by Dare, Tessa
Well, then. It would seem the tactics were escalating. She could rise to the challenge.
Alex had exhausted her supply of biscuits. She brought in a new box of watercolors, bright as jewels in a treasure chest, placing them in easy reach.
The girls dusted her chair with soot.
Alex brought in a litter of kittens Mrs. Greeley was evicting from the cellar. No one could resist fluffy, mewling kittens. And Daisy almost didn’t, until Rosamund yanked her away with a stern word.
That evening, a rotting plum mysteriously appeared in Alex’s slipper—and unfortunately, her bare toes found it.
Rosamund seemed to be daring her to shout or rage, or go complaining to Mr. Reynaud. However, Alex refused to surrender. Instead, she smiled. She allowed the girls to do as they pleased. And she waited.
When they were ready to learn, they would tell her so. Until then, she would only be wasting her effort.
At last, her patience was rewarded. She found her opening.
Rosamund fell asleep on a particularly warm afternoon, dozing off with her book propped on her knees and her head tilted against the window glazing. Alex motioned Daisy closer and laid out a row of wrapped sweetmeats on the table, one by one.
“How many are there?” she whispered. “Count them out for me, and you may have them for yourself.”
Daisy sent a cautious glance toward her sister.
“She’s sleeping. She’ll never know.”
With a small, uncertain finger, Daisy touched each sweet as she counted aloud. “One. Two. Three. Four. Five.”
“And in this group?”
Daisy’s lips moved as she counted them quietly to herself. “Six.”
“Well done, you. Now how many in both groups together? Together, five and six are . . . ?”
“Daisy,” Rosamund snapped.
Startled, Daisy snatched her hand behind her back. “Yes?”
“Millicent’s vomiting up her innards. You’d better see to her.”
As her sister obediently retreated, Rosamund approached Alexandra. “I know what you’re doing.”
“I never imagined otherwise.”
“You won’t win.”
“Win? I’m not certain what you mean.”
“We will not cooperate. We are not going away to school.”
Alex softened her demeanor. “Why don’t you want to go to school?”
“Because the school won’t want us. We’ve been sent down from three schools already, you know.”
“Don’t say you’d rather remain here with Mr. Reynaud. If it were up to him, you’d have only dry toast at every meal.”
“We’re not wanted by Mr. Reynaud, either. No one wants us. Anywhere. And we don’t want them.”
Alexandra recognized the defiance and mistrust in the girl’s eyes. A dozen years ago, those eyes could have mirrored her own.
A tender part of her wanted to clutch the girl close. Of course you’re wanted. Of course you’re loved. Your guardian cares for you so very much. But to lie would be taking the coward’s way out, and Rosamund wouldn’t be fooled. What the girl needed wasn’t false reassurance—it was for someone to tell her the honest, unflinching truth.
“Very well.” Alex folded her hands on the desk and faced her young charge. “You’re right. You’ve been passed around from relation to relation, sent down from three schools, and Mr. Reynaud wishes to rid himself of you at the first opportunity. You’re unwanted. So what you must decide is this: What do you want?”
Rosamund gave her a suspicious look.
“I was orphaned, too. A bit older than you are now, but I was utterly alone in the world, save for a few distant relations who paid for my schooling—on the condition that they would never have me in their sight. It wasn’t fair. It was lonely, and my schoolmates were cruel, and I cried myself to sleep more evenings than not. But in time, I realized I had an advantage over the other girls. They had to worry about catching a husband to help their families. I was indebted to no one, I answered to no one, and I needn’t meet anyone’s expectations of what a young lady should or shouldn’t be. My life was my own. I could follow any dream, if I was prepared to work hard for it. Do you hear what I’m saying?”
Rosamund gave no acknowledgment, but Alex could tell the girl was listening. Intently.
“So what is it you truly want? If you could have any life you wished, what would it be?”
“I want to escape. Not just this house, but England.”
“Where do you mean to go?”
“Anywhere. Everywhere. I’d take Daisy with me. We’d travel the world, wearing trousers and smoking cheroots and doing as we pleased.”
