Page 9 of I Never Forget a Duke (The Night Fire Club #1)

A fter dinner, Adele took Smith to see the countess, who had professed earlier in the day that she was in high spirits and felt much better than she had in a week.

Adele went in first and made Smith stand in the hallway. She found the countess sitting up in bed with a book in her lap. “I’ve brought our guest to see you,” Adele said. “But I wanted to check on you before I brought him in. How do you feel?”

“Much better. The fever seems to have passed.”

“I am very happy to hear that.” Adele leaned over and smoothed over the countess’s hair. “You could use a little color on your cheeks.”

The countess waved Adele away. “Pale complexions are fashionable, are they not? Besides, our guest knows I have been sick in bed. That is not a secret we are trying to conceal.” She set the book on the side table. “Are we any closer to guessing our guest’s identity.”

“Not quite. The staff and I have been calling him Mr. Smith. However, he remembers a signet ring with a coat of arms on it that may help. Perhaps you can recognize it. Or you may even recognize our Mr. Smith.”

“I’m afraid my knowledge of these things is seeping away like my health, but I will do what I can. Bring him in.”

Adele fetched him from the hallway. The countess gave him a long look.

“My, you’re a handsome one,” said the countess.

Smith laughed. “Thank you, my lady.”

“You do look familiar to me, but I cannot place your face. Or perhaps I knew your father. It has been quite some time since I went out into society.”

“I wish I could say.”

“Tell me about this coat of arms. And please sit while you do it. I don’t need two tall people hovering over me.”

Adele pulled over two chairs, and she and Smith sat beside each other next to the bed. “I forgot the sketch I made downstairs,” said Smith, “but what I recall is lions and boars on a family crest, on a signet ring that I believe has an S inscribed on it.”

The countess closed her eyes for a brief moment, likely trying to picture what he was describing.

“I’m not connecting it with anything I remember, but then, my late husband, god rest his soul, was better at remembering those sorts of things anyway.

” She smiled at Smith. “I’d ask you to tell me about yourself, but you don’t know much, do you? ”

“I’m afraid not.”

“We lead a pretty quiet existence here,” said the countess. “Often Lady Adele and I read together. We play cards. She helps me with my needlepoint because the old eyes are not as sharp as they once were.”

“That sounds… nice.”

The countess laughed. “It sounds dull to you. We can’t all lead the thrilling life of a society gentleman.”

“What have you been reading today?” asked Adele, anxious to change the subject.

The countess touched the book on her bedside table and her face lit up. “It is a mystery story. A detective must find a missing person who seems to have disappeared into thin air. The story is quite enthralling, but I’m afraid it has few tips for how to solve our real-life mystery.”

“Do you think you’d see something like that in a novel?” Adele asked.

“I did read about a case similar to Mr. Smith’s in a novel once. The character fell from a great height and hit his head, although miraculously sustained no other injuries. When he came to, he could not remember anything. The affliction is called amnesia .”

“How did the character solve it?”

“He got hit in the head again.”

“I don’t think I would like that much,” said Smith. “Nor do I recall that being on the list of things Dr. Willis suggested to encourage my memory.”

“Best to follow the doctor’s orders, then,” said the countess with a wink.

The countess gave Smith a long look again. “I do wonder now if I knew your parents in my youth. You look about the age of my son. Perhaps it will come to me.”

Adele had hoped the countess would remember.

Part of her also hoped Smith’s family would be out looking for him, but how would they know to look for him here?

She’d been checking the newspapers for stories of missing nobles but had yet to see anything.

Perhaps tomorrow, she’d be able to put a name to the coat of arms and that would narrow the search enough.

Probably she could have gone to town today. Part of her was putting off the inevitable.

She felt a little guilty about that, but Smith hadn’t questioned her.

“Back in my day,” the countess said, “we still powdered our hair to go out. I met the earl at Lady Christie’s annual ball, and my own hair was too flat, so my sister talked me into this ridiculous wig festooned with flowers and feathers.

The earl told me later that he found me quite fetching, though I do not know how he did not think me a clown.

Let me tell you, I was not sad to see that custom pass into obscurity. ”

Adele wondered what the point of this story was, but Smith said, “Perhaps my parents were hidden under wigs when you met.”

“Precisely so,” said the countess. “My last social season was long ago. Lady Christie is long dead.”

“I have the sense that my father and I were not particularly close but that my mother and I were. Part of me wishes to see her, although I of course barely remember what she looks like.” Smith sighed. “I do not wish to bring the room down. Perhaps we could play cards?”

“I’d be delighted,” said the countess. “Adele, dear, there is a deck of cards in the top drawer of the chest of drawers in the corner.”

*

Much later, Smith escorted Adele down the hall to her bedroom, which he had not realized until they arrived was across the hall from the room where he’d been staying.

“The countess seems… lively.”

Adele laughed. “She is that, most days. I worry about her lately. She has not seemed herself, although she did tonight. Perhaps she just needed some company to put forward a good face.”

“She clearly cares for you a great deal.”

“Thank you. We’ve grown quite fond of each other, I think.” Adele shook her head and pressed a hand over her eyes.

“What is it?”

Adele sighed and dropped her hand. “Are you familiar with the Brothers Grimm?”

The question took him aback. “No. Are they society gentlemen?”

