Deceived (9 page)

“Bless you! And Mrs. Howard will love it, I know,” Josie said as she placed the bottle carefully in her already full basket. There was bread and other pastry in there, seeds from their very own garden, a salve, several pairs of socks, a salami and now the bottle of cordial, along with a few other sundries.

“Please tell me you two are going on the oddest picnic in the history of Britain.”

Josie froze in her place as the all-too-familiar voice washed over her. She didn’t want to look. She couldn’t look. She ought not look.

And yet…she still turned and faced Evan. She had not seen him in nearly three days, not since their heated, odd, wonderful encounter in the billiard room. It had been all she thought about since, but she managed to remain calm as she said, “Good afternoon, my lord.”

He arched a brow at her formality, but continued to grin at her. “Good afternoon, Josie and…”

“Nell, my lord,” her maid said with a glance between Josie and Evan. She stifled yet another sneeze.

Josie gritted her teeth. Some girls told tales to their maids about gentlemen. But as much as she liked Nell, she hadn’t said a peep about what had happened between Evan and her.

“And Nell,” Evan said with an acknowledging nod. “Now, do tell me, you two have a very mixed basket there. What
are
you doing?”

Josie wished she could fold her arms, but with the basket in the way, it was impossible. So she made her tone very frosty as she said, “Well, if you must know, Nell and I are about to make the rounds of those who live and work on my late father’s lands.”

Evan’s smile fell a little, replaced by an expression of surprise. “You are?”

“Yes. I do it every time I come here for any extended period,” she explained. “My mother usually goes with me, but today she is actually with
your
mother. So Nell is going to accompany me.”

The maid responded with another sneeze.

“Gracious, are you all right?” Evan asked, his focused attention suddenly shifting to the maid.

Nell just stared up at him, smiling slightly. Josie rolled her eyes. Trust Nell to be taken in by a handsome face. A very handsome face with the most kissable dimple.

Damn, now she was doing it.

“The horse chestnut tree seems to make Nell sneeze,” Josie explained. “In London we don’t have any, but here we are in the country.”

“I’m perfectly fine otherwise,” Nell said, then let out a sneeze that belied her statement. “Thank you for inquiring, my lord.”

Evan shook his head. “If you are going out to see the tenants, you’re going to be strolling right through copses of the trees. You will explode.”

“I have a handkerchief,” Nell offered weakly.

Evan folded his arms. “It will not do. No, Nell, you will march back home right away and have a good hot tea.”

Josie stepped forward. “Now wait just a moment, you have no right to tell my servant what to do.”

“Do you want her to sneeze all day? It sounds painful,” Evan asked. He had a smile on his face, damn him, for he knew she wouldn’t agree that Nell should hurt herself.

“Of course not,” Josie sighed. “Come, Nell, we should go back. I’ll see if someone else can accompany me. Or wait for my mother and go tomorrow.”

“No, no,” Evan said, swooping in to gently remove the basket from her arm. “This is beastly heavy, Josie, great God.”

“What are you doing?” Josie asked, ignoring his comments and grimaces about the basket.

“
I’m
going to accompany you,” he said, blinking at her as if that should have been perfectly clear. “Go on, Nell, your mistress is perfectly safe with me.”

“No one is perfectly safe with you,” Josie muttered and to her surprise Evan laughed. She frowned at him and turned to Nell. Her maid shifted with discomfort.

“I don’t know, miss. Is that proper?”

Josie glared at Evan, but then shrugged. “Not precisely, I suppose. But Evan is an old friend to our family and his brother is the marquis, so in truth, all our tenants are also under Lord Woodley’s charge. And Evan is right, you are going to suffer all day. I should have been more mindful of that fact and I apologize for my lack of care toward you.”

Nell waved her hand. “My reaction has never been so strong.”

“Go back, have tea and do not worry yourself,” Josie said, well aware that Evan was watching her every move. She rather wanted to slap him for it, actually. Or kiss him again. She would choose to do neither, though the second was so very tempting.

