The Trouble with Virtue by Stephanie Laurens & Alison DeLaine

Author:Stephanie Laurens & Alison DeLaine [LAURENS, STEPHANIE & DeLaine, Alison]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2013-11-26T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWELVE

“CAN I FETCH you anything, my lord?”

Seated behind his desk in the library, Philip looked up. Carring stood in the open doorway. Philip frowned. “No. Not at the moment.”

Carring bowed and backed out, reaching for the doorknob.

“And you may leave the door open.”

Carring bowed again. “Of course, my lord.”

Smothering a growl, Philip refocused on the Gazette. The weak rays of the midday sun intermittently pierced the clouds, throwing fitful beams across the page.

The weather was not the only thing to have suddenly turned uncertain.

Antonia had given him no chance to explain, no chance to set the record straight. He trusted her implicitly; despite her agreement to do so, she obviously didn’t trust him. Admittedly, he carried a certain reputation, one he’d made no effort to hide, but they were friends and had been for years. He had thought that would count for rather more than it had. To his mind, the matter was clear. She should have known better—known him better.

Rather than believe the evidence of her eyes. And her ears.

Philip grimaced. His gaze, fixed unseeing on the page, grew more deeply abstracted.

A faint creak sounded from beyond the library door.

Instantly, he was out of his chair and rounding the desk. By the time Antonia started down the last flight of stairs, he was waiting to greet her.

“Good morning, my dear. I missed you at breakfast.”

The rest of his carefully rehearsed speech, his “I trust you slept well?” followed by a pointed request for a moment of her time, went winging from his head the instant he saw her face.

Antonia hesitated, one hand clutching the balustrade, her gaze deliberately unfocused. “I’m afraid...” Dragging in a breath, she lifted her head. “That is, I slept in.” She felt chilled to the marrow, very close to shivering, but if she wished to be his comfortable wife, she had to comport herself appropriately, even at moments like this.

Stiffly poised, she continued her descent, concentrating on her carriage. Behind her, Nell’s heavier footfalls followed down the stairs. Defiantly, she kept her head high. Nell had ministered with cucumber water and Denmark Lotion; she assumed the worst was disguised. Reaching the last step, she bestowed an unfocused glance on her husband-to-be. “I trust you are well, my lord?”

“Tolerably,” came the brief answer. Then, after a fractional hesitation, “I wonder, my dear, whether you can spare me a moment of your time?”

Surprised, not only by the request but by the gentler tone of his voice, Antonia blinked; unintentionally, she focused on Philip’s face. The concern in his eyes had her turning her head away; she disguised the movement by flicking out her skirts. “As it happens, my lord, I was on my way to the back parlour to write letters. I regret to confess I’ve been greatly remiss in my correspondence. There are many ladies in Yorkshire to whom I owe a degree of thanks.”

She was determined to make no fuss, but the idea of being alone with him just now was simply too much. Her gaze fixed on his cravat, she continued, “I’ve put the matter off unconscionably long.

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