The Lady Risks All (7 page)

By late afternoon, his desk was clear.

Jordan gathered up the ledgers, saluted, and left.

Roscoe waved Tomkins in in Jordan’s wake, then slouched back in his chair, stretched out his legs, and relaxed.

His mind wandered . . . throwing up an image of a face far less striking than Jenny Edger’s, yet infinitely more riveting. Large hazel eyes under finely arched brown brows, a straight, no-nonsense nose, a mouth a trifle too large yet with lips luscious and full, pale, flawless, peaches and cream skin, brown hair glinting honey and gold, and a firm yet feminine chin, all set in an expression that held too much seriousness, too much . . . unrelenting sobriety.

Why he should feel that he had no idea, but his instincts were rarely wrong.

Why he was sitting there thinking about Roderick’s sister was an even greater mystery.

Banishing the image, shaking free of the compulsive spell—the impulse to learn more about something he didn’t understand—he sat up and opened the center drawer of the desk.

Extracting the latest missives from his family, one from his mother, the other from his sister-in-law, both delivered that morning, he briefly debated, then opened the packet from Caroline. After reading her brief note, he unfolded the enclosed report from Eton. Reading that made him smile.

Setting those sheets aside, he opened the slimmer missive from his mother, one of her usual brisk communications bringing him up to date with his sisters and their offspring. This one informed him that his sisters would be descending on Ridgware in a week’s time to spend several days planning Edwina’s wedding. The youngest of his sisters, Edwina was the last to wed. Despite the unstated yet underlying suggestion that his input would be welcome should he be able to visit, he couldn’t imagine that the five females who would be closeted at Ridgware would need any help from him.

He’d attended Millicent’s and Cassandra’s weddings by slipping inside the church at the last minute, remaining out of sight, then sliding out again before the bride and groom had even turned to come back up the aisle. If matters had been otherwise, he would have led both girls down the aisle . . . Henry, a mere boy, had had to stand in for him.

And that had hurt.

More than he’d expected.

Now Edwina was about to marry, and he wouldn’t be able to lend her his arm down the aisle, either.

Staring at the letter, imaging his little sister walking down the aisle—experiencing in a visceral way the irretrievable passage of time, of years gone that he could never have back, of opportunities passed up that would not come again—his mind slid in a direction he rarely allowed it to take, to dwell on his regrets.

On the dreams he had, so long ago, set aside.

At the time with little thought, with little real appreciation of what he was sacrificing. That hadn’t seemed important at the time. Now . . .

Twelve years on, his frame of reference had shifted.

He was thirty-eight and could see no hope of ever achieving the one goal that, underneath all else, solid and real but unrecognized until recently, encompassed his ultimate desire.

Family had been his lodestone, the pivot about which his life had swung . . . but the family he’d given up so much for was fragmenting. The girls would soon all be married, with husbands and children, families of their own. His mother was aging, and Henry, although currently still dependent on him, would be grown and his own man all too soon.

And he . . . would be left with no one.

No family to care for, no one to look out for.

He was too cynically clear-sighted not to know that his role—his one true purpose in life—had always been to protect others. That was who he was.

So who would he be, and what would he do, when he had no one?

The blankness in his mind cleared, and he saw again the face that had proved so riveting last night.

He wondered why his mind made the connection . . . then recalled that he’d told her Roderick no longer needed her to watch over him.

His lips twisted; the advice had been sound. He knew all about sacrificing, and then having to let go.

A moment passed, then he sat up, set his mother’s letter back on the desk. Determinedly shaking off his melancholy mood, he reached for a pen and settled to write to his sister-in-law, reassuring her that Henry’s performance at Eton was perfectly acceptable—indeed, to be expected. Anything more and he would have been concerned that his nephew wasn’t learning all that he should.

Imagining Caroline reading that, he grinned.

“T
hese pigs’ trotters in calf’s-foot jelly are excellent.” Gladys looked at Miranda, seated at the foot of the table. “We should have them when Mr. Wraxby comes to dine. I’m sure he’ll appreciate them.”

