Page 42 of Deceiving an Earl
Her head shot up, and a thrill of fear raced through her. “Why? Fieldhurst is a fully functioning estate. Rents are coming in as they should be. There are maintenance issues that we have been putting off—”
“Ellen.”
She snapped her mouth closed and raised her chin. Just the one word seemed to put her in her place.
“I’m not making any accusations and I’m not passing judgment. Please stop being so defensive. You asked me to help and that’s what I’m doing. If you would like me to step back, I will. But if you want me to continue to help, then you need to stop fighting me.”
Suddenly she deflated. He was right. Of course he was right. But her fear of discovery was overpowering every thought. She wanted to push him away, but he was the only one willing to help.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
Oliver leaned forward again and studied her in such an intimate way that it made her cheeks heat and she had to look away, flooded with memories. There had been a connection the first night she’d met him at the ball, and there was still a connection. A visceral feeling deep inside her, a feeling that Oliver was special, once in a lifetime. Her body began to remember Oliver in ways she had tried to erase—that first kiss underneath the tree in Hyde Park. The shocked feeling that he was actually kissing her, then the acceptance that she liked him. She really, really liked him.
He was the only man who had made her heart and body sing.
Oh, it had been such a horrible mistake inviting him back into her life.
“What is wrong, Ellen? You’re not yourself.”
She lifted her chin again. “It’s been seventeen years, Oliver. I’m not the girl you remember.”
“You never told anyone? About us?”
“Of course not!”
“Arthur never suspected?”
“Oliver. Please. Stop. We can’t talk about this.”
“He’s dead, Ellen. It doesn’t matter anymore.”
But it did matter. It mattered greatly, and his look told her that he thought the same.
“He never suspected,” she whispered. But there were times she’d wondered. Over the years, Arthur would say something about how lucky he was to have Philip. Or how sad he was that they’d never had another child. She would catch him sometimes looking at Philip when he thought no one was watching, a deep crease between his brows, as if looking for something of himself in the boy.
Her guilt would consume her, and she would desperately try to distract him.
“To see you with him…it was difficult. Especially after…”
Please, stop. Please.But she sat silently, wringing her hands, her words locked in her throat.
Oliver suddenly stood, startling her. “I must go. It’s been a long day. Tell Philip I will be by soon to go over the books with him. His tutelage on how to be arealearl will start then.”
She stood on shaking knees, feeling as if she had just escaped something life changing. “I will tell him.”
…
A week later Oliver was still kicking himself for mentioning his and Ellen’s past relationship. Why the hell had he asked her if she’d told anyone about them? Had he wanted her to? Had he secretly hoped she had said something to Arthur? What kind of twisted thought was that?
He’d certainly never told anyone, and he would expect Ellen not to have, either, since she had chosen Arthur over him.
He wouldn’t say anything to her again about that night. It obviously made her uncomfortable, and that was the last thing he wanted to do.
But he also couldn’t stay away from her. It had nothing to do with his promise to her and to the headmaster regarding Philip. It had nothing to do with Philip and everything to do with Oliver and his strange, awful need to see her again and again and again.
He had no reason to continue to attend her salons. O’Leary had said that they were no longer looking at Antoine Bertrand as a threat to the Crown, that Bertrand seemed to be working on his own without any serious backing from anyone in France. Oliver’s services were no longer needed. And yet he found himself dressing for tonight’s salon and eagerly looking forward to it as if he were still that lad from long ago.
He didn’t even care if tonight’s performance was another boring poetry reading.
