Always a Rogue, Forever Her Love (Scandalous Seasons #4)(2)

“Then, Mrs. Sampson,” she ticked off on her fingertips.

“Ah, yes, the whole incident with the frogs in the woman’s teacups.”

“In her bonnet, Jonathan. Her bonnet,” Mother said covering her face with her hands and shaking it back and forth. She dropped them back to her side and proceeded to go through the list. “After Mrs. Sampson, there was Mrs. Dundlebottom.”

Jonathan coughed into his hand to bury a laugh, knowing Mother wouldn’t be in a forgiving mood if he were to laugh outright in remembrance of Mrs. Dundlebottom. But really? Mrs. Dundlebottom? And she’d certainly had quite the sizeable, er…bottom. “Whatever happened to Mrs. Dundlebottom?”

“Does it rather matter now?”

No, he supposed it rather didn’t.

“Then there was Mrs. Jenkins.”

He frowned at the reminder of the sour, pinch-faced crony who’d dared to put her hands upon Penelope. She’d slapped his sister but once before he’d turned her out. “Mrs. Jenkins does not count toward the five,” he felt inclined to point out.

Mother folded her arms and tapped her foot in clear annoyance. “I’ll concede on that point, but what of Mrs. Sternwood?”

Had there been a Mrs. Sternwood? That one he didn’t remember. She mustn’t have lasted more than a fortnight. Rather disappointing for a governess with the name of Sternwood. His ears pricked up as he detected the faintest giggle.

Mother lowered her eyebrows. “Whatever is that noise?”

“What noise? Was there a noise? I didn’t hear a sound.” He glanced over Mother’s shoulder to Poppy who peeked her head into his office. She winked at him.

His lips twitched.

“Do you find this amusing, Jonathan? Because I assure you, it is not amusing in the least. I’ve run out of options where governesses are concerned. Why, I have the only girls in the whole of the kingdom without a suitable governess and it is all their fault—”

“Except for Mrs. Jenkins.”

“Yes, except for Mrs. Jenkins,” she concurred. “But that is neither here nor there, because now we’ve lost Mrs. Atleby.”

Jonathan raised his glass and took another swallow. “What do you propose then?”

“What do I propose? What do I propose?” His mother’s voice increased in volume and he winced at the high-pitched sound sharp enough to cut glass. Oh hell, first trotting then screeching, yes, this had only gone bad from worse for the Tidemore siblings. “What I propose Jonathan Marcus Harold Tidemore is that you do your duty and find a suitable countess…”

And she’d taken the conversation this direction. Again. It invariably found its way back to his bachelor state. Some days it would be, ‘I’m planning a dinner party, you need a countess.’ Other days it would be, ‘It is raining. You shouldn’t be out riding, lest you catch a chill and die before you carry on the Sinclair line.’

“I’d found a suitable countess,” he felt inclined to point out. It had hardly been his fault the young lady he’d set his marital sights upon had chosen to marry the more straight-laced, ever-frowning Geoffrey Winters, Viscount Redbrooke.

His mother snorted.

Trotting, screeching, and snorting. Oh, blast and bloody hell.

“I would hardly consider the American young lady you’d taken it into your fool head to court would ever be viewed as suitable countess material.”

Jonathan disagreed. Miss Stone, now, Viscountess Redbrooke, had been a delight. He’d imagined they would have gotten on famously. Considering his mother and four minxes of sisters, the young lady had no idea the certain calamity she’d managed to avoid when she’d selected Redbrooke. “I believe we’ve deviated just a bit,” a lot, “from the real matter of concern.”

Mother blinked. “Oh, well, yes,” she waved a hand. “There is the whole matter of the governesses, but of equal concern is your unwed state.”

And here he’d thought the disaster of his sisters’ governess-less state would have captured Mother’s sole focus for at least a fortnight, allowing him to carry on as he pleased. He sighed. He should have learned long ago that little could alter her matchmaking tendencies. Hell, since he’d inherited the earldom twelve years past, she’d made it a goal to play matchmaker for him.

Jonathan downed the remaining contents of his tumbler and grimaced. Vile brew. He detested the stuff. Since his friend Drake had returned from the Peninsula War several years back, he at least made a concerted effort to avoid all things French.

With the exception of lovely French mistresses, of course.

“Are you listening to me, Jonathan?” his mother’s question snapped into his silent musings.

No. “Yes.”

“No, he wasn’t,” a voice sounded from the doorway.

He set his glass down with a thunk as the eldest of his sisters, Patrina, swept in. At nineteen, she was the only one of them to have officially made her Come Out and hadn’t yet to secure a match, which Jonathan understood. He couldn’t name a single blighter worthy of her…even if she was a bossy bit of baggage most times.

“Trina,” he went and poured himself another whiskey. He held it up in salute.

“I told you not to call me Trina. I’m nineteen, now,” his sister said with a flounce of her black curls.