Unraveling the Earl

Lynne
Barron

Book three in the Idyllwild
series.

The Earl of Hastings’ reputation as
London’s greatest gift to the ladies has taken on a life of its own, one he is
only too happy to live up to in one Mayfair bedchamber after another. Until he
encounters a lady more interested in poking around his country estate than
sampling his lauded charms.

Georgiana Buchanan is possessed of
murky morals, skewed notions of right and wrong, a talent for dancing around
the truth, and a penchant for crashing weddings, funerals and charity balls.

When Georgie catches Henry’s roving
eye, she turns the tables on the arrogant scoundrel, introducing him to a world
of sensual delights and unraveling his vaunted control before fleeing into the
night.

Henry is determined to make the
elusive Georgiana his mistress while the lady wants only to use his desire to
further her own schemes. When they find themselves marooned at Idyllwild during
a summer storm, they will both discover they’ve gotten more than they bargained
for.

A Romantica®
historical romance
from Ellora’s Cave

River’s End, Somewhere Nearby

September, 1827

“Please don’t kill Archie.” Georgie Buchanan hurried to
catch up to the tall, brawny man as he disappeared into the dilapidated barn.

“How many times I got to tell you not to make pets of the
wooly beasts?” Douglas tossed the question over his shoulder without slowing
his steps, without so much as glancing her way.

“I won’t, I swear it. Not ever again,” she vowed. “Just let
this one live.”

It was beyond silly to care about the life of one lamb, one
small lamb born with a withered and useless hind leg. If the foxes that roamed
the hills and woods surrounding River’s End did not make a meal of the lame
creature, the harsh winter to come would surely put an end to his young life.

Somehow the tiny lamb with his downy, soft fleece and his
face as black as pitch had become all tangled up in the confusion and
loneliness and despair that colored Georgie’s world until she could no longer
differentiate one from the other.

“He’s too lame to last out the year,” Douglas growled. “But
he’ll make a fine dinner and his hide a pair of warm mitts for one of the
girls.”

“I’ll do whatever you want!” Her words were a muffled wail
as she grasped the torn hem of her shirt and wrestled the garment over her
head.

Douglas spun around and froze, a look of surprise and
something else transforming his handsome features until a stranger stood before
her with Archie wiggling about in his arms.

“Please.”

“What are you about?” he asked even as his gaze drifted over
long pale arms and small breasts barely coming into bloom.

“I see the way you look at me.” Georgie allowed the stained
and threadbare shirt to fall to the hay-strewn dirt floor.

“I don’t look at you no different than I always have.” His
words held denial and a trace of mocking laughter, but his gaze lingered on the
two pink buds made hard by the wind that whipped in through the cracks in the
old barn.

“You want me.” Where she found the words and the bravado to
utter them she knew not but they fell from her lips with surprising ease as he
took one step toward her. “You want to lay me down on the floor and do to me
what a man does to a woman.”

“That ain’t so.” He took another step nearer, and another
and another, stopping only when he stood close enough she could see the
moisture dotting his brow.

She dropped her trembling hands to the rope belt that held
torn and patched trousers sagging around her bony hips. “You think I don’t know
you watch me from the trees when I bathe in the river? I feel your eyes on me.”

He licked his lips and his gaze dropped to her fingers
fumbling with the frayed knot. “Don’t do this, Georgie.”

“I want to,” she whispered as the tattered rope unraveled, the
rough hemp sliding through her fingers and biting into her flesh. “I want you
to touch me, to love me.”

“You don’t know what you’re asking,” he murmured even as he
lowered the lamb to the floor.

“I do know.” She released the rope and her breeches fell to
pool around her bare ankles as the fluffy lamb ran from the barn. “I’ll lie
down with you and you’ll let Archie live.”

Buckinghamshire, England

June, 1831

Henry Tinsdale, the Earl of Hastings, shifted his weight
from one foot to the other, covertly angling his body away from Reverend Jones
who stood just outside the open door of the Somerton family vault. On and on
the clergyman droned, reliving one anecdote after another, most of which the
earl suspected were entirely derived from his imagination.

