She was out the door before he had time to reply.
Pen spentthe entire afternoon scouring the streets of London, in vain, for a sign of Marcus. This couldn’t continue. Alworth knew about her masquerade. She was burning through her funds faster than she’d imagined possible, and other than a last-minute averted duel, she had accomplished nothing during her time in London. Her best course of action was to pack up and return to Bath. She would meet Alworth one more time, for she owed him that, to say goodbye.
When the butler admitted her in Cavendish Square with a resigned nod, she was dusty and tired from the long walk.
“Pen. I was about to take a ride in Hyde Park. Join me?” Alworth, impeccably dressed as usual in riding breeches and Hessians, pulled a primrose from the vase that stood in the foyer and tucked it into his buttonhole.
Pen blinked, bemused. “Why the flower?” she asked.
“Fashion always needs a personal accent, child.”
She climbed up into the seat next to Alworth in the curricle, and Alworth flicked the reins.
“May I also try?” Pen asked. Her days in breeches were numbered. Driving a curricle was one experience she’d like to have as a man.
Alworth hesitated.
“I promise not to crash or overturn the curricle.”
He gave in. “Very well.”
After a quick lesson on how to handle the reins, Pen was thrilled to drive the vehicle through Regent’s Park.
“It is such a liberating feeling,” she said, and flicked the reins.
“Slow down, this is not a race.” Alworth gripped the side.
“I rather like it fast.” Pen grinned.
After she’d handed the reins back to him, it occurred to her that he was uncommonly quiet. She cast him a sideways look. He was deep in thought, with a frown on his forehead.
“How much do you really care for this guardian of yours?” he asked abruptly as he drew the vehicle to a halt.
Pen stared ahead in silence.
“I understand your reticence to talk. I myself am not naturally prone to spilling intimate details of my life to people. However, don’t you think you owe me an explanation, to say the least?” His eyes bore into hers.
“He’s the only family I have left,” she whispered.
“Your parents are still in Rajasthan?”
She visibly struggled with herself. “Dead.”
“I’m sorry.” The sympathetic look on his face made her choke.
It seemed so far away. India. Her childhood. Her parents. Another world. Another life. Her childhood in Bikaner was a delightful blur of intense colour, the smell of spices, the sound of crickets, the scorching sun on her skin.
There were some things she remembered vividly. She remembered the cloth of her new sari, scarlet interwoven with golden threads. She remembered the cheerful lanterns that lit the courtyard of their villa. The strings of music, the laughter ringing through the night. She remembered her mother’s smile as she twirled in her father’s arms.
“It was an earthquake.”
She heard her voice far away, as she told him in a faltering way what happened that night. There’d been a ball. She remembered how excited she’d been. They’d sent her to bed, because it was late, but she’d crept out of her room and crouched under the mango tree to watch them dance. Her mother, a dark-haired beauty in her golden-cream sari, and her father, handsome and tall in scarlet uniform.
Pen had watched them, jealous, wishing she could dance, too. She remembered Marcus, dashingly handsome in a black evening suit, who’d bowed to her and called her ‘princess’, with a mocking glint in his eyes, holding out his hand for her very first waltz. She’d danced on clouds.
Then the earth shook, the walls cracked, and all hell had broken loose. A branch crashed down next to her, narrowly missing her, but shielded her from the glass shards and debris that came raining down about her. The walls caved in, right there where they’d been dancing.
“They didn’t find me immediately, and I was half-dead myself. It is strange because when you lie there, half in this world, half in the next, you lose all sense of time. I remember little, hardly anything at all. Everything is a blur, a dream. It was almost as if I was watching everything from the outside. As if it happened to a different person.”
