After just a short time working in Lord Chilton’s employ, Bridget discovered something about herself: she had been born a Hamilton, but she was rot at treachery.
During the days, as she inventoried Vail’s latest purchases, it had been too easy to pretend that she was, in fact, a record keeper for a powerful bookseller. All the while, she’d searched—to no avail—for that coveted Chaucer tome. Under the guise of familiarizing herself with Vail’s prized collection, she’d systematically gone through room after room in search of that blasted title. There, however, remained two rooms she’d yet to search—another library…and Vail’s office.
Her stomach twisted in vicious knots. A tray of coffee and pastries in her hands, Bridget made her way from the kitchens. The servants had sought out their beds for the evening and Vail was otherwise at his clubs. She took advantage of his absence and the quiet to search for that bloody copy.
As she wound her way abovestairs to Vail’s office, she contemplated their last meeting—in the portrait room—and everything he’d revealed about himself…and the people whose portraits hung inside his household.
Her brother had painted Vail Basingstoke, Lord Chilton, as a ruthless businessman who cared about nothing and no one, except his own material gains. As unpalatable as it had been to stomach the idea of committing theft from anyone, it had been, if not easy, somewhat palatable, to imagine she was sharing a roof with a man who was just like her brother and father.
Only to find in a handful of brief meetings, that the man, Vail, who thought nothing of conversing with a servant and who cared for his brothers and sisters, couldn’t be more different from Archibald than the Lord himself was from Lucifer. What he is or who he is cannot matter. No one mattered more than Virgil.
Her resolve strengthened, Bridget stopped outside Vail’s office. Shifting the burden of her tray, she rapped once and waited. She strained her ear to make out a call or hint of sound within that room. When only the sharp hum of silence rang in the corridors, she knocked again. No one is here. Get inside and conduct your search now. The sooner she found that book, the sooner she could be free of this household and Vail would become nothing more than a memory.
Adjusting her grip on the burden she carried, she let herself inside his office. The tray clattered in her hand as she immediately caught her gaze on a lone occupant in the room—Vail. Her heart climbed to her throat and she braced for him to jump up with shouts for a constable.
A bleating snore filtered from where he rested. Her heart warmed at the sight of him, seated at his desk littered with books. The baron’s head was down on his right arm, which occupied the only available space on that surface. He’d the look of a student asleep at his studies. Carefully, she set the tray down on a nearby table.
I should go. She could hardly conduct a search with him slumbering a handful of feet away and there was otherwise no reason for her to stay.
Bridget wet her lips. She briefly contemplated the hallway, but then made the mistake of looking at him, once more…more specifically, his left arm. That long limb hung down before him. Having fallen asleep too many times while tending the accounting, she knew what it was to eventually awake from that stiff, uncomfortable slumber. “Do not,” she silently mouthed. He was not her affair. The only reasons she’d come were to serve as his housekeeper and steal, and how he slept or didn’t sleep or whether he enjoyed the raspberry puff pastries or the chocolate tarts were all irrelevant in the scheme of what Archibald had concocted.
She briefly closed her eyes. Her sister, Marianne, had always called her the ugliest and the weakest of the Hamilton siblings. And though she’d never doubted the former argument, she’d strenuously protested—at least to herself—the latter. Until now.
Her true purpose in being here briefly set aside, Bridget moved quietly forward and stopped beside the baron. The great space of the cavernous office now erased, her ear picked up the bleating snores that filtered past his lips. Another dratted sliver of warmth snaked through her. With him sleeping on, she used the moment to study him…
Her breath caught.
Nay, appreciate him. Half his face was concealed by his arm and the other half was partially concealed by a curtain of black hair, given to a slight curl, that fanned his face. A thick, dark growth marred his chiseled cheeks, giving him the look of a medieval warrior. The sight of him was one of a male beauty of which she’d never before seen, even in the books she’d studied and examined. As she carefully cleared a spot, she continued to steal furtive looks, ascertaining that he still slept on. Her lips twisted wryly as she reached for the baron’s limp arm. Not that she’d had an opportunity to appreciate the male form outside of those art books she’d once read and researched for Mr. Lowell. Bridget froze.
