He muffled a growl. He wasn’t in the habit of badgering the servants. At this rate, the girl would be in such a state by the time he questioned her, she’d be in hysterics.
“Do you need anything, my lady?” she asked with a calmness that belied that prediction.
“Just my book and spectacles,” his mother said and accepted them with a smile. “Don’t stand for any nonsense from James.”
Miss Trim’s smile was faint as she curtsied and preceded him from the room with a poise that wouldn’t disgrace a debutante at Almack’s. As he followed, Leath couldn’t help thinking that she was the damnedest housemaid he’d ever seen.
Nell’s heart hammered with dread by the time she reached the library. She knew Leath chose this room to intimidate her. Goodness, after his tiff with his mother, she might yet face dismissal. It was clear that he wanted to get rid of her. If he did, how would she gather the evidence against him?
Before she was summoned, her eavesdropping had been enlightening. The newspapers were right. Leath’s political career was in trouble. Good. When Sedgemoor used the diary to expose him as the villain he was, all hope of public office would evaporate.
Nell had arrived at Alloway Chase despising Lord Leath. But that was before she’d listened to him battle with a mother he loved over something he considered important for her sake, not his own.
Mentally Nell kicked herself. His kindness to his mother didn’t mean anything. With his family, the marquess might act the civilized man, but at heart he was a monster. If she forgot that, she was lost.
She stood straight and quiet in the center of the library as he prowled across to sit behind the desk.
“It’s too late to pretend humility, Miss Trim,” he barked, making her start.
When he’d spoken so tenderly to his mother, the beauty of his deep baritone had struck her. Now his voice was like a gunshot. Of course it was; she was a lowly servant. And he didn’t like her, despite those disturbing moments last night when she’d sensed male interest. This morning he’d regarded her like a cockroach in the castle’s pantry. Should the Marquess of Leath ever condescend to visit that prosaic location.
“Yes, my lord,” she said meekly, intending to needle him.
She succeeded. He growled and gestured toward the chair in front of the desk. “Sit down.”
“It’s inappropriate for me to sit in your presence, sir.”
“It’s inappropriate to answer back, my girl.”
He had a point. She sat and concentrated on her lap to avoid those intense deep-set eyes.
Last night, his size had struck her as remarkable. Since then, she’d told herself that nervousness alone had painted him as such a powerful physical presence.
It wasn’t nervousness. He was tall and broad and dauntingly muscled. Clearly he found time for plenty of exercise away from his parliamentary activities. The portrait in his mother’s room was of a young man, long and lean and with a touch of innocence in his face. When she dared to glance up, there was nothing innocent about the man studying her over steepled fingers. He clearly awaited her full attention. She shivered and prayed he didn’t notice her disquiet.
“Tell me about yourself.”
The mad urge rose to announce that she was Dorothy Simpson’s sister and she was at Alloway Chase to ensure that he never ruined another woman.
“Well?” he asked when she didn’t answer. “Cat got your tongue?”
She licked her lips in uncertainty and suffered a jolt when his eyes focused on the movement. Immediately she was back in that strange dance of hatred and fascination. She’d been mistaken to think he’d conquered last night’s sensual awareness.
Oh, dear Lord, this was an unholy mess.
“I’m a little frightened,” she admitted.
“Rot.” He arched those formidable black eyebrows. “How did you come to work here?”
She straightened in the chair, which would have put any of the furniture in her stepfather’s cottage to shame. “I’m an orphan.”
“Is that so?”
Her lips tightened. When she’d told his mother that her parents were dead—well, it was true, however kind her stepfather was—the marchioness had overflowed with sympathy. Lord Leath studied her as if reading the layers of deceit beneath every word.
“Yes.”
“And how long have you been alone in the world?”
She couldn’t restrain a faint sharpness. “You speak as if my bereavement is a matter of choice, my lord.”
He bared his teeth. “My apologies.”
She shifted uncomfortably under his unblinking regard, before she reminded herself that betraying her fear gave him the advantage. “My father was a sergeant major under Wellington in Portugal. He died when I was a child. My mother remarried and died when I was fifteen.”
All true. So why did she feel like she’d lied?
“Where did you grow up?”
“Sussex.” Her first lie. If she mentioned Kent, he might connect her to Dorothy, although he’d shown no recognition when she’d told him her name last night.
“You don’t sound like you’re from Sussex. You sound like a lady.”
William Simpson had been an unusual man, educated on a scholarship at Cambridge despite his humble origins. He’d made sure that both girls in his charge spoke with educated accents. “Are there no ladies in Sussex?” she asked sweetly.
His lips quirked. “None that I’ve met.”
That was another surprise. In her imaginings, Dorothy’s seducer had possessed no sense of humor. Nell had expected evil to seep from his very pores. But unless she’d already known his wickedness, she’d see nothing to despise and much to admire. It was odd, the more she saw of Leath, the less she understood why flirty, flighty Dorothy had found him appealing. Perhaps on the hunt, he adopted a different style.
“How did a woman from the gentle south end up here?”
She’d prepared a plausible story. The marchioness had swallowed it without question. She had a nasty feeling that the marquess wasn’t nearly so trusting. “I was to take employment in York, but the lady was called back to London unexpectedly and shut the house. One of the other servants told me about Alloway Chase and I decided to try my luck.”
His face didn’t lighten. Her stomach sank with the certainty that she hadn’t gulled him. “So you crossed an inhospitable moor, came miles from the nearest civilization, on the off chance of finding employment?”
She kept her voice positive. “Indeed, sir. Fortunately there was a vacancy for a housemaid.”
That had been lucky. Although if there hadn’t been a place, she’d have sought work in the area and waited until a job opened up. Staff at big houses were always coming and going. She’d have found a spot eventually, especially with the excellent references she’d written in the guise of a wholly fictitious employer at a wholly fictitious Sussex manor. Of course there was a risk that someone might check her background, but hopefully by the time anybody discovered her ruse, she’d be far away with the diary in her possession.
Under that level gaze, she battled the impulse to fidget. No wonder Leath had such a reputation as a shark in parliament. If she were the opposition, she’d roll over and give him anything he wanted.
“I find it puzzling that you accepted such a junior position. Surely if you can read and write, you’d find work as a governess.”
Perhaps