Page 47 of The Secret Life of the Elusive Governess
It unsettled her stomach to know that her efforts to get rid of this pesky woman Robins had been foiled. Lavinia hated the governess for showing her up, despised Moses for playing an avenging knight, and sporadically, even herself for allowing her jealousy to take her over.
What do I have to lose?Lavinia sighed as she wrapped a thick shawl around herself.Moses can have his amusement but he is dedicated to me. I am his wife and he swore his fidelity to me. I may not have his love but I do have his assurance.
Dropping the novel that she had read over three times, she stood up and crossed the room to the large window that gave her a wonderful overlook of the gardens. It was drawing to dusk, and the ether between day and night felt mystical.
She was tired, so very tired, but what could she do? She was a Duchess, admittedly, with two children she did not know all that well, and a husband who barely recognized her. Lavinia knew why she was invisible to Moses—her attitude towards him and everyone around her was dastardly. Her anger, surliness, and penchant to be uncaringly abrasive had stemmed from an inside pain, one Moses knew nothing about, but her pain had to come out some way.
Bracing her hands on the window sill, Lavinia looked out and saw a picture that angered her soul. Moses was there and beside him was the governess. They had a respectable distance between them as they walked on the cobblestone path but she knew there was a different sort of closeness between them.
Her jaw clenched tightly as Moses plucked a flower from a bush and handed it to the Robins woman with a look Lavinia could only liken to a young lad under the weight of infatuation. Turning away, her stomach churned while her heart hardened.
Plunking herself back on her chaise-lounge, Lavinia sneered and waited for him to come upstairs. Grabbing the book back upon her lap, she allowed her eyes to run over the words without reading them. She knew the story in and out and it was a torrid one.
Sadly, it was one she connected with on an emotional level. It was a haunting tale of a moody, cynical man with a merciless need for revenge on the scourge who had stolen his true love away. The female, his lover, was locked up in the captor’s graveyard citadel while physicians and mystics tried many ways to bend her mind to love her captor. In the end, the woman had broken free and thrown herself off a cliff.
What a pathetic woman.
Logically, Lavinia could understand the woman’s position and the motive behind the sacrifice. The woman had been broken beyond repair and was trapped in a hopeless situation. It felt natural to just end the suffering once and for all, as there was no expectation that she would love her first lover again in the same way she had from before her captivity. What Lavinia disagreed with, however, was her cowardly way of fixing the situation.
“That novel must be enrapturing as I have seen you read it over three times,” Moses’ even tone lanced through her musing.
“Actually,” Lavinia said idly, while keeping her head down, and turning a page, “It really is not that interesting. Well, not as much as you giving the governess a rose, I might say.”
The startled silence told her that she had shocked him and Lavinia looked up, trying to keep the satisfied smile on her face and only arched an eyebrow. Sadly, Moses’ back was turned to her and her smile dropped like a piece of rotten fruit.
Curses! Why can he not give me the upper hand even once?
“Nothing untoward happened, Lavinia,” Moses’ tone was weary.
Lavinia huffed, “But why arose,Moses and why didyouhave to pick it? The last I recall, she has fingers.”
“I was the closest to the bush, Lavinia,” the Duke replied, now sounding decidedly exasperated while rooting in a drawer. “Please do not tell me you are making a Cheltenham Tragedy out of this.”
“Did you see the look on your face when you gave that flower to your chère amie?” Lavinia spat. “Because I did. You have the look of a boy of four-and-ten, Moses, mooning with doe-eyes.”
The drawer slammed shut. “She is not my mistress, Lavinia. We happened to meet in the garden and she noted a desire to etch out the points for a rose so Josephine could trace it over. Those torrid novels are addling your mind to see something that is not there.”
Lavinia stood quickly and tightened the shawl, “Admit it, Moses. You cannot tell me that she is not more to you than a governess.”
She was met with narrowed green eyes, “If you are insinuating that I have broken my vow of fidelity—”
“Have you?”
A ringing silence felt more deafening than a ringing gong.
“Lavinia, I thought you were over these tiresome spates of jealousy.” Moses' voice had dipped to a disappointed tone which sparked a dejected feeling inside her.
After staring at him, with unformed words running through her mind, Lavinia found that she could not find anything to say to him. Clenching her jaw, she just spun around and went back to her thrice-read book.
“Apparently, I was wrong,” Moses sighed, and finding what he had come for, left the room.
* * *
Russ House, the Baron of Rowe’s Residence
Albion Russ, the Baron of Rowe, was about to bite into a sliver of his choice cut of beef when his butler knocked on the door of his study.
“Enter,” he called idly while removing his napkin from his table to his lap and sticking his fork into his mouth.