…What good does she do me? No man will ever want her. And, why should he? She is hideous and now deaf, to go with her ugliness…?
Her father’s thunderous voice echoed in her mind all these years later; his venomous recrimination bellowed at the doctor who’d tended a then four-year-old girl. And with it, her own flaws stood out a stark contrast to the baron’s perfection. Flaws she’d believed herself long at peace over.
She firmed her mouth. Enough. She had shed her last tear and applied her last hopeful concoction to her marked cheek long, long ago. She’d not let those memories force their way back into her life now. Disgusted with herself for that fleeting moment of caring still, she lifted Vail’s heavy forearm. The heat of his skin penetrated through the dupioni silk shirt he wore, burning her fingers. She laid that muscled limb upon the place she’d cleared on his desk.
He emitted a broken snore and she froze.
But then his breathing settled into a smooth, even cadence.
Bridget hovered at his desk, taking note of the details that had previously escaped her until this moment. For the earlier clutter she’d taken his work space for, there—upon closer inspection—appeared an order to Lord Chilton’s work. Leather folios occupied one parcel of space, matching leather ledgers another, and every other left unoccupied sliver had been claimed by aged texts and manuscripts.
Her gaze went to the book and magnifying glass that rested near the baron’s fingertips.
What manner of gentleman was Lord Chilton? Weren’t noblemen supposed to spend their evenings at balls and soirees and then travel off to their wicked clubs? Or mayhap only their wicked clubs? Instead, this man spent his days and nights dealing in antiquated texts.
She spared a brief glance at the snoring baron, and then leaned over him to examine the open book before him, when her gaze snagged upon a folded note there. The pungent scent of jasmine slapped at her nostrils. Jasmine. A floral, feminine scent. Was it a letter from a lover? The ugly tendrils of jealousy wrapped her in its hold and, unbidden, she read the first two lines.
Vail…
Mistakes were made. Please, I miss you…
Heart racing, she quickly yanked her attention away from that private note. In the scheme of her many crimes, reading his letters would certainly fall as the lesser of the evils. And yet, she’d not intrude on those delicate missives.
Unbidden, she stole another sideways peek.
Enough…
Returning her attention to the original object to secure her notice, she sank to her knees and craned her head around to look at the gold leather cover, etched in dark green lettering. The crimson and green mark in the middle marked it as that great seventeenth century work. Squinting—Bridget cursed the dim lighting—and yet, something of that page gave her pause. She shifted her gaze to her still slumbering employer and, holding her breath, she reached past him. She closed her fingers around the gold handle of the magnifying glass and brought it to her eye so she might examine the page.
Bridget quickly worked her gaze over it. “No shadows,” she whispered.
“That is, if one doesn’t count one’s hovering housekeeper,” Lord Chilton said in sleep-laden tones.
She gasped and swiveled sideways. Seated upright, his hair hanging about his shoulders, Lord Chilton’s thick lashes obscured all hint of emotion in his eyes. The magnifying glass slid from her fingers and clattered noisily in the quiet of the room. Silently cursing her blasted fascination with any and every antiquated book, she jumped up. “You’re awake,” she blurted.
He arched a midnight eyebrow.
And for the first time since she entered his office, she gave thanks for the dim lighting that hid her burning cheeks. “That is, my lord,” she said weakly, dipping a belated curtsy. “I brought you coffee and pastries.” She pointed over at the silver tray, giving thanks for the hindsight she’d had to bring along that offering. He followed her stare and, then again, met her gaze.
Bridget braced for the deserved fury from him. She’d no place touching, snooping, or interfering in his business. Mayhap, he’ll sack me. And for a sliver of a moment, instead of the terror that prospect should raise, there was a fledgling hope. For then, Archibald would have no use for her and she might not have the fortune from the Chaucer tome but she’d have freedom with Virgil and Nettie in their small corner of Leeds. Archibald will never let me be free. The truth of that stung like vinegar in her throat.
Lord Chilton rolled his shoulders. “Well?”
