Once Upon a Marquess (The Worth Saga 1)

Judith had blinked at this. “You came here to point your pistol at me?”

He put one hand over his face. “In a sense,” he’d muttered. “There’s a rule that gentlemen ought not give ladies gifts that are too dear. Flowers, yes. Ribbons, maybe. But never anything particularly expensive or thoughtful.”

“It will make the lady seem fast if she takes it,” Judith had said with a nod.

“No,” Christian said. “That’s what they tell the young ladies. I don’t think it’s the true reason, though.”

“No?”

“It’s because some gentlemen aren’t gentlemen. Sometimes, a man will say he’s giving a gift, and then later, he’ll ask for compensation in the form of attentions a lady does not wish to give.”

Judith heard herself laughing. “Goose. Nobody will think you’re seeking my attentions.”

He hadn’t laughed with her. He’d bit his lip instead and looked over at her. “Won’t they?”

And then he handed her the box he was carrying.

It had been heavy. She’d needed two hands to steady it on her lap. Then she’d lifted the lid.

Inside that wooden box had been a brilliant tableau. A shepherdess sat in a field, her face upturned. She had been smiling. The painter had captured the look of sun kissing her lips.

But that had not been the best part. Around her, three clockwork sheep were arranged on a little track that wound round the figurine’s skirts. And when she pulled the shepherdess out of the box, there was something underneath her—a thick volume, the spine stamped with the notation Elements of Clockwork.

“Oh, my.” Judith had touched the figurine and then found the mechanism and wound it. The sheep danced, turned, and—one by one—leapt a tiny wooden fence.

She had turned to Christian. He was watching her with an unreadable expression on his face. Even if she couldn’t read his expression, she could comprehend what he’d given her. This wasn’t the sort of bauble one handed to one’s best friend’s younger sister on a whim.

She had been glad. “It’s perfect.”

He had scuffed his foot against the carpet. “If you flip it over, you’ll discover that the clockwork can be accessed via a simple panel. You can completely disassemble it, if you wish.”

That had been it: the moment she had known that he’d seen her, that he knew what she most desired, and that he’d wanted to give it to her. It was more intimate than a kiss. She was seventeen; he was nineteen. She was unlikely to see him at all in the next few years.

She had been old enough to think of boys, but not quite old enough to do so seriously. Up until that moment, she hadn’t let herself dwell on the possibility of Christian. He spent summers in her house, for God’s sake; there was no point working herself up to being nervous in his presence.

She was nervous now.

“It’s extremely improper,” he said. “Far too expensive. And I had it commissioned for you in particular, which makes it even worse. But I won’t ever ask you for anything because of it. I won’t even remind you I offered it.”

“Won’t you?” She felt almost wistful.

“No,” he said. “While your father and your brother are gone, you are going to stay with your uncle three counties over. You’ll be in mourning, not taking visitors. We won’t have a chance to talk at breakfast. We shan’t have any meetings in the orchards. You won’t be out. So no, Judith. I won’t have the opportunity to ask you for any attentions. Not for two years.”

She nodded. “It’s a farewell gift.”

His eyes had held hers. “By the time I see you again, you’ll be nineteen, and every inch the lady. I am not asking you to do anything improper, Judith. But I must admit that I’m hoping you will do me the honor of…”

She had waited in utter confusion.

“Of not forgetting me,” he said.

She hadn’t. She’d taken his shepherdess apart and reassembled it until she could see the gears in her sleep. She’d studied the book and saved her pin money so she could order the parts she needed to make the sheep leap backward, and when her first attempt had failed, she’d tried again.

She had never forgotten him. Not during those two years while her father was away and she was stranded in mourning at her uncle’s. Not when she saw him again after all that time. Not after her father’s trial.

She’d thought of him the day she sold her first design for a clockwork dancing couple.

She picked up the shepherdess now and gave it a perfunctory wipe.

Her memory was too good. She also couldn’t forget Benedict’s lip. She remembered that the little bits and pieces she’d scraped together for her sisters added up to a tiny fraction of what they would have had…and that it felt like she’d spent the last years of her life scrambling from one sinking ship to the next.

They should have had more. She should have had more.

“You’re right,” she told the shepherdess. “I can’t let myself forget that I hate him.”

Chapter Eight

“Wire ahead,” Christian was saying to Mr. Lawrence, his man of business, as they walked in the front door of his house. “We’ll need a conveyance of some sort when we arrive.”

“Yes, my lord.”

Beside him, the butler gave him a faint nod in greeting and tilted his head slightly to the right.

Christian turned back to his man of business. “Reschedule my meeting with Lord Grafton.”

“Yes, my lord. Already accomplished.”

The butler moved ten degrees, back into Christian’s field of vision, and mildly cleared his throat.

“And find my notes from the Worth affair, if you will—there’s one matter I must think about briefly.”

“Of course, my lord. I’ll have them brought right over.”

The butler cleared his throat a little louder, and when that didn’t work, coughed mildly into his fist.

“Good.” Christian handed his hat and gloves to the butler, hoping that this was the source of the man’s insistently putting himself forward. “Then we can knock off these last—” He stopped midsentence, looking into the front drawing room.

His mother sat, a stiff expression on her face. Next to her on the sofa was Lillian, his second cousin, and her husband, Viscount Stafford. They were staring at him with matching, pained looks that suggested he had either murdered a score of baby elephants in the public square and was still dripping blood, or he was guilty of some minor breach of etiquette.

For instance, not noticing that he had visitors when he walked into his house.

Also, possibly, not remembering that he had promised his mother that he’d be home to visitors today. Damn it.

He handed his hat and coat to the butler and walked through the doors. “Lillian,” he said. “You look well. You’re much recovered from your confinement.”

“Thank you, Christian.”

“And Stafford. How good of you to come by.”

He reached for a biscuit; his mother frowned at him, and he left it on its platter.

“Do sit with us,” his mother said coaxingly. “Talk.”

Small talk was the last thing on his mind. He could have engaged Stafford on some of the little matters dithering about in Parliament if they’d been alone, but they were in mixed company. He might have enjoyed drawing Lillian out—he had never known what women talked about when they were alone until his cousin had begun to whisper details—but she’d never divulge her secrets with her husband present. Besides, he had a journey in the morning to plan.

Still. His mother handed him a cup of tea that she’d prepared, and he dutifully seated himself and set the cup on the little side table.

“Ashford.” Lillian touched her fingers to the coiled plait of dark hair wound about her head. “We are here on a very serious matter. We request that you give this your utmost…ah…consideration.”

He reached for a sandwich. “You perceive me all considering consideration.”

“Something dire has happened.” Lillian

reached for her own teacup, as if it were filled with liquid consolation instead of just brown brewed water. “Something truly, dreadfully awful. Your reputation will never be the same.”

“Oh my.” Christian sat up straight. “They’ve found out about the elephants.”

Lillian frowned at him. “The…what?”