9. Chapter 9
Lord Randall’s robust baritone announced his presence in the corridor, and Annabelle cut off her song with the suddenness of a whip crack. The ticking of the small mantel clock seemed inordinately loud, while the once chilly air now felt stifling.
Wearing a serene smile, Babette patted Annabelle’s hand, then rose. She hurried to retrieve her feather duster from where she’d dropped it and once more employed it with a single-minded purpose.
Seconds later, Lord Randall appeared in the den’s open doorway. He searched the room—purportedly for her, then sent her a genial smile. “You are here. Good.”
Annabelle regarded him with suspicion. Was it her imagination, or had she glimpsed a flicker of amusement in his eyes before he lowered his thick, spiky lashes?
And why was he acting glad to see her? One would have thought—as she’d deliberately disregarded his demand she remain in his study during Lord Vane’s visit—that he’d be his usual, cranky self. But here he was, smiling.
“Babette, thank you—that will do,” he said.
The maid’s feather duster froze mid-air. Glancing over her shoulder, she shot Lord Randall a wide-eyed look, shifted her gaze pointedly toward Annabelle, then regarded Lord Randall once more.
He arched a dark brow at her.
When Babette made no move to leave, he said in a gentle voice that he seemed to reserve for Babette alone—not that Annabelle cared, “She’s quite safe with me, lass. Now run along and find Nell. I’m sure she has some…er…dusting, or some such thing to occupy you.”
Babette’s mouth firmed, but she made for the open doorway where Lord Randall remained, bobbed a curtsy to him, then exited. Only then did he cross to join Annabelle in the small seating area.
He took the adjacent armchair and stretched out his long legs. “Now then, you were saying before we were so rudely interrupted?”
She affixed a deliberately cold smile. “I’m not sure I can recall, not having had my nap.”
The blackguard had the gall to aim a lopsided grin at her. It reached all the way to his eyes. They sparkled with a warmth she had never seen, leastways not while looking in her direction, and heralded the appearance of two heretofore unknown dimples.
Her stomach did a neat somersault, and a bloom of heat sprouted over her. She eyed the hearth, surprised to see only a small fire glowed in the grate. She resisted the urge to fan herself. “You do not like Lord Vane?”
“Not particularly.” He gazed at her from beneath hooded lids. “You seemed to like him well enough.”
She lifted her chin. “Of course. He was all that was gracious and kind—unlike some people.”
Jaw tensing visibly, he crossed his arms over his broad chest. “If it was your intention to make an impression on him, you succeeded.”
She opened her mouth to ask him what on earth he implied, but he continued speaking, executing a swift subject change into the heart of where they’d left off.
“Now then. To refresh your memory, last you told me, you’d overheard Gaston asking my sister if she would approach me about him accompanying me to my club. ”
No use trying to put this off further, she supposed. “Yes, that sounds right.”
“She didn’t, as I recall.”
“No, of course not,” Annabelle replied. “She explained that you planned to discuss your recent inheritance of the marquess’s holdings here at Holy Island and that, as such, it wasn’t a good idea for her to suggest bringing him along.”
“Ah. I begin to understand.” One corner of his broad mouth crooked upward in a bemused smile. “After overhearing one chance conversation, you deduced you’d find me here.”
The admiration underlying his words had her face flushing anew.
“A mere guess. It was clear by what Lady Caroline said that you and your grandfather were quite close. As he had passed several months prior to Gaston’s death, and as, following Gaston’s death, you disappeared without a trace with no one seeming the wiser as to your whereabouts, and as no one in your family had rung the alarm bell, I decided it was as good a place as any for you to have gone off to hide. ”
“To hide,” he mocked with a snort of amusement, but he propped his chin on his hand and studied her for a long moment, like a heretofore unknown object he wished to comprehend. “Fascinating,” he finally said. “Armed with that scrap of information, you came all this way.”
She gave a dismissive, one-shoulder shrug, growing uncomfortable with his continued scrutiny, and half convinced he was making sport of her.
“Anyone would have concluded as much, and as the journey cost me only a day’s voyage and some pin money”—a bit more than pin money, thanks to the loss of her reticule carrying the guide’s exorbitant fees—“I decided it was one worth exploring.”
“Worth exploring, perhaps. Although one has to ask what you would have done if you’d arrived and found no one here to receive you.”
Her stomach clenched. He was right, of course. She could have been wrong. She could have died.
“Nevertheless,” he continued, “It was a rather astute assessment.” An odd little smile curved his lips.
“I’m uncertain what you find amusing.”
“I’m not amused. Impressed. My sister did say there was more to you than a pretty appearance.”
That caught her completely off guard. “Lady Caroline said that? About me?”
“No need to sound so shocked. I’m sure you knew Lady Caroline liked you. She always did admire when a woman with natural intellect chose to apply herself."
A woman with natural intellect? Had he, in a roundabout way, complimented her?
“Did you, by chance, know your brother had put out feelers to the powers that be regarding a possible membership at White’s?”
She sent him a look of polite interest, or so she hoped. “I may have heard something to the effect. I hardly recall. Why do you ask?”
