carried like an invalid, she couldn’t help noticing that it was a beautiful room. The walls were papered with a delicate design of pale green and blue, the draperies green velvet and the cherry furniture polished to a gleaming gloss.
Nevertheless, her surroundings were less important than the fact that he was still holding her in his arms. “You may put me down now.”
He did, slowly setting her on her feet. Very slowly. Her body close to his. Very close.
Suddenly his expression darkened and her heart seemed to stop beating as she wondered what she’d done.
“Who the devil are you?” he demanded, and she realized he wasn’t addressing her, but someone behind her.
She turned swiftly to see a woman in a plain gray woollen gown and white mop cap with a pillow in her hand standing on the other side of the bed curtained with pale blue silk.
She must be a maid, Esme thought, and a very pretty one, too, although not so young as Esme first supposed. She immediately hoped she didn’t have to worry about her alleged husband seducing the servants.
“I am Mrs. Llewellan-Jones, the housekeeper, my lord. I wasn’t informed you had arrived,” the woman replied with a Welsh accent as she dipped a curtsey and met MacLachlann’s genial smile with a frown.
Esme was suddenly quite sure that even if MacLachlann tried to seduce the housekeeper, Mrs. Llewellan-Jones was quite ready and able to resist him.
As she, apparently—and to her chagrin—was not.
“Ah. The solicitor hired you as well?” MacLachlann asked.
“Yes, my lord. I was recently working for Lord Raggles.”
“How is old Rags?” MacLachlann asked with one of his more charming smiles, while Esme sidled toward a huge armoire near the door.
“His lordship was quite well the last time I saw him, my lord,” Mrs. Llewellan-Jones answered evenly.
“Glad to hear it. Now if you’ll excuse us, Mrs. Jones,” he said, “my wife and I would like to rest before dinner.”
Esme darted him a sharp glance, then flushed when she saw The Look on his face.
“It’s Llewellan-Jones, my lord, and what would you like done with your baggage?”
“It can all be taken to the dressing room and unpacked—but no one should enter this room until we ring for a maid.”
Until …? What was he thinking?
“As you wish, my lord. My lady,” the housekeeper replied, her expression serene as she left the room and closed the door behind her.
Chapter Five
On guard and ready for anything, Esme waited with bated breath.
Fortunately MacLachlann didn’t come any closer. He shoved his hands into his trouser pockets and rocked on his heels as he surveyed the room. “I see Augustus hasn’t paid for any redecorating.”
Determined to act as if she were perfectly calm, Esme began to remove her gloves. “Was it really necessary to be quite so primitive? I’m not one of the Sabine women to be carried over the threshold.”
“It seemed appropriate,” MacLachlann absently replied as he strolled toward the cheval glass that was cracked in one corner. “Gad, this place is in worse condition than I imagined. Augustus should have sold it if he was going to let it fall into ruin.”
“Perhaps he expects to return and repair it someday.”
“Perhaps, but I doubt it,” MacLachlann said as he continued toward the barren dressing table, running a finger along the top as if checking for nonexistent dust. Despite the slight state of disrepair, the room had obviously been recently cleaned.
“Your solicitor seems to have hired a considerable staff.”
“Augustus always had a considerable staff.”
“For which, I assume, my brother is paying?” Esme asked as she began to pull the pins from her hair and set them one by one on the dressing table, making a tidy little pile.
“I certainly couldn’t afford it,” MacLachlann shamelessly admitted. “Jamie was well aware there were going to be considerable costs, no matter how much I try to economize.”
“And are you?” she asked.
“As much as possible. Everything will be accounted for.”
As she pursed her lips with disdain, for the money would still be gone, he strolled to the window and pulled back the draperies, peering into what must be the back garden.
“I don’t think I’d be quite so willing to pay so much to help a woman who jilted me,” he said under his breath, as if thinking aloud.
She wouldn’t be so willing to help a man who’d broken her heart, either, Esme silently agreed, but she wasn’t going to make any more confessions to MacLachlann. “My brother is a very kind and generous man.”
“Obviously,” MacLachlann replied, “or he would have left me on Tower Bridge.”
He turned back into the room, and she was sorry to see that the usual sardonic, mocking expression had returned to his features. “Makes me damn glad I’ve never been in love.”
He hadn’t?
“What about you, Miss McCallan? Has any young gentleman ever stirred your heart?”
As if she would ever tell him if one had! “No.”
“Thought not,” he said with another infuriating grin.
Then, without a word of warning or explanation, he suddenly launched himself at the bed and rolled around on it as if he were possessed.
“What on earth are you doing?”
“Making it look as if we’ve been engaged in intimate marital relations.”
“Whatever for?”
“I warned you that the men in my family are passionate.”
Passionate was not what she would call it. “How unfortunate for the women in your family, to be always put upon.”
“Put upon? There speaks a virgin.”
Esme wouldn’t let him make her feel ashamed or ignorant. “Of course I am, and so I shall stay until I’m married.”
He rolled off the bed and onto his feet in one fluid motion. “Until that day, should it ever come to pass—or, I should say, the day after that blessed event—I wouldn’t presume to comment on how other women feel about their husbands’ passionate attentions.”
As she flushed and tried to think of an appropriate response, he started toward a door in the wall to Esme’s right. “Now if you’ll excuse me, my little plum cake, I’m going
