A Duke by Any Other Name by Grace Burrowes Page 0,81
way?” he groused. “I have Cookie put together this lovely tray for the gentleman in the estate office and now you’re making off with him. First proper guest we get in donkey’s years, and you lot can’t leave him be long enough to enjoy a plate of toast. I ought to give my notice, I really ought.”
“Now, Thatcher,” Rothhaven said quietly, “you know we’d be lost without you.”
“I’ll just retrieve a book and return to my room,” Master Robbie said. “Lord Stephen, a pleasure.” He bowed with more dignity than a man in slippers and a dressing gown ought to be able to muster, then departed in the direction of the estate office.
“Into the library,” Rothhaven said, holding a paneled door open. “Please.”
Stephen limped forward, more entertained than he had been in ages.
“And what am I to do with this tray, I ask you?” Thatcher muttered, following in Stephen’s wake. “I’m not getting any younger, and I have better things to do than watch you lot waste good food.”
Rothhaven held the door for the footman. “On the reading table, please, Thatcher. I believe it’s time for your morning tea break too.”
Thatcher set the tray on the table and fairly sprinted for the door. “I do fancy a spot of tea from time to time. Mind you finish every bite, Master Nathaniel.”
He closed the door behind him, still muttering, as Stephen took a seat at the reading table.
“So your brother is alive?” Stephen poured two cups of tea and selected a slice of golden toast soaked with butter. “Bit of a pickle, that.”
Rothhaven—or Lord Nathaniel?—took the seat at Stephen’s elbow. “It’s a bloody damned mess and has been for years. You are sworn to secrecy. Pass the jam.”
“I don’t care for secrets, especially when my sister is entangled in them.”
“That is precisely why you will keep your mouth shut. You didn’t put any sugar in my tea.”
Stephen passed him the sugar bowl. “Sugar it yourself, and tell me what in seven sulfurous hells is going on here.”
Rothhaven dropped a lump of sugar into his tea. “It’s truly better if you don’t know.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.” The toast was wonderful. Cut thicker than bread was usually sliced, done to a turn, still warm, and dripping butter. Nursery food, but then, nurseries were supposed to be happy, healthy places.
Rothhaven stirred his tea and sat back, an odd smile lurking in his eyes. “You really are Althea’s brother. I suppose you should hear the tale from me, but you are not to badger Althea for more details. She doesn’t have them, and that’s for the best too.”
“Your front door is manned by Methuselah’s great-uncle, you are impersonating a peer of the realm who is very much alive, and exasperated mothers invoke your name as a curse. Who are you to be telling me anything where my sister is concerned?”
Rothhaven’s lashes swept down, his head remained bowed for a moment, and in his silence Stephen lit upon the answer to his own question: Rothhaven was the man who’d fallen in love with Lady Althea Wentworth, a woman determined to take her place in society, a woman connected to one of the most prominent—some would say notorious—families in the realm.
While Rothhaven was determined on a life of secrecy and obscurity.
His Pseudo-Grace took a sip of tea—no hurrying this fellow—and set down the cup and saucer. “Who am I? I am the man who will see you ruined if you take the smallest risk with your sister’s happiness. You will say nothing of her presence here and nothing of what you’ve seen. Do have some more toast. It’s about the only thing Cook prepares well.”
“A fine speech, but a bit of work on the particulars of your threat will make it more convincing.” Stephen helped himself to more toast. “Now why have you spent years lying to all of society, pretending to be somebody you are not, and very possibly breaking the law?”
The seizure came without warning in the darkest hours.
Robbie had dozed off shortly before midnight, his temperature warm but not alarmingly so. Althea remained awake in the chair beside his bed while Rothhaven was across the hall napping. He’d told her that if Robbie had a seizure, there was nothing to do but roll him onto his side and safeguard him from anything that might fall upon him. The bedroom had a double thickness of carpet both because that helped keep Robbie’s chambers quiet and because he was less likely to injure himself