The Beautiful One (4 page)

“I'm so sorry,” the seamstress said quietly. Lizzie read the compassion in her companion's eyes, and if there had been any trace of pity there as well, she would have sent her away, but there wasn't. Lizzie crossed her arms.

“I hadn't realized Lord Grandville was married,” Miss Black said.

“Not for much more than a year. Aunt Ginger died shortly before my family did.”

“Oh. So much tragedy.”

“I hadn't seen her since I was little. I was supposed to come to Stillwell for the summer, but she died and so I never came.”

She'd had her own sorrows soon enough, when the letter telling of what happened in Malta had arrived.

With the generous allowance she began receiving from her uncle, she'd buried her grief under mounds of pretty clothes, the kinds of things a poor churchman's daughter would never have owned. And she'd set herself to learning every bit of the reviled deportment. The girls at Rosewood didn't laugh at her anymore, but by then she hadn't wanted their shallow friendship. Gentlemen were better.

The seamstress's gaze rested on her. She had pretty eyes of a clear brown, like a glass of sherry with light shining through. Not that Anna Black probably cared what color they were. She seemed…functional. Lizzie looked away from the kindness on her face, knowing it would undo her.

“I want to go back to Malta. I shall ask Grandville to send me. Then he won't have to bother about me.”

“Now might not be a good time to broach that idea.” The woman's tone contained no surprise or judgment, but Lizzie wished she hadn't said anything about her beloved Malta, where life had been so much freer and better than it was in England.

“What will he do with me?”

“You must remain at Stillwell for the moment. Beyond that, all I know is that you can't go back to Rosewood.”

“That is no loss.”

A hint of a smile teased the edge of Miss Black's mouth. “I had gathered that. I rather suppose that you wanted to be sent away from there.”

“All right, I did. I hated it.”

Lizzie almost wished Miss Black were staying at Stillwell, because she seemed refreshingly unbothered by things that shocked other people. Lizzie could feel her throat tightening up again and looked down at her feet in their apricot satin slippers, and took comfort in knowing that she was very likely the prettiest, best-dressed female within a fifty-mile radius. Grandville's property was huge, but she supposed there must be other people nearby. People, she thought, who would care that she was pretty and pleasing.

“I suppose I can understand that, Miss Tarryton.”

Lizzie had a flash of understanding that Miss Black wouldn't have liked the deportment lessons either, if for different reasons.

“Oh, just call me Lizzie,” she said impatiently. “‘Miss Tarryton' reminds me of horrible Miss Brickle.”

“Very well, Lizzie. And you must call me Anna.”

* * *

Anna was not deceived by the stoic facade of the girl sitting before her. Lizzie was devastated by what had happened in the drawing room. She might not be a child, but she was still young enough for it to matter that she was an orphan. And her guardian had just made it clear that she was nothing to him but a duty he didn't want.

Lizzie was watching her with a wary look that reminded Anna of a young sparrow hawk she and Lawrence had once found. The bird's wings were not yet strong enough for flight, but as she'd discovered painfully, it was able to use its beak. Anna could imagine this girl using her own devices against Lord Grandville, and about as successfully as a fledgling hawk might challenge an adult. She sighed.

“Lizzie, I must be certain you'll be comfortable here before I can leave.”

The girl lifted her chin. “I'm not afraid of my uncle, if that's what you're wondering. I can contend with whatever comes my way.”

“Ah, yes, as you have already demonstrated.” Anna's eyes flicked to the window. “I'm not certain that your solutions always serve you well.”

“I'm accustomed to looking out for myself.”

Right. Anna pressed her lips together, realizing she was about to make a foolish decision but not seeing how she could in good conscience do otherwise.

“I shall speak to Lord Grandville,” she said. “Perhaps I might stay for a day or two, until you are settled. Miss Brickle said that I might, if there were need.”

Lizzie looked up, clearly surprised. “You would do that?”

“Yes.”

“That might be…helpful.” Lizzie paused, her brow lowering. “You mustn't think that—in the garden last night with Lieutenant Scarsdale… It was never going to be more than a kiss.”