Alexandra had been hoping to hear “I want to be a painter.” Or a French-trained chef, or an architect. Whatever pursuit Rosamund named, Alex could build lessons on its foundation. But she was quite certain Mr. Reynaud would not approve of lessons in cheroot-smoking. Alex wouldn’t have known how to give them, anyway.
“That sounds like a grand life indeed,” she said, “but how will you support yourselves?”
“I’m perfectly capable of looking after us both.” Rosamund cast a glance at the table. “So you can clear away your nine sweets and leave us alone.”
“You know very well there are eleven sweetmeats.”
“Are there?”
Alex looked. Sure as could be, two sweetmeats were missing. The girl had managed to steal them, right from under her nose, and one of the two was already across the room in Daisy’s hands. Alex could hear the paper crinkling as the younger girl unwrapped it.
“Rosamund, may I tell you something? You will find yourself reluctant to believe it, but it’s the truth.”
The girl gave a lackadaisical shrug. The warmest gesture she’d made toward Alex so far.
“I like you,” Alexandra said. “I like you very much indeed.”
Chapter Nine
Alex woke to darkness.
Disorientation wrapped her brain like a fog. She sat up and shook her head, trying to clear it. Her heart pounded. Perspiration glued her shift to her chest. Worst of all, her stomach pitched and rolled. As if she were at sea.
Dread rose within her, quickly transforming—thanks to Nature’s least helpful of alchemies—into panic.
She fumbled blindly, finding nothing familiar. Her hands grasped bedclothes of the softest flannel. Definitely not her own. Her feet found a solid floor, but as she stood, the floorboards didn’t creak beneath her weight.
Then her knee collided with a chest of drawers. Ouch.
The pain gave her racing thoughts a jolt. Calm yourself, Alexandra. She pressed one hand to her belly and mentally sank through each solid, immovable layer beneath her feet. Wooden floor. Stony plinth foundation. Cobbled London street. The same layer of grainy, musty earth that Romans had packed beneath their sandals, and the bedrock Atlas, supporting the city on his shoulders.
There, now. You’re fine, you ninny.
She wasn’t lost at sea. She was in the Reynaud residence. And she was a governess.
An underqualified, ill-prepared, and thus far unsuccessful governess, but a governess nonetheless.
When she swallowed, her tongue rasped against the roof of her mouth. She was also a thirsty governess.
By now, Alex’s eyes had adjusted to the dark. She went to the washstand and lifted the ewer. It was light in her grip, no sound of sloshing. Empty. Drat. Tomorrow she’d be certain to set a cup of water aside before she retired, but that wouldn’t help her now. She supposed she might ring for a maid, but she hated to bother the staff. She squinted at her compact traveling clock on the washstand. Already five in the morning. She could wait another hour until sunrise, couldn’t she?
Her parched throat objected. No, she couldn’t wait. To most people, the sensation of thirst was an inconvenience. But then, most people didn’t know the minute-by-minute torture of going without water for days at a stretch.
Alex slid her feet into a pair of worn slippers and made her way out of
the bedchamber, through the corridor, and down the stairs with silent footsteps. Being small-statured had a few benefits, and stealth was one of them.
In the kitchen, she found the kettle on the stove. It still held some cooled water. She gulped down one cupful, then a second, and yet another still.
Once her thirst was slaked, she turned to make her way back upstairs.
Thump. Thump.
She eyed the closed door to Mr. Reynaud’s private retreat.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
The dull rhythmic sound ceased, and then started anew, and despite her misgivings, Alex put her ear to the door.
Now the thumping sounded more like banging. Something hitting the wall, again and again. Not just banging, but intermittent grunting.
She shouldn’t be listening to this, but she couldn’t pry her ear from the door. The sense of sordid fascination was irresistible.
All went quiet once again. She pressed her ear tightly to the door and held her breath, eliminating the distracting sound of her own inhalation. Then:
Bang-bang-bang.
Crash.
