Henri frowned. A compliment couched as an insult or the other way around? Her head spun as her body shifted slightly in his arms.
‘If I get too heavy, you must put me down. I dare say I can hop.’
‘Hopping doesn’t come into it. And you will have to obey me for once.’
His arms tightened about her, pulling her more firmly against his body. His chest hit hers and she forgot the correct manner of breathing. It was as if she had been encased in ice and had suddenly come out in the sun. If she turned her head only slightly, her lips would brush his neck.
She screwed up her eyes and tried to conjure up Edmund’s familiar features. Annoyingly they were indistinct, like a miniature that had spent far too long in the sun, and were growing more indistinct. The memory did help to curb her impulse, but it also frightened her. If she failed to remember his exact features, what else had she forgotten? For so long it had been a part of her, but it was slipping away.
‘My duty is to ensure you are safe and keep off your ankle, Henri,’ Robert Montemorcy said, bringing her back to her current predicament. ‘And I do endeavour to do my duty. Always.’
Henri gritted her teeth and tried to keep the world from turning dark. She glanced up in his eyes and noticed they were not solidly brown as she’d thought, but full of a myriad of colours. ‘And that is what I am—a duty?’
‘Why are you out this way?’ he asked, not replying to the question.
‘I wanted a stroll,’ she said too quickly. How could she confess without explaining everything?
‘Indeed. All the way out here. Were you going to call? Apologise?’ He gave a cynical smile. ‘It is far too much hope for. The great Lady Thorndike has no need of apologies.’
Henri knew her face flushed. Perhaps she had been a bit high handed at their last meeting, but he had been as well. ‘What I was going to do is of no import now. Everything has changed.’ Robert sat in his dark oak-panelled study, contemplating the glowing embers of the fire Dorothy Ravel had insisted was necessary to ward off the chill of a Northumbrian summer. But instead of seeing the embers, he kept seeing Henri’s pale face and remembering how her body felt curved against his, how her lips had touched his for one glorious instant.
The vulnerability in her eyes when she claimed that she could cope tugged at his heart-strings. And her determination to make good her promise.
What was he going to do about her? She was an added complication that he didn’t need. Beautiful headstrong women were always trouble. He’d seen it when his father remarried, and how his father had changed, particularly after his stepmother ran away with her impoverished but titled lover. His father had been unable to take the rejection and had taken his life. Later still, he had his own experience with changeable women and had learnt to trust facts rather than emotions.
What was her destination? Here? And if yes, why—to apologise? Henrietta Thorndike never apologised for anything. Was she trying to do her duty as she saw it in welcoming the Ravels to the neighbourhood or did she have an alternative plan?
She had singularly neglected to answer his question about her cousin. He curled his fingers about his pen. He’d view any attempt to open communication between her cousin and Sophie as a clear breach of their wager. And he’d inform her of that.
‘The doctor is here, sir,’ Davis the butler intoned.
‘Show him into the green drawing room. The upstairs maid is sitting with Lady Thorndike,’ Robert said.
‘Is it true, Robert?’ Dorothy Ravel burst into the room. Her Belgian lace cap was slightly askew. ‘Have you brought that man’s cousin here? I will not have my girl getting upset again!’
‘Dorothy,’ Robert said evenly, looking at the woman who had helped to bring him up, ‘Lady Thorndike is a friend. She had a mishap. The New Lodge was by far the most sensible place to bring her.’
The woman’s ribbons quivered and she tightened her layers of shawls about her shoulders. ‘I’d hoped and prayed that it had all ended, but I worry so. Sophie must make a good match. Her father longed for it.’
‘And I’m well aware of the necessity. I did promise James on his deathbed. No rogues, rakes or rascals. I intend to keep my promise. Sophie will marry a man who is worthy of her and her fortune.’
‘I suppose…there is no hope—you and Sophie? You could always move to a warmer climate. London would welcome you. You are thirty-three and it is high time…’
Robert recoiled from the unspoken request. ‘You, better than most, know my history, Dorothy. Sophie deserves someone she loves with her whole heart and who is closer in age and temperament. I’ve known Sophie since she was in her cradle.’
‘I curse that stupid woman.’ Dorothy Ravel rolled her eyes. ‘What she did to you was less than kind. You had a lucky escape, Robert. And your father was an old fool to marry that…that short-heeled wench. Mr Ravel told him to his face when he remarried. No good comes of lust and indulging spoilt women’s whims. He attempted to add her to his collection of beautiful objects and paid the ultimate price. But that was his shame and not yours.’
‘I know what my father did. I choose to remember him for other things. The way he was before it happened.’ Robert focused on the fire. His father might have felt compelled to commit suicide after his stepmother deserted him, but he’d learnt to trust facts rather than his instincts where women were concerned. He’d learnt that long ago. All relationships were governed by logic and scientific method. It was the only way.
‘And Daphne Smith—do you know what she was?’
‘I understand Lady Alderney is quite happy living abroad in Italy. I go down on my knees nightly, thanking God that I was saved from a fate worse than death. And logic should rule the heart rather than the other way around.’
Robert pulled at his cuffs. He had been far too young then and far too ready to believe the lies that sprang from beautiful titled lips. Daphne had seemed to be an angel set on this earth and he had worshipped the ground her dainty foot trod as only a lovesick youth could do. He’d naïvely believed her protestations that she could care for him, if only her parents would allow her to. Her refusal of his proposal and her subsequent mockery after she had secured Viscount Alderney’s hand had made him even more determined to succeed and to follow his father’s injunction that a rational approach was the only way. And succeed he had, until one day he realised that success had a sweetness all of its own and the refusal was no longer the spur it once was. Thereafter he’d been very careful to take his pleasure only from sophisticated women who expected little in return—always ending the affair before his emotions were fully engaged rather than risk the hurt.
‘Do you think that Lord Cawburn sent Lady Thorndike as a spy? Does she know what he tried to do to my darling girl? The wickedness he had planned? I have heard stories, terrible stories. Why he remains accepted in polite society, I have no idea!’ For the second time in as many days, Dorothy appeared to be on the brink of hysterics as she fumbled for her handkerchief.
Robert put a calming hand on Dorothy’s ample shoulder. There was no need to inform her of his wager with Henri and their quarrel. Dorothy might read far too much into it. ‘Lady Thorndike’s reason for being in the neighbourhood will be entirely innocent. She is well-known for her generosity and she always calls on visitors. She has started some society or other.’
‘I do hope you are right. I worry about my little girl and that…that monster. The women he has ruined. And rumours of his gaming.’
‘Trust me to handle it,’ Robert said grimly. ‘It is why you came to me in the first place. Nothing will happen to Sophie under my roof. She is safe here with trusted servants to watch over her. And when we know she is sensible, then she can go out into society again.’
‘You are so good to us, Robert.’ Dorothy dabbed a handkerchief to her eyes. ‘My nerves…the very thought of having to meet