by Heather Boyd
Her lips quirked up at the corners and he remembered he’d said that very same thing on the last night they were together. However, in this instance he wasn’t inviting her to mount him. The condom was returned to a drawer in his bedchamber and there it would remain.
When she passed him to sit where he indicated, Constantine inhaled sharply. Damn, she smelled good. He quickly sat behind his desk before he forgot his own rules. He would treat her as any other servant applying to enter his employ. They would talk, discuss her past and any references, and determine her wage. He would ignore the thickening length in his trousers and hope the desk hid his reaction to her presence. “Was your journey pleasant?”
“Yes, my lord. The light rain last night didn’t make the travel so bad as to be impossible.” She dug into her bag and thrust a wad of papers at him. “Lady Farnsworth asked me to pass along her best wishes and these letters. She apologizes for not delivering them in person, but she thought you might like to have a letter of reference from her. It’s the uppermost one. I’m not sure what the others might be.”
In all honesty, Constantine couldn’t care less about references, but their existence would lend credence to her claim of experience in educating young girls. He peeled open the missive she mentioned and read the short message it contained.
Don’t let her push you away. She needs you as much as you need her. She’d make you an excellent wife.
Bella
Constantine shuffled in his chair. “Did Arabella mention what she relates in this letter?”
“No.”
Constantine grunted and folded the letter. So Arabella thought she could manage him from London, did she? Admittedly, she’d done a spectacular job of reuniting him with his lover, albeit in a respectable guise this time. But a marriage between them was hardly likely.
A man with three daughters had to consider their futures and happiness, too. Calista, or Miss Clark, was a liar and the ultimate dissembler. Constantine had no idea who she really was beneath the superficial identity she showed the world, and that changed almost daily. It was true that one day he would have to bury his fear of putting a woman in peril and marry again. He needed a son to carry on after him. Yet he couldn’t consider any woman for a wife unless they were completely honest with him. That certainly wasn’t part of Miss Clark’s nature today.
He pushed the notion aside to contemplate on another day. He wouldn’t consider a second marriage for a long time, not until he had his daughter’s happiness in hand. Miss Clark had met the girls briefly, but she had a long way to go in gaining their trust. He would wait until he was sure of their contentment and they were showing signs of improvement with their new governess’s help before he turned his mind to his own needs. Their happiness was his first consideration.
His gaze fell to where Miss Clark twisted her gloved hands in her lap. Was she cold? He glanced toward the fire and considered adding more fuel to heat the room, but that was what he’d have done with Calista. With Miss Clark he shouldn’t be so obviously solicitous of her comfort. He clenched his hands before him on the desk and tried not to think of dragging her into his lap and wrapping her tight in his arms to warm her up personally.
Miss Clark cleared her throat. “Perhaps you might share with me your requirements regarding my duties here.”
An image of Miss Clark spread over his desk, legs wide as he tasted her, filled his mind. He shook his head to clear the image away. Miss Clark was only for his daughters now. He shouldn’t think of her any other way, but curse it, he was going to struggle not to. “My children require a firm but gentle hand. They are not unruly but are prone to tears. They have a nurse on hand at all times, as well as a maid, but they miss their mother. She had a way of bringing out the best in them and making them laugh. Their best hasn’t been seen in a very long time and your predecessors failed to make a lasting impression. You face a difficult challenge.”
“They are just children and seemed very shy. May I ask their exact ages?”
“Willow is five, Maisy four, and Poppy is nearing two years of age. Far too young to be motherless.”
Miss Clark smiled, a hint of dimple appearing on one cheek. How had he never noticed a dimple before? Yet when Miss Clark pursed her lips tightly, the dimple disappeared as if it had never been. “Well, I’ll leave it to you to procure a mother for them in due time, but for the present, can you tell me of any important events that should be celebrated?”
“I hardly think a party should be planned for. The girls need routine and order and stability. Their environment has been a disruptive two years.”
