“Westcott.” Nia made a loop at the end of the line as she crossed the two ‘t’s.
Jasper touched the edge of the paper, peering down. “And you are Lady Gardenia Rose Hathaway.”
“Perhaps Perry.” Her voice came out breathless-sounding, so she quickly added, “Conditionally.”
“But of course.”
She would begin with the more practical details.
“I’m fully prepared to manage your households.” It was what she’d been trained for, after all. She’d make no promises now, but she had a few ideas of how to dislodge his pesky step-mama. She’d not taken years of propriety and etiquette classes without learning how to deal with unwanted houseguests.
“Of course. Mrs. Charles has mentioned the need for a lady to take over on more than one occasion.”
“She was very kind to me.” Jasper had brought her into his home, and she’d been treated with great compassion when she needed it most.
Even if one of those servants had betrayed his trust—another aspect Nia would be more than willing to handle. She’d sat with her mother more than once and witnessed the best way to send someone packing without turning them into an enemy.
A skill of her mother’s, if not her father’s.
“You’ll receive a generous allowance,” Jasper pointed out. “How much are you accustomed to?”
Nia blinked. “I’ve never had an allowance.” It was not something she’d considered.
“But how do you pay for your little trinkets…? Or ices at Gunter’s?”
“My mother. Or she puts them on my father’s accounts.” She had never been allowed the privilege. But… “My mother never denied me anything.” She felt a little sting in her heart. Her mother had loved both her daughters, in her own way; she’d simply never had the courage to stand up to their father.
And Nia couldn’t really blame her.
“You miss her.”
“She’s the only mother I have.” Nia felt her throat swell. “My father is a tyrant, but my mother loves me. And she loves Goldie too. She just… After my sister married Lord Standish, my father forbade both of us from seeing her.” Nia stared down at her hands. “Mother accepted his decision without argument.”
Goldie had run off with the earl against their father’s wishes. She’d not left a note, nor had she told her or their mother goodbye. Nia had been angry at first, but now… she found herself admiring her younger sister’s courage.
“I attended the wedding,” Jasper said.
Nia swiveled around to face him. “Really?” Such a coincidence seemed impossible. But then she remembered that the very reason she’d found him was because he’d been stopped outside of Lord Standish’s residence.
Jasper dipped his chin. “I dined with them a few weeks afterward. Their marriage came about under… questionable circumstances, but I believe it’s one of those rare occurrences—a love match. Lord and Lady Standish are, in fact, embarrassingly affectionate toward one another.”
“Goldie is happy? I’ve never gone this long without seeing her.”
“She appears to be quite satisfied with the earl.”
And Nia understood why Goldie hadn’t waited to tell her goodbye. Nia had been away from London at the time. “My father wrote my mother of the news. She and I had retired to Bath to mourn Lord Rupert.” She had been engaged to him, after all, at the time of his death.
No one had foreseen that Lord Standish, the man Goldie married, would possibly inherit his uncle’s earldom. Lord Rupert, Reed’s cousin; Reed’s own father; and his older brother had all stood between him and the title. And if not for a tragic but suspicious fire, he would not be earl now. Several members of the ton had suspected Standish of foul play, and it was rumored that he’d only married one of Crossings’ daughters to improve his standing.
With Nia out of town, the earl had married her sister instead.
“Would you have been happy marrying Lord Rupert, if he’d lived?” Jasper asked.
Many believed Nia had left London to nurse a broken heart. But her first betrothal hadn’t been all that unlike the one her father arranged with Dewberry. The greatest difference had been that Lord Rupert had been at least twenty years younger than the duke. Many ladies had considered him quite handsome.
And he had been, until she’d begun to see his darker side.
“I’m not sure.” She winced and then lowered her voice. “No one knew at first, but he was addicted to the poppy. It turned him into a different person, one I didn’t like, but saw more and more of as time passed.”
