The Princess and the Peer(11)
At that thought, her spirits sank. It shouldn’t matter to her—it didn’t matter, she assured herself—but she found the idea of a Lady Lyndhurst oddly depressing. Pushing such thoughts from her mind, she decided to make the best of the situation.
Just wait, she thought, until I tell Mercedes and Ariadne what I’ve been doing.
Some minutes later, they drew up before a large, elegant town house in a fine section of the city. As Nick brought the carriage to a halt, a footman hurried down the front steps.
“Welcome back, milord,” the servant said, taking up a position near the horses’ heads to hold them steady. “Had a good morning, did ye?”
Nick jumped down from the carriage, landing light as a cat in spite of his towering frame. “Quite good, Bell.”
“And who’s this pretty thing with ye?” the footman inquired with a casual familiarity Emma found astonishing for a servant.
She was equally astonished by the black leather patch covering the lanky young man’s left eye and the long, jagged scar creasing his cheek below. He must have been handsome once, she thought, before he’d suffered the terrible event that had disfigured him.
But he didn’t seem disheartened by the loss, or lacking in confidence, as he flashed her a friendly smile. “Didn’t know you were going out fishing, milord,” Bell continued. “You sure did bring back a right fine catch.”
Nick’s lips twitched, but he repressed a laugh. “Mind your manners, lad, or you’ll have our guest wishing she hadn’t agreed to accompany me here.”
“Quite right, your lordship. As Mr. Symms is always tellin’ me, I need to watch this loose tongue o’ mine afore it lands me in the suds,” the footman said before returning his gaze to Emma. “Don’t mind me, miss. Just can’t seem to help meself around lovely females.”
Despite the impropriety of fraternizing with a servant, she couldn’t keep from smiling back.
A moment later, Nick reached up to help her from the carriage. But rather than offer his hand, he grasped her around the waist and swung her to the ground. Her pulse drummed in her veins, the curious footman utterly forgotten as her gaze locked with Nick’s. They stood just so for several long seconds before he released her.
“I promised you tea, as I recall,” he said, apparently unaffected by their brief touch.
Willing her heart to resume its normal pace, she let him lead her up a short flight of steps to the front door.
Nick’s butler—the inestimable Mr. Symms, she surmised—greeted them at the entrance. Emma saw immediately that the man was a far more proper servant than Bell, his gracious politeness putting her instantly at ease.
“If you will forgive me,” Nick said after a moment, “there is a matter to which I must attend. In the meantime, Symms will see you made comfortable in the drawing room. I shall join you there shortly.”
Nick excused himself, striding away down the hall without another word of explanation.
Emma stared after him.
Symms proved excellent at his profession, however, and Emma hardly noticed Nick’s absence as the servant led her into the drawing room, where she settled as comfortably as promised onto a well-sprung salmon-colored divan.
She gazed around the room, noticing the handsome but somewhat dated walnut furniture, the spring green draperies and colorful cream and blue Aubusson carpet. Tasteful as the room’s decoration might be, it didn’t seem to suit Nick Gregory at all; the style was far too frivolous and much too feminine.
So he does have a wife.
Is that where he had gone so abruptly? Had he left to seek out Lady Lyndhurst?
She linked her hands in her lap, telling herself she would stay only long enough to be polite and then depart. Where, she wasn’t entirely sure, as the thought of the embassy was a less-than-happy prospect.
Moments later, Nick strode into the room. “Sorry to have deserted you,” he said. “I hope Symms took good care of you in my absence.”
“Excellent care. He has gone for tea.”
Nick nodded in apparent satisfaction, then crossed to the fireplace to toss a pair of logs onto the grate. Taking up a heavy, black iron poker, he began working the wood, trying to coax the flames to burn hotter.
“Will Lady Lyndhurst be joining us?” she ventured, casting a glance toward the drawing room doors.
Nick stopped prodding the fire and turned to face her, his brows furrowed. “No.” At her continued look of inquiry, he went on. “My mother passed away some while ago.”
His mother?
“Oh, I—?” she said, confused. “My condolences.”
He stared, tilting his head slightly to one side. “Did you think I had a wife?”