Page 32 of Brave New Earl (The Way to a Lord's Heart 1)

The boy’s tone implied that he was intimately familiar with these caverns.

“You can’t go inside though,” Geoffrey continued. “Because you might get lost and fall into a…a pit. There’s lots of pits.”

He’d been told exactly this on their picnic, Benjamin remembered. He could tell Geoffrey had no idea what a mine pit was really like.

“I wouldn’t let you though. You don’t have to worry. I’ll never let anything bad happen to you.”

On the echoes of that fierce little voice, it came to Benjamin that Geoffrey possessed a personality all his own. Startlingly intelligent for his age and defiant, he wasn’t the least like Alice. His looks were a distraction, in a way a deception. He was…developing into himself.

“I’ll be like the lord,” his son continued. “Hecan go riding whenever he wants. Wherever he wants.”

Moving without thought, Benjamin stepped forward. “Don’t call methe lord,” he said.

Geoffrey had been tucked into the back corner of the stall on a pile of dry straw. He jumped up.

“You should call me Papa,” Benjamin added.

His son eyed him with Alice’s blue eyes but his own stubborn jaw. His expression was an odd mixture of shyness and doubt. Benjamin had the uncomfortable feeling that his appearance had spoiled the boy’s fun. Only then did it occur to him that someone ought to be watching him. “Where is Lily?” he asked.

It was precisely the wrong thing to say. Geoffrey scowled. “Asleep. I can go down to the kitchen and ask for breakfast if I wake up at thecrack of dawn.” A sideways flick of his gaze seemed to acknowledge that this was not the kitchen. Going on the offensive, he added, “Fergus ismypony. Isn’t he?”

A long tug-of-war over what was and was not permitted unfolded in Benjamin’s mind. Yet in the face of his son’s vibrating longing, he had to say, “Yes, he is.”

There was that grin again, blazing on Geoffrey’s small face. The air of the stables seemed to lighten with it. Benjamin’s heart stirred. And again, he made a misstep. “But Lily, or someone, should always know where you are,” he said.

Geoffrey scowled again. “When I’m grown up, I’ll do what I want!”

“You won’t, actually,” replied Benjamin. “It may look that way to you now, but life isn’t like that.” Why had he said that? He’d sounded like his own gruff father, with his discouraging philosophizing. Benjamin tried to make amends. “Have you had your breakfast?”

But Geoffrey took this as a dismissal. Scowl deepening, his son pushed off the side of the stall, scrambled over the rail, and stomped out of the stables.

Benjamin watched him go with a mixture of perplexity and regret. When the sound of Geoffrey’s footsteps had died away, Benjamin turned toward the box where his own horse was kept and discovered Miss Saunders, standing by the open door at the other end of the stable aisle. Their eyes met. Benjamin felt his cheeks warm. How much of that conversation had she heard?

She should have moved on earlier, Jean thought. But she’d been transfixed by the scene. When Lord Furness told Geoffrey to call him Papa, and the boy wouldn’t, she’d felt so mournful. And now, facing this tall, masterful figure, she was shaken. He had the looks and bearing of an autocratic nobleman, yet his commands meant nothing to a stubborn little boy.

She’d come here to save Geoffrey from neglect, Jean thought, and she wasn’t sorry, no matter what anyone thought. But she’d been wrong about the method. Man and boy should be brought together, not separated.

The idea bloomed in her mind like a rose opening, revealing petal after petal. She imagined Geoffrey truly finding a father. She saw Lord Furness joyful over his son, instead of always melancholy. Yes. It only remained to see how she could bring this about. She had no notion, but she was filled with the determination to try.

The silence had stretched into awkwardness. “I came out for a walk,” she said, very aware that she’d just thrown on a cloak. She hadn’t even bothered with a bonnet.

“What?”

She’d spoken too softly. “I was out for a walk,” she repeated. “And I heard voices.”

He moved toward her. “I did the same. Geoffrey was talking to his pony.”

“Yes.” Jean glanced at Fergus and Molly, who gazed out from their stalls with ears swiveled toward them. “And he seemed to listen.”

Lord Furness turned to follow her eyes. “I hadn’t noticed. They appear attentive, don’t they?”

“Well, horses must know how to listen. Or else no one could train them.”

“They merely react to gestures and a firm tone of voice.”

He stopped beside her. She kept forgetting how large he was, Jean thought. Until he stood right next to her and practically…oozed attraction. “You don’t think they care for their riders?”

“Care?” he replied in a distracted tone.

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