Chapter 4
Jensen
Despite being exhausted, I couldn’t fall asleep last night. I didn’t feel all that great. There was an awful emptiness in my chest and a clank in my bones. I felt out of place. Far, far away from everything normal. Everything I know. Everyone I love.
I tossed and turned until, at last, I accepted defeat and got the blankets Mrs. Thompson left for me out of the cupboard and arranged every pillow I could find on my bed.
I placed them in a big circle, threw the entire selection of blankets over them, and buried myself in the downy pile.
When that still didn’t drown my homesickness out, I snuck my ancient pink tickle blanket out of its hiding spot in the bottom of my bag and rubbed it over the bottom half of my face until its soft comfort slowed my thoughts enough that I was finally able to rest.
I wake nestled up to my eyeballs, drowning in the most luxurious blankets I’ve ever laid my hands on. There’s a mauve weighted one on my legs and a soft, velvety one tucked under my chin.
I’m as snug as a bug.
It’s heavenly until I open my eyes and look around the room, cheeks heating at the thought of anyone seeing me like this.
Nesting is natural and normal, obviously. There’s nothing wrong with it. It’s just that doing it when you’re twenty-seven years old and not in the throes of heat is quite embarrassing.
I leap out of bed and take great care to put all the blankets and pillows back where I found them.
By the time nine o’clock rolls around, my stomach is growling, so I see myself to the dining room. I’m unsure of where else to go because I haven’t caught a glimpse of Mrs. Thompson this morning.
I push open the tall double doors, expecting to be greeted by an empty room.
It’s not an empty room though. Far from it.
There, at the head of the table, is a man I instantly identify as not only one of the two or three best-looking human beings I’ve seen in real life, but quite possibly the most difficult too.
His presence is enormous. A heavy, dense aura that rolls down the length of the room and threatens to bowl me over.
His eyes are jet black, his head tilted down in a way that gives him a penetrating stare.
His hair is dark too. Dark and shiny. Well-cut and well-styled.
So is his beard. There’s a tiny bulge at the hinge of his jaw that makes it look like he’s trying his best not to roll his eyes, but the effort is costing him.
I have a feeling that being forced to dine with a stranger who happens to be on his payroll is not his idea of a good time.
He gets to his feet with powerful, well-practiced grace, and sweet Jesus, he’s tall. Easily as tall as Branson. Maybe even taller.
He closes the space between us with purposeful strides that leave me feeling as though I urgently need to urinate.
I don’t, obviously.
And I’m going to stop being like this immediately. I am my own man. I’m not going to let myself be affected like this by an alpha I don’t know. I’ve been furious with Lucien for letting my brother get to him the way he did, and I certainly won’t be making the same mistake anytime soon.
“Alfred Augustus,” he says, wrapping a mammoth hand around mine and squeezing just hard enough to remind me that I have a name and it’s time for me to say it.
“I’m J-Jensen,” I squeak. “Jensen Lawlor.”
Despite myself, I lean in and take a quick, surreptitious breath, waiting for the heady scent of an attractive, asshole alpha to flood my senses, and…
Nothing.
No signals firing. No delicious chemical molecules entering my nasal passages. No spicy stimulation of olfactory sensory neurons. No sudden flash of sensation.
Just nothing.
A plasticky absence of scent, if anything.
God, that’s odd.
I try not to make a face because I don’t want to be rude, but I’m not sure how successful I am.
I’ve never been especially talented at keeping my face under control, and this is the strangest human scent I’ve ever picked up.
It’s a non-smell, if such a thing exists.
It’s not especially bad, it just…isn’t anything.
I look at him again, a tiny puddle of panic forming as I realize that I have no idea how on Earth to address him.
He gave me his first and last name. But surely I can’t call him Alfred?
No. I don’t think I’m supposed to do that.
I seem to recall something about firstborn sons being referred to by their last name in noble families, but I’m so muddled right now that I can’t remember if that’s something I read, or if I just made it up.
“Please, take a seat,” says Lord Alfred or Augustus with a slightly bored sigh and an open-palm gesture to my chair.
The gesture is infinitely polite…in a practiced way.
A way that’s been rehearsed so many times that it comes naturally to him now, even though it goes against the grain of his character.
His accent is clipped, precise, and harmonious.
His voice is deep and emanates from low in his chest. It travels through muscle and bone to reach me, and all I can say is thank goodness he doesn’t smell how he looks.
I’d be in one hell of a mess if he did.
A man wearing gray slacks, a white shirt, a gray waistcoat, and an exceedingly dour expression, enters the dining room, pours a cup of tea for me, and quietly asks how I like my eggs. I consider telling him I like them with coffee, not tea, but think better of it.
“Poached, please,” I say instead.
Lord Whatever His Name sips his tea at his absolute leisure without so much as a sideways glance at me. He doesn’t have a care in the world, and I can tell he’s so stuck up that he’s barely aware of my presence.
