An Affair Before Christmas

She clapped and he felt so proud that he was grinning like a maniac. “There can’t be a lord in the house to disagree with you!” she cried.



“It’s just because of some advice from Beaumont,” he said. “You see, it’s all about telling a story, rather than actually parsing out the arguments. And then you pointed out that it would be better to be clear and simple—”



But she was giggling again.



“What?”



“It’s your—your thing,” she said, covering up her mouth, “when you don’t have it trapped in your breeches, it’s so hopelessly odd-looking, Fletch! You have to forgive me, but—” and she broke into peals of laughter.



Fletch looked down and there it was, proudly tenting the front of the blasted nightshirt. Well, he couldn’t expect any different. Poppy was drowned in acres of fabric, but her hair was curling in adorable ringlets, and she was the prettiest, sweetest, most delicious thing he’d ever seen.



He sighed.



“It’s a man’s curse.”



“I know,” Poppy said, sobering. “I shouldn’t laugh. After all, you never laugh at my breasts, do you?”



“Never,” he said with absolute truth.



“And yet they’re just as odd in their own way. I mean, if I ever have children they’ll leak milk and even now they bobble all around, and once in a while they actually fall out of my dress.”



“Very odd,” Fletch said. “Odd. Very odd.” And then because he couldn’t think of another thing to say that didn’t involve close contact with those breasts, he suggested they go to sleep.



So he snuffed the candle and climbed back into the featherbed. The snow had stopped a while ago; to Fletch’s regret it seemed likely that they would be able to leave in the morning. This storm wouldn’t keep them in the bed for a hundred years.



He was lying on his back, staring up into the darkness of the rafters when a small hand crept into his. “I’m so happy that you came to Oxford with me,” Poppy whispered.



He was too. But he was afraid to tell her why in case he ruined it all.



“You’re my responsibility,” he said, a bit roughly. “I’ll always look out for you, Poppy.”



“Thank you,” she whispered back.



He thought she sounded a little disappointed, but maybe it was just wishful thinking.



Chapter 39



It was only as Charlotte climbed out of the hackney the next day that she realized that she’d forgotten to put her Bible in her bag. Not that it really mattered, but she had convinced May (who thought her visits were scandalous) that she was succoring the dying by reading biblical passages.



“He’s worried his immortal soul is lost,” she had explained.



May dithered, torn between distrust and an innate wish to help. “I just wish there was someone else who could do the succoring,” she had said over and over, wringing her hands. “Why must you be the one to read aloud the Bible?”



“No one will think anything of it, if they learn of it.”



“They certainly will!”



“Not if he dies,” Charlotte had said.



“Oh!” May had said. “It seems so…”



But Charlotte had stayed up half the night thinking about it. “I don’t see how Villiers can possibly survive. He’s had a fever for months now. He’s thin as a rail and stretched…you can see it. It’s a terribly cruel way to die.”



“Oh, dear,” May said.



“If there’s anything I can do, I shall.”



May wrung her hands again but they both knew Charlotte had no choice. Yet for all Charlotte talked of death, she had a plan. Villiers perked up when she sparred with him. He needed that. When he wasn’t fighting, he lay quietly in his gray and sleepy room. He let himself slip away. But when she insulted him and fought with him, he woke up.



It probably wouldn’t work. But it was the only thing she could think of.



She walked into his bedchamber, ready to insult him, and stopped. Villiers wasn’t alone.



Propped against the window on the far side of the bed was a lean man with a rugged face. His eyes were black as midnight, with great circles under them, as if he’d had no sleep. Even tired, there was no mistaking those sharp-cut cheekbones; she looked from Villiers to the stranger and back again.



“Look at that,” the man drawled, not bothering to come to a standing position. “Your churchifier has shown up and damned if she doesn’t see a resemblance between the fanciest man in the ton and myself.”



Villiers had been lying with his eyes shut. His skin looked translucent to Charlotte, drawn tightly over his cheekbones. He opened them now and looked—with the same eyes as his relative—at Charlotte. “There you are, Miss Tatlock,” he said. He smiled too, that sweet smile that came so rarely.



She walked over to the bed and looked down at him. “I came to read you the rest of that story I began, but I forgot my Bible.”



“Do tell,” the man by the window said. "‘The Song of Songs,’ Villiers?”



She would have thought he was horrible except there was something strained in his voice, as if he too were trying to wake Villiers up, make him answer by taunting him.



“The story of Jesus’s birth,” she said. “His Grace was quite curious to find out how it ended.”



“Badly,” came the voice from the bed. “It ends badly, like so much else in life. My dear Miss Tatlock, I find I am hideously tired today.”



She tried to think of something to say.



A thin hand waved. “My cousin. You see, I do have family. Someone has to be duke after me. It’s taken months, but my solicitor just managed to track down the man himself.”



The future duke grinned at Charlotte, his teeth white against his bronzed skin. “It’s killing him to admit that such a shaggy type as I will take over the title.” It was true that he wasn’t very elegant. His coat was rumpled and hung open. He was wearing a cravat, of a sort, but it looked nothing like the gorgeous pieces of linen that dukes tied around their necks.



“Cruel,” Villiers said. “Handing over my exquisite house, not to mention my collection of walking sticks, to this sad excuse for a gentleman.”



“Your name, sir?”Charlotte asked.



“Miles Dautry. I wouldn’t want to be rude, Miss Tatlock, but I think that the duke should preserve his strength at the moment.”



He was evicting her. But she couldn’t do that before she tried to rouse Villiers. “How can His Grace possibly relax when the dukedom is going to one such as you?” she asked, sitting down as if Dautry hadn’t spoken. “The very name Villiers is known for exquisite judgment, style, taste…no wonder the duke cannot rest.”



There was a moment of stunned silence in the room. Then Villiers started chuckling. It was weak, but a chuckle. And he opened his eyes and and peered at his cousin.



“A mess, isn’t he? I’m so pleased that you agree with me, Miss Tatlock. I should have taken him on while I was still on my feet.”



“It’s not too late,” Charlotte said quickly. “You could teach him all the ways of being a duke. How to dress.”



Dautry snorted but he didn’t say anything, which meant that he saw her plan. He raised an eyebrow at her and she gave him a quick frown, willing him to fall in.