Page 3 of The Governess and the Brooding Duke
A young girl, pregnant by force at thirteen. The emblem of all that had gone wrong in Clan McKenzie, an affront Lachlan had taken personally.
He had avenged her. Thoroughly. Even though the man had been his own blood.
Perhaps especially because the man was his own blood.
And Mary had been a girl with no education, no husband and no hope of ever rising above what had happened to her, not in that place where everyone had known.
Penny had taken the child—her son—to raise as her own.
She’d had choices.
She could have kept the child. She could have given him to the loving couple who led her clan and give him a position of respect and dignity. It had been no choice. She’d given him a better life.
She could have also stayed and worked in the castle. Watched her son grow up from afar.
But she’d wanted the escape Penny had offered instead. A new life. One where she didn’t have to be Mary McLaren, who had been pinned down in a muddy field behind a grim hut and stripped of her ability to dream that the world might be softer, prettier, better than she’d seen.
She’d wanted her hope back.
England had been a new world when she’d needed it desperately.
She wasn’t ashamed to have to admit she wasn’t English.
But she was angry to be reminded.
Most days she was Miss Smith with no effort or thought. Once, she’d put her on each day with her chemise, and took her off at the end of the day. Now, even when her skin was bare, she remained Miss Smith.
She resented having to think of sad Mary McLaren.
But she would not let him know that.
‘Your former employer had nothing but high praise for you, but I cannot tolerate a liar.’ He turned away from her and began to move back to his desk, effectively dismissing her with his posture.
She did know that the proper thing would be to respond to the dismissal. He was a duke. But while she had learned the rules of society, she was not an English miss. He already knew that. And if she did not fight for herself now, she would leave with nothing.
No position, and nowhere to go.
She had nothing to lose now.
‘I do not consider myself a liar,’ she said. ‘Rather I am conscious of the fact that no English parent wants their children to learn to speak with a brogue. I altered my speech in order to better suit my position.’
He did not turn.
‘If I may be as honest with you as you have been with me,’ she projected her voice a bit too hard. A bit too firm. ‘Your Grace,’ she added. ‘If I were a charlatan this would not be the method by which I made my way in the world. I am a governess because I wish to work, and I wish for that work to matter. I must keep to my own moral code. If I wished to steal from a wealthy man, why would I not make myself his mistress?’
That earned her a response. He turned, just to the side, giving her a view of his profile, his square jaw and strong chin. His shoulders going taut, his body straightening.
‘I am not vain,’ she continued, ‘nor am I unaware of the charms which I possess. If my honour did not matter, if my integrity meant nothing to me, why should I work? For there are more effective ways to disarm a man, are there not?’
One dark brow lifted, just slightly. ‘You speak as if you are knowledgeable of the subject.’
Yet again, she felt as if his gaze was the cut of a broadsword.
Thesubject.
What she knew was that men were base. If a woman married a man her body was his. If a woman was on the wrong street and encountered the wrong man, her body was his. Smart women, Mary thought, made their bodies a commodity and forced men to pay for the privilege.
She saw no shame in that. The world demanded women debase themselves for survival. Mary would not judge anyone for how they survived.
