Page 29 of A Proposal to Wed (The Beautiful Barringtons #9)

“ T he house is lovely,” she offered, nearly lisp free, as Harry led the new Mrs. Estwood out of the drawing room.

It wasn’t lovely. He didn’t have the patience or the eye for drapes and cushions. Color palettes. Choosing the proper paintings. But Harry appreciated her attempt at a compliment all the same.

“You may decorate as you see fit.”

Except for his study and bedroom, the house was sparsely furnished.

One would think that having grown up poor, the first thing Harry might have done with his wealth would have been to purchase the largest home he could find and furnish his residence in an extravagant manner.

But ostentatious displays of money had never impressed Harry.

The neighborhood where he lived was respectable but not fashionable.

He rarely entertained, unless it was for business reasons. Didn’t have a wife?—

She smells of lemon. I could eat her up just as I did the cake.

—to preside over dinners and the like. Or to add a feminine touch to the drawing room, which was sorely lacking in any sort of real decoration.

Harry’s only indulgences had been the fireplaces, which he’d had enlarged because as a child, he’d been forever cold.

A well-stocked library because after learning to read properly, he’d hungered for words nearly as much as numbers, and the bloody feather mattress on his excessively large bed, which he’d never shared with another human being.

No more sleeping on straw or random elbows in the nose for Harry Estwood. He’d shared a bed with his siblings.

“This way,” he gently directed her.

“ Upthtairs ?” The blue of her eyes blinked up at him.

Harry dragged his thumb along her bottom lip. “Breathe.”

The lisp’s return, no matter how slight, told him Lucy was somewhat distressed despite the scotch.

She had every right to be unsettled, after running through a modiste shop and an alley, marrying him in a bit of a rush, and then having Gerald Waterstone appear in time for dessert.

But Harry didn’t sense she felt any fear of him.

Maybe she should be afraid.

Harry wasn’t an entirely nice person, as the method of his father’s demise indicated.

A great deal of ambition and a bending of the rules was required for a blacksmith’s son to rise in rank at an ironworks, realize his gifts, and become a gentleman of means.

Not all of Harry’s success had been accomplished without… unpleasantness.

“Stop doing that. Reminding me. I’m aware of what I sound like,” she snapped at him, the lisp once more disappearing beneath her annoyance.

Much better .

Harry grinned back at her.

He thought of the lovely, reserved young lady with the whispery voice he’d first met, the melancholy that had practically dripped from her skirts drawing him to her.

He’d assumed Lucy’s modesty to be overblown and intentional, given her station and his.

But seeing the terrified creature she had become today before Gerald Waterstone, watching her curl into herself, had been excruciating.

He preferred her annoyed. Angry. Irritated.

“Sir.” Bartle appeared just as Harry started up the stairs. “I’m sorry the fire wasn’t lit in the drawing room.”

Harry hadn’t even noticed, and he always felt the cold. “It’s fine, Bartle.”

“But it’s roaring in your chambers—sir. Made sure of it.”

Bartle, bless him, wasn’t really much of a butler.

He ran Harry’s household, which consisted of a cook— Mrs. Bartle —the two young lads who’d escorted Waterstone and the harpy he’d wed out, three maids, and a boy who helped in the kitchens.

The older man wasn’t really a servant. He was more a father to Harry than James Estwood had ever been.

Bartle was also a splendid ironmaster who had once run Pendergast the way that it should be.

“I can send up one of the maids, Mrs. Estwood.” Bartle smiled, making the scars on his face pull in a hideous fashion. “Or wake up Mrs. Bartle to tend you.” He shrugged and gave Harry an apologetic look. “Nodded off before the fire, she did.”

“As well she should have. The meal was wonderful,” Harry said, taking the lamp from Bartle. “Lock up.”

“Immediately, Har— sir .” Bartle inclined his head and disappeared down the hall.

“You were doing so well,” Harry yelled after him. Bartle wanted to impress the new Mrs. Estwood.

“He is…” Lucy paused. Took a deep breath. There was movement inside her mouth before she spoke once more. “Your butler.”

“Untrue,” he answered. Lucy could control her speech, but it took concentration on her part, though when she became angry and completely forgot to do anything, the lisp faded. “He’s something of a butler. Bartle is just better at other things.”

Like teaching a terrified, young boy who’d just killed his abusive father that he had a place in the world and a wealth of skills which only required proper encouragement.

