Worth Lord of Reckoning (43 page)

Maybe Worth had known she would?

And yet, Grey looked worried. “Does this mean I can bring up your former employer?”

“If you must.”

“Roberts will be returning to Surrey,” Grey said as he held the front door to the house for her—another small, dear courtesy he hadn’t shown her five years ago. “You could send along a note.”

“A lady does not correspond with a single gentleman to whom she is not related, unless to offer condolences or other socially acceptable sentiments.”

“Jacaranda, the poor blighter’s in love with you,” Grey said when they reached the family parlor. “For once in your life, have pity on the male of the species. Write to him.”

She was well and truly done having pity on the males of the species.

“What I have to say to Worth Kettering can be said in person, Grey. I’ve made the mistake once before of thinking my sentiments were returned, and I was egregiously in error. Now I
know
my sentiments are shared with the object of my affections, and I owe the man an honest recitation. His affection for me was not in doubt when I left Trysting, I can only hope he still holds me in high regard.”

Vaguely, she heard somebody clearing his throat behind her, but she went on even in front of some embarrassed footman, because Grey needed to let this drop once and for all.

“I have come home, I’ve seen you through the house party, I’ve sorted out matters with Daisy. I’ve put your house to rights, and even dispensed advice to Francine, but it’s time I put my own house in order, Grey.”

She’d known she loved Worth Kettering when she’d left Surrey. Now she knew that she needed him as well. She didn’t need him as a large household needed organization and effort to run smoothly, she needed him as a woman needs to love and be loved.

“Er, Jacaranda?” Grey, who never dithered, was dithering.

“You must simply learn to muddle along without me,” she went on, because this was something Grey should understand. “I have my own life to live, my own matters to tend to. I never told Worth Kettering I loved him. I didn’t think I deserved to impose my feeling on him, didn’t want to risk that he might not—what?”

Grey looked like he’d swallowed bad fish, but he managed to point over Jacaranda’s left shoulder. She turned and saw Worth Kettering standing in the family parlor, his expression arrested while the butler beside him wrung his hands.

“Lady Jacaranda has a caller. Mr. Worth Kettering,” the butler explained, his ears as red as the fall mums gracing the sideboard.

“
Worth?
” There he was, looking just as handsome and fit as ever, though not particularly happy.

“I’m sure you two have things to chat about.” Grey sketched a bow and escaped right behind the retreating butler, leaving Jacaranda ready to melt into a puddle of mortification.

Joyful mortification, if such a thing were possible.

“Have you come for your horse?” she asked, taking two steps into the family parlor.

Worth walked right past her and pulled the door shut with a definitive bang. The next thing she knew, he was kissing her like they’d been parted for years, not mere weeks.

Though weeks could be eternities when a woman was in love.

“So give me the words,” he growled. “Don’t make me drag them from you, because I haven’t come for the damned horse. I’ve come to retrieve my heart.”

“Your h-heart?”

“Say the words, Jacaranda, and then, by God, it’s my turn.”

“I’ve missed you,” she said, searching his face, for his mood was not that of a man glad to hear a lady’s declaration. His mood was like nothing she’d observed in him before.

He dropped his hands from her arms. “I’ve brought you a bank draft.”

“Thank you.” Because he could have resorted to the mails or to a messenger. He hadn’t, and Jacaranda’s heart rejoiced simply to see him.

“Don’t you want to know the amount of the draft?”

“You don’t owe me interest, Worth, not for a few weeks’ loan of such a paltry amount.”

Still his expression gave away nothing.

“I wanted you to have your cottage, Lady Jacaranda. I can go home again to Grampion in part because of you, and I wanted you to be able to buy your cottage, though that’s not all I want.”
He passed her an official-looking paper. Jacaranda couldn’t spare it a glance.

“You mean Complaisance Cottage?”

“If it’s ever for sale, you can afford it now.”

She glanced at the document and saw a sum many times what she’d lent him. “Worth, there’s a mistake. I know you are a conscientious solicitor, but this—”

“Thank the captain of the Drummond. My ship came in, so to speak.”

“Yolanda told me about the Drummond. She was very worried for you.” Jacaranda had worried for him, too, but not about his finances. Never that. “What did you do?”

“May we sit?”

Sitting meant he wasn’t leaving, and Jacaranda would get her turn to speak. “Of course. Shall I ring for tea?”

“Hang the damned tea.”

Hang the damned tea?

“Don’t look at me like I’ve sprouted horns, a tail and cloven feet.” He patted the place beside him. “Sit where my nose at least can plunder your charms.”

That sounded more promising, more like her Mr. Kettering. “Worth, you aren’t making sense.”

“No, I suppose I’m not.” He didn’t say another word until she’d dutifully taken her place exactly where she wanted to be, right against his side. “Better,” he said. “I invested your funds in shares in a ship thought lost at sea. The shares were available for a pittance, the cargo was very valuable, and here you are.”

Here you are, a small fortune, simple as that. “But why?”

“Because when you take your morning tea at your cottage, tossing the crumbs to the sea birds, I wanted you to think of me and the pleasures we shared. I wanted to make you happy, though you’ve said things that lead me to hope I might see this cottage.”

A pure, piercing joy curled up from Jacaranda’s middle. She’d been determined to fight to regain his esteem, but Worth was so generous, so kind, and his actions spoke so very, wonderfully loudly.

“The cottage is leased. Grey has to lease it out when he can, but I’d love to show it to you.”

Worth pushed her hair behind her ear. “Buy out the rest of the leasehold. You can afford it easily, my dear. Put a new steeple on the local church if it suits your whim. You’re modestly wealthy, Jacaranda, and you can do as you please.”

