He dropped to a knee beside her. “I did,” he said in solemn tones. “A very, very long time ago. I am so very sorry she is...” The man’s throat worked.
“Lost,” Flora supplied. “She is not truly gone. Not forever. She is merely lost.”
Lily struggled to draw in a breath past the tightness in her chest. For all the ugliness Flora had known, she still retained hope with innocence only a child was capable of. Unable to meet the grief mirrored in the marquess’ eyes, Lily looked away, and her gaze collided with his kind-eyed wife. The woman met her stare with a gentle knowing.
Flora tugged the marquess’ hand. “How do you know my mother? Do you remember her from when she made her Come Out? My grandmother used to say there was no more magnificent diamond in all the waters than my mama.” At the unwitting child’s reminder of the dark deed that brought Lily here, she dropped her gaze to the tips of her boots.
“I did remember your mother’s Come Out,” he said quietly. A sad smile creased his lips. “But I remember her from long ago. I was...” He coughed into his hand. “I was a friend of your uncle.”
Flora gasped. “You are friends with my Uncle Derek? I did not know Uncle Derek had any friends. He is quite miserable, you know.”
“Flora,” Lily chided, placing a gentle hand on the girl’s shoulder. With her child’s ears, Flora had very neatly missed the telltale word used by the marquess. The desire to protect the duke...Derek, from the world filled her with a staggering intensity. Mayhap he had the right of it? It was far too dangerous living outside; at least closeted away, one could insulate oneself from the peril that was life.
“I know your Uncle Derek quite well. We used to make a good deal of mischief as children.” The faint grin on the gentleman’s lips gave Lily pause, as with those words he transformed Derek from this cold, terrifying stranger, into a man who’d once been a child Flora’s age with a troublesome grin and a penchant for mischief. The realness in that pulled at her heart.
Her skin pricked with awareness and she looked up. Lady St. Cyr stared curiously at her. Surely a stranger could not see into her confounded thoughts. Unnerved, Lily cleared her throat. “We should allow the marquess and marchioness to their picnic, Flora.”
“Must we?”
“You must stay,” the marchioness said quietly.
Then, with the ease only a peer could manage, she looked to their servant and, with a slight nod, motioned for him to lay down a blanket he’d taken out of their picnic basket. Flora clapped her hands excitedly. Lily curled her toes within the soles of her serviceable boots. This world was not her world. She could not be farther from it than had she been set into orbit within another galaxy. Casting a desperate glance over the marquess’ shoulder into the lake, she wished herself far, far away.
“And I gather you are...”
“She is my governess,” Flora supplied, as the marquess rose to his feet and helped his wife sit.
Another powerful longing ran through Lily at the sign of that closeness between two people; she would have given her littlest finger to know a fraction of that genuine love. She bit the inside of her cheek. Instead, some women were born to lives of happiness, while others trudged along with the path and way winding less clear. She claimed a seat alongside Flora.
Lily glanced at the bag of books she’d brought for the girl’s studies, but the manner in which Flora was firing off questions at the marquess, the day’s lesson would, no doubt, prove a good deal less productive. And yet, even with that truth, she carefully attended the marquess’ words, hoping for further mention about the man Lily now called employer.
“...He was a superior boxer.”
“Was he?” Flora asked excitedly. “I do believe I can see that. He enjoys fighting with Harris and mean Mr. Davies.” She cast a look at Lady St. Cyr. “His man-of-affairs,” she clarified for the other woman’s benefit.
“Ah,” the young lady replied with a smile dimpling her cheek.
The marquess waggled his eyebrows. “Mean Mr. Davies is still in the duke’s employ?”
Flora rolled her eyes in a dramatic fashion. “Oh, yes.” Then she scrambled forward. “You know him, too?”
“Davies? Oh, indeed.” Lord St. Cyr winked, and dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Your uncle was never afraid to go toe-to-toe with the man.”
“Yes, well Davies does deserve yelling at sometimes,” Flora said ringing a chuckle from the young lord. She pointed to Lily. “Uncle Derek fights with Mrs. Benedict, too.”