And a deep, harsh sound that was part growl, part barbaric shout.
She clapped a hand to her mouth. She was so absorbed by the struggle not to laugh, she didn’t notice the heavy footfalls until they were just on the other side of the door. The door latch turned.
No time for escape.
The door swung open.
She jumped back, clapping both hands over her eyes. “I didn’t see anything.”
“I swear it,” she said. “I didn’t see anything at all.”
Chase stared at his governess. She stood there with a finger-blindfold clamped over her eyes, dressed in a simple shift. Shadows skimmed contours of the form beneath it. “I should think snooping is beneath you, Miss Mountbatten.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, still covering her eyes. “I’m so sorry. I only came down for a drink of water, I promise.”
“Pressing one’s ear to a door would seem an ineffective way to quench thirst.”
Her shoulders wilted. “I didn’t mean to intrude. And I didn’t see anything, hand to my heart. I’ll be going to my chamber straightaway.” She covered both eyes with one hand and groped comically with the other. “Turn me around, if you would?”
“Are we playing blindman’s buff?”
“No.” Her throat flushed red. “Turn me the other direction. Toward the door. Point me back the way I came, and I’ll go up to bed.”
Chase went to the basin and worked the pump handle. The scene was so absurd, he’d nearly forgotten the throbbing pain in his hand. “I can’t send you to bed yet. I’m in need of your assistance.”
She swallowed audibly. “Assistance?”
“I can’t deal with this one-handed.”
She reeled a step in retreat, colliding with a shelf of copper butter molds, setting them a-rattle. Even though she’d backed herself into a corner, she still wouldn’t lower her hands from her eyes. “Can’t your . . . your guest provide you some relief?”
His guest?
“I don’t have a guest.”
A single finger peeled away from her face. He caught a glimpse of dark eyelashes through the gap.
“I thought you were entertaining a visitor,” she said.
He looked at the door to his retreat, then back to her. “Why would you think that?”
“I heard . . .” She swallowed and whispered faintly, “. . . banging. And groaning.”
Good God.
He chuckled. “If you hoped to hear something salacious, I’ll have to disappoint you. I was hanging paneling. On the wall. With a hammer and nails. And I seem to have sliced my thumb. Hence the groaning.”
“Oh.” She lowered her hands and gave a nervous laugh. “Thank heavens. What a relief. I mean, I’m not relieved about your wound, of course. I’m sorry about that. I’m just glad you’re not—”
“Bare to my skin and covered in well-earned sweat?”
“Erm . . . yes.”
He gritted his teeth. He would have loved to draw out the amusement, but his thumb wouldn’t be ignored any longer. “The cook keeps a bit of plaster up there.” He jutted his chin toward a high shelf atop the cupboard. “If you’d kindly fetch it for me.”
She didn’t do as he asked, but approached him and had a look at his wound. “You can’t just smear plaster over this.”
“It’s a small wound.”
“But a deep one. It must be cleaned thoroughly.”
“It’s fine.”
“I’ve seen wounds like this one fester. Bigger and stronger men have succumbed to less.”
“It’s truly none of your concern,” he said, growing testy at the suggestion of her tending the wounds of bigger and stronger men.
“It is my concern. If you die of gangrene or lockjaw, I’ll never be paid.”
Fair enough. He offered her his hand for dressing.
She washed the wound thoroughly with boiled water from the kettle and strong lye scullery soap. He winced. Damn, bugger, blast.
Then she slipped the flask from his waistcoat pocket. “May I?” Having uncapped it, she lifted it to his lips. To his quizzical expression, she replied, “You’re going to want it. This will hurt.”
Chase took a sip. He wasn’t about to admit any pain, but he wouldn’t refuse a swallow of good brandy.
As he watched, she poured a stream of amber spirits directly into his wound, letting it trickle until it overflowed. Then she pressed the wound to purge more blood and did it again.
On the outside, Chase was determined to look manful and impervious to pain.
On the inside . . . Christ.
When she capped the brandy and set the flask aside, he exhaled with relief.
