True Story (The Deverells, Book One) (11 page)

"You are a girl with a
dark and devious imagination, Olivia Westcott. I cannot think what
will become of you."

"I shall marry Mr. True
Deverell, shan't I? People say he's not fit for polite society
either..."

"I see something through my window
amuses you, Mrs. Monday."

She straightened her lips. "Your son
returns to school today, sir?" she asked, changing the
subject.

"Yes." He sighed gustily. "The brat
could do very well there if he only applied himself more to his
studies. But he thinks he can do without school. Arrogant
chit."

"He seems very...confident. I'm sure
you and your wife are proud."

Behind her, Deverell exhaled a taut
huff. "He's not one of my wife's litter. Damon is the younger of my
two sons by a mistress, Emma Gibson. When she died I brought both
boys to live with me."

"Oh." Only a man with Deverell's
excessive wealth and audacity would launch his illegitimate
children into the world without even trying to mask the truth,
without shame or apology for not marrying their mother.

She turned away from the window and
faced him boldly. "It is a curious name— Damon. I do not think I
ever heard it before."

"Greek. Loyal friend to Pythias, for
whom he was ready to sacrifice himself."

"You are a student of Greek mythology,
Mr. Deverell?"

He smiled at her, head tipped back
against the leather chair. "I am a student of life, Mrs.
Monday."

"Life?"

"Stories. I love people's stories.
Don't you?"

His smile was pleasantly crooked.
Olivia could see how some might find it alluring. Even infectious.
"I never really considered—"

"For instance,
yours
, Mrs. Monday." His
eyes simmered, like cool winter sunlight on ripples of icy water.
"I would wager it's most interesting."

"Why?"

"A young, sensible woman like you,
abandoning respectability to put yourself under my roof. What could
have driven you here to me? What secrets lurk behind those big,
round eyes of yours?"

"Oh, my story is very dull." She
touched the back of her neck where a small curl of hair had begun
to tickle. Her skin seemed more awake than usual, feeling and
reacting to every tiny draft, any little contact.

"Well, let's
see...
Olivia
," he
muttered thoughtfully. "I like unusual names. I made sure to give
all my children names that were uncommon, unexpected." He paused.
"The name Olivia was first coined by Shakespeare, you know. Your
parents must have enjoyed the playwright's work."

"Perhaps." Not likely her father, she
thought; he always kept his nose buried in work and never read
anything for entertainment. Her mother, however, possessed a more
sentimental soul. Her parents’ marriage had been a love match, so
Olivia was told— her maternal grandmother had been so angered by it
that she'd cut her daughter out of her will and refused to see her
again. But despite the romance of all that, Olivia's parents never
showed much affection in front of her. It wouldn't be proper, of
course, and it would embarrass her father. Love was signified by a
gentle pat on the hand or the shoulder, and never in front of
company.

She walked away from the window and
stood before Deverell's desk, trying not to see his boots and long,
firm thighs stretched out. He smelled of leather, hay, sea water
and wet sand. Had he been out riding already? She waited for him to
invite her to sit, but no such offer was forthcoming. He continued
to stare at her in a quietly amused way, now tapping the riding
crop on the outside of his boot.

Before he could ask her another
question, she said brightly, "Damon is your youngest
child?"

"No. Rush is fourteen and the last of
Lady Charlotte's litter." To her relief, he finally swung his feet
down to the carpet where they should be. "There is also Bryn, my
adopted son who also just turned fourteen. They are both at school
together in Exeter. I thought it best not to send all my boys to
the same schools, but those two are inseparable. You will meet them
in the term holidays." He paused. "Should you stay, of
course."

Olivia refused to reassure him, yet
again, that she honored her commitments. Instead she said, "And
there is only one daughter?"

"Yes." He looked away, staring at the
bookcase. "Bloody women."

She took a breath and plowed bravely
forward. "Shall we get started, Mr. Deverell? My term of employment
has begun already, and we haven't written a word."

His gaze snapped back to her. "We
can't begin work until we know each other, Mrs. Monday."

"Know each other?"

"We need to...sniff one another
out."

She did not. Like. The sound. Of
that.

"Would you agree to embark on a long,
intimate journey with someone about whom you knew nothing?" he
added, making his face solemn in an utterly unconvincing
way.

"I'm not sure what sort of intimate
journey you—"

"The journey of my life story, Mrs.
Monday. I will be confessing all my deepest, darkest sins to you,
commending my secrets to your hands. But how do I know I can trust
you, since you keep hiding your fingers from me?"

She gasped. "I do not."

He pointed with the riding crop to
where she kept her hands tightly clasped in a knot before her.
"Show me."

Olivia slowly unwound her fingers and
slyly wiped her palms on her skirt before she turned them for his
examination. He leaned forward, his gaze sternly perusing her
hands.

"I am adept at the art of palmistry,
you know," he warned.

"I do not believe in that
nonsense."

"Then you needn't be worried. Keep
your hands still, woman, and let me study the lines."

"They
are
still."

"You're waving them about all over the
place." He used this as an excuse to grab her left hand, and Olivia
felt her pulse quicken. His grip was very strong, crushing her
fingers.

She tried— she really tried. But it
was no good. Unable to bear his scrutiny, which felt twice as
fierce as Inspector O'Grady's, she pulled her fingers away from his
grip and put both hands behind her back.

"Mrs. Monday, you are being truculent
again."

"I am not, sir," she exclaimed
breathlessly. "I gave you long enough to study them. They are quite
innocent and capable."

