Remarkable what a few pounds could buy.
She desperately hoped he didn’t think it would also buy him a woman.
The two closed doors would be the bedrooms.
“The fires have been laid in the rooms and they should be nice and cozy,” Mr. Pike told them. “Do ring if you would like tea before eleven o’clock this evening. Otherwise, we shall see you at breakfast. So delighted to have you staying with us.”
“Thank you, Mr. Pike,” she said as graciously as if this was her very own home.
He seemed an enviable servant, the sort that were always a challenge to find and keep.
The sort that Daphne’s family had lost one by one.
The door clicked shut behind him.
They turned to face each other.
“Mr....” She paused for a breath.
“Blackguard?” he completed helpfully.
“...St. Leger... I should like to make something clear.”
“I am all anticipation.” Though he looked, in truth, somewhat impatient.
She drew in a breath to steady her nerves.
Then another.
He watched her with great patience.
“While I am grateful indeed for the shelter tonight and for your assistance, I hope you shall not construe my presence alone in this suite with you as... that is... I hope you do not think that your generosity has purchased certain... ah, benefits, beyond the amenities. That is, I should like to tell you that you should not assume my presence in this suite with you is an agreement to... andwhile I did in fact t-touch your knee, for which I sincerely apologize, it was in the spirit of...”
The array of subtle emotions—astonishment, irritation, hilarity, anger, bafflement—that flickered in swift succession across his remarkable face made her falter to a stop.
A sort of detached amusement was what settled in at last.
Throughout he regarded her the way a lion might regard a mouse darting to and fro between its paws. Mildly amusing, a bit presumptuous and a trifle irritating, possibly not worth the effort to lift a paw to smash.
Her face was hot.
He said nothing for a moment.
“Virtue isquitethe millstone, isn’t it, Lady Worth?” he finally said on a sympathetic hush. “You would have spared us both that little speech if you could only allow yourself to say, ‘I hope you don’t think you purchased rights to... ravish me.’”
He rolled the “r” extravagantly and ironically. She had the distinct sense that the delicate pause was less to spare her sensibilities than to give her an opportunity to imagine the word he really wanted to use.
He was mocking her, but not scathingly. She sensed she did not signify enough for him to scathe.
She remained mute. Mortified.
“Allow me to give you the benefit of my experience,” he continued, still politely. “Life is, on the whole, short, brutal, and unjust. And I expect ifyou ever do relinquish your virtue, you’ll wonder what all the fuss was about.”
She gave a short dark laugh. “Oh,thankyou. Spoken like a man. Both the lecture about your ‘experience’ and your astonishing blithe ignorance of the societal value of so-called virtue to a woman. And what makes you think I haven’t relinquished it?”
God above, Daphne,she thought.
Why?Whywould you say a thing like that?