Kasey Michaels - A Reckless Promise

“My lord, your duty is to return to our ranks in any way you can, as is the duty of every soldier. Mine is to remain with the wounded.” Hamilton looked behind him, where the others were deep in conversation, and leaned in closer. “You say you don’t remember anything, my lord, and I agree that can be a blessing. But you did speak while you were lost in delirium. Only I heard.”

“Well, goodness me, John, you put me to the blush. Was what I said all that terrible?”

“You spoke of your childhood, my lord. A particular time in your childhood. I...I only wanted to say that what happened was not your fault. Children often assume guilt that does not belong to them. You’re a good man—you are all extraordinarily good men.”

“Thank you, John,” Darby said. “I’m sorry you had to hear my ramblings. Truly, I’m long past those years. I can’t imagine why I spoke of them all this time later. I would much rather have regaled you with stories of my adventures with the ladies.”

The physician smiled. “You were not without amusing anecdotes, my lord.”

“Well, thank heaven for that. John, if you can’t reconsider and come with us, I want you to know that I’m aware of all I owe you, not the least of which is my fairly worthless, ramshackle life. If there is ever anything I can do for you in return, no matter how inadequate that thing might be, you must not hesitate to ask, because it is yours, on my word as a gentleman.”

“You have more goodness in you than I believe you realize, my lord.” The physician hesitated, looking out into the camp that was deteriorating daily. “I have every hope of returning home, sir, but if I don’t...”

Darby pushed himself to a sitting position and held out his right hand. “Yes? Name it, John, and it’s yours.”

CHAPTER ONE

London, the Little Season, 1815

“WHAT DO YOU think of Spain, Norton? I’ve heard intriguing things about the Alhambra, once termed a pleasure palace. But no, you have no interest in pleasure, do you?”

“I take vast pleasure in my duties, my lord,” the valet supplied in his usual monotone. “Even more so when His Lordship refrains from speaking whilst I am shaving him.”

Darby Travers, Viscount Nailbourne, longed to inquire as to whether his man’s words could be construed as a threat, but quickly discarded the notion. Until the straight edge moved from his neck, he prudently refused to so much as swallow.

“And we’re done, my lord,” Norton said in some satisfaction, stepping back even as he handed his employer a warm, moist towel. “Until this evening, that is. I would ask you to consider again the advantages of a well-trimmed beard.”

Darby wiped at his face, then tossed the towel in Norton’s direction as he got to his feet and walked over to the high dresser topped with an oval mirror. “Not if you’d continue to force your barbering skills on me, no. It wounds me to say this, Norton, but your mustache appears chewed on, and I’m convinced you employ that wirelike appendage on your chin to brush dried mud from my riding boots. The fact that both are shoe-black dark and your hair red as a flame makes me wonder what you do to amuse yourself when I leave you alone.”

Norton, a man of at least forty summers, smoothed a hand over his hair, parted neatly in the middle and tied back into a tail at least six inches in length, and then tugged at his goatee. “Red facial hair is unattractive, my lord.”

Darby would have asked his new valet why he didn’t expand his use of the dye pot to include the hair on his head, but then the man might tell him. Norton was his third valet in as many months, and the only one who didn’t perpetually suppress a flinch when he saw his employer without his eye patch. For that small mercy alone, the viscount didn’t really care if Norton sought his jollies by wearing his pantaloons on his head.

He picked up his brushes and ran them through his own coal-dark hair. “I believe I’ll refrain from comment on that, Norton. But back to Spain. I’m devastated to inform you that we can’t go, much as I’d like to escape my fate. For one, I’m promised to a birthday celebration at the end of the month. Either that or a funeral. Nobody’s quite certain yet. My jacket, if you please.”

“Yes, my lord. Will we be returning to London today?”

“Don’t care for my cottage, Norton?” he asked, shrugging into his handsomely cut tan hacking jacket, for he was anticipating a ride yet this morning. “I know it’s quaint, but I believe it provides most of the necessities of life.”

Nailbourne Farm, or the “cottage,” as Darby termed it, was a large estate just outside Wimbledon, and only an hour’s drive from London. Along with an extensive breeding stable and three hundred acres of Capability Brown’s better efforts at landscaping, the estate boasted a unique, sprawling stone-and-timber mansion. There were sixteen bedchambers, a dining hall that comfortably sat fifty and a dozen other rooms, all beneath a whimsical thatched roof that kept four thatchers gainfully employed year-round. It even boasted a royal bedchamber, which had actually been slept in by no less than two English monarchs.

It was the smallest of the half dozen Nailbourne holdings.

“Well, Norton? Do you agree?”

“It’s...serviceable, my lord.”

“How greatly you relieve my mind. I wouldn’t want to have to order it torn down and rebuilt to your specifications.”

Sarcasm was totally lost on Norton, Darby knew, winging over his head like a bird in flight, but at least the viscount was amusing himself. He was in some need of a smile at the moment.

“Your pardon, sir, but I feel I must remind you that I accepted this temporary position on the understanding that we would be in London for the Little Season.”

Darby made one last small adjustment to the black eye patch he’d tied to his head, and turned to give a slight bow to his valet. “And alas, I’ve failed you. I’m so ashamed, and must hasten to make amends. Since I’ll be traveling to London this evening for an engagement, you have my permission to ride along with me. I’ll have you dropped at your favorite tavern, as I’m certain you have one, and come back to take you up before I return here, to the wilds. I most sincerely hope that meets with your approval?”

“Yes, my lord!” Norton exclaimed, bowing deeply at the waist, perhaps the first display of emotion the man had allowed in his master’s presence. “The Crown and Cock, my lord, just off Piccadilly. And may I say, my lord, you look exceptionally fine today. You flatter that new jacket all hollow.”

“Oh, shut up,” Darby said amicably as he brushed past the valet on his way to the stairs, only smiling once he was out of sight. “For a moment there, I thought he’d ask to kiss my ring,” he mumbled to himself.

His mood may have been temporarily lifted, but the knowledge that Norton was right served to bring it crashing back down once more. He’d been at the cottage for nearly a week, cooling his heels as he awaited the arrival of the consequences of his forgotten promise to John Hamilton. Granted, he’d escaped to London, twice, for evening parties, but the days here were nearly interminable when he wished only to be with his friends before everyone adjourned to their country estates until the spring Season.

Darby supposed he should have put a qualifier or two into his promise to the good doctor before agreeing to take guardianship of the man’s daughter should anything fatal befall the man. He’d thought that meant if John had perished at the camp before it could be liberated. He hadn’t counted on any responsibility outliving the promise by more than eighteen months, which was when the good doctor had cocked up his toes.

Yet here he was, about to become guardian to his very own ward. His female ward. If there could be any one person less suited for the position, Darby believed a person would have to search far and wide to find him. His friends had all laughingly agreed, and looked forward with some glee to watching him deal with this unexpected complication to his smooth-running life.