Page 1 of The Governess and the Rogue (Somerset Stories #6)

Chapter One

P.O. Steamer “Pera”

Alexandria to Marseilles

B eatrice Layton crossed the moonlit deck of the ship, her cheek still burning from the stinging slap she’d received. She’d be fortunate if it didn’t leave a bruise. And if it did, she thought bitterly, she’d have no one but herself to blame.

Everyone from Calcutta to Bombay had warned her not to take a position as governess with the deplorable Dimsdale family.

The parents were well-known tyrants, and their four children even worse.

Bea had observed the little villains often over the years, shouting at their mother, striking their native bearers, and driving off one ayah, nanny, and governess after another.

When the time had at last come for the Dimsdales to quit India, there had been no one left for them to hire to look after their beastly brood on the months-long voyage home. No servant desperate enough—or stupid enough—to take them on.

Not until Bea.

Drawing her thin, knitted shawl tighter about her arms, she walked to the ship’s railing just as she did every night after dark, preparing to make her obligatory wish on the evening star.

It was a longstanding ritual, taught to her by her late mother.

One practiced whether Bea was at home or abroad, on land or over water. She was loath to abandon it.

Not that it ever worked.

Bea had wished for countless things in the past two decades and none of those wishes had come true.

That she persisted owed more to honoring her mother’s memory than it did to any intrinsic faith of her own.

The late Sybil Layton had believed in stars and wishes and all manner of lovely romantic things.

As a girl, Bea had believed in them too.

But she was no longer a child of six. She was a woman of six and twenty, alone in the world, with only herself to depend upon.

Harsh reality had long ago leached the romanticism from her soul.

She’d been forced to be practical. To see things as they were, rather than wishing for some star-sent miracle to change them.

Nevertheless…

Some childhood habits were excessively hard to break.

She approached the rail of the ship, searching the sky.

There was a full moon tonight. It shone as bright as a naphtha lamp, shimmering in concert with an abundance of twinkling stars.

Their light was reflected in the sea below—an endless expanse of softly rippling black water that stretched, unbroken, toward the horizon.

It had been two days since Bea had seen land. And it would be many more until she saw it again.

Endless days, and every one of them a trial. And for what? For the price of passage back to England? To a country where she had no friends or family to welcome her? Where the best she could hope for was a chance to find another position?

Her shoulders slumped. She leaned against the rail, feeling the uncharacteristic prickle of tears at the back of her eyes. In moments like this, she wondered why she kept going. But she had little choice. It was either persevere in her present position, or?—

A deep, masculine voice sounded behind her. “You’re not thinking of jumping, are you?”

Bea’s heart leapt in alarm. Spinning around with a start, she came face to face with a gentleman she’d never seen before.

But not a gentleman. A soldier .

He was unshaven, clad in an old wool cavalry coat and trousers, and balancing some of his weight on the cane in his right hand.

It was that which first caught her attention.

The rest of him came second—the broad shoulders, tousled golden hair, and weary ice-gray eyes that glinted with a trace of wry humor.

Her mouth went dry. “I beg your pardon?”

“I wouldn’t advise it,” he said. “We’d both end up drowning.”

Bea took an unconscious step backward. The ship’s rail pressed against her back. “ We? ”

“I’d have to leap in after you, wouldn’t I?” he said. “That’s what heroes do.” His mouth quirked briefly. “Or so I’ve been told.”

Her pulse accelerated as he came to stand beside her at the rail. He was a full head taller than she was and smelled, very faintly, of bay rum.

She hadn’t been personally introduced to everyone on the ship, but after the land portion of the journey from Suez to Alexandria, she knew them well enough by sight. And this man—this rogue —wasn’t among the passengers she’d seen.

He must have boarded at the docks in Alexandria, else she would have noticed him. He was the sort of man a woman would notice, even if she didn’t have a mind to.

“You should know,” he said, casting a glance out at the water. “It’s not as calm as it looks from this distance. And it’s cold. If you must throw yourself over the side, I’d advise you wait until we’re nearer to Greece.”

