The Sherbrooke Bride (Sherbrooke Brides 1)

CHAPTER

1

Northcliffe Hall

Near New Romney, England

May 1803

“I SAW HER last night—the Virgin Bride!”

“Oh no, not really? Truly, Sinjun? You swear you saw the ghost?”

There were two shuddering gasps and fluttery cries of mingled fear and excitement.

“Yes, it had to be the Virgin Bride.”

“Did she tell you she was a virgin? Did she tell you anything? Weren’t you terrified? Was she all white? Did she moan? Did she look more dead than alive?”

Their voices grew fainter, but he still heard the gasps and giggles as they moved away from the estate room door.

Douglas Sherbrooke, Earl of Northcliffe, closed the door firmly and walked to his desk. That damned ghost! He wondered if the Sherbrookes were fated to endure unlikely tales of this miserable young lady throughout eternity. He glanced down at the neat piles of papers, sighed, then sat himself down and looked ahead at nothing at all.

The earl frowned. He was frowning a lot these days for they were keeping after him, not letting up for a day, not for a single hour. He was bombarded by gentle yet insistent reminders day in and day out with only slight variations on the same dull theme. He must needs marry and provide an heir for the earldom. He was getting older, every minute another minute ticked away his virility, and that virility was being squandered, according to them, for from his seed sprang future Sherbrookes, and this wondrous seed of his must be used legitimately and not spread haphazardly about, as warned of in the Bible.

He would be thirty on Michaelmas, they would say, all those uncles and aunts and cousins and elderly retainers who’d known him since he’d come squalling from his mother’s womb, all those sniggering rotten friends of his, who, once they’d caught onto the theme, were enthusiastic in singing their own impertinent verses. He would frown at all of them, as he was frowning now, and he would say that he wasn’t thirty on this Michaelmas, he was going to be twenty-nine on this Michaelmas, therefore on this day, at this minute, he was twenty-eight, and for God’s sake, it was only May now, not September. He was barely settled into his twenty-eighth year. He was just now accustoming himself to saying he was twenty-eight and no longer twenty-seven. Surely his wasn’t a great age, just ample.

The earl looked over at the gilded ormolu clock on the mantel. Where was Ryder? Damn his brother, he knew their meetings were always held on the first Tuesday of every quarter, here in the estate room of Northcliffe Hall at precisely three o’clock. Of course, the fact that the earl had only initiated these quarterly meetings upon his selling out of the army some nine months before, just after the signing of the Peace of Amiens, didn’t excuse Ryder for being late for this, their third meeting. No, his brother should be censured despite the fact that Douglas’s steward, Leslie Danvers, a young man of industrious habits and annoying memory, had reminded the earl just an hour before of the meeting with his brother.

It was the sudden sight of Ryder bursting into the estate room, windblown, smelling of leather and horse and the sea, alive as the wind, showing lots of white teeth, very nearly on time—it was only five minutes past the hour—that made the earl forget his ire. After all, Ryder was nearing an ample age himself. He was very nearly twenty-six.

The two of them should stick together.

“Lord, but it’s a beautiful day, Douglas! I was riding with Dorothy on the cliffs, nothing like it, I tell you, nothing!” Ryder sat down, crossed his buckskin legs, and provided his brother more of his white-toothed smile.

Douglas swung a brooding leg. “Did you manage to stay on your horse?”

Ryder smiled more widely. His eyes, upon closer inspection, appeared somewhat vague. He had the look of a sated man, a look the earl was becoming quite familiar with, and so he sighed.

“Well,” Ryder said after another moment of silence, “if you insist upon these quarterly meetings, Douglas, I must do something to keep them going.”

“But Dorothy Blalock?”

“The widow Blalock is quite soft and sweet-smelling, brother, and she knows how to please a man. Ah, does she ever do it well. Also, she’ll not get caught. She’s much too smart for that, my Dorothy.”

“She sits a horse well,” Douglas said. “I’ll admit that.”