“That may have been your plan,” Anna said gently, “but you can't have known what his intentions might have been. Never mind what you were risking regarding your reputation.”

A tinge of pink spread across the girl's cheeks. “No matter what, I'm better off here than at Rosewood.”

Anna left the room thinking that Lizzie was, unfortunately, likely to find herself very much mistaken.

* * *

Will sank into the chair behind his library desk in the dusky darkness, his long legs sliding straight under it, his head slumping forward into his hands. The belligerent lead ball in his stomach had exploded in the drawing room, blacking over the whole of his insides.

Dear God, what had he done? That young woman he'd propositioned might be someone who'd known hardship, but that should have secured his compassion, not given him leave to insult her. In his whole life, he'd never so offended a woman. Never even been tempted to do so.

Ginger used to call him her knight in shining armor, and it had always made his heart swell with pride.

The day before the accident that had killed her, they'd stood and looked at the place where the hamlet of cottages they'd planned would be built, and they'd been so happy.

“
You've done a marvelous job working with the architect
,” she'd said. “
The
tenants
will
love
these. And your father would have, too. No man is an island, right?
” It had been his father's favorite saying, and one Will had taken to heart from his earliest days of training to be a viscount.

But Will had had to become an island over the last year. After Ginger had died, he'd needed to be alone with his sorrow and anger, and after today, he saw how right he'd been to keep himself apart. If he couldn't control the darkness Ginger's death had brought, he must at least keep it from others.

Except now he didn't see how he could turn away this girl who was Ginger's niece and David's daughter.

God, the Tarrytons—there was nothing left of them now except her. David, the good-hearted knave, who'd seen the light and gone off to save the souls of Malta, and his beloved Ginger—both gone.

Though Will had known Ginger because she was David's younger sister, he never would have come to court her after David left if she hadn't become friends with Will's cousin Ruby. Which now meant that seeing Ruby and her Halifax siblings reminded him painfully of what he'd lost, and so he avoided them along with everyone else.

He leaned forward and let his forehead fall against the top of the desk and pounded its ancient solidness with his fist. Damnation, where did Anna Black get the colossal nerve to tell him what to do? There was nothing here for his niece, and every time he looked at her he would be reminded that Ginger was gone.

Still, it was not the girl's fault that Will was her guardian. She deserved so much better than he could give her.

He flopped his arm across the desk and grabbed the brandy bottle and poured a large measure. He slung it all back at once so that it burned, but it helped not at all.

A tap on the library door indicated the arrival of his steward. Dragging himself upright, Will bid him enter and leaned forward to light the candles on his desk. He hoped Norris would bring some thorny estate problem to tangle his brain.

They had just finished discussing the expenses for the cottages, Norris tactfully refraining from commenting on the fact that his master was himself currently performing the work on the roofs, when Norris looked down and shuffled a few papers.

“And shall I make arrangements for Miss Tarryton to return to Rosewood for the summer, my lord?”

“No,” Will said. “I wish you to find someplace else for her. Another school.”

He wondered what exactly it was that his ward had done to make the headmistress send her away. It would have taken quite a bit of provocation for her to part with the ward of a viscount. Who was to say she wouldn't get into trouble again?

“Or perhaps she might live at another of my homes in the company of a governess. Look into it.”

“Very good, sir,” his steward said in the usual bland tone he used with his master.

Not a single person had gainsaid Will once since Ginger's death until Anna Black had done so today. His employees were unfailingly patient and kind toward him, and he knew much of this was due to loyalty, an earned indulgence he ought not to exploit. He frowned.

“Norris, did you never think other arrangements should be made for Miss Tarryton, so that she wouldn't always be at school?”

“My lord, it would not be my place—”

“I'm asking for your opinion.”

Norris pressed his fingertips together, doubtless weighing his words. “She is, my lord, without family save your own. I had thought she might like to be invited to stay, or at least to visit for the holidays.”

Will grunted and dismissed him.

It was unfortunate that he didn't have any female relatives who could take over the care of his ward.

There's Judith
, a voice whispered before he could cut it off.
No
. Not his stepmother. Never in a million years.