Oh, God. Memories of her father’s harsh, cruel dressing-downs ran through her mind. The vicious cries of one maid as Archibald had struck her across the cheek. “It will not happen again,” she said on a threadbare whisper. “I’d no right approaching you while you slept. I…” She swallowed hard. “It won’t happen a-again.”
The baron folded his arms at his broad chest. Sans jacket and attired in nothing more than his stark white shirtsleeves, it revealed the broadness of his chest and the faint wisp of midnight curls exposed there. Her mouth went dry. Look away. It is shameful and wanton staring as I am. But then, mayhap she was just like her younger sister who’d often cavorted with stable boys and footmen, for she could no sooner tear her gaze away from Lord Chilton than she could pluck out her eyelashes.
Then, slowly, he unfurled to his whole six-foot, four-inches, towering over her. The momentary pull of madness was shattered.
She took a hasty step back, but he merely turned on his heel and continued around the other side of the desk. Bridget watched in abject confusion as he crossed to the front of the room and picked up that small pot she’d brewed a short while ago.
The tinkling clink of porcelain touching porcelain, followed by the steady stream of liquid as he poured himself a cup, filled the room. That porcelain cup looked dainty in his large grip. He took a small, experimental sip, revealing nothing. Then, freeing one of his hands, he passed his fingers over the tray.
Which would he select? One could always tell much about a person by the sincerity of their smile…their eyes…and the dessert one selected.
Lord Chilton settled on a Banbury cake, the simplest of all those elaborate treats. Then, cup and dessert in hand, he moved to the center of the room and stopped so they were directly across from one another. Quickly dusting off that small cake, he downed his coffee and set his cup down on a side table. “I referred to the book,” he finally said.
Bridget shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
He nudged his chin at the Shakespearean tome. “You’ve again demonstrated an inordinate interest in my collection and I wondered what you thought of that piece.”
She eyed him suspiciously. Invariably, in the rare times Archibald came ’round, whenever he presented questions to her, there was a trick contained within them.
The baron chuckled, that deep rumble easy. “I assure you, this is no test. Sometimes, a question is simply a question.”
“Yes. But sometimes, it is more, too,” she pointed out.
His lips tipped up in the right corner into a heart-stopping half-grin. “This is not one of those times.”
“It’s a beautiful book,” she gave him the words he, as a bookseller, hoped for. But she could not offer half-truths in this. “Although…not an original.” She winced, waiting for an explosion of fury and thunderous questions.
The smile melted from his lips. “Beg pardon?”
What does it matter whether he believes he’s in possession of an original text? And yet, no self-serving aficionado on books could dare let such a truth slide. “Here.” Not bothering with permission, she collected his gold-handled magnifying glass and held it out.
Lord Chilton joined her at the desk and collected that fine piece in his hands.
“As you know, until the eighteenth century all molds had the same design.” She drew the proverbial rectangle with her fingers. “And there was the widely-spaced, vertical, wooden ribs with a chain wire lace to the top of each and…”
Pausing in his examination, he looked at her through baffled eyes.
Bridget coughed into her hand. “Ah, yes, laid paper. You know it was all laid paper with a latticework pattern that—”
“Revealed a watermark,” he finished, turning his glass back upon that page.
“Exactly. A watermark.”
Lord Chilton shifted the lens back and forth. “This has the requisite one.”
“But not the one,” she pointed out. “The vertical stripes have a graduated shadow.” Bridget held her palm out. “May I?”
The baron eyed her palm a moment and then turned it over…when surely any other nobleman would have turned her out for her insolence. Nay, when any other gentleman wouldn’t have even asked for her opinion in the first place. Encouraged by his silence, she placed the magnifying glass at the center of the page and leaned close. “Do you see how it’s lighter down the middle but darker at the edges?”
He dropped his head beside hers and eyed the watermark in silent contemplation. “This is antique laid paper that came along when mold designs improved,” she explained. Unnerved by his silence, she folded her hands before her.
What was he thinking?
Given his body’s response to his housekeeper, Vail had intended to keep his distance from the enthralling young woman.
