The Cinderella Governess

‘With Father’s mounting bills and you possibly never coming back, I didn’t have a choice but to accept him,’ she cried out against his sarcasm. ‘So much has changed in England since you’ve been gone. The cold winters have taken their toll and, with crops failing year after year, Father began to fall into debt like so many others.’

No doubt his gambling habit helped increase it, Luke bit back, holding more sympathy for her than he should have. Her family wasn’t the only one facing ruin and struggling to hide it. His father and grandfather had spent years rebuilding Pensum Manor after his feckless great-grandfather had nearly gambled it away. The continued crop failures were threatening to send it spiralling back into insolvency. Like Diana, Luke needed to marry and well. He hated to be so mercenary in his choice of bride, but it was a reality he couldn’t ignore. However, it didn’t mean he had to wed the first merchant’s daughter with five thousand a year who threw herself at him in an effort to be the mother of the next Earl of Ingham. ‘Surely you could’ve chosen someone better suited to you than that old man.’

‘My first duty is to my father and my family, not to you, not to even myself.’ She settled back into her chair, her brown eyes at last meeting his and filled with a silent plea for understanding. He couldn’t withhold it. He’d abandoned his men and his military career to come home and do his duty for his family. He couldn’t blame her for doing the same.

‘It seems we’re both obliged to make sacrifices. You with Lord Follett, me as the heir.’

‘But your brother and his wife?’

‘After ten years, there’s been no child. If things stay as they are—’

‘You’ll inherit.’ She pressed her palm to her forehead, realising what she’d given up by following her parents’ demands. However, Luke knew the way of the world. A possible title at some future date was not the same as an old, wealthy baron on a woman’s doorstep with a special licence.

Not wanting to torture her further with his presence or his ire, he took the shako from Collins and tucked it under his arm. ‘I wish you all the best and future happiness. Good day.’

He left the house and climbed into the hack waiting at the kerb. He knocked Captain Reginald Crowther’s feet off the seat where he’d rested them to nap.

His friend jerked upright and tilted his shako off his eyes. He was about to crack a joke when a warning glare from Luke turned him slightly more serious. ‘I take it all didn’t go well with your fair damsel?’

Luke rapped on the roof to set the vehicle in motion. As it lumbered out of Mayfair towards the Bull in Bishops Street, he told him what had happened inside the Tomalins’. ‘This isn’t how I imaged this would go.’

‘And I can see you’re utterly heartbroken over losing her. More like inconvenienced.’ Captain Crowther threw his arms up over the back of the squabs. ‘You thought you’d marry a tidy little sum, produce an heir with the least amount of bother and be back in Spain with the regiment inside of two years.’

Luke fingered the regimental badge of a curved bugle horn hung from a ribbon affixed to the front of his shako, unsettled by Captain Crowther’s frank assessment of his plans and secretly relieved. If he and Diana had entered into marriage negotiations, the Inghams’ debts would have been revealed. Diana’s family would probably have made her cry off and all England might have learned of his family’s financial straits. His rapture for her had faded too much during their time apart for him to go through so much on her behalf. ‘Her refusing to marry me before I left and insisting we keep the engagement a secret always did rankle.’

‘Now you must give up the hell of battle for the hell of the marriage mart.’ His friend chuckled. ‘Wish I could be here to see you dancing like some London dandy.’

‘When I agreed to come home, I didn’t think I’d have to face it.’ Or the ugliness he’d glimpsed in Diana’s situation. He set the shako on the seat beside him. Worse waited for him in the country. With the future of the earldom hovering over him, all the tittering darlings and their mamas who’d ignored him as a youth because he wouldn’t inherit would rush Pensum Manor faster than Napoleon’s troops did a battlefield.

‘You don’t have to do this. Write and tell your brother to pay more attention to his wife and come back to Spain,’ Captain Crowther urged.

‘I’m sure their lack of a child isn’t from a lack of trying and it isn’t only an heir they need, but money.’ Luke stared out the hackney window at the crowd crossing London Bridge in the distance. He couldn’t have refused the request to come home even if he’d wanted to. His father had called on his old friend, Lieutenant Colonel Lord Henry Beckwith, using the connection he’d employed to begin Luke’s Army career to end it. Luke might have ignored one or two orders in battle, achieving both victory and forgiveness for his transgressions, but he couldn’t dismiss a direct command from Lord Beckwith to return home.

