Page 16 of The Rogue and the Viscountess

Pete, in something of a daze, put her trunk on the tiled marble floor of the small entrance hall and waited behind Prunella as she paused and looked around her, taking everything in. The trunk was sturdy camphor wood, bound with brass-studded leather, something an officer might carry on a military campaign. She was nothing of what he expected from a gentle lady who had married a lord.

Granted, Pete, in his ordinary days, did not cross paths with the great unless he was being sent to collect money from one, or rough him up for nonpayment. But still.

He had expected softness, but all that was soft about this woman were her abundant curves and the fine wool fabric of her dress. Her head was as solid on his shoulders as his own. She appeared to be taking very much in stride his assertion that he had kidnapped her as a means of preventing another, worse man from kidnapping her.

But that did not mean she would acquiesce. She was intelligent, beneath all that round and dumpling softness. He had best look sharp and make sure she didn’t try to set fire to the wall hangings or create another diversion to help her escape.

“This,” she said, her voice soft. “This…will do.”

“D’ye like it?” It was suddenly terribly important that she like his house.

She pressed her lips together as if she meant to keep another expression from surfacing. “I have seen worse,” she said. “St. Sefin’s, for one. There were birds nesting in the beams of the ceiling.”

He nodded like a twymfat. All sense deserted him around her. When he’d opened the door of her post chaise and seen it was she he was meant for, and not the old biddy, he’d had to shut the door again for fear of revealing his joy.

She looked as if she belonged here. Her carriage gown, with its set of embroidered frogs marching from throat to slippers, made her look disciplined and adorable, and her elegance set off the high ceilings with their carved cornices and the carved oaken balusters of the stair. His grandfather, coming into money along with the title, had built a house designed to impress, at least in its reception rooms on the ground floor.

She was a viscount’s widow. She was likely accustomed to much grander accommodations than this.

“I might show ye about, if ye wish,” he offered humbly.

She raised her brows. They were a shade of brown much darker than her hair, shaped into a delicate arch. “You’re making rather free with the baronet’s house, it would seem.”

He wondered when she might guess that he was the baronet. He didn’t want to tell her. She was the first person here, besides Morys, who had known him in his old life, his real life, before his entire identity had been reordered. He wanted to know if Pedr Wilkins, cad and ruffian, could be anyone she liked.

Now that was foolish. What would a gentlewoman find to like in a cad and ruffian? “This is th’entrance hall,” he said gruffly, his voice strangling at his own stupidity.

“You don’t say. And this is the drawing room, I should guess.” She stopped short on the carpet inside the room and made a small half-turn. Pete, behind her, admired the shape of her silhouette. Prunella Price had all the proper curves of a woman.

And all the disdain of the highborn, too. “No,” she said in a decisive tone. “This pink will not do. In another room, perhaps, paired with shades of peach blossom or coral. But not with verdigris green.”

“Thas what I said.” Pete came to stand beside her. A whiff of perfume teased his nose, orange blossom with a deeper hint beneath, something more substantial and robust. This woman was not a blossom to be wafted away in a breeze. She was…a sturdy seed pod.

It wasn’t a delicate image, but it suited what he was learning of her. All soft allure on the outside, an easy, complacent charm, but beneath that, he sensed a firm layer that would not easily crack.

“P’raps you’ll tell Barbara ye said so. Thas Lady Wilkins,” he added.

His grandmother would cuff him about the head for using low speech with a lady. But he wanted her to think of him yet as the man from the ship.

The man who had held her in his arms before, and wanted to again.

“I perceive this would be Lady Wilkins.” Prunella studied the massive oil of Barbarba that hung above the mantelpiece of Italian marble. His grandmother had never been beautiful—at her best, she might be called handsome—but she was formidable in her manner and impeccable in her breeding, and she knew it.

“Shades of Lydia,” Prunella murmured. “Is this baronet an aged man, then?”

Pete coughed into his hand. “He’s this one’s grandson.”

“How long has he held the title?” She walked to the harpsichord and tapped a couple of keys, releasing a burst of bright, tinkling notes. Her brows rose. Pete wondered what that meant.

“Er, the baronet? He’s been such since…” He counted on his fingers. “Three months.”

“And how do you know him?” She wandered around the room, trailing her finger along the carvings on a shield-back armchair, pressing a finger into the upholstery, studying the designs in the draperies.

“Ah. From Wales. We knew each other in Wales.” He would sound so profoundly stupid when she put his two identities together. But he also didn’t want to reveal himself here and make her aware she was inspecting his furnishings while he watched. She was comfortable with him precisely because he was no one of account.

Well. As comfortable was she could be, given that he’d brought her here against her will, and— He would have to ensure her bedchamber was properly prepared. He’d instructed a maid to air the linens when he thought he’d have the old Dowager Viscountess in his keep for a day or three. For Prunella, he wanted to make sure the wardrobe was free of moths, the carpets and draperies had been beaten of their dust, and there were the assorted small items a fine lady required for her toilette. He didn’t know what those might be.

Pete pulled at his neckcloth. Perhaps he might have the maid scatter rose petals about. That was done, wasn’t it? And the autumn roses were in bloom, scads of them in the back garden. A regular rose garden, he had. Perhaps he ought to take her there so she didn’t think the entire house was a mash of salmon tones and pea green.