A Lady Never Lies (33 page)

“No, damn it,” the duke grunted, folding his arms.

“Burke?”

“Bloody hell,” muttered Burke, under his breath.

“You see, Lady Morley? All quite willing and happy and so on. I daresay Burke can take the little room upstairs, as he’s such a tiresome, misanthropic old chap, and my brother and I shall be quite happy to . . .”—he swept his arm to take in the dark depths of the common room—“make ourselves comfortable downstairs. Will that suit?”

Lady Morley clasped her elegant gloved hands together. “Darling Penhallow. I knew you’d oblige us. Thanks so
awfully
, my dear; you can’t imagine how thankful I am for your generosity.” She turned to the landlord. “Do you understand?
Comprendo?
You may remove His Grace’s luggage from the rooms upstairs and bring up our trunks at once. Ah! Cousin Lilibet! There you are at last. Have you sorted out the trunks?”

Roland couldn’t help himself. He swiveled to the doorway, desperate to see her, now that he’d recovered his wits; desperate for even a glimpse of her, without all the rain and darkness and bloody damned
hats
in the way. He wanted to know everything. Had she changed? Grown cynical and world-weary? Had her fresh-faced beauty faded under the blight of marriage to the legendarily dissolute Earl of Somerton?

Did he wish that it had?

She was kneeling by the door, unbuttoning her son’s coat. Typical of her, that she would make the boy comfortable first, the little martyr. She turned her head to answer her cousin, her voice as even and well-modulated as ever, despite the raspy edge Roland had noticed before. “Yes, they’ve all been unloaded. The fellow’s coming in the back.” She straightened and handed the boy his coat and began unbuttoning her own.

Roland held his breath. Her gloved fingers found the buttons expertly and slid them through the holes, exposing inch after inch of a practical dark blue traveling suit with a high white collar, pristine and ladylike, her bosom (fuller now, or was that his imagination?) curving tidily beneath the perfect tailoring of her jacket.

He felt a sharp poke in his ribs. “Keep your tongue in your mouth, you dog,” hissed his brother.

The landlord hurried down the steps to assist her. She had that effect, Roland thought crossly. “I take the coat, milady,” he said, dipping obsequiously, folding the wet wool over his arm as if it were cloth of gold. “And the hat. The hat. Ah,
mia donna
, it is so wet. You come to the fire, you dry.
Mia povera donna.
”

“Thank you,” she said. “
Grazie
.” She allowed herself to be drawn to the fire, smoothing her dark hair with one hand, pulling young Philip with the other. The light gleamed gold against her pale skin, casting shadows beneath her cheekbones. She looked tired, Roland thought, taking an involuntary step in her direction before he remembered himself. Concern! For Lady Somerton! As if she couldn’t take perfectly good care of herself without him. She’d proven that well enough.

Roland looked around and found that both Burke and Wallingford had resumed their seats, and he was standing there like the village idiot, staring after her ladyship’s decorously clothed backside.