Relief flooded Nell’s features. “Oh, thank you, miss. And thank you, my lord.”

Nell scurried away and Josie took a long breath before she turned back to Evan. “What do you want with seeing tenants with me?”

He laughed. “You said it yourself that the charges of your father are also in some ways the charges of my family.”

“Well, all your
charges
got a good dose of Woodley wisdom and company while your brother and his wife were here. They visited every single person in the shire.”

Evan blinked. “Edward and Mary did? I thought they went out for just a long ride.”

Josie turned her eyes upward with a sigh. “Evan.”

He moved a little closer. “Please don’t say my name like it’s a curse.”

She jerked her gaze toward him. His tone was teasing but his eyes were serious.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly. “Old habits, you know.”

“We should form some new habits,” he returned, his voice silky.

She shivered despite herself and didn’t resist when he took her arm and led her across the main street to the phaeton that was parked there.

“Oh,” Josie said with surprise. “Nell and I were going to walk.”

“Don’t you like phaetons?” he asked as he set her basket in the tiny space behind their seat and then helped her up.

She wobbled slightly in the high perch. “I-I don’t think I’ve ever ridden in one. My mother doesn’t own one and it isn’t as if I get invited to ride by the kind of fast gentlemen who do.”

Evan laughed again as he took a place beside her and urged the horses forward. “Well, consider yourself in the company of a fast gentleman.”

“I do,” she muttered under her breath, but his chuckle told her that he had heard her yet again.

And in truth, she rather liked that he laughed at her little quips. In London, there were gentlemen who looked at her like she was speaking another language if she made a sarcastic remark. Certainly her intellect and wit had done her no favors in the marriage mart.

Which was part of why the fact that she would likely never marry didn’t trouble her. Much.

“My mother will likely give me a full report tonight,” Josie said, searching for a comfortable topic. “But how is Lady Woodley’s recovering going?”

“Very well, actually. Ever since Mary suggested the healer. Mary—that is Edward’s new wife, you know, who I think you would adore.”

“I’ve heard nothing but good about her. We talked briefly at Audrey’s wedding and I did very much like her. She is not at all like Alice.”

Both of them shuddered at once. “No,” Evan agreed. “Edward’s second wife is nothing like his first. And
that
is all the more to recommend Mary to us.”

“Tell me more about the healer,” Josie said. “She is very pretty.”

“Is she?” Evan said, his gaze darting to her in what seemed like true surprise.

Josie shook her head. “Oh, please. It is an undeniable fact that Miss Gray is lovely. I’m surprised you haven’t found your way to cornering
her
in the billiard room.”

The moment she said those words, she wished she could take them back. First, they brought up a subject she was trying to ignore, but also because she now wondered if Evan, indeed, had done that already with the pretty, auburn-haired healer. Josie couldn’t possibly be special in that regard.

Evan turned her to with a frown. “I’m not exactly in the habit of doing that, Josie. Certainly I have no interest in doing it with Miss Gray.”

“Oh,” Josie said, both embarrassed and secretly pleased with his answer. “Well, at any rate, I was just saying she was pretty and wondering what you thought of her.”

“She seems a nice enough girl, though for all the time she spends in our home with our mother, she speaks mainly to Gabriel, rather than me. And she saved our mother’s life, so we must all like her.”

“Was it truly so dire?” Josie whispered, trying to picture her own life without her mother. She would really have no one at that point, since she wasn’t close to her siblings. Oh, one of them would take her in, she supposed. But it wouldn’t be out of love, but duty.

“Very,” Evan said, all humor gone from his voice. “When we first arrived from London, I think she was on death’s door. It was…horrifying.”

Josie reached out and covered his hand with hers. His gaze slipped down to her hand before he looked at her face, and she caught her breath. He wanted to kiss her. She recognized it now, that heavy-lidded expression.

