Grace Burrowes: Ethan: Lord of Scandals

“Come on.” Nick prodded him with an elbow. “I brought spare breeches, and you can borrow a pair. Into the bushes with us. Beware the savages, as we’re fair game for attack.”

When they’d changed their clothes, they returned to the blankets to find the boys still cavorting in the water—though their lips were blue and their teeth were chattering.

“Joshua and Jeremiah, out!” Ethan barked. “Now!”

They came right out of the water and presented their shivering little selves to their father, while John and Ford whined and dallied and made excuses to Nick.

Ethan bent down and wrapped each boy in a towel. “You will be dried off and dressed and eating yourselves sick while John and Ford are still dripping on their blankets.” He grabbed for Joshua and rubbed the child briskly all over with the towel, until the shivering had subsided.

And if he stole a surreptitious hug in the process, he was the only one who knew.

Alice glanced up from where she was reading the children a story, to see a groom leading an enormous golden gelding from the direction of the house.

“It’s Argus,” Jeremiah informed her in a whisper. “Papa’s horse. Is Papa going somewhere?”

“I am not.” Mr. Grey spoke from where he stood towering above the children. “Miss Portman requires escort back to the house, and Argus volunteered.”

“Your horse?” Alice tried to scramble to her feet, but found she was lifted there instead by Mr. Grey’s hands under her elbows. “What about the story?”

“Mrs. Belmont?” Mr. Grey’s smile sported an alarming complement of perfect white teeth. “Can you or Priscilla finish the story?”

“Let me!” Priscilla yelled before her mother could respond. Mr. Grey passed the girl the book.

“We’ve no mounting block,” Alice said. Also no sense, for the last thing, the very last thing she was going to do was climb onto that enormous golden beast. The idea of it made her chest pound and sent Hart Collins’s taunts skittering through her memory.

“No problem.” Nick appeared at her elbow, oozing friendly concern, the wretch. “We’ll get you on board easily enough, provided you’re willing?”

“I can’t ride by myself.” The admission hurt, even all these years later.

“Nor would I expect you to,” Mr. Grey said as he swung up. “Nick?”

And just like that, Alice found herself gently deposited before Mr. Grey in the saddle, the horse ambling off in the direction of the house.

“Put your arm around my waist,” Mr. Grey said as he guided the gelding away from the picnic spot. “You’re sitting gingerly, as if the saddle were too hot, and that will just make the horse nervous and you more prone to tipping off.”

“You frequently ride about with damsels before you?” Alice tentatively slid an arm around Mr. Grey’s lean waist, reasoning he’d done the same with her when they were on foot.

“I never ride about with damsels before me.” He passed the reins to one hand and circled her waist with the other arm. He drew her back against his chest and left his arm where it was. “Relax, and I’ll have you safely home.”

Relax. She was on a horse large enough to rival an elephant, snugged up against an equally large, grouchy man who smelled too good, and he wanted her to relax.

“Is it the horse you’re afraid of,” the man asked when Alice was still barely letting her body touch his, “or is it me?”

“What have I to fear from you?” Alice didn’t dare turn her head. It might upset her balance, the horse, anything.

“Nothing.” He leaned back as Argus negotiated a slight slope, and Alice clutched his waist. “Easy.” Mr. Grey straightened slowly. “It must have been a very bad fall.”

Alice did risk peeking at him and wished she hadn’t, because his mouth was exactly in line with her eyes. God above, it was a lovely sight. Those perfectly sculpted lips were the boon of a god both generous and perverse.

“It was a bad accident,” Alice said. “I was dragged for quite some distance and lucky I didn’t lose my leg.” Or her mind. She shoved the memory of Collins’s cronies jeering at her back into its mental vault. The memory of Avis’s eyes was a more difficult struggle.

“You’re lucky you didn’t lose your life. Being dragged is usually far worse than simply being pitched off. You’ll tell me about it?”

What an odd request—until Alice realized he was trying to distract her from her perch before him. “Sometime. I don’t even like to think of it.”

“I know.” His tone turned bleak. “You want to forget, but you never will, so neglecting the memory is the next best thing.”

He spoke from experience, leaving Alice to wonder what a wealthy, handsome man like Ethan Grey had to forget. He was a bastard, true, but that hardly seemed to bother him. Perhaps the pain in his eyes stemmed from grief over the recent loss of his father. It might explain his distance from his sons, and even an occasional loss of temper with them.

“Nick said you were the one who noticed the marks on Joshua,” he said, as if divining her thoughts.

“They were very angry marks,” Alice replied, though this was hardly a more sanguine topic than her fall. “It must have hurt him to sit, but he wouldn’t talk about it, so I had Nick give the boys their next bath. Joshua didn’t want to talk to him either.”

“I didn’t do it. I didn’t even know about it, and in a way, that’s worse than if I had done it.”

So she could remove from the list of Ethan Grey’s numerous faults that of child beater. It was an odd relief, but she was willing to do it.

“One cannot keep one’s children safe from all harm,” Alice said gently. “Joshua thinks he deserved the punishment. You might consider talking to Jeremiah. He is very protective of Joshua and could not be happy to see his brother treated so poorly.”

“Good suggestion. Is it the case you haven’t yet secured another position, Miss Portman?”

Oh, no. No, no, no. Alice would have pokered right back up, except Mr. Grey’s arm around her middle prevented it.

“I have not.” She went on the offensive, despite her precarious perch and the fact that she was depending on Mr. Grey for her safety. “I am not well versed in the nuances of dealing with little boys, Mr. Grey. I do not know your sons well, and I am not cheap.”

“Neither am I,” he replied, amusement in his voice. “I will pay you exactly what I paid their previous tutors, if you’ll take them on even a temporary basis.”

She might have hopped off the horse and stomped away rather than conclude the discussion, but money was always a consideration, and with a bad hip, one didn’t hop off eighteen-hand behemoths or stomp very far.

“How much?”

He named an astonishing figure, one that would allow Alice to add considerably to her savings. But no… These were boys, and two of them, and that was bad enough, but then there was Mr. Grey…

“I can’t. They are active little fellows, Mr. Grey, and I cannot be responsible for getting them into the fresh air and sunshine each day as I should.”

“I’ll manage that part, if you’ll handle the schoolroom and the rest of it.”

“What is the rest of it?” She should hop off, bad hip or not.

“They’ll have a nursemaid, of course, for tending them at the start and end of each day. The grooms will supervise them in the stables, and I’ve enough footmen to toss cricket balls at them, and so forth.”

Here was purchase in a negotiation she intended to win. “Not footmen. You.”

“I beg your pardon?” He frowned again, but then made a little fuss over steering the horse, who no doubt could have found the barn blindfolded in a high wind.