Page 53 of A Lady’s Guide to Mystery and Mischief

“But it’s Francis and you couldn’t help yourself?” she suggested, a half-smile gracing her pretty face. “I heard him mention your grandfather.”

Grey winced. So she’d stumbled upon them the moment he’d decided to shove Francis up against a tree. What a paragon of gentility he must have looked. “Yes.”

“Ah,” she said, her thumb still trailing back and forth over his bandaged palm.

“He knows,” Grey said, his voice low and vehement. “He knows exactly which of my nerves to touch and how. The consequence of God knows how many summers together, I suppose.”

“Were you ever close?”

Grey frowned. “No. How could we be? My grandfather loved Francis. In his mind, Francis had the makings of a perfect gentleman. All the—the gambling, boxing, and shooting—Francis enjoyed all those things. He swanned around in the finery as though it were made for him. I didn’t want to do or wear anything, because I—I wanted to be alone.”

“Of course you did,” Farah said, the corners of her mouth pulled down in sympathy. “It’s what anyone in your position would have wanted.”

Grey swallowed around the lump in his throat. A mere three weeks after he’d moved to Montgomery House, George had demanded Grey behave like more of a man. Despite Leila’s empathy, he had always felt cheated out of his grief. He’d needed time, and it had been snatched away from him. Then, he’d grown. He’d grown and grown and grown, looking out of place among the others, still unable to connect with them, still wanting to be alone.

Alone was always better when one had no hope of fitting in.

To his grandfather, it had all come down to an inherent lack of civility. Something that Francis had been blessed in abundance with.

“It would have been different with Francis’s support,” Grey croaked. “But he delighted in it—in the knowledge that he was the favorite and I was the failure. And I just—hated him for it.”

Something unidentifiable crossed Farah’s features, gone as soon as it had appeared. She dipped her chin, her focus shifting to the desk where she spotted a small glass jar nestled in the medicine tin. For a moment, her spark was back in full force, a grin blossoming on her face. “The ointment I gave you! Is it working?”

Grey scrambled to adjust to the change in subject. “It is.”

“Have you used it today?”

He grimaced. “No.”

She picked up the jar. “And now you’re one hand short.”

“I have another hand,” he said, waving it in the air. “I’ll be fine.”

“It’ll be awkward using that one,” she countered. “Let me help.”

Grey’s brain screeched to a halt. “Help?”

Farah jumped off the table and made a vague gesture at him. “Take your shirt off.”

“Excuse me?”

“Go on,” she said, all impatience. “The sooner you let me do it, the sooner I can leave you in peace.”

Grey considered this. Farah was as stubborn as they came, and he had promised himself that they would part on amicable terms tonight.

And, fine—perhaps it was nice to be treated with kid gloves.

Slowly, even as the logical parts of his mind fought against it, he began to peel his clothing off his body. Farah watched in silence, her petal pink mouth slightly parted. Setting his black neckcloth aside, he began to work on the buttons of his waistcoat.

“I can help with that.” She took a step forward and made quick work of the buttons, leaving him to pull his shirtsleeves over his head in one fluid motion. The heat of the fire licked at his skin, the room feeling far hotter than it likely was.

She bent to inspect his scar, assessing. There wasn’t even a suggestion of revulsion on her face, even as he knew how hideous his old injury was. She reached out and gave it a hesitant touch, the sensation dull.

“Has the skin softened?”

He nodded, and she beamed in satisfaction.

“Take a seat,” she instructed. “This won’t take long.”