“Crutchley, my lord.”
Ah, a man of few words. And then a mangy-looking tabby cat darted into the hall, stopped in its tracks, arched its back, growled at Percy as though it had mistaken itself for a dog, and darted out again.
If there was one thing Percy abhorred, or rather one class of things, it was cats.
And then one of the front doors opened and closed behind his back, and he turned to see who had had the effrontery to enter the house by the main entrance without so much as a token rap upon the knocker.
It was a woman. She was youngish, though she was not a girl. She was clad in a gray cloak and bonnet, perhaps so that she would blend into invisibility in the outdoors. She was tall and slim, though it was impossible with the cloak to know if there were some curves to make her figure interesting. Her hair was almost blond but not quite. There was not much of it visible beneath the bonnet, and not a single curl. Her face was a long oval with high cheekbones, largish eyes of a slate gray, a straight nose, and a wide mouth that looked as though it might be covering slightly protruding teeth. She looked a bit as though she had stepped out of a Norse saga. It might have been a beautiful face if there had been any expression to animate it. But she merely stared at him, as though she were assessing him. In his own home.
That was his first impression of her. The second, following swiftly upon the first, was that she looked about as sexually appealing as a marble pillar. And, strangely enough, that she was trouble. He was not used to dealing with females who resembled marble pillars—and who walked unannounced and uninvited into his own home and looked at him without admiration or blushes or any recognizable feminine wiles. Though blushes would have been hard to detect. Both cheeks plus the end of her nose were a shiny red from the cold. At least the color proved that she was not literally marble.
“And who the devil might you be?” he asked her.
She had provoked the rudeness by walking in without even the courtesy of a knock on the door. Nevertheless, he was unaccustomed to being rude to women.
“Imogen Hayes, Lady Barclay,” she told him.
Well, that was a neat facer. If it had come at the end of a fist, it would surely have put him down on the floor.
“Am I suffering from amnesia?” he asked her. “Did I marry you and forget all about it? I seem to recall that I am Lord Barclay. The Viscount of, to be exact.”
“If you had married me,” she said, “which, heaven be praised, you have not, then I would have introduced myself as the Countess of Hardford, would I not? You are the earl, I presume?”
He turned to face her more fully. She had a low, velvety voice—which overlay venom. And her teeth did not protrude. It was just that her upper lip had a very slight upward curl. It was a potentially interesting feature. It might even be a beguiling feature if she were beguiling. She was not, however.
He was not accustomed to feeling animosity toward any woman, especially a young one. It seemed he was making an exception in this woman’s case.
Understanding dawned.
“You are the widow of my predecessor’s son,” he said.
She raised her eyebrows.
“I did not know he had one,” he explained. “A wife, I mean. A widow now. And you live here?”
“Temporarily,” she said. “Usually I live in the dower house over there.” She pointed in what he thought was roughly a westerly direction. “But the roof is being replaced.”
His brows snapped together. “I was not informed of the expense,” he told her.
Her own brows stayed up. “It is not your expense,” she informed him. “I am not a pauper.”
“You are spending money on a property that presumably belongs to me?” he asked her.
“I am the daughter-in-law of the late earl,” she said, “the widow of his son. I consider the dower house mine for all practical purposes.”
“And what will happen when you remarry?” he asked her. “Will I then be asked to reimburse you for the cost of the roof?”
And why the devil was he getting into this when he had scarcely set foot over the doorstep? And why was he being so abominably ungracious? Because he found marble women offensive? No, not plural. He had never met one before now. Her eyes, potentially lovely, were absolutely without warmth.
“It will not happen,” she told him. “I will not remarry and I will not ask for a return of my money.”
“Will no one have you?” Now he had gone plummeting over the edge of civility. He ought to apologize abjectly and right now. He scowled at her instead. “How old are you?”
“I am not convinced,” she said, “that my age is any of your concern. Neither is the list of my prospective suitors or lack thereof. Mr. Crutchley, I daresay the Earl of Hardford would like to be shown to his apartments to wash the dust of travel off his person and change his clothes. Have the tea tray brought up to the drawing room in half an hour, if you please. Lady Lavinia will be eager to meet her cousin.”
“Lady Lavinia?” He drilled her with a look.
“Lady Lavinia Hayes,” she explained, “is the late earl’s sister. She lives here. So, at present, does Mrs. Ferby, her companion and maternal cousin.”
His eyes drilled deeper into her. But there was not the smallest possibility that she was teasing him. “Not at the dower house when it sports a roof?”
“No, here,” she said. “Mr. Crutchley, if you please?”
“Follow me, my lord,” the butler said just as Percy heard the rumble of wheels approaching outside. His curricle, he guessed. For a brief moment he considered bolting through the door and down the steps and vaulting aboard with the command on his lips that his groom spring the horses, preferably in the direction of London. But it would be a shame to leave his favorite horse behind.