Seduction of an English Beauty. Miranda Jarrett

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      Diana snapped her fan shut. “That’s my governess,” she said, her eyes round with urgency. “I can’t let her find you here with me. Hurry, hurry, you must hide!”

      “Hide?” The gentleman smiled indulgently. “There’s no need for that, my lady.”

      “Oh, yes, there is.” Swiftly, Diana glanced around the room, searching for a hiding place, and grabbed his arm. “There, behind those curtains. I’ll send her on her way as soon as I can.”

      But he didn’t move, only patting her hand as it clung to his sleeve. “I’m not ashamed to be here with you, my lady.”

      “That is not the point, sir, not when—ah, Miss Wood, you’ve found me!” Diana smiled brightly, and pulled her hand free of the gentleman’s. “I was just coming to answer your call when this gentleman stopped me.”

      With her hands clasped at the waist of her plain gray gown, Miss Wood didn’t answer at first, taking her time to judge the situation for herself. Such silence was hardly new to Diana, and she knew that the longer it continued, the less likely her governess was to decide in Diana’s favor. While Miss Wood herself was still a young woman, not yet thirty, in Diana’s eyes she would forever be a model spinster-governess: small, drab, inclined to stoutness, severity and suspicion. If Father had sent her away with the head gaoler of Newgate Prison, he couldn’t have watched her more closely than Miss Wood.

      Even now the governess was studying the gentleman, from the silver buckles on his shoes to the top of his gold-colored head, with the same shrewdness that a farmer’s wife used to gauge the worth of vegetables on market day. Finally, she gave a quick little nod, her way of prefacing disagreeable tasks.

      “Good day, sir,” she said, her voice as chill as ice as she dropped a perfunctory curtsey. “Forgive me for speaking plainly, sir, but I do not believe you have been properly introduced to her ladyship. My lady, come with me.”

      Diana sighed with frustration. All she’d wanted was a few moments’ conversation, a small diversion from this wretched trip’s tedium. She’d meant no harm nor scandal, nor had she intended to do anything to put her return to England and London and her season in jeopardy.

      But there’d be no use in arguing with Miss Wood, because, as usual, Miss Wood had truth on her side. Diana hadn’t been properly introduced to the gentleman; she didn’t even know his name. Besides, if he was like all the others, now he’d make as hasty a retreat as he possibly could, the cowards. No man, gentle or otherwise, liked to be reminded of the fearsome prospect of her father’s displeasure, even though Father was hundreds of miles away in England.

      She swallowed back her unhappiness and raised her chin, prepared to follow Miss Wood back into discretion, gentility and exquisite, undeniable boredom.

      But to her surprise, the gentleman spoke first.

      “Hold a moment, Miss Wood,” he said, his voice strong and sure and not the least cowardly. “If all that’s lacking between this lady and myself is an introduction, then introduce us properly, and set everything to rights.”

      Diana gasped, startled that a gentleman had dared challenge Miss Wood’s authority or her father’s wrath. None of the other men that she’d known in the past would have. But this one was already proving himself to be a superior gentleman—quite superior.

      But Miss Wood remained unconvinced. She stopped abruptly, drawing herself up as tall as she could before him. “How could I possibly introduce you to her ladyship, sir, when no one has introduced you to me?”

      “Then I shall.” He bowed, more towards Diana than her governess. “Miss Wood, I am Lord Edward Warwick, and my father is the Marquess of Calvert, and if you choose not to believe me, you need only ask my uncle, who is also a guest of this house.”

      “My lord, I am delighted to make your acquaintance,” Diana said cheerfully, flickering her fingers as she held her hand out to him. True, an heir to a title would have been preferable to a younger son, but after her sister had gone and married a questionable Irishman for love alone, Father would consider the second son of a marquess as a genuine prize. “Not even Miss Wood could object to you!”

      But Miss Wood could, and now she stepped between them. “If you please, might I ask your uncle’s name?”

      Lord Edward smiled past Miss Wood to Diana. “My uncle is Reverend Lord Henry Patterson, the elderly gentleman residing in the rooms across the hall. He is so occupied with his studies and his writings that he keeps to himself, but there is no more honorable Englishman to be found here in Rome.”

      “Oh, Miss Wood, not even you could find fault with a recommendation like that,” Diana said, her gaze fixed entirely on Lord Edward’s charming face. It must have been months since an English gentleman had looked at her with such open admiration.

      Perhaps she’d been pining after the season for no reason at all. Lord Edward wouldn’t have heard of her misadventure with the groom at Aston Hall, or her flirtation with the guard in Chantilly, or even that last dramatic little affair in Paris when she’d been kidnapped for a brief time. All Lord Edward would know of her was what he saw and what she told him. With a little discretion, anything—anything!—could be possible.

      “You know exactly what to say to reassure us, my lord,” she continued happily. “What better reference for character could there be than the Church of England?”

      “None, my lady,” Miss Wood said darkly. “But let me please remind you that we must take care, after—”

      “Come with me.” Lord Edward took Diana’s hand—seized it, really, as if he’d every right—and led her from the room and across the hallway. “You can meet the old fellow yourself, and he can set things formally between us.”

      “This is not proper, my lord,” Miss Wood protested, scurrying after them. “This is not right. Because her ladyship’s rank is higher than yours, you must be introduced to her, not the other way about.”

      But Lord Edward was already opening the door to the other rooms.

      “Uncle, it’s Edward again,” he called as he entered, not bothering to wait for the footman that came rushing towards them, still buttoning his livery coat. “I’ve discovered the English ladies staying beneath your roof, and brought them to you for approval.”

      In a large room that must serve as parlor, study and dining room sat an elderly gentleman, his armchair drawn close to a large table before the open window. Although rain splattered on the stone sill and curled the papers on the edge of the table, the man himself was oblivious, too absorbed in his work to notice.

      Wisps of his white hair poked out from beneath a black velvet beret such as painters wore, and though his black linen waistcoat and breeches were ordinary enough, his bare feet were thrust into outlandish needlepoint slippers embroidered with red roses. Scowling with concentration, he held a large magnifying glass in one hand and a fragment of ancient pottery in the other, while puffing furiously on a long-stemmed white clay pipe.

      Lord Edward cleared his throat with noisy emphasis. “Uncle, if you please,” he said. “The ladies, Uncle.”

      “Ehh?” Startled, the Reverend Lord Henry Patterson jerked his head around to face them, his scowl at once dissolving into a beatific smile. He put down his pipe and his fragment, and rose from his chair, sweeping the velvet cap from СКАЧАТЬ