My Fair Marchioness (Scandalous Affairs Book 3) by Christi Caldwell (best short books to read txt) 📗

this conveyance.” And certainly not while racing off to meet who was surely yet another charlatan intending to pass herself off as the duchess’ niece.

Her Grace tossed her head back and laughed. Hers was the practiced, careful nature of measured mirth. “Oh, come. You, who are notorious for racing curricles and horses to win some wager or another, has grown squeamish when it comes to speeding about?”

“I haven’t raced a curricle in some years now,” he muttered.

“He’s grown into a fogey with age,” Lady Cowpen whispered.

“A good deal less fun, he is,” her sister returned in not-at-all-hushed tones.

“I can hear you, you know,” he said dryly.

The twins nodded. “Then that is good. You can do something about your fogey-ness.”

His… This was really enough. “I’ll have you know, the last thing I’m known for is… is…”

“Being a fogey,” his godmother snorted. “No. You’re known for womanizing and wagering and indulging in spirits.”

His neck went hot, and shock of all shocks, his cheeks flushed with a warmth that felt remarkably like a blush.

At last, as the carriage approached the duchess’ palatial, detached residence, he sent a prayer upward at having survived both the hazardous ride and the razor-sharp lecture and insults. “Why do I continue to dance attendance on you?” he muttered.

Lady Cavendish patted his hand and smiled. “Because you love us, and you are a good boy.” She paused. “Just a good boy who’s lost his way.”

The carriage finally stopped, and he sat there in silence with those words of Lady Cavendish.

Lost his way. Had he ever been… found? He, who’d gone from one miserable existence as the son of a man who’d had no need or want of him after the death of his wife, to a marriage with a mercenary woman who’d trapped him more neatly and surely than the late Boney could have.

Cursing, the duchess yanked the curtains back and looked out, angling her head back and forth. “Blasted servants. If a woman wants something done, she need do it herself,” she muttered, and before Harris realized what she intended to do, she pressed the handle, opened the door, and jumped out.

“You’re going to injure yourself,” he called after her. Scrambling down, he hurriedly reached back to help the twins.

“You really are a fogey. The twins are right,” his godmother drawled, taking the steps of her home with about the same caution as she’d made the descent from her garish pink-lacquer conveyance.

Chapter 5

The duchess’ servants hadn’t sent Julia away.

Why, they hadn’t even mistaken her for a beggar girl and directed her round back for handouts.

The butler hadn’t summoned the constable, as he would have been wise to do.

Rather, he had attempted to help her out of the cloak that she was decidedly not parting with, shown her to a parlor that was finer than any castle for a queen, fetched her a tray that she’d promptly devoured, and set her by a warm fire…

Where she’d sat for nearly an hour, huddled in her cloak, periodically stealing glances at the silent maid embroidering on a fancy upholstered bench across the room.

They’d been expecting Adairia.

That was the only way to explain why Julia had been ushered through the front door.

That was all that explained it.

It hadn’t been a trap by Graham. This was…real. How could it be real?

And yet, the longer she sat, the more she kicked herself for coming here. For coming to tell the duchess about the girl named Adairia who’d believed herself the lady’s niece and who’d believed it so much she’d been willing to die for the dream.

As soon as the fantastical thought slid in, she quashed it.

Even if by some far-fetched, magical chance Adairia had been who she’d professed to be, there’d hardly be forgiveness for Julia, the one who’d let the other woman be slaughtered.

It didn’t matter that Julia had helped keep Adairia safe for years. What had transpired in the span of these past days mattered the most, her greatest of failings.

I am so sorry, Adairia. So very sorry.

What was she doing?

When she’d fled Covent Garden, she’d had only one thought in mind—escape. She’d run as fast as she could to the place where even Rand Graham’s reach was thin and his ability to extricate her would be a struggle.

Now she found herself seated in a duchess’ fine parlor and not knowing what in hell she actually planned to say.

I had a dear friend who was like a sister and who believed she was a princess and that she was the daughter of nobility. Oh, and I also deterred her from coming to see you and didn’t safeguard her enough, so she’s no more.

Julia squeezed her eyes shut. A pike might as well have been run through her chest for the pain there. Adairia… was gone.

And Julia? Didn’t have so much as a body to bury or eyes to slide closed. She’d nothing more than eternal regrets and an empty void that could never, ever be filled.

She needed to leave.

Now.

Julia flew to her feet.

Just as the pounding of footfalls filled the corridor and reached into the grand parlor.

The doors were thrown open, and as one, there stumbled into the room a trio of ladies somewhere in their fortieth years. Two of the women were identical pictures of each other. However, with the loud silks and turbans they all wore, they might as well have been triplets.

Gasping and out of breath, they hunched over, each pair of enormously rounded eyes on Julia.

Her toes curling into the worn soles of her boots, Julie tensed.

Tick.

Tock.

Tick.

Tock.

The clock continued to mark the never-ending stretch of silence while they studied Julia, an oddity on display like those parrots and monkeys employed by people in Covent Garden to attract