Page 13 of The Marquis' Game of Seduction
Rose’s eyebrows stitched tightly over her eyes. She stuttered for a moment before saying, “I’m terribly sorry, my lord, but I know what I saw. There was a little girl, running through the previous corridor and then into this one. She was hiding behind the curtain, looking out across the moor. When I spoke to her, she rushed as quickly as she could…”
“You SPOKE to her?” Colin demanded. His eyes were wild with anger.
“But of course I did!” Rose spat back. “And if she’s not meant to be in the estate, then we must do something, my lord! Perhaps she needs help. She could be on the run from her parents, or something much worse. Perhaps she snuck into the mansion for refuge and she’s unsure of where to turn or who to trust.”
Now, Rose rapped her chest with a fist and added, “If there’s anyone she can trust in this world, it’s me, my lord. I know what it’s like to be cold and alone in this world.”
But Colin’s face remained stone-like, his eyes spitting with anger. Again, he shook his head, and when he spoke, he did so with a strange growl. “This is absolutely ridiculous. I am telling you here and now, and forevermore, there is no one else in this mansion. No other child. I must insist that you return to your bedroom at once, so that we may all get some sleep tonight. There is nothing more important to me than the goings-on in this house. And right now, you are very much out of order.”
Rose bit down on her lower lip. She was filled with a strange sense of anger mixed with wonder. And, like a person on the edge of a cliff overlooking the ocean, she leaped forward—at first with fear, and then with a glittering sense of promise.
“And what, pray tell, are you doing out of bed, then?” she demanded. “What are you doing, wandering the corridors at night? I have quite a good reason, wouldn’t you agree? I’m looking for a little girl. A little girl I suspect to be lost and afraid and probably hungry and tired. And you? What are you doing, if not frightening me in the midst of my hunt and ordering me about?”
But Rose’s audacity had taken her too far. Immediately, she bit down on her lip so hard she thought she might draw blood. She lurched back a bit, waiting for some kind of blow. Colin’s face grew increasingly cloudy, his eyes difficult to read.
Suddenly, candlelight flickered in through the far entry to the corridor. A figure flapped her feet across the floorboards. Moments later, Judith appeared behind the candlelight, which cast strange shadows across her cheeks and forehead. The light made her look ghoulish and perhaps thirty years older than her 45 years.
“There you are, my lord,” Judith began. Yet, when her eyes found Rose’s, her face looked suddenly hesitant, as though she hadn’t expected to spot Rose there so late at night. She pressed her lips together and seemed to exchange a worried glance with the Marquees.
What on earth was going on? Was it possible that the two of them had arranged to meet in that very corridor so late at night? And why was Judith out of bed as well? It seemed she’d never even removed her day gown, that she’d never prepared herself for bed.
Yet now, Rose still sizzled with adrenaline at her impulsiveness. Her eyes lurched between the Marquees and Judith and back again, and she bowed her chin to her chest and said, “I’m terribly sorry to have interrupted your evening. I do hope that you’ll let me know if you see anything…”
“See anything?” Judith asked. She sounded very much like a woman trying to put on an act, although perhaps this was Rose “putting this” on the situation. She truly did have an active imagination, much like Duncan.
“Yes,” Rose affirmed. “You see, I spotted a young girl in the corridor. I thought at first she was Duncan, which was why I was following her in the first place. But—“
“And yet, I’ve explained to our new governess, quite a few times now, that we don’t have any such young girl in the mansion,” Colin said. This time, his words were icy. “I trust that she can return to her room swiftly, and without much noise. Otherwise, I must envision that we have to take note of this with regards to her future career with us.”
Judith grimaced a bit. “I’m terribly sorry, dear. But your imagination truly must have got away with you. There’s nobody else here. I can assure you of that.”
Rose felt as though she was pressed up against a stone wall. All she could do was apologise and retreat. She bowed her head once more and bid them both adieus, before tossing herself back down the corridor toward her bedroom. Yet, steps away from her own room, she had a second thought. Not to find the missing girl—a girl she was 100% certain she had seen—but to check on Duncan.
Perhaps the girl was in some way affiliated with Duncan and had grabbed him out of bed, as well? Or perhaps Duncan was hiding her in his bedroom, to keep her safe? This was the sort of thing a boy like Duncan would do, certainly. He recognised the evils of the world and felt himself strong and powerful and good enough to fight them.
Rose tapped on tip-toes all the way to Duncan’s bedroom. Her eyes searched continually for any sight of the lurking candles. If she ran into Judith or Colin again, she felt sure that they would kick her out of the mansion—and perhaps they wouldn’t even wait till morning.
Duncan’s door was clipped shut. Slowly, Rose opened the door, hating every screech and squeak it made along the way. Yet, within 30 seconds, she was able to peer fully in through the crack to find Duncan tucked deep beneath his sheets. Just his little head was pressed into the pillows. Moonlight swept over him beautifully. And his lips were parted just slightly. Little gasps—inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale—came from those lips. And Rose felt a funny ache of the first brewing of love. The kind of love, she knew, that could come only from a mother. Therefore, hers was a kind of shadow of that love, but incredibly strong and powerful in its own right.
“Good night, Duncan,” she muttered. Slowly, she crept the door closed and then slid her palm over the wood, like a kind of blessing. “Sleep well till morning. At least, sleep better than me.”
Rose couldn’t get back to her bedroom quickly enough. She was oddly panicked, her legs arching quickly. And when she finally landed on her bedroom floor, she tossed the door back so quickly that it actually slammed. She lurched around and glared at it, as though she could possibly scold a door.
Then, she tossed herself back into bed and shivered wildly. Outside, the autumn wind raced past the glass and shifted the tree branches to and fro. She drew a line over the window pane and tried to focus on her own breathing, hoping to finally calm her mind.
What did I see, if it wasn’t a little girl? And why was Colin so adamant that I hadn’t seen what I know, for sure, I saw? It seems ridiculous that he would fight it so much. I know what I saw. And I don’t have a history of making things like this up…
But again, Rose found her thoughts tracing back toward Colin. Domineering and almost monstrous in that hallway, towering over her and insisting, over and over again, that she was wrong. But that gleam in his eyes, and his thick muscles, and his wild black hair—all of it flickered in the back of Rose’s mind.
She splayed her hands over her flat belly and fell into a puddle of these dreams, easing back into slumber. Perhaps the reality of the world—that Colin was a reckless brute, apt to declare her inability to exist in the world—wasn’t the sort of thing that could calm her down. But just like Duncan, she could imagine anything she pleased.
Perhaps it would be the only fodder that would allow her to live through this time.
Chapter 7
The following morning, sunlight smeared over Rose’s blankets. Her eyelids burst open and she peered out the window at a bright and beautiful fall morning, the sort without any memory of the dark events that had unfolded the evening before. Rose toyed with her curls and swept her feet to the chilly floor.
Within moments, however, her mind clung back to thoughts of the little girl. If she’d been within the mansion during the night, there was a very good chance she remained within its walls. It was unlikely that she’d run off into the chilly dark moors. Rather, she’d probably hunkered in the library, or an abandoned study—or even found a long-lost bedroom, where she planned to remain until she could find her way out and hunt for food.
