His Bewitching Jewel (A Regency Holiday Romance Book 7) (5 page)

Perhaps, she should have agreed with Mrs. Teague. Staying here might be the costliest mistake she had ever made. Mayhap, she should flee before this place took hold of her heart completely, and she lost herself more than she could ever hope to do. She could pay for her fare back to Wiltshire, and once there, she could accept the advances of either Lord Prescott, or Lord Cedric Wisdom.

Mrs. Teague’s stern warning against attempting to become leg-shackled to the Duke lingered in her mind. It had affected her just a little. She couldn’t become involved with him. She just could not. No matter how tempting the thought. He was the first man that had turned her head. He was the first man that had sent her world tilting. He was the first man who had touched her heart.

If Mrs. Teague found that out…if she found out that she had run from those suitors only to find herself facing the prospect of marrying a man she couldn’t stand…why she would think she was here with the intentions of landing herself both a title and a fortune.

No one could ever know that she had once rubbed elbows with other members of the ton. None could ever suspect that she had been pursued by a penniless duke, and older duke, the son of a marquess, and a baron.

The way the Duke looked at her made her skin tingle, as she reflected back on it. His gaze made her feel something quite foreign. She hadn’t felt that way when a man looked at her before. Her skin crawled whenever the man that her mother wanted her to marry laid eyes upon her. He had always made her want to run screaming from the room. Any fate other than becoming his wife was what she wanted.

No other man had stirred her heart the way the Duke of Camblesforth did. When she had been around the Duke of Stoneleigh, Freddie’s father, Lord Cedric, or Lord Prescott, her heart hadn’t been affected in such a profound way. Maybe Mrs. Teague had cause to be concerned. Maybe she had reason to worry.

Still, with her weak resolve, if she did have feelings for him, she would never be able to act upon them. It just wasn’t her way. She was here for only one purpose—she was here to educate his two young nieces.

She was the governess…nothing more, and nothing less. She had to continue moving forward. She couldn’t look back now. She had come too far to have it all ruined.

She had run from everything and everyone she had ever known. She had run from all that she had loved. She wouldn’t miss her mother, but she would miss her uncle, and she would miss going to Wiltshire to visit everyone who cared about her there…and yet, that was all behind her.

Her life was now here in Cornwall.

She couldn’t go back—could she?

Then, it dawned her. Now…now…she was on her own. No one would miss her if she fell ill and died. No one would mourn her.

She was alone.

Well, and truly alone.

She didn’t know whether or not to be despaired or elated.

Chapter Five

 

Finn couldn’t stop thinking about Miss Massey…or Ruby. She suited her Christian name, even though she had a diminutive build, and a personality to match. She didn’t have to be of a gregarious personality to shine like the beautiful jewel she had been named after.

He wanted her with him. The fact that he was so besotted with her, did surprise him. He had never put much credence into the love at first sight rubbish, but now…now, he believed in it with his whole heart.

He desired to see her, and listen to her sweet voice. He knew that she was probably quite shattered, but that didn’t stop him from coveting her company. He was almost tempted to go up to her bedchamber and demand she come down to have dinner with him.

He had been dining alone for such a long time, that he craved the company of a woman who could meet him at his own level. He wanted a woman who could fit into his world, without disrupting it too much. Most of all, he wanted a woman who wouldn’t beg him to leave Cornwall.

Most in the ton, would believe that he was mad to make this house his main residence, and many women within his own class would balk at having to abandon what they thought was the civilized world, for this wildly untamed county.

His thoughts went again to Giselle. She had so loved London. Even if he had asked her to accompany him, he doubted she would have agreed to leave the bustling metropolis. He had been seduced by the sins of London, after he had returned from the Wars, and sought to build a life for himself outside of the Royal Navy. Seeking to drink away the memories of the Wars, gamble them away, and lose himself in the pleasures that Town contained.

Giselle Brant had been the widow of a soldier of limited fortune, and she had been forced to entertain men, to keep herself from being out on the street. Finn had plucked her from one of the upper class establishments on King’s Street that offered women to his class for a price. He had first met Giselle at one of the gambling hells he had frequented. She had been with another lord, a Lord Lumley, if his memory served, and somehow, they had found a way to have a word alone. He had been instantly smitten, and she had used all of her womanly wiles on him. She had told him that Lord Lumley was about to give her the boot, and that she would have to find employment at an establishment on King’s Street. They had parted, but he hadn’t been able to get her out of his mind. He had been so enthralled by her that he’d been motivated to seek her out, and take her as his mistress. 

