An Unwilling Conquest. Stephanie Laurens
to hurry.”
Together with Heather, Lucinda found herself hustled towards an open doorway—a drawing-room lay ahead. On the threshold she hesitated and glanced back, as did Em behind her.
“You’re not staying, are you, Harry?” Em asked.
He was tempted—sorely tempted. His gaze not on his aunt but on the woman beside her, Harry forced himself to shake his head. “No.” With an effort he shifted his gaze to his aunt’s face. “I’ll call sometime during the week.”
Em nodded.
Prompted by she knew not what, Lucinda turned and re-crossed the hall. Their rescuer stood silently and watched her approach; she steadfastly ignored the odd tripping of her heart. She halted before him, calmly meeting his green gaze. “I don’t know how to thank you for your help, Mr Lester. You’ve been more than kind.”
His lips slowly curved; again, she found herself fascinated by the movement.
Harry took the hand she held out to him and, his eyes on hers, raised it to his lips. “Your rescue was indeed my pleasure, Mrs Babbacombe.” The sudden widening of her eyes as his lips touched her skin was payment enough for the consequent hardships. “I’ll ensure that your people know where to find you—your maids will arrive before nightfall, I’m sure.”
Lucinda inclined her head; she made no effort to retrieve her fingers from his warm grasp. “Again, you have my thanks, sir.”
“It was nothing, my dear.” His eyes on hers, Harry allowed one brow to rise. “Perhaps we’ll meet again—in a ballroom, maybe? Dare I hope you’ll favour me with a waltz if we do?”
Graciously, Lucinda acquiesced. “I would be honoured, sir—should we meet.”
Belatedly reminding himself that she was a snare he was determined to avoid, Harry took a firm grip on his wayward impulses. He bowed. Releasing Lucinda’s hand, he nodded to Em. With one last glance at Lucinda, he strolled gracefully out of the door.
Lucinda watched the door shut behind him, a distant frown in her eyes.
Em studied her unexpected guest, a speculative glint in hers.
Agatha’s been with me forever,” Lucinda explained. “She was my mother’s maid when I was born. Amy was an under-maid at the Grange—my husband’s house. We took her with us so that Agatha could train her to act as maid for Heather.”
“Just as well,” Heather put in.
They were in the dining-room, partaking of a delicious meal prepared, so Em had informed them, in honour of their arrival. Agatha, Amy and Sim had arrived an hour ago, conveyed by Joshua in a trap borrowed from the Barbican Arms. Joshua had returned to Newmarket to pursue the repairs of the carriage. Agatha, taken under the wing of the portly housekeeper, Mrs Simmons, was resting in a cheery room below the eaves, her ankle pronounced unbroken but badly sprained. Amy had thus had to assist both Lucinda and Heather to dress, a task at which she had acquitted herself with honours.
Or so Em thought as she looked down the table. “So,” she said, patting her lips with her napkin then waving Fergus and the soup tureen away. “You may start at the beginning. I want to know all about you since your parents died.”
The sheer openness of the request robbed it of any rudeness. Lucinda smiled and laid aside her spoon; Heather was dipping into the tureen for the third time, much to Fergus’s delight. “As you know, what with both families disowning my parents, I hadn’t had any contact with my grandparents. I was fourteen at the time of the accident. Luckily, our old solicitor hunted up my mother’s sister’s address—she agreed to take me in.”
“Now let’s see.” Em’s eyes narrowed as she surveyed the past. “That would be Cora Parkes that was?”
Lucinda nodded. “If you recall, the Parkes family fortunes had taken a downturn sometime after my parents married. They’d retired from Society and Cora had married a mill-owner in the north—a Mr Ridley.”
“Never say so!” Em was enthralled. “Well, well—how the mighty did fall. Your aunt Cora was one of the most intransigent when it came to any question of reconciliation with your parents.” Em lifted her thin shoulders. “Fate’s revenge, I dare say. So you lived with them until your marriage?”
Lucinda hesitated, then nodded.
Em noticed; her eyes sharpened, then flicked to Heather. Lucinda saw—and hastened to explain. “The Ridleys weren’t exactly happy to have me. They only agreed to house me, thinking to use my talents as governess to their two daughters and then to broker my marriage as soon as maybe.”
For a moment, Em stared. Then she snorted. “Doesn’t surprise me. That Cora was ever out for her own gain.”
“When I was sixteen, they arranged a marriage with another mill-owner, a Mr Ogleby.”
“Ugh!” Heather looked up from her soup to shudder artistically. “He was a horrible old toad,” she blithely informed Em. “Luckily, my father heard about it—Lucinda used to come and give me lessons. So he married Lucinda instead.” Having done her bit for the conversation, Heather returned to her soup.
Lucinda smiled affectionately. “Indeed, Charles was my saviour. I only recently learned that he bought off my relatives in order to marry me—he never told me.”
Em snorted approvingly. “Glad to hear they’ve some gentlemen in those parts. So you became Mrs Babbacombe and lived at…the Grange, was it?”
“That’s right.” Heather had finally relinquished the soup; Lucinda paused to serve herself from the platter of turbot Fergus offered. “To all appearances Charles was a well-to-do gentleman of moderate estate. In reality, however, he owned a considerable collection of inns up and down the country. He was really very wealthy but preferred a quiet existence. He was close to fifty when we married. As I grew older, he taught me all about his investments and how to manage them. He was ill for some years—the end was a relief when it came—but because of his foresight, I was able to handle most of the work for him.”
Lucinda looked up to find her hostess staring at her.
“Who owns the inns now?” Em asked.
Lucinda smiled. “We do—Heather and I. The Grange, of course, went to Charles’s nephew, Mortimer Babbacombe, but Charles’s private fortune wasn’t part of the entail.”
Em sat back and regarded her with frank approval. “And that’s why you’re here—you own an inn in Newmarket?”
Lucinda nodded. “After the will was read, Mortimer asked us to vacate the Grange within the week.”
“The blackguard!” Em glared. “What sort of a way is that to treat a grieving widow?”
“Well,” Lucinda held up a hand. “I did offer to leave as soon as he wished—although I hadn’t thought he’d be in such a hurry. He’d never even visited before—not really.”
“So you found yourselves out on your ears in the snow?” Em was incensed.
Heather giggled. “It really turned out most fortuitously in the end.”
“Indeed.” Lucinda nodded, pushing her plate away. “With nothing organised, we decided to remove to one of our inns—one a little way away from the Grange, a place we weren’t known. Once there, I realised the inn was far more prosperous than I would have guessed from the accounts our agent had recently presented. Mr Scrugthorpe was a new man—Charles had been forced to appoint a new agent a few months before he died when our old Mr Matthews passed on.” Lucinda frowned at the trifle Fergus placed before her. “Unfortunately, Charles interviewed Scrugthorpe on a day he was in great pain and I had to be in town with Heather. To cut a long story short, Scrugthorpe had falsified the accounts. I called him in and dismissed him.”
Lifting her gaze to her hostess’s face, Lucinda smiled. “After that, Heather and I decided that