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That was what she’d been doing, she saw. While she was busy, nursing Tom, she didn’t have time to dwell on the truth. She’d been pushing it away for as long as she could. By any means.
She’d just decided to pull out of Tom’s embrace and do something, when a knock came at the door. Giving Sarah the perfect excuse to untangle herself, sit on the chair by his bedside and run a hand over her hair to smooth it, before shouting out permission to enter.
It was Madame le Brun, with a troubled expression on her face.
‘I know you said you do not want the visitors. But this man, he says he has come from Colonel Randall, your brother. And so I thought...’ She spread her hands wide in one of those Gallic expressions that said so much.
Sarah’s heart seemed to flip over in her chest. On the one hand, she did want to learn how Justin was faring. But on the other, if he was sending messages to her, here, then it meant he’d discovered where she was. And probably who she was with, too.
Which meant the fat would be in the fire.
Well, she’d survived all sorts of things so far this week. Done things she’d never imagined she could do.
Including kissing a rake. Deliberately. To shock him.
She wasn’t that timid, diffident girl who would do anything to avoid confrontation. To say whatever people wanted to hear, if it meant they would leave her be.
She squared her shoulders.
‘You did quite right, Madame. Send him up.’
Though as soon as Madame had shut the door on her way out, Sarah reached for Tom’s hand. Somehow, nothing seemed so bad when she could hold his hand.
Not that she needed him to protect her from her own brother.
On the contrary. If Justin really did know she was here with a man they’d nicknamed Tom Cat, it was more likely she’d need to protect him.
‘I won’t leave you, Tom,’ she vowed. ‘No matter what he says. What threats he uses. Not while you need me.’
* * *
She’d got that look on her face again. The look of a lioness guarding her cub. Which made him feel much better. When she’d come in looking so bereft, after he’d just seen Bennington Ffog’s name on the casualty list, he’d experienced such a bitter wave of jealousy he could still taste it. Even when she’d confessed that her heartbreak was for her beloved twin, rather than the man who’d spent the last weeks of his life practically turning cartwheels in order to gain her favour, from what he’d observed, the jealousy had scarcely abated one whit.
There just wasn’t room in Sarah’s heart for any man, not while it was still filled with Gideon Blasted Latymor.
Except, she had flung herself into his arms for comfort, hadn’t she? Appeared hurt when she thought he didn’t respect her.
Ah, but then when he’d explained himself, she’d let him take her in his arms and settled in as if she felt she belonged there.
And now she was bristling at the prospect of receiving a messenger from Colonel Randall.
He’d been half-joking when he’d said he would gladly stay ill for ever if it meant keeping her beside him. But there was no denying that whenever she thought he needed her to defend him, she forgot all about her dead twin and took up the cudgels on his behalf. And it was such a sweet feeling, having somebody thinking he was worth defending. Nobody had ever tried to defend him from anything.
No wonder he wished, so badly, that he belonged to her. With her.
The door opened then, and a short, squat man with iron-grey hair came in.
‘It’s Robbins, isn’t it?’ Sarah got to her feet and held out her hand to him, in a particularly regal fashion. With a smile Tom would describe as queenly.
Tom just about managed to bite back an appreciative grin. She’d fought Major Flint openly. But it seemed she was going to subdue Robbins with a combination of charm and hauteur.
‘I have a letter here from Miss Endacott,’ said Robbins, darting Tom a brief look from his shrewd grey eyes.
‘Thank you,’ said Sarah as she took it from him with a dazzlingly sweet smile. As though she was blithely ignorant of any impropriety in her situation.
It didn’t have the effect on Robbins she’d probably intended. On the contrary, his eyes grew flinty.
‘And how is my brother? The Colonel?’
