Chapter 9
Adrian didn’t join Miss Templeton for Ryan and Etienne’s feline husbandry lesson that afternoon, but kept to himself for the remainder of the day. The worst of it was, he was no longer sure whether it was his sons he was avoiding, or Helena Templeton.
Either way, he soon had cause to regret it, because by the time he did venture from his study, cursing himself as a coward, Miss Templeton had disappeared.
She didn’t appear with his tea tray that afternoon, and any hopes he might have secretly entertained that she’d come to the stables early the following morning were dashed when he entered, and found only Cyrus and Hecate.
He would have sworn he felt the weight of Helena’s gaze on him as he crossed the stable yard, but her bedchamber window was dark, and she didn’t appear.
By mid-morning, the walls of his study were closing in on him, and he was so consumed with thoughts of, er…feline husbandry nothing in the world could have stopped him from hurrying to the stables for the lesson.
But when he got there, Miss Templeton was nowhere to be found, and neither were his sons.
Hecate cheered up when he appeared, but once she found he didn’t have any more of the prawns he’d fed her earlier that morning, she gave a dismissive twitch of her tail that was downright offensive, and proceeded to ignore him.
Where the devil could Miss Templeton have gone? He never should have touched her yesterday. What had he been thinking, stroking her lips in that shameless manner? He’d likely frightened her to death. After such a lapse in propriety, he’d hardly blame her if she left her post!
At the very least, he could have attended the feline husbandry lesson. She’d invited him a half-dozen times this week. Yesterday she’d come close to pleading with him, her lovely blue-gray eyes wide with hope, only for him to disappoint her once again.
He trudged back to the castle and roamed aimlessly from room to room.
Eventually he found the boys engaged in a rather chaotic fencing lesson with their beleaguered fencing master, but there was no sign of Miss Templeton.
She wasn’t in the kitchens, the schoolroom, or the library.
He even went so far as to knock on her bedchamber door, but there was no reply.
By the time he came across Mrs. Norris in the linen room, he was all but certain Miss Templeton had left his employ and fled Hawke’s Run in the dead of night, so she never had to see his face again. “Mrs. Norris! Miss Templeton is missing!”
Mrs. Norris paused in her inspection of the linen closet. “Missing, my lord?”
“Yes, damn it. I’ve been all over the house searching for her, from the kitchens to the library to the boys’ bedchamber, and even the attics. She’s nowhere to be found.”
Mrs. Norris stared at him. “The, ah…the attics?”
“Yes! Unless she’s hiding in one of the priest’s holes underneath the castle, then she’s vanished, I tell you!”
“I assure you that Miss Templeton hasn’t vanished, my lord. Today is her day off.”
“Her day off?” That did make more sense than the priest’s hole, didn’t it? “I, ah…I see. But don’t you mean her half-day?” Surely, she wasn’t going to be gone for the entire day?
“No, my lord. Miss Templeton and I arranged for her to take a full day every other week, rather than a half day every week, so she might have time to go and visit her sister at Steeple Cross.”
“Steeple Cross? What, has Lord Cross opened the house again?” And why would Miss Templeton’s sister be there? Was she the housekeeper there, or the new countess’s lady’s maid?
“Yes, my lord. He spends a great deal more time there since he married.”
Ah. Now he thought of it, he did recall hearing something about Cross having married, to some lady named…
well, he couldn’t recall what her name was.
He hadn’t paid much attention, as he and Cross weren’t well acquainted, despite being neighbors.
They didn’t move in the same circles. Which is to say, Cross was respectable, and he was not.
“What time will she return?” Good Lord, was he whining? Because it sounded very much as if he was whining.
“Not until this evening, I should think, my lord.”
This evening! But it was only ten o’clock in the morning! The evening was hours away.
“Is there something I might do for you, Lord Hawke? Of course, Abby’s here, as well, and we have an additional housemaid in from the village for the day, to make up for Miss Templeton’s absence.”
He stifled a snort. There wasn’t a bloody housemaid in existence who could replace Helena Templeton. He didn’t say so, of course, mainly because Mrs. Norris was already eyeing him as if he’d lost his wits. “No, not a thing, only who’s to mind the boys today?”
“Not to worry, my lord. Miss Templeton arranges for them to be kept busy with lessons on her day off. They’re engaged with their fencing master at the moment, and later this afternoon they’ll go out with their riding master.”
Riding master? How the devil had she managed that? “But the boys don’t have horses.”