“That’s to be expected. The loss of a girl’s mother is a pain that never goes away.” Her eyes grew unfocused. “But a forgotten birthday, an event that should be at least marked by those closest to her, is never truly forgotten, no matter how many years have passed.”
Constantine leaned forward eagerly. Was that a chink in her armor, or was he simply hoping to finally see one? “I take it you’ve missed a few birthdays with your family?”
“Enough to regret each and every one.” She shook her head. “Whose birthday is next?”
“Poppy’s, but we don’t celebrate it.” Gray glanced at the tabletop, guilt and grief filling him. Eventually, he glanced up. “It is the day my wife died.”
“Of course.” Miss Clark glanced over her shoulder toward the door. “Would you excuse me a moment? There is something I must attend to.”
She got up quietly, removing her scarf as she walked to the door and then tied it about the handle. Puzzled, he studied her handiwork, not understanding until she stood at his side that she’d blocked the view from the keyhole. “I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve never enjoyed the sensation of grown men spying through keyholes at me,” she murmured softly.
“Clever girl,” he whispered back. “You might just be a match for Cunningham one day.”
“I should think I already am,” she whispered back with a cheeky grin. Her smile broadened and then she did the unthinkable. She cupped his face between her hands and stared deeply into his eyes. “You mustn’t punish the child. It’s not her fault.”
Constantine closed his eyes as the touch and scent of Calista filled his senses and ran amok with his resolve. “I know.”
When her fingers tangled in his hair, he opened his eyes. The same mesmerizing stare that he’d grown to admire peered from behind the spectacles. A warm, urgent longing to hold her and touch her everywhere surged within him. If she remained close, he would break his word.
He didn’t want to behave dishonorably while she was under his roof. He couldn’t ask her to on her first day of employment. He’d made a promise not to expect her presence in his bed, or on any other piece of furniture, but he had the feeling he’d be hard pressed to keep his hands from wandering over her delectable body if she touched him like this again.
“I’m not sure how to do this,” he whispered.
Her gloved fingers caressed his face and then she drew back. “You’re making excellent progress, my lord. But rather than subject you to further temptation, perhaps I should begin my duties with the children. The rest of the details can be discussed later. The children are the reason I’m here, after all.”
Her brow rose, challenging him to deny he hadn’t brought her here for his pleasure. He’d brought her here to keep her away from Lord Squires and other gentlemen callers visiting the brothel. Purely selfish reasons, of course, yet he harbored no regrets whatsoever.
He did need help with the children, especially as the anniversary of his wife’s death drew closer. He hoped Miss Clark might have the power to distract them all from their maudlin thoughts. She backed away slowly with an amused glance for the state of his bulging trousers, then retrieved her scarf from the door handle. While she slipped it around her neck again, he soaked in her every move. She collected hat and bag and offered a sunny smile when she faced him. “Ready.”
Constantine willed his desire to ebb quickly. He stood and walked to the d
oor slowly with his hands clenched behind his back. This was it. Time to act like the gentleman he aspired to be. He did not molest the help, no matter the sorry aroused state they left him in. He would do nothing to lure the pretty, wickedly talented, and energetic governess into his bed. He would behave.
He grabbed her hand and dragged her away from the door, hopefully out of sight of the keyhole. “What did Arabella tell you yesterday?”
Miss Clark grinned. “Worried for your reputation?” she whispered.
“Terrified.” He released her and folded his arms across his chest. “Now, out with it.”
“I have to give the lady credit, she has completely bamboozled you, and it only took a moment of conversation.” Her hand rose to squeeze his arm. “I never divulge a secret, but in all honesty, we spoke a great deal but of you only a very little.”
Constantine was actually disappointed. Given the contents of the note, he’d assumed Arabella had regaled Miss Clark with a list of his better qualities and faults. “What could Arabella need to talk to you about in private? You barely know each other. I’m her friend. She could have confided in me.”
