The Rake by Mary Jo Putney

do you spring to merit the title?”
    â€œIt’s only a nickname. Someone called me Lady Alys, and it stuck.” Under his probing gaze, she added, “Because of my dictatorial tendencies, I imagine.”
    He smiled at her explanation. “Lady Alys. It does suit you. Shall I call you that, or do you wish to be Miss Weston?”
    â€œWhatever you prefer, Mr. Davenport,” she answered, doing her level best to sound like an obedient employee even though her stomach was churning. She sipped more whiskey, hoping it would have a soothing effect.
    They drank in silence, Davenport frowning to himself, until Alys could stand the suspense no longer and asked, “Well?”
    He glanced up. “Well, what?”
    Her chin lifted at his deliberate obtuseness. “Are you going to discharge me?”
    â€œI decided before I arrived here to make no changes until I was more familiar with the situation.” He studied her with shuttered eyes. “It will be a confounded nuisance to have a female steward, but everyone seems to hold you in high regard. Since you can do the work, it would be foolish to release you for a reason that is not your fault and which apparently doesn’t hinder your performance.”
    Alys released her breath, almost giddy with relief. She really hadn’t expected such an enlightened attitude from a libertine.
    Reading her expression, he went on, his heavy brows drawn together. “I will keep you on for the time being, but I want to make two things perfectly clear. First, I intend to take you at your word and treat you like a man, so I don’t want to hear any spinsterish outrage about my crude language and behavior.”
    He waited until she gave a nod of acknowledgment, then continued, “Secondly, for the last four years you have been running Strickland, with authority for everyone and everything on the estate, answerable only to a London lawyer who never visited. For all practical purposes, you might have been the owner. Now, however, Strickland is mine. If I tell you to plant orange trees in the water meadow, you will do it. If I want the laborers to cut a Saxon horse into the chalk of the hillside, you will give the orders. If I want to color the sheep pink, you will order the dye.”
    He set his tumbler on the desk and leaned forward for emphasis, his dark face stern. “I am quite willing to take advice on estate matters, since your experience is greater than mine. However, once I make a decision, I will expect you to implement it without further questions. Your will is no longer supreme; what authority you have is derived from me. For you, it will be a change for the worse. I don’t expect you to like it, but I do expect you to accept it and behave in a civil and cooperative manner. If you can’t, you had better leave right now.”
    Alys stared into his cold aquamarine eyes, and realized that it would be very easy to hate Reginald Davenport. Before today, she hadn’t had time to worry beyond the question of whether he would discharge her out of hand. Now she had survived the first fence, only to discover that the rest of the course would be much harder.
    Her new employer had gone to the heart of her dilemma with uncanny perception. For years she had ruled Strickland like a private fiefdom. Because of her position and the fact that she was an enlightened despot, her orders had been accepted, and she was proud of what she had achieved. Now he was saying in unmistakable terms that her reign was over. She was as much an employee as the youngest field hand.
    Authority came very naturally to Alys; subservience did not. Unfortunately, she had no real choice. She would never be able to find an equivalent situation anywhere else.
    As the silence stretched, he prompted, “Well?”
    Swallowing hard to force down her resentment, she said coolly, “I can accept that, Mr. Davenport.”
    He smiled with a lazy charm that was a startling