The carriage lumbered to a stop in front of the arch of the bustling Bull Inn. Luke tucked the shako under his arm and stepped out, as did his friend. Behind them the driver unloaded Luke’s things while Captain Crowther’s stayed fixed on top. After he visited his sister, Reginald was going back to Spain, his mission of delivering dispatches complete.

Luke flicked the dull edge of the bugle-horn badge with his fingernail. He would catch a coach to Pensum Manor, his family’s estate in Hertfordshire and take up the position of second in line to the earldom and groom-to-be to some willing, and as of yet unnamed, wife. ‘I wish you’d accepted my offer to buy my commission.’

‘You know I don’t want it, or the debt to secure it. Don’t look so glum.’ Reginald cuffed Luke on the arm. ‘We aren’t all meant to be leaders like you. Your intelligence, wit and daring will be missed.’

‘But they’ll have your ability to charm the locals, especially the gambling men.’

Reginald grinned with self-satisfaction. ‘I do have a flair with language.’

Luke snapped off the Forty-Third Regiment of Foot bugle-horn badge affixed to the front of the shako and handed the now-unneeded headpiece to his friend. ‘Stay safe.’

Reginald ran his thumb over the bare felt front, a rare seriousness crossing over his face before it passed. ‘You’re the one who needs to watch yourself. I hear those unmarried ladies can be dangerous.’ He tossed the thing inside the coach then took Luke’s hand. ‘Go on to Hertfordshire, find a wife and give your family their much sought-after heir.’

Reginald climbed back into the carriage and then hung one elbow out the door window.

‘Give Napoleon hell,’ Luke encouraged, the edge of the badge biting into his palm where he clasped it tight.

‘I intend to.’ With a rakish salute, Reginald tucked inside as the hack rolled off down the crowded street.

With each turn of the wheels, the most accomplished and contented ten years of Luke’s life faded into the past. He opened his palm, the tin against his skin tarnished with Spanish mud and rain. What waited for him in Hertfordshire was everything he’d joined the Army to escape: the oppressive weight of previous generations which hung over Pensum Manor, and his own insignificance to the line as magnified by his brother’s importance.

He slipped the badge into his pocket and strode into the inn to arrange for a seat in the next coach to Hertfordshire. He’d do his duty to his family, as fast and efficiently as he could, then he’d return to the Army and a real sense of accomplishment.

Chapter Two

Joanna had never been to a ball before. The Pensum Manor ballroom was decorated with autumn leaves, straw bales, scarecrows and bunches of wheat tied with orange-and-yellow ribbons. The same musicians who played in the church on Sundays now performed on an equally festive stage at the far end. In front of them, young ladies and gentlemen danced in time to the lively music. Everyone in attendance seemed happy and carefree, except Joanna, and, it appeared, Major Preston.

Joanna glanced at the guest of honour again, admiring the dignified arch of his brows, the subtle wave in his dark brown hair where it curled over both ears before touching the smooth skin above his collar. It wasn’t only his commanding stature which drew her to him, but the discontent deepening the rich coffee colour of his eyes. He stood beside his brother, Lord Pensum, near the door, nodding tersely at each passing guest while his brother greeted them with a gracious smile and a few words. More than once Joanna saw Major Preston’s sturdy chest rise and fall with a weary sigh and she sympathised with him. Like her, he was clearly ill at ease in the midst of all this merriment.

‘Watch where you’re going,’ Frances snapped as she stopped to examine the dancers, forcing Joanna to come up short to keep from bumping into her tiring charge. Then Frances set off again on another circle of the room, no doubt searching for Lieutenant Foreman. Thankfully, they hadn’t seen him, but it didn’t stop Frances from looking. The girl was stubborn in her desire to ruin herself.

