Page 14 of A Virgin for the Icy Highlander
Grace suspected it wasn’t a matter of neglect, for the maids seemed attentive to the child, but more to do with the girl’s years of lacking company. Loneliness could rob anyone of their appetite. Little Ellie had no one to talk to or play with, and likely felt on the outside of everything. Of course, with Grace, it had been the opposite, but she could understand the feeling well.
Ellie grinned and took a scone, biting into it eagerly. She ate as if she hadn’t seen food in months, chewing like a child possessed, swallowing it down like she couldn’t get the treat into her stomach fast enough. And she washed it all down with an adorably delicate sip of her berry tea, as if remembering her manners at the last moment.
“I like this,” she said quietly, almost fearfully, as if she thought it might be taken away.
“Well then, we must do it often,” Grace replied, glancing at her friends, who nodded in agreement.
“It has beensucha lovely time,” Lilian said, her eyes shining as she looked at the child.
Maddie sipped her tea. “It’s nice to havesomeonewho appreciates my beetles and butterflies. You see, I told you it is always a good idea to bring one’s collection of treasures, regardless of how long one might be staying.”
It had been a point of contention that morning when Miss Sutton had announced that the carriage was waiting for them. All three had been forced to pack their belongings in a hurry, not knowing what they might need for the week—or longer, possibly, in Grace’s case.
Maddie had insisted on bringing her array of creatures, “in case I have nothing else to amuse me,” while Grace had tried to convince her that her collection would be better left at the school. Now, she was very grateful that her friend had been right all along. The beetles, insects, and butterflies had utterly delightedEllie.
“TheVanessa… at… ata…Atalantais me favorite,” the girl said, stumbling over the name.
Maddie smiled. “The Red Admiral. A fine choice. Though I shall always have the greatest fondness for the Cabbage White.”
“Audrey never showed me butterflies,” the little girl murmured, staring down into the vivid red of her tea.
Grace sat forward in her chair—another acquisition from the servants, along with a round table for drawing and tea parties—and felt the air in the room change. It had suddenly taken on a confessional quality, as if a tentative trust had finally been brokered between the ladies and the child.
“Who is Audrey?” she prompted.
Ellie shrugged. “My nursemaid. She fed me. Played sometimes.”
“She didn’t come here with you?”
“Faither asked her,” Ellie replied solemnly. “She didnae want to.”
Grace glanced at Maddie, who gave a nod of encouragement. “And what about your family? Didn’t they play with you or show you the butterflies? I heard you were at your grandfather’s castle for a while. Didn’t he tell you stories or walk with you or teach you games?”
Ellie shook her head. “It was the same as here.” She paused, looking up with a smile that warmed Grace’s heart. “‘Til ye came, I mean. Nay one played. It was just me and Audrey in the tower.”
In the tower? So, she mustn’t have gone outside much…
“So, you didn’t know your grandfather very well?” Grace asked delicately, filled with such pity for the girl that it took everyounce of restraint she had not to scoop Ellie into her arms and hold her until the past saw fit to change itself.
The girl sipped her tea, copying Maddie by sticking her little finger out. “Dinnae ken him. Just stories. Seen him twice, I think. Saw an old man that someone said was me grandfaither, anyway.”
You were at your grandfather’s castle for years,and you only saw him twice?
For a moment, Grace felt like she had swallowed a lump of chalk that was now stuck in her throat. She had thought her own upbringing was harsh, but compared to Ellie’s, it was practically paradise.
“What stories were you told? I should very much like to hear you tell a story. I imagine you’d be very good at telling them,” Grace said, for there was no better way to get anyone to speak than to ask them for a story.
And though the girl was very young, she had shown a surprisingly developed vocabulary and eloquence.
Reaching for another scone, Ellie tilted her head to the side, considering the suggestion. “I haveonestory,” she said, a moment later. “It’s about?—”
The loud clearing of a throat drew everyone’s attention to the chamber door. The sound was too masculine, too commanding to belong to any of them.
Hunter stood just outside the door, not putting a foot over the threshold. And one look at his cold eyes, narrowed as they were, told Grace that she was in rather a lot of trouble.
“A moment, Lady Grace,” he said, his tone matching the look in his eyes.
He turned without another word, the expectation clear: she was to follow and face his wrath in private.
