Fiona Delacroix moved away from the window and set down the book of French fashions she’d intended to take upstairs. Staying carefully quiet in the dim library, she listened until two sets of footsteps went up the stairs and faded away.
So that was it. She’d known something was afoot. The governess was after her nephew, and it sounded as though she’d gone a fair way toward catching him. Under the same roof—practically under her nose—Alexandra Gallant was a breath away from catching one of the wealthiest men in England.
Lifting her candle, she made her way over to the writing desk. She’d attempted it before, the little strumpet. She’d lifted her heels for Lord Welkins, and then no doubt did him in when he tired of her. Since Welkins had been married, she would only have been after his money. With Lord Kilcairn, though, no doubt she would want it all—his money, his land, and his title.
Well, not this time. Lucien Balfour was going to marry Rose, and that was that. She’d planned it for years; the moment was not going to slip away simply because her nephew had become temporarily infatuated with a woman who was practically a servant.
As for Miss Gallant, she knew where that miss belonged, too. Fiona sat and wrote out a note, folded it, and left it on the foyer table under some other correspondence to be delivered first thing in the morning. No doubt Lady Welkins had been lonely this Season. Lady Halverston had already mentioned knowing the unfortunate widow; Fiona would like to make her acquaintance, too. They apparently had something in common. Another widow to console Lady Welkins would be just what the baroness needed. And then Alexandra Gallant would go away.
Chapter 15
“Oh, nonsense.” Alexandra gestured for Rose to precede her into the millinery. “I’m sure he’s not pining over you.”
“But it’s true!” the girl insisted. “He’s sent me a letter every day for the past week, and I know he’s called on Lucien at least twice.”
“They are friends, you know.”
“Lex, you just aren’t romantic.”
Alexandra chuckled. Perhaps Rose had hit on her problem. If she had been romantic, though, she probably would have drowned herself in the nearest pond by now. “All right. I concede that you may very well be correct, and Lord Belton is indeed pining over you, but I don’t want you to be disappointed if he’s not.”
Rose lifted a pretty blue hat off its stand to examine it. “I suppose you’re right. Freddie Danvers at home, the squire’s son, used to say he wanted to marry me all the time, but I never believed him. And Mama said it would take a dowry bigger than Dorsetshire to pay off his gambling debts, and he wasn’t likely to find that with us, anyway.”
Alexandra paused in her perusal of a practical brown schoolmistress’s hat. Despite their lack of social skills, she’d assumed the Delacroix ladies to be wealthy. They’d seemed more concerned with netting a title than a mound of cash, though perhaps they’d been under the impression that the two went together, as they did with Lord Kilcairn.
“If your dowry wasn’t a consideration, would you have wanted to marry this Freddie Danvers?”
Her student made a sour face. “Good heavens, no. He only has a six-room cottage, and no title at all. Even Blything Hall is bigger than that, and I wouldn’t want to move somewhere smaller.” She replaced the blue hat and moved on to a quaint green bonnet.
“Of course not. How silly of me.”
“Now you’re just teasing.”
“I am not. Please, go on.”
“About three years ago, when Lucien was in London, Mama and Papa and I went to Westchester and convinced his housekeeper to give us a tour of Kilcairn Abbey. You should have seen it, Lex. It has more than two hundred rooms, and six sitting rooms, andtwoballrooms. Mama said she could imagine herself holding court there, while Lucien and I had all the neighboring nobility over for country balls.”
“You and Lucien?” Alexandra asked slowly, her heart giving a distinct lurch. This was ridiculous. She had no reason to become so…irrational every time a female mentioned his name. Half the time she couldn’t even decide whether she loved him or hated him.
Rose blanched, then with a nervous twitter put on the bonnet. “Oh, it’s not me at all, is it?” she said, giggling, and flung it off again. “Do let’s go somewhere else, Lex. I don’t like anything in here.” With that she flitted off toward the door.
Alexandra looked after her for a moment. “Whatever you like, my dear.”
That was odd. Exceedingly odd, unless her own recent suspicions were correct and Rose did have her cap set for Lord Kilcairn. She’d seemed so pleased by Lord Belton’s attentions, though. Alexandra wondered if Lucien knew his cousin had developed a tendre for him. Given the way he’d been conducting his outrageous bridal search, he probably hadn’t noticed.
“Lex? Come on.”
“Right away.” She hurried out the door in Rose’s wake.
The first thing she needed to do was find out whether Rose preferred Robert or her Lucien. Alexandra frowned. He wasn’theranything, just as she wasn’t his. She’d made that clear enough. And she was not jealous of a seventeen-year-old girl, whatever the circumstances. She wasn’t.
The noontime crowd in front of the corner bakery finally forced Rose to slow, and Alexandra caught up and wrapped her arm around her student’s. “Please slow down, my dear. I feel like a racehorse in the Derby.” The girl still wore a tense expression, and Alexandra reminded herself that her primary duty was to see to her charge’s well-being. “Shall we get a crumb cake?”
“Mama wouldn’t approve.”
“We won’t tell her.”
Rose gave a reluctant grin. “All right.”
