Angelique caught sight of him in her mirror as Lisette dressed her hair, and she felt her desire for him rise again as if they had not just spent the night together between the soft sheets of her bed. With an effort at discipline, she schooled her face to blankness.
Lisette seemed to notice nothing, but James caught Angelique’s eye in the looking glass and smiled as if he knew exactly what she was thinking. Angelique blushed like the schoolgirl she had never been and swallowed the desire to laugh. Giggling was simply out of the question, no matter how giddy she felt.
Lisette left them with a curtsy and one sly glance toward James Montgomery. After drawing on his waistcoat and coat, tying his cravat with an easy, thoughtless style, he rose and took Angelique’s hand in his. She felt as clean as if she were seventeen again, as if they were childhood sweethearts and he was leading her out to walk in the garden beneath flowering trees and not down to her own breakfast room after a night of lovemaking.
Angelique followed him docilely into the corridor, thinking how fine he looked in his brown coat and breeches. His eyes gleamed as he smiled down at her. “Forgive me, my lady, but I do not know the way.”
She did not relinquish his hand but drew him toward the staircase. They walked hand in hand to the breakfast room on the first floor. Angelique did not let go of him until they were seated together, the silver coffee service between them, a pot of tea at her elbow as well as brioche and jam.
She had never felt so easy with a lover in her life. All her days with Geoffrey were painful, as she had tried desperately to be what he wanted and had failed. All her nights with Anthony had been filled with fire but also with pain, for she had always known that though he was fascinated by her, he did not love her.
But here, with this stranger, she felt finally as if she had found an equal, perhaps even a friend. She had never had a man for a friend before. It was almost disconcerting.
They ate in companionable silence and had almost finished their meal when her butler, Jerrod, stepped into the breakfast room.
“My lady, the young lady from the village is come to see you.”
Twenty-one
Angelique swallowed hard, her nerves suddenly fluttering like birds. “Thank you, Jerrod. Please bring her in.”
Looking only slightly scandalized, the older man moved to obey. If her Greek butler Anton had an opposite, it was this man. Staid and set in his ways, Jerrod was a holdover from her husband’s days as Earl of Devonshire.
In spite of his very strict ideas about a lady’s place in the world, the elderly butler had been won over by Angelique’s charm early in her disastrous marriage to his lord, and his affections had been assured by the assiduous care she had taken of the house. Aeronwynn’s Gate had not looked so well in a hundred years, and as he was close friends with her estate steward, Billings, Jerrod knew exactly how much money Angelique had lavished on the place to reclaim it from ruin. So Jerrod said not a word of censure, nor did he even lift an eyebrow as he left to escort his lord’s bastard daughter into his lady’s presence.
Angelique stood and smoothed her gown. James caught her hand and squeezed it. “She will love it here,” he said. “She will come to love you.”
For once in her life, she did not try to hide her old losses. She knew their shadow must be visible in her face, along with her hope. “I hope so,” she answered.
Sara Burr entered the room behind the butler, her blue eyes wide with fright. Angelique saw pride in the tilt of the girl’s chin, but she also saw the pale, drawn look around her eyes. The child had not slept last night. Angelique remembered her own youth, how she had been left alone with her ailing mother, a sailing ship, and her beauty her only dowry when she was seventeen. Angelique had been forced to become a woman, and quickly. She would see to it that this girl got to be a child for a little while longer.
Angelique pushed aside her own memories and crossed the room to the girl, extending her hand. “Welcome, Sara. Come and have some breakfast.”
Sara did not take the offered hand. She curtsied prettily but did not meet Angelique’s eyes.
“I ate at the inn, my lady. I thank you.”
The girl stared around the well-appointed room as if it were a den of lions and she expected to be torn apart. Angelique withdrew the hand she held out and gestured to a chair.
“Well, if you’re not hungry, please join us for a cup of tea. Or would you prefer a cup of chocolate?”
Sara’s blue eyes flitted about the room like a bird that did not mean to roost, finally coming to settle on Angelique’s face. “Yes, my lady. I mean, no, my lady. I have never had chocolate.”
Angelique smiled in an effort to bolster the child’s spirits as well as her own. “Today you shall try it then. We will all have a cup.”
Jerrod nodded to one of the footmen, who stepped out to take the order to the kitchen. A second footman stepped forward and drew out a chair. Angelique sat and finally, Sara followed suit, her small bag still clutched in her hands.
“Jerrod will take that, Sara. Please see that Miss Burr is put in the blue room.”
“Yes, my lady.”
Jerrod took the child’s case in hand. She clearly did not want to relinquish it, but when the tall older man loomed over her like a specter in a fairy story, her grip loosened and Jerrod whisked the bag away.
The footman returned with a silver pot of chocolate and tiny demitasse cups. James looked bemused but accepted his cup without question. Angelique filled his cup first, adding a touch of milk to it, before filling her own and Sara’s.
Angelique nodded to William, and he withdrew. It was not usual for her to sit and eat her breakfast unattended, but she wanted time alone with the girl she had taken into her home.
