Page 31 of Not Just Any Earl
“Your interest in flowers isn’t merely a hobby, either,” Lord Melrose went on. “It’s much more than that. You’re a botanist, aren’t you?”
A warm rush of pleasure flooded Emmeline’s chest at his words. No one had ever called her a botanist before. Unless he meant it sarcastically? She glanced up at him, but he was smiling down at her, his handsome face alight with interest. “A novice botanist, I suppose.”
“You follow in your father’s learned footsteps, then?”
Emmeline’s eyes widened. The ton seemed to have forgotten all about James Templeton after her mother’s scandal and his retreat from society. Aside from Lady Fosberry, even those who’d once been his friends had abandoned him. No one had dared mention either of her parents to her since then, though she knew the ton spoke of the Templetons readily enough behind their backs.
“You know of my father’s work?” she asked cautiously.
Lord Melrose looked surprised. “Yes, of course. James Templeton is quite well known in Royal Society circles.”
“He, ah…yes. He was a scientist, mainly a chemist and a botanist. He created his own hybrid rose garden at our home in Buckinghamshire.” It had been so long since Emmeline had discussed her father with anyone but her sisters or Lady Fosberry the words came slowly, awkward and creaky on her lips. “I didn’t like to see his garden go to ruin after he died, so I took up where he left off.”
Her father had encouraged hers and her sisters’ natural curiosity. He’d been a brilliant man, and had taught them sciences, mathematics, literature, and languages, much to their mother’s outrage.
A spinster in the making, her nose forever thrust between the pages of a book. No gentleman wants a bluestocking for a wife.
Emmeline’s lack of prospects was the reason their mother had insisted she and Phee share their first season. She’d announced she wouldn’t be put to the trouble of bringing out a girl who hadn’t a prayer of catching a husband.
As it happened, Alice Templeton had been proved right. Neither Emmeline nor Phee had had a prayer of making a decent match, but not for the reasons their mother had supposed.
“Does your estate in Buckinghamshire have extensive grounds, Miss Templeton?”
Emmeline managed to smother her very unladylike snort at the word ‘estate,’ and shook her head. “No, both the house and the grounds are quite small, but it’s…it’s home.”
“I understand. I prefer the country to London.” Lord Melrose glanced up at the sky, his blue eyes narrowing against the flood of sunlight on his face. “It’s unfashionable of me, but I find the city begins to press in on me over time.”
“Your younger sisters don’t spend much time in London, I believe?” Emmeline ventured, after a silence. Lord Melrose was said to be utterly devoted to his sisters, and Emmeline, who treasured her own sisters, was curious to hear how he’d speak of them.
“Not much, no. It’s my opinion that they’re too young for London, though my eldest sister Margaret does not happen to share that opinion.”
His lips curved in a rueful smile that lured an answering smile from Emmeline’s lips.
“Henrietta and Sarah, my two younger sisters adore the country, but Margaret finds it terribly dull.” His brows drew together as if he were baffled by the vicissitudes of a young lady’s mind. He was such a picture of the doting but puzzled elder brother, a trill of sudden laughter escaped Emmeline.
He jerked towards her as if surprised, a quick grin rising to his lips. “You have a lovely laugh, Miss Templeton. Has anyone ever told you that?”
No one but Emmeline’s father and sisters had ever told her she had a lovely anything. That same rush of warmth suffused her, tingling through her veins until she fairly vibrated with pleasure. She raised her eyes to his, he met her gaze, and for the time it took for Emmeline’s heart to beat once…twice…a third time…neither of them looked away.
At last, Lord Melrose dropped his gaze, and as soon as those lovely cornflower blue eyes released her from their thrall, Emmeline recalled with a pang that she wasn’t meant to be drowning in Lord Melrose’s eyes.
But they were well into the rose arbors by now, the blooms surrounding them heavy with fragrance, and so thick Emmeline could no longer see the entrance behind them, or the exit ahead. It was as if Juliet, Lord Cross, and Lady Fosberry had vanished, leaving her alone in a cocoon of silken petals with Lord Melrose.
“There’s a bench, just there.” He nodded to a low stone bench nestled under an arch smothered with pale, creamy roses that released a refreshing scent of wintergreen. “Shall we rest for a while?”
Emmeline knew she should refuse. That she should take him back to Juliet, and attempt to manage it so he and her sister were seated beside each other in the carriage for the ride back to Hampstead Heath.
But that wasn’t what she did.
She meant to. Indeed, she opened her mouth to do just that, but somehow, she found she couldn’t push the refusal past her lips.
It was one afternoon only, and she did so want to see the roses.
“I’d watch my back if I were you, Melrose. Lady Christine doesn’t carry a muff pistol, does she?”
Johnathan was sprawled in front of the fire in his study, staring down at the last swallow of port in his tumbler, his mind on…nothing whatsoever, but he roused himself at Cross’s words.
“Lady Christine?” Good Lord, he’d nearly forgotten about her. Odd, that he could so easily forget about the lady he’d been resigned to marrying at the start of the season. “What’s the matter with her? It’s not the silver hairbrush again, is it?”