She laughed. “No. They are German academics who compile and publish old folktales. They released a collection not long ago that contains a story called ‘Cinderella.’ In the story, a young girl loses her mother, and then her father remarries. Shortly after the wedding, the father joins his first wife in heaven, and Cinderella is left in the care of her stepmother, who is not at all kind or compassionate. She makes Cinderella wait on her as a servant would. I lately feel that way. I am not a blood relation of anyone in the Sweeney family, nor am I a servant. I work for the countess, but my role is to keep her company, not make her tea or clean up her bedroom. And yet…”

“Is that why you are so unhappy?”

She winced. “I should stop being so unflinchingly honest with you or you will think me truly pathetic.”

“I do not think you pathetic.” Smith picked up her hand and held it in his own.

He was surprised by how small and delicate her hands seemed.

He smiled at her. “I appreciate your honesty. I suppose if we had met at a party, we’d have guile enough to put forth some perfect version of ourselves meant to impress each other.

But I feel that I have gotten to know something of you these last few days. ”

She smiled back shyly. “Thank you. I believe I have found some innate goodness of you. You may not know your name or your title or where you came from, but you are… yourself.”

“I hope so. I would hate to think that I’ve forgotten that I used to be a tyrant.”

“That cannot be possible.”

“And if it turns out I have no title or if I am a mere baronet without any significant wealth or property?”

“It would not matter to me. You earn a title merely by being born by the right family. A title does not speak to your work ethic or your kindness or your character.”

“Well put.”

He couldn’t seem to stop gazing at her. She had lovely eyes, light grayish blue, with long eyelashes. Her whole face brightened when she smiled. Would he ever tire of gazing at that face?

Was this conventional? He felt drawn to her, but they’d known each other mere days.

“That is not much of a story,” he said.

“What wasn’t?”

“Cinderella. Her father dies, so she becomes a servant to her stepmother?”

Adele laughed. The sound rang through the hallway.

“Oh, no. The story actually has quite a happy ending. You see, the king has a ball. The stepmother takes her own daughters but forbids Cinderella. Cinderella is of good heart and has befriended animals, so when she wishes with all her heart to go to the ball, birds bring her a beautiful gown to wear. When she arrives, her stepmother does not recognize her. The prince however thinks she is beautiful and will dance with only Cinderella. He falls in love with her. But she must return home before her stepmother does, so she runs away and leaves a shoe behind. The prince declares that he will marry only the girl who fits this shoe. Only Cinderella has feet small and dainty enough to fit the shoe. So they marry and she lives happily ever after.”

Smith smiled, liking the story. “That’s quite lovely.

I’m sure that was revenge on the stepmother, who likely wanted her own daughters to marry the prince.

” Something about that prickled at Smith.

Had he been a prince, or at least a gentleman, in the middle of a ballroom, surrounded by prospective eligible daughters? It seemed he had been.

“It is a nice story. Life does not work like that, though.”

“No?”

“Of course not. I may think of myself as Cinderella some days, toiling on chores, but no prince will fall in love with me and sweep me away from here.”

His heart ached for the way she’d given up. She deserved so much better than the hand she’d been dealt. He reached over and tucked a loose tendril of hair behind her ear.

“You are beautiful,” he said.

“Oh.” She looked down.

“Has no one ever told you that?”

“Not in a very long time.”

“Someone should tell you that every day, because it’s true.”

“I am old and on the shelf.”

“No.” Smith reached below her chin and tilted her face up so he could look at her eyes again.

“You are not old. Older than this year’s new crop of debutantes, yes, but not too old to marry and have children, if that is what you most desire.

Not too old to make something of your life. Not too old for this.”

He leaned down and kissed her. The vulnerability in her eyes and the slightest pout in her lips rendered him unable to resist.

This was ridiculous and he knew it. There were any number of obstacles laying between them. But enough time had gone by that he was beginning to doubt he’d ever fully recover his memories, so why shouldn’t he court Lady Adele? She was smart and beautiful and he knew he could make her happy.

She tasted lovely, too.

Dr. Willis had come by earlier that day and discussed his progress.

Smith had been grateful Adele had been otherwise occupied at the time, because the doctor had asked about some basic operations of Smith’s body.

Smith was relieved in a way that, as he kissed Adele, as he put his arms around her and pulled her close and felt her soft body pressed against his hard one, his body responded.

In fact, he was responding now for the first time since he’d first woken up in this house.

That part of him still worked. He’d been worried it wouldn’t.

Although now he’d surely scare her, so he eased away.

She squeezed his hand. “I think it is quite likely that whatever flirtation exists between us will not last once you recover your memories.”

“Perhaps. Or not. We can’t know.” He let out a breath. He should go to his room, but he couldn’t bring himself to leave her side. “Perhaps if nothing else, this has shown me that life is never quite what you expect it to be.”

She shook her head. “That’s a nice sentiment, but—”

“If nothing else, I hope that we might be friends. If I ever go back to my old life, I’d hate to think of it without you. You’ve been so kind to me these last few days, and I did nothing to deserve that except fall out of a carriage onto your doorstep.”

“Friends. That I can do.” She glanced at her door. “I should…”

“I will bid you good night, then, Lady Adele. Sleep well.”

“Good night.” She lifted up onto her toes and kissed his cheek.

When he slipped back into his room a moment later, he tried to tell himself that he was in no position to plan his future, but he wanted Adele to be a part of it in some way.