“No, but Miss Templeton found a riding master in Steeple Barton who’s willing to lend his horses. He has a pair of delightful roan ponies he brings for Ryan and Etienne.”
Of course, because there wasn’t a single thing Helena Templeton couldn’t do.
A wave of some emotion rolled over him at the thought of her searching out riding masters, but it wasn’t affection, no matter how much it might feel like it.
Earls didn’t feel affection for their sons’ governess. It was unseemly.
“Perhaps you’d like to ride out with the boys this afternoon, Lord Hawke?
I’m certain your horse wants exercising.
Ryan and Etienne would be thrilled to have you, and really, my lord, it’s the dearest thing imaginable, to see them trotting about on their matching ponies.
” Mrs. Norris cast a shrewd look at him.
“I daresay Miss Templeton will be vastly pleased to find you’d all been out together. ”
It was frightening, really, how adroitly Mrs. Norris managed him. “Perhaps I will.” There was only so much time he could spend with Hecate, after all.
But until then, there was nothing for him to do but return to his study, stare into the fire, and do his best not to think about the plush softness of Helena Templeton’s lower lip beneath his fingertips, and try not to count how many hours must elapse before evening arrived, and she’d return to Hawke’s Run.
“You seem out of sorts, Helena. Are you quite all right, dearest?”
Helena startled, guilty heat rising in her cheeks as she jerked her attention back to Juliet, who was regarding her with an anxious frown on her pretty face. “I beg your pardon, Juliet. I’m perfectly well, just a bit distracted.”
Juliet’s frown deepened. “It’s not the boys, is it?”
Dear Juliet. She was nearly as fond of Ryan and Etienne as Helena was.
She never failed to ask about them ever since she’d met them several months ago, after she’d fled a house party at Steeple Cross, arrived unexpectedly at Hawke’s Run early in morning and promptly burst into a flood of tears over some business having to do with Lord Cross.
Helena had never quite worked out what had gone awry between them, but Lord Cross had appeared that evening in a rather startling scarlet waistcoat, shouted verses of Shakespeare up at Juliet from underneath a bedchamber window, and four weeks later, Juliet had married him.
It was a curious business, but to see them now, one would never believe anything but the most ardent love could ever have existed between Lord and Lady Cross. They were utterly devoted to each other.
“No, the boys are fine, it’s just that Lord Hawke returned home rather suddenly last week, and things at Hawke’s Run have been a bit unsettled since then.”
“Lord Hawke’s back from London?” Juliet’s lovely blue eyes went wide. “My goodness. I confess I didn’t anticipate that happening anytime soon. Lord Hawke is an, er…eager participant in the entertainments London has to offer.”
“Entertainments, Juliet? By that, I take you to be referring to Lord Hawke’s rumored wickedness?”
“Are they just rumors, then? Goodness knows I don’t take a word that falls from the ton’s lips as sacred truth. For all I know, Lord Hawke is positively saintly.”
“He’s hardly saintly, I assure you. Some scandal or other drove him out of London.
” She’d expected Abby would have heard from her sister before now with a full accounting of the latest gossip regarding Lord Hawke, but as the days passed, whatever had landed him at Hawke’s Run mattered less and less to her.
“I can’t say what it was, though, or whether or not it’s true. ”
Juliet snorted. “Likely not, or at the very least it’s not as bad as the gossips make it out to be. Does he realize you’re one of the infamous Templeton sisters?”
“I don’t think so, no. If he has heard the gossip about us, he hasn’t yet connected it to me.
” Which was odd, really, given he’d just come from town, and half the ton was still buzzing about the wicked Templeton sisters who’d tricked two of London’s most eligible earls into marriage with their clever matchmaking schemes.
Or so the ton would have it. Half the ladies in London wanted to scratch her sisters’ eyes out.
The other half wanted to know how they’d done it, so they might trap husbands of their own, but of course, there was no trick to it, no trap.
Lord Melrose had fallen madly in love with Emmeline, and Lord Cross with Juliet.
It was simply love, and that was all.
“Well, it’s lucky he hasn’t figured out who you are, though he’s likely to work it out at some point.
What’s he like?” Juliet leaned forward, her eyes dancing.
“I do hope at least some of the rumors about him are true! He’s said to be extraordinarily handsome, and extraordinarily wicked, and one does tend to be fascinated by a handsome, wicked earl, doesn’t one? ”