“Aye, and that’s not all she sits well.”

Only through intense resolve did Douglas keep his grin to himself. He was the earl; he was the head of the far-flung Sherbrooke family. Even now there might be another Sherbrooke growing despite Dorothy’s intelligence.

“Let’s get on with it,” Douglas said, but Ryder wasn’t fooled. He saw the twitch of his brother’s lip and laughed.

“Yes, let’s,” he agreed, rose, and poured himself a brandy. He raised the decanter toward Douglas.

“No, thank you. Now,” Douglas continued, reading the top sheet of p

aper in front of him, “as of this quarter you have four quite healthy sons, four quite healthy daughters. Poor little Daniel died during the winter. Amy’s fall doesn’t appear to have had lasting injury to her leg. Is this up-to-date?”

“I will have another baby making his appearance in August. The mother appears hardy and healthy.”

Douglas sighed. “Very well. Her name?” As Ryder replied, he wrote. He raised his head. “Is this now correct?”

Ryder lost his smile and downed the rest of his brandy. “No. Benny died of the ague last week.”

“You didn’t tell me.”

Ryder shrugged. “He wasn’t even a year old, but so bright, Douglas. I knew you were busy, what with the trip to London to the war office, and the funeral was small. That’s the way his mother wanted it.”

“I’m sorry,” Douglas said again. Then he frowned, a habit Ryder had noticed and didn’t like one bit, and said, “If the babe is due in August, why didn’t you tell me at our last quarterly meeting?”

Ryder said simply, “The mother didn’t tell me because she feared I wouldn’t wish to bed her anymore.” He paused, looking at the east lawn through the wide bay windows. “Silly wench. I wouldn’t have guessed she was with child although I suppose I might have suspected. She’s already quite great with child. She may well give me twins.”

Ryder turned from the window and swigged more brandy. “I forgot, Douglas. There’s also Nancy.”

Douglas dropped the paper. “Nancy who?”

“Nancy Arbuckle, the draper’s daughter on High Street in Rye. She’s with child, my child. She will have it in November, best guess. She was all tears and woes until I told her she needn’t worry, that the Sherbrookes always took care of their own. It’s possible she might even wed a sea captain for he isn’t concerned that she’s carrying another man’s child.”

“Well, that’s something.” Douglas did a new tally then looked up. “You’re currently supporting seven children and their mothers. You have impregnated two more women and all their children are due this year.”

“I think that’s right. Don’t forget the possibility of the twins or the possibility of Nancy marrying her sea captain.”

“Can’t you keep your damned rod in your pants?”

“No more than you can, Douglas.”

“Fair enough, but why can’t you remove yourself from the woman before you fill her with your seed?”

Ryder flushed, a rather remarkable occurrence, and said, his voice defensive, “I can’t seem to keep my wits together. I know it isn’t much of an excuse, but I just can’t seem to withdraw once I’m there, so to speak.” He stared hard at his brother then. “I’m not a damned cold fish like you, Douglas. You could withdraw from an angel herself. Doesn’t your mind ever run off its track, doesn’t it ever turn into vapor? Don’t you ever want to just keep pounding and pounding and the consequences simply don’t come into it?”

“No.”

Ryder sighed. “Well, I’m not so well disciplined as you. Do you still have only the two children?”

“No, the babe died whilst I was in London. There is only Cynthia left now, a sweet child, four years old.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It was expected and just a matter of time so the doctors kept telling his mother. I went to London not just to see Lord Avery in the War Office but also to see Elizabeth. She’d written me about the babe’s condition. His lungs never really properly developed.” Douglas drew out a clean sheet of foolscap and adjusted last quarter’s numbers.

“Your lust becomes more costly,” he said after a moment. “Damned costly.”

“Stop your frowns, Douglas. You’re bloody wealthy, as am I. Great-uncle Brandon would be pleased that his inheritance to me is being put to such excellent use. He was a lusty old fellow until his eightieth year, as least that’s what he told me. Bragged like a bat he did.