Chapter 5
Boom, boom, boom.
The bronze door knocker was shaped like an orchid, but it made a sound like thunder.
It was still early morning in Mayfair, the sky the faintest pink, so it was several minutes before the butler, bleary-eyed and still in his nightclothes, pulled the door open. “Yes, yes!” he said testily. “What could anyone want at this hour?”
“Morning, Levy.” Charlotte smiled brightly even as her hands shook and her stomach quaked with a quivery sort of fury. “Good God, is that a nightcap? I wasn’t aware people still wore those.”
Levy blinked awake. “Lady Charlotte? My goodness! You’re meant to be upstairs in bed.” He took in Warrick, standing on her flank like a constable. “Your Grace. Come in at once.”
Charlotte tilted her head. “Do you wear a nightcap, Your Grace? I can picture you in one. Candy stripes, with a little pom-pom at the end?”
Warrick ignored her, as he had ever since he’d wrapped her domino tight around her and bundled her into a hansom cab. She could feel fury sitting heavy on his shoulders, like a mantle of stone.
“Wake the dowager,” Warrick said to Levy.
“I’m afraid—” Levy began.
“Wake her now.”
The butler swallowed. “At once, Your Grace.”
“Do not wake Gran, Levy.” Charlotte shot Warrick a cross look. “The doctor said she needs her sleep, and I refuse to bother her with something that can wait until morning.”
Levy glanced nervously at the duke, but all he said was, “Very good, my lady.”
Warrick stopped her as she turned for the stairs. “Lady Charlotte, a word?”
She paused on the first step and cocked an inquiring eyebrow.
“In the salon, if you please,” he said through gritted teeth.
She didn’t please, but she crossed into the salon anyway. “Yes, my lord duke? I take it you have a lecture to deliver? I can’t promise to stay awake for it, but I shall try.”
It was an attack, and Charlotte regretted it immediately.
The trick to confronting an angry man was to remain calm.
The calmer the better, with perhaps a concerned furrow of the brow thrown in, as if one was trying very hard to be helpful.
Charlotte had flummoxed any number of lords, leaders of industry, politicians, and even members of the royal family in just this way, but with Warrick she lost all finesse.
“I’m not your brother,” said Warrick. “I’ve no obligation to lecture you, but I do have an obligation to say—”
“You’ve no obligations whatsoever.” Charlotte crossed her arms and huffed away a powdered curl that had worked loose and fallen in front of her eye. “I deeply regret any inconvenience Julian caused by involving you in my affairs, and I release you entirely.”
“Ramsay caused me no inconvenience. He’s your brother, and it’s only fitting that he should see to your care.”
“Oh?” A thought occurred to Charlotte, and much to her horror, her eyes went hot. “Don’t tell me you’re planning to stand in my own drawing room with that awful look on your face and tell me you think me ruined.”
“No! Christ, I wouldn’t.”
In the pale morning light, his inky blue gaze was filled with a bewildering mix of anger, irritation, and—Charlotte swallowed because her throat felt suddenly tight. Oh God, was that sympathy?
Warrick stepped closer. “Any look you see on my face is fury that I could not squash Dumbarton like the bug he is, for fear of greater scandal. Do you see my dilemma? I was a soldier, you remember. My first thought when I see a problem is how much gunpowder I will need.”
Oh.
Heat rushed through Charlotte.
Oh!
“I see.” Her eyebrows came together. “No, I don’t see a thing. I’ve never understood! Are you quite—”
“I brought you here to apologize, Lady Charlotte. I promised your brother to protect you and I failed. I will not fail you again.”
Warrick bowed low over her hand and turned on his heel, leaving Charlotte to stare at his broad back as he strode out of the room.