“Your birthright makes you worthy of them.”
“It shouldn’t.”
He found her blunt statement a little unsettling. “Your lineage is—”
“There ought to be more to it than that—a proper education at the very least.”
“You are wrong if you think you are lacking in that regard. From what little I have managed to gather about you and your sister, your proficiency in math and science surpasses that of most young ladies, who tend to receive only basic training in such areas. They are raised to marry well and produce the next heir. It is rare that their skill with numbers goes beyond the ability to keep the necessary housekeeping records, while you... Your brother mentioned you have all studied numerous texts on the subject and that you also have a sound knowledge of history, geography and politics.”
“Books were our only source of entertainment. We’d brought a few with us when we left our home and after having read them all repeatedly, Raphe began exchanging them for others. He kept insisting that knowledge was power, and that it was something no one could ever take away from us.”
Touched by the sadness with which she spoke, Thomas raised his hand with the intention of reaching for hers. Blinking, he acknowledged how wrong such a gesture would be, the numerous ways in which she might misjudge it. So he lowered it once more, settling it back in his lap. “Your brother was right. He did well by you and your sister.”
“Yes. I believe he did.” A smile lifted the corners of her mouth. “And if I can do well by others, then my conscience might find some peace.”
“How do you mean?”
Her smile widened with the sort of pleasure that poured from every part of her. It produced a glow that warmed his skin in a way the sun failed to do, and for a moment, he was awestruck by her beauty. It was rare and unique, the kind that revealed itself slowly until it was so overpowering it could no longer be denied. And as she leaned closer and he managed to catch a glimpse of perfection in the thick dark lashes that shaded her eyes, he felt something ease inside him. It was almost as though she were able to pull out his knotted insides and replace them with rippling waves of calm.
“My intention is to open a school.”
The words were so soft he almost missed them. Without thinking, he dropped his gaze to her mouth as if seeing some movement there would confirm she’d spoken. Instead, he found himself studying the subtle dip of her lower lip and how carefully her upper lip hovered over it. It left him feeling slightly unsettled, if not completely confused about the sudden interest he seemed to be having in that particular part of her face.
And then the weight of her comment struck him and his eyes snapped back to hers. “A school?”
She gave an enthusiastic nod. It was almost as if the strain that had existed between them had been completely undone and tossed aside. “Precisely.” Her eyes gleamed with the sort of pleasure one might find in shocking someone with a bit of juicy gossip. Except this was so much more substantial, it fairly boggled his mind. “What I’m planning is to renovate that house and then offer the children of St. Giles a proper education, free of charge.”
“Free of charge,” he repeated like the dumbfounded fool he’d been reduced to in the face of her startling attempt at charity. Shaking himself, he straightened his spine and tried to focus on the implications of her idea. It would certainly be welcomed by the poor, but the cost would be staggering. “How will you fund it?”
“I’m not entirely sure,” she confessed. “If you must know, this has all been a bit of a hasty decision on my part.”
He raised an eyebrow. “You don’t say.”
“There’s no need to mock me,” she chastised. “I’ll figure it out one way or another. There simply has to be a way.”
“Your tenacity will no doubt reveal the answer.”
“Yes well... there is one small issue I thought I might ask for your assistance with.” She was suddenly on her feet, which forced him to rise, as well. He watched as she began to pace while making all sorts of agitated gestures with her hands. “Now that we are friends again...”
Oh hell. This was not going to end well.
“Yes?” he prompted when her attention seemed to drift toward a couple of birds now perching on a branch.
She spun toward him as if he’d startled her. “Well... I... you see, the thing is...”
“What?”
Stopping right in front of him, she seemed to deflate on an exhalation of breath. “I think you’re going to be very angry with me when I tell you this, but the truth is, I can think of no one else to turn to for help.”
Balling his fingers into fists, he forced down the rising panic her words evoked. “Tell me,” he said, since knowing was better than not doing so.
With a sigh, she crossed her arms in that manner he now recognized as a sign of defensiveness. “As it turns out, I don’t have the money I owe Mr. Gorrell.”
Thomas’s entire body went rigid and he did his best not to mutter an unpleasant curse. “Did you ever have it?”
“No.”
Biting his tongue, he took a moment to force some sense of calm into the words he would speak next. “Then why”—the bloody hell—“did you bid as high as you did?”
