Mary Putney: Angel Rogue

Robin nodded. Trying to keep his voice casual, he said, "It's good to be back."

They talked through dinner and into the night while silent snowdrifts rose outside. As the level in the brandy decanter declined steadily, the marquess studied his brother. The signs of strain that had concerned him three years earlier had intensified to the point where he suspected that Robin was on the edge of mental and physical collapse.

Giles wished there was something he could do or say, but realized that he did not even know what questions to ask. He settled for saying at the next conversational lull, "I know this is premature, but do you have any plans for the future?"

"Trying to get rid of me already?" Robin said with a faint smile that didn't reach his eyes.

"Not at all, but I think you'll find Yorkshire rather flat after all your adventures."

The younger man tilted his gilt head back into a corner of me wing chair. In the flickering light he seemed fragile, not quite of the mundane world. "I found adventures to be deucedly tiring. Not to mention dangerous and uncomfortable."

"Are you sorry for what you have done?"

"No, it was needful." Robin's fingers drummed an irregular tattoo on the arm of his chair. "But I don't want to spend the second half of my life the same way I spent the first half."

"You are in a position to do anything you wish- scholar, sportsman, politician, man about town. That's more freedom than most people ever have."

"Yes." His brother sighed and his eyes closed. "The problem is not freedom, but desire."

After an uneasy silence, Giles said, "Since you were occupied on the Continent and communications were chancy, I didn't notify you at the time, but Father left you Ruxton."

"What!" Robin's eyes snapped open. "I assumed I would be lucky to get a shilling for candles. Ruxton is the best of the family estates after Wolverhampton. Why on earth would he leave it to me?"

"He admired you because he could never force you to do anything you didn't want to do."

"That was admiration?" Robin asked, his voice edged. "He had a damnably strange way of showing it. We couldn't spend ten minutes in the same room without quarreling, and it wasn't always my fault."

"Nonetheless, it was you who Father boasted about to his cronies." Giles gave an ironic half smile. "He used to say that the blood had run thin in me, and that it was a pity his heir was such a very dull dog."

Robin frowned. "I'll never understand how you could be so patient with the old curmudgeon."

Giles shrugged. "I was patient because the only other choice would have been to leave Wolverhampton, and that I would never do, no matter what the provocation."

Robin swore softly and rose from his chair, crossing to the fireplace to prod the embers unnecessarily. After coming down from Oxford, Giles had taken over the hard work of administering the immense Andreville holdings. He had always been the reliable one, quietly doing the difficult tasks with little reward or recognition. "Typical of Father to be insulting when you were making his life so much easier."

"It wasn't an insult," Giles said calmly. "I am a dull person. I find crops more intriguing than gaming, the country more satisfying than London, books more amusing than gossip. Father must have found some satisfaction in knowing his heir was reliable, but that didn't mean he particularly liked me."

Robin searched Giles's face, wondering if his brother was genuinely detached about such painful insights. Yet he couldn't ask; their friendship had very clearly defined limits. He settled for saying, "People are interesting because of what they are, not what they do. You have never been dull."

Expression unconvinced, Giles changed the subject. "I imagine you'll want to visit Ruxton. I've been looking after the place, and it's doing well."

"Thank you." Robin watched a log break apart and send sparks dancing up the chimney. "Between Ruxton and the inheritance I received from Uncle Rawson, I'll have more money than I know what to do with."

"Get married. Wives are excellent at disposing of excess income." For the first time, there was bitterness in Giles's voice. After a brief pause, he continued more smoothly, "Besides, Wolverton needs an heir."

"Oh, no," Robin said with a flicker of amusement. "Producing an heir is your duty, not mine."

"I tried marriage once, and failed. Now it's your turn. Perhaps you'll be more successful."

The flat comment made Robin wonder what the late marchioness had been like, but his brother's expression did not invite questions. "Sorry, but I've only ever met one woman I thought I could live with, and she had more sense than to accept me."

"You refer to the new Duchess of Candover?"

Robin gave his brother a hard stare. "Apparently I am not the only one in the family with a talent for spying."

"Hardly spying. Candover is an old friend of mine, and when he returned to England, he knew I would be interested in news of your welfare. It wasn't hard to deduce that there was more to the tale than what he told me." Giles's voice warmed. "I met the new duchess. An extraordinary woman."

"She is indeed," Robin agreed in an unforthcoming tone. Then he sighed and ran his hand through his fair hair. Though they had never been as close as Robin would have liked, he knew he could trust Giles's discretion completely. "If you've met Maggie, surely you understand why the idea of marrying a bland English virgin is so unappealing."

"I take your point.There can't be another like her." His brother smiled slightly. "If neither of us is willing to do our duty by the family, there's always cousin Gerald. He has already sired a whole string of little Andrevilles."

Remembering Gerald, Robin assumed that any children would be dull, but worthy.

If Maggie had children, they would not be dull. He felt the familiar ache, and forced himself to cut it off before it could worsen. The past was a damned unhealthy place to live.

His thoughts were interrupted when Giles asked, "Do you intend to stay at Wolverhampton long?"

"Well," Robin said cautiously, fearing that speaking the words aloud might invite a rebuff, "I had thought through Christmas. Perhaps longer. If you don't mind."

"You can spend the rest of your life here if you choose," Giles said quietly.

Lord Robert Andreville, rebellious younger son, master spy, black sheep, and survivor, shut his eyes for a moment, not wanting to show how affected he was by his brother's welcome. Then he returned to his wing chair and settled in again, the peace of Wolverhampton beginning to dissolve tensions so old that he had thought they were part of him.

Giles was right to say that Robin was unlikely to spend the rest of his days rusticating in Yorkshire. God only knew what he would want to do.

But for now, it was good to be home.

The moors of Durham were very different from the forests and farms of America, but they had their own kind of beauty. Since her father had died two months before, Maxima Collins had walked the hills every day, absorbing the wind and sun and rain with mindless gratitude. She would miss these barren moors more than anything else she had found on this side of the Atlantic.

After two hours of wandering, Maxie settled crosslegged on a hillside, absently nibbling a tender stem of wild grass. The bright spring sunshine seemed to dissipate the haze of grief that had numbed her since her father's death. Quite clearly, she saw that it was time to return to America.

Her uncle, Lord Collingwood, was kind in a distant way, but the rest of the family regarded their guest with feelings that were dubious at best. Maxie could understand their position; she was an oddity that never should have set foot in an English country house. She suspected that the fashionable world would be even less welcoming. No matter; she had no desire to enter that world. In her own country, there was more room to be different.