Page 66 of Along Came a Rogue

“And tell Mrs. Smith to take the night off,” Grey ordered, stalking toward the stairs. “I’m going out for dinner.”

“But, sir—”

“And then I plan on spending the rest of the night at the clubs.”

“Which club?” Hulston’s face reddened, even more flustered than before as he held the ring box at arm’s length in a futile attempt to hand it back.

“Whichever one lets me through the door,” he grumbled, the words too true to be amusing.

“But, sir!”

He snapped out another curse, this one aimed at Hulston’s ancestry. “I don’t care what you do with that ring. Pawn the goddamned thing and spend the money on drink and whores for all I—”

“Major, you have a visitor waiting,” Hulston blurted out before Grey could interrupt him again. “I told her you wouldn’t be back for hours, but she insisted.”

Damnation! The last thing he wanted to deal with right now was a visitor, especially a female one. After this afternoon, he certainly wasn’t in the mood for anything regarding women and had no other goal for the evening than getting blindingly drunk.

“I’m not receiving visitors.” He headed up the stairs. “And you can tell whoever is waiting that she can take her parasol and shove it up her—”

“Nathaniel.”

The mature female voice stopped him in mid-step, his foot hovering above the stair. He knew before he turned around—

“Lady Henley,” he said curtly but politely, facing her as she stood in the doorway to the drawing room.

The last person he wanted to see right now was the stern old woman from his youth. Emily had damned him to hell with her rejection, only now for the devil herself to appear in the flesh.

But with no other choice, he shoved down his anger and descended the stairs. He bowed stiffly to her. “Viscountess.”

She nodded her head regally. “Major Grey.”

He motioned toward the drawing room. She had always been inexplicably generous toward him, when the stiff-spined dowager was rarely kind to anyone outside her own family. He wouldn’t insult that generosity by asking her to leave, even if at that moment he’d rather shoot himself than entertain a visitor. “Shall I ask Hulston to prepare tea for—”

“I shan’t be here long enough for tea.” Her old but sharp eyes swept over him critically, and he had the odd impression that she was sizing him up. Like an opponent before a fight. Good. He could use a fight right now, the anger over Emily’s rejection still burning hot inside him.

With the help of her cane, which he suspected served more as a weapon than a walking support, she spun on her heel and charged into the drawing room.

He followed after, gritting his teeth. The very last person he wanted to see right now…when he wanted nothing more than to be making his way to the bottom of a whiskey bottle.

Not taking a seat—apparently, she didn’t plan on staying even long enough to bother with sitting—she stopped in the middle of the room and faced him, thumping her cane firmly against the floor.

“To what do I owe the pleasure, ma’am?” Although no pleasure rang in his voice as he ground out the question, getting right to the point. There was nothing to be gained in attempting polite conversation, not with her.

Her brow rose haughtily. The viscountess had always possessed an intimidating air, even when he first met her twenty years ago. Her crusty imperialness was one of the traits he’d liked best about her, and very few people had the arrogance—or bravery—to defy her. “Your name was mentioned at Lady Agnes Sinclair’s garden party.”

Well. That was a damned lie. Lady Agnes Sinclair was the spinster sister to the late Earl of St. James, aunt to the current earl, and if rumors could be believed, a particular favorite of Wellington’s. No one who would have given a scoundrel like Grey a second thought. While he could imagine several scenarios in which his name might arise amid a group of society women, it certainly wouldn’t have been at Lady Agnes’s garden party. And certainly not in a context to which Lady Henley would have been privy.

“Was it?” He kept his face carefully blank, not giving a damn what those tea party biddies had said about him, yet he felt compelled to ask. Because she expected it. “In what context?”

“Oh, just the usual gossip.” She dismissed that with a wave of her gloved hand, which confirmed the falsehood for him and frustrated him even more.

He folded his arms impatiently across his chest. God knew, with the way he was feeling right now, he might just throttle her if she didn’t soon get to the reason for her visit. “And?”

“I remembered that you used to work in the stables at Henley Park. I wanted to see you again for myself, to discover with my own eyes what kind of man you had become.”

Another lie. He knew from contacts within the War Office that the old woman had been keeping an eye on him since he left Henley Park for the Peninsula. Odd. Why would Lady Henley call on him at his home, then lie about her motives? She’d given him a job when he’d been starving and homeless, and later, she was the reason he was commissioned into the First Dragoons. He would always be grateful to her. But being grateful didn’t mean he trusted her. Or wanted her nosing around in his life.

He’d had enough of lying society women today. His lips curled sardonically as he held his arms out from his sides, insolently putting himself on display for her. “Have you satisfied your curiosity, then, my lady?”