He’d gone through the week seeing to his business, doing an admirable job of carrying on as he always had with his affairs, confident that he was not at all like the father who’d sired him.
Then he’d caught the lady hovering over him as he slept. Or rather, as he’d feigned sleep. After she’d come around his desk, he’d awakened, but he’d been too damned intrigued by her boldness to question just what she was up to.
And then she’d moved his arm in an attempt to make him comfortable as he’d slept; in a gesture that was so tender, it went against the very life he lived and the business he conducted. He’d been so frozen by that tenderness that he’d almost forgotten his pretend bid at sleep.
Now, for his earlier resolve, he could not put distance between them for altogether different reasons.
Vail whistled through clenched lips. “By God, I’ve been swindled.”
His skin pricked with Mrs. Hamlet’s eyes on him. He looked away from the book and met her gaze. She eyed him with a world’s worth of wariness. He frowned. What had put that look in her eyes? “I’m sorry,” she said softly. She did not, however, attempt to assuage his ego or doubt her own opinion. She rose in his opinion for that honesty and self-confidence.
Setting down the glass, he crossed his arms before him. “I’d believed the extent of your knowledge was of the care and keep of antiquated books.”
A droll grin curled those bow-shaped lips, revealing a flash of even, pearl-white teeth. Desire ran through him, as all manner of wicked thoughts whispered forward. “Because I’m a woman?”
His neck went hot and he ripped his focus away from her mouth. I’m a depraved letch. “Because I, apparently, was given to two miscalculations this evening.” He waved a hand lazily between the book and her. He inclined his head. “I apologize for both.”
The lady stared at him as if he’d sprang a second head. “Apologize?”
“Are you unaccustomed to a gentleman apologizing?” he asked, curious about her life before she’d entered his household.
“Actually, I am. I—” She abruptly cut her words off and he cursed that small glimpse she’d been about to provide.
Eyes weary from a night of poring over that damned volume, Vail scrubbed a palm over his face. He dropped his arm to his side. “So now that I’ve discovered you in my office, again examining my works, what are we to do with you, Mrs. Hamlet?” he asked, pushing away from the desk. He took a step toward her.
Mrs. Hamlet backed up. “D-Do?”
Vail continued his approach. “I hired you as a housekeeper. Are you not content in that role?”
“Yes. No. Yes.” The young lady’s eyes formed round saucers in her face.
His lips twitched. “Which is it, Mrs. Hamlet?” he murmured. Detecting her quick retreat, he stopped.
“I’m content,” she said quickly, continuing to back away from him, anyway.
“I’m afraid, though you do brew a tremendous cup of coffee, the role of housekeeper is not one you’re entirely suited for.” Vail folded his hands at his back. “I’d have you take on some of the responsibilities overseeing my inventorying.”
Her breath exploded from her on a noisy gasp. “What?” She backed into the wall. That abrupt movement knocked her chignon loose and several crimson-kissed strands tumbled over her shoulder. The whispery hint of a country garden clung to her skin and that delicate scent wafted about his senses, intoxicating in its innocence, and so wholly different from the sharp, cloying fragrances used by the women he’d taken to his bed. Shock brought her mouth open. “You would turn such important tasks over to a housekeeper?”
“If she was as capable as you are, then yes.”
“But…” She again shook her head.
“Your services would be entirely wasted dealing with mutton and perfumery.” He paused. “Unless, you otherwise wish to deal with them.”
“No.” She shook her head frantically. “The altered assignment would be…is perfect,” she whispered. He may as well have gifted her the task of caring for the Queen’s crown for the reverent awe there.
He opened his mouth to offer some glib reply, but she touched a hand to her heart, bringing his gaze back to those loose strands. Vail clenched and unclenched his hands several times, at war with himself.
In the end, the temptation proved too great. He caught one of those curls in his fingers, and rubbed the satiny soft tress between his thumb and forefinger. “I’ve never met a woman who was so adept at antiquated books,” he said softly, puzzling through the mystery that was his new housekeeper.
Her lips parted and a soft whispery exhalation slipped forward. She fluttered her lashes.
