Page 39 of Duke with a Deception
But King beat her to it.
“It’s worth me deciding not to break down your door,” he answered with remarkable calm.
The eye watching them narrowed. “No reason for threats now, Yer Grace.”
Slowly, the door opened to reveal a dimly lit, sloppily kept room. The scent of food and unwashed garments and fire emerged. The woman within was dressed garishly, her rather abundant breasts on indecent display with her daringly low-cut décotellage. Her dark hair was shot through with gray streaks. It was plain she had once been a lovely woman, but time and life had worn thin the veil of her beauty. Now, she looked tired, plum-colored half-moons beneath each eye, lines etched in her face. Verity wondered if she was a woman of the night.
“Wot do ye want, then?” the woman bit out ungraciously. “The child? She’s sleeping. Came ’ere with tear-soaked cheeks, dirty and bedraggled, she did. Didn’t look like she came from no duke’s mansion.”
Relief hit Verity, so sudden and powerful that her knees knocked together. “You have her? Where is she?”
The woman jerked her head in the direction of the back of the flat. “This way. I’ll fetch ’er, but I do ’ave a price.”
“You will be kindly rewarded,” King said smoothly, extracting a few notes and offering them to her.
Eyes wide, the woman snatched up her fortune, clearly most concerned about receiving her payment. Disgusted, Verity pushed past the woman, desperate to find Emma. She rushed across the dimly lit room to where a small, familiar figure was huddled beneath a threadbare blanket on the dirty floor.
“Emma?” She sank to her knees, uncaring of the dirt that besmirched her silk. “Is that you, my darling girl?”
She spied golden-red curls shifting, and then a soot-streaked face popped up. “Lady Vitty?”
“Yes, my dear.” She opened her arms. “It’s me.”
Emma threw herself into them, bursting into tears. Verity hugged the girl’s small frame to hers tightly, the fear she’d been carrying with her slowly ebbing from her at last.
It was over.
“I’m going to take you home with us now, where you belong,” she promised Emma.
Verity left a sleepingEmma behind in the room she had been given for the evening, one that was near to Verity’s own chamber. One of the maids, a sweet and kind girl named Grace, had volunteered to sleep on a cot in Emma’s room until a new nurse could be procured and Emma was established in the nursery. After the nursemaid her brother employed had failed to take note of Emma’s absence, Verity doubted the woman’s proficiency. She would find someone new to take her place.Someone who would watch over the girl with the same strict observance as Verity herself would.
The hour had been late by the time Verity, Emma, and King returned to Castelyn House. Verity had personally attended to the girl’s bath and dinner before seeing her settled for the night, having secured the child’s promise that she would never again run away. Poor Emma’s adventure had frightened her. It was a miracle no villain had spirited her off the streets during her journey to the flat she’d once shared with her mother.
Verity wasn’t taking any chances.
Which was why she made her way up the stairs to the nursery one floor above. King had been adamant about waiting until tomorrow to begin preparations for Emma. They had decided to postpone their honeymoon, given what had happened. Verity was determined that if they did take a honeymoon, they would bring Emma and her nursemaid with them. She had yet to tell King, and she worried over his response, particularly since he had seemed hesitant to bring Emma to live with them when she had broached the subject.
She still had some time before she had to dress for a late supper with King, and she wanted to investigate. Arranging the nursery would give her a meaningful task, and although she couldn’t recall every detail of her past, Verity knew that a sense of purpose was important to her. As were children. That was why she had devoted so much of her time to the Children’s Foundling Hospital prior to the fire.
Verity reached the top stair and made her way down the shadowy hall, lighting the gas lamps as she went. She tried several doors until she finally found what she was looking for, the spacious apartments dedicated to the nursery. How curious, she thought now, that they had been left out of her initial tour.
Within, she lit the gas lamps and began a cursory examination of the space. To her surprise, it was furnished.Thick, luxurious carpeting adorned the floor, looking untouched. But that wasn’t the only detail that gave her pause. The crib, like the carpets, seemed far too new. It was fashioned of satinwood and embellished with hand-painted scenes. She also noticed a doll placed neatly on a shelf by the crib. A blanket was laid over the arm of a rocking chair that sat nearby.
Verity picked it up and saw that it was embroidered with a name.
“Daphne,” she read softly, her mind spinning with curiosity.
Did King have a younger sister he hadn’t told her of? Surely that was the only explanation for the state of the nursery and the embellishment on a blanket bearing a girl’s name. It rather disappointed her to know he had kept this facet of his past from her. But then, just as quickly as the thought arose, she realized he might have told her, and the memory had been lost along with so many others.
A wave of sadness hit her. Sadness for poor little Daphne, who must not have lived. And, much to Verity’s shame, selfish sadness too. Sadness that she could not remember so many facets of her life from before the rafter beam had struck her head.
She was clutching the blanket, trying to blink away the tears that threatened to fall, when the door to the nursery creaked open. It would need to be oiled, she thought absently, when they aired out the room tomorrow.
But all other thoughts were dashed away by the sight of King at the threshold. His jaw was hard, his face chiseled in granite.
“What are you doing in here?” he demanded, his voice harsh.
She jumped, startled by his presence and his anger both. “I came to see what would need to be done tomorrow so that Emma can be moved here. I haven’t missed supper, have I?”
