“Certainly. You have my permission to get drunk. As soon as you return to me the price of my wasted ticket, that is.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face, then sank back against the squabs with apparent weariness. “I took you up, Miss Frost, because your brother would want you to be safe. And that is the end of the discussion.”
“Oh, good! Then you agree with me.” She bared her teeth in a grin. “You should let me go to Benedict.”
“I can’t let you go alone, Miss Frost,” he replied. “It wouldn’t be right. A woman alone . . . there are those who would hurt you.”
Thus my disguise as a boy. She rolled her eyes. “If your conscience won’t permit me to travel alone, you may accompany me to Derbyshire.”
“Out of the question. My business holds me in London.”
“What business?”
“Endless business. Only today, I have a meeting at Somerset House with the president of the Royal Society. Then I must review a new treatise on infection at the Royal College of Physicians.”
“Say ‘royal’ once more.”
His dark blue gaze snapped to meet hers, suspicious. “Why?”
“Because I hadn’t got it into my brain that you’re a lord who moves in exalted circles and can do whatever he likes.”
The carriage rocked on its well-oiled springs, swallowing the roughness of London’s roads. Twisting and cornering. Taking her away from the coaching inn. Was she closer to Derbyshire now, or farther away?
Farther. Definitely farther.
She sighed. “Lord Hugo, I don’t want to stay with your mother. I want to go to my own family. Surely you can understand that.”
He lifted a brow. “Such a wish is unfathomable to me. But then, my family is ashamed of me.”
Dark suppositions about hidden chambers and monstrous deeds flooded her mind. Now it was her turn to ask, with some suspicion, “Why is that?”
“Because I went to medical college instead of into the clergy. Because I call upon ill people and sometimes perform surgeries.”
Georgette released a caught breath. “How terrible. I can understand why they are disgusted by you.”
He winced, then tried to cover it by adjusting his starched white cuffs.
Oh, dear. “I’m teasing, Lord Hugo. I can understand nothing of the sort. To me, such behavior seems . . .” She cast about for the right word. “Acceptable.”
“Acceptable,” he repeated drily. The carriage gave a sway, and he steadied himself with a broad hand against the fabric-softened ceiling.
“Is that why you’re going to all those royal locations? To learn something about patient care?”
“Nothing so admirable. I’m looking for a patron for a private hospital.” He lowered his hand, regarding her narrowly. “You’re about to ask why again, aren’t you?”
“I would never intrude into a matter that was no business of mine.” She fired a pointed stare at him.
“Right. I’m sure you wouldn’t.” The curve of his mouth was distant and haughty, the sort of not-quite smile worn by classical statues. “Surgeons with little knowledge cut and operate, while the physicians with the most medical training drone and profess and hardly ever see patients. I think the best of both roles should be blended. I intend to see that it is.”
“So your meetings are to ask important people to give you money because your family will not support your scheme?”
“Indeed. Honesty is the most expedient way of getting what one wants.”
“When one is dealing with the elite?” She hooted. “Not likely. I’ve changed my mind. Take me along with you. I want to watch this.”
“Ah—well. No. This is a delicate matter. If I hope to persuade them this time—”
“This time? You’ve asked before?”
His gaze slid away. “Twice.”
“So you’ll batter them with arguments and proposals they’ve already rejected. Twice.”
“Because they are wrong.”
“Say no more. That would convince me.”
“I ought to put you out of the carriage right now,” he muttered.
“If you’ll give me coach fare to Strawfield village in Derbyshire, I’ll be on my way.”
It wouldn’t be the first time she’d left right before being evicted. After Georgette and Benedict’s parents died, Benedict had inherited the bookshop—and sold it to Cousin Mary and her husband with the understanding that they would house Georgette until she turned twenty-one. But in the cramped family quarters above, Mary needed another day maid much more than she needed a cousin who served as bookstore clerk. And Georgette’s wages, meager though they were, would easily hire Mary the help she needed.
Better to leave now than to find herself cast out—with kindness and apology—in a few more weeks. Better to descend from Lord Hugo’s carriage before she found herself in a world she knew not at all.
She had raised her hand, prepared to rap on the ceiling and bring the carriage to a halt, when Lord Hugo spoke: “Wait. Please.”
She glared at him.
“Miss Frost. Please do not make yourself unsafe.”
His tone was stern, but not unkind. How odd. She let her hand fall to her lap, fingers twisting together. “My lord, I don’t wish to be unsafe. I wish to go to my brother.”
This observation seemed to strike the high-handed man in the solar plexus. “I am trying to help your brother. And you. Why do you think I visited Frost’s Bookshop so often?”
“Because you wanted books.”
“I could buy books anywhere.”
Her mouth opened—and then closed again.
He turned aside, working at the latch on the carriage window. “Warm day,” he grunted. “Some air would be—ah. There. Isn’t that pleasant?”
The gruff tone of his voice had gone tentative.
In fact, the air was humid and close outside as well as in. With the window open, smuts wafted in like a sprinkling of black snow, making him blink.
If his expression were always thus—a little weary, a little befuddled—he would be quite handsome.
Digging her split-seamed shoe into the mat cushioning the floor of the carriage, she looked down. “Thank you for your concern.”
“If you were my sister, there is no way in heaven I’d let you run off and seek treasure.”
As quickly as that, the moment was spoiled. Her head snapped up. “Let, let, let. Just stop. If I were your sister, I wouldn’t need the money, so the point is moot. If I were your sister, I’d have been raised on clouds of spun sugar and dined off dishes made of carved diamond.”
“That is ridiculous. Diamond is far too hard to carve for use as crockery. Too small as well.” He considered. “However, my sisters-in-law are remarkably fond of spun sugar.”
“Hugo.” She used his name without the honorific for the first time, and his brows lifted—displaying surprise, but not, she thought, displeasure. “You asked where I wanted to go. Besides the cousins I have left behind, my brother is the only close family I have in the world. I do not know him well, and I do not know what his life is like. But I know being in his company would be better than being alone.”
And then an idea struck her. A marvelous, wonderful idea, worthy of a heroine in a fairy tale. “You really could come with me,” she said. “Leave your business with Royal This and That behind and try something new. Pursue the royal reward instead.”
* * *
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Copyright © 2016 by Theresa St. Romain
Cover Design by Carrie Divine/Seductive Designs
Image copyright couple © Period Images
This is a work of fiction. All names, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, places, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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Theresa Romain, My Scandalous Duke
My Scandalous Duke Page 10