She turned to search the kitchen stores. “Now for some vinegar.”
Bloody hell.
He winced as she began her fresh round of torture. “How are the girls’ lessons coming along?”
“Slowly. I’ve been attempting to earn their confidence, but they have the sort of wounds that won’t be easily healed. How long ago did their parents die?”
“I’ve no idea,” he admitted. “I don’t even know if they’re orphans. They could be illegitimate.”
“They’re not . . . ?” She broke off, abandoning the query.
“Mine?” He shuddered at the suggestion. “I would still have been at school when Rosamund was born. It’s true that I possess a natural talent for seduction, but I wasn’t that precocious. All I know is that their father never claimed them, and the woman they called mother died three years ago, and they’ve been passed around relations and schools ever since.”
She clucked her tongue. “Despite all their mischief, I pity them.”
You ought to be pitying me, he thought.
Having a woman this enticing living under the same roof was a constant temptation. And Chase battled temptation with approximately the same success as a seagull battling the Royal Navy.
Out of sight was not out of mind. At night, he found himself thinking of her. Upstairs, alone, in the dark. But worse by far were the mornings. For God’s sake, he began each day holding her hand. That, and trying like hell to make her laugh. He hadn’t managed it quite yet, but most days he wrangled a reluctant smile. That alone was worth four flights of stairs.
Just yesterday, Rosamund had woken him with a single word: “Tapeworms.” He’d all but leapt to his feet with delight.
It wasn’t entirely desire, but it was partly desire. He knew an innocent outward appearance often concealed a tightly coiled spring waiting for release. In the dark of night, with that virginal shift unbuttoned and that plait of dark hair unbound, Alexandra Mountbatten might prove surprising.
No sooner had he conjured the image than she untied the strip of linen holding the end of her plait. As her hair came unbound and fell loose, he stared at a lock of black satin dipping to graze the slope of her neck.
She pursed her lips and blew over his wound to dry
it.
God Almighty.
“There’s no doubt that they’re clever,” she went on, winding the strip of linen about his thumb, “but life’s taught them some difficult lessons. One only needs to look at Millicent to know Daisy’s hurting. It’s obvious from spending mere minutes with Rosamund that she’s learned to be wary. She won’t lower her guard easily. It will take time and patience to gain her trust.”
“You have until Michaelmas.”
“We have until Michaelmas.” She deftly tucked the strip of linen in on itself, securing the binding.
“Disciplining children is not among my talents. That’s why I hired you to take them in hand.”
She looked up at him. “Maybe they don’t need to be taken in hand, but taken into someone’s heart.”
Heart? He tugged his hand from hers. “Oh, no. Don’t get ideas.”
“Goodness. Heaven forbid that a woman have ideas.”
“Ideas are all well and good, but not those ideas. I know that look in a woman’s eye. I’ve seen it before, many times. You think you can convince me to settle down.”
“You don’t need to settle down. My father was a sea captain. I was raised on a ship, sailing the globe. We were the least settled family in the world, and yet I never doubted his love for me.”
“Wait. You were raised aboard a ship? Sailing the globe?”
She paused in the act of packing up the unused salves and plaster. “I probably shouldn’t have mentioned that.”
“No, I think you should have mentioned it. And long before now.”
“Does it truly matter? Perhaps I had an unconventional upbringing, but that doesn’t mean I can’t perform my duties. I had a full education. Here in England, at a proper school. I . . . I did warn you I wasn’t gently bred, and you said you didn’t care.” Her voice went small, but resonant with emotion. “Mr. Reynaud, I need this post. Please don’t sack me.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I have no intention of sacking you. That’s not what I meant.”
“It isn’t?”
“No. You should have told me straightaway because you should tell everyone straightaway. If I had your life story, it would be the first thing I mentioned to anyone. ‘Hullo, I’m Chase Reynaud. I learned to toddle aboard a merchant ship, and the Seven Seas rocked my cradle. And have I mentioned that no tropical sunset could compare with your beauty?’ The women would fall into bed with me.”