Page 30 of My Darling Mr. Darling

Which was not to say that extorting Violet with plum cake for that very supper was any better—but he was willing to wager that Mrs. Nettles’ cooking would sweeten her out of her temper. And Mrs. Nettles had quite outdone herself this evening. The moment she had learned that John had made his peculiar request on behalf of her long-lost mistress, she had flown into a creative fervor to rival the haughtiest of French chefs. In the end, she had prepared no less than three baskets stuffed with every manner of indulgence she could produce, from medallions of beef filet sautéed in garlic and rosemary straight down to trifle liberally layered with plump strawberries.

He left his house at a quarter until ten, instructing the driver to pull the carriage around to the mews behind Violet’s residence in what was perhaps an overabundance of caution. This late in the evening, most of the neighborhood would be out and about to various balls, musicales, or perhaps the theatre—but Violet had stressed the importance of remaining unseen.

And so it was unseen he endeavored to remain as he climbed from the carriage and carefully lifted down the baskets, setting them atop the wall that bordered the small garden.

“Wait on the next street,” John told the driver. “I’ll come find you when I am ready to leave.” And if the driver thought anything unusual about such a request, he was well paid to keep his opinions to himself. With a quiet snap of the reins, the carriage retreated down the mews toward the street and disappeared.

John hoisted himself up over the wall and heard the snap of a thread and the ping of a button as it ripped free of his coat, but he landed in the grass of the garden no worse for the wear otherwise. He scanned the windows, searching for signs of movement within, but the windows were dark—except for one, on the ground floor, where a candle glowed on the sill.

He scrubbed a hand over his face, frowning. Awindow?Truly? But he seized the first basket and made his way toward it, rapping gently upon the glass when he reached it. Within moments Violet appeared, the flickering candlelight playing over features that looked rather tortured—whether she was yet in the throes of misery due to the daisies or whether it was owed to his unwelcome presence was yet to be determined.

She moved the candle aside and slowly, silently opened the window. “Be quiet,” she hissed. “Davis is a light sleeper.” And then, “Oof,” as she staggered beneath the weight of the basket he thrust through the window to her. “Good Lord. There must be a week’s worth of food in here.”

Clearly, Davis was not quite the light sleeper she’d claimed, given that she had spoken in an entirely normal tone for that. Nevertheless, he whispered back, “There’s two others like it remaining. Mrs. Nettles was in paroxysms of joy to cook for you once more.”

Her arms curled round the basket, and her face changed minutely in the candlelight, which could not disguise the glow of pleasure that suffused her cheeks. “I have missed her,” she said, and her voice was softer than he’d ever heard it, awkward and hesitant.

Softness, he thought, was not something Violet had had the luxury of for a very long time indeed. “I’m going back for the rest,” he said. “Where shall I take them?”

“The drawing room. It’s down that hall there,” she said as she stepped away from the window, with a nod in the correct direction, her shoulders pulling tight. “Doendeavor to walk softly.” And then she was gone, her slippers soundless on the floor as she retreated further into the house.

It was an effort to get both remaining baskets into the house by himself, but he managed to wrangle them through the window and slide in himself, though he had to wedge himself through at an odd angle, as the frame of the window had clearly not been constructed to accommodate his broad shoulders. He had the distinct impression that she had chosen the window merely for the inconvenience it presented, because there was a door not ten feet away from the window he’d just crawled through.

Still, he supposed she was entitled to a bit of petty vengeance, given that he’d outmaneuvered her. He collected the baskets and headed toward the drawing room, careful to step lightly. No doubt Daviswouldtoss him out on his arse—with a few bruises for his trouble.

Light glowed beneath the drawing room door, and poured out into the foyer when he pushed the door open. She’d lit a dozen candles at least, and they wreathed the table in the center of the room, dripping wax down onto the plates set beneath them. Two or three candles would not have been uncalled for, given the hour, but the room was small and a dozen was an overabundance indeed.

She had busied herself already with the first basket, and her teeth tore into a soft dinner roll. A flicker of pleasure crossed her face for half a moment, as if it had taken her unaware, but it was swiftly replaced with that cool, challenging expression that he was coming to realize was uniquely Violet. Her chin lifted almost imperceptibly, as if daring him to remark upon the candles.

Instead he set the remaining baskets on the floor and turned to close the door once more, keeping his own face carefully blank. He remembered the vicious shudder that had rolled through her the evening he had seen her breaking into his office, when she had been presented with the overwhelming darkness of the room.

