Page 26 of Entrancing the Earl
“If you’ll allow, they won’t know I’m a woman,” she said in satisfaction. “I can ride those fields better than Avery ever did.”
Gerard remembered why he avoided his estate three-hundred-sixty days of the year. The women were insane and did their best to drive him down the same path.
“She can do it, my lord,” Winifred said firmly. “You won’t know it’s her when she rides out.”
They were effectively telling him that a woman—alady—could be as good as a man in an all-male terrain. He couldn’t see it. The men were crude and frequently aggressive. They needed someone who spoke their language. Even he was at a disadvantage. It required a man in the middle who could speak to both classes—like Avery, dammit.
“Women are very adaptable,” Iona said with confidence. “We have to be. You’ll be here part of the time. Watch and see.”
He could imagine the little countess now, walking the fields of the north country after her mother’s death, beating sheep into submission through sheer strength of will. He threw back his whisky, swallowed his doubts, and nodded. “Let’s test it then. I make no promises. If the men get drunk at noon or drive sheep over a cliff, that will be the end of the experiment, understood?”
Mary Mike held out her hand like a man. “I’m honored. Thank you, my lord.”
He shook, as if she were a man. He could almost sense a collective sigh of relief.
“Ceridwen says you’re one of us,” Simone said with satisfaction. “Is dinner ready yet? After all this tension, I’m quite famished.”
The bell rang as if her words had yanked the ropes. Or maybe the ghostly Ceridwen.
Before the beekeeper could vanish, Gerard caught her arm and all but dragged her into dinner.
If he wasn’t careful, he’d make herhiscountess, just to handle the residents of his castle. But she was an impoverished, managing Malcolm, and the very last kind of wife he needed. He would try not to want her too much.
As the soup was served,Iona waited for the earl to scold her for her interfering ways. When she had corrected her stepfather, he’d usually shouted and stomped off, leaving her or Isobel to manage what needed to be done. The earl retained his diplomatic façade, as always, but he was steaming. Even over the heady scent of the chicken broth, she could sense his fury and confusion.
And integrity. She hadn’t smelled integrity often, so she’d been unable to identify the scent at first. It was much like being unable to judge the taste of a spice by its smell. But now she recognized that it complemented the clean fresh odor of honesty well.
She savored the soup but still the earl didn’t speak except when spoken to. He could hold his raging temper—nice.
Hers wasn’t a retiring nature. She’d simply learned to disappear in self-defense. But the earl knew her story, most of it, anyway. If she didn’t mean to hide while she was here, she might as well shake off the rest of her invisibility and try to remember who she was.
“You are perfectly free to scold for my managing ways,” she offered. “I’ve been locked in my room, threatened with a whip, and had feces flung at me. I will assume you’ll be more polite. And since I have to leave anyway, you can even throw me out, if it will make you feel better. But I must say, you dealt with the ladies beautifully this evening.”
The earl’s jaw muscles tightened over aristocratically high cheekbones and his midnight eyes glared. “You are not at fault for Avery’s theft.”
“But you were perfectly content to let him go his own way until I interfered.” She needled him just a little to deflate the steam.
“I would have been perfectly content on the way to bankruptcy,” he retorted in a low voice so Grace on his other side could not hear. Politely, he turned to Grace and asked a question about her loom.
“Mary Mike will make an excellent steward,” Iona suggested when he turned back to her. “She is better educated than Avery and already knows your property.”
“She can wear what she likes, but she is not a man,” he said through clenched teeth. “I cannot single-handedly change the world. The men need to respect the person giving orders.”
“Thank you for letting her try,” Iona said demurely, now that he seemed to be calming down. “I’ve seen her work with your grooms. I’m not sure they realize she’s a woman any longer.”
The earl rubbed a tic in his cheek. “This is not suitable dinner conversation. I cannot even imagine the scandal if word goes out that I have a woman masquerading as a man running my estate, and it will. She won’t be able to negotiate or sign contracts with banks or others.”
Iona winced. She had no answer for that. She was relieved when he turned his attention elsewhere.
He glanced down the table. “Mrs. Merriweather, do you know if there has ever been a discovery of Roman ruins or artifacts hereabouts?”
As the Malcolm Librarian, the slight, older lady held a paying position even higher than Avery’s had been. She was the only woman currently on the premises addressed with formality. She wrinkled up her eyes in thought, then shook her gray curls. “Not that I recollect, but I’ll ask the books this evening, shall I?”
“I would appreciate that, thank you.” He turned to Mary Mike. “In your wandering, have you noticed anything that might be the remains of an old keep?”
Iona cut into her fish and wondered what was on his mind. And why he’d set her at his right if he didn’t want to shout at her. Smelling integrity didn’t answer her curiosity.
“There are outcroppings of rocks all over the fells but none that appear to be more than a shepherd’s hut,” Mary Mike acknowledged. “The plowmen occasionally turn up a coin or two but nothing of significance.”