"Hmm. The former, I have
yet to ascertain. The latter I will agree with, although
what
exactly they are
capable of remains to be seen." He grinned in that lopsided way. "I
confess I can't wait to discover it for myself."

He was testing her, she sensed. Trying
his boundaries.

"You had better behave, sir, or you
just might find out."

She knew she should never have said
it, but there it was. He drew out the worst in her, it
seemed.

Rather than be put off by this remark,
his eyes gleamed polished silver. "Shall I be spanked and sent to a
corner?"

"If that's necessary, sir."

"You'd have to catch me first. I'm
very fast."

Olivia arched an eyebrow. Perhaps,
despite his love of tales, he'd never heard the fable of the
tortoise and the hare.

"But only when I don't want to be
caught," he added slyly.

"I'll bear that in mind then,
sir."

He fell back into his chair, making it
creak loudly. "Shakespeare's Olivia, if I recall correctly,
declares herself in mourning for seven years— until she falls
stupidly in love with Cesario, simply because he has a habit of
saying exactly what he thinks, not coating his words with honey for
the lady."

"Oh?"

"But it turns out that Cesario is a
woman living in disguise as a man. So there is a lesson for you,
Mrs. Monday."

"Never to fall in love with a woman
dressed as a man?"

He laughed. "Or...first impressions
can be misleading. People are not always what they appear to be,
or... what they want you to believe."

Olivia suddenly felt as if he had
somehow stripped her naked with the sharp edge of his steel-grey
gaze.

It was, by no means, as unpleasant a
sensation as it should be, but every pore on her body felt the
wicked caress of that blade, whispering over the surface of her
skin.

Chapter Eight

There were few things
worse than an itch one couldn't scratch. This particular itch was
moving around his limbs like an adventurous flea, but he sensed it
was not caused by a tiny insect. He was fine, not a disturbance
anywhere on his person, before
she
came in.

He eyed Mrs. Monday cautiously,
wondering what part of her might be causing this reaction. She wore
another day gown of dreary grey. It could be the same as she wore
yesterday, for there was nothing distinctive about this one; it was
equally dismal, a shade only slightly lighter than wet
mud.

He imagined how she would look in
blue. It would bring out the rich brown of her eyes, which were
actually quite pretty, he supposed. When they weren't being
scornful.

This morning she remained a mystery,
gripping her secrets with determined fingers, but he would trick
them out of her hands somehow.

Still young enough to remarry and not
completely unattractive in daylight— well, it would help if she
unpursed her lips and loosened her poor hair from its
tightly-wound, unforgiving knot— she'd severely endangered her
reputation by agreeing to live under his roof for half a year. That
would lessen her chances of finding another suitor. Did she
understand the consequences? She must; she clearly was not
stupid.

Yes, now that he was over the shock of
finding her in his kitchen last night— a woman quite different to
what he had expected— he could admit she was not so very
plain.

Damn that drunken sot, Abraham Chalke,
for sending such an unsuitable woman. Fellow must once again be
downing four bottles of Madeira daily.

Since Mrs. Monday had enjoyed a full
night's sleep, he ought to send her packing and put her on the next
coach back to civilization for her own good. She may as well go
safely back inland with his son today. He could give her the money
he'd promised, even slip a little extra into her trunk for the
inconvenience. When she wasn't looking, of course, because she was
clearly the self-suffering, dignified sort who wouldn't take
charity, and then he—

"I'll need paper," she said
suddenly.

"Paper?"

"To write. As your secretary. The
position for which you hired me, sir."

Apparently she thought she was staying
and saw no issue with this chafing of their personalities. Now
would be the time to tell her to pack her trunk, but instead he
said, "Paper? Really?"

"To write."

"Ah."

"And ink."

"Ink? Good lord."

She exhaled a soft sigh. "And a pen,
sir."

"Did you not bring these strange,
otherworldly materials with you, Mrs. Monday?"

"No. I assumed—"

"This is why women should not venture
into employment outside the home. They're not thinkers. I suppose
you packed your frilly petticoats and hair brushes, but entirely
forgot the tools of the trade for which you were hired."

The woman unclenched her lips to
exclaim, "I have some personal writing materials, which might be
used until you can provide me with others."

"Sakes no, Mrs. Monday! I would not
purloin your personal things for my own use."

"Then what do you
suggest—?"

He pointed with his riding crop, and
she looked over her shoulder to the small painted bureau by the
wall. "I believe you'll find everything you need within
it."

She glared at him, her slender brows
drawn together like two pulled stitches. "Would it not have been
simpler to tell me that from the start?"

"But not nearly so much
fun."

Sims appeared in the open doorway,
looking annoyed. "Breakfast is finally served, sir."

True leapt to his feet. "Aha! Very
good. I'm famished. What about you, Mrs. Monday? Of course, you
stayed under the covers enjoying my hospitality like a lazy
slug-a-bed this morning, until long after the lark had gone about
his business. You have had no chance to work up an appetite yet, I
suppose."

She hesitated, half way between his
desk and the bureau, her countenance trying to stay vexed with him,
but the lure of food on the horizon apparently caused her quite a
challenge. The creature certainly looked in need of a good meal
before he sent her back to Chiswick. If he told her now that her
services weren't required she'd probably go off — alone and in a
prim huff —to the mainland, looking for the next mail coach. Who
knew when she'd have the opportunity to eat well again? No, he
wouldn't let her run off unescorted or unfed. Or unpaid.