Bea drew herself up with offended dignity. Never mind that her heart was still racing. It wasn’t safe to be alone with a strange man. Not when one was an unmarried woman of the servant class. And certainly not in the moonlight.

“I was not planning on throwing myself over the side,” she informed him. “Mister…?”

“Colonel,” he said. “As to the rest, I’m afraid I’m traveling incognito. I prefer to keep it that way, Miss Layton.”

She blinked in surprise. “You know my name?”

“I’ve observed you on the deck with your young charges. They’re forever shrieking it.” His gaze fell to her reddened cheek. A frown darkened his brow. “Did one of them do that?”

Bea flushed, mortified that anyone, even a stranger, should witness the depths to which she’d fallen.

A half dozen responses sprang to her lips—bitter, candid, ill-advised.

For once, she managed to restrain them. For all she knew, this self-described colonel was a friend of the Dimsdales.

The last thing Bea wanted was to be caught speaking ill of her employers.

“They are willful children,” she allowed. “But?—”

“They’re not children at all,” he said. “They’re savages.”

She flinched at his plain speaking.

So, not a friend of the family, then.

But not a friend of hers, either.

Bea couldn’t afford to agree with him. Her position was already too tenuous.

Turning back to the rail, she again faced the sea. The full skirts of her plain wool dress fluttered in the wind that whispered over the moonlit water. A shiver went through her slim frame. “Yes, well, if you must know… It’s a temporary position. I’ve only to endure it until we reach Southampton.”

The colonel remained at her side. “That’s nearly two weeks altogether.”

Her stomach knotted. “I’m aware.”

“If they’re already striking you?—”

“Really, sir, it’s none of your affair.”

“—it’s only going to get worse.”

She shot him a doubtful look. He sounded so certain. “You have experience with children?”

“My siblings have been extraordinarily prolific in my absence. Their offspring frequently write to me. I suppose they could be little beasts as well, but I confess, they don’t seem so from their letters.”

Her lips flattened in a repressive frown. “A correspondence with nieces and nephews hardly makes you an expert.”

“Not only a correspondence. I see them for short periods whenever I’m on leave.” He paused, adding, “And I’m expert enough to know that no one should be laying hands on you.”

Bea privately conceded his point. “As to that… I mean to speak to Mrs. Dimsdale about it in the morning.”

“If I were you?—”

“Which you aren’t.”

“—I’d wake her now. There’s no point putting it off until tomorrow. Better to confront the thing head on than?—”

Bea straightened. “If you’re quite finished?”

His expression hardened with impatience, but his eyes were kind. “I’m offering you the wisdom of my experience.”

“I thank you for it, Mr. Colonel.” Bea tightened her shawl about her. “But the hour grows late. I pray you would excuse me.”

Not waiting for his reply, she turned on her heel and strode off across the deck in the direction of her shared cabin.

Her pulse beat heavily at her throat. He’d flustered her, drat him.

And it wasn’t because he’d taken her off her guard.

Or even because he was so handsome beneath his overgrown hair and beard.

It was because she’d been tempted—sorely, recklessly tempted—to confide in him.

Which would have been a mistake indeed.

Bea had learned her lesson on that score. To be sure, it was the very reason she was in this predicament. Dismissed from one post after another, for being too bold, too opinionated, too bloody difficult, until the only family left to whom she could apply for work were the Dimsdales.

Unpleasant as her new position was, Bea couldn’t afford to risk it. Certainly not by unburdening herself to an impertinent stranger she’d only met three minutes ago.

No matter that he’d seemed sympathetic. Or that his eyes had been kind.

No.

If she was going to make it through this ordeal, she must hold her tongue, keep her own counsel, and, above all, refrain from rocking the boat.

* * *

Jack Beresford watched the prim little governess march off in the direction of the ship’s single and double-berth cabins. She rather resembled a sparrow who’d had its feathers ruffled. She was that plain of feature, that slim and small, with severely styled brown hair and an unusually pale face.

Her drab dresses didn’t help to dispel the illusion.

