Page 23 of The Governess and the Rogue (Somerset Stories #6)

Chapter Twenty

B ea was awakened the next morning before sunrise, not by the efforts of the maid her hostess had lent her the previous evening, but by a soft and rather insistent knock on her chamber door.

She had an immediate sense who it might be.

Answering the surreptitious summons a moment later, clad in her dressing gown, with her hair still in its nighttime plait, her feminine intuition was proved right.

“Jack,” she whispered. “What are you doing here?”

He stood in the darkened hall, leaning heavily on his cane. He was dressed for the out of doors in a wool topcoat and trousers. “We need to talk,” he said quietly.

“We absolutely do,” she agreed. “But not, I should think, in my bedroom.”

“Naturally not in your bedroom. Not in the hall either. How soon can you be dressed?”

“What did you have in mind?”

“There’s a secluded place along the banks of a stream that runs through the grounds. It’s far enough away from the house that we won’t be disturbed.”

Bea nodded solemnly. “Give me five minutes.”

Closing the door, she hurried to wash and dress.

It took longer than she’d anticipated, owing to difficulties finding a suitably warm dress and stockings in the hodgepodge of packing cases the footmen had brought up last night.

Once discovered, she hastily put them on, and equally hastily brushed out her plait, twisting her hair back into a loose chignon at her nape.

Collecting the cashmere shawl Jack had given her, she at last exited her room.

Jack was leaning against the wall outside her door. He straightened when he saw her. “Ready?”

“Ready.”

“It’s this way,” he said.

Wrapping her shawl around her shoulders, Bea silently followed him along the corridor and down the curving staircase. Rather than crossing the marble entry hall to the house’s front doors, Jack led her down another flight of stairs to the kitchens.

Unlike the rest of the house, the kitchens were already lit, with servants bustling about, and an aged, aproned cook standing over an enormous iron stove, presiding over an array of steaming pots and kettles.

Jack winked at the old woman as they passed through, provoking her into a smile. “She’s been here since I was a lad,” he said to Bea as he opened the back door for her.

Bea preceded him outside, where dawn was breaking rapidly over the verdant, mist-covered landscape. A chill wind nipped at her face and ruffled her hair. “Is this where you grew up?” she asked.

Jack closed the door after them. “In large part.” He offered Bea his arm.

“My parents split their time between Beasley Park and Worth House, our family seat in Hertfordshire. But they far preferred it here. This is where my mother was born, and where she met my father as a girl. It’s where they fell in love. ”

Bea slipped her hand through Jack’s arm. As they left the kitchen yard, making their way over the sloping lawn toward a stand of trees in the distance, she couldn’t be entirely sure whether she was relying on him for support or he was relying on her.

It occurred to her that, perhaps, it was mutual. Each of them needing the other an equal amount to get where they were going. To keep from falling or losing their way.

The thought brought Bea some small comfort. Especially now, when Jack’s family, and anyone else she and Jack met, might reasonably view their arrangement as being appallingly one-sided.

Sunlight streaked through the branches ahead of them, burning away the morning fog and lighting their way through the trees.

Bea heard the stream before she saw it—the melodic trickle of softly rippling water.

And then it was there, before them, framed by gently sloping banks covered in a profusion of blue wildflowers.

They were forget-me-nots, Bea realized. As dazzling a display of them as she’d ever seen in her life. “How beautiful,” she whispered.

“It always is at this time of year,” Jack said. He guided her carefully down the bank, finding purchase with his cane.

“Are you sure you’re able?—”

“I’m not a complete invalid.”

She gripped his arm. “I wasn’t implying that you were. Only that, if you fell?—”

“I won’t,” he said. “Anyway, we’re nearly there. Do you see that fallen tree?”

Bea followed his gaze to an old, dried-out trunk at the edge of the water. It was hardly a park bench, but it would do. Jack escorted her to it. He remained standing until she seated herself. Only then did he join her.

“Your sister-in-law’s maid will be dismayed not to find me in my room when she comes to wake me,” Bea remarked.

“I doubt it,” Jack said. “My family has so far seemed to predict my every move.”

Her eyes jerked to his in swift alarm. “Don’t say they’ve already guessed that our engagement is a false one?”

“No. Not exactly.” Jack pushed his fingers through his hair. The thick blond strands shone like golden wheat in the newly risen sun. “But my brother doesn’t entirely believe it’s real either.”

Bea waited for him to explain, her stomach tense.

“I have a reputation, you see.” He paused. “ Had a reputation.”

“For larking about?”

His brows notched. “Someone’s already told you?”

“Mrs. Rawson mentioned it on the Pera,” Bea reminded him. “And Hannah referenced it last night.”

Jack frowned. “Yes, well… It isn’t true any longer.

” He paused, adding, “And they were never larks . I merely enjoyed risks. Dares, contests, and the like. My little sister is the same. We used to set challenges for each other when we were younger, much to James’s disapproval.

He was constantly after me to behave in a more dignified manner.

Since joining the army, I like to think I have.

I’ve distinguished myself. Moved through the ranks.

Proved that James is wrong. That I’m not a reckless idiot, incapable of exercising sound judgment. ”

“I see,” Bea murmured.

“Do you?” Jack asked. “Do you really, Bea?”

“When he met us on the docks yesterday, you were afraid you’d be proving him right.”

“I would have been, had I told him that you and I were no longer engaged. Or worse, that we’d never been engaged in the first place. That’s why I said what I said. I’m sorry I didn’t consult with you first. I know it wasn’t part of our agreement. But?—”

“I don’t want to lie to your family, Jack,”

“I know,” he said. “Nor do I.”

A breeze drifted over the banks, making the wildflowers quiver.

Bea gazed at them for a long moment, her spirits sinking as low as they’d ever been.

It wasn’t right to be here with Jack, in a place so beautiful and remote, so exceedingly romantic, discussing something as bleak as their imminent parting.

But one had to face facts.

“What if I left now?” she suggested. “Quiet-like, without any fuss. Just slip away to the hotel and…when I’m gone…you could simply tell them the truth?”

Jack’s ice-gray eyes were unusually grave. “Face James and Hannah on my own, you mean?”

A flicker of guilt took Bea unaware. She was abandoning him. It was cowardly. Disloyal.

Yet, it was his lie that had brought them here, not hers. She’d been ready to walk away at the docks. Any other woman in her position would do the same. It wasn’t a matter of loyalty. It was a question of self-preservation.

“Yes,” she replied.

“But it won’t just be them any longer,” Jack said.

“That’s what I came to tell you this morning.

When James and I spoke last night, he informed me that my other relations are expected today.

My brother, Ivo, and his wife, Meg. My sister, Kate, and her husband, Charles.

All of their children. Not to mention my parents, who will be arriving by Saturday.

It’s to be something of a family party.”

The blood left Bea’s face. She recalled everything Mrs. Rawson and the Farradays had told her about the Beresfords.

About their wealth and pedigree. About their fashionableness and extraordinary good looks.

It was one thing to meet Jack’s oldest brother and his wife, but to confront the family entire?

The mere prospect of it was enough to send a chill down Bea’s spine.

“It was Hannah’s idea, apparently,” Jack said grimly.

“Hers and Meg’s, sparked by that dratted wire Mrs. Rawson sent them.

They’ve already got it planned. A week-long celebration to welcome home the injured hero, culminating in a ball, with all the village in attendance.

” He paused. “There’s only one problem.”

Bea immediately thought of his injury. “You can’t dance?”

Jack’s mouth twisted. “I’m not a hero.”