Page 44 of The Governess and the Rogue

“Ah.” Jack’s smile faded. “Now that might be awkward.”

“And we don’t want that,” Bea said. “Better we should keep to our agreement in public.”

“What about in private?” he asked.

“We must be friends,” she said. “And nothing more.”

“And friends don’t kiss friends, presumably,” he said.

“Not like that.”

“I see. What about gifts? Can a friend give his friend a shawl?”

Bea’s throat constricted. The answer was no. Not if that friend was a gentlemen friend, and not if the recipient was an unmarried young lady.

But they’d already bent some of the rules. Surely it could do no harm to bend them a little more in this respect?

“I suppose a friend could,” she said slowly. “But only as you described earlier.”

“I can’t recall what I described,” Jack replied frankly. “Everything before I kissed you is somewhat of a blur.”

Heat crept into Bea’s cheeks. “You called it costuming for my role,” she reminded him.

Jack leaned more heavily on his cane. “So I did.”

“Which means I may wear it for the remainder of our journey, but…” Bea hesitated to utter the words. She wanted so badly to keep her present. “But… I must return it to you when we part.”

Jack accepted her judgment as though he’d been expecting it. “Very well. If that’s how you prefer it.”

It wasn’t how Bea preferred it. But what could she say? More to the point, what could she do? A governess had only her reputation to recommend her. Without that, she had nothing.

No. There was no more to be said.

She glumly permitted Jack to accompany her back to her stateroom. They didn’t speak again. Not on any topics worth mentioning. He remarked on the weather, and the calmness of the sea, filling up the silence until he deposited her safely at the door of her cabin.

Only then did he look at her, addressing her with uncommon seriousness. “You never told me which of your wishes came true,” he said.

“No, I didn’t,” Bea replied as she opened her door.

And she never would.

Chapter Fifteen

Marseilles to Calais

April 1858

Bea sank down on a bench at the edge of the railway platform amid the swirling smoke and steam. Pearl took a seat beside her, Bea’s small leather traveling valise cradled in her arms. After docking in Marseilles, they’d wasted no time in getting themselves, and their luggage, to the station. It was going to be many hours to Calais by train. And several more across the Channel by steamship. They couldn’t afford to dawdle.

Not all of the passengers had been so impatient to resume their journey. Several had taken rooms at local hotels, eager to rest and—as they put it—regain their land legs. Bea had hoped the Dimsdales would be among them, but it wasn’t to be. No sooner had she sat down than they stalked past her on their way to the ticket office.

Mrs. Dimsdale was shepherding her children, with little success. “We must find a servant to look after them,” she was saying to her husband. “Anyone woman will do. Even if she is a Frenchwoman.”

“Yes, my dear,” Mr. Dimsdale replied. “Whatever you will.”

They neither of them spared a glance in Bea’s direction. It was as though she didn’t exist. Only Lilith dared look at her, her mouth sullen, and her gaze glinting with mingled scorn and awe.

“You have achieved the impossible in her eyes,” Pearl remarked once the family had disappeared from sight.