Page 72 of Lady Diana's Lost Lord

“Always.” He gave her hand a squeeze, and she squeezed back, her small fingers tightening around his.

She nodded, a little frown of concentration pursing her lips. “Then I’ll punch ‘em,” she said.

“You’ll—” Ben drew a swift breath and swallowed back an odd little flutter of laughter. “You’llpunchthem.”

Hannah raised her other hand, clenched it into a tiny fist, thumb wrapped around her folded fingers, as he’d shown her after that bit of nastiness in the village with little Johnny. “I’ll punch them,” she declared. “Anyone who says mean things about me.”

He’d forgotten, somehow, that people had been saying nasty things of her for some time, now. And it had made her angry—angry enough to lashout at times. But she had never lacked for his support, or for Diana’s. She hadn’t let those nasty words poison her, hadn’t let them twist her perception of herself.

Perhaps the words themselves mattered less than one’s feelings about them. And he—he had never wasted an opportunity to make certain that Hannah knew her worth. People could say whatever they wished, and those cruel words would not alter Hannah’s opinion of herself. Diana had been so very right—Hannah had never needed him to protect her from every eventuality. She had only needed his unwavering love and support. And he had always given her that.

“What if it’s someone you can’t punch,” he asked. “An adult, or—or the king himself.”

Hannah set her shoulders, tipping her chin to an angle that was humorously imperious for a child of her tender years. In clear, precise tones that were far too prim for the little rapscallion he knew her to be, she said, as if she were quoting someone, “How ill-bred of you.”

A glorious, delightfully arrogant set-down. He could only imagine the furor it would cause, the humiliation of having a child so young proclaim someone’s impertinence in such a dry little voice.

Yes. Hannah had needed both of them, he thought. She had needed Diana especially to teach her to scrap like the lady she ought to be. To teach her a different sort of strength, one that was best shown in the stubborn tilt of a chin, in the refusal to be cowed by one’s detractors.

“Good,” he said, his voice gone raspy with emotion. “But still it could be dangerous for you in London. You were too young to remember, but once, a very long time ago, someone tried to take you from me. He sent men to abduct you.”

Her eyes widened. “Really?”

“Yes. You were just a baby,” he said. “You screamed, and I came running, and—I chased them off,” he said. But God, it had scared thelifeout of him. He hadn’t felt safe since. Hadn’t felt thatHannahwas safe since. “That’s why we stay to small towns,” he confided. “There’s less of a chance of running into someone I might once have known, someone who would carry tales back to London and put you in danger.”

“Well,” Hannah said, speculatively. “I’mverygood at screaming.”

Another startled flutter of laughter he only just choked back. “I’m very good at running,” he said. And he would always come running if she needed him—always. Still, the thought did not comfort him. Footpads ran rampant inLondon, and the city was rife with unsavory sorts, underworld denizens who would perform just about any task for the promise of a few coins.

Hannah shuffled her feet beneath the covers, flopping back onto her pillow with a sense of security he could hardly understand. “You won’t let anyone take me,” she said, and she sounded so certain, so at ease. “Diana won’t, either.”

Of course she wouldn’t. Like a lioness with a precious cub, she would fight tooth and claw to prevent it. And Hannah—Hannah would be safer withtwoguardians. Diana came from a powerful family, whose wealth and prestige far outstripped his own. She would wield the full force of it, if necessary, to protect Hannah.

Ben knew, of course, that he couldn’t protect Hannah from everything, from the whole of the world. Probably that knowledge was a burden that hung heavy upon every father’s shoulders; that there would inevitably come a time when a child had to handle their own troubles. That she had so many more years left than did he.

It was a long way off, yet, he hoped, that inevitable day when she would have to fight her own battles. The best thing he could do for her was to prepare her for them. To teach her how to fight them, how to hold her head up over adversity.

For so long it had just been the two of them together. But it didn’thaveto be. Hannah could have aunts and uncles. Cousins. Brothers and sisters. Family who would remain at her side even when he was long gone from this world.

“Probably it won’t be easy,” he said, and dashed at his eyes with the back of his hand. She was still so young; she couldn’t possibly comprehend the complications that would accompany a decision of this magnitude. But she knew what she wanted—and it wasn’t a small cottage by the sea. It wasn’t a circulating library and lemon ices. It was a family. The one they had almost had. But he hadn’t the funds to keep them living well in London. At least, not on the interest a proper investment would generate. Probably what he had would see them through a few years, but it wouldn’t keep them comfortable in perpetuity. It wouldn’t see Hannah through her come-out, or provide her the dowry she ought to have as the daughter of an earl. It wouldn’t sufficiently provide for any other children they might have. He was as he’d always been—an impoverished nobleman. They would be asking Diana to live a life that was so muchlessthan the one she deserved. “The simple fact is that I have got my name, my title, you…and very little else to recommend me.”

Hannah shoved her hand beneath her pillow, swiping it around until at last she withdrew a crumpled handkerchief. She spread it out over the edge of the bed, smoothing it with her fingers until at last the words stitched upon it were legible in the candlelight.

Wherever you go, you take the whole of my heart with you.I love you always.

“It’s enough,” she said. “Don’t you think, Papa?”

God, he hoped so. “I think,” he said, squeezing her hand, “that we must go to London.”

Chapter Twenty Eight

You’ve been at this for the last four hours at least,” Marcus said as he strode into the upstairs sitting room, where Diana had, indeed, been seated at her writing desk since midmorning. "Haven’t you made any progress at all?”

No, though she’d made large splotches of ink upon innumerable sheets of paper. There were just too many things she wanted to say, and she didn’t know quite how to begin. Gnawing at her mind were the myriad uncertainties she’d acquired.

A month, now, and Ben still had not written. Perhaps—perhaps he never would. Perhaps she would put pen to paper at last and scratch out her love upon it, and it would sit, unsent, in the drawer of her writing desk forever for want of direction.

Perhaps they had found it already, the life they had dreamed of for so long. Perhaps they had forgotten her in that perfect happiness they had finally achieved. She had occupied their lives for so short a time.