Sara stared at the thick chocolate in the bottom of her tiny cup. She watched Angelique as she stirred the chocolate and the milk together, then lifted her own and took a sip. Sara imitated her every movement, down to the graceful tilt of her wrist.
Angelique felt a strange moment of pride. This girl was a quick learner. She would be a credit to her in a few years’ time. Perhaps, if the girl wanted it, she might even arrange for Sara to have a season in London. The ton might not accept her, but Angelique’s business acquaintances would.
By now the whole city must have heard where she had gone and why. Her people were discreet, but the London elite was not. She knew Victor alone would work assiduously to spread the rumor that she had taken in her husband’s bastard daughter. The story was simply too delicious for the gossipmongers to ignore.
“Your room has a lovely view of the park,” Angelique said. “I am sorry that I am not better prepared for your arrival. When we return to London, I will find a suitable governess to teach you, but until then, I am afraid you will be on your own a good deal here.”
“I am happy to go back to the inn, my lady. I do not want to cause any trouble.” Sara’s voice was soft but firm. Angelique was not certain if it was her fancy, but she thought she heard her own tones echoed in the girl’s voice. She smiled at the strength that lay beneath Sara’s supposed diffidence. Angelique wondered how one encouraged a girl to obey without curbing that strength in the process.
“Your home is here now, Sara. It should have been here since your birth. You must forgive me. I only learned of your existence last week, or I would have come sooner.”
“Your ladyship need not trouble yourself over me. I am happy where I am.” Sara’s chin rose again, and Angelique heard the distinct note of stubbornness in the her voice. Stubbornness was an asset every woman needed.
“I am grateful you are here, Sara. It is a lonely old house and it needs young laughter in it. I spend as much time here as I can. I hope we can come to know each other better.”
For the first time, the girl’s eyes began to show a hint of hope. Angelique watched Sara battle with herself, uncertainty beginning to war with her desire
to return to the inn.
She wanted to reach out and take the girl’s hand, but she knew that Sara would shy away. Angelique held herself very still the way she would with a horse that had not yet been broken to harness.
“I thank you, my lady, but I do not belong here.” Sara rose to her feet as she said that, her chocolate left with only one sip taken from it.
Angelique stood also, facing the girl across the length of the breakfast table. She forced herself to keep her voice even and calm. She could not remember the last time one of her dependents had challenged her.
“Sara, you are my charge now and my responsibility. You will live with me, and I will care for you.”
The girl did not flinch but squared her thin shoulders. “I’m old enough to take care of myself.”
Angelique felt her temper rise. It slipped from her grasp before she could catch it and rein it in. “I will not leave you to make your way in the world alone. Not as long as I draw breath.”
Sara’s temper matched hers, and her voice rose with it. Though the girl did not shout, she spoke very firmly, her voice never wavering. “Respecting Your Worship, I do not want to be here.”
James laughed out loud at that. Angelique turned on him and glared.
“She has you dead to rights, Angelique.”
He stood then and offered the girl his hands. “Her Ladyship hasn’t seen fit to introduce us, but I’m James Montgomery, formerly of the Royal Navy, at your service, ma’am.”
Sara did not know whether to accept his hand or curtsy to him. When she hesitated, he bowed and smiled.
“It’s an odd world you’re coming into, Miss Burr. But I can vouch for our lady here. She’ll do you no harm and a lot of good. It seems to me you both need each other. You’re both alone in the world.”
Angelique felt tears rise in her throat, and she swallowed hard. Sara was blinking hard too.
“I have a sister about your age,” he said. “Her name is Sarah, too. Perhaps one day, you will meet her.”
Sara spoke then, her voice quiet. “I would like that. Your sister, does she still play with dolls?”
“She sleeps with one. But only in secret.”
Sara smiled at him. Angelique knew that she could not rely on James Montgomery to intervene for her. She and the girl must come to an understanding of one another, and the sooner, the better. But she made sure her tone was gentle when she spoke again.
“Sara, there are many things in life we do not want, but which we must face. I did not want to lose my parents, but they died. You did not want to lose yours, but here we are.”
“I never had a father,” Sara said, her eyes shining with unshed tears. Angelique did not back down at the sight of them.
“Your father is best not spoken of. He was a worthless wastrel and a ne’er-do-well. But your mother was a good woman.”
Sara’s tears overflowed then, and Angelique ignored them. She remembered herself at that age and the humiliation she would have felt to weep in front of strangers. Angelique held herself back and stayed where she was.
“My mother was the best woman who ever lived,” Sara said.
Angelique felt her own throat thicken. She swallowed hard to clear it. “Well. Then we will educate you for her sake. She would want what is best for you. And I can give you the best.”
“I want my mother back.”
The girl’s voice was so soft that Angelique almost did not hear it break. Sara’s thin shoulders rounded beneath the worsted gown she wore. A strand of hair fell from her braids and into her eyes. Angelique tried to hold herself very still, but she could not leave the child to cry alone. She stepped around the table and took the girl into her arms.
