It was enough, he assured himself. He was content for one night to have kissed her and pleasured himself resoundingly. If she truly insisted he keep his distance, he would respect that, but he would make damned sure her decision was based on as much persuasive information as he could put before her.
As the night settled peacefully into his bones, he closed his eyes and started making a list.
Anna was up early enough the next morning to see to her errand, one she executed faithfully on the first of each month—rain, shine, snow, or heat. She sat down with pen, plain paper, and ink, and printed, in the most nondescript hand she could muster, the same three words she had been writing each month for almost two years: All is well. She sanded that page and let it dry while she wrote the address of an obscure Yorkshire posting inn on an envelope. Just as she was tucking her missive into its envelope, booted footsteps warned her she would soon not have the kitchen to herself.
“Up early, aren’t you, Mrs. Seaton?” the earl greeted her.
“As are you, my lord,” she replied casually, sliding the letter into her reticule.
“I am off to let Pericles stretch his legs, but I find myself in need of sustenance.”
“Would you like a muffin, my lord? I can fix you something more substantial, or you can take the muffin with you.”
“A muffin will do nicely, or perhaps two.” He narrowed his eyes at her. “You aren’t going to be shy with me, are you, Mrs. Seaton?”
“Shy?” And just like that, she blushed, damn him. “Why ever would I…? Oh, shy. Of course not. A small, insignificant, forgivable indiscretion on the part of one’s employer is hardly cause to become discomposed.”
“Glad you aren’t the type to take on, but I would not accost you where someone might come upon us,” the earl said, pouring himself a measure of lemonade.
“My lord,” she shot back, “you will not accost me anywhere.”
“If you insist. Some lemonade before you go out?”
“You are attempting to be charming,” Anna accused. “Part of your remorse over your misbehavior last evening.”
“That must be it.” He nodded. “Have some lemonade anyway. You will go marching about in the heat and find yourself parched in no time.”
“It isn’t that hot yet,” Anna countered, accepting a glass of lemonade, “And a lady doesn’t march.”
“Here’s to ladies who don’t march.” The earl saluted with his drink. “Now, about those muffins? Pericles is waiting.”
“Mustn’t inconvenience dear Pericles,” Anna muttered loudly enough for the earl to hear her, but his high-handedness did not inspire blushes, so it was an improvement of sorts. She opened the bread box—where anybody would have known to look for the muffins—and selected the two largest. The earl was sitting on the wooden table and let Anna walk up to him to hand over the goodies.
“There’s my girl.” He smiled at her. “See? I don’t bite, though I’ve been known to nibble. So what is in this batch?”
“Cinnamon and a little nutmeg, with a caramel sort of glaze throughout,” Anna said. “You must have slept fairly well.”
Now that she was close enough to scrutinize him, Anna saw that the earl’s energy seemed to have been restored to him. He was in much better shape than he had been the previous evening, and—oh dear—the man was actually smiling, and at her.
“I did sleep well.” The earl bit into a muffin. “And he is dear, you know. Pericles, that is. And this”—he looked her right in the eye—“is a superb muffin.”
“Thank you, my lord.” She couldn’t help but smile at him when he was making such a concerted effort not to annoy her.
“Perhaps you’d like a bite?” He tore off a piece and held it out to her, and abruptly, he was being very annoying indeed.
“I’ll just have one of my own.”
“They are that good, aren’t they?” the earl said, popping the bite into his maw. “Where do you go this early in the morning, Mrs. Seaton?”
“I have some errands,” she said, pulling a crocheted summer glove over her left hand.
“Ah.” The earl nodded sagely. “I have a mother and five sisters, plus scads of female cousins. I have heard of these errands. They are the province of women and seem to involve getting a dizzying amount done in a short time or spending hours on one simple task.”
“They can,” she allowed, watching two sizeable muffins meet their end in mere minutes. The earl rose and gave her another lordly smile.
“I’ll leave you to your errands. I am fortified sufficiently for mine to last at least until breakfast. Good day to you, Mrs. Seaton.”
“Good day, my lord.” Anna retrieved her reticule from the table and made for the hallway, relieved to have put her first encounter of the day with his lordship behind her.
“Mrs. Seaton?” His lordship was frowning at the table, but when he looked up at her, his expression became perfectly blank—but for the mischief in his eyes.
“My lord?” Anna cocked her head and wanted to stomp her foot. The earl in a playful mood was more bothersome than the earl in a grouchy mood, but at least he wasn’t kissing her.
He held up her right glove, twirling it by a finger, and he wasn’t going to give it back, she knew, unless she marched up to him and retrieved it.
“Thank you,” she said, teeth not quite clenched. She walked over to him, and held out her hand, but wasn’t at all prepared for him to take her hand in his, bring it to his lips, then slap the glove down lightly into her palm.
“You are welcome.” He snagged a third muffin from the bread box and went out the back door, whistling some complicated theme by Herr Mozart that Lord Valentine had been practicing for hours earlier in the week.
Leaving Anna staring at the glove—the gauntlet?—the earl had just tossed down into her hand.
“Good morning, Brother!”
Westhaven turned in the saddle to see Valentine drawing his horse alongside Pericles.
“Dare I hope that you, like I, are coming home after a night on the town?” Val asked.
“Hardly.” The earl smiled at his brother as they turned up the alley toward the mews. “I’ve been exercising this fine lad and taking the morning air. I also ran into Dev, who seems to be thriving.”
“He is becoming a much healthier creature, our brother,” Val said, grinning. “He has this great, strapping ‘cook/housekeeper’ living with him. Keeps his appetites appeased, or so he says. But before we reach the confines of your domicile, you should be warned old Quimbey was at the Pleasure House last night, and he said His Grace is going to be calling on you to discuss the fact that your equipage was seen in the vicinity of Fairly’s brother yesterday.”
“So you might ply his piano the whole night through,” Westhaven said, frowning mightily at his brother. Val grinned back at him and shook his head, and Westhaven felt some of his pleasure in the day evaporating in the hot morning air. “Then what is our story?”
“You have parted from Elise, as is known to all, so we hardly need concoct a story, do we?”
“Valentine.” Westhaven frowned. “You know what His Grace will conclude.”
“Yes, he will,” Val said as he dismounted. “And the louder I protest to the contrary, the more firmly he’d believe it.”
Westhaven swung down and patted Pericles’s neck. “Next time, you’re walking to any assignation you have with any piece of furniture housed in a brothel.”
They remained silent until they were in the kitchen, having used the back terrace to enter the house. Val went immediately to the bread box and fished out a muffin. “You want one?”