A Rogue of Her Own (Windham Brides #4)(72)

Those young fools breaking his bones for sport had been from “the best” families. The instructors and headmasters seizing on any pretext to beat him had been beholden to those same families. Brantford, who expected a handsome return on his investment, acted as if he were doing Sherbourne a favor by adding to Sherbourne’s burdens.

The very neighbors who’d boxed Sherbourne into turning a profit from an exorbitantly expensive new venture were titled aristocrats held in high regard throughout the realm—and thanks to Charlotte, they were also Sherbourne’s family.

She was his wife. He’d have her loyal support, and others could learn from her example.

“Tomorrow morning,” Charlotte said, “you send a cheerful note over to Haverford Castle, welcoming Brantford to the neighborhood. You inform him that your lady wife is eager to entertain him as the first official guest following our nuptials, and that all at the colliery is in readiness for a tour on the first available fine day.”

The past few days had seen a flurry of busyness at the works, with string pegged out to mark the houses atop the hill, the first of the tram tracks laid, and laborers from both the Haverford and Radnor holdings swelling the ranks of the masons.

“I’m to be cheerful?” Sherbourne lifted his feet from Charlotte’s lap and pulled on a stocking. “Perhaps you ought to send this note. Cheerfulness eludes me lately.”

She picked up the other stocking. “I can draft the note, but it must be written in your hand. Where is Debrett’s?”

“You don’t have it memorized?”

Charlotte balled up the stocking and pitched it at Sherbourne’s head. “Written correspondence requires different forms of address than greetings offered in person. What is Brantford’s Christian name?”

Sherbourne donned the second stocking and rose. “Quinton, the family name is Bramley, if I recall his signature. Charlotte, may I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“How do you know a Harold Porter, from rural Brecknockshire?”

Sherbourne stood above her, looking tall, tired, and unreadable by the firelight.

Charlotte rose and kissed him while her mind whirled. “An old, old friend. I went to school with his sister.”

“Young ladies do not correspond with single gentlemen,” Sherbourne said. “I may not have taken any firsts at university or spent much time with my nose in Debrett’s, but I know that much.”

“Mr. Porter is married, as am I.” And Heulwen was in for a severe talking to, for Charlotte had asked that the letter to Mr. Porter be taken directly to the posting inn. “Are you reading my correspondence now, Mr. Sherbourne?”

He looped his arms around Charlotte’s shoulders. “I need for this mine to succeed, Charlotte.”

What did that have to do with letters to old friends and Mrs. Wesleys? “Then I need for it to succeed as well.”

They would have remained thus, touching but not exactly embracing before the fire, except Charlotte took the initiative and stepped closer, resting her cheek against Sherbourne’s chest. They had not had a pleasant evening together, though neither had it been unpleasant.

Charlotte mentally began composing a note to his lordship, Quinton, Earl of Brantford—a cheerful note—though it puzzled her that an eighth earl would be named Quinton. A fifth earl might have such a name, while an eighth would more likely be Octavius.

She fell asleep beside Sherbourne an hour later and dreamed of calligraphy written in twine, his lordship’s initials all tangled up with the colliery, the tram tracks, and Sherbourne’s stockings. When she woke in the middle of the night, she was not entwined with her husband.

He was not, in fact, even in the bed.





Chapter Sixteen



“I’m reduced to delivering notes,” Radnor said, passing along Haverford’s epistle to Sherbourne. “If you ever sought revenge on Haverford for past slights, he’s suffering mightily now.”

Sherbourne broke the seal and read what Radnor probably already knew:

Sherbourne,

Brantford will join you for a tour of the works tomorrow at three of the clock, rain or shine. If you were to invite him to dinner thereafter, my duchess would be ever in your debt.

As would I.

Haverford

PS: Her Grace expects to be struck down—even bedridden—by a terrible megrim no later than sundown tomorrow. She will, alas, decline any invitation to join your household for supper. I will remain loyally by my duchess’s side, offering what comfort I can.



Brantford had spent three days underfoot at Haverford Castle, three days during which Sherbourne had rehearsed optimistic speeches, refined detailed estimates, and watched the rain dribble down the library window panes.

“His lordship is not good company?” Sherbourne asked.

“Unlike you, Haverford has probably been troubling himself to be a decent host.” Radnor lifted a glass from the tray on the sideboard. “May I?”

“Of course, but the noon hour has passed. I was about to ask if you’d prefer tea or a tray before the fire.”

Sherbourne hadn’t been about to ask any such thing. Failing to offer a guest libation was a gross oversight, and he could not afford to be making gross oversights. Making more gross oversights.

“I am a bit peckish,” Radnor said. “You aren’t joining your lady wife for a midday meal?”