Miranda nodded. “I’ll speak with Mrs. Flannery in the morning to make sure Cook gets more in.” On Corrine’s death, she’d assumed control of the household; it gave her something to do, something to accomplish. Glancing at Roderick, seated in the large carver at the table’s head, she added, “We don’t yet know when—or even if—Mr. Wraxby will be able to dine, but he wrote to Aunt Gladys that he’ll be in town next week and will look to call on us.”

Roderick arched a brow. He made no comment, but she read his thought clearly in his expression: Wraxby wrote to
Gladys
?

She looked down at her plate. Roderick thought Wraxby a cold fish and no suitable suitor for her, but Roderick, with his light brown hair, clean-cut features, and significant fortune, wasn’t the one facing a lonely old age.

The thought of Roderick’s sizeable fortune brought her discovery of what he was planning to do with at least some of it back into her mind. In the drawing room earlier she’d had a few minutes alone with him before Gladys had joined them, but she hadn’t yet made up her mind whether to broach the subject. If she did, how would she explain how she’d learned of his private endeavor?

As Roscoe had implied, Roderick had grown to be no callow youth, no dissolute profligate, but a quiet, steady, and able gentleman. He’d thought things through and had decided to do good, and in joining the Philanthropy Guild he was on the right path.

He’d found the Guild, and the support of its members, on his own.

There was no avoiding the obvious conclusion: in this, Roderick didn’t need her help.

By the time Hughes ferried in the trifle, Roderick’s favorite dessert, she’d decided that the time had come to step back and let her little brother have the privacy he was owed.

“P
igs’ trotters.” Mrs. Flannery made a note on her list. “Now, as for luncheon today, I was thinking of a light bisque to begin with, and then perhaps . . .”

Miranda sat at her escritoire in the morning room and, with Mrs. Flannery in a chair nearby, worked through the menus for the day. They’d already settled sundry other matters, including the purchase of new linens and moving the tweeny’s day off.

“Now, for dinner, Mr. Roderick told Hughes he wouldn’t be dining in, so as it’s just you and Miss Cuthbert, miss, I was thinking we could . . .”

Miranda nodded but barely heard a word of what followed. Roderick had told Hughes, but she’d passed Roderick in the corridor earlier and he hadn’t said a word to her.

“So, miss, do you think that’ll do?”

Blinking back to the moment, she found Mrs. Flannery looking at her inquiringly. “Yes. I’m sure that will be ample.” She paused, then asked, “Is there anything else we need to discuss?”

“No, miss. I think that’s it for this morning.” Mrs. Flannery rose. “I’ll leave you to your work, and I’ll get on with mine.”

She found a smile for the housekeeper, but it faded before Mrs. Flannery had quit the room.

Roderick had always told her . . . well, until recently.

Until he’d stepped into adulthood and taken charge of his own life.

As he should.

As she’d always hoped he would.

But now he had . . .

She shook her head irritably and told herself she would simply have to get used to not being Roderick’s keeper anymore.

S
he kept herself busy for the next two days, filling her time with all the minor household tasks she often let slide. She focused on her role as de facto lady of the house and filled it to the very best of her ability . . .

Until the afternoon she found herself walking the garden, shears in hand, deadheading the numerous rosebushes dotted about the beds. The gardener, digging at the back of one bed, eyed her anxiously, as if worrying that her sudden burst of activity might presage a cutting back of his duties.

Reaching a large bush of faded roses, she halted.

What was she doing?

Trying to convince herself that she had some real role, that running Roderick’s house wasn’t a temporary occupation, one she’d have to hand over to his bride when he married?

The realization rocked her. She could manage this household to the top of her bent, yet it never would be hers.

Just as Roderick, and managing his life, no longer fell to her.

Neither Roderick, nor his household, could provide her with an ongoing purpose, could give long-term meaning to her life.

She stared at the withered roses, one question, strident and unavoidable, in her mind.

What am I going to do?

With the rest of her life.

