Read Online Magical Masquerade: A Regency Masquerade by Hilary Gilman - Free Book Online

with fear of
discovery, but it was too late. The door opened once more, and Rochford stood on
the threshold.
    Even in her confusion, she could not help noting
how commanding his tall, elegant figure appeared framed in the doorway. The
ruin of his face was nothing when set beside the power she acknowledged in his
gaze and the virility he seemed always to hold in check as though not to
frighten his young bride. Suddenly, she fancied she glimpsed the truth. What if
the Duke had not turned from Eugénie as her foolish sister had thought? What if
he was simply giving her time to know and trust him before— Ah! Bon Dieu ! What was she to do?
    ‘To what do I owe this wholly delightful visit?’ he
asked in a voice of courteous enquiry.
    She pulled herself together. ‘I wished to speak to
you privately.’
    ‘I am enchanted. But, had you summoned me, I should
have been pleased to wait upon you in your own chamber. But perhaps you thought
your invitation might be misinterpreted. I am not sure you were wise to choose
this alternative, however. It is even more liable to—er—misapprehension.’ He
was watching her with a lurking smile at odds with his formal words.
    She forced a little laugh. ‘Oh, I do not fear that,
Sir. I do not think you are very apt to misread a situation.’
    ‘You flatter me.’ He smiled and left the doorway,
walking forward with a hand held out. ‘I am pleased to see you looking so
blooming, my love. You are quite recovered?’
    Reluctantly, she laid her hand in his and, lifting
it, he just brushed it with his lips. The slight touch set her heart beating
faster, and an exquisite colour suffused her cheeks. She could not doubt that
he noted it, but he said nothing, merely conducting her to a chair by the fire
and settling her there before taking up a stance beside the fireplace, resting
his shoulders against the wainscoted wall.
    ‘Well?’
    She reflected that, as she really had wished to
speak to him about his sister, this was a perfect opportunity. It was, however,
unexpectedly difficult to begin with him standing over her, his expression
blandly courteous.
    ‘It concerns Arabella.’
    He laughed. ‘I thought you would not tolerate her
for very long. You wish to send her back to school?’
    ‘No! Of course not!’ Indignation lent her a more natural tone, and she continued with less
constraint. ‘She is a dear child, and it would break her heart to be sent away
again. But I am worried about her.’
    ‘As am I,’ he said rather wearily. ‘Do you have any
suggestions to make?’
    Minette considered and then said carefully, ‘She is
the oddest mixture of precocity and innocence. She seems never to have been
taught to think seriously, and her head is full of romance and—well—well it
does not help that you allow her to read books like that horrid Monk .’
    He looked a little taken aback by this attack. ‘I
have never censored her reading, certainly. Surely, she has sense enough to
know that it is all quite absurd and not to be taken seriously.’
    ‘That is just what she does not have.’
    ‘Will you tell me what you apprehend?’
    ‘I fear that she could be easily wrought upon,
even—even—seduced by any attractive male who shows any interest in her.’
    He nodded as though she were merely confirming his
own observation. ‘She is a considerable heiress, too, which makes her a target.
That is one of the reasons I left her so long in that wretched school.’
    ‘I think that was a mistake. She needs more
society, not less, so that she may meet the kind of young men who would make
her an eligible husband. Then there would be less danger from the other kind.’  
    ‘You wish to bring her out? But she is not yet seventeen.’
    ‘No, not that exactly, but if there were the
prospect of a few entertainments, it would give me the opportunity to buy her some
more suitable clothes and perhaps instil some measure of decorum. I mean if she
were to be convinced it was necessary for social