Page 13 of The Baroness of Sin
James was in a rather casual debate with his valet, Vickers, about what he would wear to Lady Carrington’s that night for dinner. He had been invited as a guest, and he was trying to find a discrete and polite way to insinuate that Victor should dress him more handsomely without giving himself away. The conversation was proving to be patently unproductive when his daughter walked in to interrupt him, though she was interrupting very little of consequence.
“That one,” Lady Amanda said, seeming to point at random to a reddish-brown burgundy coat. Vickers rolled his eyes and picked up the coat while his lord turned his attention to the lady of the house. Amanda smirked as Victor took a moment to study the coat she had selected behind her father’s back, holding it up to examine what the color might look like on Lord Barristen.
“How are you this day, dear one?” her father asked with the gentle love she always felt in his words.
“Absolutely wonderful, Papa. I heard you have been asked to dinner by Mar- by Lady Carrington,” Amanda said, catching herself before she slipped up in front of Vickers.
“You did? Wherever did you hear that?” James asked, genuinely curious as to which of the staff had informed her, so he might have a discussion with them on the topic of gossiping about one's employer.
Amanda simply shook her head. “My lips are sealed.”
James laughed inwardly, not wanting to give his daughter any sort of positive reaction to this behavior. Still, he couldn’t help but be amused. He wasn’t sure who had developed worse habits, his staff or his daughter, but they certainly didn’t discourage each other.
“Are you and Lady Carrington courting?” Amanda asked excitedly.
James felt his stomach twist a little. He definitely should have learned by now that his daughter would find out about anything long before he intended to discuss the topic with her. “Is that what you heard?”
“No, they just said you were going to dinner,” Amanda said nonchalantly.
“So where did you get the impression that Lady Carrington and I were courting?” James was genuinely curious where the thought came from. Amanda was getting to the age where she would be able to put certain pieces of information together, but this would be the first time she had leapt to that sort of conclusion alone.
Amanda was silent in the way that only secretive children are, like the answers are filling them to burst, and they want to let them out, but they know they can’t. She averted her gaze and shrugged her shoulders. Not very becoming of a young lady, but James didn’t have it in him to scold Amanda at the moment. He rarely ever did.
“In any event,” James continued, “I’m afraid the lady and I are not courting.”
“You aren’t?” Amanda asked earnestly, her voice dejected.
He shook his head. “We are just good friends.”
“Oh,” Amanda seemed bitterly disappointed, and it wasn’t hard for James to guess why. He didn’t want to give his daughter false hope. James never planned to remarry after all, but it still tore him up inside to see his daughter so sad.
“But,” he almost hesitated and then followed through, “she is also your good friend as well as mine. Which means you will see her very often all the same.”
That did seem to cheer his daughter up quite quickly. “That’s true, Papa. You are absolutely right.” She nodded enthusiastically, and James felt he had done enough of his fatherly duty to return to the discussion of dinner dress.
James wasn’t a bad father, but he was on occasion an inattentive one. It was, in this instance, that he missed a crucial twinkle in his daughter’s eye. The look that Amanda Williams had inherited from her mother, and that she often had while planning something mischievous.
* * *
“Lord Barristen is coming to dinner? The same Lord Barristen who insulted you in your own manor? That Lord Barristen?” Emma balked. She didn’t balk often. It wasn’t a good look on her, but in private and when it was warranted with her sisters then she would balk.
“He apologized. Did I not mention that to you?” Martha asked sheepishly.
“No, you didn’t. In fact, we haven’t talked much at all these last few days. You have been so busy entertaining guests.” A look of realization crossed Emma’s face. “You have been meeting with him, haven’t you?!”
Martha didn’t try to hide her blushing from her sister. It wasn’t worth the effort. “And if I was? It is perfectly appropriate.”
Emma’s eyes were even wider than normal, which, with her spectacles, was saying something. “Perfectly appropriate are hardly the words I would use to describe what could be happening here.”
“And what words would you use, sister dear?” Martha asked her, her tone pointed and challenging, daring Emma to try and put her in her place.
Emma bit her tongue, not wishing to elaborate at risk of hurting her sister’s feelings. “I think it is perfectly reasonable as a lady in this house and as your sister to be informed of the comings and goings,” she said eventually, her tone softer.
Martha softened as well. She was defensive because she knew she was giving people something to talk about, and it upset her greatly. But her sister was not one of those people.
“I’m sorry, Emma. I didn’t tell you about Lord Barristen because I was a bit ashamed. We aren’t courting or anything, but I have been rather forward, and I didn’t want you to think less of me,” Martha confessed.
“Well,” Emma paused for a breath, and she let the anger go with it, “that is understandable, but I am afraid the path you chose wasn’t much better.”