Miss Clark’s lips pressed together as if holding back laughter. She took a moment to collect her thoughts. “It wasn’t so much confiding as asking a woman’s point of view on a delicate subject.”
The world wobbled again. Miss Clark’s skills in the bedroom were exceptional. If she’d shared even a tenth of her experience in the bedroom, Arabella was bound for trouble. He glanced toward the door nervously. “About what?”
“To tell you would be betraying her trust.” She wrinkled her nose. “I cannot do that, even for you.”
Constantine rubbed a hand over his face. Hell and damnation. He couldn’t write to ask Arabella what the conversation had been about. Farnsworth might open her letter. Constantine would have to go to London before the season started to warn her off acting on Miss Clark’s advice.
Miss Clark rubbed his arm again. “You really are the worrying sort, aren’t you? Trust me. Lady Farnsworth knows exactly what she’s doing. I would never provide answers to questions that were not in her best interests to know.”
“What the devil do you mean by that?”
“Gray, there are some matters that only a woman can give an opinion on. If your wife had lived, I’m sure Arabella would have posed her questions to her instead of me.”
“Then I would have learned them,” he grumbled. “Augusta did not keep secrets from me.”
She reached up to brush her gloved fingers over his cheek. “Arabella is counting on my silence, so it is just as well that I’m not bound to you.”
He set his hands on his hips rather than crushing the woman in his arms and never letting her go. “You really are the most confounding woman I’ve ever met.”
“And you have a singularly rare gift for compliments,” she murmured. “As much as I’m sure you’d like to argue the matter all day, we had better end this discussion before your butler finds a reason to burst through the door.”
She walked away quickly and regained her possessions.
After a moment’s consideration, Constantine trailed after and when he joined her, he smiled down on her unguardedly one last time. “Cunningham will show you up to the nursery and acquaint you with the house and its schedule. I’d like to see you at the end of each day, after the children are asleep, for a report of your progress with them. We can discuss your wage and employment terms and other matters then.”
He would find out what she’d spoken to Arabella about whether she liked it or not. Eventually, he’d have all her secrets.
She dipped a curtsy. “As you wish, my lord.”
When she rose, her remarkable whiskey-brown gaze was fixed somewhat lower than his, most likely on the red-stoned pin holding his cravat in place. He grinned. He’d picked ruby especially to mark the beginning of her employment and his sad return to celibacy.
Constantine wrenched the door opened and glanced out. Cunningham, the wily devil, was exactly where Constantine expected him to be—three feet away and wearing an expression of complete innocence. He’d likely heard and seen everything until the keyhole had been covered and they’d begun to whisper.
Grayling struck out his hand to Miss Clark. “Welcome to Stanton Harold Hall. I hope you’ll be with us for many years to come.”
The hand in his was tiny, but he remembered all too well the strength of her grip about his privates. A flame of heat swept his body, and he retreated to his study quickly before he did something stupid like kiss her. He already missed her taste.
CHAPTER 13
HEAVENS ABOVE, THAT man could make her head spin. Meredith forced her feet to move her away from the study as she struggled to suppress the confusion she experienced at being so near Grayling but not permitted to touch. Of course, she’d failed to keep her hands to herself for even five minutes.
When they’d first met, Meredith hadn’t imagined he was nursing such a wounded heart. Their attraction had been immediate, his interest obvious. But the mere mention of the late Lady Grayling was enough to bring his melancholy to life again. She hadn’t been able to maintain a distance.
Behaving properly when alone with him was going to be a struggle. A governess was thought of rather poorly if she flirted with her employer. Grayling had hinted her good standing was important to her position. She would have to find other ways to help him set aside his regrets for his wife.
She glanced around the hallway, wondering at the faces staring from the frames. Was one of them the late Lady Grayling, who had left such loneliness in her wake? Meredith was keen to find her portrait and learn more about her.
“Don’t think the children will be as easy to win over as His Lordship,” Cunningham grumbled before they had gone many steps away from Grayling’s study. “They are not concerned in the least about their governess’s pretty looks, unlike their father.”
