Excerpt of The Heir by Grace Burrowes

Weighed down by responsibilities, and determined to avoid the summer round of country house parties and matchmaking mamas, Gayle Windham, Earl of Westhaven, decides to summer in London. He becomes engrossed in his lovely but secretive housekeeper, who he realizes would make the perfect Duchess. As housekeeper, it’s Anna Seaton’s job to deal with the petty maladies and wounds in the household, even when her patient is Westhaven himself….

Grabbing her medical supplies, Anna went in search of her
quarry, hoping to find
him where he usually was at this pleasant hour of the early
evening, out on his balcony.

He lounged on his wicker chaise in lordly splendor, his
waistcoat slung over the
back of the chair, cravat folded tidily over that, his shirt
open at the throat,
and his cuffs rolled back.

“Your lordship?” Anna waited for his permission to step from his bedroom, feeling absurd for doing it and abruptly self-conscious.

“Mrs. Seaton,” he drawled, glancing up at her. “You’ve come
to poke at my injured
self. Does nothing deter you from the conscientious
prosecution of your duties?”

“Craven evasion,” she replied, stepping out onto the
balcony. “As when my patient
disappears at first light, not to be seen until tea time,
and then only in the company
of his protective little brother.”

“Val is protective of me?” Westhaven scowled as he eased
forward to the end of the
chaise, then dragged his shirt over his head and turned his
back to her. “I suppose
he is at that, though he knows I’d bite his head off were he
to imply I need protection.
Jesus Christ, that still stings.”

“We all need protection from time to time,” she said,
dabbing gently at his back
with arnica. “Your bruises are truly magnificent, my lord.
They will heal more quickly
if you don’t duck out of a morning—and skip your breakfast.”

“It’s too hot to ride later in the day, at least at the pace
I prefer.” He winced
again as she went at the second large laceration.

“You shouldn’t be out riding hell-bent, your lordship. Your injuries do not need the abuse, and I can see where you’ve pulled this cut open along this edge.” She drew a chiding finger along the bottom seam of a laceration. “What if you were unseated, and no one else about in the dawn’s early light?”

“So you would come along to protect me?” he challenged
lazily. She began to redress
his back.

“Somebody should,” she muttered, focused on the purple,
green, and mottled brown
skin surrounding the two mean gashes on his back.

The earl frowned in thought. “In truth, I am in need of
somebody to protect. I fired
my mistress today.”

“My lord!” She was abruptly scowling at him nineteen to the
dozen, as much disapproval
as she dared show, short of jeopardizing her position
outright.

“There is always gossip,” he quoted her sardonically, “below
stairs.”

She pursed her lips. “Gossip and blatant disclosure are not
the same thing. Though
in this heat, why anyone would…”

She broke off, mortified at what had been about to come out
of her mouth.

“Oh, none of that, Mrs. Seaton.” The earl’s smile became
devilish. “In this heat?”

“Never mind, my lord.” She wetted her cloth with arnica
again and gently tucked his
head against her waist. “This one is looking surprisingly
tidy. Hold still.”

“I have a thick skull,” he said from her waist. And now that
she was done with his
back, came the part he always tolerated almost docilely. She
sifted her fingers carefully
through his hair and braced him this way, his crown snug
against her body, the better
to tend his scalp.

And if his hair was the silkiest thing she’d ever had the
pleasure to drift her fingers
over, well, that was hardly the earl’s fault, was it?

***

He should have brought himself off when he didn’t complete
matters at Elise’s. Why
else would he be baiting his housekeeper, a virtuous and
supremely competent woman?
She was done with her arnica and back to exploring the area
around the scalp wound
with careful fingers.

“I don’t understand why you haven’t more swelling here.” She
feathered his hair away
from the scalp wound. “Head wounds are notoriously
difficult, but you seem to be
coming along wonderfully.”

“So we can dispense with this nonsense?” He reluctantly sat
back and waved his hand
at her linen and tincture.

“Another two days, I think.” She put the cap back on the
bottle. “Why is it so difficult
for you to submit to basic care, my lord? Do you relish
being stiff and scarred?”

“I do not particularly care what the appearance of my back
is, Mrs. Seaton. Ever
since my brother took several years to die of consumption, I
have had an abiding
disgust of all things medical.”

“I’m sorry.” She looked instantly appalled. “I had no idea,
my lord.”

“Most people don’t,” Westhaven said. “If you’ve never seen
anyone go that way, you
don’t fully comprehend the horror of it. And all the while,
there were medical vultures
circling, bleeding, poking at him, prescribing useless
nostrums. He tolerated it,
because it created a fiction of hope that comforted my
parents even as it tortured
him.”

He fell silent then stood and went to the railing to stare
out at the lush evening
sunlight falling over his back gardens.

“And then late this winter, my stubborn father had to go
riding to hounds in a weeklong
downpour, only to come home with a raging lung fever. The
leeches went at him, his
personal physicians doing nothing more than drinking his
brandy and letting his blood.
When he was too weak to argue with me, those idiots were
thrown out, but they came
damned close to costing me my father.”

“I’m sorry,” she said again, turning to stand beside him,
laying a hand on his back.
He heard her sharp intake of breath as she realized her
error—his shirt was still
off. He didn’t move off, though, but waited to see how she’d
manage. Her hand was
comforting, and without him willing it, his own slid along
her waist and drew her
against his side.

She remained facing the gardens, her expression impassive,
her breath moving in a
measured rhythm, her hand resting on his back as if it had
arrived there despite
her complete indifference to him as a person. Slowly, he
relaxed, sensing her innate
decency had, for just a few moments, trumped her notions of
propriety, class distinction,
and personal rectitude.

She offered comfort, he decided. Just comfort, for him, upon
his recounting some
very dark moments and his frustration and helplessness in
those moments.

But what about for her?

He turned her to face him, brought her slowly against his
body, and rested his cheek
against her temple.

Just that, but it changed the tenor of the moment from gestures of comfort to the embrace of a man and a woman. His arms draped over her shoulders while hers looped at his naked waist, even as he told himself to end this folly immediately, or she’d have grounds for believing he trifled with the help after all.

She didn’t end it. She stood in the loose circle of his
arms, letting him positively
wallow in the clean summery scent of her, the soft curves
fitting him in all the
right places. He urged her with patient strokes of his hands
on her back to rest
more fully against him, to give him her weight. He wasn’t
even aroused, he realized,
he was just…consoled.

When he finally did step back, he placed a single finger
softly against her lips
to stop her from the admonitory and apologetic stammerings
no doubt damming up behind
her conscience.

“None of that.” He shook his head, his expression solemn.
“This wasn’t on my list
either, Anna Seaton.”

She didn’t tarry to find out if he would say more, but shook
her head in dismay,
no curtsy, no resounding whack to his cheek, no offer of
resignation. She left him,
heir to the dukedom, standing half dressed, bruised, and
alone on his private balcony.