Page 96 of Sloth: The Fallen Earl
Cressida hurried and grabbed another dish and took a step to return. When she whirled around this time, she gasped. Benedict rescued the burden from her hands before she dropped them.
“Here,” he murmured. “I have those.”
As he hurried over to the table to set the things down, Cressida stared after him unblinking and motionless.
Get my bloody breakfast, you stupid cow.
Her throat worked spasmodically. Not once had any gentleman, or any man, for that matter, raised a finger to help her.
Certainly not Stanley nor his goon. Not even her own father. After her mother had passed and Cressida was left and the staff began to dwindle because of declining finances, she’d served.
“What is it?” Benedict’s quiet concern jolted her to the present.
“I’m not accustomed to gentlemen either visiting the kitchens or helping set their own table.”
“Well, that would be two of us. I’ve never known a lady who enjoyed spending time in the kitchens, and at such an early hour at that.”
“Not like the ladies you keep company with, my lord,” she murmured.
He stood, clearly waiting for her to join him. When she had taken up a place on the other side of the table across from him and sat, he spoke.
“You’ve alluded to this several times now, Cressida,” he said, just as she started to reach for the knife, “and you insist we’ve met before.”
“Because we have.”
“And I trust at some point, you’re going to let me know when those times were.”
“Well, you didn’t ask.”
He froze with the bread halfway to his mouth and chuckled.
“That’s a fair point.” He took a bite and went absolutely motionless. His eyes slid closed and his hard aquiline features went soft like he’d just partaken of that forbidden apple, the first fruit that had led men to sin.
“Holy hell,” he breathed. “This is bloody fabulous.”
His complete reverence could not be feigned, not even by the best stage actor at the Royal Theater Company.
Cressida felt her face warming for entirely different reasons, not embarrassment. When was the last time she’d received such a compliment? One that came from truth and not pity as she’d often received from her friends at the Mismatch Society.
“You still haven’t said,” he said after he’d finished his big mouthful.
No, she hadn’t. She’d rather hoped he’d have forgotten because—
“You may have courted one of my only friends.”
Benedict’s eyes flared wide. She saw the wheels of his mind churning as he sought to place her.
“You’re wondering which of the women you courted.”
Neither of which had been she. Both of whom she’d envied tremendously, so deep to the point of sinning. She took mercy on him. “The Marchioness of Landon,” she said, and the fact that confusion continued to pray across his eyes, managed to somehow, and possibly, hurt her even more than she could believe.
He still had no clue about her identity. Burning with humiliation and hurt, Cressida quickly set to work, slicing herself a piece of bread, slapping butter on it and stuffing her mouth even as light as the inside of the loaf. The crispy loaf was as dry as dust in her mouth and yet thick as clay so that she struggled to choke and swallow.
“I’m sorry.” He said as he didn’t even try to deny that he couldn’t recall her.
She shook her head, grateful that she couldn’t finish her swallow.
“It was only one occasion,” she finally said, after choking down her bite.