Joanna followed wearily behind her, tugging at the pale-blue secondhand dress Frances had tossed at her last night after Lady Huntford had announced Joanna would attend as Frances’s chaperon. It spared the mother the bother of hovering around her headstrong daughter. Joanna played with the small bit of lace along the thankfully modest bodice. It fit her in length, since she and Frances were nearly matched in height, but Joanna had been forced to stay up late to take in the chest. The lack of sleep, combined with Lady Huntford having instructed Joanna to try and manoeuvre Frances to Major Preston, added to her disquiet. The young lady was as co-operative as a donkey. With Frances relentlessly circling the room and refusing to dance, Joanna had been denied the company of the other governesses sitting along the wall and chatting together. She needed some hopefully polite conversation with someone, anyone. She rarely received it at Huntford Place.

To Joanna’s luck, Frances’s hurried steps brought them closer to Major Preston and Joanna hazarded another glance at him. This time, his eyes met hers and the entire ballroom faded away until only the two of them and the soft melody of the violin remained. There were no wayward charges, laughing country squires or gallant young men to concern her. His gaze slid along the length of her, pausing at her chest which increased with her drawn-in breath.

Instead of stopping him with a chiding glance, she stood up straighter, offering him a better view of her in the prettiest dress she’d ever worn. His silent appraisal of her continued down to her feet and then up again. It kindled the strange fire burning near her centre which spread out to engulf her skin. She touched the curls at the back of her head, returning his attention to her face. With a slow, refined movement she lowered her hand, linking it with the other in front of her, each fingertip aching to trace the angle of his jaw to where it met his stiff cravat. She envied the linen encasing his throat and whatever woman he chose here tonight for his bride. She would experience the thrill of his body against hers, the heat of his wide hands upon her bare skin, the luxury of his height draping her like a heavy coat on a windy day.

‘Stop gawking at everything,’ Frances hissed, snapping Joanna out of her licentious daydream. ‘You’re embarrassing me.’

Considering the lady’s encounter with Lieutenant Foreman, Frances possessed a strange idea of what might embarrass her. Joanna held her tongue, eager to avoid cultivating any more of Frances’s ire.

‘Might we not go speak with Major Preston?’ Joanna slid a sideways glance at Major Preston. He continued to watch her with an allure which almost made her rush to him, but she didn’t move. Instead, she tugged at the back of the dress, wondering what had come over her. She was here to chaperon Frances, not lose her head over a man so far above her the only relationship they could enjoy would risk her livelihood and go against everything Madame Dubois and Miss Fanworth had invested in her. They’d trained her to teach young ladies, not to become a kept tart.

‘Why would I want to talk to him?’ Frances shifted back and forth on her toes to look over the guests’ heads.

‘To save your slippers for the delight of dancing,’ Joanna joked. Her attempt at humour withered as Frances narrowed her eyes at Joanna. ‘And because I’ve noticed him admiring you.’

It was a lie, but an effective one.

‘He has?’ Frances’s attention whipped around to Major Preston so fast, the blonde curls at the back of her head flew out before they settled back against her neck. Frances thrust out her ample chest and cast Major Preston a none-too-subtle smile.

Frances’s interest in him ended his interest in them. He offered Frances a polite nod, then turned to speak to a gentleman Joanna vaguely recognised as someone of local importance. On the dance floor, one dance ended and couples began to form up for the next. Mr Winborn, the son of another local baronet who Catherine, Frances’s younger sister, had teased Frances about during their last visit to the village approached them.

‘Miss Huntford, may I have this dance?’ The lithe gentleman with a head of wild red hair held out his freckled hand to Frances.

‘Yes, I suppose I must be seen dancing with someone or people will talk.’ Frances placed her hand limply in his.

‘We can’t have that, now, can we?’ Mr Winborn concurred, not offended by her blunt acceptance and just as blasé about taking her to the dance floor as his partner.

Joanna sagged a little in relief. Frances couldn’t get into trouble while she danced. Joanna turned, excited to at last be able to join the other chaperons when a mountain of a man stepped between her and them. A badge of a bugle horn hung by a tin ribbon met her before she peered up to the peak to find Major Preston standing over her.

The scent of cedar surrounding him enveloped her and she pressed her heels into the floor to keep from wavering under the pressure of it. His dark coat ran tight along the horizontal plane of his shoulders. Brass buttons with crossed sabres held the wool closed at his navel and emphasised his narrow waist. The dark material stood in stark contrast to the white breeches covering his legs. She didn’t dare check to see what kind of buttons held those closed.

