Free The Duke’s Obsession Bundle by Grace Burrowes Page A

chin up.
    “That’s it,” she said, freeing the stickpin and peering at it. “You should have a jeweler look at this.” She set it on the table as her fingers went to the knot of his neckcloth. “There.” She loosened the knot until the ends were trailing around his neck, and a load of weariness abruptly intensified low down, inhis gut, where sheer exhaustion could weight a man into immobility. He leaned in, his temple against her waist in a gesture reminiscent of when she tended his scalp wound.
    “Lord Westhaven?” Her hand came down to rest on his nape, then withdrew, then settled on him again. He knew he should move but didn’t until she stroked a hand over the back of his head. God in heaven, what was he about? And with his housekeeper, no less. He pushed to his feet and met her eyes.
    “Apologies, Mrs. Seaton. A tray would be appreciated.”
    Anna watched him go, thinking she’d never seen him looking quite so worn and drawn. His day had been trying, it seemed, but it struck her that more than the challenge of a single meeting at Carlton House, what likely bothered him was the prospect of years of such meetings.
    When she knocked on his door, there was no immediate response, so she knocked again and heard a muffled command of some sort. She balanced the tray and pushed open the door, only to find the earl was not in his sitting room.
    “In here,” the earl called from the bedroom. He was in a silk dressing gown and some kind of loose pajama pants, standing at the French doors to his balcony.
    “Shall I put it outside?”
    “Please.” He opened the door and took half a step back, allowing Anna just enough room to pass before him. “Will you join me?” He followed her out and closed the door behind him.
    “I can sit for a few minutes,” Anna replied, eyeing the closed door meaningfully.
    If he picked up on her displeasure, he ignored it. Anna suspected he was too preoccupied with the thought of sustenance to understand her concern, though, so she tried to dismiss it, as well.
    He was just in want of company at the end of a trying day.
    He took the tray and set it on a low table then dragged the chaise next to it. “How is it you always know exactly what to put on a tray and how to arrange it, so a man finds his appetite perfectly satisfied?”
    “When you are raised by a man who loves flowers,” Anna said, “you develop an eye for what is pleasing and for how to please him.”
    “Was he an old martinet, your grandfather?” the earl asked, fashioning himself a sandwich.
    “Absolutely not,” Anna said, taking the other wicker seat. “He was the most gracious, loving, happy man it will ever be my pleasure to know.”
    “Somehow, I cannot see anyone describing me as gracious, loving, and happy.” He frowned at his sandwich as if in puzzlement.
    “You are loving,” Anna replied staunchly, though she hadn’t exactly planned for those words to leave her mouth.
    “Now that is beyond surprising.” The earl eyed her in the deepening shadows. “How do you conclude such a thing, Mrs. Seaton?”
    “You have endless patience with your family, my lord,” she began. “You escort your sisters everywhere; you dance attendance on them and their hordes of friends at every proper function; you harry and hound the duke so his wild starts are not the ruination of hisduchy. You force yourself to tend to mountains of business which you do not enjoy, so your family may be safe and secure all their days.”
    “That is business,” the earl said, looking nonplussed that his first sandwich had disappeared, until Anna handed him a second. “The head of the family tends to business.”
    “Did your sainted brother Bart ever tend to business?” Anna asked, stirring the sugar up from the bottom of the earl’s drink.
    “My sainted brother Bart, as you call him, did not live to be more than nine-and-twenty,” the earl pointed out, “and at that age, the heir to a duke is expected to carouse, gamble, race his