Page 68 of The Heiress in Disguise
“I wish I knew how to help you,” he said. It was the truest thing he had ever said in the guise of Philip. He wanted desperately to help her. He desired nothing more.
She smiled. “It’s all right,” she assured him. “It’s just life, isn’t it? The life of a servant is a perilous and fraught one, and I’m sure you know that as well as I.”
He shook his head. “It’s not the same for me,” he said. “The earl treats me very well. My life doesn’t feel perilous at all, and yours shouldn’t either. You should be able to trust the people who are supposed to care for you.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Supposed to care for me? That’s a funny way to put it.”
He could have bitten his own tongue. That had been a slip. He didn’t officially know who she was, so he couldn’t pretend to know that the family she served had a duty of care to her. He had made a mistake and she had cleverly seized upon it.
Now he had to backtrack. “I just think it’s important for lords and ladies to care for those who serve them,” he said. “Lord Cambridge has always had my best interests in mind, and your own family ought to do the same.”
Your own family—that was another mistake, another thing he ought not to have said, but this time, he was lucky, for she just seemed to interpret it as him referring to the family she served. She smiled. “I like your way of looking at the world, Philip,” she said. “I always have. Please don’t worry about me. I do have friends who will look out for me. I’m not alone as long as I’m in this house.”
And if you had gone to France, you would have been alone. If nothing else, Lord Leicester’s documents should contain enough financial information to prove that he had never sent his niece to France. Perhaps that was what he needed to try to find. With that information on record, maybe he would finally have the slippery Leicesters cornered.
“Why haven’t you been getting along with Jane?” he asked, hating to think of her losing a friend for any reason.
She sighed. “It’s complicated, but the short of it is that I’ve been receiving mysterious gifts from… someone. I don’t know who; someone claiming to be a fairy godmother. Jane has found out about the gifts, and I think they’ve made her jealous. I believe she’s stolen a few things from me. I’m not angry with her—I was happy to share—but the dishonesty has driven a bit of a wedge between the two of us.”
“Oh no,” Antoine said, feeling immediate remorse, for of course the fairy godmother gifts had come from him. “That’s terrible—that something intended to be a kindness could have turned so sour. I’m so very sorry.”
“You don’t have to apologize,” she said, clearly mystified. “It’s not your fault. You had nothing to do with any of it.”
“You’re right, of course,” he fibbed. “But even so, I’m sorry to hear that it happened. I hope the two of you will be able to reconcile.”
“I’m sure we will, given time,” Angelique said. “She’s been my friend for many years. It’s hard to imagine that ending for good over something like this. I just wish she would be honest with me. If she would tell me the truth about having stolen from me, at least I could understand the rest of it. I just hate that she lied to me.”
Antoine took her hand. “Our friend in the mask wishes to see you tonight. What shall I tell him?”
“You may tell him that I’ll be free at nine o’clock,” she said. “And thank you.”
He felt warm, knowing that he would see her again tonight—and strange, knowing that she was expecting another man. For the first time, Antoine found himself wondering which of them—which ofhim—she preferred.
He wasn’t jealous. It would be mad to be jealous of himself.
But he wished fervently that he could drop the pretense, that he could simply be his true self with Angelique, instead of always dividing himself in two.
Chapter 31
Jane crept along the path through the woods, following Philip back toward Lord Cambridge’s house. When he and Ella had parted company, she had been seized by the urge to know where he would go next.
She’d eavesdropped on their conversation, as Lady Gwyneth had suggested, and she thought there had definitely been something odd about it. Why was he asking questions about Ella’s parents? And why did he want to know who her friends were? Such personal questions. What was he going to do with that information?
And Jane wasn’t exactly fond of the way Ella had spoken about her either. Accusing her of stealing to this stranger? The fact that shehadstolen was hardly a thought in her mind at all anymore—the point was that Ella shouldn’t have spoken about it to someone outside the family.
She had betrayed Jane by doing that, and that meant Jane no longer needed to feel guilty about having betrayed her. Clearly, Ella had never been worthy of Jane’s loyalty. She had never deserved Jane’s friendship.
Well, that was fine. Jane would now be only too happy to report her to Lady Gwyneth for the things she had been doing. This made the choice an easy one. And as she followed Philip, she was filled with a sort of righteous anger.
It was justice that she was pursuing here, really. She was right to want to stop Philip, because whatever he was doing, it was clear that it was going to be an action against the family Jane served. She couldn’t let that happen. She had a duty here.
Philip reached Lord Cambridge’s property and ducked into the stables. Jane frowned. What was he going in there for? She crept around the side of the building and stood on her toes so that she could peer in the window.
Philip looked around furtively, as if he didn’t want to be seen. Jane tensed. What was he up to? What was he about to reveal?
He reached into a bag. At first, Jane thought it was a feed bag, and she was even more confused. What was he doing?
He pulled something out. Not feed. Something much larger. She tilted her head, trying to see—