The trio’s attention swung to Lily and heat flamed on her cheeks. She choked. “Flora...”
The little girl gave a wave of her hand. “They are friends of Uncle Derek. They know. Isn’t that right, my lord?”
A spark of pain glinted in the man’s eyes, gone so quick Lily wondered if she’d merely imagined it. “Indeed,” he said, his voice rough.
Flora looked to the book clutched in Lady St. Cyr’s hands. “What is that?” she asked with curiosity seeping from her wide, blue eyes.
“I enjoy sketching,” the young woman murmured. “Would you care to see?”
“Oh, yes.” Flora reached for the book with eager fingers and quickly set to turning the pages. “Oh, my,” she whispered.
“I’m really rather a deplorable artist,” the woman said with a wry smile. “But I do very much enjoy it.”
“Oh, no, my lady,” Flora said emphatically, not taking her gaze from the pages. “You are wonderful. Your pictures are magnificent.”
“And you are very kind, Flora,” Lady St. Cyr said with a wide smile that climbed all the way to her eyes.
Odd, she’d never before known a lady could be capable of that unfettered expression.
The marquess collected his wife’s hand and raised her fingertips to his lips. A look passed between them, the moment so poignant, so beautiful, that Lily carefully averted her gaze, feeling the worst sort of interloper on that intimate exchange. And more hating herself for aching to know a sliver of the love shared between them. She fixed her attention on the book Flora held and squinting, she tried to make out the image that now commanded the girl’s notice. It appeared to be...a...a...
“Oh, I do love this one,” Flora whispered.
“Do you?” Lady St. Cyr scooted closer to her.
“Yes,” the girl breathed. She dropped her chin atop her hand and assessed the same drawing.
Broad strokes and slashes filled the lower portion of the page with misshapen circles lining the top of the sheet. Lily peered at it; lost in the ambiguous images, and yes, one would never claim the lady was in any way an artist, and yet... She leaned closer, staring intently, and there was a mystery that forced a person to look at what they saw and truly see it, devoid of the perfection expected by Society.
“What do you see?” Lady St. Cyr urged gently.
“I see the ocean.” There was a haunting timbre to the girl’s words. Gooseflesh dotted Lily’s arms. “It is a storm and there is a ship, lost.” Another breeze stirred overhead and the leaves danced noisily.
Oh, God. Pain stabbed at Lily’s heart. This was the loss Flora had known. What blackness existed in Lily’s soul that she’d cursed the entire Winters family?
“Would you like it?” The marchioness’ quietly spoken question brought Flora’s attention up, away from the artwork.
She blinked several times. “Truly?”
“Truly,” Lady St. Cyr murmured. She leaned over and effortlessly tugged out the page. “It is yours.”
Flora accepted the sheet with eager hands and with a wide-beaming smile, returned to her study of the squall she saw captured there. The marquess pointed to the page and said something that roused a laugh from the girl.
Lily stilled, lost in the poignancy of that exchange. This charming marquess had once been friends with Derek. What would the Duke of Blackthorne have become had life not turned him bitter and he’d not removed himself from the world? Would he even now be the loving uncle pointing at obscure pictures and rous
ing laughter from a child’s lips?
“You are a governess, Mrs. Benedict.”
Those words, more statement than anything else, snapped Lily’s attention back to the marchioness. “Forgive me.” She cleared her throat. “I am.” In a world where she’d known the ugliness of the late Duke of Blackthorne and his mother, who was this woman who spoke to governesses with such ease? Lily felt set adrift at sea in that storm upon the page Flora spoke of.
Is that how Derek feels each day? Her throat went tight.
“My sister-in-law was a former governess,” the young woman said gently.
Lily angled her head. “Beg pardon?” Noblemen did not wed governesses.
“You’ve heard me correctly.” A lively twinkle glimmered in the lady’s eyes. “She and my brother are very much in love.”
Unable to meet the probing stare, Lily shifted her gaze over to the lake. Yes, sometimes magical moments happened to people. A pink pelican dipped its head under the surface and fished about for its fare. He came up a moment later with his wide mouth empty. But most times, life was hard, and predictable, and predictably hard. The graceful creature delved his head under the surface once more.
