Where Roses Grow Wild - Softcover

Chapter One

 

Lord Edward Rawlings, second and only surviving son of the late duke of Rawlings, was unhappy.

It wasn't just that Yorkshire wasn't the most pleasant place to spend the winter, though there were entire weeks when it seemed as if the sun never shone. It wasn't just that Lady Arabella Ashbury, whose husband owned the estate neighboring Rawlings Manor, was currently too self-absorbed to turn her prodigious attentions to him.

No, Edward was unhappy for reasons he couldn't have put into words had he wanted to, and he didn't want to, because the only person at hand was the viscountess of Ashbury. While the viscountess was well-known throughout England for many of her fine attributes, including her fair coloring and slim, elegant ankles, a sympathetic ear was not one of them.

"I'll have Mrs. Praehurst order enough foie gras for fifty people," Lady Ashbury said, scratching away at the list of assorted last minute items she wanted Edward to bring to the attention of his housekeeper before their friendsfrom London arrived in Yorkshire for a weekend hunt. "I've found that in the country, not everyone cares for foie gras. The Herbert girls wouldn't know a foie gras from a hole in the ground."

Edward, stretched out on a chaise longue in front of the fire in the Gold Drawing Room, let out a yawn. He tried not to, but it escaped, just the same. Fortunately, Lady Ashbury, not used to men yawning in her presence, wasn't paying attention.

"I don't see why you have to invite the Herbert girls at all," Lady Ashbury went on. Her tone wasn't petulant, but it wasn't playful either. "Their father may be your estate agent, but I can't say that I feel he's done you any good, Edward."

Edward leaned forward on the chaise longue to pour himself another snifter of brandy from the decanter he'd placed within arm's reach on the side table. He was quite drunk already, and intended to get even drunker before the afternoon slipped into evening. One of the viscountess of Ashbury's finest attributes was that this sort of behavior did not bother her. Or at least if it did, she never mentioned it.

"After all, Edward," Lady Ashbury continued, "if it weren't for Sir Arthur Herbert's so-called tireless efforts on the behalf of the Rawlings estate, you'd be duke now, and not that brat of your brother's."

Edward leaned back, sipped his brandy, and stared heavenward. The Gold Drawing Room's ceiling was painted a muted yellow to match the heavy velvet drapery over the windows. He cleared his throat noisily and said in his deepest voice, the one that frightened the Rawlings Manor stable boys, "Everyone seems to forget that John's son is the legal heir to the title and to the estate."

Lady Ashbury affected not to notice his warning tone. "But no one even knew the whereabouts of the boy until Sir Arthur started his vile nosing about--"

"At my request, remember, Arabella?"

"Oh, Edward, don't patronize me." Lady Ashbury threw down her pen and rose from the ivory-topped secretary, the skirt of her pale blue satin gown rustling noisily. She strode towards the chaise longue, her pale skin and white-blonde ringlets making quite a pretty picture against the tawny drapery in the background. That, of course, was the reason why the viscountess always demanded that they be seated there, rather than in the more comfortable, but less complexion-flattering, Blue Morning Room.

Arabella declared, "It would have been the easiest thing in the world for you to simply tell the duke that John's son was dead too, like his mother and father, and then assume the title yourself."

Edward raised a mocking eyebrow in her direction. "The easiest thing in the world, Arabella? To lie to my father on his deathbed? He spent the past ten years cursing John for marrying a Scottish vicar's daughter, wouldn't allow their orphaned brat to be brought to Rawlings even though he was, in fact, the proper heir to the title. And then, when the duke relented at the eleventh hour ... Faith, Arabella! It would have been damned dishonorable of me not to at least attempt to grant the old man's dying wish."

"Oh, hang honor," Lady Ashbury exclaimed. "You've never even met the boy!"

"No," Edward agreed. He'd finished his fourth brandy and poured himself a fifth. "But I will when Herbert returns with him tomorrow." Smiling to himself, Edward mused, "What you can't seem to get through that lovely head of yours, Arabella, is that I don't want to be a duke. Unlike yourself, and, I'm certain, your mamma, who made it her life's ambition to snag you a husband with a title, I would be perfectly content to be merely a mister."

Lady Ashbury let out an exasperated snort. "And how, pray, could you afford the kind of horseflesh you keep in your stables on the salary of a mere mister, Lord Edward? Or the house on Park Lane in London? Not to mention thisdrafty monstrosity you call a manor. The only mister I know who can afford all that you have is Mr. Alistair Cartwright, and as you well know, his wealth is every bit as inherited as yours. No, Edward, you are a duke's son, and, accordingly, you have the tastes of a duke's son. Your only misfortune was that you were not born before your miserable brother John."

Edward glanced over at her, one eyebrow raised sardonically. "Damn, Arabella. Do you honestly think I'd enjoy being duke? Brooding over estate business all day long? Forever being hounded after by men like Herbert, who'd want to take up all my time with account-keeping? Having to muck about with the tenant farmers, seeing that their roofs are freshly thatched each year, their children educated, their wives happy?" He heaved his wide shoulders in a shudder of distaste. "That kind of life made an old man out of my father, killed him before his time. I won't allow it to happen to me. Let my dear departed brother's brat have the damned title. Herbert will see that Rawlings doesn't burn to the ground in the meantime, and, in ten years, when the boy's left Oxford, he can return here and assume his rightful place in the hallowed halls."

"And what do you intend to do with yourself, Edward?" Arabella inquired, her asperity ill-disguised. "You can only hunt from November to March, and London's beastly in the summer. What you need, my darling, is an occupation."

"What do you think I am, an American?" Edward laughed, not very nicely, and drained his glass. "I adore it when you condescend to advise me, Arabella. It always puts me in mind of the difference in our ages. Tell me, does it bother your husband that you're always sprinting off across the moors to visit a man half his age and a decade younger than yourself?"

"Must you drink so much?" snapped the viscountess of Ashbury, and Edward, with a resigned sigh, mentallysubtracted one of her attributes. "It's quite revolting to see someone so comparatively young getting so bloated and paunchy."

Edward looked past his white, expertly tied cravat at his powerfully built chest and lean, waistcoated torso. "Paunchy?" he echoed in disbelief. "Where?"

"You've got bags under your eyes." Arabella stepped forward and snatched the brandy snifter from his hand. "And it's plain to see that you're starting to get jowls, just like your father."

Edward cursed and leapt up from the couch, the brandy making him a little unsteady on his feet. Standing several inches over six feet tall, Edward was always an imposing figure, but in the Gold Drawing Room of Rawlings Manor, he seemed doubly so. His large frame dwarfed the delicate gilt and green velvet furniture, and his feet, in well-shined black riding boots, trod heavily upon the carefully combed Persian...