tightly, as if to squeeze the ugliness away. But it was too late.
Her mother’s voice had whispered from the bed. “And now I’ve got an ugly daughter who’s a whore,” she’d said. “Why is my life so wretched?”
Elinor had broken free of Nanny’s gentle embrace and looked down at her mother, trying to think of something to say. But Lady Caroline’s eyes had drifted closed, and there were no words harsh enough.
It had taken months for her to accept Lydia’s embraces and joy in having her home again. Not until she’d had word that Sir Christopher had returned to England with his new bride, a girl of fourteen, the gossips had said, horrified.
And the last trace of regret had vanished, and Elinor had put her arms around Lydia and for the first time in a year, she wept.
12
The next ten days proved to be a challenge to Elinor’s newfound determination. It wasn’t simply the daily arrival of gifts from Viscount Rohan. With no other source to turn to, she had no choice but to accept his charity, and she did so with perfect grace, as long as she didn’t have to see him. In fact, her nightmare had done her good. It didn’t matter that she refused to be a whore like her mother, dependent on the largesse of wealthy men—she’d already accepted that role the day she climbed into Sir Christopher’s bed.
Each day a new arrival of food, of firewood, of rich wool blankets and silken throws, would arrive, and she would dutifully sit down and write a polite note of thanks and promise of repayment, dispatching Jacobs with it. Each day he would return with a note in Rohan’s careless scrawl, and even her sister failed to see the impropriety of his suggestions that she might visit to further discuss methods of repayment. Ones, he said, that didn’t involve rats. Lydia had wrinkled her brow at that, but Elinor refused to explain. Besides, she’d changed her mind. She’d underestimated the danger of the King of Hell, and she wasn’t going anywhere near him again, not if she could help it. The memory of his mouth still burned. Rats would be easier to forget.
She ate the food, rich and wonderful beyond her memory, without choking, she warmed herself by the fire his money had provided, and she slept in the bed next to her sister, holding tight to the knowledge that as long as Lydia slept beside her the girl was safe.
There’d been a time, a brief time when she’d been in Rohan’s dangerous, mesmerizing presence, when she’d really believed it wasn’t her sister he wanted. When he’d touched her, kissed her, and a whole new world had opened up. Not the sunshiny bright world of true love and happy endings. Something darker, more complex, infinitely more alluring.
Common sense had returned along with daylight. If he’d had even the slightest passing interest in her it was occasioned only by her unique status as an innocent. Once he learned otherwise he would have come to his senses. Assuming he had left them in the first place.
But he’d made no effort to broaden his acquaintance with her sister, and Elinor allowed herself to relax, at least briefly. And to be grateful for the most important gift of all. Etienne de Giverney.
It wasn’t until the third day that there was a sudden knock on the door, and apprehension swept through Elinor. “Go in the bedroom, Lydia,” she said swiftly, rising from her seat by the blessed fire. “I’ll get rid of him.”
Lydia didn’t argue. She never did when Elinor used that tone of voice. She was far from naive, and she knew full well, without any vanity, that her looks brought her unwanted attention, and she slipped into their bedroom as Elinor waited for Jacobs to open the door, certain that Lord Rohan would be there, ready to claim his reward.
Instead, a husky young man stepped into the house, ducking beneath the low lintel. He was dressed immaculately, perhaps too much so, and he carried a medical bag in one hand. “Miss Elinor Harriman?” he said in the French of a native. “My name is Etienne de Giverney. I’ve been sent by my cousin, the Comte de Giverney, to provide assistance.”
She stared at him, dumbfounded for the moment. And then memory flooded back, Rohan’s absurd suggestion that she marry this young man. If she could go by the way he was looking at her out of flat black eyes, he was having