“Thane. I am the daughter of Lord Archibald Thane and granddaughter to Lord George Thane. My grandfather founded the orphanage and my father carried on his work. Uponhisdeath, the duty fell to me. It is expected that every generation of Thanes will keep the orphanage funded to honor my grandfather and protect the children brought there. I—”
“Send your invitation, Lady Berengaria. Mr. Knight will attend,” he said with a surprising depth of feeling.
“And will he bring his wallet?”
The cold steel of his gaze turned warm and mirthful as a slow smile spread across his face. “Yes. With his wallet, Lady Berengaria.”
She nodded and was about to return to her residence when this man called Gideon suddenly took hold of her hand and drew her back. “One more thing…”
“Yes?”
He picked her up by her armpits again and planted a savagely tender and scorchingly wild kiss on her lips. “That is for all the orphans your family has saved at St. Brigid’s.”
He set her back down and strode away.
Berry put a hand to her tingling lips as she glanced up at her parlor window.
She counted seven faces plastered to the glass. All of them wide-eyed.
Had her friends seen what just happened?
Chapter Two
“He kissed you!”Gwenys shrieked, and rushed to her side the moment Berry returned home still slightly dazed from that thoroughly improper kiss that had every bone in her body melting.
The other ladies now surrounded her, all atwitter.
“How was it?” Alice asked, grabbing her hand and giving it an excited squeeze.
“Was it nice?” Mabel asked, turning Berry to face her.
“The brute! You ought to have slapped him,” Maude Harcourt intoned, for she was quite the stickler for decorum, and what Gideon had done was utterly shocking and not to be condoned. “That would have put him in his place.”
“And what do you think he would have done had I slapped him, Maude?”
The prudish spinster fidgeted. “Well, you could have at leastlookedangry.”
“No, I could not,” Berry said as her friends now took their seats and she began to pour the tea. “He told me the most extraordinary thing.”
“What did he say to you?” Miranda asked, almost toppling out of her seat in anticipation.
“All of those workers, including himself, were raised at St. Brigid’s.Myorphanage. And isn’t it wonderful they areall productive members of society and working in honorable trades? My father and grandfather would be so proud.”
Arabella smiled at her as she reached for a slice of buttered bread. “How wonderful. And does this not say something about Mr. Knight, too?”
Berry nodded. “Perhaps he is not as arrogant as I thought. I am going to send him an invitation to Saturday’s charity affair. I think he will attend.”
Miranda had just scraped some sugar off the sugar cone and now looked up. “Truly? That will cause quite a stir, but I’m glad you will invite him. After all, he is my neighbor, too. Perhaps not right next door, but you and I and Mr. Knight all reside on Duchess Square, do we not?”
Maude pursed her lips, looking as though she had just sucked on lemons. “Fiona really ought to have sold to a respectable spinster of means instead of a crass oaf off the streets.”
“I think Mr. Knight was also raised at St. Brigid’s, so I would hardly refer to him as an oaf off the streets, Maude. Perhaps this is why Fiona thought he might make a good neighbor for me. That is quite a strong bond between us, don’t you think?”
She snorted. “You are best served encouraging Viscount Hawthorne’s courtship. Now, he’s a real gentleman.”
“A viscount with a desperate need for deep pockets,” Gwendolyn Carstairs, another of Berry’s neighbors on Duchess Square, remarked. “He is interested in Berry’s trust fund, not Berry herself. Although you are lovely and kind and he could very well fall in love with you.”
Berry did not believe the viscount would ever love her, although how could she know what love looked like? In all of her eight and twenty years, soon to be nine and twenty, she had never been kissed with true passion—except for Gideon’s surprising kiss today, but that did not count.
