Free By Love Undone by Suzanne Enoch Page A

Willits?”
    She clapped a hand over her mouth and coughed. “No, my lord,” she managed. “’Twould not be seemly.”
    He scowled. “No, it wouldn’t.”
    Much more enthusiastic than she had been a moment earlier, Maddie smiled at the Fowlers’ butler as he came forward to help her to the ground. “My thanks, Mason.”
    “Miss Maddie.”
    Warefield came around to her side of the curricle, and she led him forward to where the Fowler family stood waiting at the end of the line. “My lord, may I present Mr. Fowler and Mrs. Fowler? Mr. and Mrs. Fowler, the Marquis of Warefield.”
    Tall James Fowler bent himself almost double in a bow, his normally dour expression stretched into a rather alarming-looking smile. Beside him, Jane Fowler sank so far to the ground in her curtsey that Sally had to help her upright again. “My lord,” they breathed, echoing one another.
    “It is an honor to have you at Renden Hall,” Mrs. Fowler continued reverently. “You have met our dear daughters Lydia and Sally, I believe.”
    “Yes, I have.” The marquis stepped forward to shake Mr. Fowler’s hand. “You’ve a lovely family, sir.”
    “Thank you, my lord.” Mr. Fowler gestured toward the house. “Allow me to show you inside.”
    Quite delighted to be ignored, Maddie followed behind the Fowlers and Lord Warefield as they passed the retinue of servants. They had nearly reached the front door when the marquis made a show of turning around and coming back to collect her.
    “Can’t have you getting lost, Miss Willits, can we, now?” He tucked her hand around his arm and held it against him.
    “I know my way around, my lord,” she muttered, trying unsuccessfully to free her hand, and surprised at his iron strength.
    “That is precisely what I am afraid of,” he murmured, nodding at the wide-eyed procession of footmen and maids who swarmed up the steps and into the house behind them.
    “This way to the dining room, my lord,” Mrs. Fowler announced regally, scattering servants out of her way and thrusting her daughters ahead of her. “Mrs. Plummer has outdone herself today, if I do say so myself. You have inspired her.”
    “Glad to be of some use,” he said, glancing about but keeping Maddie pinioned securely at his side.
    They entered the dining room to find it stuffed practically to the rafters with fresh-baked bread, puddings, ham, and chicken. Maddie simply stared for a moment. She hadn’t seen this much food even at the Fowlers’ annual Christmas pageant, famous throughout southern Somerset. For a country luncheon, unless they intendedto feed all the farmers out plowing the fields, it was absurdly overwrought.
    “Do let me go,” she whispered, tugging again at the marquis’s hand warmly covering hers as they toured the repast on the table and the sideboards.
    He looked down at her, and at the unexpected humor in his gaze, she stopped struggling. Damnation, he was ruining everything. He wasn’t supposed to be amused at the Fowlers’s toadying; he was supposed to accept it as his due.
    “I’ve no intention of letting you out of my sight,” he whispered back. “This was your idea.”
    “They wouldn’t have invited me ,” she pointed out, more disconcerted by his attention to her than she cared to admit. “You are the Marquis of Warefield, my lord. This is all for you.”
    “And I’m supposed to be honored?”
    She glared at him. Maddie wasn’t particularly fond of the Fowlers, either, but there was no reason to be cruel. She yanked her hand free. “I’m certain you’re used to much better, my lord,” she retorted in a hushed voice, “but this is their ideal of highest elegance.”
    He looked at her for a long moment, his expression serious and unreadable. “I see.”
    Maddie intentionally seated herself between Lydia and Sally, keeping as far from the marquis as she could manage. He’d goaded her into being directly rude again, when she’d decided to stay with the more subtle approach of