Page 79 of The Hidden Heart

At that moment there was a discreet tap on the door, and they sprang apart, turning toward the sound.

“Enter,” Richard said, his voice coming out harshly.

The door opened to reveal Baxter. “Your Grace.” He came into the room, his face alight with excitement. “You have a visitor. Lord Westhampton has just arrived.”

Richard gaped at him. “Lord Westha—”

“Yes, Lord Westhampton.” A tall blond man appeared in the doorway. He was in his middle thirties, with even, attractive features. He was bundled up warmly in a heavy caped overcoat, a muffler around his throat, and he carried a hat in his hand. He looked a trifle tired, and Jessica noticed that snow clung to his boots and the bottom of his long coat. “It is I, Richard.”

“Michael! My God!” Richard let out a short laugh and strode across the room to greet him warmly, shaking his hand and clapping him on the shoulder. “Where the devil did you come from?”

“Well, home, actually,” Michael replied, looking faintly embarrassed.

“The Lake District? In this snow? Are you mad? How did you get through?”

“It seemed a bit dicey at times,” the other man admitted mildly. “But once I’d started, well, it would have been as bad going back, so I pressed on.”

“But whatever for?” Richard frowned suddenly. “Has something happened. Is something wrong? Not Dev—”

“No, no. There is nothing wrong. At least, not with me. Not now that Baxter has assured me Rachel is safe.”

“Why, yes, she has been here throughout the snow. You did not know she planned to stop here on her return journey?”

“I, well, she was much later coming home than she had said she would be, and I began to worry, so I thought I would go down to Derbyshire, just to make sure she was all right. Dev told me that she had come here to persuade you to join us for Christmas, and I felt a fool, of course. I started to go home, but then the storm came. I was afraid, you see, that she had left before and had gotten caught in it, so I decided to ride here. Just to make sure.”

Jessica looked at Lord Westhampton with interest. So this was the man with whom Rachel had a “pleasant” marriage, but one lacking in love. It seemed a trifle odd to her that a man who maintained a polite but distant marriage with his wife would panic at her being a few days late and ride to meet her, let alone press on even farther through a snow so deep that the mail coaches could not run.

Lord Westhampton glanced over at Jessica. “I beg your pardon for intruding upon you, ma’am.”

“It is quite all right, I assure you,” Jessica replied.

“I am sorry,” Richard said, turning to Jessica. “My manners have deserted me. Miss Maitland, this is my brother-in-law, Lord Westhampton. Rachel’s husband. Michael, this is Miss Maitland. She is, um, governess to my ward.”

“Your ward?” Michael had started forward to take Jessica’s hand in greeting, but he stopped at these last words and turned to Richard, exclaiming with some surprise, “I didn’t know you—”

“Michael?” There was the sound of hurrying footsteps outside in the hallway and Rachel’s voice calling her husband’s name.

Lord Westhampton spun around at the sound of her voice, and Jessica saw on his face a flash of something—hope, excitement?—that he quickly controlled. Rachel hurried into the room, breathless and flushed, and came to an abrupt stop. The two of them stood there looking at each other for a moment. Then Rachel swallowed and stepped forward, holding out her hand almost formally.

“Michael,” she said, only the faintest tremor in her voice. “I had not expected you.”

“Yes, I know,” he answered with equal politeness, advancing to take her hand and raise it to his lips in a courteous gesture. “I apologize for intruding.”

“Nonsense!” Cleybourne said stoutly.

“’Tis not an intrusion,” Rachel told him quietly. “I was merely surprised that you had come all this way.”

“I—well, it occurred to me that perhaps you had gotten trapped in the snow somewhere between here and home,” he explained.

“I almost did, but fortunately Richard came after me,” Rachel explained.

Jessica, watching them, decided that it was time for her to leave. These three, old friends and family, did not need a stranger hanging about. “Excuse me,” she said, “I must go check on Gabriela now. It was a pleasure to meet you, Lord Westhampton. I am glad you arrived safely.”

He thanked her, and she slipped out of the room, aware that Richard turned to watch her go. Her thoughts were at first on Rachel and her oddly stiff meeting with her husband. There was something strange and contradictory there, and she could not help but wonder what had happened between them. She had thought more than once that there was a hint of sorrow in Rachel’s lovely green eyes. But she could not keep her thoughts on that—or, indeed, on anything—long before thoughts of Richard came creeping in. She thought about his coming to her room again tonight, and excitement leaped in her. She knew she was acting wantonly, even wickedly.

She looked in on Gabriela and found her, amazingly, absorbed in one of her books. “The little princes in the Tower,” she said, explaining her interest, then returned to the macabre subject.

Jessica went on to her own room, thinking to pick up the knitting she had started the other day, before all their guests arrived, and work on it while Gabriela did her lessons. When she entered the room, the first thing she saw was her ruined jewelry box lying on the dresser. She went over to it, then began to separate the jewelry from the bits of wood.