“Yes, Your Grace. You haven't seen me before, I've only just been employed here the other day.”
“Well, I have only just been married the other day, so we are both new to this place,” Georgia replied, smiling to reassure the young girl. “I am Georgia Rose—Deverall,” she corrected. “What's your name?”
“Molly, Your Grace. Molly Jones.”
“Well, Miss Jones, I am rather parched and somewhat peckish. Do you think something could be rustled up for me from the kitchen?”
“Of course, Your Grace, and you can call me Molly.”
“I shall be in my rooms then, Molly.”
She heard Keaton and his Uncle approaching the door, so she hurried across the hall and up the stairs. There had been little time to eat at the tea room, but she found that she was hungry a good deal of the time since moving to Westvale. The fact that food was readily available was such a novelty.
I must consider what my next steps will be. I do not want to wait around on Keaton's pleasure, waiting for the axe to fall.
She went to her rooms, putting the letter on her bureau for a time when she could enjoy reading what Amelia had been up to in Georgia's absence. Her food arrived a while later, and she ate while sitting in the window seat of her bedroom, gazing out over the Westvale lands. Leaving now would mean no help in finding her brother.
I am trapped. I cannot stay because Keaton wants me gone. I cannot go without betraying my brother. Must I make a sacrifice? Stay and even humiliate myself by begging at least until Elias has been found?
A knock came at the door, and Georgia found herself hoping it was Keaton. Not just so that she could try and salvage the situation, but because she found herself looking forward to his presence.
Infuriating though it is, he is also exciting in a way I have never known.
But it was Lord Swinthorpe who was at the door.
“Hullo, Lord Swinthorpe, I did not know you were here,” Georgia announced, rising quickly from her window seat, “please, do come in.”
Swinthorpe frowned. “I think perhaps it is better if you come out here, Your Grace. It would not be proper for me to be alone in your chambers with you.”
“Oh, quite right,” Georgia said, stepping out and closing the door.
Swinthorpe began to walk along the hallway, hands clasped behind his back. Georgia hastened to follow.
“I hope you will excuse my prying, but it strikes me that your marriage does not seem to be going smoothly.”
Georgia paused beside a tall window looking out over a pleasant quadrangle, a tall birch tree with leaves of a purple-red hue stood in its center.
“That certainly is a personal question, and an odd one for a newlywed,” she murmured. “For what newlyweds find that their marriages go absolutely smoothly at first?”
“For anordinarynewlywed, perhaps this would be true,” Swinthorpe continued while slowing his pace, “but you and Keaton are hardly that, are you?”
He turned and looked at her. Georgia realized that of course he knew about the nature of their marriage. He was a close relative of Keaton's, it was natural that he would be confided in.
“No,” she admitted, “but not the first to enter a marriage of convenience.”
“Not the first, nor will you be the last. But, do you hope to hold any records for longevity?”
Georgia did not care for his tone. It suggested personal knowledge of her married life and made her wonder precisely how much he was being told. Then there was the sly smile and the gleam in the man's eye. There was something more than paternal concern at work here, she was sure of it.
“Keaton made it clear our aim was to be married for a period of time long enough to dispel the scandal and repair reputations.”
“Hisreputation was untarnished...”
There was an unspoken, ‘until you came along’, which Georgia bridled at. She smiled forcibly, walking down the hall so Swinthorpe had to follow to continue the conversation.
“I find this house something of a maze. Difficult to navigate,” she commented distractedly. “I simply cannot fathom how Keaton manages without sight.”
“Because it has not changed since before he lost his sight. He has preserved it in amber. Every room and corridor exactly as he remembers it. That is how Keaton survives.Nothingchanges.”
