He was taking down the teapot when someone started pounding on the cottage door. Quickly he shut the bedroom door. He palmed his knife and opened the cottage door a crack.
A gentleman stood outside. Tall, with reddish-brown hair. The stranger flicked a riding crop in one bony hand. A horse was tethered behind him.
“Aye?” Harry braced his right hand above his head. The other hand held the knife, hidden on his side of the doorjamb.
“I’m looking for Lady Georgina Maitland.” The stranger’s voice, clipped and upper crust, would have frozen most men.
Harry raised one eyebrow. “And who might you be?”
“The Earl of Maitland.”
“Ah.” He started to close the door.
Maitland wedged his crop in the doorway to prevent him. “Do you know where she is?” There was warning in his voice now.
“Yes.” Harry stared flatly at Maitland. “She’ll be at the manor soon.”
Anger sparked in the other man’s eyes. “Within the hour or I’ll kick this bloody hovel down around your ears.”
Harry closed the door.
When he turned, he saw Lady Georgina peeking from the bedroom. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, and she had used a bedsheet as a wrap.
“Who was it?” Her voice was husky with sleep.
Harry wished he could pick her up and carry her back to his bed and make her forget about this day, but the world and everything in it waited.
He replaced the teapot on the shelf. “Your brother.”
HER BROTHER HAD TO BE the one person in all the world a woman didn’t want to meet directly after a night of ecstasy. George fiddled with the ribbon at her neck.
Tiggle batted her hand away and set a last pin in her hair. “There you are, my lady. As ready as you’ll ever be.” At least the maid was no longer sending her mournful looks.
Instead, she was now commiserating. Did everyone know what had happened last night? She really should’ve been more discreet than to spend the night. George sighed and contemplated feigning a headache. But Tony was nothing if not stubborn. He might not drag her from her room to interview her, but he’d be right outside the minute she tried to emerge. Best to get it over with.
She threw back her shoulders and marched downstairs like a Christian going to meet a particularly irate lion. Greaves sent her a sympathetic look as he held the breakfast room door for her.
Inside, Tony was standing by the mantelpiece, staring down his bony nose into the fire. He evidently hadn’t touched the food on the sideboard. Tony was the spitting image of their late father, tall and angular with a face dominated by prominent cheekbones and heavy eyebrows. The only difference was the auburn hair he’d inherited from their mother. That, and the fact that he was a much nicer man than Father had been.
Usually, anyway.
George noticed that Violet was conspicuously absent. She had a very good idea why, too. She’d corner the minx later.
“Good morning, Tony.” George strolled to the sideboard. Buttered kippers. Even Cook knew. She helped herself to a large serving. She was going to need her strength.
“George,” Tony greeted her coolly. He advanced swiftly to the door and flung it open. Two footmen looked at him, startled. “We won’t be needing you. Make sure we’re not disturbed.”
The footmen bowed. “Yes, my lord.”
Tony closed the door and yanked down on his waistcoat to straighten it. George rolled her eyes. When had her brother become this stuffy? He must have been practicing in his room at nights.
“Are you having breakfast?” she asked as she sat down. “Cook has made some lovely kippers.”
Tony ignored her pleasantry. “What could you have been thinking?” His tone was unbelievably dour.
“Well, really, if you want to know the truth, I wasn’t thinking at all.” She took a sip of tea. “I mean, not after the first kiss. He does kiss very well.”
“George!”
“If you didn’t want to know, why ask?”
“You know very well what I mean. Don’t play the flibbertigibbet with me.”
George sighed and put down her fork. The kippers tasted like ashes in her mouth, anyway. “It’s no concern of yours.”
“Of course it’s my concern. You’re my sister and you’re unmarried.”
“Do I poke into your affairs? Do I ask about what ladies you see in London?”
Tony crossed his arms and stared down his large nose at her. “It’s not the same and you know it.”
“Yes”—George poked a kipper—“but it should be.”
He sighed and took a chair opposite her. “Maybe so. But that isn’t how the world works. We don’t deal with how society ought to be but rather how it is. And society will judge you rather harshly, my dear.”
She felt her lips tremble.
“Come back to London with me,” Tony said. “We can forget about this. There are some fellows I can introduce you to—”
“It’s not like choosing a horse. I don’t want to exchange a bay for a chestnut.”
“Why not? Why not find a man from your own class? One who could marry you and give you children.”
“Because,” George said slowly, “I don’t want just any man. I want this one.”
Tony slammed the flat of his hand down on the table, making her jump. He leaned over her. “And the rest of the family can just go to hell? You’re not like this. Think about the example you’re setting for Violet. Would you want her doing what you’re doing?”
“No. But I can’t live my life as an example for my sister.”
Tony pursed his lips.
“You don’t,” George accused. “Can you honestly say that with every action you take, you stop to think, ‘Is this a good example for my brothers?’ ”