His Wicked Sins (26 page)

Her gaze flicked to the open door, then to Miss Percy, who had turned and reached for

the handle. Beth's throat grew tight. She could not bear it if they closed the door.

Mr. Fairfax continued to watch her, his expression bland, his dark eyes shadowed.

"I find the air a bit stuffy, Miss Percy," he said, his gaze never leaving Beth's. "Would it

trouble you to leave the door open?"

There was only silence for a heartbeat, and another.

"Not at all," came Miss Percy's delayed reply. Walking briskly, she rounded her desk

and sat.

Beth shifted her stance, clasping her hands tight together behind her back, uncertain if

she should be grateful or wary.

Mr. Fairfax seemed to see to the heart of her. Had he requested that the door be left

open for her comfort, or for his own? Had he seen her fear, somehow divined that she felt

uneasy in this small, closed space?

Uneasy
. She almost laughed. Such a gift for understatement.

Not for the first time, Beth had the thought that she shared some odd affinity with him,

that he somehow knew her secrets, her passions, her fears.

A far from reassuring notion.

Miss Percy's voice poked through her reverie. Realizing that she had been invited to sit,

Beth did just that, unclasping her hands as she perched once more on the edge of the hard-

backed chair.

"…so you see, Mr. Fairfax and I both feel that Isobel would benefit from your presence.

You seem a calming balm to her, and it can only be for the good."

Beth blinked, started, the words coming down a long tunnel to her, and she realized she

had missed the beginning of Miss Percy's explanation, and only heard the tail end. The

headmistress was watching her with a marked frown as she spoke, and Beth thought it best

that she not request a repetition. Instead, she tried to use the bits she had heard to fashion

the whole. A puzzle.

But one thing seemed clear. She had been granted a reprieve. She was not being

dismissed. In fact, this meeting had nothing at all to do with her classroom skill.

"I see," she said, grateful that her voice, at least, sounded calm. "I would be pleased to

be of assistance. When…?"

There. That should garner her a clue. Perhaps Miss Percy would say enough in reply

that Beth could understand what it was they had asked of her.

"Isobel comes to dinner once each week." Mr. Fairfax spoke from his place behind

Beth's chair. She swiveled to look at him and found him positioned in the corner, in the

shadow where the light coming through the window did not reach. "At least, that is the

preference I have. The unfortunate truth is, there are times she simply refuses to come."

The memory of the day of her arrival at Burndale Academy tugged at Beth, the

recollection of Alice's words.
She is not ready, sir… She will not come!

"And my role?" Beth asked, curious now, curious enough that the racing of her pulse

slowed a little.

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Focus on the riddle, not the fear.

Yes, there, her panic snuffed a little more, and she knew now that she would come

through this episode without disgracing herself. Relief was sweet and clear as water from

a spring.

"Isobel appears to feel some affinity for you," Miss Percy said. "Mr. Fairfax is of the

opinion that your presence at the weekly dinner would both encourage Isobel to attend and

ensure her enjoyment of the experience."

Startled, Beth looked back and forth between the two, an action that necessitated her

twisting about at the waist, given their opposing locations in the room. With a breathy

sigh, she tapped her fingertips on the spindly arm of the chair.

The corner of Mr. Fairfax's mouth twitched, and he stepped forward to take the seat on

her right. So close. Too close. She could smell the faint scent of spice, and of
him
, so

enticing.

Despite the turmoil that tugged at her, she noticed that and other things about him. The

simple white stock tied at his throat. The wind-tousled fall of his hair. If her preoccupation

with him, despite the panic that yet threatened to swell, was not proof that she was fit for

Bedlam, then she could not imagine what
would
be.

She looked away, focusing her attention on Miss Percy.

"So you wish me to accompany Isobel to dinner once each week?" She found the

proposition unsettling, not for the dinner itself or the role of companion to the child, but

rather for the prospect of sitting at a table with Griffin Fairfax.

Oh, she could well imagine it, the two of them, cozy over dinner, with the silent child

between them.

