She was in the kitchen filling the kettle when some change in the air alerted her. She raised her head to see Leath in the doorway, studying her with a brooding expression.
Dear heaven, he was a gorgeous man. In his loose white shirt and with his hair untidy after the night’s exertions, he made her heart turn over. Her hand began to shake and the kettle sloshed water over her dress. She hadn’t been alone with the marquess since he’d kissed her. The memory was painfully vivid.
The memory. The shame. The confusion. The… desire.
He strode forward with his purposeful step and grabbed the kettle from her precarious grip. “Pass that over before you flood the place.”
The brush of his hand made her wayward heart lurch with a dizzying mixture of fear and excitement. “I don’t—”
“You’re safe.” He placed the kettle on the hob, giving her a chance to catch her breath. When they’d worked together to help Mr. Crane, they’d been a team. Now all the bristling, difficult awareness revived.
“I know.” She wished that she didn’t sound like she regretted the fact.
Chapter Ten
Leath leaned his hips against the draining board, studying Miss Trim. Nell. Eleanor.
She looked tired and jumpy. And beautiful. Her dress was damp and stained after helping Crane and a streak of dirt marked her lovely face. A strand of silvery blond hair escaped her daunting coiffure and dangled onto her breast. His hands curled against the cold stone bench behind him as he fought the urge to tug the pins away and see her hair tumbling around her like moonlight.
Two nights ago, she’d given him too much.
She hadn’t given him enough.
“Thank you for your help.”
“I told you—I’ve done a lot of nursing.”
Lit to spellbinding shadow in the turned-down lamps, she stood on the flagstones. Her stance betrayed uncertainty and her eyes were suspicious. She was always suspicious. He was devilish tired of it.
He glanced down at his filthy boots. Selsby would haul him over the coals for the state of his clothes once h
e finally made it upstairs. “So you really are an orphan.”
She stiffened, hostility replacing uncertainty. “Why would I lie?”
He fixed his gaze on her. “I don’t know.”
Pink tinged her cheeks and she avoided his eyes. Was that because she was a liar, or because she was a respectable woman alone with the man who had taken liberties? As always with Miss Trim, he wasn’t sure of anything.
“My mother was ill for months before she passed away.” She sent him a look which felt significant. He had no idea why. “And my sister Dorothy died in May.”
“I’m sorry.”
“So am I.” She seemed to expect a stronger reaction. Again, he sensed that there were levels of meaning here that he missed.
“Your father was a soldier?”
“I’m surprised you remember that.” She didn’t sound pleased.
“Of course I remember.” He recalled every encounter with this woman and every word she’d said. Perhaps because she was so damned elusive. There was nothing like mystery to whet a man’s interest. “You intrigue me, Miss Trim.”
To his surprise, she didn’t take up the challenge. Instead she straightened with that innate pride so incongruous in a housemaid. “My father was a sergeant major in one of Rowland Hill’s brigades. He was killed at Vimeiro in ’08. I was only five, but my mother talked about him all the time until I’m not sure whether the memories are mine or hers.”
“What was his name?”
“Robert.”
So much loss in Eleanor’s life. He’d wondered if she’d used the orphan story to gain his mother’s sympathy, but looking at her now, he saw that whatever other lies she’d told, she hadn’t lied about losing her parents. Compassion pierced him, softened his voice. “I’m sure he was a brave man.”