Modern Romance Collection: October 2017 5 - 8. Heidi Rice

blinked. “Oh?”

      Later, Eleanor thought immediately, she’d be furious with herself for sounding something other than blandly disinterested. But all she could do now was gaze back at the disapproving older woman and pretend she hadn’t sounded a little too intrigued.

      Maybe more than a little. She hated herself for that, too.

      “We expected him in residence today,” Mrs. Redding said matter-of-factly, very much as if she hadn’t heard anything in Eleanor’s voice. Eleanor told herself that of course she hadn’t. It was all in her head, because Eleanor was the one wandering around with the guilty conscience—and the memory of that kiss. Not Mrs. Redding. She hoped. “But his plans have changed, and he will be making a brief trip to Dublin before returning.”

      “I didn’t realize he wasn’t in residence now,” Eleanor lied, her voice as bland as she could make it. She punctuated it by taking a calm sip of her tea.

      Mrs. Redding eyed her as if she knew the tea was a prop. “When the Duke is in residence, he likes to have Geraldine presented to him at least every other week at dinner. By the child’s current governess, so he can assess both Geraldine’s and the governess’s progress.”

      “Well, I suppose that explains why the Duke has appeared so hands-off since I arrived.” Eleanor managed a laugh. “I thought perhaps he didn’t have much interest in his ward.”

      The temperature in the room seemed to plummet at that. Eleanor watched Mrs. Redding’s gaze frost over right there before her.

      “It would be wiser to put a little less stock in what people say about His Grace from afar,” the housekeeper said, as if each syllable cut the roof of her mouth on the way out. “That tabloid creation bears no resemblance to the man I’ve known since he was a child. A man who took in an orphaned child out of the goodness of his heart and is still painted a villain for it.”

      Eleanor took her time placing her cup of tea back in its saucer, surprised at the vehemence in the older woman’s voice.

      “Having a ward thrust upon one and being expected to raise them must be something of an adjustment,” she said after a moment.

      Mrs. Redding shifted behind her desk, and gazed at Eleanor for a moment over the top of her eyeglasses.

      “We are a mite protective of the Duke here,” she said with the same quiet intensity, and Eleanor couldn’t tell if that was a warning or an explanation. “It’s a rare stranger indeed who has his best interests at heart. He has been so long in that spotlight that the spotlight is all anyone sees, but we see the boy who grew up here.” Her gaze edged back into chilly territory. “The whole of England might be dedicated to telling nasty stories about His Grace, but they are never told here. Ever.”

      Eleanor couldn’t help feeling as if she’d been slapped again. And harder, this time. As if the fact no one had met her at the train station when she’d arrived had been a test, not an oversight. She wanted to ask Mrs. Redding directly but didn’t quite dare.

      It was the same with all the staff in Groves House, she found as the days passed and the weather grew more blustery and grim. Each day was bleaker than the one before. The trees grew ever more stark and the rain fell colder. Icier. And the other members of the household were as uninterested in Eleanor’s presence weeks into her residence as they’d been at the start. She ended up eating her meals alone in her own rooms because when she entered the common staff areas, all conversation stopped, which did not exactly aid the digestion.

      “What do you mean they’re all offish?” Vivi asked in one of their phone calls. She sounded distant and preoccupied, the way she often did when Eleanor called her instead of the other way around. As if she had her mobile clamped to her shoulder while she bustled about doing other things. Much more important things, her distracted tone suggested.

      Eleanor told herself, brusquely, that it wasn’t entirely fair to attach meaning to Vivi’s tone. They each played their parts, after all. If she had a problem with that, she’d had years to say so. She could have objected years ago when their reluctant, distantly related cousin had eyed the pair of them as adolescents and set the course of their lives.

      “Might as well marry a rich man as a poor man,” she’d tutted at them one afternoon. “You two have nothing in this world but Vivi’s pretty face. I’d use it to better yourselves, if I were you.”

      “I mean exactly that.” Eleanor said now, scowling at the memory. As if Vivi hadn’t already been a miracle, walking the way she had when the doctors thought she never would. And it wasn’t entirely true that all they had was Vivi’s face, was it? Because what was Vivi’s face without Eleanor’s financial wizardry and prowess with a sewing needle? “They’re a closed group. No newcomers.”

      Eleanor had taken to walking in the evenings and tonight she’d taken the back stairs that led from the kitchen into a wing she never been in before. She’d climbed up to the second floor and found herself in a long hallway that doubled as an art gallery. Obvious, recognizable masterpieces worth billions were flung on walls next to what looked like very dour and period-appropriate versions of Hugo. But she concentrated on her phone call, not the wigs and funny hats and companion animals in the portraits before her.

      Vivi sighed, which definitely put Eleanor’s back up, and no matter that she tried to pretend otherwise. “Are you there to make friends, Eleanor?”

      “Of course not.” She could hear the tension in her voice, and forced herself to take a breath. “I know why I’m here, Vivi. All I’m saying is that it wouldn’t be the worst thing to have a friendly face about the place. That’s all.”

      Vivi, clearly no longer feeling guilty or bullying or drunk, sighed again.

      “Don’t go moping about the place. No one likes an Eeyore.”

      Eleanor found she was scowling at the painting in front of her, biting her tongue. As in, literally pressing it against her teeth to keep from saying something back in the same dismissive tone.

      “I should think you ought to feel grateful that you’re not required to work so hard for the friendship of people you won’t know in a year’s time,” Vivi said dismissively.

      It hadn’t really occurred to Eleanor to think about the people here—or her position here or whole solitary little life here, really—as temporary. But of course it was. Even if all went well, a girl only needed a governess for so long.

      “I think I have a few years before I can happily drift off into the sunset,” she pointed out, and she was proud of herself for sounding as if she was smiling, not scowling. “Geraldine is seven, not seventeen.”

      Vivi laughed. “You’re not disappearing into the north forever, Eleanor. You’re supposed to make us enough to cover our bills and then come back.”

      “I didn’t realize that was the plan. Especially when the longer I stay, the more I’ll make.”

      “Eleanor, please,” Vivi said, her tone light. But there was something beneath it that wedged its way into Eleanor’s stomach and sat there. Heavily. “I can’t possibly do all this without you. You’re on holiday, nothing more.”

      Eleanor finished off the call, and found herself staring blankly out one of the windows in this strange art gallery hall, her stomach still not quite right. Because it was tempting to pretend that Vivi couldn’t do without her emotionally, that she missed Eleanor herself, but deep down, Eleanor suspected that wasn’t true. Just yesterday Vivi had been in a panic about how to pay all the bills and get the rent in, and she’d moaned something about what a tip the flat was since there was no one to tidy it up.

      Because, of course, the person who usually handled all those things was Eleanor.

      It was a good thing Vivi thought Eleanor was suffering in a pile of debris in the middle of a moor. Because if her sister had any idea how luxurious Eleanor’s lifestyle was at present, Eleanor had no doubt Vivi would contrive a way to get herself up to Groves House so she could