As far as Henry knew his mother had never volunteered so
much as an hour of her time at the London Foundling Hospital. Nor had she been
in the habit of delivering baskets to the poor, sewing shirts for her servants
at Christmas or visiting Mr. and Mrs. Jones after Sunday services. And if she
had, she certainly would not have partaken of a glass of his homemade
elderberry wine.

Ignoring the reverend’s tale of a young Lady Lydia gamboling
over the hills surrounding Somerville, Henry turned his head just enough to
catch the vision in blue from the corner of his eye.

The lady stood in a beam of sunlight slanting through the
trees at the edge of the graveyard as if she were a player poised on a stage
waiting for the curtain to rise. It was odd to find a woman at the funeral when
his female relations had bowed to society’s strictures and remained ensconced
at nearby Somerton Manor. Odder still that she appeared to be quite alone.

In a sea of gentlemen adorned in black, she stood out like a
beacon in a robin’s egg blue gown that hugged her slender waist before belling
out in yards and yards of fabric, lace and bows. On her head she wore a
fantastical confection of a bonnet, blue and white flowers and ribbons
encircling a wide brim that cast her face into shadow.

It wasn’t the first time Henry had seen the lady lingering
on the fringes of this event or that. By his calculations, she’d been following
him around London for nearly a year, flying past him on the street in her
yellow curricle, loitering outside his Mayfair mansion, sitting in the box
directly across from his at the theater. Hell, he’d seen her in St. George’s
Church at a number of London weddings, including his sister’s. In fact, it was
at that event, as he’d ushered Olivia down the long aisle, that he’d first
noticed her.

“Tell me you did not invite your latest paramour to travel
with you to your mother’s funeral.” Viscount Easton whispered the words, though
idle chatter could be heard from the other gentlemen gathered around the tomb.

“Even I would not stoop so low.” Henry watched as the lady
lifted her hand and placed it on the crown of her hat. Her skirts lifted on the
warm breeze, revealing white half-boots amid numerous frilly petticoats.

“Who is she?”

“I’ve yet to make the lady’s acquaintance.”

“That beanpole is hardly Hastings’ sort,” Lord Everett said,
openly ogling the woman who gave no indication she was aware of their combined
scrutiny.

“How would you know what my sort is?”

“All of London knows your sort. It isn’t as if you are
discreet in your liaisons.”

“He has you there, Hastings,” Easton said.

“You’ve a preference for beautiful ladies with big, round—”

“Ahem!”

The cousins turned as one to find the uncontested head of their
combined families glowering at them. Uncle to all three gentlemen, the Earl of
Somerton ruled with a bellowing voice and a booming laugh, alternating
demanding their obedience and turning a blind eye to their rebellions.

Henry had lost count of the number of times he’d been called
on the carpet in his uncle’s study to endure long-winded lectures prefaced with
the order to appear properly chastised at the conclusion.

He dutifully settled into quiet contemplation of the
mysterious woman who’d shadowed him through London only to follow him to the
country. He hadn’t lied when he’d said he’d yet to make her acquaintance. As
Reverend Jones’ sermon wound to a close, Henry determined that today he would
do just that.

If he had to waylay her in the streets of Somerville to see
it done, so be it. The lady had obviously heard of his talents and wanted a go
at him. It wasn’t the first time a woman had stalked him before approaching to
offer him a tumble in her bed, a secluded corner of a garden, a linen closet or
a bouncing carriage.

Though never before had one waited so long to offer an
invitation nor followed him to the country.

“Where are you rushing off to?” The Earl of Somerton’s
thunderous voice stopped Henry in his tracks half an hour later, just as he’d
turned away from his waiting carriage to follow his quarry down the road to the
village proper.

“I’ll be along shortly, Uncle Robert.” Henry kept his eyes
on the swaying blue skirts. “I just need a moment.”

“Bloody hell, son. I’m sorry.” The earl slapped his nephew
on the back in what he supposed was meant to be a gesture of commiseration. “I
know it couldn’t have been easy having your mother residing with you this last
year, as daft as she’d become. But you stuck by her as a dutiful son ought to,
I’m proud to say. If you need a moment to collect yourself before joining the
throng at the house, you go right ahead.”

