Genova wrenched her lips free and stared over the marquess’s shoulder. A man and woman in outer clothes stood in the open doorway. If she was stunned, so were they. They were staring at her as if she were a three-headed monster.
“I say…” said the man, a smirk starting.
Ashart was off her, standing, and she was somehow standing beside him in a movement so swift she could hardly comprehend it. But she comprehended disaster. She’d been discovered in a man’s bedroom in her nightclothes. On his bed. Under him.
Kissing him!
For the first time in her life she wanted to throw a fit of the vapors.
“Miss Smith fell,” Ashart said, as if bored.
Genova glanced, praying that some magical transformation had dressed him, at least in a robe. He was still in his long nightgown open down his chest, his feet bare.
“How dare you burst into my room, Brokesby?”
The thin-faced man with small eyes laughed nervously. “I say, Ash. Arranged to meet Molly here. Assumed she’d be with you. This is a turn up for the books, though.”
A maidservant passed by in the corridor behind the couple and stopped to boggle.
Ashart swept up a silky gray robe and put it on as he walked to the door and shut it, the couple inside.Genova could feel the fury in him as if it were a heat, but what good would fury do?
“Permit me to make this situation clear, Brokesby, so that you and your sister will be in no danger of displeasing me with your tattle.”
Brokesby and his equally thin-faced sister went still, but Genova wasn’t sure even Ashart’s fury could silence them. There was something in the sister’s eyes that already relished the whispering of this tale.
“This parlor is part of the rooms taken by my great-aunt Lady Thalia Trayce, and this lady is her companion. I spent the night here because there was no other bed. She came into the room to retrieve her needlework and fell in the dark.”
Genova looked around, picked up her cracked tambour frame, and dangled it as hopeful evidence. One splinter had pierced the cloth, and she anxiously eased the work off it.
“Of course, Ash. Of course! But what of Molly?”
“We thought she was here,” the woman said.
“And why, Tess, would you think that?”
Alerted by menace, Genova looked up. The marquess’s expression was merely cold, but color flared in the woman’s face.
“She did say she might…”
“She did say she might to me, too. To be precise, she made an appointment to meet me here, which is why I have spent a devilish night in an uncomfortable bed. She never arrived and I am considerably displeased with her. I hope,” Ashart added, in a tone that sparked prickles on Genova’s skin, “not to be displeased with you, too.”
The couple seemed to have the same reaction. They backed toward the door spouting reassurance.
Then the adjoining door opened and Thalia came in, smiling brightly in her ruffled pink robe. “Ashart, Genova! How naughty of you to tryst indéshabillé, but love will be love.” She beamed at the Brokesbys. “I see you’ve discovered our little secret. Ashart and dear Genova are engaged to marry!”
Chapter Ten
Everyone seemed suddenly turned to statues. Unsure how to react, Genova, too, did nothing, praying without hope that this was all a dream. After a few seconds, she flicked a glance at the marquess. In a rare show of unguarded emotion, he had a hand to his face.
He lowered it. “Dear Thalia, you know that was a secret.”
Thalia seemed completely unaware of danger. “You would not want to keep it secret at the expense of Genova’s reputation, dear. Sometimes you young people do not think.”
She turned her guileless smile on the Brokesbys. “I’m sure you are both the soul of discretion, but things do slip out, don’t they? So hard to remember what one should and shouldn’t say. The announcement will soon be made, but no one would want scandal to touch the happy union, I’m sure.”
“No, no, of course not!” said Miss Brokesby with all the confusion Thalia seemed able to create. She did not, however, seem to doubt the story, nor did her brother. Who would think Lady Thalia Trayce party to impropriety?
Ashart opened the door. “I’m sure you wish to be on your way. If you see Lady Booth, oblige me by giving her this news. I’m sure it will interest her.”
