The Girl is Not For Christmas - Emma V Leech Page 0,46

dear,” Livvy said, sniffling a little and smiling at George. “That’s Lord Kingston.”

“Gog.”

“King,” King said to the child, his voice firm. “I am many things, young man, but I draw the line at being described as a dog.”

“Ooof, ooof.”

“King.”

George got a sly look in his eyes and said, carefully and deliberately: “Pego.”

“George!” Livvy exclaimed. “Wherever….”

She turned an accusing eye upon King.

“It was an accident,” he said defensively.

“What manner of accident results in you teaching the child that word?” she demanded.

King cleared his throat.

“He was walking about in the buff! I merely pointed out that ladies took exception to….” He waved his hand in an expressive manner. “That being on display.”

“Oh, King,” Livvy said, and put her head in her hands.

Her shoulders shook and King felt a wave of shame at being the fellow who had finally broken the indomitable Miss Penrose.

“Oh, Liv… Miss Penrose, please…. Don’t… Don’t…. I’m terribly sorry. Truly. I swear I’ll try to teach him something else….”

Livvy raised her head, tears running down her face, and went off in a peal of laughter.

“Oh, you ridiculous creature,” she said, gasping for breath. “I’m not crying. It’s the funniest thing I’ve heard in… oh… oh….”

She clutched at her sides while the children stared at her, wide-eyed.

“Pego?” George enquired with interest.

Livvy went off in whoops again as the girls snickered and whispered behind their hands.

King sighed and got to his feet.

“Ladies,” he said to the girls gravely. “Would you excuse us? Your aunt is a little… overwrought. I think perhaps she needs some air.”

Somehow, he got Livvy to her feet and steered her, still spluttering and wheezing, out of the room, wrapped a shawl about her shoulders, and guided her outside. It was a beautiful winter’s morning, with a sky the colour of the Madonna’s cloak, and air so sweet and crisp it hurt his lungs.

Livvy sucked in a shaky breath and turned back to him, her eyes alight with merriment.

King had the oddest sensation of being kicked hard in the chest.

“Oh, King, thank you.”

“Whatever for?” he asked crossly, finding he was suddenly breathless and out of sorts.

“For making me laugh when I felt like crying. Again.”

He shrugged, frowning at his feet and avoiding her eyes, which he had just noticed were an even more intense shade of blue than the sky. She fell quiet and King kept staring at his feet until he couldn’t stand not to look back at her. He’d known she was studying him. He could feel the weight of her appraisal, but still the act of meeting her gaze unbalanced him, as if he was on a ship that had pitched to one side.

“Are you well, King?”

The pitching sensation increased on hearing the soft concern in the question, the sincerity. So many people might ask, yet so few really wanted to hear the answer. In fact, besides Walsh, he couldn’t think of a single one who truly cared, and wasn’t that the most depressing realisation for a man of his years?

“Of course, fit as a flea,” he remarked, trying to sound insouciant and at ease and managing neither.

The way she looked at him, her intense scrutiny, made him want to squirm like a child about to be birched, and he felt hot and uncomfortable.

“Does it pain you? Not drinking, I mean. I think it does. You’re fighting it, aren’t you? Terribly hard.”

To his horror, she took his hand and squeezed.

“I’m proud of you, you know. I can’t pretend to understand what it is you are feeling, but… but I’m sure it would be easier to just give in, and you haven’t, and… well done, King. Oh, goodness, that sounded horribly patronising, didn’t it? I didn’t mean for it to, I promise, only—”

He kissed her.

Really, she’d left him no other option. He felt as if her words had cut his chest open and exposed his innards, rotten and festering as they no doubt were, and yet… yet she looked at him as if he might actually be worth something. It was too much. She made him feel too much, which was to say anything at all. It had been so long since he had allowed himself to feel anything, and then Miss Prickly bloody Penrose had waltzed into his life and scolded him and bossed him about, and… made him feel… things. It was damned inconvenient. Whatever those things were, he had not the least desire to examine them any closer, and so the only thing to do was to shut her up because she was