The Runaway Countess (21 page)

“And I do remember your mother. She was a famous beauty.” He tilted his head to the side, the motion sending the wayward lock of dark hair across his forehead. “You look like her.”

She had heard this opinion from many people, but to know that Trent felt the same brought an unwanted surge of pleasure, a warm flush that she feared showed on her face.

“I was only vaguely aware that your father lost his fortune.” He kept his voice soft, gentle, as if talking to a child. “Were you informed of the details?”

Damn and blast.

She shrugged, tried to let her shoulders drop and relax. “He—” she cleared her throat, “—he spent too much money on my first season. Maman was mad for the dresses and carriages. I think father gave her everything she wanted.” She kept her eyes round and innocent as she told the lie. Well, not exactly a lie. Those things were true and had led to the demise of the family fortune. But they were not the real cause of their destitution.

Trent’s brows lowered as he concentrated on her. Another wave of heat washed over her.

“What do you know of your father’s business interests with Lord Nash?” Again, he used a soft, kind voice.

She shook her head, pretending confusion.

So he had learned much in Rodsley. Too much.

She held her posture though inside she wanted to run, pivot on her heel and flee.

Trent relaxed his frown and seemed to accept her denial as truth. Really, why would she know about Nash? Daughters rarely knew of their father’s business concerns. But Mazie had always been curious. She had known something was wrong when her father lost his usual sparkle. It was not too hard to listen in on a few private conversations and rifle through his desk at night. Around the same time her parents became ill with the influenza, she had discovered that Nash had swindled her father with a land scheme.

“Always so serious.” Cat swatted her brother’s arm. “Certainly you heard some charming tales about our guest.”

A warm breeze blew across the lake, tossing loose strands of Mazie’s hair across her sensitive cheeks. The slight tickle was a great irritation in her current state. She tucked her hair haphazardly into her bonnet, wondering what Trent would say next, pretending like there was nothing to fear.

“I did hear quite a number of amusing stories,” he finally confessed. “And I brought something back.” He raised his brows and walked toward the gazebo.

Mazie hung back, fearing what it was he had to give her. Whatever it was, she was certain she did not want it.

So, when Trent returned with his gift, she was stunned for a moment.

He held her doll.

“Bébé.”

He placed the doll in her outstretched hands and she thought her heart would literally break, the ache was so intense.

She ran a finger over Bébé’s familiar face. The doll looked exactly the same. The same wide blue eyes and brown curls, the same pink cheeks and full mouth. She fingered the miniature gown of silk and lace, made from a favorite dress of her mother’s. She could still picture her maman wearing the evening gown, smelling like roses as she bent to give a goodnight kiss.

She felt suspended in time. No matter how much she thought she had changed, how much she wanted to run away and become someone else, she was the same little girl inside, sad to say goodbye to her parents for an evening’s entertainment. She was the same young woman, desperate over their deaths.

The unbearable ache rendered her chest into two throbbing halves. Memories of another time, another life, crashed over her and threatened to drag her under. The sorrow was too much for one heart to bear.

“Mrs. Martin gave it to me,” Trent said quietly. “She found it a few years ago but didn’t know how to return it to you.”

“Mmm.” Mazie did not dare open her mouth for fear her composure would completely crack.

Pandora’s box had been opened.

With exaggerated slowness, Mazie walked into the gazebo, placed her doll on a chair and picked up a glass of lemonade from the table. She looked beautiful, serene in her pale lavender. The picture of a gentle lady enjoying the country air. Trent could not relate this image of her with the wild, erotic woman he had left three nights ago.

No, not just left. He had fled, run away from her and the fierce pull she had over him. Fled the questions she had inspired about his father.

But his time in Rodsley had been no distraction from thoughts of Mazie. Indeed, he had spent the last three days talking of nothing but the mysterious Lady Margaret and her childhood, learning of her parents and the classically aristocratic world they had inhabited. Learning about the demise of their fortune and their ruined friendship with Lord Nash.

Lord Nash—the Midnight Rider’s first victim.

At night, when he had tried to sleep, Trent had dreamt of Mazie, the throaty sound of her passion, the arch and tremble of her pleasure. Now his body was acutely, painfully aware of her. Even as she stood three paces away, he noticed her scent of rose, the lines around her eyes from not sleeping, the way her hands fluttered and never seemed to still.

The way she was trying very hard not to cry.

He should not have given her the doll. Without intent, he had insulted her or hurt her or some other mysterious female emotion. He wished he understood what he had done to cause her sadness so he could fix it, render her pain obsolete. Instead, he stood there, confused and frustrated, ignorant to the true mind of the woman who tormented him. The woman who was at this moment hiding her face behind the straw brim of her bonnet. The woman who’s every dodge and parry only stoked his interest.

What the hell was he going to do with Lady Margaret Parthena Harlan Chetwyn?

Cat stepped in with a gentle touch to Mazie’s shoulder. “Can I get you anything? Would you like to return to the hall?”

Mazie shook her head then lifted her chin, her brown eyes shining with tears. “I feel so foolish.”

“Trent and I understand,” Cat said with a reassuring pat. “Truly, it does help to cry.”

He rubbed his hand over his forehead. When was the last time he had cried over his parents’ deaths? He had been a lad when his mother died in childbirth and had wept and wept until his father reprimanded him. After his father’s death, he had allowed himself one night of tears. That was it. He was the earl, and earls do not cry.

Another sob tore from Mazie’s throat and he had to restrain the impulse to embrace her. He hated feeling useless in the face of her sorrow and contented himself with handing her his handkerchief.

“I-I want to stop hurting. I-I do,” she stammered. “But I am a-afraid to forget them even more.”

