Frantic nodding wetted Tamsyn’s bodice. “Yes, kind. He’s honourable and good and we used to talk a lot. He’s so intelligent and well-read, and he held me and told me all would be well, kissed my hair… But I have nothing, not even my maidenhood. An earl’s distant relative is all I am. Nothing else. Nothing to offe–”
“That won’t matter a jot if Mr Miggens ‘admires you’, as you say.”
“How can I be sure he wants me?” she fretted, skin blotchy, rubbing her eyes on Tamsyn’s sleeve. “I thought the earl cared for me but I’d seen emotions that weren’t there. And even if Oliver does feel affection, he’ll hate me when I tell him about my wickedness. Everyone in the household always adored him. He…cared, Tam, always cared. The scullery maid who burned her hand, the footman who lost two guineas at gaming. And then he cared about me. And…”
“Oh, Lowdy, dearest. If Mr Miggens is disgusted by a lost maidenhood – taken by trickery, I might add – then he doesn’t deserve you. And remember, you have Father and I. We love you as family.”
“You’ll marry in time if–”
“No, Lowdy. I won’t. How could I with this ugliness I bear?”
“But Captain Lynch?”
She shook her head. “I enjoy his company, but there is no…” Desire. Fervour. None of the feelings that a London rogue had ignited. “…attraction, only friendship and even then, he can be a little fierce. Do you think he might snap his fingers in bed?”
A giggle. Good. That was more like the Lowdy she loved, and she rubbed her friend’s arms. “We will grow old together and have cats – a superior replacement – and tell fortunes like Mrs Mildern. We may travel to Italy and take young lovers.”
“Eugh!” cried Lowdy.
“Oh, did you not enjoy your…encounter with the earl?”
Another wet giggle. “It was only twice.” A frown. “It hurt, and he insisted on being called Lord Big…and he kept his boots on.”
She’d take that as a “no” then.
Chapter Fifteen
True colours.
“I’ve not forgiven you, Papa,” warned Tamsyn, as she straightened her straw poke bonnet with ash-grey trim in the hall mirror.
Her father merely grinned and pulled on his shabby tan gloves, ready for a visit to the china clay pit with his man of affairs whilst the ladies shopped in Helston.
Yesterday, they’d exchanged words concerning his outrageous fib as to Jack’s true reason for staying at Penrose Manor, but he’d hauled her into a tight hug, declared he loved her and ordered her to buy a new gown on the morrow.
As if she could be bribed in such a way.
“I want two new gowns and the same for Lowdy.”
“Anything you wish, my girl.”
“I could gladly escort the ladies, Sir Jago,” a low rumble offered. “As I am to visit the post-house this morning.”
Breath caught in her throat at the spectacle of Lord Winterbourne strolling down the ancient staircase, fingers brushing the oak bannister as if a woman’s spine.
He embodied a fashion plate come to life, and today’s waistcoat would put a courtesan to shame. Puce with lemon silk stripes.
It shouldn’t match; it did.
It should be revolting; it wasn’t.
A deepest black tailcoat balanced that colour and instead he exuded aristocratic poise and careless elegance, inordinately handsome and utterly perfect.
Tamsyn glared at her own gown – an “attractive mist grey” as the dressmaker had termed it. Tasteful, but she felt an utter dowd.
“Miss Penrose, you look most fetching. Like a fluffy rain cloud,” Jack assured, eyes twinkling. “Perhaps you can tempt the weather to change.”
“And you look most…stylish, my lord.”
