and she looked around her, appalled, then realized the sound came from her own throat. She swallowed, convulsively, shoving the pain back. She was being ridiculous.
She washed swiftly with the now-icy bowl of water before dressing. She was shaking from the cold, and perhaps something else, but she wasn’t going to consider that possibility. When she finally rose to her feet, her ankle almost gave way beneath her, and she welcomed the pain, a distraction from what she refused to consider.
Her cloak lay across the chair by the dead coals, and she wrapped it around her shoulders, pulling the hood up over her face. She found the walking stick she used to help her perambulate, then opened the door, half afraid she’d see him again. She wasn’t quite sure she’d manage to keep her icy calm much longer if she had to look at him again. Into his dark green eyes, cool and assessing, at his beautiful, distant face.
Someone was waiting for her, and she almost jumped when she recognized Rohan’s majordomo. “Your ladyship,” he said, his voice soft and inexpressibly kind. “Your carriage is waiting. I’ve had it brought to the side portico—there’s less of a distance for you to walk on your bad ankle.”
“That’s very kind of you.” She struggled for a moment, then remembered his name. “Richmond,” she added, and was rewarded with his smile.
“It’s my honor, your ladyship. May I offer you my arm?”
She took it. She didn’t want to lean on him, didn’t want his kindness, but she really had no choice. They made their way down the flights of stairs with stately grace, and the pain was a welcome distraction from that stronger, bleaker pain inside her. By the time he handed her into Rohan’s town carriage she was biting her lip to keep from crying out, a film of sweat covering her forehead. She’d been an idiot, as always. If she’d simply stayed home, as Rohan had instructed her, this never would have happened. She would be in happy ignorance of the wonders of the flesh, and she could continue to think of Rohan as an annoyingly attractive thorn in her side.
She sat very still on the seat as she was conveyed the short distance to King Street, and she directed the coachman to take her around the back, to the garden entrance, rather than up the twelve steep marble steps to the front door. She was handed down with great care, far more care than Rohan had ever shown toward her, and she limped up onto the terrace, pushing open the French doors that led to what had once been a salon and now served as a sewing room. The house was still and quiet, the gaggle still asleep in their chaste beds, while she had been carousing.
She couldn’t think of them as the gaggle any longer. That had been his term for them, and he was no longer any part of her life. She moved into the deserted hallway, glancing up at the interminable flights of stairs.
She couldn’t face them. She went into the front room, where she and Emma both had desks, and sank down on the chaise, leaning back and closing her eyes. The morning was still and quiet and beautiful, and she had a new life to begin. What a glorious morning, how delighted she was with her little experiment, and how good it was that Rohan had retained his boredom with her while proffering her exquisite, sublime pleasure.
Indeed, life couldn’t be much better.
“Are you crying, miss?” A small, anxious voice came from the general vicinity of the banked fire, and Melisande made a damp, choking noise as a bundle of rags emerged from the shadows. It took a moment for her vision to clear through her streaming tears, and she saw Betsey’s bright young face, creased in uncharacteristic worry as she looked up at her.
For a moment Melisande’s voice refused to obey her. She struggled, then managed to come out with something faintly akin to a conversational tone. “My ankle is paining me, Betsey.”
“Yes, miss.”
Betsey was still proving remarkably stubborn when it came to proper forms of address, and Melisande knew she should instruct her in the proper form. Your ladyship for a titled female, miss for an untitled one. On no account was she a miss, and yet Betsey persisted, possibly because the only comfort and safety she’d known had been provided by a miss long ago.
Melisande swiftly wiped the dampness away from her cheeks. “What