Haunted by the Earl's Touch - By Ann Lethbridge Page 0,97

to panic. ‘Build as many schools for orphans as you decide are required.’

For that he earned a small smile. It was a start. A chink in her armour. ‘I’ll give you free rein. Your own allowance. You don’t have to see me from one year to the next, if you don’t want to.’ He would do his level best to make sure that didn’t happen.

She took a deep breath. ‘It is not enough.’

Dumbfounded, he stared at her. She turned and walked away, out of the door, out of his life.

Left him standing there feeling as if he had a hole in his chest the size of a cannonball. He looked down just to be sure he was still in one piece.

Damnation. Impossible, headstrong, wilful woman. And he’d thought she was the only truly sensible female he’d ever met.

He ought to lock her up until she saw reason. Except he’d tried that already. He could not hold back the small smile that tugged at his lips.

Now what the hell was he to do?

Manners scratched at the door and came in, disturbing his thoughts.

‘What?’ he snarled, then closed his eyes and grappled his temper into submission. ‘I beg your pardon, Manners, what did you require?’

Manners acknowledged the apology with a twinkle in his eyes. ‘Miss Wilding has requested the carriage for first thing in the morning. I told her that our carriage was with Mrs Hampton and that the earliest I could arrange for a hiring would be the day after tomorrow. Did I do right?’

He could refuse to let her leave. Again. What would that get him, apart from her hatred? No. If leaving was what she wanted, if that would make her happy... Happy. The word painfully jiggled the shards in his chest. If leaving made her happy, he forced himself to continue, then that was what must happen. ‘Arrange it.’ He had one more day to find a way to change her mind.

The butler bowed himself out.

Happy. The word came back to lash him anew. She deserved to be happy. Between him and his predecessor, they’d destroyed her life. If he couldn’t do anything else for her, he could help her put it back together the way she wanted.

Finding this Mrs Ladbrook might be the key. But if Templeton couldn’t locate her, no one could. Then he would give her a school of her own.

Nearby. Where he could keep an eye on her. A school and a salary large enough to keep her in luxury. He would then have the excuse to ride over and see her from time to time, to inspect his investment.

His throat dried. She might not welcome visits from the bastard earl.

All right. He would have his reports second-hand. He would know she was safe, and from a distance he could protect her from harm.

The ache in his chest eased slightly.

And what if she found a man she did want to marry? What then? The thought of another man with the right to engage her wit in conversation whenever the mood took him, the right to touch her silken skin and arouse her passion... No. He would not think of his needs. This was about her happiness. Nothing else mattered.

Something burned behind his eyes.

He felt like a boy again, mourning his mother. Only this time, he knew it was different. There was no anger to balance the pain. No one else to blame.

* * *

‘You sent for me, my lord?’

Bane put down his pen and looked up. How was it that when she walked into a room she made it come alive? Or was it only him who came alive?

At this moment she looked worried. Expecting he would prevent her departure on the morrow, just as he had prevented it today, no doubt. She thought him that kind of cur. And he didn’t blame her.

‘Please, sit.’

She did so, sinking into the chair in front of his desk with natural elegance, her long slender limbs bending to her will, when he would much rather they would bend to his, her face calm and still, her eyes a deep shadowed blue.

Perhaps he shouldn’t bother her with this, but she wouldn’t thank him for making her decision for her. ‘I found something among the papers Gerald tried to destroy. You might find it of interest.’ He passed over the piece of parchment he’d read with astonishment only half an hour before.

Swiftly, she scanned the yellowed paper. A gasp left her lips as she raised her gaze to meet