“Thank you,” Henry murmured as the lady turned onto a narrow
lane that would take her to the High Street.

“In fact, take the entire day. Hop in your carriage and
continue on to Hastings House. I’ll make your excuses and we’ll join you there
tomorrow.”

Visions of the two-hour journey to his estate, blue skirts
hiked up around pale thighs as the lady bounced over him, filled his head. “I
might just take you up on the offer.”

“Go on, then.” Somerton gestured to the footman in blue and
gray livery who hurried to open the carriage door and lower the step.

With a nod, Henry approached the luxurious coach and four
matching grays, pausing long enough to whisper to the footman, “Drive through
the village.”

She was easy enough to spot on the streets of the bustling
little village. Henry laughed as locals greeted her with nods and smiles before
hurrying to remove themselves from the path of her full skirts and swinging
reticule. Blue and white flowers shimmied and swayed and long, trailing ribbons
floated out behind her as she swiveled her head from side to side, clearly
taking in the sights of the quaint little hamlet.

Knocking on the roof, he waited only long enough for the
carriage to roll to a stop before pushing open the door and jumping to the
ground.

The lady had halted before a shop window, her gloved hands
pressed to the glass as she peered inside.

Nodding to the villagers he passed, Henry came up behind her,
his gaze sweeping over her from the bright orange curls that had escaped her
bonnet to trail along the pale skin of her nape, to the long line of her back,
to her tiny waist and beyond, over what seemed to be miles of skirts.

He’d never been quite so close to her and was struck by her
slender build and uncommon height. Racing his gaze over her reflection in the
glass he took in a long elegant neck, a white lace fichu tucked into a bodice
that skimmed over…next to nothing.

Two nearly indiscernible bumps barely lifted the silk that
hugged her svelte form. Either she was astonishingly small-bosomed or bound up
tighter than a drum.

He nearly laughed aloud, though he couldn’t have said why he
found the tall, wraithlike creature standing before him amusing. Perhaps it had
something to do with his shirking his duties as host to the guests who had
traveled from far and wide to show their respects for a woman who’d openly
reviled most of them. All to chase a woman who, as Everett had proclaimed, was
not his usual sort.

He dragged his gaze back up to find her looking at him in
the distorted reflection of the glass.

“I beg your pardon.” Thrown off balance to be caught
blatantly leering at a lady on the street, Henry felt heat sweeping up his
neck.

She made no reply, simply continued to study him. The old
glass window panes were coated with a thin layer of grime, small bubbles and
hairline cracks, rendering both their faces hazy and unfocused.

“I could not help but notice you at my mother’s funeral,” he
said, disconcerted when she remained silent. “I’m Hastings. That is I am the
Earl of Hastings.”

Slowly she turned around, her head tilted back and her chin
lifted in a gesture that struck Henry as both haughty and wary.

He had only a moment to contemplate the odd dichotomy before
he was ensnared by eyes of a startling shade of blue bordering on lavender,
large and luminous and framed by long golden-red lashes.

The woman’s skin was so pale as to appear nearly
transparent, without a freckle, blemish or line to mar the angles of a face
that was arresting rather than beautiful, or even pretty. With her astonishing
eyes set below winged brows and a smooth expanse of forehead, and a pointy
little chin, she might have possessed a certain delicate, feminine appeal. But
her features were too bold, too dramatic for true elegance. Her cheekbones were
sharp ridges above gaunt hollows, her nose a long, thin blade with a bump and a
bend just below the bridge.

And her mouth, good lord, her mouth was the work of a
demented artist, a taunt and a tease, with an upper lip as thin as the bottom
was plump. That is to say the upper was as noticeable as her bosom while the
bottom resembled a pretty pink pincushion.

“I know who you are, my lord.”

Her voice was sinfully soft and husky and laced with a faint
Scots burr, bringing to mind all manner of torrid thoughts. None of which
belonged on a village street.

