Three Nights with a Scoundrel (Stud Club #3)(94)

“Perhaps.” Her opponent did not look up from arranging the backgammon board. “Your play has seen moderate improvement.”

“Moderate improvement? I nearly won yesterday.”

He nudged the last group of black markers into a precise line. “Do you know the difference between ‘nearly winning’ and defeat, my dear?”

She shook her head.

“There isn’t one.”

Claudia pretended to pout. “The dice, if you will.”

Feigned petulance aside, Claudia liked Peter Faraday. She liked him a great deal. He’d been a most welcome addition to the household. Amelia and Spencer were always busy with their obligations, or each other. Now she had a fellow invalid, a captive companion. Like her, Mr. Faraday was confined to the sitting room and scarcely able to move without a servant’s assistance. They spent most of the day together, and typically part of the evening too. They played backgammon and cards. When they tired of games, he read aloud from the newspaper whilst she worked on a baby quilt or simply rested her eyes. Claudia didn’t care much about the content of the newspaper articles, but she enjoyed listening to his witty commentary.

She enjoyed listening to him, in general. He had a very pleasant voice, Mr. Faraday did, with a rich, soothing timbre and an accent that bespoke education and good breeding. He was very handsome, in a way that recalled Mr. Bellamy, but with less flash and more refinement. A true gentleman, Claudia thought. Quick to jest, but never belittling.

He asked her questions, about everything from her childhood to her pregnancy. Not that Claudia was unused to being questioned, but it was a rare pleasure to have someone truly listen to her answers. She’d told him all about Amelia and Spencer, and what she could remember of her late parents. She’d even talked honestly of her foolish tryst with that horrid tutor in York, and Mr. Faraday hadn’t been the least bit judgmental or cross. Just interested. She could talk to him of anything.

They got on well, indeed.

She rolled the dice and moved her tokens accordingly. “Would you like to marry me?”

Poor man. He’d spent a week at Morland House, and this was the first time Claudia had seen him stunned speechless.

“I beg your pardon?” he finally said.

“Did you not understand me? I thought I made myself rather clear. I’m asking if you’d like to marry me.”

She sensed him mulling over a response, and she sipped at her glass of tepid lemonade, giving him time.

When he still didn’t reply, she tried to put his mind at ease. “Don’t be concerned, Mr. Faraday. I’m not so foolish as to imagine I’m in love with you. But we get on well, don’t we?” She patted the squirming mass in her belly. If this babe’s behavior in the womb was any indication, Claudia was in for trouble years down the line. Still, she loved the bothersome, soon-to-be-squalling lump. “Any day now, I shall give birth. And I want to keep my baby.”

“Then keep it you shall.” He frowned. “Don’t tell me the duke is insisting you either marry or give the child away?”

“No, no. Spencer and Amelia say they’ll support me, whatever I decide. But there’s no denying our lives will go easier if I do wed. And I thought perhaps you might like to be a father. You seem well-suited to fatherhood, and this could be your chance to have a child without … you know, the nuisance of impregnating a wife.”

“The nuisance,” he repeated, incredulous. “The nuisance of impregnating a wife? Just how miserable a lover was this music master, anyway?”

“Bad indeed. But that’s not my point.” With a glance to the corridor for servants, she leaned toward him as much as her pregnant belly would allow and whispered, “You are a molly, aren’t you?”

He was very careful not to react. Instead, he unstoppered the decanter of lemonade and freshened her glass.

“It’s all right,” she assured him quickly. “I’m very good at keeping secrets. And no one else has noticed, I’m sure. You know how it is, being homebound. I don’t have anything else to do with myself, but sit and notice things.”

“But how …?”

She smiled. “Easy. Your eyes follow the footmen, not the maids. And you fancy the tall one with the square jaw, don’t you? So do I. He has perfectly lovely calves. And that arse …” She propped her chin on her hand and released a languid sigh. “Sad for us both, my lady’s maid says he’s devoted to his sweetheart. She’s a seamstress, I hear. Still, that’s no reason we can’t look. We must contrive to drop a great many objects when he’s about, so he will have to pick them up.”

“Why, Lady Claudia.” He sat back in his chair and studied her. A bewildered smile slowly crooked his lips. “You are a truly remarkable young woman.”

Claudia allowed herself a small moment of satisfaction. It was high time someone noticed that. “Does that mean you’ll marry me?”

“No, my dear,” he said gently. “I can’t marry you. But I think I would very much like to be your friend.”

“A friend can’t give my baby a name.”

“No. There, you will be on your own. But you will do splendidly.”

She slumped back in her chair. “I don’t know how I’m going to care for a child. I can’t even keep myself out of trouble, most days.”