a snake rising to eye prey, trying to get situated for the closest tender spot. ‘Oh, my dear, I think you know full well whatever that song meant and I am not daft enough to fall for that one.’
‘I already told you that I have no accomplishments,’ Bellona insisted flatly.
‘How do you spend your days?’
‘Archery. The forest. I spend hours with my niece—I miss the little one. Her joy makes me laugh.’
The duchess opened the book. ‘I know what it is like to miss someone.’
‘You spend too much time with books,’ Bellona said. ‘If they make your eyes hurt it is not good for you. Poison in the stomach makes it hurt. The head is the same. Your eyes are telling you that you must not read.’
‘Oh. Thank you for informing me.’ The duchess digested the words.
Rhys walked into the room, greeting them both, a book under his arm. His eyes had a faraway look, but he settled into a chair and asked them to continue as they’d been because he needed to study the accounts.
But even though he stared at the volume in his hands, Bellona felt his thoughts were on her much the same as a governess might have her back to the children, but be aware of their every move. She felt the need to test her idea and knew she would before the conversation was over.
The duchess leaned towards Bellona. ‘How did you learn to speak English?’
‘My father was English.’ Her father was alive, but he was dead as far as she was concerned. ‘He insisted we only speak English when he was home. He made us recite to him. Yet he knew Greek well and if we spoke Greek in anger, we were punished. He is... It is hard to talk of him.’ She sniffed and lowered her face. That would discourage any questions of him.
‘At least you speak two languages.’
‘Some French, too.’
The older woman nodded. She appraised Bellona. ‘Did you leave behind family in Greece?’
‘None close,’ Bellona said. ‘I have never wed. Marriage. It makes a woman change. And cry. Men are only good for lifting and carrying, much like the bigger animals that do not think well.’
The duke didn’t respond to her deliberate prod.
‘Well, yes, some of them can be,’ the duchess admitted. ‘But marriage is not all bad. Children make you change and cry, too. I do not know what I would have done without my own.’ A wisp of a smile landed on the duchess’s face. ‘My three children were the best things that ever happened to me.’ Then her expression changed with the memory and she began to sniff.
Bellona searched her mind for a distraction. ‘At least I will not have to marry—like His Grace will have to before he gets much older.’
His mother’s sniffle turned into a splutter. Bellona didn’t have to turn her head to know where the duke was looking. She pretended to look like her own thoughts were far away.
‘Yes. He will marry. Of course,’ the duchess said. ‘But that is not for you to discuss, Miss Cherroll.’
‘I hoped that you would call me Bellona.’
‘That is a strange name.’
‘I was named for the Roman goddess of war. I remember that every day.’
‘Perhaps you should put it from your mind. She doesn’t sound like someone appropriate to be named after.’
Bellona shook her head. ‘I’m proud of it. To get to England, I had to flee in the night. Thessa’s suitor chased us.’ She had slept though the final confrontation, unaware of all about her. Earlier, she’d fallen asleep with the rhythm of the ship and woken when her sister had shaken her awake. Thessa’s rapid voice had fallen back into the Greek language while she’d told Bellona how the pirates from their homeland had followed the ship, planning to force the women into marriage.
She thought of what Melina had told her of Almack’s—a marriage mart, her sister had said.
‘Have you ever been pursued, Your Grace?’ She turned to Rhys. He did have her direct in his vision, watching her without censure, but as if she were a very interesting...bee, and he wasn’t afraid of getting stung.
‘Not by a pirate,’ he said. ‘Only by a very unhappy bull.’
‘I’m sure you could escape.’
‘I have managed thus far.’ He glanced at the book again, but even with his eyes averted, she could still feel his attention on her.
‘My poor Geoff,’ the duchess said, ‘he was once chased by an angry dog and I thought—’ Her lip quivered and she reached for a handkerchief.
Bellona did not want the discussion to return to sadness. A slap with words worked as well as one across the face. ‘Reading does appear a good way to waste time. A way for people with no chores to be idle.’
The duchess’s sniff turned into a choke.
She had the older woman’s full attention and Rhys’s book looked to have turned humorous. For little more than a blink, their eyes met. Sunshine suffused her and didn’t go away when he examined the book again.
* * *
After his morning ride, Rhys heard the clock as he strode into his home—the same peals he’d heard his whole life. The sounds didn’t change, but if they clanked about in his ears, he knew the world felt dark. For the first time in a long time, the peals were musical.
His mother had spoken to him repeatedly about the heathen, informing him that the miss was beyond help. Each time she’d recounted the discussion between the two, her voice rose in anger. Not the bare mewl it had been before.
Finally, she’d left her room of her own volition to come and find him to complain with exasperation of having to deal with this motherless child who’d been left too long to her own devices. She’d wondered how he could possibly expect his own mother to correct such a tremendous neglect of education in the woman. ‘It would take years, years,’ she’d explained as she walked away, shaking her head.
He’d quashed his immediate urge to go to Bellona and pull her into his arms, celebrating with her the rebirth of his mother’s life.
Thoughts of Bellona always caused his mind to catch, wait and peruse every action or word concerning her a little longer. The miss did something inside him. Like a flint sparking against steel. Made him realise that his heart still beat, his life still continued and that some day he’d be able to walk into a room and not be aware of all that was missing, but see what was actually there.
He turned, moving towards the archery target that now stood in the garden beneath the library window.
Disappointment edged into him when he did not find her near the targets she’d had placed about. He went inside the house, thinking of her hair and the way she reminded him of pleasures he did not need to be focusing on right now. As he passed the library door, he heard pages rustling.
He stepped into the library. Stopped. Stared.
She