The muscles of his stomach clenched as a wave of hunger took root and held him frozen. “If you do not leave now, Bridget, I am going to kiss you,” his voice emerged hoarse to his own ears.
His shameful admission should have sent her fleeing. Instead, she wetted her lips. “Wh-what if I wanted you t—?”
Vail swallowed the remainder of that question, taking her mouth under his as he’d ached to since she’d first entered his household. She hesitated, and then lifted her palms between them. For an agonizing moment, he believed she’d push him away. Instead, she gingerly twined her fingers about his neck and melted into him.
With a groan, he took her lips under his again and again, exploring the plump contours of that generous flesh. She boldly met his strokes and a little moan filtered from her. He slid his tongue inside and laid claim to that moist cavern. She tasted of chocolate and mint, and he was enthralled by the innocence of her.
Bridget collapsed against the wall and he went with her, anchoring her between his arms. He broke contact with her lips and her little protesting cry filled the room; it echoed off the soaring ceiling in an erotic melody.
He kissed the corner of her mouth and moved lower, exploring all of her, until he reached that graceful column of her neck. Vail found the place where her pulse beat hard.
Footsteps sounded in the hallway, cutting across the thick haze of desire that had dulled all logic and reason. He wrenched away from Bridget and she slumped against the wall. Their chests rose and fell in a like, desperate rhythm.
He backed away, as a slow, dawning shame replaced his hungering for this woman.
I am my father.
Riddled with the horror of that truth, he spun away from her, putting space between them—
Just as Gavin entered, his lips wreathed in a perpetual smile. “Vail,” he greeted, “I’d forgotten to bring you coffee and—oh.” He stopped abruptly as his gaze landed on Bridget. “Mrs. Hamlet,” he said cheerfully. “Whatever are you doing here this late?”
An awkward pall descended on the room. Vail, who’d dallied with any number of wicked widows and unhappily married wives and ballet dancers, found himself unable to utter a smooth, deflective reply.
The high color on the lady’s cheeks deepened and she looked helplessly to Vail.
Gavin’s smile dipped and he glanced about. His stare landed on the empty coffee cup. “Oh, how good of you to remember.” He glanced to Vail. “She makes far better brew than I do,” he said on a loud whisper, as though it was a secret he intended to take to his grave.
Avoiding Vail’s eyes, Bridget dropped a swift curtsy. “If there is nothing else you require, my lord, I will leave you to your business.” Without seeking or awaiting permission, the lady darted around his shoulder and bolted past Gavin.
“And she’s quick,” Gavin said with rounded eyes. “I suspect she was quite good at blind man’s bluff.”
Vail’s shame deepened. As innocent as his brother was, he could not see the truth of the depravity that had gripped him moments ago. “I suspect you’re right. Gavin, going forward, given Mrs. Hamlet’s skillful knowledge of books, her responsibilities of the stores and perfumery are to fall to another.”
Four lines creased the younger man’s brow. “But…but…you’ve just hired her.” Whenever Gavin’s usual household routines were altered, he demonstrated confusion and worry.
“I’ll have Edward find someone to take on the tasks,” he said in calming tones, when inside he was still in tumult.
Some of the tension left Gavin’s wiry frame and he again smiled. Without so much as a parting word, he spun on his heel and left.
As soon as he’d gone, Vail unleashed a streak of black curses. By God in heaven, he’d kissed her. Nay, he’d backed her against a wall and passed his mouth over her skin, exploring her…and he would have continued had Gavin not interrupted.
Filled with a restiveness, he claimed a seat beside the fraudulent Shakespearean book…the one Bridget had brought to his unknowing eyes and attention. Given that, he should be focused on his fury with Lord Aberdeen and frustration with his own mistake.
Instead, desire gripped him still and a hungering to know more of the clever young woman who could identify a fake from a real antiquated book, and who smelled of a countryside meadow.
This inexplicable pull she had went against every moral standard he held himself to. Vail gave his head a hard, clearing shake, determined to dispel her from his thoughts.
He returned to his work. All the while, shame ate away at him and left a hollow, empty void inside.