“That I did, mum. But not before m’mistress come upon it.”
“Your…what?”
“Mistress. The lady of the house.”
“There’s a lady of the house?” Heat rushed to Evangeline’s cheeks. Of all the arrogant, dastardly things for him to do, Mr. Lioncroft had kissed her while hismistressslept beneath the same roof?
“Yes’m. Although I don’t guess she still is, now that he’s dead.”
“Now that he’s…what?”
“Dead. Weren’t you just in here this morning to lay your hands upon his corpse?”
“I—I—what?” Evangeline stared at her as the realization set in. “You work for the Heatherbrooks?”
“Yes’m. That I do.”
Evangeline closed her eyes. No wonder the footman claimed no Ginny worked with them. No Ginnydidwork with them. Not only that…
“Lord Heatherbrook hit you?”
Ginny nodded. “Better me than m’mistress, although he gave her a good one, too. If you don’t mind me saying so, you don’t look so fine yourself, covered in dust as you are. Haven’t you got a maid to do the cleaning?”
“I—yes, I suppose so. Why aren’t Mr. Lioncroft’s servants doing the cleaning in here?”
“They did. Everything except for my master’s swordsticks, that is. He was always real particular about them things. Cost a pretty penny, I suppose. Hope m’mistress sells every last one.”
“Me, too,” Evangeline agreed, still reeling from the combined shock of Ginny’s battered face and the knowledge Lord Heatherbrook, not Mr. Lioncroft, put the bruises there. “I…I apologize for not helping you sooner. Maybe I could’ve saved you both.”
“How could you help sooner when I hadn’t met you sooner?” Ginny pointed out reasonably. “Besides, if he hadn’t beat me for that, it would’ve been for something else. Probably for looking at him wrong, or letting one of his swordsticks get dirty. Some men are like that.”
Evangeline couldn’t help but nod. Most men were like that. Maybeallmen.
Ginny resumed cleaning. Evangeline hurried back into the hallway. She needed to get back to her room—and changed—before anyone else saw her.
Chapter 16
When Evangeline finally reached her section of the guest quarters, a dark figure lounged against the wall outside her door, thumbs hooked in his waistband, eyes closed as if asleep. She tried to slip in her room without catching his notice, but the creak of a loose floorboard betrayed her.
His eyelashes lifted. “Miss Pemberton. How do you feel?”
“Much improved, Mr. Lioncroft. Thank you for asking.”
“I meant it when I said you could call me Gavin.”
“I’d rather not.” She stepped past him, ducked her head, and reached for the doorknob.
“Did you forget something?”
Her fingers clutching the cold brass of the doorknob, she glanced at him over her shoulder. He hadn’t moved. He hadn’t changed. He still stared at her with the most intense gaze she’d ever encountered, his posture tense but casual, the soft tumble of his hair carelessly rakish, the familiar lines of his warm mouth—no. She wasn’t forgetting anything. She only wished she could.
“No,” she said at last. “I plan to stay in my chamber for a while.”
“You plan to—” As his eyes finally quit their focus on hers long enough to take in her tangled hair, her tattered dress, her ruined fingernails, his words simply stopped. He blinked once, twice, again. And then, “What happened?”
What could she say? Oh, I’ve been skulking between the walls, just like you?
“Nothing.”