Meredith regarded the butler’s frosty visage. She was used to people expecting the worst of her. A whore had no status to speak of. But to act so rudely to a stranger from second meeting without knowing anything of her past showed an overpowering lack of manners. She shrugged away her irritation. She had come for Grayling’s daughters and nothing else. What the butler thought of her was inconsequential. “I have no notion of what you refer to, Mr. Cunningham, but rest assured my sole concern is for the young girls I’ve been asked to care for.”
Cunningham stopped in the middle of the hall. “They’ve done all right without your sort.”
“My sort?” Really, this was too rude to ignore. She didn’t have a brand burned into her skin to say she’d been a whore. Given the time she’d spent perfecting this prim identity, Cunningham shouldn’t see anything untoward. “What exactly is my sort?”
He looked her up and down. “A class above the rest of us. A meddler like Lady Farnsworth. You’re only pretending to be a governess until you can snare His Lordship.”
Meredith almost choked on her surprise. A woman with her past was far beneath a butler in status. Clearly her disguise and acting talents were even better than she dreamed. She stepped around Cunningham and hitched her skirts to start up the stairs. “I would be careful how you speak of Lady Farnsworth. Your employer might not like his friends slighted in such a manner. She was his late wife’s good friend, too, wasn’t she? Now, if you’re finished gossiping, would you be so kind as to show me the way to the nursery? I would like to begin.”
Cunningham scowled but grudgingly hurried to lead the way up the stairs. He directed her all the way to a stout oak door without another word, but as he set his hand to the handle, he looked over his shoulder. “I’ll be watching you closely. Any sign of mischief and I’ll see you dismissed.”
Meredith smiled brightly. “The only mischief I see is a butler standing between me and my charges.”
Cunningham tapped on the wood and then opened the door slowly. Meredith peered into the gloom and spotted shapes huddled around the fire on the far sid
e of the room. She took a pace in and then Cunningham slammed the door behind her back. She cursed him, out loud too, as she struggled to acquaint herself with the room. And then cursed herself under her breath for forgetting to behave properly around the children. She was no longer in a bawdy house where such language could be used without raising a fuss.
First impressions were important. That moment could never be recovered.
She waited while her eyes adjusted to the darkness and she could see the occupants of the room better. An old woman sat in a far corner with a young nursery maid, darning by the insufficient candlelight at her elbow. Across the space, three sad little faces watched her. The eldest held the infant close to her chest.
Meredith’s temper rose that the children were smothered in darkness. It was little wonder they were not happy. This had to stop. Hoping there was nothing blocking her path in the shadows, Meredith walked across the room. The little girls drew closer to each other, their ease of yesterday long gone.
Meredith paused to look about and give them time to grow used to her presence. “Oh, what I wouldn’t give for a firecracker right now so that I might see how pretty you all are. How do you do? My name is Miss Clark. Do you remember me from yesterday? Lady Farnsworth sent me to be your new governess.”
The little girls stared and clutched their cloth dolls, saying nothing. Meredith turned to the older woman and held out her hand. “Hello. I’m Meredith Clark, and you are?”
The old woman didn’t move a muscle. “Ridgeway,” she mumbled slowly in a voice so thick Meredith almost couldn’t understand her. “I’m the nurse. Been with our lady since she was small. This is Miss Cunningham, the butler’s niece.”
“How wonderful.” Meredith withheld a groan. A servant with ties to the past lady of the house and a relation of the butler. They’d likely be against her, and the girl was sure to tell the butler everything she did in the day. “A pleasure to meet you both.”
She glanced about curiously and noted the table was bare of food and teacups. She’d thought she’d timed her arrival to coincide with breakfast or perhaps even morning tea, but that did not seem to be the case. She set her bag at her feet and worked her gloves from her hands. At least the nursery was warm enough for her taste. She flexed her chilled fingers. “If you could point me in the direction of my room, I should like to lay my things aside and commence my duties.”
