There was a pointed message in her words, but he couldn’t decipher it. “Tell me about your family,” he said, speaking quietly to not strain his head. “What happened in the last ten years?”
“We grew up.” She caught him up on the doings of her family. Three brothers, one in the navy, one headed for the clergy, and the last deep in studies at Oxford. As for the girls, there were three sisters, including Giselle’s twin. None had married, and the youngest two attended a London school in exchange for help with the younger children.
Then she revealed the most disturbing news. Her father was no longer a vicar. He’d been demoted to a curate in Stepney parish. Good God, the man couldn’t make more than forty pounds a year. No wonder she was dressed poorly.
“A curate?” he said, his mind reeling. “Giselle—”
“And what of your family?” she interrupted. “How do they fare?”
He swallowed his words. It would be rude to press her more, but he couldn’t shake the guilt. His father had removed them from their home in Cotswold, and they’d ended up impoverished.
“Jonathan?”
“Oh! Right.” Damn, his head ached. “My father died more than a year ago. We are out of mourning now, and my sister wants her debut. We came up before the season began, but…” He shook his head. “Mama’s headaches have been plaguing her. And we’ve all had mishaps of one sort or another.” If he were a superstitious sort, he’d say they were cursed. Twisted ankles, broken carriage spokes, headaches, and strange sounds at night.
“You haven’t been sleeping well, have you?” she asked.
He frowned. “Why would you say that?”
She shrugged and her gaze skittered away. “You’re a viscount now, aren’t you? Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown.”
“It’s work, that’s for sure. Especially since…” His voice faded away.
“Oh, don’t tease me like that!” she exclaimed. “Especially since what?”
“It’s been a bad year, is all. We’re all unsettled.”
“I see.”
He looked at her sharply. He remembered so many things about her now. The cadence of her voice. The way the sun seemed to love her skin. And the way she used neutral words to hide her true opinion.
“I always hated how you held your thoughts back.”
“I always hated that you accused me of the very things that you did.”
He opened his mouth to object but then shut it with a snap. She was right. He wasn’t telling her about all the strange things that were happening. And she wasn’t telling him if she still believed in ghosts.
“I don’t want to argue with you,” he said softly. “I’ve often thought about you. I tried to find out what had happened to you, but no one knew.” He’d asked everyone, but his father had forbidden any mention of them.
“We are here and well. How’s your headache?”
“Better.” He smiled as he watched the shadows of the leaves dance across her face.
A lock of her hair had escaped its restraint, and the breeze pinned it to her cheek. He reacted as he always had, carefully setting it behind her ear. His stroke was gentle, the touch as electrifying as every caress between them had ever been. Hunger roared in his blood, and he drew her forward to kiss.
She resisted him. Of course she did. What was he about kissing a girl he hadn’t seen in a decade? But her reaction was slow, and he saw yearning in her eyes.
Then pain flashed through his head, white and vicious just behind his eyes. He gasped and pressed his hand to his forehead. Damnation, what the hell was going on in his head?
“I’m sorry,” he muttered, his breath shallow. It was the only way he could keep the nausea at bay. “Perhaps I’ve caught ill.”
“Or perhaps the ghost of your dead father doesn’t like your choice of companion.” Her voice was tart as she looked hard at a spot above his left shoulder. It was where the pain was the worst, that temple and the ache that radiated down his neck. But it wasn’t any ghost. It was simply a bad headache.
He sighed. “You still believe in ghosts.”
Her gaze cut to his. “And you still don’t, despite being haunted.”
“It’s an illness.”