Harry threw open the doors to his chambers with great aplomb, deciding it wasn’t only Waterstone’s presence that had Lucy drinking a decent amount of scotch. Dread likely had a great deal to do with it.

A fire roared in the enormous hearth so that there was no chill in the air, just as he always requested. “He’s my man, I suppose you could say.”

Releasing her hand, Harry sauntered into his overly large chambers.

Another thing he didn’t care for. Small spaces, specifically a tiny cottage for six people.

When he’d purchased this residence he’d had the wall separating this room from the one beside it, meant for the lady of the house, taken out completely.

The fireplace had been enlarged and a small sitting area, placed before it with a table, a small settee and a couple of chairs.

Walking over to the table, Harry pushed aside the stacks of papers covering the surface and placed the bottle of scotch atop it.

Lucy followed slowly, stopping completely at the sight of the enormous bed taking up the center of the room. A shaky breath escaped her.

“Big, isn’t it?” Harry nodded at the bed. “Made to my specifications. Cost a fortune.”

He hadn’t blinked at the cost. After living in a cramped cottage and sharing a tiny bed with his siblings, a bed that could easily fit at least four people had definite appeal.

But the only person who had ever slept in that bed was Harry.

None of his female companions over the years had ever made it past the drawing room.

Lucy came forward, perched on the edge of the settee, placed her now empty glass on the table, and clasped her hands.

Harry settled beside her, deliberately placing no more than an inch between their bodies. He set down his own glass and poured out two more fingers of scotch.

“No tossing it all back in one swallow,” he teased.

“I’m not a?—”

“Sot? My father was,” Harry surprised them both by saying. “A dreadful affliction, becoming a drunkard. One that makes everyone around you miserable and eager to escape. I know a little bit about living under someone’s thumb, as it happens, though our circumstances were vastly different.”

Not even Harry’s closest friends knew about his past. Oh, he’d told Granby, Blythe, and Haven the broad strokes, but nothing more.

They knew, for instance, that he’d scraped in the dirt along with his mother, to grow what they could on that pathetic patch of land that served as a garden.

That his father had been a blacksmith, which had led to Harry’s love of metal and fire.

That in finding an old bronze knife one day while pulling carrots out of the ground, he’d fallen in love with the study of ancient weapons and civilizations.

But the only one who knew James Estwood had been a raving drunk was Blythe.

As a man surrounded and adored by his sisters, Blythe had asked once why Harry never brought his own to London.

My father’s love of gin drove us away from each other.

Lucy regarded him with curiosity. “I thought he was”—she frowned at the sound the word made—“a blacksmith.”

“One hardly precludes the other, Mrs. Estwood. Usually, a blacksmith is a valuable member of a village. Not so in my father’s case, though he was the only way to get a horse shod for miles.

When he was sober, he did a marvelous job.

” Harry looked away for a moment. Those were the good days, few and far between though they may have been.

Plenty of coin for the Estwoods to eat instead of struggling to grow enough in their small garden.

“Unfortunately, my father wasn’t often without a bottle of gin. ”

He flicked the top of his missing pinky finger, the rough edge itching along his thumb.

“Is he still?—”

“No.” Harry could still hear the sound of the poker striking his father’s head.

The shattering of plates as his sisters, both missing fingers, had flung everything on the table at their father to keep him from getting up.

His brother, all of five, had watched silently, a determined look on his face as Harry’s mother screamed.

“Both my parents died long ago. If you are curious, I’ve two sisters and a brother. I only see them on occasion.”

Alice kept in touch, but only rarely. In saving them all, Harry had also pushed everyone away. But it was for the best. Truly.

“I always wished for…a sister. Or a brother.” She took a delicate sip of the scotch. “I suppose there is still time. Sally is only a decade older than I.”

Harry made an exaggerated shiver. “What an unappealing thought.”

She smiled back at him, exhaustion lining her lovely features. “Agreed.”

“Finish that up, and I’ll help you with your gown.” He would have Lucy in his bed tonight, but only to sleep. The fire she’d shown earlier had all but disappeared.

Lucy’s glass clattered to the table. “But?—”

“You don’t have a lady’s maid at present, Mrs. Estwood, and I’m not going to rouse one of the maids or Mrs. Bartle at this late hour. Stand up.” He waved a hand at her. “You can’t sleep in your corset.”