Always a Rogue, Forever Her Love (Scandalous Seasons #4)(15)

A renewed sense of eagerness filled her. The sooner she began molding his sisters into models of proper, English gentility, then the sooner she could attain Rosecliff Cottage and freedom from her brother.

How difficult could three girls really be?





Chapter 5


His butler, Smith, opened the door and bowed. Jonathan held a finger up to his mouth, but too late. “Good afternoon, my lord.” The graying man with his loss of hearing spoke even louder than the vendors hawking their goods in the bustling London streets.

“Smith,” Jonathan drawled. He shrugged out of his cloak and handed it over to the man’s waiting, heavily wrinkled hands. Perhaps he could make it to his rooms before the final echo of Smith’s greeting reached—

“Wherever have you been, Jonathan?”

He winced. Too late. He directed a lazy smile, up the stairs to where his mother stood, a hand resting on the top rail. She looked for all the world a cross between Joan of Arc prepared to battle and Queen Charlotte herself, stern-faced with disappointment. “Mother,” he greeted, as he climbed the stairs.

She launched right into her disapproval. “Where were you last evening?” She tossed her hands up, as she’d grown accustomed to doing for all the Tidemore offspring. “At your clubs, I gather.”

He reached the landing, and paused to drop a kiss on her ageless cheek. “At my clubs,” he confirmed. However, what enthralled him wasn’t what had occurred inside the Hell and Sin Club, but rather what had taken place outside the gaming hell. Specifically inside his carriage with a certain, freckled beauty.

Mother pointed her gaze to the ceiling. “You think to soften my disappointment?”

He winked. “Did it work?”

“Hardly.” She snorted. “I’m not one of your moon-eyed young ladies, Jonathan. It will take a good deal more than a kiss on the cheek and a sly wink to soften my displeasure.”

Jonathan sighed, and clasped his hands behind his back, as they started onward to his rooms.

“To your office,” she commanded like Lord Nelson himself.

He bit back a curse and cast a single, longing glance down the corridor to where the comfort of his own rooms could be found. “Not my rooms?”

Her jaw set. “Not your rooms, and certainly not after you spent the night gaming…and doing all manner of other inappropriate things.” Color filled her cheeks.

Jonathan shot a sideways glance at his mother. “My activities last evening were perfectly respectable.”

They hadn’t involved too much drink, or any obliging young woman in his bed. Though he’d very dearly wanted a particular young woman in his bed last evening. That should constitute a perfectly respectable evening.

“You must help Patrina make a match.”

They reached his office and Jonathan opened the door, gesturing for Mother to enter ahead of him. He looked over his shoulder. Perhaps if he made a quick beeline…

“Do not even consider it.”

With a long sigh, he entered the room, and closed the door behind them. “Patrina does not need my assistance making a match,” he said as he walked over to the sideboard and poured himself a glass of port. He’d not see her wed to any lack-wit who didn’t have the sense to court her without prodding on Jonathan’s part. He picked his glass up and took a drink.

“All young ladies need the guidance of their older brother, my dear,” his mother said chidingly. She folded her hands in front of her and took an audible breath. “Which brings me back to the reason for our meeting right now, Jonathan. Your sisters,” she shook her head forlornly. “They are in desperate need of guidance.” Mother cast a longing glance over at his sideboard and for a very long moment he suspected she wanted to pour herself a glass of liquid fortitude.

He took another sip. “They’re perfectly lovely,” he said defensively. Yes, his sisters, all four of them were spirited, and tended to utter the occasional curse, but he’d not turn them into the placid, English miss. A grin tugged at his lips as he thought of the impossible charge he’d tasked Miss Marshville with.

“You are a good brother, for the most part,” his mother seemed inclined to amend. “I do not know how I failed all of my children. I know with your father’s death, you indulged them. But you’ve allowed them too much freedom. Riding. Shooting. Hunting. You,” she motioned to him. “Well, I understand. Those are the expected behaviors of a gentleman. But your sisters. No single woman, not a governess, nor any of the nursemaids from their younger years could have ever undone such an influence.” She eyed his port covetously.

Jonathan held it up as a kind of offering.

His mother gave her head a shake, and seemed to snap herself from the woeful, self-pitying state. “They are not perfect,” she said bluntly. “They’re in dire need of ladyification.”

He coughed around his drink. “Is that even a word?”

“No, but it should be.” His mother frowned. “Now, stop distracting me this instance. We need to—”

“I found a governess for the girls.”

His mother went silent. Then, “You did what?”

“A governess,” he said after he’d taken another drink. “A polished young lady.” A crimson beauty with fast fingers and fire in her eyes. He thought back to his meeting with Miss Marshville whose first name he didn’t even know. “She’s quite accomplished at needlepoint and watercolors,” he opted to slightly exaggerate the young lady’s abilities. “She is proficient on the pianoforte.” But I can imagine a good deal many more enjoyable activities to occupy those long fingers.