“I have a much better sense now of what will please me.”

“About time you had a care for your own happiness,” he said, glaring at her. “Which brings me to the next negotiating point.”

“You look very stern, Worth, but I am grateful for the money.”

“I care that”—he snapped his fingers before her nose—“for the money. You had ten shares, Jacaranda. I had two hundred, Prinny had two hundred, my brother had fifty, and the other forty were owned by other small investors.”

“Two hundred?”

“I did not think it wise to earn more than my sovereign.”

“Angels abide.” Two hundred? She gave up trying to do the math.

“You are stalling, Lady Jacaranda.” Worth still looked ferociously stern. “I overheard your charming diatribe to your brother and must disabuse you of an odd misperception.”

She did not say a word lest the hope beating in her chest find some foolish admission with which to mortify her.

“In some matters, a lady is not allowed to go first.
I love you.
Does that put your house in order? I want you for my wife and for my lady—I’m to suffer a damned barony for this summer’s folly. A knighthood simply won’t do when Prinny’s in a magnanimous mood. I want to wake up beside you every morning until I’m so old, I know you’re there only because your fragrance assures me it’s so. If I’d known you were willing, I would have brought a special license with me, for God’s sake. I love you, I will always love you. Is that clear enough?”

“You’re quite sure?” How she would love teasing him, and managing his households, and his babies, and his—

“I said…” He was winding up for a shouting match, and then he fell silent. He slid to his knee, and not in any romantically debonair posture. He laid his cheek against her thigh and circled her waist with his arms.

“I love you,” he said, quietly but clearly. “I did not feel it fair to inflict my sentiments on you when all you wanted was a frolic or some comfort when far from home. Then, I did not feel it fair to inflict my sentiments on you when your family needed you so. After that, I did not think it fair to make you choose between my importuning and setting things to rights with your siblings. I finally get up my courage to come here and pluck you from your fairy cottage, and I find you telling your damned idiot brother—”

She stroked her fingers over his hair.

“You didn’t let me have my turn, Worth. I’m slow at this business of setting things to rights. I must have a turn, too.”

“I’m a solicitor. We’re long-winded, and I’m not finished.” He subsided against her knees. “I love you, you make my house a home, you brought my family together. I have my brother back, a sister…” He fell silent again, holding her as if his every dream and wish hung on her next utterance, though he had to know how she felt.

Jacaranda took a moment to let wonder and joy flood through her while she tried to organize words that would equal the ones he’d given her. She slid to her knees, too, holding on to him as if he was her every happy memory, including those yet unborn.

“I love you, Worth Reverence Kettering. I love the physical strength and competence of you, the way you sit that great black beast as if you were born on his back—and he misses you, too, by the way. I love your mind, it’s as quick and brilliant as lightning, and I love your kindness to the opera dancers, and to me, and your family, and I love your generosity, for I know of no other who would share a fortune with both the Regent and the small investors, I love your body—”

He smothered the rest of her litany with his kisses, and right there on the floor behind the locked door to the Dorning family parlor, Lord and Lady Trysting conceived the first of their many lovely daughters.

They turned out to be great strapping beauties, with their father’s head for money and their mother’s ability to manage anything—and anybody—they took a fancy to.

And they all, all of them, with their cousins and uncles and eventually with some brave aunties as well, lived happily ever after.

THE END

Continue reading for an excerpt from
The Captive
, by Grace Burrowes (July 2014), first book in The Captive Hearts trilogy

“Your Grace, you have a caller.”

Christian had been at his London town house for three days and nights, and still his entire household, from butler to boot boy, seemed helpless not to beam at him.

He’d been tortured, repeatedly, for months, and they were grinning like dolts. To see them happy, to feel the weight of the entire household smiling at him around every turn made him furious, and that—his unabating, irrational reaction—made him anxious.

Even Carlton House had sent an invitation, and Christian’s court attire would hang on him like some ridiculous shroud.

The butler cleared his throat.

Right. A caller. “This late?”

“She says her business is urgent.”

By the standards of London in springtime, nine in the evening was one of the more pleasant hours, but by no means did one receive calls at such an hour.

“Who is she?”

Meems crossed the study, a silver tray in his hand bearing a single card on cream vellum.

“I do not recall a Lady Greendale.” Though a Greendale estate lay several hours ride from Severn. Lord Greendale was a pompous old curmudgeon forever going on in the Lords about proper respect and decent society. An embossed black band crossed one corner of the card, indicating the woman was a widow, perhaps still in mourning.

“I’m seeing no callers, Meems. You know that.”

“Yes, quite, Your Grace, as you’re recovering. Quite. She says she’s family.” Behind the smile Meems barely contained lurked a worse offense yet: hope. The old fellow hoped His Grace might admit somebody past the threshold of Mercia House besides a man of business or running footman.

Christian ran his fingertip over the crisp edge of the card. Gillian, Countess of Greendale, begged the favor of a call. Some elderly cousin of his departed parents, perhaps. His memory was not to be relied upon in any case.

Duty came in strange doses. Like the need to sign dozens of papers simply so the coin earned by the duchy could be used to pay the expenses incurred by the duchy. Learning to sign his name with his right hand had been a frustrating exercise in duty. Christian had limited himself to balling up papers and tossing them into the grate rather than pitching the ink pot.

“Show her into the family parlor.”

“There will be no need for that.” A small blond woman brushed past Meems and marched up to Christian’s desk. “Good evening, Your Grace. Gillian, Lady Greendale.”

She bobbed a miniscule curtsy suggesting a miniscule grasp of the deference due his rank, much less of Meems’s responsibility for announcing guests. “We have family business to discuss.”