Dealing With Discipline (43 page)

"Of course I pined for him
when we were separated, but that's to be expected.  He came
and visited as often as he could, although I wouldn't let him
overexert himself."  Her mother sighed.  "It hasn't been
easy, I admit, but now that Hugh is taking over so much of the
responsibilities in London it will certainly be
easier.
"  Her mother gave her a
rather rueful look.  "I wish you'd told me before what you
thought about your father always been in London.  I would have
explained."

"Talking about him always made you so
sad when you were separated, I didn't want to bring him up."
 

"Well I'm glad we've had this little
chat," her mother said smiling as Eleanor picked up her tea again
now that her hands were quite so shaky.  She still felt as if
she'd been blown sideways by a stiff wind, but at least her
physical reactions were back under her control.  

"Me too," said Eleanor rather
wonderingly.  Her mother had given her quite a bit to think
about.

******

Although he'd been loath to leave
Eleanor at home by herself, Edwin had been reassured when her
mother had arrived and he'd gone with Wesley to greet Lord
Harrington.  They'd all gone to a gentleman's club to have a
drink and chat until Wesley felt he needed to go and greet his
mother, leaving Edwin alone with his father-in-law.  Since
most of Society was in London the club room was lightly sprinkled
with other patrons, most of whom were much older and had already
taken their leave from the Season if they had attended at all.
 Edwin and Wesley's presence had brought down the average age
drastically, and even Lord Harrington had contributed to the
effort.

As such, it seemed like the perfect
place for Edwin to receive some masculine advice.  His own
father was more studious than anything else and he'd often gone to
Hugh's father for advice on more mundane matters like women,
boxing, swords and really everything that labeled him as a
Corinthian.  It only seemed natural that he would seek out the
older man's advice now, especially as he was married to the man's
daughter and hadn't had a chance to talk to Hugh.  Who else
would know her better?

"So I believe I may be guilty of
taking her for granted a bit," he confessed, after having explained
the quarrel that had brought them to Bath in the first place,
although of course he didn't go into the more sordid details.
 

Lord Harrington chuckled.  "Worst
thing you can do to a woman, son.  Especially a woman like my
daughter, she's not the type to stand mildly by and wait for you to
take notice."

"I'm just not quite sure
what she wants."  Edwin stared broodily at the drink in his
hand.  "I don't ignore her.  I give her presents.  I
pay her more attention than most men do their wives at balls.
 But she runs hot and cold... although I never thought she'd
tried to leave without telling me.  I know she wants
something
from me, I
just don't know what."

"Do you think she was really trying to
leave?" Lord Harrington wondered.  "Or just test you? My
Eleanor does like to test her boundaries."

"It certainly felt like a test,
although I'm not sure I passed," he grumped in response.  The
older man hid a smile.  Edwin's black scowl went rather well
with his dark good looks, if there had been any women in the room
they would have been swooning over his rather Gothic demeanor.
 Personally Lord Harrington thought it was rather good for
Edwin, from what he'd seen many things in life had come rather
easily to the young man - including his marriage to Eleanor - it
would do him good to work for it.  It was obvious that Edwin
did want to work for it. 

"I rather think you must have, if you
got her to Bath without incident," Lord Harrington said rather
dryly. 

"That's true," Edwin said, his
expression lightening somewhat.  "I just... she's driving me
wild.  The idea of her not wanting to be around me... I
can't..."

"The best way to be sure of a woman is
to have her fall in love with you. Eleanor’s been halfway there all
her life, just get her the rest of the way there.”

It was almost too simple to be
brilliant, but brilliant it was.

Somehow, the entirety of
his marriage, Edwin had never really considered love. Like he had
Eleanor, he’d taken his emotions for granted, accepting what was on
the surface without examining them too closely. It hadn’t mattered
to him why he constantly wanted his wife’s presence, despite the
fact that she sometimes welcomed him and sometimes gave him the
cold shoulder, he’d only known that he wanted it. He’d never
considered why he danced attendance on her at balls, not that he’d
ever cared about whether or not he was being unfashionable, he’d
only known that he didn’t want her receiving too much attention
from the rakes and roués of the
ton
without them knowing he was watching over
her.

Of course he was in love with Eleanor,
it was why he no longer cared to attract any other women. He
admired them of course, he wasn’t blind, but no matter how
beautiful or sultry or desirable, the woman he desired above all
else was Eleanor. All he wanted was to make her happy and to spend
the rest of his life with her.

Because he loved her.

So all he had to do was make sure she
felt the same way about him.

“Lord Harrington, I do believe you’re
right.”

Rolling his eyes, the older man shook
his head at the silly grin that was plastered across Edwin’s face.
“Of course I am.”

Epilogue

Not entirely surprisingly, when Wesley
was giving the direction to the house his mother was residing in,
it was not far from Lord Harrington's house in the most fashionable
part of town.  What he hadn't expected was to discover that
the front drawing room was not filled with her friends having tea
and chattering loudly enough to send a man running for a stiff
drink.  Normally his mother was an incredible social
butterfly, it was highly unusual for her to not be "at-home" or at
the very least to not have at least one or two friends over to have
a coze with.

The open door to that empty room made
him surprisingly uncomfortable as the butler took his greatcoat
with a judgmental sniff.  Wesley hid a grin.  Good old
Manfred.  He'd been the butler for the Countess for as long as
Wesley could remember and a stuffier, more upright example of the
breed Wesley had never met.  Old age hadn't made Manfred's
eyes any less sharp and they took in every wrinkle in Wesley's
shirt, the less than perfect knot of his cravat, the mud on his
boots and the unfashionable length of his hair.  It gave
Wesley a sense of normalcy that his mother's lack of visitors had
unbalanced. 