A raw ache filled his throat and he clasped his hands behind his back until he was sure his knuckles were white. “God damned Midnight Rider.” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them. Both women regarded him with wide eyes. “Of course you were easily led astray by the criminal.” A swipe of his hand indicated her vulnerable state. “You lost your family, your fortune, even your friends in one fell swoop. You were unprotected. Lovely and unprotected and an enticing prey for any warm-blooded male.”

Mazie pursed her lips at his statement. Cat’s blue eyes widened even further. He should bite back his anger and tamp down his frustration, but it had been growing since the moment he left Mazie’s room, his erection fierce and unsatisfied. The more he learned about his captive, the more he wanted to protect her from the highwayman, ensure she never saw the bastard again.

Surely it was a natural inclination, for it couldn’t be jealousy.

“Our gender is a despicable lot,” he grumbled. “But the Midnight Rider is ten times a coward to abuse a vulnerable woman. I will see the man hang, I swear it.”

Mazie’s face paled and Cat shook her head at him, clearly thinking that he’d lost his mind. He paced to the table and poured himself a glass of lemonade. The day was hot and growing hotter. The matter of Lady Margaret was twisted and growing ever more confusing.

“I am no man’s prey,” Mazie whispered.

He leaned back against the table and studied her. Wide, guileless eyes and a prim, upright posture. At this moment, she painted the picture of innocence, but he wasn’t so obtuse as to believe she was a victim to life’s circumstances. She was heartbroken, confused and had made some unfortunate choices. But at least she had made
choices
, had tried to manage the lot life had given her. He had to respect that even if she continued to choose the path of deception.

Certainly she had been lying through her teeth about Nash.

But she did not deserve to be sent to gaol. After the highwayman was found, he would see her safe. Settled somewhere she couldn’t make trouble.

“Perhaps prey was the incorrect term.” He cast his gaze around them, trying to make her understand. His eyes fell on a nearby bed of red daylilies that had escaped their confines. “You are like an overgrown garden allowed to spill out, wild and chaotic. You simply need to be tended to, pruned and contained.”

“I am not a garden of weeds,” she huffed.

“No, no, not weeds.”

“Neither am I overrun with insects.”

“Most assuredly not.”

“Nor do I choke out the sunlight from other living things.”

He furrowed his brow. Certainly he never said that. “You are an aristocrat, Mazie, the daughter of an earl. You are meant to be coddled and spoiled and surrounded by your children and friends. You should be protected, allowed to be soft and vulnerable. I would like to see you free of this situation. Happy and settled.”

Not carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders.

Not scared and running and making unscrupulous agreements in the dark.

Not fondled by her captor, no matter if she pleaded in the most erotic way.

Hell.

“We will free you of this man.”

Somehow, he would put everything back in its place. Mazie, his father, the villagers, the Midnight Rider. He would fix it all.

Chapter Eleven

“Be not too hasty to trust or admire the teachers of morality; they discourse like angels but they live like men.” Dr. Samuel Johnson

“Ink is black, and Papa’s shows…shrews…
shoes
are black.” Alice threw the book down with a huff. “This is ridiculous. I can’t even read a silly children’s book.”

Mazie patted her maid on the shoulder. “You have improved so much in only a few days. I am quite proud of you.”

“Pfff.” Alice flapped her lips.

“It is always frustrating learning something new. Let’s go over the pages you have already read, shall we? Perhaps that will make you feel more confident.”

Alice rolled her eyes but returned to the beginning of the book.

“Paper is white, and Charles’s fr-frock is white,” she read, then grumbled under her breath, “Charles looks rather silly in his white frock, if I do say so.”

Mazie bit back her smile and glued her eyes to her student. But no matter how hard she tried to keep her focus, her gaze kept wandering to Bébé. The doll rested on the center of Mazie’s bed, as she always had, and her little doll face made Mazie feel better, as she always had. But there was a sadness as well. A yawning drop of emotion that Mazie feared to explore.

She hadn’t wanted to feel the heavy pulse of emotion in her heart, the painful mix of nostalgia for the past and anxiety for the future. But there it was, knocking at the door of her attention. So she’d done what she always did and wandered off in search of distraction. She had thought helping Alice improve her negligible reading skills would be a good diversion this morning. It was their third lesson, and she was proud of the success Alice was having. But they had met in Mazie’s room—where else could a maid and a prisoner conduct a quiet lesson—and the baby doll was an endless magnet for her attention.

Even with Alice sitting an arm’s length away, Mazie was unwound in a way that worried her. She felt naked and raw. Vulnerable.

Unendingly alone.

All emotions that were dangerous in the current circumstances. She couldn’t afford to be soft, anxious, lonely. She couldn’t afford to crave the comfort and stability of her childhood—the warm arms of her father, the soothing voice of her mother. And it would not help Roane to worry herself sick over him. She needed to get her head on straight.

Perhaps she should put the doll in the wardrobe? No, she could never do that. Not to Bébé.

“Come, let us go home, it is e-e-evening. See how t-tall my… What is this word?” Alice folded her arms, frustrated.

“The word is shadow. Sha-dow. It reads, ‘see how tall my shadow is. It is like a great black giant stalking after me’.”

“It says that?” Alice looked surprised. “Some book, scaring the little kids.”

Mazie’s smile faltered. It
was
a bit intimidating, thinking of great black giants stalking in the shadows. It was too close to her reality. She had watched the guards outside her window the previous night, weaving in and out of the darkness.

She would run if she could. Far away from all of it. To some place where she could shed the weight on her chest, where she could breathe again.

Trent had discovered too much in Rodsley. How long until he unraveled the truth and followed the clues to Roane?