rose, intending to greet her, and the words died on his tongue.
Those great dark eyes under expressive arched brows were green, he realised—the deep green of the velvety moss beside a woodland brook that invited one to sit and listen to its throaty chatter. And her hair! Hidden last night by the bonnet, haloed now by the morning sun, it was an intricate arrangement of auburn braids that glowed bright as a copper penny.
Though the soft green morning gown had a modest neckline, the scrap of ribbon under the high waist nonetheless managed to emphasise her breasts. For a petite lady, the top of whose head would scarcely touch his chin, they were deliciously full.
His hands curled into fists, itching with the desire to cup them.
One by one he catalogued her other charms: graceful curve of neck and shoulders, slender arms, narrow wrists, those delicate small hands.
Warm, dry and dressed, he found her even more alluring than he had by firelight.
‘Good morning, Mr Greaves,’ she said at last, startling him into realising he’d been evaluating her as blatantly as if she were Haymarket ware in a theatre box.
Maybe she is, a little voice murmured in his ear.
Well, probably she isn’t, he growled back. ‘To you, too, Mrs Merrill,’ he replied. ‘Please help yourself to the dishes on the sideboard. Should you like coffee?’
‘Yes, thank you.’
Ned nodded at Myles to pour and waited for her to fill a plate. She sat, taking small delicate bites as if she were savouring each mouthful … while he savoured the play of those tempting lips against her teeth and tongue. Ah, the wickedness he could imagine inciting them to!
Thanks to years of ingrained breeding, he needed but a tiny portion of his brain to carry on a polite conversation. However, her open, apparently honest answers to his slightly disjointed questions about her home, her growing up with her brother, her sojourn in India—that must be the origin of the exotic spicy scent that clung to her—and subsequent marriage slowly began to curb the ravening lust in his brain with the unhappy conviction that she most probably was exactly what she represented herself to be: Greville Anders’s sister, thus Nicky’s cousin, thus beyond the touch of his lecherous imagination.
That still did not explain how she’d ended up dripping on his doorstep at midnight.
Regardless, he’d better stop contemplating naked assignations in the moonlight and start thinking of and reacting to her as a lady, he concluded, squelching a niggle of disappointment.
He waited until they had both finished their meal, asked Myles to pour them each another cup and dismissed him. Now to discover what she’d been about.
‘So, Mrs Merrill, how did you come to arrive at Blenhem Hill last night?’
She gave him a pained smile, a slight flush colouring her fair skin. ‘Humiliating as the details are, after your hospitality to a total stranger, I suppose I owe you the truth.’
‘As you wish.’
She looked away, a troubled expression on her face. He sat silent, reining in his impatient curiosity and waiting for her to continue.
‘My husband was a soldier, as I already told you,’ she began at last. ‘About a year after our marriage in India I—fell ill. Fearing for my health, he insisted that I return to England. Later I learned that he himself had succumbed to a fever. As … as his family never reconciled themselves to our marriage and I had not the funds to voyage back to India and my father, I was pleased to accept a position as a governess. My employers, Lord and Lady Masters, spend most of the year in London or visiting the country estates of their friends, while their daughters reside at Selbourne Abbey in Hampshire.’
Hampshire—gently rolling hills, corn, cattle and sheep, he thought. ‘A lovely county,’ he interjected.
She looked up. ‘It is indeed. I was very happy there. Until … until my employers returned.’
Her flush deepened. ‘There’s no genteel way to express it. Lord Masters pursues every female within reach, whether they encourage his interest or not. I most certainly did not encourage him, but he … he kept after me anyway. Despite my continual vigilance, he managed to corner me in my chamber, where Lady Masters discovered us in a … compromising position. She expelled me from the house that very night.’
Twisting her hands together, her face averted, she continued in a low voice, ‘With little money and no references, I could think of nothing else to do but come here to Greville. Encountering delays at every turn, by the time I reached Blenhem Hill my resources were exhausted. So … I walked from Hazelwick. And now you know the whole.’
Her cheeks still rosy, she lowered her eyes and studied her hands, as if she couldn’t bear to look at him and perhaps see censure in his eyes.
If it was a performance, it was masterful. She appeared every inch a wronged and virtuous lady. Except … except for those plump, bite-me lips and those lush, fondle-me breasts.
Even if her story were true, Ned felt a stir of sympathy for Lord Masters. Here was a tasty morsel to dangle in front of a rake.
Only a bit, however, for he considered a man who preyed upon women, particularly a woman dependent upon him, to be beneath contempt.
Had Lord Masters preyed upon Mrs Merrill? Or was this gentlewoman with the body of a temptress a temptress indeed? Either way, what was he to do about her?
If she had been dismissed for wantonness, he could understand her deciding to throw herself on her brother’s mercy until some more promising pigeon came along. Her shock at discovering Anders was no longer at Blenhem was genuine enough that Ned felt certain her sudden appearance had not been part of some devious scheme devised by the two of them.
If she were in fact Greville Anders’s sister, and it appeared she was, then she was also cousin to Lord Englemere. Though she appeared despairing of her future, Ned knew that Nicky would never turn away a connection of his—and warm-hearted Sarah would probably delight in helping her settle somewhere.
But he couldn’t in good conscience send on to them a woman who might be a doxy.
How could he tell for sure?
At the moment, she was entirely dependent on him. Suddenly a means to test her veracity occurred to him—a scheme that revived his lustful thoughts with a guilty zing of excitement.
With her brother beyond reach and only Ned at hand, if her morals were less than they should be, she would probably, with only a token protest, be amenable to accepting an arrangement that would be profitable for her and pleasurable for them both.
Not that he really intended to make her his mistress, but if he made advances that she accepted, he would know not to burden Nicky with responsibility for her welfare.
In such a case, a plump purse with coach fare to London and enough to live on until she found herself a new protector would be sufficient to fulfil whatever obligations Nicky might owe her.
She still sat, silent and head bowed, as if in deep contemplation. As he gazed at her loveliness, his body protested against the decision not to avail himself of her charms, should she respond to his lures.
Impatiently
