Seduced By a Lady's Heart (Lords of Honor #1)(9)

Lady Drake looked wide-eyed between them. “Indeed?” A pleased smile lit her brown eyes. She motioned him forward. “Jones, you mustn’t rush off! However did you not mention such a thing?”

“Oh, I’m sure because he is so very dedicated to his services that he’d never do something as improper as to rekindle an old friendship if it were to in anyway compromise his obligations to your household, my lady.” He’d have to be as deaf as a dowager to fail to hear the stinging rebuke in her words.

He hesitated, eyeing the door with the same longing a man with an addiction to drink surely felt for a tumbler of whiskey.

“Don’t you dare leave,” Lady Drake admonished, a smile in her gentle command.

Lucien turned fully around. He fixed a black scowl on Eloise with a look that would have withered much taller, stronger men. She angled her chin up another notch.

“It has been so long, Emmaline.” She lowered her voice to an almost conspiratorial whisper. “Do you know, I believe for a moment Mr. Jonas…Jones didn’t remember me?” A forced laugh bubbled past her lips.

He frowned. When had Eloise learned the art of false laughter and brittle smiles? As much as he detested her reappearance in his life, he hated even more that innocent, grinning Eloise with that intriguing birthmark at the corner of her lip had been hardened by life. “I should return to my obligations, my lady,” he said. He’d never been one to plead. But from the time the surgeon had made the decision to chop off the lower portion of his left arm, he’d not begged anyone for anything. Mayhap if he’d begged his father, begged for that position with the church instead of a damned commission, Sara would now live. In this moment he wanted to beg off, leave the two ladies here.

“Oh, you simply mustn’t, Jones!” The faintest command underlined the marchioness’ words and he silently cursed, knowing all hope of escape had been effectively ended by the bits of his past Eloise had dangled before his employer.

Eloise averted her eyes, unwilling to meet his gaze. Good, the lady should be bloody terrified. She didn’t play with the same lad who’d raced across the hills of Kent. No, Eloise didn’t know the man he’d become. She only remembered the man she thought she knew. The one who’d laughed and smiled and loved.

He shifted on his feet, too aware of the station difference between him and these ladies. And he hated that Eloise had reminded him he’d not always been a servant. For there was nothing disrespectful in honest, hard work. Of course, the viscount would never see it that way. He smiled. Oh, that would be the ultimate revenge upon his vile sire. “I have household business to attend to, my lady,” he tried again. It was the closest he’d come to begging.

Something reflected in Lady Drake’s eyes. Possessed of a kinder heart than most of the empty-headed, vain members of the ton, she saw more. She must have seen something in his expression for she inclined her head and the laughter dimmed in her eyes. “Of course, Jones.”

He sketched a bow and, without a backward glance for Eloise, all but sprinted from the room, feeling the same freeing sense of relief he’d felt when he’d fled Kent after learning of Sara’s death.





Chapter 4


Eloise tried to smile. She tried to drum up suitable repartee and dialogue for the kind, warmhearted marchioness who’d been so gracious to invite her to visit when no one in Society really invited Eloise anywhere.

She tried. She really did. But failed miserably. Quite miserably. Eloise accepted the proffered cup of tea, grateful for something to hold in her slightly trembling fingers. She raised the glass of tepid brew to her lips and sipped, all the while aware of the marchioness’ curious stare trained upon her. She took another sip.

“I hope you know,” the marchioness began and Eloise froze, the rim of her delicate, porcelain glass pressed to her lips. “I would never dare press you for details that I don’t have a right to.”

The muscles of her throat worked spasmodically. She managed a nod but feared if she spoke her gratitude the other woman would detect the tremor in her words.

Emmaline held up the tray of pastries. “I have a shameful weakness for cherry tarts.”

Eloise clung to the offered change of discourse and set her teacup down. “Then who doesn’t?” She plucked one of the confectionary treats from the tray and the other woman laid the small platter upon the marble top table.

They shared a smile and sat in companionable silence for a long while, nibbling at their respective pastries.

The marchioness was the first to break the silence. “Ours was not necessarily a chance meeting, was it?” There was no rebuke, no outraged shock in that question, sentiments the woman was entitled to.

The dessert crumbled to ash in Eloise’s suddenly too-dry mouth. She choked around the bite and picked up her cup once more. She took a sip.

Emmaline waited patiently. Then, according to what she’d learned of the woman who’d been betrothed as a child and waited nearly twenty years for her intended, the returned war hero Lord Drake, to come up to scratch—she was quite adept at waiting.

Eloise sighed, humbled not for the first time. “No,” she admitted, shamed by the woman’s discovery. “I’m sorry.” How very inadequate that apology was for this woman who’d been nothing but kind, when most members of the ton were usually nothing but coolly polite to Eloise. She flicked her gaze over to the entrance of the room, but, of course, he would not be there. Lucien had responsibilities, of which she’d never been one. At the pain of that, she tightened her fingers around her glass.