Worse, she wanted him to do it.

But he didn’t. Instead, he moved to stare straight ahead, his jaw set, and said, “But we’ve talked about my family more than enough. How is yours?”

Josie pulled her hand back to her lap. It seemed for all his smiles and teases that perhaps Evan regretted what had happened between them. She pushed aside her hurt at that fact.

“Oh, you know. My brother is so busy running everything that he hardly ever calls on us. My sisters are married, with their children and their charities. I suppose they’re all well enough.”

“You were never close to them,” Evan said, a statement not a question.

She shook her head. “No. But they were all so much older. Lydia is the youngest after me, and she is fifteen years older than I am. What could we possibly have in common? I was a surprise youngest child who only served to split the family inheritance further. Why would they
want
to be close to me?”

Evan frowned. “When Edward was estranged from our family after his first wife’s death, it was terrible. I suppose I have a hard time picturing not being a friend to my siblings.”

“But your family is wonderful,” Josie explained, smiling as she thought of the days she had spent in their company. “Aside from you, I loved spending time with all of them.”

He laughed, and she blushed as she realized what she’d just said to him.

“I didn’t mean—” she began.

“I know what you meant,” he reassured her. “You had a history with me that made it hard to want to be my friend, but with Edward or Gabriel or Audrey or especially Claire, you were welcomed.”

She nodded. “Yes. I felt a part of that circle when I truly needed to be a part of something.”

“Mostly thanks to Claire I would wager since we boys were rather busy being hellions and Audrey was so much younger,” he pressed.

She squeezed her eyes shut. “Yes, Claire was my angel so many times. Without her, I can’t imagine what my childhood would have been like, let alone those awful first few years of my debut.”

For a moment, Evan was silent and shifted beside her in what seemed like discomfort. Then he said, “Do you ever wonder what she suffers now?”

He had brought up the subject of Claire before, and Josie had avoided the subject as much as she could. He was trying to ascertain if Claire had written to her, that much was clear. Josie slid her gaze to his face. His mouth was drawn down and his pain was palpable.

“Evan,” she said softly. “I know you all fear for her. You want her safe return. But…”

She trailed off and he set his jaw. “What do you know?”

She sighed. Of course he would press her on this subject. This one subject she couldn’t discuss. After all, what little Claire had shared with her was private. Knowing it would give Evan no pleasure.

“When Claire is ready to come home, I have to believe she will.” Up ahead she saw a little cottage at the turn in the road and breathed a sigh of relief. “Ah, and here is our first stop.”

Evan continued to frown as he brought the horses to a halt. As he got down and came around the phaeton to help her down, she took a long breath. This day with Evan was unexpected, but as long as they could stay away from difficult subjects and she didn’t make a cake of herself…well, at least she could try to enjoy herself.

Evan watched Josie as she stirred a pot of steaming liquid and smiled at the older woman at the worn kitchen table.

“Mrs. Howard, this sauce smells divine,” Josie said. “Now, what should I add next?”

“You really shouldn’t, my dear,” Mrs. Howard fretted as she smoothed her palms along her well-worn skirts.

“But I insist! I never get a chance to play in the kitchen at home. Cook would have a spell.” Josie laughed. “Shall I add the herbs we chopped earlier?”

“Yes,” Mrs. Howard said. “Then just put the lid on and we’ll let it simmer a while.”

Josie did as she had been asked, smiling and chatting and asking about Mrs. Howard’s children all the while. Evan leaned back to enjoy the show.

He had chosen to horn in on Josie’s day out for two reasons. First, he was under strict orders from Gabriel to obtain information about Claire. That had been a failure, for Josie steered him away from the subject every time he tried to broach it.

The other reason was because he found himself
wanting
to spend time with her. In that aspect, the day had been a smashing success. Whether it was in his phaeton, rushing around corners just a little too fast so that she squealed in delight, or spending time with her family’s tenants, he had truly enjoyed the afternoon.