"If you do not find the inconvenience too great, it is truly the best solution for the

child," Miss Percy said. "She has formed an attachment to you. It is most unusual. She has

never behaved so before."

Because she has never before encountered a soul matched to her own, strange and fey

and burdened with all manner of private terrors
, Beth thought, but she said nothing,

merely bowed her head and nodded her understanding as Miss Percy turned to Mr. Fairfax

and discussed the arrangement for his carriage to come for Beth and Isobel on Thursday

next, a week hence.

A pang of regret echoed inside her that it would be the closed carriage that fetched her

and not the open curricle that flew along the road, letting the wind sting her eyes and tear

her hair free of its pins. She had liked the curricle very much, the freedom of it. Like

flying.

The idea of the closed carriage was far less appealing, especially in her present state of

fatigue and heightened distress. At this moment, she found the prospect of such a small

space infinitely ghastly.

As though he read her thoughts, Mr. Fairfax said, "If the weather is fine, I shall come

myself with the curricle. Isobel prefers it, and she takes not much space. I suspect we can

wedge her between us."

Raising her eyes, Beth found him watching her, his frame relaxed on the chair beside

her, his gaze unreadable. A shaft of sunlight sliced across him, painting him in bronze and

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gilt, the contrast playing over his hard features like a gift. In this light, his eyes were not

so very dark, the whisper of green more apparent.

His thick lashes swept down, then up. In his gaze she read shrewd awareness, a

knowing understanding that left her feeling as though he stripped her secrets bare.

The way he looked at her was …
unsettling
. Her pulse fluttered, then raced, as it had

earlier in her panic. Only now, both the sensation and its cause were different. A prickling

awareness made her mouth go dry and her limbs restless. Her gaze dropped to his lips,

hard, well formed.

Oh, she was a regular pendulum, swinging to and fro between panic and …
what?

Apprehension? Anxiety?

No …
attraction
, hot and sharp.

Tension knotted her shoulders, and Beth was grateful when a knocking at the door drew

their attention.

Alice. A distraction. Oh, thank heaven.

A glance at Mr. Fairfax showed he had leaned back in his chair, behind the beam of

light. The shift in his position left his face in shadow, veiling his expression from her

sight.

"Excuse me, Miss Percy," Alice said. "The stonemason is here to speak with you about

the wall."

Beth knew the part of the wall she spoke of, near the gate of the back garden. There was

a crumbling section that was both unsightly and a danger. Miss Percy rose, excused

herself, and left the room.

Left her alone. With Griffin Fairfax.

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Chapter 15

S
itting rigid in her seat, Beth stared at her lap for a long moment. The silence was

unnerving. She slanted a glance at Mr. Fairfax, caught his eye for an instant, then dropped

her gaze to her lap once more.

He had haunted her these past weeks, haunted her secret dreams that surfaced in the

midnight hour, and now he tormented her in the full light of day. Not by any particular

action, but by his mere presence, the way he looked at her, the subtle scent of him, the

way he moved. He had risen as Miss Percy rose, and now stood tall and solid, broad of

shoulder and narrow of hip, filling the space.

Just the two of them in the tiny room.

Beth said, "I had best return to the schoolroom."

"Wait," he ordered, his voice resonant and low.

She froze in her seat, her head falling back to watch him as he moved to stand above

her. His gaze held her pinned, enthralled. She felt a sharp click of connection, like a key in

a lock.

There was yet some small physical distance between them, but it was no barrier. The

look of him, unsmiling, mysterious and handsome and vaguely frightening, sent shivers

through her.

"What is it you fear, Miss Canham?" he asked, low voiced.

He knew. He had seen what she hid, perhaps today or in one of their encounters in days

past, something that had revealed her secrets. Her heart banged against her ribs, and she

stared at him in mute dismay.

She would not say. She could not.

She folded her hands in her lap, closing one tight about the other so their shaking would

not betray her.

With an oath that was soft and slurred—she heard only the tone but not the word—he

jerked away from her. In three strides he closed the distance to the door and pulled the