A spark had burned brightly between them…for a while anyway. It had started to fizzle out about six months before he had left her. During that time, he had awakened from her bewitching spell, and had started to realize how shallow and selfish she had been. Her love spell had started to shatter because what he had felt for her hadn’t been love—it had been lust. But oh, how his rakish behaviour, now appalled him. He was shocked by his former lack of propriety. He had had absolutely no morals, and had used his mistress well for whatever sort of pleasure she could give him.

For her part, Giselle had been grateful to be out of such a place, and when he had set her up in a townhouse in Mayfair, she had easily adapted her life to suit his needs. They had conveniently forgotten where he had found her, and they had lived a nice little life, going through his money like it was going out of fashion, until he had received word that his sister needed him. Isolde had lived here at Penryn House with her husband and family with his blessing, while he had spent his life playing, and carousing his way through London.

Once he had read Isolde’s urgent missive pleading for his help, he had told Giselle that he had to leave London, possibly never to return. She had looked at him with an expression that now nauseated him when he thought about it, and told him that it would be a cold day in hell before she left London for Cornwall.

He had given her the sum of one thousand pounds, and had bid her adieu, telling her that she could remain on in the townhouse he paid to keep her in for one year. After that, she would be forced to find her own lodgings.

She had screamed bloody murder at him, as he had walked away. She had told him that one thousand pounds was not enough, called him a cheap bastard, and told him, she would make him rue parting from her bitterly.

Her ferocity had surprised him a little. He had not thought she could change so drastically. She had been an angel one minute, and had turned into an absolute shrew the next minute.

Finn wagered that she had believed she could get him to bow to her edict. She had wanted him to stay on in London, and forsake his family. After he had seen how cold she was, and how greedy, he had to break things off with her—knowing that he could not live with someone like that. She had shown her contempt for any other location but London, and he had found out that she was not the woman he thought he’d made her into. She was nothing but a calculating, greedy, selfish minx who had attached herself to him like a bloody leech because he had been both stupid and gullible. He had fallen for her tricks so easily that now, now, he hated himself for it.

She had seen him as an unending source of money. He was rich, even by the ton’s standards, and because of that, he could spend and gamble as much as he pleased. His family had made many investments over the years. His mother had been a tin and copper heiress from Cornwall. Upon her marriage to his father, her wealth became a part of the family’s fortune, and they had other business interests in Yorkshire that focused on the textile industry there, and to a lesser extent, interests in coal and steel. His family was benefiting greatly by industrialization, and while some old families had started to suffer fortune wise, his would only continue to grow.

The rest of the monies came from being influential landowners, as they owned a good deal of Yorkshire. Many in the ton derided his family for moving with the times, thinking that it was beneath them to go into industry, but his father hadn’t given a tinker’s fart for what others thought, and neither did Finn. His father’s forward thinking ensured their legacy. While his wealth continued to flourish, other men in the ton set to inherit their father’s title and lands were not as lucky. 

No matter what other worries Finn had, he never had to worry about money. Some of his mates were poor buggers who were on the hunt for an heiress in order for them to save their estates. He had no such concern. He did not have to marry out of duty, or obligation. He could marry for love. He wagered that he had already lost his heart to Ruby. She beguiled him in a way that no other woman ever had.

Someday, he might attempt to spend part of the year in Yorkshire, as it was a beautiful county, like Cornwall, it had been dubbed God’s Own County, and he wondered how Ruby would view Yorkshire. She had been willing to come here to Cornwall, so he hoped she would not be horrified by the thought of living in Yorkshire—should he ever want to return there.

He would stay away from London for a few years, to give those who had known about Mrs. Brant, the time to forget about her. Hopefully, she would find another young lord—or old lord to latch onto, and she would take up to warming his bed instead.

He knew very little about Ruby’s past, but he suspected it was a little cleaner than his. Surely, she would have no scandal to speak of. How could a woman with angel eyes ever have been touched by scandal? No…she was most certainly an honourable and innocent woman free of any stain upon her reputation. Why, she probably hadn’t even had any suitors.

She had probably lived the life of a nun, cloistered away from society, tending to her invalided father. He could imagine her dutifully sitting by his bedside, easing him through his trials, until he left this world for the next, leaving her utterly alone in a cruel and unforgiving world.

He knew she had to hail from a good family, and he knew she had good breeding. What he didn’t know was what sort of circumstances had put her into having to work for him as a governess. He wanted to know what dreadful event in her life had caused her to come down in the world. Had her father died, with his estate entailed, and had the family who had inherited, booted her out of what rightfully should have been hers?

Had she been cast out into the cold cruel world, forced to make her way in life without a tender word or kind shoulder to cry on?