It would take time to find a place for Elizabeth, probably at least a month, during which interval she would have to stay at Stillwell. He owed at least that much to David and Ginger. But he would need Anna Black here if he were going to do something about his niece.

She had refused his demands, but she was poor—that much was obvious from the scrawny, threadbare look of her. If he presented an offer in a better light—and it would hardly be difficult to improve on his first performance—he might be able to entice her. Although the woman was anything but manageable. Where did she come by her boldness? She ought to have felt how absurd she looked in Stillwell's drawing room in her shabby, hideous gown. Was it blue? Or gray? The color was so indistinct, he could not have said.

He would simply have to ensure that he spent as little time as possible in his ward's company, or that of Anna Black, if he could get her to stay. Stillwell Hall was vast, and he had the cottages to finish. At the end of the month, arrangements would be in place for his ward, and she would be gone.

Anna walked slowly down the massive staircase in the growing evening darkness, astounded at what she'd just told Lizzie she would do. She was going to stay in the home of Viscount Grandville, the very man who'd just made an outrageous proposal to her. That was, if he would still have her, which she was fairly certain he would.

But what else could she do? Her conscience wouldn't let her leave Lizzie with a man who seemed dead to tenderness. He'd lost his wife, and perhaps that explained much about the way he was, but what must matter now was that Lizzie needed a family. And all she had was a dark gentleman who wanted to push the world away.

She heard the sound of footsteps. Lord Grandville appeared at the bottom of the stairs and stood in the light of a tabletop candelabrum, all shadow and hardness, and watched her descend. She was far from eager to see him again.

What on earth had made him make that offer to her? It was hardly as if she were dressed to entice or had flirted with him—as if she even knew how. She'd been nothing but tart to him, yet since their meeting on the road, she'd felt something crackling between them, and there was no convincing herself she didn't find him incredibly handsome. But his character—ugh.

“A moment, please. I would speak with you,” he said as she reached the foot of the stairs.

“Very well,” she said. “I too have something to say.”

“I wish to apologize for my behavior in the drawing room. I have never done such a thing before. You,” he began, then stopped himself. “There is no excuse.”

She blinked. Was humility possible in such a man? And yet she saw that his face, framed by that too-long dark hair, no longer looked angry but instead haunted, as though that hint of restrained torment she'd glimpsed in the drawing room had been unleashed. Perhaps he wasn't an entirely hard man after all.

“Very well. I accept your apology.”

“And I would like you to stay until I can get things sorted out with regard to my ward.”

“Ah,” she said. “That was what I wanted to discuss. I was thinking it might be best if I stayed for a few days to help your ward get settled.”

“A few days will not be sufficient. I will need you to stay for at least a month.”

“A month! That's not possible.”

“It will take me at least that long to find her a governess or a new school. I'll pay you two hundred pounds for your trouble.”

Anna's heart skipped a beat. Two hundred pounds! What a huge sum. She wouldn't even need to go back to Rosewood if she had that much money. She could go directly to Yorkshire, to the home of her Aunt May, her only relative. Aunt May, a serious, religious woman, lived in a village that was far away from anyone who might ever see
The
Beautiful
One
. Anna could live there in peace.

But she couldn't arrive at her upright aunt's home trailing an air of desperation, with no belongings or money of her own. Viscount Grandville was offering more than enough to make such an undertaking possible.

She might even open her drawing school in Yorkshire with the kind of money he was offering. The thought brought the first feeling of true hope she'd felt in a month.

But how could she take his money when she already disliked him so intensely? How could she trust him after what he'd said to both her and Lizzie in the drawing room?

And yet, he'd asked her pardon and appeared wholly sincere.

“I might stay a bit longer than a few days, but I don't require a salary. I would stay because I believe it would be a help to your ward.”

“If you stay, you will stay for the full month and accept the salary.” He regarded her with as arrogant an eye as any falcon, every inch the aristocrat. “You would act as a temporary governess and keep her occupied with whatever it was you were teaching at Rosewood.”

She narrowed her eyes and returned his haughtiness, not inclined to correct his impression of what she'd been doing at Rosewood. There was only one reasonable choice, and it seemed it would serve both her and Lizzie.

