“I apologize.”
He was saved from saying more by the arrival of tea, along with scones and clotted cream and a pile of cakes that surprised even Duncan. But perhaps the most rewarding part of the tea service was the way that Caroline came to the edge of her seat, considering the sweets with wide eyes befitting her age. She was unsettlingly beyond her years most of the time—a younger, more forthright version of her mother—but right now, the nine-year-old wanted cake.
And that was something that Duncan could manage. “Help yourself,” he said as Baker set a pile of letters on the desk and took his leave.
Caroline immediately went for a fondant-covered oval at the top of the pile and had it halfway to her mouth when she froze, looked at him, and said, “I am supposed to pour.”
He waved her on. “I don’t need tea.”
She did not care for that answer. “No. I’m supposed to pour.”
With great control, she set her cake on a plate and stood to lift the heavy teapot, pouring steaming liquid into one of the cups. When it was full, she said, “Milk? Sugar?”
He shook his head. “As it is.” It was bad enough he was going to have to force down a cup of the stuff, but the girl seemed so proud of herself as she offered him the teacup, rattling in its saucer, that he did as any decent man would do, and drank the damn tea.
“Cake?” she asked, and he heard the yearning in her young voice.
“No, thank you. Please, sit.”
She did. He did not miss the fact that she did not pour a cup for herself. “You don’t want tea?”
Her mouth was full of sweets, so she shook her head, swallowing before saying, “I don’t like it.”
“You asked for it.”
That shoulder lifted again. “You offered. It would have been rude to say no. That, and I hoped there would be cake.”
It was precisely the kind of thing Georgiana would say. Mother and daughter might not have spent the lion’s share of the years together, but there was no question that they were connected—clever, quick-witted, and with a smile that would win over an army.
She would no doubt be exceedingly dangerous when she came of age.
“What can I do for you, Miss Pearson?”
“I came to ask you to stop helping to get my mother married.”
It appeared she was exceedingly dangerous now.
He resisted the urge to lean forward. “What makes you think I am doing that?”
“The columns,” she said pointedly. “Today’s was the best yet.”
Of course it was. It was the one he’d written after the night in his swimming pool, when he’d hated and adored her all at once.
“It made her seem positively respectable,” Caroline added.
He blinked. “She is respectable.” He ignored the fact that he’d made love to the woman in question not an hour earlier.
She met his eyes, all seriousness. “You are aware that I am a bastard, are you not?”
Good Lord. The child was as brazen as her mother. She shouldn’t even know the damn word.
But she reminded him too much of another girl, another time.
The same word, whispered as he walked past with his mother. His sister.
“I never want to hear you say that word again.”
“Why not?” she asked. “It’s what I am. Others use it.”
“They won’t once your mother and I are through with them.”
“They will,” she replied. “They just won’t do it to my face.”
She was too wise, this girl. Knew too much about the world. And he—who had only known her for a week—hated that she had no choice but to know it. That her life had always been embroiled in scandal and muck.
All that could be done was to give her a chance at propriety. Which was why Georgiana had come to him. Together, they could give Caroline that opportunity, just as he’d given it to Cynthia all those years ago.
And it was in that moment that he understood why Georgiana hid from him.
He didn’t know how he hadn’t seen it before—how he hadn’t recognized the way she moved the pieces across the chessboard of Society. Hadn’t he done the same? Hadn’t he packed up his sister and run into the night, afraid of being caught, but even more terrified of leaving her there, in that place, with those people who judged her with every breath? Hadn’t he built this life to keep Cynthia safe?
To keep their secrets?
And now, as he stared at Georgiana’s daughter, he understood that she was doing what she could to save Caroline. This girl, with her smart mouth and her independent spirit and her winning smiles—Georgiana would do anything to save her. To give her the life Georgiana had not had. To keep her secrets.
And that meant keeping Chase’s secrets, too.
How many times had he seen Chase destroy a man? How many times had a debt been collected to the demolition of a history, a life, a family?
How many times had West aided and abetted those destructions?