Chapter 7
Hecate wasn’t, as cats went, the worst creature Adrian had ever encountered.
She was still a cat, of course, and thus was moody and unpredictable like most of her species, but Ryan and Etienne were right. She didn’t scratch or bite, and she did have remarkably soft, warm fur.
Not that he’d patted her. She’d brushed up against his hand, that’s all.
She seemed to tolerate his visits well enough, though that had more to do with the clotted cream and bits of meat than any desire she had for his charming company. Still, the welcoming meow she gave him when he entered the stables now wasn’t entirely disagreeable.
“Hungry, are you?” He stepped into the pen, spread an old horse blanket over the hay and settled down beside her. “I do hope tonight’s offering agrees with you, madam.”
Hecate had a rather discriminating palate, for a cat. He’d made the mistake of bringing her French beans a la crème the other night. She’d given them a disinterested sniff, then turned her back on him, disgusted by his stupidity.
He hadn’t made that mistake again.
“It’s a nice ragout this evening. I liberated it from my dinner plate, but don’t tell Cook that.” He rummaged in his coat pocket, took out the napkin he’d hidden there and spread the morsels out on the floor. “Here we are.”
Hecate rose from her sprawl, sniffed delicately at the beef, and after a fastidious twitch of her nose, deemed it acceptable. He reclined back against the side of the pen and watched, oddly pleased, as she began to eat. “That’s it. There’s a good cat.”
Good cat, indeed. If his fashionable London friends could see him now, they’d either laugh themselves sick, or drag him directly off to Bedlam.
God knew he didn’t bear much resemblance to the elegant Earl of Hawke now, with his breeches dusted with hay and bits of Hecate’s orange fur stuck to his coat.
Even now, three nights into his feline experiment, he hadn’t any bloody idea what he was doing here, hunkered down in the hay, his arse gone numb with cold in spite of the horse blanket, trying to make friends with a persnickety cat.
A cat, of all absurd things.
But Hecate wasn’t just any cat. She was Ryan and Etienne’s cat.
After eight long months of absence from Hawke’s Run, he no longer knew how to talk to his sons.
He didn’t know how to be with them—he didn’t know them at all anymore, really—and since he’d returned home, his efforts to bridge the gap seemed destined for disaster.
He couldn’t bear to see their eager expectation give way to bitter disappointment every time they gave him another chance, and he made another gaffe.
The fear was even worse. He’d seen it on their faces—that flash of uncertainty, that nearly imperceptible flinch backwards.
Cats were sly, demanding creatures, but they were a great deal less complicated than little boys were. If he could persuade Hecate to tolerate him without utterly cocking the thing up, then there might be hope for him, after all.
It was a start, at least. Proof that the thing could be done.
He rested his head against the side of Hecate’s pen and stared up at the dusty rafters above. Aside from Hecate’s soft nibbling and the whistle of the wind around the sides of the stables, it was silent here.
It was unnerving, all the silence. There was forever someone nattering in his ear in London, and an endless parade of willing ladies and bored gentlemen traipsing through his townhouse, all of them eager to be seen with the fashionable Lord Hawke.
It was no wonder his sons found him such a disappointment. It had been months since he’d been obliged to exert any effort to please anyone aside from himself. The irony there, of course, was that nothing and no one could please him—
“Mrreowww.”
He glanced up at Hecate’s disgruntled meow. “Yes? What is it now? No, I don’t have any more beef, you greedy creature.”
She ambled over to him, her heavy belly hanging low, and without so much as a by- your-leave crawled into his lap and settled herself down on top of him as if he were a stuffed cushion.
“No, that won’t do. Bad cat.” It was ridiculous enough he was sneaking into the stables at night to feed her, but a cat lounging atop him, kneading her claws on his thigh? No, indeed. He did have some pride left. “This isn’t part of our agreement, Hecate.”
Hecate paused to glare at him with her round, yellow eyes, then began calmly licking her paw.
“You’re spoiling my coat, you ridiculous animal.” It was a Weston, for God’s sake. He wriggled his legs, trying to dislodge her, and when that didn’t work, he rolled onto his side to tip her off. “Go on, shoo.”
But Hecate didn’t shoo. She remained right where she was, a continuous rumble emanating from her throat.
