“It is a matter of some importance, my lord.”
Harry paused at the foot of the stairs. He looked at her with narrowed eyes. She rubbed her nose against his. “Do you honestly believe, madam, that my will, my resolute, inflexible, unbending will is so easily swayed?”
“Yes,” she said, all but purring in his arms.
“You know me so well,” he said with that wonderful twinkle in his eyes as he started up the stairs.
“My lord, I would not bother you if it was not a matter of some urgency—” Ben was summarily ignored by both Plum and Harry.
“Papa!”
Both Plum and Harry looked up at the shouts that greeted their arrival.
“Papa, you’ll never guess!” India said as she appeared at the landing.
“—but you should know, my lord, about the incident that happened here earlier.”
“I get to tell it, I’m the one who pushed him down the stairs,” Digger said. The other children followed quickly, swarming Harry and Plum, all of them talking at once.
“I pushed him, too, and I’m the eldest.”
“You’re just a lady, I’m an earl.”
Ben gave it another valiant try. “It was just a short while ago, my lord. I was on duty in the hall, as I have been these past three nights—”
“Children—” Harry said, trying to make himself heard above the din.
“Mama, pet Harry!”
“Papa, Andy bit the man, and I kicked his shin, and he ran away!”
“—when a man ran down the stairs, followed by the children.”
“An earl is nothing compared to being the eldest,” India informed her brother. “The eldest is the most important.”
“One at a time! You can’t all speak at once.” Harry ordered. No one paid him any attention.
Plum giggled, filled to overflowing with love and happiness and hope even in the midst of such a maelstrom. Harry knew the worst about her, and he didn’t care.
“He ruined our surprise, too. Tell him, Anne.”
“My lord, the man appeared to have met with some accident, which, Lord Marston later informed me, was of his and the other children’s doing.”
“Pet Harry, Mama!”
“He did, he ruined our surprise. I didn’t like him.”
“I didn’t like him more than you didn’t like him, Anne!”
“An earl is a title. Being eldest isn’t a title, it’s just a thing.”
Harry loved her still! How could she have been so foolish as to ever doubt his strength of character?
“I cannot understand when you all talk at the same time. Calm down, all of you. Who are you talking about?” he asked.
Plum kissed the muscle that was jumping in his jaw. He was the most divine creature on the whole planet.
“Being eldest isn’t a thing! Plum, tell Digger that being eldest is more important than being an earl.”
Perhaps the most divine creature that ever was.
“PET HARRY!”
“Nothing is more important than being an earl except being a marquis or a duke, isn’t that right, Papa?”
And he was hers, all hers. They all were hers, every last one of them, right down to Ben the footman who was so desperately trying to get Harry’s attention. She loved them all — her family.
“You take that back! I didn’t like him the most, not you!”
“Lord Rosse, you must listen. I tried to ascertain the man’s business in the house, but he ran off before I could know what was what.”
Everything was right in her world. Harry knew all, and he loved her, and she loved him, and everyone loved everyone else, and wasn’t life the most fabulous thing that ever was?
“The children later said that the man claimed he knew Lady Rosse, and was attempting to find out the location of her bedchamber.”
“That’s a lie! I told him I didn’t like him, and you didn’t, so I didn’t like him most of all. Papa, tell Andy I didn’t like him most of all.”
“SILENCE!” Harry roared.
“Harry?” Plum asked, her cup of happiness overflowing.
“What?” he barked, then immediately looked contrite.
“I love you. Shall we try The Virgin and the Unicorn toni—” Plum’s eyes widened as Harry’s lovely hazel eyes went dark.
“Man?” she asked him.
“Bedchamber?” he asked her.
They both turned to Ben.
“What man?” Harry yelled. “What was he doing in Plum’s bedchamber? Good God, man, don’t stand there gaping like a fish, tell us what happened!”
Plum nudged Harry until he set her on her feet, clinging to him as the incoherent bits and pieces the children and Ben tripped over each other to tell merged into one horrifying narration.
“It must have been Charles,” Plum said, her happy world crumbling about her. “The description sounds like him, but how could he dare come into the house—”
“He’s a dead man,” Harry snarled.
“And you thought I was bloodthirsty,” Plum said under her breath, then gasped aloud as her husband started for the door, “No, Harry! You can’t call him out, remember?”
Harry paused to shoot her an outraged glare.
She put her hands on her hips, ignoring the captive audience of children and servants who were gathering behind her. She might yield to Harry about other things, but over this she would not, and the sooner he learned that, the happier they all would be. “Even if you did kill him, and I wouldn’t want that because I like living in England, even if you did, it would be too late. The second Charles thinks you’re threatening him, he will tell as many people as he can find the truth about me.”
“It’s my right, Plum,” Harry growled, pacing back and forth before the door. “What the devil am I going to do if I can’t call him out?”
“I don’t know, but there has to be another way.”
Harry paused. “What if I were to thrash him within an inch of his life? He wouldn’t know about that until it happened, and afterward he would not be in any condition to tell anyone.”
There was a distinct wheedling tone to his voice that made Plum want to smile. Such a dear man he was. She pursed her lips and thought it over. “Alas, my darling, if he survived the thrashing, he would tell someone sooner or later, and if he didn’t survive it, you would be hung for murder.”
“Bah,” Harry said, resuming his pacing.
“You see my dilemma,” Plum said, all her attention on her angry spouse. “You see why I had to hire a mur—” She stopped and shooed the children upstairs to bed. They didn’t want to go, but Plum was in no mood for argument. She waved the rest of the servants away, pulling Harry into the library to discuss the situation.
“Harry, sit down, you’re making me dizzy,” she said a few minutes later as he paced a circle around her chair.
“This is ridiculous. I’m to allow — without challenge — the man who dishonored my wife to creep into my house for who knows what reason? I’m supposed to tolerate the scum who dared ruin your name, and let him escape without justice? I’m to turn a blind eye when he threatens you? I won’t have it, Plum! I have to call him out. It’s the only way.”
“Then our lives will be destroyed,” Plum said softly, her gaze on her hands. She knew not one word of blame would ever pass Harry’s lips, but the truth of the matter was simple — she should never have married him. She knew she wasn’t to blame for Charles’s lying to her, but Harry…he was another matter. She had willfully hid the truth from him, and now he and the children and Thom were going to pay the price for her selfishness.
“You’re exaggerating,” Harry scoffed. “Our lives will not be destroyed.”