Sara flinched as if Angelique had struck her, her body rigid in a stranger’s embrace. But perhaps the embrace of a strange woman was better than none, for the girl relaxed in her arms. The girl’s moment of trust was like a dagger in her heart, and her longing for her own daughter rose in her, an old ghost that would never be completely vanquished.
Angelique stroked the errant lock of hair back from Sara’s eyes. “If I could give her back to you, I would. But that is beyond my power.”
She stepped away from the girl, offering her the handkerchief from her sleeve, the soft linen square beautifully edged with Lisette’s lace. Sara wiped her nose with the back of her hand, both her tears and her anger fading. “Oh, no, my lady. That is too fine. I cannot use that.”
“Indeed you can, and indeed you will. In my household, the finer things will be at your disposal. You will live according to your father’s birth, and you will learn to be a better person than he was.”
Sara blew her nose loudly into the cloth, wiping her eyes and tucking it away in her own sleeve with almost the same gesture Angelique had used to draw it out. “I am a better person than my father already,” Sara said.
“You are indeed,” Angelique said. “We will be two orphans together. Perhaps we can make the best of it.”
Angelique smiled and offered the girl her hand. This time, Sara took it.
“We will see you at dinner. Please go with Mrs. Bellows, and she will help you get settled in your room. Come down to the drawing room at five sharp. Dinner will be at five thirty. We keep country hours at Aeronwynn’s Gate.”
“I will join you for dinner?” Sara asked, her voice almost a squeak.
“Of course. You are a lady and this is your home. You will take your meals with us.”
Sara’s face lit up, and Angelique felt her heart clench.
Sara turned and bolted into the hallway without a backward glance, gone before Angelique could call her housekeeper. The girl’s coltish beauty, which had not yet fully flowered, gave Angelique pause. She wondered what might have happened to the girl, left in a public inn.
“You’ve rescued her then,” James Montgomery said. “Does that good deed leave any time in this day for yourself?”
Twenty-two
“That went well,” James said.
He watched as Angelique tried to collect herself, as she struggled to put together the pieces of her broken composure. The girl had unsettled her.
“I hope so. I am a bit out of my depth with children.”
“She is not a child anymore,” James said. “I would advise you not to call her that when she’s in the room. I’ve made that mistake with my own sisters a time or two. It didn’t end well.”
“I should have introduced you sooner. I’m sorry about that.”
“It’s awkward. There’s no precedence for introducing your husband’s bastard to your current lover.”
She laughed then, as he had intended, and her face lightened a little. James stepped toward her and took her hand, drawing her close. He took in the scent of her hair, the soft smell of orchids in the fall of dark curls. His body hardened at her nearness, and he wished he could drag her back upstairs. No doubt, like at a fine hotel, the bed they’d left behind had been made already.
All the more reason to muss it again.
She was talking, so he tried to listen.
“Thank you for hanging back for so long while I spoke with Sara,” she said. “You hold your tongue when I need you to. Not one man in six hundred would do that.”
“Not one man in six hundred could, my lady. But I have five sisters, all of whom know their own minds. I know to hold my tongue when a woman has the bit between her teeth.”
He moved even closer so that he could feel the rise of her rounded breasts against his coat front. Still, she talked on.
“So I have your sisters to thank for those rare occasions when your good manners arise,” Angelique said.
“My mother is the one to thank. You may do so when we see her.”
“I don’t know when that will be.”
“Neither do I. But time will tell.”
She had noticed his body fin
ally, and she had started to lose her train of thought. Angelique leaned back so that she could look up into his eyes. Her blue gaze was as fathomless as any sea, as full of mystery. It could take a man all his life to unravel her. But James didn’t have that long.
He leaned down, his lips hot over hers. Her mouth was soft beneath his light kiss. He caressed her gently, as with a feather, teasing her, taunting her with his desire, as he watched hers rise. Angelique opened her eyes when he pulled away, and he saw that she had truly lost her train of thought.
“Is there someplace we can go, somewhere without a hundred servants and hangers-on, where we can be alone?”
He whispered into the hair at the nape of her neck as his lips traveled up behind her ear. He caught her earlobe between his teeth and bit down gently. He felt her body give way as she leaned against him. Still, her voice was only slightly breathless when she answered him.
“It occurs to me, Captain, that you might like to see the summerhouse.”
He matched her formal tone, unable to keep the laughter from his voice as he ran his tongue over the line of her jaw. “Well, then, if you would show it to me, my lady, I would not mind escorting you there.”
“How kind of you.”
“I am a humanitarian.”
He kissed her then, and he stopped toying with her. He dove into her lips as into a pool of cool, clear water, awash in sensation as he touched her. His hands roamed down from her waist to cup her buttocks in his palms. He kneaded them, drawing her body against his to press his erection against her softness. If he did not have her again, and soon, he would not be able to answer for himself.
James kept his voice even, but he heard that he had lost his breath when he raised his head, drawing away from the siren song of her lips to speak again.
“And the gardens, too, Angelique? I have great hope of seeing your fields of green and gold.”
“My gardens are indeed in bloom this time of year. I will show you the flowers that grow there.”
Much Ado About Jack Page 13