To give her fingers something to do, Lily picked up the volume of Moral Tales for Young People and fanned the pages. “How very fortunate they are,” she said softly. There was no bitterness in that. There was a peace in knowing that sometimes those mystical moments did come.
Lady St. Cyr narrowed her eyes and opened her mouth, but Flora called the marchioness’ attention and left Lily to her thoughts once more.
And just then, fate in its ultimate mockery placed a familiar, detestable figure on the riding path ahead. With his elegant, sapphire coat and fawn-colored breeches, the gentleman may as well have been any other gentleman present. She fisted the book in her hands as their gazes collided. No, this was no meeting of chance. This was a carefully orchestrated reminder of her role, his presence and, more importantly, his reach. Holdsworth gave a slight nod, a hard smile on his lips, and then shifted his attention away.
As he continued riding past, panic swelled inside Lily’s breast. In embroiling this little girl in that madman’s machinations, she’d not allowed herself to consider the possible jeopardy she placed Flora in. You didn’t think, because all you’d cared about was your own future security. Guilt squeezed like a vise about her lungs. She jumped to her feet. “We should go,” she squeaked.
Flora looked up, confusion and disappointment warring in her eyes. “Mrs. Benedict?”
Unable to meet the marquess and marchioness’ eyes, Lily dropped a curtsy. “I thank you for allowing us to join you under the elm. If you’ll excuse me.”
Holdsworth shot a deliberate look over his shoulder, and with her free fingers, she grabbed for Flora’s hand. “Good day,” she said quickly and fled the park.
For the truth was, there existed more nightmares than magical moments. Life had taught her that.
Chapter 14
Later that evening, Lily paced the floor of her quiet chambers. The white coverlet and dove-white curtains stood as a silent mockery to the woman who now occupied these noble rooms. She wrung her hands together. In the dead of night, when the household slept, it was a good deal harder to escape one’s guilt.
She stopped abruptly and her nightshift fluttered about her ankles. On numbed legs, she walked over to the dressing table and slid into the Trafalgar chair. From the bevel glass, the face of a woman who appeared far older, far more mature than Lily’s three and twenty years, stared back. She tried to pull her gaze from the creature with wan cheeks and bloodshot eyes, but the moment was much like the day she’d arrived in London. The cacophony of shrieks and cries as a phaeton, driven by a reckless lord, tipped. Her life was that carriage accident. For gone was the girl with blush-pinked cheeks and dreamy, optimistic eyes. That woman had been killed by the ruthlessness of one rake who’d taken her virtue. Tears smarted behind her eyes and she blinked them back.
Through her blurred vision, she examined the sterling silver cloth brush and comb far grander than her own treasured pieces; pieces she’d been forced to leave behind.
Lily glanced over at the locked door and then returned her attention to the dressing table. With trembling fingers, she slowly pulled open the narrow center drawer and revealed the neat pages clipped from The Times. She shuffled through the pages she’d assembled; pages detailing the tragedies of one particular family. The Winters family who’d existed as nothing more than a conglomeration of individuals. She’d read through the scandal sheets about first the death of George, then the mother, and sister as all but one remained of the Winters line with a detached interest. Their tragedies had not roused the expected glee or satisfaction; for with their passing, none of them could right the wrongs once done to her.
Before, she’d been removed from who these people were. It had been far easier to hate anyone and everyone who shared George’s blood when they were mere strangers, ducal kin gossiped about in scandal sheets. It was quite another when those same strangers became people, lonely, broken, fearful. Or, as Flora had indicated in the duke’s case—a hero who now cried when he thought no one else was watching.
Her lips moved silently as she read.
The 7th Duke of B dead in a carriage accident. With no heir or kin born to the couple, the line will pass to Lord Derek...
Except him. The one Winters who’d lived; a figure who’d been mentioned as nothing more than an afterthought in the scandal sheets. He’d existed as another one of those who shared George’s blood and nothing more.