“Very well, I will stay for one month, with the understanding that by then you'll have made arrangements for Miss Tarryton—arrangements satisfactory to her and to me as well.”

A dark eyebrow lifted sardonically. “You drive a bargain, do you? And what if, at the end of a month, I've chosen a gorgon as companion for my ward?”

“I suppose such a person
would
be to your taste. Tell me, my lord, are you always this jolly?”

He blinked, and the corner of his mouth trembled faintly, but he made no reply.

“You could at least
try
to behave as if you were part of humanity,” she pressed, “now that you have a young lady in your care. She is homeless and alone, while you live a life of privilege.”

His eyes met hers, smoldering, and a shiver ran down her spine.

“Do I, by God?” he said, and moved closer. Night had settled into the house early because of the rain, and the cool dampness of the air pressed against her heavily. Or maybe it was his presence.

“I'm sorry about your wife,” she said. “Lizzie told me.”

He flinched. “Don't,” he said, just the single word.

“All right,” she said quietly. She could understand not wanting to speak of something painful, of needing to allow a wound to develop a scab. Though she wondered, in his case, if the wound weren't festering.

His dark gaze rested on her. “Why aren't you afraid of me? You should be, after what happened in the drawing room.”

“Maybe I
am
afraid and hide it well.”

“Pish,” he said. “I don't believe you're afraid of anything you should be.”

Oh, yes, she was. She was afraid of the marquess finding her. Afraid of how he might use that book of drawings. Afraid that he or Rawlins would decide to reveal her name and she'd be found out. An angry, brooding viscount simply paled in comparison to these threats.

“Perhaps it's simply that I've learned not to give in to bullies.”

That struck something in him, and the light of remorse burned in those midnight eyes.

His gaze traveled toward her shoulder, where her hat hung from its ribbons, which were still tangled in a knot along with some of her hair. She hadn't had a minute to set it right, and in fact had forgotten all about it. She'd never paid much attention to hats; growing up without a mother (her own had died giving birth to her) she'd had only the housekeeper to remind her about protecting her skin, and she'd frequently ignored her.

“Why haven't you put your bonnet away yet? Or better, discarded it? And why should you wish, anyway, to wear such a thing?”

“It's my favorite bonnet for traveling.”

“Then you have execrable taste.” He sighed. “Do please take it off.”

“I can't, actually. The ribbons are knotted and some of my hair is stuck as well. But if you will excuse me now, I'll go see to it.”

He made no move to excuse her but instead squinted at the ribbons, then, to her astonishment, lifted his hands and took hold of the knot just below her ear.

“What on earth are you doing?”

“Untying the knot, obviously.” He leaned closer, evidently to see the knot better, and she caught a nice soap smell and a hint of brandy, along with a note of something that smelled deep, like strength. She felt a soft tug as he began to work the knot, and the gentle, fiddling sensation sent a shiver of pleasure along her ear and down her neck.

She pushed down the desire for more shivers. “Really, my lord, I should like to find my room now. I have”—she cleared her throat emphatically—“rather an enormous amount of unpacking to do.”

He ignored her and continued fiddling. More shivers. They felt too good.

“You're pulling my hair,” she said untruthfully.

He paused for a moment and glanced at the side of her face, and she saw his skeptical look out of the corner of her eye.

“I doubt that. I am quite good with my hands.”

Those hands. The long, lean fingers with the nicks that suggested hard use. There was certainly a double entendre to be found in his words if not his tone, but she concentrated instead on not melting into a puddle as the exquisite torture resumed just below her ear.

His fingers brushed her earlobe as he worked. The soft sounds of the old satin sliding against itself entered her ear and rippled along the tops of her shoulders like something live. She clenched her teeth against the beguiling sensations.

“Hold still,” he said.

She hadn't realized she'd moved.

“These ribbons are ridiculously knotted,” he said some moments later, and underneath the terseness in his voice she detected a husky note that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand at attention. “What did you do, twirl them?”

She forced an even tone. “It was somewhat knotted to begin with.”

“Somewhat? These ribbons have surely been the plaything of an army of cats.”