Every time Jack had spied her on the deck she’d been clad in ill-fitting coarse brown cloth or dreary gray wool.

Even so, she’d commanded his attention. There was starch in Miss Layton’s spine and a vaguely stubborn tilt to her chin.

It hinted at a formidable strength of will.

And Jack admired strong-willed women.

He wondered who she was underneath that starch, and what it was that made her look out at the stars with such melancholy attention.

“Sad creature,” Maberly remarked, emerging from the shadows.

Jack flexed his fingers around the handle of his cane. They were cramped from all the letters he’d been writing. A frightful nuisance. One would think he’d have developed more stamina for the task. It had been his primary occupation since departing Egypt.

“Aren’t we all?” he replied distractedly.

“Some sadder than others.” Maberly came toward the rail.

Not much more advanced than Jack’s own four and thirty years, the stocky batman managed to look far older.

His shock of chestnut hair had gone gray somewhere between Sebastopol and Ahvaz, and the unrelenting desert sun had turned his once youthful complexion to creased leather.

“Take that burned gent in the foredeck cabin. Thornhill. Cavalry soldier, he were, rescued from a sepoy prison.”

Jack knew about the fellow. The man had boarded the ship in Alexandria at the same time as Jack and several other wounded soldiers. Many were recovering from injuries suffered during the Indian rebellion, while others—like Jack?—were still nursing their wounds after last years’ conflict in Persia.

“None of us has escaped unscathed,” Jack said.

“Leastways, he got a fine horse out of it,” Maberly replied. “He has him stabled on board. A great big chestnut stallion. Hiran, he’s called.”

“Lucky fellow,” Jack said. He’d hoped to return with a horse or two of his own. Perhaps some carpets too, and a few trunks of souvenirs. Instead, he’d barely escaped his last battle with both limbs intact.

If one could call it a battle.

“You might talk with him if you want a chat,” Maberly suggested. “Safer than revealing yourself to the dogsbody servant of some jumped up colonials.”

Jack felt a flash of irritation. “I’ve no desire for a ‘chat,’ as you so quaintly put it,” he said. “And I didn’t reveal myself.”

“Beg pardon. I thought you was meant to be hiding from the ladies.”

Jack narrowed his eyes at his batman. Is this what Maberly thought of him? That he was some spineless coward? “I’m not hiding from anyone.”

“Avoiding, then,” Maberly amended.

Jack didn’t reply. He had been avoiding people, in truth.

And the ladies in particular. But it wasn’t Miss Farraday and her marriage-minded mama he was thinking about now, or any of the attractive single ladies or ripe young widows who had pursued him during his time abroad.

He was thinking of drab little Miss Layton and the burning red handprint across her cheek.

His temper crackled with unexpected heat.

Someone needed to grab those Dimsdale children by the scruffs and knock their heads together before they did one of their servants permanent harm.

“Miss Farraday and her mother very nearly had you in Cairo,” Maberly reminded him. “If they were to discover you’re on the ship, they’d plague you night and day until they caught you good and proper.”

“No one on board knows who I am, save for the captain and a handful of the crew,” Jack said. “I intend to keep it that way. As for any woman catching me…” He inwardly recoiled at the thought. “I’ve successfully evaded a leg shackle for years. I’ll not fall at the final hurdle.”

“You will if you insist on chatting with unmarried women in the moonlight.”

“Not a woman, a governess,” Jack said. “And Miss Layton wasn’t trying to beguile me.” Though, he reflected, her tear-damp eyes had been an uncommonly pretty shade of porcelain blue. That had been beguiling in itself. “She’s come out on the deck every evening since we left port.”

“Just as you have,” Maberly said. “Happen you’ll meet her again.”

Jack lapsed into silence. He’d already spent too many hours in his small cabin, devoid of company and conversation, only emerging at night to take the air.

The prospect of two more weeks of isolation sat heavily on his shoulders.

Especially now, when fate had presented him with an unexpected alternative to his solitude.

Given his present circumstances, the idea of encountering Miss Layton again wasn’t entirely unappealing.

“Perchance I will,” he replied. “What harm could it do?”