Violet did not care for the dark, and it didn’t strain his imagination to guess why.

But rather than remark upon it, he took a seat in the same place he always had—a contrived gesture he hoped might lend her some comfort. She had chosen the same chair she sat in during her lessons, and with his own selection he had cast them once more into the roles of instructor and student.

He tipped the lid off of one of the baskets at his feet and attempted what he hoped was a genial pitch. “You’re looking…well, miserable.” Dreadful, if he were honest. The golden glow of candlelight couldn’t disguise the redness of her nose or the telling hoarseness of her voice. And there was a stack of handkerchiefs folded on the arm of the chair beside her.

With one hand she pinched off a bit of the roll, popping the fluffy morsel into her mouth. “I agreed to dinner,” she said pointedly. “Not conversation.” The imperious wing of her brows suggested she was a prolific and skillful holder of grudges.

“Fair enough,” he said, drawing a bottle of wine from the basket. Mrs. Nettles had been thorough; nestled alongside it were two glasses wrapped in napkins to protect them on the journey, and a corkscrew. “I’m not accustomed to silence during meals; you’ll forgive me if I fill it myself.” He was, actually, entirely accustomed to it. Aside from those meals he took with Alex and the duchess, his meals were largely solitary. But there was no reason Violet ought to know that.

She did not dignify his statement with a response, and instead polished off the roll and began to explore the remaining contents of the basket at her feet, as if she had decided to ignore him entirely, his presence nothing more than an inconvenience to bear up under until she had finished her meal.

He poured two glasses of wine as he considered what he ought to say, and slid one across the table toward her. At last he decided to circumvent the muddied morass of disjointed thoughts traipsing through his mind and simply begin at the beginning. “Your father hired me straight out of Cambridge,” he said. “FromCambridge, I should say. I left university to work for him when I was not quite twenty. Your father had little in the way of formal education, you know, but he was well-studied nonetheless.”

She said nothing, of course, but a little frown tugged at her lips as she pulled a dish from the basket and lifted the lid. The fragrant scent of a rich cream sauce permeated the air; he assumed she’d unearthed the chicken and mushrooms. She snatched up the fork and knife he handed across to her and averted her eyes once more, chewing silently.

“I met him at a pub,” he said, and that attracted her attention for a fraction of a moment, a whisper of surprise flashing across her face. So shewaslistening, at least. “Like many of the students, I spent the occasional evening swilling ale with my classmates. Your father was at the same pub, and we had engaged in a row of some sort—I’m afraid I was far too inebriated to recall the details. I am given to understand that it involved some method of doing business upon which we disagreed strenuously. Insults were flung; threats were made. But at the end of it, your father offered to hire me.”

Was it a trick of the light, or did he see a question in her eyes? He paused to search through one of the baskets, withdrawing a pot that he thought must contain potatoes a la crème, which he passed to her, and which she accepted quickly enough.

“Your father, you see,” he continued as she lifted the lid and inhaled deeply of the steam that billowed forth, “had reached the point in his career where he had made scads and scads of money—but his business had stagnated. It hadn’t only ceased to grow, it was actively flagging. He was surrounded by employees who told him only what they thought he wished to hear, when he had so long relied upon their expertise. He knew his business was suffering, and he knew where the problem lay. And I was the perfect solution.”

He did not tell her how trapped he had felt in his own circumstances, how bored he had been at Cambridge. He did not tell her how Townsend’s offer had come like a blessing from on high. How it had given him the permission he had felt he needed to cast off the shackles of his unhappy life and pursue his own interests instead.

“I admired your father very much,” he said instead. “Perhaps it would have been better to say we admired each other. He taught me everything he could, and I was…” Grateful would have been appropriate, yes. And he had been. But he had lived for the pride that Townsend had taken in him, lived for the endless bickering and discourse over brandy well into the early hours of the morning. Townsend had been as a father to him, and he had been devastated when the man had died.

And desperately jealous of the young girl who had called himFather. It hadn’t been fair, he knew, but Townsend’s affection for his daughter had been a bitter draught to swallow, because she had never had to earn it. She lived in her perfect, secure world, content in the unassailability of her father’s love. And Townsend had just been so bloodyproudof her, despite the myriad ways she had, in John’s opinion, failed him. Failed to be the kind of daughter that Townsend had deserved.