Protectiveness welled up inside of him, and he resolved that now…now, he would shield her from the horrors of the world. She had found safe haven with him, and she would never have to worry again. From this moment on, she wouldn’t have to fear a blessed thing in life.

He would be her knight in shining armour.

He sighed, and finished dressing for dinner, and then, dismissed his valet. He would go down once again to their empty 16
th
Century Dining Room. He would eat at the large table, alone. He would have no one with which to have a lively discussion. No one here could possibly meet his intellect. No one here save for Ruby, and his nieces were of the class to sit with him at dinner. His nieces were too young, and Ruby was most likely, too tired.

He wanted to see her face when she discovered the rest of the house. She had seen greatly pleased with what little she had seen, before Mrs. Teague had whisked her away to her bedchamber. Mrs. Teague was an annoying woman at the best of times, and he knew that she and his butler, Mr. Chegwin, did not always see eye to eye. Where Mr. Chegwin was a kindly older gentleman, Mrs. Teague was a hard and stern woman.

Both were set in the ways, and both had different ways upon which they wanted to run the staff and the house. Despite all of that, Mr. Chegwin had a good heart, and he usually stuck up for Mrs. Teague when he should not. They had both been employed for a relatively short amount of time, as he had taken them into service after he had returned from London. The servants he had found at Penryn House, hadn’t been suitable, and so he had dismissed them without delay.

Mrs. Teague knew that when it came right down to it, Mr. Chegwin was above her in authority, and it was a good thing, too, because he kept her from doing things that Finn knew he wouldn’t approve of, and it was Mr. Chegwin’s efforts that usually kept Mrs. Teague employed. Should he decide to stop interceding on her behalf, Finn would have cause to dismiss the woman.

He walked slowly toward the staircase. He was so tempted to go and knock on Miss Massey’s bedchamber door and invite her to dinner. He couldn’t do that. That wasn’t proper, and now, now, he was a proper gentleman and so he had to act the part.

He was the Duke of Camblesforth, and it was about time he started acting like it. He was no longer a libertine. He was a reformed rake, and his life here had to remain untouched by scandal.

He groaned, as longing swept through him. He took a shaky breath, and instead decided to go up and check on Miranda and Cordelia in the nursery.

He quietly opened the door, without gaining anyone’s attention, and found them ready for bed. One of the nursemaids had just slipped the warming pan under Miranda’s bedclothes, to warm her bed up. Once she was satisfied the bed was no longer damp, she took the bed warmer out, and handed it back to a waiting maid who hurried away with it.

As the woman’s back was to him, she left Miranda’s side, and walked back over to a waiting chair. Settling herself with a contented sigh, she reached for her sewing. The two women that were their nannies seemed to be good women, and they had a few maids that worked beneath them to facilitate them with their care of their charges. That was one thing about Finn. He could go easily undetected whenever he wished. So far, none in the room had noticed his arrival—or they were pretending not to notice his arrival.

Miranda hadn’t crawled into her bed yet, but Cordelia was already under her bedclothes, and when she caught sight of him standing in the doorway, she let out a terrified little yelp, and shrunk under the bedclothes so her head was concealed from him.

Miranda groaned, looking to see what or who had upset her sister. She held the kitten they had named Joan her arms. When her perceptively astute blue gaze settled on him, she sighed. “Cordelia that is simply no way to behave around Uncle, he has only come to bid us goodnight.”

The nursemaids sat opposite their beds, and from what he could see, one was knitting, and the other one seemed to be darning socks. They slept in an adjoining room, and were meant to be on hand, in case the children needed them during the night. 

The nursemaids stiffened, as they finally noticed him, and jumped up to give him a quick curtsy.

“That isn’t necessary. Go about your business as if I wasn’t here,” he murmured. “Would one of you two little pixies like a bedtime story?”

He could see the covered lump that was Cordelia twitch ever so slightly. She must have been intrigued by his offer, but she couldn’t muster the courage to reveal herself and ask for a story.

Miranda crawled under her bedclothes, and put the kitten at the end of her bed, then, she propped her pillows up, so she could sit up and lean against them. Folding her hands over the top of her sheet, she settled her uniquely intelligent gaze on him.

“I would like a story, Uncle. I want one with pixie or a ghost in it. I want a spooky story befitting this splendid time of year.”

He sighed. “It might give your sister nightmares, Miranda.”

“Oh, no,” Miranda contradicted. “Not if it has a friendly ghost in it. We aren’t afraid of friendly ghosts, are we, Cordelia?”

Cordelia hesitantly peeked her head out from beneath her bedclothes, and eyed him warily with her brown eyes that were so like his own mother’s. She looked as if she was trying to gather the courage to speak, but then, her resolve faltered.

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