“Practical things often elude or bore my father,” she clarified stiffly.
“Justthe quality we like in people who father children. Funnily enough, the same might have been said for my father.”
Her eyes sparked with temper. “My father isnothinglike yours was.”
Lorcan doubted this, somehow. He’d learned over the years that all deeply selfish men were fundamentally similar.
“And rather than botch things he allows me to do them. He can be rather hapless.”
“‘Allows,’” Lorcan repeated neutrally.
Personally, Lorcan thought the Earl of Worth was a con man par excellence who had bartered his daughter’s affection for a life of comfort and leisure, like a bloody pasha. Hats off to the gentleman.
“Are your brothers aware of your sudden changeof fortune? Are they gallivanting about Paris on credit?”
“My brothers do not know the full extent of it. They cannot be blamed. And yes, I expect they are. Staying with friends and the like. But I believe they both have some money of their own.”
“Mmm. Well. What a fortunate man your father is to have someone to look after his well-being,” he said gently.
She exhaled, with some apparent relief.
And then he added, idly. “Who looked after yours?”
She went still again.
“Idid. I looked after mine by looking after them because they’re what mattered to me. I had a governess... for a time.”
Her voice trembled now.
“All I am saying, Daphne... if I had a fortune... and a title... and every advantage, and if I had a wife or a daughter such as you... I would be damned if I allowed her to carry my burdens. What is a man for if not to protect those that are his?”
She spun again, and his view once again was her back. She fumbled her stocking and nearly dropped it.
“What is it? Is your father mad?” he said gently. “Truly mad, the sort where he can make no decisions and must be watched at all times?”
“I’m beginning to thinkyou’retruly mad,” she said tersely.
He was, a little. It suddenly seemed important to root out a truth to show to her. It seemed imperative to seek out understanding for himself.He suspected he was taking out a little bit of his mood on her, unfairly. And yet he could not seem to stop.
“Is it melancholia?”
Her words were clipped and brittle now. “He’s cheerful and witty and marvelous company. Which is more than I can say for...” She paused meaningfully.
“Is it drink? Did he drink his fortune away? Is that how you came to have a job?”
“Never imbibes,” she bit off, angrily.
“It’s gaming.”
Ah, poor lass. She was a novice at this. She could not control the way her head jerked toward him or the way her eyes flared in shock and fear.
“That’s it. He’s gambled away his fortune and your dowry.”
She took a stunned step backward into the fire screen, which rocked perilously, then dumped her stockings into the fire. She half gasped, half shrieked.
But in moments they were devoured in flames.
She stared, stunned. Then her face dropped into her hands.