He lowered his gaze to his boot tips. “He was advised not to bother.”
Rather than admit she’d overheard her brother raging about the correspondence he’d received to that effect, she muttered a vague, “That seems very odd,” while striving to maintain a neutral expression.
“A clever girl like you might ask herself why a gentleman’s club might dissuade a member of the nobility from attempting to join its ranks.”
In truth, she had asked herself that question, many times. “The answer is obvious.”
He arched a thick dark brow. “Is it?”
“They had reached the same conclusion as you, Lord Randall,” she said crisply.
“That my brother’s blood—and that of my entire family—is not nearly blue enough to meet their exacting standards.
Father, with his enviable looks and charm and business acumen received a title for his value to the Crown.
But as for accepting him into the more elevated circles which the likes of your family have enjoyed for years, that apparently was too much for the upper echelons of society to stomach. ”
“So you were aware.”
She pressed her lips together. The man was too intelligent for his own good.
His eyes narrowed—though not with scorn. With pity? No. Not that, either. She couldn’t decipher his expression, and it maddened her.
“Is that truly what you think, Lady Annabelle? That Gaston was refused admittance due to his common origins?” he asked softly.
“Of course. What other reason could there be?” she demanded. For no reason she could think of, her pulse had begun to race, as when waking from a particularly vivid nightmare.
“What else, indeed? I wonder—how well did you know your brother, Lady Annabelle?”
“What a silly question. I knew him very well. Of course I did. He was my brother, and I loved him.”
He nodded. “As any good sister would.”
Unable to work up any true offense at his statement, and having no notion how to respond, she opted to change the subject. “Well, sir. I have answered your question. Now, perhaps you will answer mine.”
He waved one hand in negligent assent.
“If you did not come here to hide, why did you come all this way, far from the reaches of civilization?”
He lowered his gaze to his boots, mouth curving downward. “I came to grieve my grandfather.”
The simple statement hit her with the force of a gong. She could not muster the first snarky remark. If anything, she had the oddest desire to say something…nice.
“On another note. Annabelle, I wanted to say…” He broke off as if searching for the appropriate words. “I appreciate your handling of Babette today. That is, it was good of you to reassure her this morning after the incident in your bedchamber. I do believe you have gained an admirer in her.”
Annabelle’s stomach plummeted, and her face flamed with heat as the truth became instantly, abundantly, horrifically plain. “You heard me,” she stated. She could not remember the last time she’d been so profoundly humiliated.
He bit his full lower lip as if staunching a grin. “I beg your—”
“You heard me singing to Babette—just now,” she said, unable to look at him.
“You refer to the children’s lullaby you used to soothe Babette?” he asked gently, and there it was. Proof.
She folded her arms. So much for the decency he’d displayed. He was merely setting her up for a fall. “Go on, then. Say it.”
Her mother had. Her brother, too.
The awful truth was, though her music tutor had been tasked with teaching her to lift her voice in a pleasing lilt, her mother had finally pronounced the effort a waste of money destined to end in failure.
Both his brows shot up. He looked utterly baffled. “Say what?”
“I am an atrocious singer.”
He huffed out a laugh that managed to not seem directed at her so much as with her. “As to that, I wouldn’t classify your voice as bad, per se.”
Unable to sit still another moment, she bounded to her feet and strode to the bookcase, putting her back to him in self-defense. “Of course you would. It’s a known thing. Poor Annabelle can’t carry a tune in a bucket, and make her stop. Her singing is enough to set one’s teeth on edge.”
“As if anyone would say as much.” His low voice held altogether too much sympathy and sounded altogether too near. “Besides, your skill--or lack thereof--is hardly the point.”
“No?” She shot a look over her shoulder and found him standing an arm’s reach from her. Warmth gleamed in his dark eyes, sending her pulse soaring.
Milord fancies milady.
Without making a conscious decision to do so, she shifted ‘round to search his face. Had she been right all those months before? She’d been so certain she’d felt something spark between them, only to hear his disparaging words. Can’t you see what sort of people they are, Caroline?
He’d humiliated her. Left her feeling foolish and rejected and like the awkward, ugly, one-eye patch little girl she’d been, once upon a time.
“You look very strange,” he said, tone suddenly wary.
“I haven’t the faintest notion of what you mean,” she said, her voice oddly breathless. Then, instinct driving her, she inched closer.
There. She saw it—the flare of undisguised heat in his hooded eyes.
Unfortunately, an answering heat swirled through her, settling low in her belly.
She’d never experienced anything like the intoxicating rush of…
she couldn’t say what it was, only that it filled her with a deep sense of curiosity about what it might feel like to be held in his strong arms and kissed. Truly kissed.
Eyes locked with his, she took another tiny step.
His brows slamming downward, he took an answering series of steps backward. Then he raked a hand through his thick hair and started for the door.
“Where are you going?” she demanded, barely resisting the urge to follow after him.
“You’ve cleared things up nicely, and I have work,” he said from the doorway.
And then he was gone. Odious man. Making her feel all those delicious things, and for what purpose? To run away from her and leave her wondering if she’d imagined his response all over again?