A Reckless Promise

He looks younger again, the way he did with the pillow marks on his cheek. And he genuinely seems to be enjoying himself.

Marley tightened her grip on the puppy, and Sadie quickly recognized a now-familiar panic rising in the child. She would have gone to her, but wanted to see how His Lordship reacted to this new problem. Besides, the shin-kicking episode was still fresh in her mind. With her aunt by her side, Marley might just feel protected enough to say or do something that would ruin the lovely scene.

“Go on, sweetheart,” Clarice soothed as she settled into a chair. “He really seems to want to roam now.”

“You won’t take him away, will you? He gets to stay with me forever and ever, doesn’t he? Auntie Vivien,” she implored, looking to the duchess, “he’s my puppy now, isn’t he? He won’t go away?”

Even as the duchess and the other women all spoke at once, fervently agreeing the puppy would stay (Clarice adding, “Even if he pids on the carpets”), the viscount inched closer to Marley, patting the dog’s golden head.

“Marley, look at me, please,” he said quietly.

The child sniffled, but then did as she was told.

Sadie held her breath.

“I told you the puppy is yours, didn’t I? I wouldn’t lie to you, on my word as a gentleman. I realize you don’t know me well, but I trust the good ladies here will vouch for me.”

As one, the ladies “vouched.”

“Thank you, ladies. Do you believe me now?”

Marley bit her bottom lip, but then nodded. “I suppose so, Darby.”

Dear Lord, he had the child calling him Darby? Against her wishes to the contrary? First the puppy, and now the unseemly informality. What next from this unpredictable man? Would he bounce her niece on his knee while reciting nursery rhymes?

The viscount held out his arms and the child released her death grip so that he could deposit the fuzzy and undoubtedly relieved little thing on the carpet, where, as if fulfilling a prophecy, he immediately sniffed the carpet and then piddled.

He was a small puppy, so it was a small piddle, and nobody commented.

“Good. And now that that’s settled, perhaps you’d feel even better if you gave this scamp here a name. We can’t keep calling him ‘puppy,’ now can we? Do you have a name in mind? Reginald, perhaps?”

Once again the ladies spoke in near-unison:

“George, after our beloved king.”

“Bouncer. See how he bounces when he walks?”

“Major. Look at those paws. He may be small now, but he’ll grow. He needs a name worthy of the man—that is, the dog he will become.”

“I shall name him Max,” Marley announced above the friendly argument.

There was an immediate chorus of agreement. Sadie imagined the ladies would have lauded the choice if her niece had chosen to name the thing Doorstop.

But did she have to pick Max?

“Max,” the viscount repeated, looking to Sadie, proving he’d known she’d been standing some distance away all along.

Did she look like someone whose stomach had just hit the floor?

“His name is Max,” Marley said again, rather forcefully this time. “Max is a very good name for a dog. Papa named his dog Max, so this one will be Max, as well. Only I won’t let this Max escape his leash and get run down by a cart, or leave me the way Papa did. Mama died, too, but I don’t remember her. You promised, Darby.”

The ladies variously sighed, or dabbed at their eyes or, in the case of Minerva Townsend, loudly blew into a handkerchief.

“Then it’s agreed,” the viscount said, again looking toward Sadie.

Had he noticed that she’d backed up two paces since he’d last glanced her way?

The duchess, carefully keeping her skirts out of reach of the dog, asked Marley if this Max looked like the last Max. “I know your uncle Basil gave the same name to two of our birds, but that was only because we had so many that he forgot we already had a Punjab. Extremely common name, Punjab. Well, at least in some areas. I believe we were in—but that doesn’t matter at the moment, does it, Minerva, so you can stop worrying that I’m about to launch into a story not fit for young ears.”

“I know I’ll hear it later,” the lady grumbled, and sat back on her chair, clearly finished with the subject. “Just don’t linger on the birds and leave out the good parts.”

Marley, seemingly oblivious to everything save the duchess’s first question, shook her head, her newly trimmed blond curls swinging about her cheeks. “Max was so big I could ride on him. Papa said he looked like a horse, so that was all right, at least until I grew.”

Sadie backed up another step, turned her head to judge how far she was from the hallway, the stairs.

The dratted man couldn’t have brought her a kitten, could he? Or even a monkey.

The viscount scooped up the puppy and returned it to Marley’s arms. “I’ve recently purchased a very handsome black horse. Was he perhaps black, this horse of yours?”

Marley began petting the puppy. “No, Max was brown, but much browner than this. And he had little ears that stood up, and white feet like the grocer’s wagon horse, and some white on his face even though a lot of it was black. Papa called him sleek. He was so handsome.”

“Brown—clearly dark brown,” Clarice said, apparently enjoying a puzzle. “White feet, black muzzle—oh, and small ears. Do you know what I think? I think Marley means the dog was a boxer. My cousin Lester had a pair of them for hunting. Handsome things, when they weren’t slobbering all over my shoes.”

Sadie had resumed covertly backing up when the viscount asked the color of the dog.

She’d turned toward the foyer at the words even though a lot of it was black.

And she had tossed both cloak and bonnet in the general direction of one of the duke’s footmen before she’d hitched up her skirts and was already halfway up the stairs as Clarice had clapped her hands and asked, “Do you know what I think?”

By the time she reached the landing she could hear the viscount’s Hessians on the marble stairs, and increased her pace, praying there was a key on her side of the bedchamber door.

Skirts still above her ankles, she ran down the hallway, sliding around a corner thanks to a small rug on the floor that apparently wanted to travel along with her.

“Whoa there, Sadie. In a rush, are you?”

She skidded to a halt. “Your Grace,” she gasped, dropping into a curtsy as she came face-to-face with the Duke of Cranbrook. “I’m so sorry. I forgot something in my room. Please excuse me.”

“Yes, yes, run along. I’m only sorry to have impeded your progress.”

“Oh, no, Your Grace, you haven’t—” The footsteps were getting closer. “Yes, thank you.”

As she picked up her pace she could hear the viscount’s voice, but not his words. His tone was light, even friendly. He was probably attempting to talk his way around the duke, which certainly wouldn’t happen. She stopped, leaning her back against the wall, her chest heaving after her effort, sure the duke would turn the man around and send him about his business, for he certainly had no business in this private area of the mansion.

“Sadie? Why, yes, son, she just blew past me as if shot out of a cannon, matter of fact. You two up to some mischief? A little hide-then-seek, eh? I remember those days with my Viv like it was yesterday. Come to think of it, it was last week, when Clarice and her Rigby were out for a drive. Don’t worry, son, I’ll keep mum. Us men have to stick together, don’t we? Just go to the end of the hall and turn to your right—mind the carpet, it slips—and then the third door down.”

Shock that the duke would aid and abet, as it were, seemed to have stuck Sadie’s shoes to the floor. Admittedly, she wasn’t as shocked as she would have been five days ago, since the duke and duchess were quite open with their affection (“randy as a pair of old goats,” Clarice had called them, winking).

Then she was off again, realizing for the first time how long the hallway was and how defenseless she seemed to be. She hadn’t heard any of the ladies following, calling after the viscount, and now the duke had as well as given the dratted man carte blanche.