Page 4 of The Viscount and the Vicar’s Daughter

“It’s beautiful,” she declared.

Beautiful. Perhaps it was. What did he know of the Bible? He had read it, of course. He was a well-educated gentleman, after all. A well-bred one, too. As a boy, he’d even attended Sunday services with his father and brother at the family seat in Hampshire. He well recalled the hours spent sitting in the family pew, affecting a dutiful interest in the dry, toneless hymns and the long drawn-out sermons.

But that was a lifetime ago. In the years since, no one had had the temerity to spout verses or psalms at him. Not that any of his confederates would do so. Most of them were as sunken into depravity as he was himself. “Who is it for?” he asked. “Some beau of yours?”

She lunged for it and, before he could lift it out of her reach, snatched the paper from his hand and pressed it safely to her bosom. “How dared you.” Her low voice was heated with indignation. “It’s going to be a book of verses. An illustrated book of verses. It’s not for some beau.”

And then she began to weep all over again.

Tristan felt a queer tightening in his chest. “My dear girl, what the devil are you carrying on about? Did one of Lady Fairford’s footmen force a kiss on you? Or was it Lord Fairford himself?” The very thought made him inexplicably angry. “Confound it. Did no one warn you to be careful here?”

She wiped at her remaining tears with his sodden handkerchief. “Yes. Lady Brightwell said I must take care never to be alone with any of the gentlemen at the house party. But it…it wasn’t a gentleman who upset me so.”

Tristan winced. “One of the ladies, was it?”

“Yes. Lady Brightwell’s daughter. Felicity.”

“Bloody hell.”

She gasped at his language. “Sir!”

Tristan was unrepentant. “Are you saying that Miss Brightwell…?” He ran a hand through his already disheveled black hair. The very idea! He’d known that Felicity Brightwell was forward and a bit wild, but he would never have guessed that her tastes ran to women. Come to that, he would never have guessed that Miss Brightwell would even be here. She was a chit of one and twenty and still actively seeking a husband. Or so he’d been led to believe. “Good God, what did she do to you?”

She shook her head. “I’ve already said too much.”

“You’ve hardly said anything.” He paused, watching her. “And why not? Do you fear I’ll betray your confidence? I assure you, Lady Brightwell and her daughter are no friends of mine. And even if they were, your secrets would be safe with me.”

“I shouldn’t even be sitting with you like this.”

“You’re not sitting with me. I’m sitting with you.”

She looked up at him with an expression that was both grave and damnably prim. It struck him quite suddenly that she bore more than a passing resemblance to a pretty little nun.

He wondered if she kissed like a nun as well.

“It doesn’t matter who is sitting with whom,” she said. “We haven’t been properly introduced. I don’t even know who you are.”

This was a rare turn of events. If Lady Brightwell had taken to warning her new companion about rakes, rogues, and vile seducers of women, surely his own name would have been at the top of the list. And even if it hadn’t been, what woman in England didn’t know of the infamous Viscount St. Ashton?

But then, he didn’t look much like a viscount now, did he?

“Tristan Sinclair,” he said brusquely. He waited for a reaction, but her face betrayed no hint of recognition. Doubtless it would if he added his title. Which was precisely why he did not. “And your name, ma’am?”

“Valentine March.”

Tristan felt another uncomfortable quake in his heart. By God but it suited her. “I’ve never before met a woman named Valentine.”

Miss March’s cheeks flushed a delicate shade of pink. “Yes…well…my mother expected I would be a boy, you see. She only chose the one name. After St. Valentine. And then, when Mama died, Papa couldn’t bring himself to call me anything else.”

“Your mother died in childbed?”

Her blush deepened. “Yes.”

Tristan nodded. “My own mother, as well. She succumbed not long after bringing my younger brother into the world.” Good Lord! He never mentioned his mother. Not to his family. Not to his friends. Not to anyone. Her death was certainly no secret, but the very idea that he’d speak of her to a stranger— What in blazes was the matter with him?

“Well, Miss March,” he said. “Now we’re acquainted, you may tell me all your troubles.”

Miss March looked down at the ink-stained paper, a line of distress appearing across the smooth surface of her brow.