Page 17 of A Flaming Lady's Secret Valentine
“Well, he was quick to ride off.”
“Edward, please! Is it any surprise after we gave him the run-around all morning? He is our father’s steward. Not your riding partner. Certainly not my lover.”
“All right, fine. You have made your point.” Edward dropped the slippers from mid-air. “Just promise me that you will be careful.”
“Why?”
“Because there is nothing that attracts a rake like a woman who is soon to be married.”
By Saturday morning, Norwich had been blanketed by rain for three days in a row. It had meant less travel for Raphael, which had made him restless. There was only so much bookkeeping and letter-writing any one man could do before it drove him to madness.
Slumping back in his chair in the Berilton library, he gazed out of the window onto the lawns. The paddock was eerily symmetrical, lined on either side by pin oaks. It was unnerving for the garden to be so empty.
The whole manor was quiet as a tomb, despite the fact that all of its residents were housebound by the rain. The duke had found endless busywork for Raphael. He visited him on occasion in the library with more books and titbits to distract him, otherwise catching up on his correspondence and focusing on his ‘convalescence’ before they made their annual trip to London in February.
Raphael was unsure how the duchess had been biding her time. She had received a call on Thursday from some of the lower peers who lived around Norwich, but Raphael had chosen to spend that afternoon in his cottage. Thankfully, he had been left well alone. Lord Edward was as much a mystery, though it seemed he had been less deterred than the others to keep up with his appointments. Raphael had crossed paths with Edward twice in the drive, early in the mornings. He could not say where the man went. He could not say that he wanted to know, either.
Of course, the activities of the elder Norberts did not pique his curiosity nearly as much as those of Lady Cecilia. Her friend Lady Daphne Griffin was still staying at the house. He would infrequently catch chatter drifting through the entrance hall as they walked to the drawing rooms, but he forbade himself from prying.
On Friday evening, the footmen had fumbled with his coat, and he had not managed to leave the house before Cecilia came down for dinner. Their gazes had crossed, and she had seemed to want to speak with him. Raphael did not encourage her. It was better that he put as much distance between them as possible, because what he really wanted to do was know everything about her.
Nothing good would come of it, in part because he was not worthy of her. As he had walked home that Friday evening, he had decided he was a hypocrite. He had told Lady Cecilia to deny herself nothing while suppressing his own hungry curiosity.
With every stolen glance, with every chance meeting in the corridors, his curiosity only grew. There was nothing he could do to stop it, not while they were neighbours.
So, when the duke returned for the third time on Saturday morning, Raphael turned from the window to speak with him.
“Your Grace, I was thinking of travelling down to London on Monday morning to meet with the solicitors over Lord Edward’s house in Florence. There’s also the matter of preparing the house on Grosvenor for your arrival, and hiring a new set of gardeners, and checking on the tenants in the flats.”
The duke pursed his lips, but he did not look up from his books. “You make it sound as though we are stretching you too thin.”
“Not at all, Your Grace. But the sooner I can gauge what awaits us in town, the easier the transition will be.”
“Perhaps we should hire a second man to oversee our properties in London. My father had two stewards.”
Raphael tried not to take that as an insult. “I could begin looking for one when I am down there, Your Grace.”
“Good, then you will have your pick of Norwich or London to satisfy you. I know how exhausting the country can be to you youngbloods.” The duke tore his nose from his book. “While I have you, do you think you investigate another matter for me? It is not exactly pressing, but I would like to get ahead on it.”
Raphael rose from his chair, intending to ring for coffee. “A matter in London?”
“A purchase of land around Radcliff. The earl’s estate is in need of an expansion, and I am wondering whether he could acquire any of the nearby farms.”
The bell hung between his fingers in mid-air. “Pardon my impudence, Your Grace, but why would concern yourself with the land acquisition for Lord Radcliff? Surely his lordship has a steward of his own.”
“Are you not equal to the task?”
His jaw clenched. “With all due respect, I could sniff out and purchase a farmstead in a minute. The more I know of this operation, the better equipped I will be to find the right holding.”
The duke shrugged and motioned for the bell. Raphael rung it.
“I suppose you are within your rights. There is a chance the Elgin and Norbert families will again be reunited, though I cannot comment on the degree of our reunion, you understand. If this is to pass, I want to be certain that Radcliff has his affairs in order, or at the very least that they have the potential to be in order. A sufficient income, which could lead to sufficient jointures…”
He rolled his wrist. “If Radcliff is a money pit, I need to know.”
Raphael’s mind flashed with images of Cecilia. He set the bell down shakily.
“Consider it done.”
