Page 5 of The Earl Next Door
“Peculiar?” Concern resurfaced in her expression. “What do you mean? There is no reason for us to stand on ceremony, my lord. We are quite familiar with each other now. Speak to me as you would a madam and tell me what made you think my home was a house of ill repute.”
“Very well. An abundance of deliveries of bedchamber furniture going into the building behind this house.”
“Why would that be strange, sir?” she asked him crisply. “Beds are necessary for everyone.”
“And women coming and going at all hours of the day and night.”
“Ah, yes,” she said on a breathy sigh as the meaning of his words became clear to her and she relaxed once again. “Now I understand. Beds and women. What else is a man to think of other than pleasure?”
Lyon felt the only thing he could reasonably do at this point was lift his brows, and say, “For that I can offer no apology.”
“It’s true, there have been many beds delivered. The building behind this house is being furnished as a boarding school for girls, my lord. The women who have been seen coming and going will be their tutors.Currently, some of the women have different jobs they must return to each day. They are free to leave at whatever time they deem necessary to make their other duties and commitments.”
“A boarding school?” he repeated, wondering why the hell his aunt didn’t know that. She was usually one of the first to hear the latest gossip.
“Yes. So whatever tawdry vision you’d imagined would be taking place between these walls tonight or any other won’t be happening. My home is not what you thought it was, and anyone else who assumed the same will have to look elsewhere for his decadences.”
The countess opened the door for him.
Lyon felt his expression softening, his admiration growing. For a number of reasons, including the truth of her words, there was no repairing their inauspicious meeting.
He nodded without further words, turned, and walked out of her house.
Chapter 3
The chill of an early spring wind cooled Lyon’s cheek, but nothing else, as his boots crunched the damp ground on the pathway that led to the pavement in front of the countess’s house. That the long-shrouded sun was trying to peek from behind gray clouds at the end of the day did nothing to change his mood.
Not that it mattered or that he cared, but he finally remembered why he and the countess hadn’t immediately recognized each other. He’d been late attending her debut Season, and she was already betrothed by the time he’d arrived in London that year. Lyon was sure they’d met, but he never pursued another man’s fiancéor wife. There were more than enough unattached ladies in the ton to woo without stepping in another man’s footprints.
From what Lyon remembered, the countess had never been to London with Lord Wake after they married. The earl must have been at least a decade older than Lyon, and Lyon hadn’t known him well. They had a different group of friends, but there had been a few times they sat down at the same table to play a hand of cards or a game of billiards when Wake was in Town. Lyon remembered Lord Wake saying on more than one occasion that his wife was too delicate to make the long and bumpy journey from his country manor to London.
Delicate?
Lyon rubbed his thumb across his cheek. Not the lady he’d just met, Lyon groused to himself. She had not spared her strength when she struck him. He had no idea what disorder may have caused her fragility when she was married, but he could safely say she was over it.
Another flicker of admiration struck him for how she’d handled herself considering what he’d done, and right on the heels of it was a streak of remorse as he opened the tall, creaky gate hanging on the iron fence that surrounded his home. He should have been kinder to her once he found out who she was, he thought as he let the gate clank shut behind him. She was a widow after all, whether or not she had been dressed like one.
Lyon remembered when the shipSalty Dovesank in a sudden and fierce storm off the coast of Portugal. No doubt everyone in the ton still remembered, as did the rest of London. It was a stunning blow to all of England, as most everyone either knew or had heardof someone who perished that day. Little more than a handful of the one hundred and fifty people on board had survived to tell what had happened.
Lyon strode into his house, ripping his hat off his head and tossing it and his cloak and gloves onto a side chair without breaking stride. He brusquely waved his tall, portly butler, Brewster, aside as he came hurrying from the back of the house to take Lyon’s wrap.
“What did you find out?” his aunt called out to him before he made it halfway down the corridor.
“It’s a boarding school for girls, Aunt Delia,” Lyon replied, entering his drawing room with determined steps. He walked past his mother’s sister, straight to where the brandy decanter was placed on a round table beside his favorite chair. “There’s no cause for the state of worry you and Mrs. Feversham allowed and no reason for me to bring down the wrath of Hades on anyone in that house.”
“A girls’ school?” his aunt questioned from the end of the dark rose-colored velvet settee where she always sat when she came to visit him. “Next door to you?”
“It appears so.”
“How can that be?” she asked. “This is a neighborhood. Not a business district where such institutions should be located.”
“The school is the building behind the house,” he answered, having no reason to doubt the countess’ word. “Which, as you know, backs up to the business district. The boarding school is the reason Mrs. Feversham saw so many beds being carried to the back of the house. The women she saw coming and goingthrough the gate during the day and in the middle of the night will be instructing the girls. For now, the tutors have other jobs they must go to.”
“That’s really quite odd. Mrs. Feversham didn’t mention seeing girls living there. Only women.”
Lyon lifted the topper off the decanter and covered the bottom of a glass with the amber liquor. “They will be soon. So you can tell your vexed friend across the street that she can stop watching what is going on at the house next door. All is well. And while you are at it, Aunt”—he stopped and gave her a rueful smile—“remind her I don’t want to hear that she’s been observing my comings and goings either.”
“Well, really now, Lyon.” Cordelia adjusted the pillow behind her back and smoothed down the folds in her blue sprigged skirt. “What else has the poor lady to do since she can no longer get out into Society?” His aunt paused. “I’ll have one of those since you’re pouring.”
