He didn’t respond, but his look said it all. If she hadn’t been so foolish, he wouldn’t have had to rescue her.
The townhouse seemed far away, set back from the street to allow a small fenced lawn in the front. Soon, Aunt Lilly would be ordering the planting of flowers. Nothing too garish to attracttoo much attention but enough to give the white façade a little color.
Her uncle’s townhouse was on the corner; it would be a simple thing to slip around to the kitchen entrance. Uncle Bertrand was notoriously parsimonious. None of the servants was permitted up after ten or before six in the morning. In that way, he saved money on lighting and coal. No one would be awake for hours yet.
She hesitated, glancing over her shoulder at her rescuer.
“Are you very certain you won’t give me the mirror?”
“Very certain,” he said.
At her silence, he smiled thinly. “It’s a mirror,” he said. “Nothing more.”
It was more than just a mirror. It showed the future, or at least she hoped it did. Before she could explain, a voice rang through the night.
“Oh, Father, it’s worse than I thought. Veronica’s undressed.”
She turned to find Amanda standing there, her cousin’s golden hair illuminated by the white light of the fog-shrouded lamps.
Amanda’s look was one of studied horror. The key to understanding Amanda, however, was never in her expression, but in her eyes. At that moment, they glittered like those of a cat, catching the faintest light and gleaming brightly.
Amanda was amused.
Anything that amused Amanda usually proved to be detrimental to Veronica, a lesson she’d learned well over the past two years.
Beside her stood Aunt Lilly, her hands flailing in the air as if to contain the situation. Aunt Lilly did not like circumstances to overpower her. Behind her stood the other four cousins. Neither Aunt Lilly nor Uncle Bertrand would tolerate their brood beingout of doors improperly attired. However, it was obvious that they’d already retired for the night.
Alice’s hair was braided, and Anne had already slathered Mrs. Cuthbertson’s Cream for Young Ladies on her face. Algernon’s jacket was askew, and Adam, for once, did not have his nose in a book.
Of course not, this debacle was more interesting than anything he might read.
Standing in front of them, his expression thunderous, was Uncle Bertrand.
He was a stout figure of a man, his buttons bulging on his vest. The Earl of Conley was fond of his food, and most of life’s pastimes, he was fond of saying. At the moment, however, he didn’t look particularly fond of her.
“Well, niece? How do you explain this outrage?”
Chapter 3
“You foolish child! What have you done? What have you done?”
Aunt Lilly stepped forward and slapped at her. When Veronica wasn’t quick enough to dodge, one of the blows struck her on the cheek. She pulled back, both of them momentarily horrified. As angry as Aunt Lilly had been with her in the past, she’d never before struck her. Especially in public. Outside. In front of an audience.
Aunt Lilly shook her head, as if to negate both the action and the rage that fueled it. “See what you’ve made me do, child? I’ve never been so humiliated in my entire life.”
She glanced behind her, the look one of summons. None of her cousins mistook it and trailed behind their mother like ducklings heading for a pond.
At the top of the steps, Aunt Lilly turned and looked down at her, decorum evidently pushed aside for her anger. “I took you in because you were family,” she said. “And because your uncle is a kind and generous man. You are his only sister’s only child. Butif I had known, on that day, that you would shame us to such a degree, I would have let you starve in Scotland.”
“Lilly,” Uncle Bertrand said, silencing her with one word.
It was evident, from the look on her aunt’s face, that she waged an internal war between anger and obedience. In this rare instance, however, Uncle Bertrand did not win.
“I refuse to have that harlot in my home,” Aunt Lilly said, extending one imperious finger toward her.
Aunt Lilly leveled a look of such fulminating hatred on her that Veronica took a step back. She’d always known that family was intensely important to her aunt. She’d forgive her children anything, any slight, any imperfection, any failing. Evidently, her attitude of tolerance did not extend to a niece by marriage.
“You have offended us in the most grievous way possible,” she said, her voice lowering in pitch as if conscious that the neighbors might be listening. “Not only have you sneaked out of our house in the middle of the night, but you return naked. Naked!” Evidently, decorum was being mightily trounced by anger. “You have jeopardized the futures of your cousins. If you cannot think of your own lamentable life, have you no Christian charity to spare for those who’ve done you no wrong? Indeed, everyone in this house has done nothing but welcome you to their bosoms from the moment you became an orphan. You were never alone. Never left to grieve or mourn. You were surrounded by love from the moment you came to this house, Veronica MacLeod. And what do you do to return that great love?”
