Free Lord Langley Is Back in Town by Elizabeth Boyle Page B

dressing robe and nearly had it on, stilled. “He did, did he?”
    “Oh, aye. So concerned about you. What a fine, thoughtful fellow he is, my lady, iffin you don’t mind me saying. He took great pains to see that Mrs. Hutchinson put your tray together just so.” Never still for a moment, Agnes had gotten right to work setting the bed to rights. She glanced up from fluffing the pillows. “He said you might be a bit peckish . . .” The girl paused and blushed, then finished quickly by adding, “After last night and all.”
    After last night . . . As if there had been a “last night.” Which there hadn’t.
    But there could have been .
    Minerva closed her eyes and counted to ten, reining in her unlikely fancies. She blamed Lucy and Elinor for all this. She wouldn’t have thought once about such things, save for all their talk of late of taking a lover and getting married.
    And now . . .
    Though it was hard to blame Lucy and Elinor when she knew who the real instigator of these unwanted flights of desire was, and he was downstairs right this moment wreacking havoc on the rest of her life.
    “You can take that tray back downstairs,” she instructed her maid. “I am not hungry.”
    “Well, he didn’t say that exactly,” Agnes amended. “He said . . . oh, it was rather fancy. Just let me recall it . . .” The girl tapped her fingers to her chin until suddenly her eyes brightened. “Yes, yes, I remember what he said. He told me and Mrs. Hutchinson that you would most likely be famished this morning. Especially after needing to sleep in so late.”
    Famished. He hadn’t! Oh, yes, he had put that pink hue of a blush on Agnes’s cheeks.
    Why, that blasted rogue had deliberately chosen that word precisely because it wasn’t too far from “ravished”—which is exactly how the story would be retold by the time his little on dit got nosed around.
    Good heavens! The man was mad. Confiding such nonsense with the servants. Didn’t he realize that such admissions would go from the attics to the cellar like a flash of Franklin’s electricity? Then it would be over the garden fence and in every house on Brook Street before . . . Minerva closed her eyes and groaned as she stopped herself from saying “noon.”
    For it was nearly noon by Agnes’s own account.
    Nearly noon?
    Oh, yes, he’d known exactly what he was doing. And let her sleep while his madness took root.
    Like small pox. Or the Black Plague.
    Not for long, she vowed, ignoring the tray of scones, bacon, and coffee that Agnes had brought up. For damn the man, it did look heavenly, especially with the thoughtful touch of a single red rose on one side. And as loath as she was to admit it, she was hungry.
    Famished, really. But she would commit herself to Bedlam before she’d ever admit such a thing. For hidden beneath his words was that unerring knowledge that her appetite and needs could not be sated with just a scone.
    Minerva tamped down a groan and hastily donned her gown. “Where is he?” she asked, twisting her hair up and stabbing the pins in place herself, rather than wait for Agnes to help.
    “Pardon, my lady?”
    “Precisely where is Lord Langley?”
    “In the morning room, my lady. Having his breakfast. He bid me to tell you that when you were able, to please join him, for he is ever so fond of your company.” Agnes smiled, her bright blue eyes sparkling with happiness for her mistress.
    Minerva gaped at her obviously smitten maid. Who would have guessed that plain-spoken, hardworking Agnes harbored a romantic side?
    Smitten, indeed! Well, she would see about that. “Agnes, do me a favor and go down and find Thomas-William. Ask him to go over to the duke’s stables and direct Mr. Ceely to send around a wagon. Oh, and a carriage as well,” she added. Minerva wagered her houseguests would be extraordinarily put out to be asked to walk around the corner to their new home, the duke’s residence.
    “Are we leaving?” Agnes