Page 70 of The Precious Secret of a Loving Governess
But as much as he tried to use Marian as the excuse, it was only a portion of his reasoning for desiring that she remain.
Yes, he had known for quite some time how he felt about Miss Jamison, but he was not a man to easily fail his commitments. Reginald had made a decision to marry Miss Ingles and he would hold to that even if it had not been his first choice in matters. Even if she was not the woman he longed to be with.
But all of that was the past now. And he was free to move on and be happy and make the choices he had long since desired to make.
Waiting in the parlour for a few moments seemed an eternity. The large clock ticked away the seconds that felt like hours until Miss Jamison softly made her way through the door and into the room.
“Miss Jamison,” he sighed, unable to keep the smile from his face.
“My lord, what is it you need of me?” she asked, as though she were a servant awaiting instructions. Standing with a straight back and hands together, she was the image of propriety in a household.
“I wish that you would sit,” he grinned.
Miss Jamison did not appear amused, but did as instructed and took her place across from him. From here, he looked at her intently, trying to decipher something underneath the face that he could not read in that moment.
She was hiding whatever thoughts were truly within her mind and she was doing it rather well. He wished that she would, just for the briefest of moments, allow him to see what was underneath that exterior.
But Miss Jamison was stronger than her emotions and she was able to hold them in check when she truly wanted to. No, he would have to find another way to learn what she was thinking. And that would not be easy, but it would start with the truth.
“Thank you. I am glad that we shall have a few moments together,” he said, still trying to rein in his excitement. But Reginald knew that it would burst at any moment.
“Miss Jamison, I could not bear to wait until the morning to share with you the changes which have occurred in these last few days,” he began.
Her exquisite face remained unmoved, as if she had been numbed by her own experiences of the previous days. No matter how desperate he was to jump into sharing his own story with her, Reginald felt that he had to pause, restrain himself, and give her a chance to share if anything was amiss.
“Are you alright, Miss Jamison?” he asked in concern.
“Yes, my lord. It has not been easy with Miss Marian the past few days as she knows of my departure, but that is all,” she told him in a flat voice.
He sensed that things must have been very difficult but that the governess was unlikely to tell him much of anything regarding the matter. And he reminded himself that if this was a part of the problem then he was very soon to solve it.
“Well then, I am sorry that it has been difficult. But I wish to tell you that everything will soon be made right,” he promised.
“I do not understand,” she replied in a static tone.
“Yes, and I am sorry for that. Now, if you will allow me to speak freely, I think I can no longer bear to hold myself back from all that I wish to say to you,” Reginald confessed.
“Then you may proceed,” she permitted in that same, proper and flat tone that he expected was merely an attempt to refrain from showing her own emotions.
“My dear Miss Jamison, I know your secret. Or rather, I know the secret that you have been keeping,” he told her.
Miss Jamison’s face fell, concern swarming the surface of it.
“But we shall get to that in a moment. What I truly wish for you to be aware of before anything else is what has come about as a result of that,” he began.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Lady Ingles and Mr. Smith, her dear friend and mine, as we both know, have been in love for some time. And now…now that has all been made right,” he said.
This was the part that Reginald had wanted to tell her, but it was not the greatest piece of the puzzle which they were to put together.
He stood from his place on the sofa and came towards Miss Jamison. Kneeling before her, he took her hands in his own from his place on the floor and looked up at her.
It was evident that she felt near to terror that this moment was taking place. He wondered if she was simply amazed that an Earl would kneel down before her or if there was something deeper, but he could see that she was awash with emotion.
Was she going to pull her hands away? Or would she listen to what he wanted to tell her?
Reginald could not help himself as he gazed upon her. With the back of his hand, which he pulled from hers, he gently stroked her cheek.