He’s obviously the most dreadful snob.
Other than the odd “please” or “thank you,” I don’t bother trying to make conversation with him. I don’t care how handsome he is. If he’s a snob, I’m not a fan.
I think it’s for the best, actually. I think while I’m here, I’m going to practice saying less in general. I’m going to think things through before talking, and I’m not going to bow to the pressure to fill awkward silences. That’s what I’m going to do.
Though the day starts like a Monday hellbent on following me into Tuesday, it improves dramatically when Mrs. Thompson shows me the library.
Holy shit, it’s incredible. It’s the embodiment of my boyhood dreams come to life.
My adult dreams too. It’s a double-volume space clad floor-to-ceiling in walnut bookshelves.
There are two floors of books, the second floor accessed by a dreamy spiral staircase, and a little wrought iron balustrade that wraps around the perimeter of the entire room.
It’s a vintage-velvet-and-antique-oil-painting kind of place.
A place where books are happy and reality doesn’t matter.
Or at least, books will be happy here as soon as I’ve laid order to chaos.
They’re in considerable disarray at the moment.
From what I’ve been able to glean from my interview, and a brief conversation with Mrs. Thompson, the last librarian was an alpha, and she and Lord Augustus—that’s what Mrs. Thompson calls him, so I presume it’s what I should call him too—had the most horrific falling out.
Mrs. Thompson’s eyes stretch wide and glisten when she tells me about it.
“I’m not one to speak ill of people who aren’t here to defend themselves,” she tuts, “but it wouldn’t surprise me if you were to find some evidence of sabotage when you get to work, that’s all I’m saying. She was a right piece of work, that girl…but you won’t hear another word about it from me.”
She shows me to the section of the library where the books that need restoring are kept. It’s a small room off the library. It’s climate-controlled, and thank God for small mercies because one of the first books I spot is a first edition of Pride and Prejudice that’s seen better days.
“Oh, she thought she knew it all, that Aurelia,” Mrs. Thompson says, shooting me a conspiratorial look. “No surprise, really. You know what they’re like.”
By they I presume she means alphas. In that case, yes, I do know what they can be like. I had a particularly unpleasant breakfast with a particularly unpleasant alpha this morning, as a matter of fact.
I consider telling her so, but so far, almost everything she’s said or implied about the man of the house has given me the impression that she considers him, if not a god exactly, something damn close.
The more Mrs. Thompson shows me around, the clearer it becomes that the library is in a worse state than I was led to believe. When she’s unable to unearth the ledger, I can’t hold my tongue.
“How, how did it get like this?” I ask. “It must have taken ages. Years. Surely someone noticed it falling apart.”
She clasps her hands together at the base of her throat. “You mustn’t think poorly of us, dear. We’ve all been doing our best.”
“Oh, I don’t think poorly of you, I just wonder how the”—I thought I could make the leap and name Lord Augustus as the main culprit, but it turns out, I can’t—“people in charge let it get this bad.”
Her head whips around and her mouth forms a small, tight dot. “It’s not Lord Augustus’s fault,” she says, scandalized. “He’s…he’s a very, very busy man.”
It’s interesting she should say that because, as best as I can tell, this entire household is crawling with people who spend their entire lives doing every conceivable thing for the good lord, barring only wiping his ass for him, though I’m sure if he asked one of them to take on the task, they’d be only too happy to help.
“Really?” I say, keeping my tone as mild as possible. “What does he do that keeps him so busy?”
“Well, there’s the…” her voice drifts slightly, “management of the property. A lot of that falls on him.”
Hmm, I haven’t been here long, but everything I’ve seen so far leads me to believe that Mrs. Thompson and Edmond, the man who interviewed me, do most of the heavy lifting when it comes to managing the property, not Lord Augustus.
Mrs. Thompson continues, wracking her brain to come up with a vaguely robust list. “And the affairs—the household affairs—he manages those…and, and the investments.” She seems particularly pleased to have thought of that one.
“He keeps an eye on his investments. And, well, mainly, he spends time outdoors. Fresh air does him good. It clears his head.” She smiles proudly.
“He goes riding every day, no matter the weather.”
I nod supportively and say, “Ahh, I see.”
I do see. I see that, as suspected, the Honorable Lord Assholeship is spoiled rotten and spends his entire life dabbling in hobbies he calls work and is pampered to within an inch of his life.
When Mrs. Thompson leaves me, I spend a few pleasant hours getting the lay of the land in the library, which is really just another way of saying that I have a jolly good snoop, but like, in a professional way.
It’s a lot of fun.
My mood is so buoyed by dinnertime that I’m hardly even infuriated by Lord Snotty-pants’s failure to appear. I pour myself a glass of wine, the size of which I strongly suspect would be considered uncouth by members of the nobility, but what of it? I’m not a nobleman. I’ll do what I goddamn like.
I enjoy my dinner, only jumping a few inches when I hear a thump that turns out to be nothing.