Grace stood in the open door, his hand resting on the latch, surprising her just as she had done to him earlier.
‘You left before we could finish,’ he said, coming to join her. ‘We weren’t done.’
‘I believed we were, your Grace.’ She wasn’t exactly frightened of him, but she was wary: of him, and of herself.
‘We weren’t,’ he said, folding his arms over his chest. ‘You say you won’t remain with me and be paid for being idle.’
‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘That is what I said.’
‘Then what if you remain as my guest? You’ll receive no wages, no money. There’s no sin to that, is there?’
She raised her chin, more determined than ever. ‘Idle tongues would still see sin, your Grace, whether I were paid a thousand pounds or none at all. It would be so with any woman beneath your roof.’
‘Damnation, it’s not as if we’re alone,’ he said. ‘The house is full of servants.’
She didn’t answer. She didn’t have to, not with her resolve so evident in every inch of her posture.
He grumbled, a sound she knew was his way of masking an oath in the company of ladies. He began to walk slowly around her, not exactly pacing, but thinking, considering. She recognised that about him as well.
‘You speak Italian, don’t you?’ he asked at last. ‘You can manage the lingo here?’
‘A bit, your Grace,’ she admitted. ‘I am not precisely fluent in the language, but I have learned enough to make my wishes understood.’
‘Well, then, there’s the solution,’ he said as if that explained everything. ‘You can remain here as my translator. You can take me about the city and show me the sights.’
‘But I—you—already have a bear leader hired for that purpose,’ she protested, naming the professional guide who had presented himself with a flourish the morning she’d arrived, ‘a native Venetian named—’
‘I do not care what the fellow is named,’ he said grandly. ‘I would rather have you, Miss Wood, to guide me, and teach me what I should know of Venice.’
‘Oh, your Grace, I am hardly qualified—’
‘You know more than I,’ he said, smiling proudly at his solution. ‘That’s qualification enough. You are a governess, a teacher by trade.’
‘Your Grace, please—’
‘I do please,’ he said, and stopped his walking. By accident he stood framed by the arch of the window, his dark blond hair turned gold by the sun, as much a halo as any English peer would ever have. Yet he also stood beside the bed, that extravagant, opulent, sinful bed, and there was nothing angelic about that whatsoever.
‘In those letters you gave me to read from my girls,’ he continued, ‘they said they’d be here in a fortnight. They’re expecting to see you then, and they’ll have my head if you’re not here to greet them.’
‘Was that all you gleaned from those letters, your Grace?’ she asked, appalled. She had given him the letters so that he’d learn of the love his girls had found with their new husbands, and the happiness as well, but now it seemed he’d read them and learned nothing. ‘An itinerary?’
‘Two weeks, two short weeks,’ he said, ignoring her question. ‘Surely you can tolerate my company for that time, until they arrive, and then—then you may go as you wish.’
‘Why does my presence matter so much to you?’ she demanded. ‘Surely you can tell me that, your Grace. Why should you care at all?’
‘Why?’ He turned slightly, just enough so that he caught the reflections from the water, ripples of light across his face that robbed it of all his certainty, his confidence.
‘Why?’ He repeated the single word again as if mystified by how exactly to reply. His smile turned crooked, too, or maybe it was only another trick of the shifting light. ‘Why? Because my girls, my finest little joys, have grown and left me. Because you, Miss Wood, are my last link here on the other side of the world to them, and to the past that I’d always judged to be happy enough.’
‘Oh, your Grace,’ she said softly, bewildered by such an unexpected confession. She took a step towards him, her hand outstretched on impulse to offer comfort. ‘Oh, I am sorry, I did not intend to—’
‘Damnation, because I do not wish to be entirely abandoned here alone,’ he said gruffly, the truth clearly so painful to him that he could scarce speak it aloud. ‘Is that reason enough for you, Miss Wood? Is it?’
Now when she looked at him, she saw neither the overbearing master she’d always known, nor the lusty male she’d encountered last night. What remained was sorrow, loss and resignation, all the proof she needed that what he’d said was true: that he did not want to be left alone.
And neither, truly, did she.
‘I’ll stay, your Grace,’ she said softly, daring to rest her hand on his arm. ‘Until your daughters arrive, I’ll stay.’
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