Page 66 of Their Master

“And likely his daughters, too,” Smith added.

Everyone chuckled.

“You three are terrible,” Nora scolded. “Gideon is a lovely name and it suits the boy.”

“It’s a perfectly fine name,” Edward said with some exasperation, “but it leads to confusion when there are two Gideons in the room.”

“Especially when both of them act like infants,” Smith said.

The others chortled, even Nora, although she gave Smith a chiding look. “You shouldn’t be so awful to poor Gideon.”

“You see how she defends him?” Edward demanded. “Truly, Gideon can no wrong in the eyes of any woman, even an intelligent one like my wife.”

“How are you enjoying fatherhood thus far, Edward?” Smith asked, wisely changing the subject.

Edward exchanged a quick look with his wife, so much love passing between them that it gave Moira a sharp pang of envy.

“Amelia is a handful,” he admitted. “The nurse we engaged said two years is often called the terrible twos.”

“Which can then become the terrible threes,” Nora added.

They all laughed.

“She is a bundle of energy and into everything,” Edward said proudly.

“I’m just relieved that she doesn’t cry or have nightmares. She lost her parents five months ago,” Nora explained, looking from Moira to Josephine. “They both died in a carriage accident. Fortunately, Amelia wasn’t with them.”

“Where has she been living since that time?” Josephine asked.

Moira felt Smith’s body jolt slightly at the sound of the other woman’s voice.

When she turned to him, she was astonished to see that his cheeks bore evidence of a slight blush.

He met her curious look with a bland smile, but Moira was not fooled. For a man who showed almost nothing of what he was feeling, a slight tensing and faint blush were the equivalent of shouting out emotions from anyone else.

Moira suspected he still bore deep feelings for his former valet.

She studied Josephine from beneath her lashes, fascinated by this woman who had attracted the attention—and love, apparently—of two wealthy and powerful men.

She was slender to the point of gauntness and possessed features that were, at best, average. The most arresting thing about her was her thick spectacles, which grossly magnified her slate gray eyes.

Moira knew the simple but elegant brown chignon must be a wig since Leather still served as Chatham’s valet.

Her brother Robert—who’d been a reserved and difficult man to know, himself—had been intrigued by the enigmatic woman.

“I tell you, Moira, when Leather is dressed in her black suit you would never guess that she is a woman,” he’d marveled. “She valets Chatham during the day and then warms his bed at night, just as she did for Smith during those few months that she lived with him.”

A light touch on Moira’s shoulder made her look up.

“Where did you go?” Smith asked softly. “You looked miles away.”

“I’m just enjoying being out,” she said, realizing after she’d said it that she meant it.

His hand slid up her thigh and Moira glanced around at the others.

“None of them can see what I’m doing,” he said, cupping her mound. He stroked a finger between her lips, the fine fabric of her chemise snagging on the bristly hairs of her sex, making her squirm.

Moira shifted in her seat, wishing that Smith had allowed her regular shaving that day.

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