Lucy, obviously heartened by her sister’s support, tossed her auburn curls.“I most certainly will.”
“If you want to eat, then I suggest you assist, as will I,” he said.Although Lucy appeared inclined to protest, he had held his title too long to brook disobedience from anyone in his orbit.She gave him a petulant glare, but kept quiet.Satisfied, he glanced down at Tom, who was staring up at him stupidly.“And you, Tom?”
“Of course, I’ll help Katie.I always do,” he said, scrambling to his feet, his scratches forgotten.
“Good.Then I suggest we begin.”Although Grayson had no notion what went on in this kitchen or any other, he had committed himself to a task.And he never turned back.“How can I help you?”he asked Kate.
She turned to him, and he saw again the yearning in her eyes, not heated this time, but a stark, open longing that flashed briefly and was gone, replaced by her usual composure.Grayson wanted to call it back, to discover every last one of her desires and fulfill them.
“Really, there is no need for you…”
Tom cut in.“The devil there ain’t!If I had known you weren’t the lazy wretch I supposed, I would have set you to plucking the chicken.”
Masking his distaste for chicken plucking with a lift of his brow, Grayson met the old man’s assessing gaze with his own.There were not many who could suffer his stare for long, and Tom soon faltered, muttered something unintelligible, and looked to Kate.
She must have been used to giving instructions, for she spoke quickly and firmly.“Tom, see if there are any apples left in the larder.Lucy, you may set the table.Grayson—” She paused, but continued resolutely.“Grayson, you may slice the potatoes.”
“Here now, don’t be giving the man a weapon!”Tom protested.But Kate paid him no heed, and with a rude noise, the old man headed from the kitchen, while Lucy went about her business with an indignant frown.Grayson knew the very second he was alone with Kate once more, for all his senses seemed to sharpen in her presence.
“Here,” she said, holding out the knife and a fresh vegetable.Grayson looked down at her hands, surprised that he had never noticed the signs of her labor.Hers was not the pale, soft flesh of the idle.Kate’s palm was pink and work-roughened, and yet he craved her touch as he had no other.
When the moment stretched out between them, too long, Grayson silently took the potato and quickly cut through it.He went on to the next, but she stopped him.
“You have to peel them first,” she said.Her mouth tugged upward at the corners, her lovely eyes laughing, and Grayson smiled at his faux pas.
“Rather demanding mistress, aren’t you?”he asked.
She laughed, and the sound was so free and fresh that Grayson reveled in it before turning back to his work.It sustained him during his efforts, for although he vaguely recalled whittling something at an old gardener’s knee when he was a child, he had not wielded a knife since.And he had no desire to see any more of his blood.
When he had finished, he found himself as proud of the mound of slices as he would be of a particularly taxing speech or of a bruising bout with Gentleman Jackson.He smiled smugly until Kate presented him with a pile of carrots and onions.
The former had to be washed, and the latter peeled, a foul task if ever there was one.He decided to raise the wages of every member of his kitchen staff, in London and at his country seat.
Tom, who seemed to be excessively slow completing hisassignment, lounged against a wall, smirking.And Grayson suspected that even the dreaded chicken plucking could not be worse than chopping the oily, foul-smelling onions.
He had never held the vegetable in high esteem, but even his low opinion was rapidly sinking.His nostrils flared, his eyes began to burn, and he wondered what his peers would say to see their friend—or nemesis, as the case may be—reduced to such a chore.
Those who knew him would be shocked, he mused, and Grayson was forced to admit that he was vaguely alarmed himself.Kate had already shot him and caused his fever.Now she had him plying the meanest of trades befitting a lowly scullery wench.
Although his lips curved slightly in bemusement, Grayson could not be blamed if he was a little leery over what else she had in store for him.
Kate finally let herself relax when they removed to the drawing room.She had been tense ever since Grayson appeared, on his feet and offering his services.She still wasn’t sure what to make of his strange behavior.Although isolated from society for a long time, Kate was not such a chawbacon as to suppose that rich and pampered members of thetonassisted their servants.
Yet the marquess had done his best.At first, Kate had worried that he might cut himself, and she wanted no further injuries laid at her door.But he soon had wielded the blade with a speed and precision that made her think he could do anything and everything well.
Her suspicion was confirmed when he carried platters to the hall with a careless elegance that would have put the most punctilious footman to shame.Apparently, the man excelled at any task and could move among anyone, from dockworker to duke, and reign supreme.
Still, Kate was not entirely comfortable with his help, and she was glad when they all took their seats at the long table, the hard-won, if simple, meal before them.She had even sent Tom to fetch a bottle from the cellar.Although a marquess would be accustomed to much fancier food and drink, Kate enjoyed the rare treat and sipped her wine slowly.
Now it warmed her as they moved to the drawing room, easing the strain of a situation so bizarre that she felt like laughing.Lucy presided over the company as if they were members of a country house party, when for all her fine manners she wore a made-over gown that concealed her pregnancy.
And then there was Tom, a coachman who normally would have been in the kitchen doing the dishes, but had stayed to glare daggers at their guest.Even the marquess looked a bit tattered around the edges in his damaged clothing, though he held himself with a nobility that the rest of them lacked.
And finally, there was Kate herself, perhaps the strangest of all, dressed in boy’s garments, just as if such a costume were ordinary attire for an evening’s conversation.
Only there wasn’t any conversation.Kate became acutely aware of the silence soon enough, and although her duties as hostess required that she do something about it, the very thought sent a hysterical bubble upward, to lodge in the back of her throat.She coughed.She did not know what Grayson was used to, but she was sure that this was not it.
Hargate’s amusements were limited at best.Lucy was a competent pianist, and sometimes Kate sang along, although she could barely carry a tune.Yet she could not imagine Grayson being impressed with such entertainment.More often, they read aloud to each other from their one resource, the vast library, but lately, Lucy had pled tiredness, and Kate rose at such an hour that they retired early.