Scrambling to think of something even remotely intelligent
to say to the woman who was nothing like the beautiful ladies with whom he
normally dallied, yet oddly alluring, Henry finally stammered out, “You are up
on me then.”

Her lips twitched.

“That is…you are
one
up on me. As you know who I am
and I do not.” Heat bloomed on his cheeks. “That is I do not know who
you
are.”
Christ, he sounded like an idiot.

“I took your meaning, Lord Hasty.” A dimple flashed to the
right of her mouth, drawing his eye unerringly to that devilishly lush bottom
lip. “But as we’ve yet to be properly introduced I am afraid I cannot stand
about conversing with you on the street.”

Henry ignored the mangling of his name and looked left and
right, spotted a middle-aged woman, plump and matronly, who looked vaguely
familiar, and bounded off in her direction.

“I say, Mrs. Smith, is it?” he demanded of the startled
woman as he stopped before her in the street.

“Mrs. Cooper, Lord Hastings,” she answered, dipping a quick
curtsy. “My son works for Lord Somerton as a groom.”

“Yes, I remember,” he lied. “Tall fellow with blond hair.”

“My Joe is actually a tad on the short side,” she replied.
“And his hair is dark. Sable I like to call it. Or chestnut. He’s a fine boy.”

“Right you are. Now I recall the lad. I wonder if you might
do me a service, Mrs. Cooper?” Henry tucked her hand into the crook of his arm
and turned her toward the lady who watched them with a faint smile. “Do you see
the lady in blue?”

“Oh, Miss Buchanan, you mean?”

“You know her?”

“She’s taken rooms above my brother’s inn. So sweet she is,
just as sweet as can be. Why when my sister-in-law Jane woke feeling poorly
this morning Miss Buchanan offered to help with the little ones. Not that we
accepted the offer, mind you. Imagine a lady such as Miss Buchanan caring for
an innkeeper’s rowdy boys.”

“Unimaginable,” he agreed. “I wonder if you might introduce
me?”

“Introduce you to Miss Buchanan?”

“Precisely.”

“She’s a lady, my lord.” Mrs. Cooper tugged her arm free and
stopped to glare up at him.

“A lady to whom I would very much like to be introduced.”
Henry reached for her hand again only to have her bat his away.

“We’ve heard about you,” she declared. “We’re not so far
from London as to miss hearing of your shenanigans. Begging your pardon, your
lordship, but I cannot in good conscience introduce you to a lady you’ve likely
accosted on the street without invitation. And on the day your lady mother, God
rest her soul, was entombed in the family vault. Shame on you.”

“Mrs. Cooper.”

Henry looked away from the enraged woman to find the lady in
question right beside them. Chagrined to realize she’d overheard the set down
he’d received, he stepped back, tempted to flee to the safety of his carriage.

“It might prove more diplomatic if you simply acquiesced to
his lordship’s request,” she said, reaching out to lay her hand on the other
woman’s arm. “I would not want the Earl of Somerton to find fault with your
behavior toward his nephew.”

Mrs. Cooper harrumphed, clearly not ready to capitulate.

“I knew Lady Hastings and I have a nodding acquaintance with
Lord and Lady Piedmont, his lordship’s cousins. I do not think it would be at
all improper were you to introduce us,” she continued pleasantly. “And you know
how the high-born can be. Sometimes it is best to simply humor them.”

Henry was riveted by her voice, by the lyrical cadence and
the sultry tones, only fully hearing the actual words when Mrs. Cooper let
loose a great guffaw.

“I do know,” the older lady agreed around her laughter.
“That I surely do. Well if you are quite convinced of the propriety, I would be
pleased to introduce you. Lord Hastings, this all too kind and gentle lady is
Miss Buchanan. Make her a bow.”

Henry dutifully bowed, fighting to contain a grin.

“Miss Buchanan, the Earl of Hastings.”

Without prompting, Miss Buchanan dropped into a flawless
curtsy, her gloved hands holding her skirts off the ground.

“Mind you watch yourself around his lordship,” Mrs. Cooper
cautioned. “He has something of a reputation. But you likely know all about
that, being from London.”