‘May I have this dance?’ He held out his hand to her. His palm was wide, with a faint scar starting at the first finger and crossing down to his wrist. Light red circles of old blisters further marred the plane of it. Here was no soft London gentleman, but one who knew something of hard work and danger. His nearness didn’t overwhelm her like the ones of the other titled men and women filling the room. Instead, she admired his confidence and wanted to emulate it.

She raised her hand to accept his, then jerked it back to her side, remembering herself. ‘When it comes to reels, I appear more like a horse trotting around a millstone than a lady of poise. It’s best for me to avoid them.’

He grinned at her, amused instead of insulted by her refusal. ‘Dancing doesn’t bring out my natural agility either. Despite lessons, I never developed the talent for it. I mastered riding instead.’

‘If only you could do both the way they do with the horses from Vienna I once read about.’ She froze, waiting for him to chastise her as Frances had for speaking out of turn. Instead, he rewarded her with a smile as captivating as his height. He was a good head taller than her.

‘Not my horse. He’s more mule than Lipizzaner and would throw me if I tried to make a dancer out of him.’

‘But you’d both be majestic for the moment you stayed in the saddle.’

‘It would be a very brief moment.’ He smothered a laugh behind his hand, the delight it brought to his eyes as captivating as the pensiveness which had called to her from across the room. ‘Do you ride?’

‘As poorly as I dance.’ Horsemanship was wasted on a governess.

‘I imagine you’d be quite elegant in the saddle if you tried.’

‘I’m sure I would be, for the brief moment before I was tossed out of it.’

He leaned in, the intensity of his woodsy scent strengthening with his closeness. She noticed a slight scar running along the hairline of his temple, the skin a touch whiter than that of his face. ‘I would catch you.’

Joanna stiffened, panic as much as excitement making her heart race. As a governess, she shouldn’t be speaking with him. She should draw this conversation to a close, remember his place and hers, but she couldn’t. She hadn’t been this at ease since the last time she’d been with her friends. She offered him an impish look from beneath her dark lashes, emboldened by his relaxed manner. ‘I’d do the same for you.’

He straightened, his laugh uncontained this time. Thankfully, the music reached a high crescendo, keeping all but those closest to them from hearing him.

‘Your catching me would make me a spectacle, more so than I already am.’ His laughter died away and his shoulders rose and fell with another weary sigh. ‘What I wouldn’t give to be riding instead of here.’

‘What I wouldn’t give to be in a quiet corner reading instead of here.’

‘Yet here we are.’ He opened his hands to the room as Frances whirled by with her red-headed partner. Mr Winborn said something to her and she rewarded him with a rare and genuine laugh. ‘It must be difficult being in Miss Huntford’s shadow. You’re by far the prettier of the two.’

Joanna studied the square head of a nail in the floor beneath her feet, as stunned as she was flattered by his compliment. Miss Fanworth’s warning about young gentlemen came to her and she pinned him with her best disciplining governess look. It worked about as well with him as it did with Frances, which was to say it didn’t. ‘Thank you, but you really shouldn’t.’

‘I can’t help it. I’ve been among plain-speaking men for so long it’s difficult to not be open and honest with everyone. Imagine if we were all like this with one another.’

‘Society would crumble once everyone realised what people really thought of them.’

‘They already know but pretend they don’t.’

‘What about you? Do you pretend?’ It was none of her business, but she couldn’t help herself.

‘Every day.’ Sorrow darkened his eyes like clouds over water on a stormy day. ‘I pretend to be happy I came home, I pretend to be glad I gave up my Army career for this.’

* * *

Luke pressed back his shoulders and clasped his hands behind him, waiting for her to brush away his complaints as his brother Edward, his father and every other young lady he’d spoken with tonight had done. They all expected him to forget his time in the Army, to dismiss it as one might a past Season in London. He couldn’t any more than he could forget the faces of all the men he’d lost or the intuition for danger which still kept his senses sharp whenever he rode alone in the woods. All the instincts which had kept him alive in Spain refused to be dulled, but they were useless to him here.

