The Cheer in Charming an Earl(5)

“My lord?” his butler interrupted loudly as he peered over the heads—and breasts—of the assembled crowd.

Grantham didn’t bother to move the Cyprian’s delicate fingers from his stubbornly uncooperative genitals. If she could make him interested in depravity, he wasn’t about to stop her. “Yes, Smithers, what is it?” he asked with only a modicum of annoyance.

“My lord, there has been an accident.”

“Oh?” Grantham replied, barely listening.

“An unprecedented event,” his servant pressed.

“Enlighten me,” Grantham drawled as his nether regions continued to fight the talented ministrations being wasted upon them.

“I fear there’s nothing left of the kitchens, my lord. We shall dine on cold meats tonight.”

Grantham sat up suddenly. “No roast?” That piglet was to have been the piece de resistance of his Christmas Eve dinner. Without it, they might as well eat gruel.

“I’m afraid not, my lord,” Smithers said, causing groans of disappointment to rumble from their guests. “Our kitchen hearth seems to be wedged inside a carriage frame.”

“What the devil!” But oddly, for the first time in a long time, Grantham felt a flicker of interest in something. He pushed away the blonde groping at his genitals and came to his feet. “Never fear, my friends,” he said to his guests. “We’ll have our bacon and eat it, too.” Not that he had any notion how they were to accomplish that. His hearth, inside a carriage? How in blazes had that been managed?

His drunken guests cheered, “Hurrah!” and returned to their licentiousness. All but de Winter, who looked at Grantham musingly. So contemplatively, in fact, that when Grantham arrived in his kitchens, he wasn’t surprised to see the earl had followed him belowstairs.

“Mrs. Calloway,” Grantham said, ignoring de Winter, “what’s gone on?”

“Oh, the usual,” she replied with a hearty chortle. “Pretty young lady crashed into the hearthstone. Driver had to be given a large dose of my special brew, and she’s gone clean out. A usual Saturday at Chelford, my lord.”

Grantham glanced at his friend. Both men shrugged.

“Have you sent for the physician?” Grantham asked.

“Oh, aye, first thing I did. But it’s snowing, my lord. He might not be reached in time to arrive today.”

No physician? Grantham didn’t like that.

“She’s not in a bad way,” Mrs. Calloway reassured him at the sight of his frown. “A bump on her head, that’s all. Nothing I’d worry about, my lord.”

Nothing he would have worried about, either, before he’d lost Hannah. Now every scrape and knock unnerved him, especially when it involved a woman’s fragile form. God’s teeth, what if she died? Here, in his house, at Christmas?

He couldn’t lose another woman in his care. Especially not at Christmas.

“Will you take me to her?” He moved forward, though he had no idea where she was being kept.

Mrs. Calloway’s lips pursed. “You’d best leave her to my care, my lord, until the snow clears enough for her to be on her way. The less she sees of you, the better, for word has a way of wandering, and it would do worse than titillate to say you were introduced at Christmas. If you see my meaning.”

He did, unfortunately. He’d made no secret of his annual bacchanalia. Nevertheless, he wanted to verify her condition for himself, or he’d never sleep tonight. “I’m not made of brimstone, Mrs. Calloway, and I do feel the need to ensure the lady’s health. Do you want me to wander the halls calling her name?”

When Mrs. Calloway stubbornly didn’t reply, Grantham said over his shoulder, “De Winter, clear your throat. I fear we have a long night ahead.”

“Poor lady!” his friend called in high-pitched voice. “Pray tell, where are you?”

Mrs. Calloway wiped her hands on her apron. The jangle of chatelaine’s keys made her sound far more in control than Grantham felt. “I’ll take you to her, but none of your nonsense, you hear?”

Grantham pressed his lips together. This was the trouble with being a rogue. Even his servants felt the need to disapprove of him. So what if he had just pried a buxom woman’s hand off his nether regions? He still liked to think he was a gentleman.

He followed his housekeeper to a narrow, unpainted door. It seemed his unanticipated guest had been put up in the servants’ hall, giving him pause.

“What kind of lady stays in the servants’ hall?” de Winter asked from behind him, stealing—as usual—the words right from Grantham’s mouth.