‘Did I remember to dismiss you as of yesterday when you finally got here, Marianne?’ he asked her huskily.
‘Why? What have I done wrong?’
‘Nothing yet and we did agree on a month’s trial, did we not?’
‘Yes, but...’
‘But nothing, that month was up yesterday and never have thirty days seemed to tick by so wretchedly slow it felt as if every one of them was a month in its own right. So now you can consider yourself unemployed and free of any obligation to keep Juno company in future unless you do so out of the goodness of your heart, Mrs Turner.’
‘I did not think I was doing so very badly at looking after your niece,’ she said and now it was being taken from her she realised how much she had enjoyed getting to know the young woman she had spent so much time with lately and what on earth was she going to do with herself instead now she did not suit her noble employer?
‘That has nothing to do with it,’ he told her with a hunted look as if he was being asked to explain something very difficult indeed. ‘Harry Marbeck is a gentleman,’ he said at last and she could not hide a smile at his look of frustration as if even he knew he was being an idiot.
‘So you told me when he brought my sister to Darius and Fliss’s wedding.’
‘Precisely and I believe I also told you he would not seduce a lady in his employment simply because he is one at heart, whatever the gossips say about him,’ he said and at last she understood what he was trying so hard not to tell her and she had a struggle not to laugh. Or maybe even sing out loud, or jump up and down with glee because apparently he wanted to seduce her after all and she felt exactly the same way about him.
‘Hence your abrupt termination of my employment, I suppose?’ she said to help him out, although how on earth he thought he was going to be able to seduce her with Miss Donne as her fierce chaperone she had no idea, but her heart was still singing at the very idea.
‘It has been a very long month.’
She looked a question at him and wondered about the potential for making love in a glasshouse. She glanced about at the scrubbed-out pots and tin labels and a few sleepy plants on the edge of an autumn sleep and above all so much glass to make them visible to anyone who cared to look out of an upstairs window or out of a back door and decided not; it was a highly unlikely trysting place. They would be far too obvious from the house and probably to one or two of Miss Donne’s neighbours as well, if they realised what was going on down here and trooped up to their attics to peer down at a scandalous lord and a far-too-willing lady.
‘And I am going to marry you,’ he insisted as if primed for an argument and getting his best one in first.
‘No, you are not,’ she told him emphatically and backed away as if he had insulted her. ‘No, no, no, you are most definitely not going to do anything of the sort, Viscount Stratford,’ she added just in case he had not understood her the first time.
‘No wedding, no bedding,’ he drawled with knowledge of the fiery heat that was coursing through her like wildfire in his smile and probably in his eyes as well if only she could see them clearly enough in the rapidly falling dusk that made her worries about them being seen out here less relevant.
Drat the man, but he knew perfectly well what he had done to her and he probably only kissed her in the first place to remind her how he could set her senses alight with one intent look and as for an actual kiss... Well, his kisses ought to be classified as dangerous weapons. ‘I am never going to marry you, my lord,’ she told him with an emphatic shake of the head that would probably do terrible damage to the topknot of honey curls softened by a few cunningly escaped ringlets Bet had wound it into to go with the finery of Marianne’s best velvet gown. ‘You are who you are and I am who I am and I did not become pregnant during five years of marriage, so of course it would be too much of a risk to take with your vast possessions and title if you were to marry me.’
‘You are a gentleman’s daughter and the widow of a hero who died to preserve the liberty of his country, but I am only a man who had a title, riches and possessions landed on him at seventeen. I did nothing to deserve or win it all, it merely dropped into my lap. Juno running away made me look hard at what matters in life and she is one who does, but I soon realised you do even more, Marianne. Once I crashed at your feet like a fool and learned to see people as they really are I woke up to all the possibilities of a love match with you and felt like a complete idiot for ever thinking a marriage of convenience with the new Mrs Yelverton would be enough for either her or me. You have taught me how to love and I am daring to hope I can teach you to love me back if I keep on telling you how dearly you matter to me and how mistaken you would be to turn your back on us simply for the sake of a boy we might or might not give