Her Christmas Earl
“You meant well.”
He almost laughed. Her generous response surprised him and sparked a faint gratification. He couldn’t remember the last time anyone had said that to him. He couldn’t remember the last time those words had accurately described his motives. The irony was that Miss Sanders was right. He’d been horrified to discover her in his room. And doubly horrified at the salacious pictures invading his mind of how to take advantage of her presence. “You took an awful risk. What if you’d broken into the room of a man with no principles?”
Another laugh, self-mocking. “I thought I had.”
His lips flattened. “In that case, you should be scared out of your mind.”
More rustling and she dropped to sit. The restricted space meant that she ventured dangerously close. “I don’t scare easily.”
He didn’t bother pointing out that only minutes ago, she’d sounded petrified. “I’ll see you don’t suffer any consequences.”
“Very noble, my lord, but you’re making promises you can’t keep.” Her words were heavy with discouragement. “If there are consequences, you’ll face them, too.”
The inevitable price an unmarried man and woman paid for spending an extended period alone together in a private place. Damn it, Miss Sanders sounded considerably more cut up about the prospect of marriage than he did. She spoke as if she’d rather face the hangman than a parson reading the wedding service.
To Hades with her, women all over England had tried to shackle him. He was rich. He was young. He was healthy—whatever the long-term effects of his rakish life. Society accounted him a dashed eligible fellow.
Then he reminded himself tha
t he had no right to pique. They were stuck in this damned uncomfortable spot because he’d pretended to lock them in. He should have known that breaking the wicked habits of a lifetime and taking the high moral ground would only cause trouble.
“Hopefully Mills will find us before long.” Except Mills wasn’t likely to seek his master until morning. He knew better than to intrude upon the Earl of Erskine after midnight.
“You’re taking this surprisingly well.” She paused. “After all, I’m here uninvited.”
“You were trying to save your sister from ruin.”
“Amelia can be a twit. But if she settles to the match, I hope she and Gerald will be happy.”
Erskine didn’t respond. From what he’d seen of Miss Amelia Sanders, she was, at the very least, an unregenerate flirt. That stripling Gerald Fox would need to be considerably more awake than he currently was if he intended to be master in his own house.
Erskine’s silence must have conveyed criticism because Philippa spoke with more emphasis. “She’s gone a bit silly with the success of her first season.”
“It’s your first season, too,” he pointed out.
“I’m not the kind of girl that society takes to its heart,” she said without resentment.
Regrettably that was true. Amelia Sanders was considered a diamond of the first water and Erskine was connoisseur enough to admit that the girl was pretty in the conventional fashion. Blond and willowy with big blue eyes holding no more intelligence than a sheep’s. The younger sister, on the other hand, was well outside the common run of debutantes. Hardly surprising that those nincompoops infesting the capital’s ballrooms hadn’t discerned the treasure lurking beneath Philippa’s direct manner.
He frowned through the darkness. His eyes had adjusted to the stygian gloom, but he’d give a hundred guineas for a candle. “That’s society’s loss.”
She sat close enough for him to feel how she stiffened in response to his compliment. “Lord Erskine, no need to waste time flirting. I know I don’t meet your standards.”
She sounded repressive again. Unfortunately for her, he found her scoldings more appealing than another woman’s praise. Besides, he’d much rather hear disapproval than fear in her voice.
Still, he was annoyed that she dismissed his sincere compliment as a rakish trick. “You’d meet the standards of any intelligent man.” He paused. “Has nobody ever flirted with you before?”
Another dismissive snort. “I’m considered far too serious for anything as frivolous as flirting.”
Erskine laughed, enchanted by her dry assessment of the world’s opinion. “If you practiced, my dear Miss Sanders, I suspect you could become alarmingly proficient.”
“The world mistakes you, my lord.” For the first time, her voice held no wry note. “You’re not the rapacious beast of legend. Instead, I think you might be kinder than you want to admit. You’re trying very gallantly to distract me from our predicament.”
Heat prickled his neck. When she called him kind, he felt about a thousand years old. Damn it, she must be at least twenty. He wasn’t that much older than she was.
“Yes.” He paused. “And no. You’re so deuced convinced that nobody notices you.”
“Nobody does.” Not a hint of self-pity.