She snuck a glance sideways, to where his dark head was bent over his task. He was being so gentle that, fool that she was, it felt like tenderness, and, startlingly, tears over the forgotten sensation pressed at the back of her eyes. She blinked them away. When had she last experienced human tenderness?

She couldn't account for it, but just the touch—the kind attention—of this troubled, bitter man was causing a terrible tightness within her to uncurl a little. She'd been on her own since her father died, though even when he was alive, she'd been in many ways alone. And she'd been in a state of desperation ever since she'd seen that book and been compelled to live as a menial in the basement of Rosewood School, a person of little interest to anyone. Now, here was this powerful, handsome man untying her knotted ribbons as a sort of apology.

With a last sliding, satiny tug, the ribbons came free. Holding the ends, he lifted the bonnet away from her.

“I insist you discard this.”

His imperious tone helped her back to sanity, and she closed herself off to the feelings he'd stirred. With no way of knowing who or how many people had seen
The
Beautiful
One
, she needed that ugly bonnet as protection when she next went out in the world.

“My lord is too accustomed to ordering people about. I will have my bonnet back, please.” She held out her hand.

He held on to the hat. “You would benefit from a new and pretty hat.”

“Nonsense. You simply wish to assuage your conscience.”

With a look that told her he was only acquiescing out of remorse for his earlier behavior, he laid the bonnet across her hands.

“You don't receive help easily, do you, Anna Black?”

“Well, I'm doubtless not as accustomed as some to receiving help.
I
do not have Dart and an entire staff of servants, my lord.”

He gave a short, doubtless unwanted bark of mirth. “Heaven help us if you did. I can only imagine I'd find myself tossed out of my own house, with some far better plan for the use of Stillwell in place within the hour.”

She looked up into that oh-so-handsome face and knew a creeping sense of disaster. She was very far removed at the moment from
The
Beautiful
One
and the troubles it could cause her, having arrived at a veritable fortress—and one with its very own dragon. But how was she ever going to stay in the same house with this man?

“Good evening, my lord,” she said quietly, and escaped upstairs, guided by a maid. Anna stopped outside Lizzie's room on the way, but the girl must have been asleep already, because her knock brought no response. Tomorrow would be soon enough to let Lizzie know she had a home—for a month at least.

* * *

When Anna awoke the next morning to find herself lying in a grand four-poster bed on lovely fresh linens, she was briefly startled. In the darkness and exhaustion of the previous night, she'd taken little note of the room she'd been given, and now a throb of panic raced through her as she took in the distant ceiling with its stately wooden beams, the tall windows covered in fine lace curtains, and the thick red carpet on the floor.

How on earth had she come to leave the sanctuary of Rosewood for a month's stay at Stillwell Hall? Lord Grandville was very possibly acquainted with the Marquess of Henshaw, even if it seemed unlikely that the marquess—or anyone who'd seen
The
Beautiful
One
—might visit a man who so clearly wanted to be left alone.

Well, she told herself stoutly, if necessary, she would disappear, though escaping again with only a few coins to her name did not bear thinking about, now that she had the possibility of the money the viscount had offered.

But that was all in the hazy future. Today she had a task before her: she was going to find a way to help Lizzie worm her way into her guardian's heart, through whatever tiny chink might allow access.

Her stomach rumbled insistently. She'd been too tired to ask for a supper tray, and after the austerity of her servant's lot at Rosewood, going to bed on an empty stomach was so familiar that she'd hardly noted it. She supposed there would be some kind of breakfast, probably hard bread crusts and water, or whatever was customarily served in the households of stone-hearted viscounts.

She swung her legs out of bed and noticed that what she had assumed was a painting on the opposite wall, above a vanity, was, at second glance, a curious mural. A pretty scene had been begun, but the artist had only half-finished it, so that the sheep and half of the shepherd existed merely as vague pencil marks, while some of the hills had been painted in soft, rich colors.

It didn't match the manor's brooding master at all, but perhaps it was some decorating scheme of his late wife's.

As she stared at it, an idea came to her: Lizzie could finish the drawing and then the painting!