Page 53 of The Heiress in Disguise
He wanted to put her at ease. “I wanted to see you again too, Lady Angelique.”
He thought she might protest again, order him not to call her by the name he knew was rightly hers, but she didn’t. Instead, she sat down on the edge of a nearby log. Antoine took a seat at the opposite end of the log, wanting to be near her but not wishing to make her any more uncomfortable than she already was. A respectful distance seemed to be called for.
“I wish I knew how you know so much about me,” she said quietly.
“Would it make you feel better if I told you that all will be revealed in time?”
“I’m not sure I can believe you,” she said.
“I’ve never lied to you, Lady Angelique.”
“But that’s what you would say if you had lied to me,” she pointed out. “Liars and honest men sound exactly the same most of the time. I can’t believe that you’ve dealt with me honestly just because you tell me you have.”
“I suppose that’s true,” he agreed. “I’ll just have to prove it to you over time.”
“We have no time,” she said. “This may be the last time we’ll ever see one another. I’ll be leaving the city soon enough, and it’s not as if we can continue to sneak into the woods for clandestine meetings. I’m a servant. I have responsibilities.”
She held up a hand, anticipating his next comment. “I know that you’ll say I’m not a servant,” she said. “But we can agree that I have the life and the duties of one, surely? I’m not free to come and go as I wish. It was difficult enough for me to slip away to meet you today.”
“Will you be in trouble?” he asked her. That wasn’t what he wanted.
“Not if I don’t get caught.”
“And if you are caught?”
“Some things are worth getting into trouble for,” she said.
“If you think you need to go back to the house to avoid trouble, you should do that,” he said. “The last thing I want is to create additional problems for you, Lady Angelique.”
“I’ve made my decision to be here,” she said. “There’s nothing to be gained by second-guessing it now. What you can do for me is tell me who you are and how you come to know so much about me and about my life.”
“In good time,” he said. “For now, I’d like to ask you some questions, if I might.”
“Haven’t you asked enough questions?”
“No,” he told her seriously. “I still don’t have all the answers I need.”
“And I don’t have any answers at all.”
“If you answer my questions—”
She shook her head and held up a hand. “Don’t tell me that you’ll give me answers if I give them to you first. You’ve already shown me that that isn’t the case.”
“Please be patient with me,” he said. “Trust me.”
“I can’t trust you. I don’t know you.”
“I’m asking you to try anyway,” he said. “I know I’m asking a lot of you, Lady Angelique. But I promise you, if you answer my questions, yourswillbe answered in time. I can’t tell you everything right now, and I’m asking you to believe that I have a good reason for that. I do, I promise you. Until I have answers, I have to keep my secrets, for both our sakes. But if you can trust me just a little bit, if you can help me discover the things I need to know, I promise you that it will serve us both.”
He wished that he could tell her more—that he could confess the reason he was so anxious to learn more about her and about her history. She might find it easier to trust him if she knew. But he didn’t dare tell her that he was trying to secure her freedom from her current situation. If he failed, it would be wrong to get her hopes up.
He wouldn’t have blamed her if she’d turned and walked away. He knew how much he was asking, trying to get her to open up to him without knowing why.
But she took a deep breath and nodded. “What is it you want to know?”
“How did this happen to you?” he asked. “We both acknowledge that youareLady Angelique, though I could see that it troubled you to admit to it. How is it that you come to be posing as a servant, and under a false name?”
“It hardly feels like a false name some days,” she said. “I’ve been Ella so long that it feels almost truer than Lady Angelique. I suppose that’s why I didn’t like you using that name. It feels so personal, like a reminder of something I try hard not to think about.”
