Housemaid Heiress. Elizabeth Beacon

said I had a big mouth,’ she acknowledged with an answering grin, and for a moment felt a peculiar heat run through her like warm lightning as he laughed and his rather sombre personality was temporarily transfigured.

      Suddenly she could picture him, light-hearted and welcoming as he bid guests welcome to his home. War and responsibility had made him serious, but she imagined him transformed—galloping that great horse of his through summer meadows just for the joy of it, as he laughed with the lucky female who rode at his side, matching him pace for pace. Putting herself into that very attractive picture, she knew her heart would be in the smile she returned, that earlier jag of fire that had spread through her growing ever sweeter….

      ‘There, and won’t you look at that!’ she exclaimed with every excuse for annoyance, as a spark flew out of the fire when she poked at it unwarily and scorched her disreputable skirts before she could slap it out. ‘They said I was clumsy as well.’

      ‘They?’ he asked companionably, glad of any diversion from the task of discovering the state of Nick’s wounds.

      ‘The folk at the Foundling,’ she improvised, fervently hoping he knew less about such charitable institutions than she did.

      ‘No doubt very worthy people, but not given to spoiling their charges, perhaps?’

      His voice was gentle as he contemplated the privations of an orphan’s life, and Thea felt guilty once more as she considered her very privileged existence as one until just lately. Grandfather had given her everything she asked for, apart from stubbornly insisting she must wed a man with a title. He even specified it in his will, and of course Granby had a title. She shuddered at the very thought and moved closer to the warmth of the fire.

      ‘They didn’t hurt you, I hope?’

      He had evidently seen that shiver. She felt the burden of untruth weigh heavy on her slender shoulders, but too much depended on her staying out of the Winfordes’ clutches to resort to the truth now.

      ‘No, but I had to run away from my last place.’

      ‘Considering you find this place preferable, I can only imagine that the alternative must have been dire indeed.’

      ‘It was,’ she replied and could not hold back another shudder as she recalled the repulsive feel of Granby’s damp hands roughly thrusting at the neck of her gown as she gagged from sheer horror.

      ‘Not all men are brutes, you know.’

      ‘No, some try honey before resorting to vinegar,’ she said cynically, recalling some of the titled suitors Grandfather had lured to Hardy House.

      Those poor and desperate men had soon put her off becoming Lady This or the Marchioness of That.

      ‘You have been unfortunate. Somewhere there must be an honest young fellow just waiting to value your youth and wit.’

      ‘Yes, most of them can’t wait to stone me from any parish that might be burdened with the burying of me, after they let me starve to death within their bounds,’ she said bitterly.

      ‘With a chance of earning an honest living, you might meet someone.’

      ‘And, if wishes were horses, beggars would ride, now what of this poor man you were supposed to be so concerned about?’

      ‘Is the water hot yet?’

      ‘Any hotter and it’ll do him more harm than good.’

      ‘Hold that light as steady as you can then, while I see what the idiot’s done to himself this time.’

      Thea gulped and reminded herself that she was a soldier’s daughter, even if she could hardly remember either of her parents. Her mother had eloped with a handsome subaltern, so perhaps this ridiculous attraction to the military was in her blood. Within five years both her parents were dead and her grandfather insisted she carry his name, then made the best of a bad job.

      It took all her flagging courage to do the same now, and she gasped in shock when the warm water finally soaked the poor man’s dressing off, and revealed the angry slash marring the length of his upper arm. She gazed down at the puckered wound and the number of stitches holding it closed, and wondered how the unconscious man could have borne the jarring that riding must have inflicted on his wounds.

      ‘He should be in bed!’ she exclaimed.

      ‘If I hadn’t brought him with me, he was threatening to set out alone as soon as my back was turned. He always was stubborn as a mule.’

      Thinking of this man’s determination to get his own way by fair means or foul, Thea raised her brows sceptically in the useful gesture she had learnt from her bitter enemy. He flashed her an unrepentant grin, then distracted her from thinking about the leap of her heart that it had caused her by bending down to sniff the wound.

      ‘According to his long-suffering doctor, if it starts to smell sweet I’m to get him to a sawbones as fast as I can tie him to his horse and force him there. Otherwise the damn fool stands as much chance of keeping his beloved arm as he might if he had had the sense to stay in bed in the first place.’

      ‘In other words, he’s getting better?’

      ‘So I concluded, but when he fainted on me tonight I began to think he was as big an idiot as his physician.’

      ‘And instead he’s just a run-of-the-mill idiot?’

      He chuckled. ‘Nothing about Mad Nick is commonplace.’

      ‘Nevertheless you are very fond of him, I think?’

      ‘Maybe,’ he said, but Thea had seen his affection for his relative in his actions tonight and perhaps he thought it was too late to pretend to mere duty. ‘We both suffered for our respective mothers’ sins, so I understand him better than most, I suppose.’

      ‘I don’t see how you could be made to suffer for your mother’s deeds.’ She forced bitterness into her voice by remembering her grandfather and his twin brother, abandoned on the doorstep of the foundling hospital.

      ‘Oh, we weren’t, at least not in the way you must have been. Anyway, I must get this mess cleaned and rebandaged, so, for the sake of Nick’s sensibilities, perhaps you could water the horses and give him freedom to swear like one of his troopers? Not even he can sleep through that, and you will inhibit him sadly.’

      She hesitated, fighting her fear of the dark wood.

      ‘Take this if it’ll make you feel better,’ he offered, handing her an evil-looking pistol, which she examined as if it might bite. ‘It’s loaded, so just draw this back and pull the trigger when you’re close enough to disable your quarry.’

      Thea gulped as she contemplated actually using a gun on her fellow man. Even if Granby was lurking out there in the darkness, she would not be able to shoot him, so she pulled back from it with horror.

      ‘Couldn’t I scream for you?’

      ‘It might be too late by the time I find you, but since this is England and black night I dare say you’ll be safe enough.’

      ‘Yes, I dare say,’ she said, with the oddest feeling of disappointment she had ever suffered in her life because he didn’t think her worth protecting.

      ‘Well, then, if you would not mind, Miss…We appear to have omitted to introduce ourselves. The gentleman on the floor is Captain Nicholas Prestbury of the 10th Hussars and I am Major Marcus Ashfield of the 95th Rifles and at your service, ma’am,’ he said with a half-mocking bow.

      She bobbed him a perfunctory curtsy, copied from those long-suffering maids at Hardy House. ‘Hetty Smith, Major,’ she lied.

      ‘Pleased to meet you, Miss Smith.’

      ‘I doubt that, sir.’

      ‘How did you come to that conclusion, my dear?’ he asked, acute interest suddenly lighting his dark gaze.

      ‘I ain’t