doubt the best one the earl had to offer. While the obvious decay might be uncomfortable, it was a good sign for Stephen’s purposes. Lord Trentham was desperate for money—ripe for the picking, as Jeremiah would have said, and then chuckled quietly, as though he’d gotten away with something criminal by speaking the vulgar cant of the streets.
Yes, the greedy Earl of Trentham was as good as in Stephen’s pocket.
He turned his mind to the real purpose for his visit: the Countess of Trentham, the earl’s aunt, who was actually younger than her nephew.
Seeing her after all these years had been like a kick to the throat and Stephen had hardly been able to breathe when he’d entered her library and found her standing there.
For fifteen years this woman had dominated his thoughts. He’d seen her face first thing when he’d woken up every morning and he’d drifted off to sleep with her, often carrying her into his dreams. She’d grown to monolithic proportions in his mind over the years. Today he’d realized the Lady Elinor of his memory was nothing like the reality.
Somehow, she’d grown in stature in his mind and Stephen hadn’t recalled her being so . . . slight. Fairy-like, really. Not that any of that mattered. After all, she was, without a doubt, the same person. For fifteen years he’d planned this, wondering countless times whether she would recognize him when the day came. She should have recognized him: the man whose life she’d ruined. But there hadn’t been even a flicker of recognition in her silver-gray eyes.
Well, why should there be? He’d been nothing but a servant—little more than a serf—and hardly worth remembering. Indeed, in many aristocratic households all the footmen were utterly stripped of their identity and given the same name for the convenience of their employers. The grand Lady Trentham had probably forgotten about the incident entirely.
Stephen’s lips twisted as he contemplated Lord Yarmouth’s arrogant little daughter, the woman who’d turned him into a criminal on the run, banished him to another country, forced him to change his bloody name, and left him blind in one eye.
And she’d done it all with only a kiss.
Not even a good kiss, if his memory served him correctly.
Stephen thought back to her as she’d looked in her cramped, shabby library today. It was clear his recollections had been those of a fifteen-year-old boy. His younger self—that poor, frightened servant—had built her into an irresistible siren in his memory. In reality she was nothing but a diminutive, somewhat colorless, aging matron.
So why had there been such a frisson of excitement when he’d touched her hand? The sharp, jolting sensation had been out of proportion to her size—a mere dab of a woman—and also for a woman possessed of her plain looks.
Oh, she was not homely, he admitted. But neither was she beautiful—hardly the type of woman a man would choose to ruin his life for. Not that he’d been given any say in the matter.
Still, he’d experienced an uncomfortable squeeze in his chest and a definite twinge in his cock when she’d looked up at him with her silvery-gray eyes.
Stephen shrugged away the momentary attraction. It was just his body’s reaction after so many years of anticipation. Besides, he was not, in the main, attracted to slight women. He preferred his women to be more substantial. He was a large man and he appreciated full figures and generous curves—a healthy armful beneath him in his bed.
Not that it mattered what his preferences were. This was business, not pleasure.
The only part of Elinor Trentham he’d remembered correctly was her eyes. They were large, clear, and gray. The last time he’d seen them they’d ranged from haughty to amused to desperate in the span of a few moments. Today they’d been unreadable.
Well, not quite. Stephen smiled. Her eyes had narrowed quite expressively whenever they’d rested on the current earl. Who could blame her? Trentham was a bullying worm of a man. Worse, he was stupid. Only a stupid man would blithely consider selling Blackfriars, one of the finest examples of late Gothic architecture in all of Britain, if not the world. Still, the rambling house would be a drain on a healthy estate, and the Earl of Trentham was not operating a healthy estate. Stephen grinned; the earl’s stupidity and venality worked in Stephen’s favor and would make taking the man’s birthright a true pleasure.
His venality would also help Stephen in his dealings with Elinor Trentham. There was no love lost between the dowager countess and her nephew and he had no qualms about dispossessing her. Trentham had been gleeful when he’d told Stephen the countess had no life estate on the house she occupied.
Yes, the man was lower than pond scum but he would serve Stephen’s purpose admirably.
A pale face with silvery eyes thrust aside all thoughts of the despicable earl. Stephen had spent years doing his research and had read everything written on the English peerage. He knew, for example, the wife of an earl did not take her husband’s surname upon marrying. She was not Elinor Atwood, but Elinor Trentham. She was also not quite what he’d expected, a realization that was a bit . . . unnerving.
He poured himself a stiff brandy from the decanter Fielding had had the good sense to pack. The Earl of Trentham’s spirts and food were as poor as the condition of his house and property.
The dowager countess had spoken the truth today; if the earl had bothered to properly manage his land it would yield more than enough to take care of his people and maintain the house. Unfortunately for Blackfriars and those who relied on it, the revenue could never be enough to support the earl’s most expensive habit: himself.
Not that Stephen was complaining. The earl was so greedy for money it would take no great effort on Stephen’s part to convince him to take the proceeds from the sale of Blackfriars and parlay it into a once-in-a-lifetime investment opportunity. A feral grin twisted Stephen’s lips and he took a deep pull on his glass. Yes, ruining the stupid, grasping earl was almost too easy. Unlike the second, and more important, part of his plan: Elinor Trentham. The countess was far smarter than the earl and another kettle of fish entirely.
Not only did she speak intelligently and knowledgably, but she seemed to lack what the earl possessed in spades: greed. She appeared not only contented with her worn gown and moth-eaten house but managed to project an image of serene superiority. Stephen knew from experience how difficult it was to manipulate people who weren’t greedy for more: more money, more power, more something.
But there had to be something she valued, something he could take from her. Some way he could hurt her.
Stephen would keep looking until he found it.
A soft scratching at the door pulled him from his reverie.
“Come in.”
The door opened and a wench stood in the doorway: the overly friendly maid from the evening before.
“You sent for me, Mr. Worth?” Her blue eyes sparkled and her full lips parted. Wild tendrils of autumn-gold hair escaped from beneath her cap. Her uniform did a similarly unsuccessful job of restraining her ripe body.
Stephen ignored her inviting lips as well as the sudden heaviness in his groin. He had nothing against a quick fuck with an attractive woman—servant or otherwise—but not when he was intent on business, especially business he’d been planning for fifteen long years.
“Have a bath prepared for me.” He tugged his cravat loose and tossed it over the back of a chair. “I prefer water that is almost scalding.” That way it might actually arrive before ice could form on the surface.
Her eyes dropped to his exposed neck. “Very well, Mr. Worth.” She inhaled so deeply Stephen swore he could hear threads popping. “Do you wish for me to . . . attend you?”
The tightness became a genuine swelling as he imagined water sluicing over her bounteous curves and down toward what would most certainly be—
“No,” he said sharply, quashing the fantasy before it could form. “I will attend myself.”
He turned away and waited for the sound of the door shutting before tossing back his drink.
There would be plenty of time for women later.