‘It can be difficult after so long in one situation to leave it, especially when it means saying goodbye to friends.’ She studied him with eyes blue enough to make the Mediterranean jealous, their colour as stunning as her response. They captivated him as much now as when he’d followed her progress around the room as she’d trailed after Miss Huntford. Seeing the sisters together had reminded him of following Edward at school until he’d railed at him for embarrassing him. Luke had caught similar exchanges between the two sisters tonight. The last time he’d seen the Huntford girls had been at a picnic nearly fifteen years ago and they’d proved as vapid as their mother. Whichever Huntford sister this was, and he could only assume she was the second eldest, she’d matured into a beautiful, wise and witty young lady.

‘Eventually, you’ll settle in again,’ she assured him, the light auburn hair framing her round face emphasising her subtle beauty.

‘Settling is exactly what I’m worried about. As the second son, there isn’t much else for me to do. The estate isn’t mine and it may never be.’ From an early age, the house, their legacy and their duty to it had been drilled into Luke and his older brother. It had meant something to Edward, the heir. To Luke, it had been nothing but a heavy reminder of his lesser status, the one his family hadn’t failed to reinforce. After reluctantly paying to educate Luke alongside Edward, Luke’s father had spent as few pounds as possible to purchase Luke’s paltry lieutenant’s commission. It had been left to Luke to claw his way up the ranks, borrowing from friends to purchase every next higher rank until the day he’d won for himself, through his own daring, the rank of major. Only now, when Luke had become useful to the line, had his father decided to waste an unnecessary fortune to trot Luke out to look over the local eligible ladies. It irritated him as much as having left so much hard work behind in the dirt of Spain. ‘I have no desire to inherit, or become lord of the manor.’

Her shock at his honest declaration was obvious in the horrified surprise which widened her stunning eyes as she stared out across the ballroom. The dance had ended and the couples were bowing to one another and making their way back to their chaperons. She seemed to watch them closely, shifting on her feet as if she couldn’t wait to flee from him and the heresy of not coveting an earldom. ‘It can’t be.’

‘I assure you, it is.’

‘Please excuse me, Major Preston, but I must, uh, see to something, uh, Miss Hartford, very important, at once.’ She bolted from him like a horse whose rider had been shot off its back.

His spirits, buoyed by their conversation, sank like a rock. He’d thought her different from the many other ladies he’d met tonight, deeper and more understanding. He was wrong. She was as shallow and covetous as the rest of her family.

‘You look as though you need this more than Edward.’ Alma, his sister-in-law, offered him one of the two glasses of champagne she carried. She was tall for a woman but willowy with dark hair, light brown eyes and a playful smile Luke hadn’t seen much of since coming home.

Luke took the drink and downed a sobering gulp. ‘It seems my worth is once again based on the luck of birth and death.’

‘I sympathise with you. Providing an heir is the one thing expected of a woman of my rank and I’ve failed at it.’ She focused on the bubbles rising in a steady stream off the bottom of her champagne flute.

‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to add to your distress. I’m being as thoughtless as Edward.’

‘Don’t be so hard on him. He’s struggling to accept our failure and, like you, the changes it means to the family and the line.’

All of their roles and places in life which had once been so secure were being thrown off kilter like a wagon caught in a rut.

‘I’ve seen miracles on the field of battle, men narrowly missed by cannonballs, or those who walked away from explosions with only minor scratches. It isn’t too much to hope for another. Don’t despair, Alma. I haven’t.’ He tapped his glass against hers, making the crystal ring. ‘You may become a mother yet.’

‘We’ll see.’ Disbelief hung heavy in her response.

He raised his glass to finish it, then paused. Across the room, a man who shouldn’t be here slipped out of the opposite door and into the adjoining hallway. ‘What the devil is he doing here?’

‘Who?’ Alma asked, following the line of his look.

‘Lieutenant Foreman.’ He’d last seen the scoundrel eight years ago riding north from their training grounds in Monmouthshire with his tail between his legs, transferred to another unit at Luke’s insistence for compromising a local vicar’s daughter.

‘There weren’t any officers on the guest list.’ Alma tipped her flute at the blue-eyed beauty weaving through the guests. ‘I believe your conversation partner is following him.’

The young lady paused at the door, taking advantage of Lady Huntford’s lack of interest in her to slip into the hallway where Lieutenant Foreman had just disappeared. Apparently, she favoured lower-ranking men more than Luke had realised.