Well, it was quite cold tonight, and then Hecate was fifty-four days into her gestational cycle—at least, according to Miss Templeton’s charts. Perhaps it wouldn’t hurt for him to let her lounge on top of him for a bit.
He settled back against the pen and curled his hand around Hecate’s back. Miss Templeton and her infernal charts. Yesterday, she’d brought Hecate’s gestational chart with her when she brought him his tea, just in case he wished to ‘have a look at it.’
He didn’t, of course. The very idea was absurd. If he had taken a peek at it once she was gone, it was only because she’d left it on his desk, where he couldn’t avoid seeing it.
No doubt precisely as she intended it.
He’d never met a more persistent woman than Miss Templeton in his life.
He couldn’t make the least sense of her.
She should have been pleased to be rid of him after the way he’d behaved toward her, but instead she seemed utterly determined to lure him back to the stables for another animal husbandry lesson.
Animal husbandry, indeed. More like cat coddling.
Still, he hadn’t liked the way her face had fallen when he’d dismissed her, and after she’d gone, he’d had rather a lot of trouble settling down to his work again.
Then this morning he’d found himself watching her, Ryan and Etienne march down the pathway from the castle to the stables with a twinge in his chest…
God above. First the cat, and now the meddlesome governess. Either being at Hawke’s Run was having a decidedly bad effect on him, or a decidedly good one. He hadn’t yet made up his mind.
One thing was certain, however. Hecate’s purring was lulling him to sleep. “I do beg your pardon for disturbing you, Hecate, but as much as I treasure our newfound friendship, I draw the line at spending the night in the stables.”
He didn’t draw the line at leaving her his coat, however, and she’d burrowed quite contentedly into its folds by the time he left the stables, closing the door against the biting wind on his way out.
He’d have to fetch it early tomorrow morning.
It wouldn’t do for Miss Templeton and the boys to find it there—
“Mew, mew, mew.”
What the devil? He paused halfway across the stable yard, listening, but the mewling was gone. All he heard was the wailing of the wind.
Damn it, he was hearing cats everywhere now.
He resumed his trek across the yard, his boots crunching over the thick layer of frost on the ground, but when he neared the kitchen door he heard it again—a frightened, pathetic mewling, and it was growing more desperate every moment.
It was certainly a cat, but it couldn’t be Hecate. She was tucked safely into her pen inside the stables, and it was too high-pitched, more like a kitten’s cry. But where the devil was it?
“Mew, mew, mew.”
Bloody hell. The kitten was nearby, but it was as dark as Hades out here, and by the sounds of it, it was a tiny thing, and likely hiding from him. “Here, kitty. Come on out, now.”
There was another pitiful mewl, then a tiny shape detached itself from the shadows near the kitchen door and took a hesitant step toward him.
Oh, no. It was that little gray demon, the one who’d sliced the back of his neck to ribbons!
Miss Templeton’s cat. Hera, was it? No, that wasn’t right, but it was something like that.
Whatever her name was, there was no question Miss Templeton loved the little vagrant.
She’d nearly sacrificed her position for the cat after that incident on the staircase with the drinking chocolate.
Damn it, why did it have to be this particular cat? She’d likely make mincemeat of his fingers if he tried to touch her, yet he couldn’t very well leave her out here. She’d freeze to death, and that was assuming an owl or coyote didn’t get her first.
Even he wasn’t so hard-hearted as to leave her to such a sad fate. With one last prayer for the well-being of his fingers, he crouched down and held out his hand to her. “Come here, little creature. Yes, that’s it. Nice kitty—”
For all that the kitten was a demon from the underworld, she was no fool.
She saw at once he was her best and only hope of rescue, and scurried toward him.
He scooped her up in one hand—she was no bigger than his palm—and held her against his chest to protect her from the wind.
As quick as lightning she scrambled up his shirt front, settled herself under his chin, and nestled her tiny body into the hollow of his throat.
“Er, well, alright, then. I suppose that will do.” She hadn’t scratched him, and she was already purring, and the sensation of her warm, soft body tucked against him wasn’t awful.
But now that he had her, what was he meant to do with her?
Leave her in the kitchen? Or outside Miss Templeton’s bedchamber, so she’d be sure to see her when she woke?
He made his way through the dark kitchen, the kitten still cuddled under his chin, but paused when he reached the bottom of the entryway staircase.