A tap at the door sliced through the thickening tension. The footman entered, looking anxiously from Marcus to his mother.
“Yes, Ellis, what is it?”
“Apologies, sir, but I can’t find Fennel—”
“He’s to bed, per my instruction,” Marcus explained.
His mother snorted ruefully at that, which he ignored. He was still fuming over what she’d left unsaid about his father, and the all-too-pointed attack on his current situation. That she’d darebring the man up, when Marcus had taken pains to never speak of him. For years.
It hurt too damn bloody much. Marcus missed him something fierce.
And he was nowhere near what he ought to be.
“Well, then, I suppose I ought to tell you, sir—it seems there’s someone at the door. Not the back door, the front.”
“At this hour?” his mother screeched, then mumbled something under her breath about expectations of propriety in this part of town.
“Ah,” Ellis looked at him and winced. “It appears to be a lady, sir. Seeking assistance.”
“Oh, is it now?” Marcus raised his brows, doing his best to keep from smiling as he turned to face his mother.
She was as white as a ghost.
“I’ll be there in a moment, Ellis.” He stood up and made a show of smoothing out his lapels. “Well, isn’t this a lovely surprise?” He grinned at his mother. Let her get in a dither.
“Marcus, wait—surely you did not mean what you said,” she sputtered, reaching for him as he passed by. “Not the next woman, in the completely—”
But he did not hear the rest of her exhortations. He was already taking long strides out of the room, making his way quickly toward the entrance hall.
The front door was ajar, with Ellis standing alongside it, looking as useless as the rest of the household staff. Marcus silently waved the footman off, hoping he’d make himself scarce. This was no doubt one of his charity cases, and he didn’t wish to alarm the girl with too many listeners present.
He did, however, wish to alarm his mother, to hold her feet to the fire and allow her to think he’d make good on his ridiculous claim. And he didn’t need an audience for the performance thatwould require, his first attempt at flirtation in heaven knew how long.
But when he swung the door open, he was so taken aback he forgot to put on his charming smile.
A woman stood in the shadows, staring so intently that for the second time that day Marcus found himself turning to look behind him, to see if someone else loitered in the hall.
“Mr. Hartley, I presume?”
Her voice sounded a bit younger than he expected, and more refined as well. Marcus took a step back, allowing more of the lamplight from the hall to spill outside onto the doorstep. Dressed in horribly wrinkled linen and an inexplicable black straw bonnet, she nevertheless stood as if she wore heavy court dress, rigid and stern. There was nothing despairing about her; rather, her posture suggested she had just arrived with the calvary, ready to render Marcus whatever assistance he required.
Or she deigned.
“Yes,” he said slowly, drawing the word out far past its single syllable.
“Your butler is terribly rude,” she said, before adding with a hint of shock, “Only it’s quite late and he’s left me out on the street like a… a…”
“Doxy,” he muttered to himself.
For he could immediately tell that she was the furthest thing from it. Hence her indignation. A bloody lady had turned up on his doorstep. But how? Usually the women he helped had nothing to their name—no money, no family, no social standing. Struggling widows and young girls, usually thin and infirm. Never young ladies with round cheeks and imperious attitudes. Had this woman somehow found herself seduced by some reprobate rake and cast aside? If so, she was either terriblyproud or somewhat naïve, eschewing the back door as she did. And at this hour.
“He’s not my butler. Just a footman.” Marcus stepped back sheepishly, holding the door open wide. “Please, come in, come in.” Then, anticipating a wariness on her part, he explained, “My mother is within. We only just finished our dinner.”
Her eyes widened at that. They were quite large, he thought, even in this low light.
“Have you eaten?”
“No,” she replied, looking down, as if it humiliated her to admit it.