Lily placed the sheet down and smoothed her palms over the worn page. Such a detail about who replaced that treacherous Duke of Blackthorne hadn’t mattered. Derek had merely been a name; a cold stranger who shared the blood of the man who ruined her and the mother who’d turned her away.
Now, he was more real in ways that George and Sir Henry never had been. Her lips tingled with the remembrance of his powerful kiss and an odd fluttering danced in her belly. She slid her eyes closed and embraced those wanton, wicked thoughts of a man who’d roused a fierce desire within her—sentiments she’d never known with the men before and had never expected to know, ever.
Lily drew in a shuddery breath and forced her eyes open. It had been a good deal easier to slip into this home to commit a theft when he’d been nothing more than a man who shared the blood of dark, ugly souls who’d turned her out. Now, nothing was certain. For he was real. And he was not the same man his brother had been. For if he’d been a lofty duke who thought of only himself, he’d not have left his office and stormed into her meeting with Mr. Davies. Knowing her as little as he did, nonetheless, he’d defended her anyway to his man-of-affairs. He trusted her.
And she would repay that kindness and trust with the greatest lie and betrayal.
Her hands tightened reflexively about the page and she hopelessly wrinkled the sheet. Forcing her fingers open, she then laid the page down, smoothing it with her palm. What did it say about the weak, pathetic woman she was that after only a few days of knowing Derek, she’d abandon thoughts about her future and security?
Lily scrubbed her hands over her face. For how could she steal from him? How could she break the trust of a man who trusted none and who kept the world out, but had somehow found her a person worth defending? “Get control of yourself, Lily Louise.” Woolgathering about the man whose kiss had curled her toes would not help keep her warm, fed, and safe years from now. Except, she could no sooner stop thinking of him than she could undo that mistake she’d made with George all those years ago.
Only, in this instant, the demons that haunted her had nothing to do with the regrets of her past or the horrific memories of George’s betrayal and Sir Henry’s improper offer, and her own fall from proverbial grace. This time it was Derek. A man called monster by Society, who cried in privacy. Emotion swelled in her throat. Somehow, between the plan presented her by Holdsworth and a little girl’s ramblings, Lily’s role in
this household had changed in a fundamental way.
She shoved herself up. “What alternative do I have?”
The hum of nighttime silence served as her only answer.
I can go home and beg... As soon as the thought entered, she shoved it aside. After the Dowager Duchess of Blackthorne’s passing, Lily had penned a letter to her father, pleading with him to allow her to return. To no avail. She would not humble herself before him again. Not when he’d been abundantly clear he considered his eldest daughter, Lilliana Bennett, dead to him.
That propelled her into movement. There really was no other choice. Staying here in this fabricated role of governess to an innocent child only complicated her plans and muddied her thoughts. Lily shoved herself up from the chair and stood. The thin carpet did little to prevent the cold from seeping into her toes. Perhaps this uncharacteristic cool had nothing to do with the early spring evening and everything to do with this house. And the cold, hurt man dwelling here with an equally hurt and lonely child. Lily hurried over to the vanity and collected her wrapper from the back of the chair. She shrugged into the modest piece and bit her lip hard. She grabbed the box from the table and with the piece clutched close to her chest, carried it to the door. If she managed to locate the diamond, she could simply tuck it into the box and be on her way...and slip away to never again see Derek or Flora.
A spasm contorted her heart. I cannot be weak...
After all, that weakness had once cost her everything. A strand of hair fell across her brow and she tucked it back behind her ear. Before her courage deserted her, she pulled the door open and peeked her head out. Heaven ne’er helps the men who will not act... She looked left and then right down the empty stretch of hallway.
She pulled the door closed behind her and started down the hall. As she walked at a brisk clip, her ragged breaths filled the corridors. When she’d received word that Sir Henry with his fat, sweaty hands had died in his clubs, she’d vowed to never, ever, ever find herself so desperate she’d spread her legs for any man. She increased her stride. The world, however, offered very few options for those unwed ladies. “Not that heaven had taken much care after I helped myself,” she muttered under her breath.
Rescued By a Lady's Love (Lords of Honor, #3) Page 19