Page 58 of Beyond Scandal and Desire
“He needs help,” she said quietly, feeling impotent with her lack of knowledge.
“I’ll see to it.”
“You shouldn’t have to. He’s not your responsibility.”
“But he’s traipsing about in my world now, and I know how to set matters to rights. You needn’t worry. No harm will come to him.”
And she believed him. With all her heart and soul. “How fortunate I am that you happened upon me and have brought me some cheer.”
“It wasn’t happenstance. I was looking for you.” Because he knew about her daily afternoon visits to the park. “Fancy is taking a group of orphans to the seaside tomorrow. I thought you might like to join her. I know it would please her to have your company.”
“Are they taking your carriage? It’ll make for a long day.”
“No, we’ll be traveling by railway.”
Her heart gave a little lurch at the mode of transportation and the fact that it wasn’t only his sister who would be on the journey, that he was doing more than asking her to join Fancy. He was asking her to join him. “I’ve told you—I fear trains. They’re too dangerous. There were more than a half dozen accidents last year alone.”
“We can’t live our life based on what scares us. If we did, we’d spend our days curled up into little balls, whimpering.”
“I can’t imagine you being afraid or whimpering.” She didn’t want to think of him as a child, frightened and crying, his young life fraught with challenges.
“Everyone has fears. The secret is not to let them take hold.”
And she’d done that with trains, allowed them to sink their claws into her, terrorize her with their noise, their speed, their ability to destroy lives in mere seconds.
He leaned toward her, still not touching the blanket, still revealing his respect for their boundaries, acknowledging she had not moved into his world. Yet she suddenly found she longed to. “Conquer your fear of trains,” he urged quietly, almost desperately. “When you subdue your anxieties, nothing, no one, will have the power to hold you back.”
She had the sense he was referring to something else entirely, something that would lead to her standing before a rippling pond with a man’s arm around her. She nodded, thought better of it. “The servants would be tagging along.”
“They’re welcome to. I’m certain Fancy can use the extra help with the orphans.”
His words confirmed that this wasn’t an opportunity for him to get her alone, even if she halfway wished it was. “I look forward to it.”
Lounging in his mother’s parlor while she prepared dinner, he contemplated his visit with Aslyn earlier. He was not one for creating fairy tales, for waxing on poetically about love or happily-ever-afters, so he had no inkling where his fantastical story about the parasol-less couple had come from or what had spurred him to spout such drivel when he was a man dedicated to accepting the harshness of reality. Yet sitting there on the grassy knoll with her had apparently served to seize his common sense.
Hence the sickening spouting.
Then she had smiled, sweetly, softly and a bit crookedly, and he’d been glad for the trite tale he’d woven for her, had wished his imagination were such that he could have woven another. Instead, he’d come up with fanciful plans for the morrow to explain his reason for seeking her out at the park—when his true reason had been that he’d simply needed to see her again, inhale her fragrance of gardenia.
The fact that he’d considered it a loss when his own bath had removed her scent from his skin irritated him. He’d very nearly gone into mourning when he’d realized her fragrance had not lingered in his carriage as he’d assumed it would. He’d come close to dismissing his coachman for opening the door in order to air out the conveyance. It hadn’t needed airing out. It had carried the fragrance of gardenias, a flower that Tittlefitz was having a devil of a time finding.
“How many orphans were you thinking?” Fancy asked him now, studying him as though he’d asked her to fly to the moon.
He shrugged. “Half a dozen or so. Young enough that they won’t be rebellious, striking out on their own. We want them sticking close. I have no plans to go chasing after any of them as I did the last time we took some to the seaside.” He’d be otherwise occupied this time.
“The difficulty will be deciding who to bring on such short notice. Rather bad planning that.”
“Surely there are some who should be rewarded for good behavior.”
“I suppose. I’ll talk with the matron.”
“Good.” He started to rise—
“And Lady Aslyn is joining us.” Unnecessarily repeating words he’d used only a few minutes earlier, she informed him with her tone that she was stepping onto a path of inquiry.
He settled back down. “Yes. However, should she ask, it was your idea to invite her.”
“Odd how I keep finding my way into your little scheme.” She gave him a pointed look.
