Page 5 of The Lady’s Deception

He very nearly smiled at such an image of his father. “My parents are in London until the summer. After they left, I determined it would be best if I hired a temporary governess for the girls. I did not expect it would be so difficult.”

A group of young men, Trinity students, passed in a noisy gaggle and were gone. Beneath the high walls surrounding the college, the evening shadows were deeper still. But not too deep for him to read a question in her eyes. A question for which he had never yet determined a satisfactory answer.

He’d already done a masterful job of proving himself unequal to the responsibilities of an eldest son and brother. Why in God’s name had his parents entrusted him with the care of two young girls?

“Not much farther now,” he said brusquely. Obligingly, Miss Gorse resumed walking, though her pace had slowed and she was limping noticeably now. But she made no complaint, and he had the distinct impression she would not thank him for enquiring about it.

To cover the sound of her shuffling, irregular footsteps, he passed the last quarter mile regaling her with stories about the girls: Daphne’s interest in learning the harp, which he attributed to their eldest sister Cami’s unfortunate book—although he omitted that particular detail from his account. And Bell’s fondness for a game of cricket, in which both he and their brother Galen had been wont to indulge her.

On the north side of Merrion Square, he stopped. “And here we are.”

She climbed the steps of Number 3 as if they were mountains, tottering a bit at the end while he fished for his key and opened the door to let them in. It hardly seemed possible for two girls, both slight of build, to make as much noise as Daphne and Bell as they thundered down the stairs from the drawing room to greet them on the landing.

“Did you see Mrs. Fitzhugh?” demanded Bell.

At the same time, Daphne asked, “Is she our new governe—?”

Miss Gorse looked from one to the other, gave a wan smile, and collapsed on the floor.

Bell’s eyes grew round and her lower lip quavered. “I didn’t mean to frighten her to death, Paris. Honest I didn’t.”

“She isn’t dead, eejit,” Daphne declared, nudging her younger sister with an elbow.

“Silence.”

Years of training had given Paris exceptional control over his voice. It could command a crowd. It could compel a confession in the courtroom. But never in all his life had it actually managed to quiet his youngest sisters.

They were both staring at him now, wide-eyed and wobbly-lipped, and he knew in another moment there would be tears. Oh God, anything but tears.

“She’s just fainted. Bell, run downstairs and ask Molly to make us a pot of tea, will you?” Bellis nodded. With one backward glance at the woman at his feet, she was gone. “And Daphne? If you could…” Could what? The clarity that had come with the cool evening air had flown, and the lingering fumes of claret in his brain showed very little interest in forming themselves into a coherent request. He knelt beside Miss Gorse, who was deathly pale and breathing shallowly.

“I’ll see if I can find a vinaigrette,” Daphne offered.

“Yes. Thank you. And I’ll take Miss Gorse upstairs.” Because he couldn’t very well leave her in a heap in the foyer, though if this was the sort of weak-spirited person Mrs. Fitzhugh recommended for a post as governess to two energetic girls…

He slipped his hands beneath her and rose, expecting to be pulled off balance beneath her weight. But she was no burden at all. Tucking her against his chest, he ascended the stairs, thinking first of the sofa in the drawing room, then bypassing it in favor of a proper bed in a chamber one floor up, the room that Cami and Erica had once shared. As he laid her atop the coverlet, she stirred and murmured but did not wake. His fingers fumbled to unpin her hat. More golden locks sprang free, tumbling over the pillow and across her brow. He brushed them carefully from her eyes. She wasn’t feverish, at least. Pray God, it was nothing contagious that had caused her to faint dead away. Perhaps he ought to send Molly for the physician who lived across the square.

He turned his attention next to unbuttoning her gray pelisse with swift, businesslike motions. Then his hands traveled to hers, tugging free her gloves. Her fingers were icy cold, but he paused to note with relief the steady drum of her pulse in one fine-boned wrist. At last, he removed her shoes and found that her hems were damp, stained with grass and fresh mud. The shoes themselves were shockingly worn down. On the sole of one was a hole the size of a three shilling piece. No wonder she had limped! It looked as if she’d walked considerably farther today than the distance from Four Courts to Merrion Square.

Where had she come from? Far enough away that she could have collapsed from the fatigue of her journey? Surely Mrs. Fitzhugh must have known he was more than capable of paying for suitable transportation.

In the bottom of the wardrobe he found a blanket and laid it over her supine form. When Daphne returned holding out a vinaigrette, he shook his head. “I think perhaps we’d best let her rest.” Already, some color was coming back into the woman’s face.

“But what about her dress?” Daphne’s cheeks pinked. “And her—her…stays?” The last word escaped in an embarrassed whisper.

His arms retained a memory of the young woman’s soft curves. “She isn’t wearing any, Daph.”

Before his too-precocious sister could ask how he knew, he waved her from the room, pausing on the threshold for one last look.

She put him in mind of the princess in some fairy tale, imprisoned by a wicked spell. In repose, her expression had lost its wariness, its prickliness, and he realized for the first time how young she was. Barely twenty, if he had to guess. Hardly the woman of experience he’d requested.

Silently, he closed the door behind them. The mystery of Miss Gorse would have to wait until morning.

Chapter 3

Noises woke her. The sibilance of children’s whispered voices. Likely Eugenia and Alexander plotting just outside her door, though Rosamund could muster very little curiosity about what they were saying. Last night’s escapade had caused trouble enou—

She squeezed her eyelids more tightly shut, as if her sight might betray her. But her other senses were quick to muster reassurance. She had indeed escaped Kilready and marriage to Lord Dashfort. Instead of damp stone walls and musty tapestries, she was surrounded now by scents of dried lavender and laundry starch and… Good heavens, was that a whiff of farmyard?