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      * * *

      ‘Are you going to read me a story tonight, Uncle Val?’ the little boy asked. ‘I’m really not very sleepy.’

      ‘You never are, even when you don’t have a fever,’ Valbourg said, stowing the last of his nephew’s toys in the large wooden box. ‘I would be quite worn out if I did all you do in a day.’

      ‘Is that because you’re old?’

      ‘I beg your pardon?’ Valbourg straightened. ‘Who told you I was old?’

      ‘Aunt Dorothy. Right before she told Grandfather it was time you were married.’ Sebastian gazed up at his uncle with wide, trusting eyes. ‘Are you getting married, Uncle Val?’

      ‘I wasn’t planning on it, no.’

      ‘It would be all right if you did. I mean, as long as you didn’t send me away.’

      ‘Send you away? Why on earth would I do that?’ Valbourg asked, sitting down on the edge of Sebastian’s bed. ‘This is your home now and has been for the past two years.’

      ‘I know, but Aunt Dorothy said the lady you marry might not want me to stay here any more,’ the boy whispered, his flushed face evidence of the fever that had only recently broken. ‘She said she might prefer to have her own children around her rather than someone else’s.’

      Anger swelled like a balloon in Valbourg’s chest. Damn Dorothy! Why couldn’t she mind her own business? She should have known better than to say something so hurtful in front of an impressionable young boy. ‘I am not going to send you away, and you mustn’t listen to anything Aunt Dorothy says. I shall marry when I am good and ready and not a moment before. So let’s have no more talk about you leaving, understood?’

      ‘Understood,’ Sebastian said, relief chasing the shadows from his eyes. ‘I’m not getting married either. I think girls are silly,’ he proclaimed with all the certainty of a six-year-old. ‘Don’t you?’

      ‘They certainly can be.’

      ‘Uncle Hugh doesn’t think so. He said I’ll come to like girls very much when I am his age, because he started liking them very much when he was mine.’

      Valbourg sighed, wondering if there was any member of his family he wasn’t going to have a word with. ‘I think we’ll leave that discussion for another time. Your aunt Mary’s betrothal ball is this evening and she won’t be pleased if I am late.’ He tucked Brynley Bear, Sebastian’s loyal companion, into the bed next to him. ‘Nanny Lamb will be in to read you a story, all right?’

      ‘Yes, all right,’ Sebastian said, though Valbourg could tell from the expression on the boy’s face that his thoughts were still distracted. ‘Don’t you want to get married, Uncle Val?’

      ‘I suppose, when the right lady comes along. But for now, it’s just going to be you, me and Brynley Bear rattling around in this big old house. And here’s Nanny Lamb to read you a story.’ Valbourg leaned forward and kissed his nephew on the forehead. ‘Sleep well and I’ll see you in the morning.’

      ‘Uncle Val?’

      ‘Hmm?’

      ‘I’m glad you don’t want me to leave. I do miss Mama and Papa, but I’m happy I came to live here with you rather than with Aunt Dorothy,’ Sebastian confided. ‘She looks a lot older than you and, sometimes, she smells funny.’

      Valbourg’s mouth twitched. ‘Yes, she does, but it isn’t polite to tell ladies things like that, so we’d best keep that to ourselves, all right?’

      ‘If you say so. Goodnight, Uncle Val.’

      Valbourg ruffled the boy’s dark curls and then vacated his seat on the bed. He regretted not being able to stay and read Sebastian a story. Reading to his nephew had become one of the highlights of his day. The childishly innocent stories took him back to his own untroubled youth, and the quiet time he spent with Sebastian was a reminder of what really mattered in life. It was only when he had an important engagement like this evening’s that he let Nanny Lamb take over.

      It might seem a surprisingly domestic arrangement for the Marquess of Alderbury’s eldest son and heir, but Valbourg had no complaints. Having Sebastian living with him was the best thing that could have happened to him—even if it had come about as the result of the most unfortunate circumstances and a promise rashly given to his youngest sister six years ago.

      A promise he never thought he’d be called upon to fulfil.

      ‘Ah, good evening, my lord,’ Finholm said as Valbourg arrived at the bottom of the stairs. ‘Is Master Sebastian feeling better?’

      ‘I believe so, though Dr Tennison said he would stop by again in the morning,’ Valbourg said. ‘If you need me, just send word to Alderbury House.’

      ‘I’m sure everything will be fine,’ the butler said. ‘Master Sebastian is a plucky little lad. I doubt there will be any cause for concern.’

      ‘I hope not, Finholm. Goodnight.’

      With the butler’s reassurances ringing in his ears, Valbourg set off for his sister’s engagement celebration, content in the knowledge that he was leaving Sebastian in good hands. It was amazing how completely the responsibility for raising a child changed his priorities. Before his nephew had come to live with him, Valbourg had lived a life as irresponsible as most; gambling too often, drinking too much and amusing himself with a string of beautiful young mistresses. He had given no thought to his future because he’d had no reason to expect it would be any different from his past.

      He certainly hadn’t expected Fate to walk in and turn his life upside down. Who could have foreseen that his youngest sister and her husband—both only twenty years old—would be struck down by illness, forcing Valbourg into the role of guardian to their four-year-old son? Who could have known that with Sarah’s death, the sybaritic lifestyle he’d led would come to an abrupt end? That the room he had used as a study would be converted to a nursery, or that Nanny Lamb would be coaxed out of retirement and that overnight, the heir to a marquessate and one of London’s most eligible bachelors would become a sober and responsible family man.

      Certainly not him.

      But, in fact, that was precisely what had happened, and in the two years since Sebastian’s arrival, Valbourg had become a model of sobriety and restraint. A paragon with no vices and few regrets.

      Except one—and he would be seeing her tonight. Miss Catherine Jones. The Angel of London. The one temptation he had tried—and so far succeeded in—resisting.

      It must be Fate interfering in his life again, Valbourg reflected moodily as he set out on foot for his father’s house. Only a perverse deity would bring the Angel into his life at a time when he could do absolutely nothing about it—because only Fate knew how desperately he wanted her. He had, ever since the first time he had seen her on the stage of the Gryphon Theatre in the role of Flora, goddess of spring.

      Garbed in a flowing white gown and with her silken hair caught up in a coronet of roses, Catherine Jones had appeared to him like something out of a dream; a golden-haired goddess sent to bewitch and beguile him. Her incredible, bell-like voice had filled the theatre and СКАЧАТЬ