A
fter dinner two evenings later, Miranda started up the stairs, intending to fetch the novel she’d been reading and sit with Gladys in the drawing room, when she heard Roderick’s footsteps striding along the upper corridor, then he swung onto the stairs and came hurrying down. Smiling, she stopped on the landing and drew back to let him pass.

Dressed for the evening, polished and precise, he grinned but didn’t slow. “I’m off for the evening.” With a wave, he continued down the lower flight. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

She remained on the landing, staring after him. Reaching the ground floor, he strode toward the front hall. She heard voices, Hughes and Roderick speaking, then the front door opened. A moment later, it shut.

If she asked . . . would Hughes know where Roderick had gone?

Not that she would ask.

It was, patently, no longer any of her business, no concern of hers.

Her time as Roderick’s carer and protector—as his big sister—was over.

“So what now?”

The whisper echoed softly in the stairwell.

Turning, she resumed her climb.

A
s advised, Wraxby called the following afternoon. He’d visited three times earlier in the year but had retreated to his estate in Suffolk over the summer to oversee his three sons during the months they were out of school.

“Now they’re once more at Rugby, and as I had to venture to London to attend to business, I felt I should not pass up the chance to renew our acquaintance, Miss Clifford.” Wraxby bowed over Miranda’s hand.

He’d already paid his respects to Gladys, ensconced in an armchair flanking the drawing room fireplace and watching their interaction like a predatory owl. Roderick wasn’t at home; Miranda hadn’t seen him yet that day, but she was determinedly
not
keeping track of his whereabouts.

“We’re delighted to receive you again, sir.” Retrieving her hand, she waved Wraxby to the sofa, then sat at the opposite end. “Will you be remaining in town for long?”

“A day or two.” Wraxby fussily settled his coattails. His attire was always rigidly precise, not fashionable so much as finicky.

The conversation that followed—a set of stilted statements from Wraxby with which Gladys invariably agreed—left Miranda questioning what her lot would be if he made an offer and she accepted, and he no longer felt the need to put himself out to be entertaining.

Inwardly sighing, she told herself to give him a chance—to give herself a chance to discover if, via him, she might find a life of her own to live.

Difficult with Gladys there, encouraging him to remain strictly within the unchallenging social parameters Gladys deemed suitable for the drawing room.

Somewhat to Miranda’s surprise—perhaps noting her silence and that his entire conversation was with Gladys and not her—Wraxby himself took the initiative. “Perhaps, Miss Clifford, you would do me the honor of walking with me in the nearby square? I drove in along the river and noticed the new tea gardens at the end of the street. Have you sampled their service?”

“Not as yet.” She rose. “But I would be happy to walk with you, and perhaps we might both determine their quality.”

“Excellent.”

After taking his leave of Gladys, assuring her aunt that he would take all due care of Miranda, Wraxby joined her in the front hall. He waited in silence while a maid fetched her coat, bonnet, and gloves. After donning them, she turned, expecting him to offer his arm. Instead, he waved her to precede him.

Their walk to Dolphin Square via Chichester Street retraced the route she’d walked nearly a week ago with Roscoe. Wraxby paced alongside her and made innocuous comments about the quietness and quality of the neighborhood; glancing briefly at the huge white mansion that dominated the other side of Chichester Street, she bit her lip against a wayward urge to point the house out and tell him who lived there.

However, his guaranteed response—centering on how she had learned who lived there, and why she felt that an appropriate subject to mention—wasn’t one she wished to invite.

Leading the way under the trees of the park, feeling the cooler shadows engulf her, she looked down the long, sloping expanse to the low stone wall that edged the lane along the river. Forcing her mind from the distracting memory of a starkly, darkly elegant face made suddenly more potent by the proximity of his house, she steered her errant thoughts to the many questions she had concerning Wraxby. He was strolling beside her, his pace slowed to match hers, his head up, his gaze fixed ahead. She glanced at him. “You said you drove along the river—was it a pleasant journey?”

Did he have any appreciation of the finer things in life? Given the paintings on his walls, Roscoe certainly did. Watching Wraxby, she saw a slight frown cloud his features.