"Thank you Manfred," he said politely
as the butler folded Wesley greatcoat over his arm.  The older
man just sniffed, amusing Wesley even more.  Who cared if he
was the Earl now?  Manfred obviously still saw him as the
little rapscallion who had tracked muddy footprints through the
entire manor when he was eight.  "Where is my
mother?"

"Her ladyship is feeling unwell and is
in her bedchamber."

"Is she ill?" Wesley asked, pausing on
his way to the stairs.  She certainly hadn't indicated any
such thing in her most recent letter. 

The butler sniffed again,
his dark eyes censuring.  "I believe the responsibilities and
trials of attempting to control
your
ward
 have had an adverse effect on
her ladyship's health."

By which Wesley was given to
understand that Manfred disapproved of both the ward and the fact
that Wesley had left her in his mother's care.  The man
practically worshiped the Countess, and considering his own prudish
and proper sensibilities would certainly have been just as appalled
by the antics his mother had described in her letters as his mother
was.  Possibly more so.  For a moment Wesley almost felt
sorry for the chit. 

"Where is my ward?"

"Confined to her bedroom," Manfred
said darkly. 

"I see."

He didn't see, not entirely, but he
knew he would.  Taking the stairs two at a time he found the
third door on the right, which Manfred had indicated was his
mother's, and knocked.  

"Come in."

The room was surprisingly dark, with
just a few candles burning next to the bedside.  It was
decorated in soft greens, which was his mother's favorite color,
and was filled with the kind of delicately carved wooden furniture
that she preferred and which always made him feel like he was about
to break by touching it.  His mother was laying on her bed,
fully dressed, her maid sitting in the chair next to the window,
knitting.  

"Wesley," his mother said, sitting up
and smiling.  

"Are you alright mother?" he asked,
coming closer so that he could see her better in the dim lighting
of the room.  The curtains were almost completely drawn, only
letting in enough light for the maid to knit by, and the
candlelight didn't give him much to go by from a distance.
 "Manfred said you were feeling unwell."

"A megrim," she said, pushing herself
to her feet and holding out her arms.  "But I feel much better
just for seeing you."

Gently wrapping his mother up in his
arms, Wesley felt rather shocked at how small and fragile she felt.
 He hadn't traveled immediately to see her when he'd returned
home, which he should have done, but she'd been on the estates and
he'd always hated that house.  It had been easier to wait till
the end of the Season, especially since she hadn't approved of his
support for his brother's plans.  When he'd left to go
traveling, against his father's wishes, he'd been taller than his
mother of course and more muscular... but now it felt almost as if
she'd shrunken in his absence.

When she pulled away, her face tipped
up to him, he could see the lines that hadn't been there before,
the glints of grey in her mahogany hair and guilt flooded in.
 He should have gone to see her immediately, whether or not he
hated Spencer Place.  He shouldn't have left her alone with a
young, hoydenish woman to handle on her own, even if she was better
suited to guiding a young female.  She'd never been very good
at disciplining anyone, and he should have realized from her
letters that she truly was overwhelmed and not just exasperated.
 

"Oh Wesley," she looked up at him in
dismay, her fingers reaching up to his neckline.  "Your
hair!"

He couldn't help it, he burst out
laughing.

******

The house was in an utter uproar.
 After a chat with his mother in which he accepted her
invitation to stay for dinner and fended off her demands that he
trim his hair immediately - he rather liked having hair that was
longer than fashionable and most ladies didn't seem to object -
he'd gone to introduce himself to his ward.  Unfortunately,
"confined to her bedroom" she was not. 

She was missing, it appeared, and no
one had seen her leave or even seen her walking around the house.
 But somehow the chit had snuck out.

Furious, especially after
seeing how worn out his mother was from dealing with the hoyden's
antics, Wesley had ordered that his mother not be informed of this
latest debacle until they located the little brat.  At which
point
he
 would deal with her.  For a moment he almost
regretted that they weren't at Spencer place, for he knew very well
that there was a large leather tawse there as well as a wooden
paddle, either of which would come in handy right now.

When it became clear that she wasn't
anywhere in the house, he sent out what servants could be spared to
look for her in the streets.  Manfred supplied him with his
greatcoat and then he went out looking for her as well, even though
he didn't know what she looked like he was overwhelmed with the
need to feel as though he was doing something.  He'd always
been an active youngster and he'd grown into an active man.
 It just wasn't in his nature to sit idly by.

Armed with a brief description, not
that it would do him much good since she apparently had brown hair,
brown eyes, a pleasing face and figure and no one had any idea of
what she was wearing, Wesley strode down the street.

He'd barely gotten halfway down the
block when a woman burst through a crowd of young men who were
walking in front of him and ran directly into his chest.

"Oof."

His first thought was that she
squished rather nicely against him.  Soft bosoms pressed
against his chest before she bounced off.  Looking down he
realized he had a rather nice view of them as well. Somebody's
mistress no doubt, no respectable woman would wear such a low-cut
dress during this hour of the day. 

"Oh I'm so sorry, I beg your
pardon!"

Reluctantly removing his gaze from her
rather spectacular bosom, he looked up to catch just a glimpse of
her face before she continued to rush past him.  He was left
with an impression of a brunette with rather mussed hair that
glinted with hints of gold and copper in the sunlight, wide hazel
eyes framed with long lashes, and soft pink lips that just begged
to be kissed.  For just a moment his ire was forgotten as he
turned to admire her backside as she hurried down the
street.