Contracted As His Countess - Louise Allen

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gossip. His claim had been ratified by both the House of Lords and the College of Heralds on the death of his brother and he could expect nothing but approval now that he was finally accepting it.

      None of the arrangements had been problematic—the difficult thing was not demanding the keys and taking possession of the house in St James’s Square the moment he arrived back in London. It was not his yet, he had reminded himself more than once over the past weeks as the temptation built like a dull ache.

      The family seat, Dersington Mote, was in Suffolk. It was ancient and should have been the place he yearned for, he supposed. But he’d had a miserable childhood there, one he was in no hurry to remember. As his grandfather became older and more confused the old man was happier in the London house, which was smaller, warmer, a little faded and old fashioned, but a home where he was less disorientated by the world. With his mother dead, his grandparents had taken their younger grandson to live with them, and Jack had loved the house. The Earl might be vague about who he was most of the time, but he was invariably kind and Jack’s grandmother was indulgent to a boy who would sit and listen for hours to her read out loud or tell stories.

      Now it would be his again. He could almost feel the worn leather of the desktop in the study under his fingers, smell the familiar scent of lemon and beeswax polish, pipe smoke and his grandmother’s lavender soap.

      Soon he would set foot in that room for the first time in more than six years. When his grandparents died his father made the house his London base and Jack had removed himself before he was thrown out. First he wanted to drop into Brooks’s where his post was directed when he was out of town. He had been accepted as a member years ago, before his father died and, despite the fact that most of his fellow members considered that he was letting them all down by refusing to use the title, he ignored the dark looks and mutterings for the sake of convenience. The wives of the members were concerned only that he, landless, did not flirt with their impressionable daughters who should be making good matches, or lure their sons into the kind of dissipation his brother and father had been infamous for. They generally ignored him, omitted him from their guest lists and pretended the aristocratic black sheep did not exist.

      It was ironic, he had thought in the early days when the snubs and whispers had hurt. His father and brother had been frivolous, spendthrift, indolent wastrels, but they were accepted. Jack had neither the taste, nor the time and money, for indiscriminate wenching, reckless gambling or drinking himself into a stupor, but he was the one looked down on.

      His fellow aristocrats might despise him, but they did not shun his talents for solving problems on their behalf. He had spent the past week in Lincolnshire, concluding the last commission he intended taking, and wondered if he would miss the work. Not the tedium, of which there was plenty, but the puzzle of solving a problem and the occasional excitement, even danger. This last case had involved the plausible gentleman who had insinuated his way into the life of a certain young viscount, much to the alarm of his trustees The man had put up a satisfactory fight when confronted by Jack and the officers of the law armed with a warrant for his arrest on forgery charges and it had been a pleasure to let off some of his tight-wound emotions.

      Jack was absently rubbing his bruised knuckles as the carriage turned down St James’s Street and pulled up outside the club. Yes, some things he’d miss. Earls were supposed to be respectable these days, on the surface at least.

      ‘Mr Ransome.’ The hall porter opened the door for him. ‘There is post awaiting you in the office, sir. Would you like it now, sir, or when you leave?’

      ‘Now, thank you.’ Jack tipped the man, then carried the correspondence through to the library. With a twinge of amusement he recognised the need to clear away everything to give himself a fresh start.

      An hour later a plump little butler flung the door open with a flourish as Jack made himself walk slowly up the steps. ‘Sir. Welcome. I am Partridge.’

      Jack stepped inside, took a deep breath, looked around. ‘What the hell?’

       Chapter Five

      ‘Sir? Miss Aylmer—’

      Jack looked around the hall and almost turned right around again. It was the wrong house, surely? But there was the famous twisted ironwork of the staircase, the foliage and hidden birds he had searched for and delighted in as a child.

      ‘Miss Aylmer had better be at home because I want to talk to her. Now. What the devil is this? It looks like a damned bordello designed for Prinny and his cronies.’

      Partridge took a step back and then, bravely, held his ground. ‘The redecoration of this floor has just been completed, Mr Ransome. The house had been let furnished for some time—it required modernising so Miss Aylmer gave instructions. No expense or effort has been spared, I assure you.’

      Jack strode past him to the end of the hall and stopped, one hand on the study door, his stomach churning. This was the heart of the house for him, the place where his grandfather had sat behind the battered old desk that had been his own father’s, reading and rereading his familiar books, shutting out the reality of the baffling world outside. Jack would sit in the armchair in the corner, his feet not reaching the floor, and listen to the old man’s rambling stories while his grandmother sat sewing, watching the two loves of her life.

      The door opened at a push. He took one look and spun round to the butler. ‘Where is the furniture? The books? Where is the damn desk?’

      ‘Mr Ransome—’ The butler was positively wringing his hands.

      ‘Is something wrong?’ enquired a voice behind him.

      The author of all this. He turned so sharply that Madelyn took a step back. Then she stopped, met his furious gaze, chin up, blue-grey eyes steady. There was the smallest furrow between her brows, but otherwise her face was expressionless. He saw her swallow, hard.

      ‘This.’ Jack swept his hand round in a gesture to encompass the entire hideous gilded mess. ‘This abomination.’

      ‘I instructed Mr Lansing to refurnish in the most modern taste. Is this not correct in some way? I carried out the most extensive research on what was fashionable.’

      ‘It is hideous. Appalling.’

      ‘I know nothing about fashionable interiors, but—’

      ‘That much, Miss Aylmer, is evident. You ordered this? Have you no taste whatsoever?’ She opened her mouth, but he swept on. ‘Where are the original contents?’

      ‘Partridge?’ She said it calmly enough, but her eyes were wide now and her cheeks white.

      ‘Everything was moved to the upper floors, Miss Aylmer. As I said, only this floor has been completed and there were sufficient rooms to store everything until we had orders about its disposal.’

      ‘Nothing will be disposed of except for this…this tawdry rubbish. Get whoever was responsible for the decoration and the furnishings back here, have it all reinstated as it was. Starting with the study.’

      ‘Mr Ransome, if I might have a word?’

       And a knife in my back by the sound of it.

      A faint tremor underneath the taut words made him stop, breathe. Jack had his anger under control by the time he turned back to her. ‘Of course, Miss Aylmer.’ He followed her into the drawing room, winced at the crocodile couch and closed the door.

      Madelyn sank down on to a hard, upright chair, her back perfectly straight, her head up. Her hair had been curled, crimped and piled up, leaving her neck naked and vulnerable.

      She looks like a plucked bird, he thought.

      Lady Fairfield was presumably responsible for the eau-de-Nil travelling dress she

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