Under the Kissing Bough by Shannon Donnelly

Author:Shannon Donnelly
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: Romance
Published: 2012-09-30T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TEN

For an instant an awkward silence held the room. Eleanor froze still. The earl scowled. And Geoff stood in the doorway, stare locked with his father, trying to keep his exasperation in check. Devil take it, but did the man wish to be buried with a Christmas service? He had heard from a servant of the earl's demand to come downstairs in a Bath Chair with wheels upon it. And then he had heard that the earl was ensconced in the countess' rooms with Eleanor.

For a brief moment, the thought teased Geoff that the earl had been play acting the whole bloody time, pretending to be deathly ill to gain his own way in this matter of his heir's marriage. After all, Simon Arthur Westerley, Earl of Herndon, Viscount Staines and Baron Wey had lived for sixty-two years upon this year, burying one wife, raising three sons, ruling his domain, and manipulating others for most of those years. Poor Cynthia had utterly dreaded the earl, and with reason for he had made her cry upon more than one occasion.

But Geoff dismissed such a notion. Ibbottson, not his father, had written him about the earl's limited time upon this earth. Besides, it would be like the earl, even while dying, to still wish to manage the world around him.

Still, the suspicion that something was afoot returned to tease Geoff as he studied his father's ruddy face, and his suspicions leaked into his voice, coming out in a clipped tone. "Good morning, Father. Eleanor. Do I intrude?"

Eleanor rose at once and went to the earl's side and placed a protective hand on his shoulder. "Good morning. Your father and I were just getting better acquainted."

Irritation nibbled at Geoff's already sore temper. Devil take it, did she think his father needed protection? He could almost laugh, if it did not chaff so much that she had leapt so readily to take his father's side.

The earl reached up and covered Eleanor's hand with his own, smiling, almost as if he had won a small victory. And then he said, his voice quavering slightly, "She's no ring yet. Thought you were to see to that."

Guilty enough to grow warm under his collar and cravat, Geoff glanced at Eleanor to see her reaction. She looked away, embarrassment staining her cheeks. Oh, Lord, she did care about a ring. Of course she would. But he had not been thinking of it, or of her, but only of his own misery. Well, that would end. He strode to the bedside to tug on the bell-pull, summoning a servant.

Bellows, the butler, answered quickly enough that Geoff suspected he had been standing at the ready. The staff must be buzzing with the news that the earl had come downstairs, and Bellows must have decided that a possible confrontation between father and son dictated the need for him to respond in person to this delicate situation.

"Bellows, please see that my father is made comfortable in his rooms again."

"So I'm to

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