Page 59 of The Viscount and the Vicar’s Daughter

Valentine’s fingers curled around his. “You visited her this morning. And you discovered all of this…” She searched his face. “I still don’t understand why you did it. After what I said to you yesterday—”

“I’ll tell you why,” he interrupted. “But not here. We will talk in the carriage.”

She blinked. “What carriage?”

“The one I have waiting in the drive.” He heard Lady Hermione make a sound of dismay, but he ignored her. He hadn’t come this far to be thwarted by an overprotective Caddington relation. “Shall we take our leave?”

Valentine cast an anxious glance to Lord Lynden and Lady Hermione.

“Never mind them,” Tristan told her. “Come. The horses will be getting restless. I didn’t plan to linger.” He stood and, much to his relief, she allowed him to pull her to her feet.

“St. Ashton,” Lady Hermione said. “This is beyond anything.”

“Let them go, ma’am,” Lord Lynden said. “Miss March has had enough for today.”

Tristan met his father’s eyes. For the first time in his life, he saw no judgment or condemnation in his sire’s gaze. Instead, much to his amazement, he saw understanding. Perhaps even a little pride.

He inclined his head. “Sir.”

“St. Ashton,” Lord Lynden said. “Miss March. Mind how you go.”

Tristan led Valentine to the door. It opened ahead of them, as if by magic. How many servants had been huddled outside listening? But it was only Frith who stood on the other side of the door. The old butler looked at Valentine, his eyes suspiciously bright.

“Ma’am,” he said as he handed her her bonnet, gloves, and cloak. “If I may be so bold…you look very like your mother.”

“That will be all, Frith,” Lord Stokedale said sharply. And then, “St. Ashton? Miss March? I would have a word, if you please.”

Tristan’s jaw tightened at Stokedale’s approach. Had circumstances been different, he would have given the fellow the same treatment he’d meted out to Phillip Edgecombe. But one could hardly throw a marquess out of his own ancestral home and into the gutter, no matter how much he might deserve it.

“I’ll do as Hermione asks,” Lord Stokedale said. “In memory of my sister, I’ll acknowledge you in public, Miss March. I’ll instruct my family to treat you with all civility. I trust that will be sufficient.”

Tristan felt Valentine tuck her hand more firmly in his arm. She was trembling, fine shivers that coursed through her small frame like electric shocks.

And, in that moment, he could have happily murdered the Marquess of Stokedale.

Civility? What in blazes! She’d come all this way, looking for the smallest scrap of familial affection, and Stokedale offered her civility? It was all he could do to keep himself from throttling the pompous ass.

Valentine, by contrast, remained outwardly composed. Despite her tremors, her voice was steady. “I thank you for your condescension, sir. But I don’t think we’ll have cause to meet again.”

Tristan fancied he could see a flicker of relief in Stokedale’s eyes. He didn’t remain long enough to be certain. After taking his leave of his father and Lady Hermione, he led Valentine out the door. The butler escorted them through the hall and down the front steps to the carriage Tristan had hired in the nearby village of Bolton Heath. It was a newer vehicle, well sprung and comfortably fitted out. He handed Valentine up into it and then climbed in to sit beside her. The coachman shut the door behind them. Seconds later, the horses had been given the office to start and the carriage lumbered into motion.

“Are we going to the station?” Valentine asked.

Tristan’s pulse thrummed. He was nervous and damnably uncertain. It was a bloody uncomfortable feeling. “No,” he said at last. “We are not.”

“Then where…?”

“I don’t know, Miss March,” he answered. “And that’s the problem. Where we go next is not up to me. It’s entirely up to you.”

Valentine had never seen Tristan look so unsure. Not since the night he’d kissed her in the conservatory. But this was different, somehow. He wasn’t melancholy. And he certainly hadn’t been drinking.

He cleared his throat. “But before you decide our destination, answer me this. Yesterday…in London…”

“Yes?”

A muscle worked in his jaw. “Why did you release me from our engagement?”

It wasn’t the question she’d expected. Indeed, she’d thought he would ask something about her mother or the Caddingtons or even Val Rutherford, the man she now understood to be her natural father. The breaking of their engagement, an incident which, at the time, had seemed to affect him so little, could hardly be of concern to him now, could it?