‘Milord!’ The housekeeper cast a scandalised eye over his shirtsleeves and crimson dressing gown.
‘You may leave us, Madame. I wish to speak to my ward alone.’
Madame Robert dropped a curtsey and left, stiff-backed.
‘I am not your ward.’
‘I wish to blazes you were not my anything,’ Nicholas snapped. From the dark circles under his eyes he had obviously had very little sleep. It had done nothing for his temper but, Cassandra thought wistfully, it had not marred his looks. ‘Unfortunately you have made yourself my responsibility and after last night…’
Cassandra blushed, remembering the heat of his body crushed against hers. ‘How could you be so unkind as to talk about that?’
‘After you confided the truth about your identity to one of the worst rakes in Paris, we need to talk.’ They were at cross-purposes: her indiscretion with the Count was obviously more important than the encounter in his bedroom. ‘Guy will never be able to resist the joke, it will be all over the City.’
‘Is he a rake?’ Cassandra enquired, momentarily distracted. ‘I’ve always been warned about them, of course, but I never thought I’d ever meet one.’
‘Cassandra, of course he’s a rake – and a gamester to boot. Not that he’d have believed a word of your story, of course. He assumes you’re my mistress, I’ve no doubt.’
Cassandra sat down with a thump. ‘Your mistress? Why would he assume that? Didn’t you tell him how old I was?’ How old I am supposed to be…
‘I doubt if it would have made any difference what I told him after you’d sat there batting your eyelashes at him and holding his hands. He’s quite well aware you are only fifteen. You are so naive, Cassandra, you make me feel forty.’ He ran his hands through his hair and broke off to roam irritably around the room.
Cassandra sat fingering the muslin of her gown, wondering what was going on in his head as he paced about like a caged panther. With a sinking heart, she recognised how foolish she’d been. Nicholas’s whole plan had depended on her staying quietly in the house so no whiff of scandal leaked out. Now she had compromised both of them, and possibly Godmama, too. She could hardly be expected to give countenance to a girl widely believed to be her son’s mistress.
‘Nicholas?’
‘What?’ He came to a halt before her, green eyes serious on her face, and she realised how much she was going to miss him.
‘I must go home, mustn’t I?’
‘Impossible. I refuse to send you home to Offley’s tender mercies. No, there is only one solution. You must go to Vienna.’
‘Vienna? To Godmama?’ Cassandra leapt from the chair and took two steps towards him, ready to throw her arms round him, then thought better of it. ‘Oh, Nicholas, thank you, it’s more than I deserve, I know.’
‘Indeed, it is,’ he observed tartly. ‘Now sit down and stop prattling, I must think.’
‘I wasn’t…’ Cassandra began, then subsided into silence, watching his thoughtful face. Vienna. Godmama would bring her out and there’d be balls and receptions and beautiful gowns – and Nicholas would see her as she really was.
‘Mama’s travelling carriage is in the stables, which is fortunate. Gaston will know of a reliable courier to take charge of the journey and Madame Robert will be able to recommend a respectable duenna to look after you.’ He was jotting notes on a set of tablets. ‘Four fully armed outriders, I think, better to be safe than sorry.’
‘But Nicholas, aren’t you coming, too?’
‘Why should I?’
‘But I thought you were going to Vienna next.’
‘No of course not, that was never my plan, not immediately, at any rate. I certainly do not intend to follow the direct route which you will now take. Once I leave here, sooner than I’d intended, thanks to your lack of discretion, I intend going down to the French Mediterranean coast. And then I have my papers to travel into Italy.’ He looked at her and broke off. ‘Cassandra, you did not believe I was about to change my plans in order to escort you personally to Vienna? Heaven help me, girl, haven’t you caused me enough trouble already?’
‘But Godmama would expect…’
‘Mama would have expected me to have boxed your ears back in London and packed you off to your father. Never have I done anything I regret more than bringing you here.’
‘That I doubt,’ Cassandra responded waspishly.
‘Meaning?’
Cassandra recognised his rising temper, but was too angry to heed it. ‘What’s done is done, and you are responsible for me, you said so yourself. I don’t want to go by myself with some hatchet-faced female. And it will be dangerous: you shouldn’t abandon me.’ She was sure she would be perfectly safe with the precautions he had outlined, but it was to tempting not to try and make him feel guilty.
‘I am flattered you should think I could protect you where four armed outriders could not. What you are really afraid of is being forced to behave yourself for a change.’