The Education of Mrs. Brimley Read online

  “A man could use a bloodhound to find the woman in this mess. Children do less unwrapping at Christmas.” He proceeded to apply his aching fingertips to the unfastening of tiny buttons lining a high-neck gray blouse. His endeavor was rewarded with a glimpse of pale white skin.

  “Thank God. You are in here after all, Mrs. Brimley. I had begun to suspect otherwise.”

  Beneath his industrious fingers, her chest rose and fell with easy breaths. A little color seeped back into her cheeks. He worked faster, revealing a few layers of fetching lace, and then a pale pink corset, the color of dewy English roses in the early light of dawn. A smile lifted the corners of his lips. “My, my, Mrs. Brimley. What have we here?”

  He hurried to finish unfastening the drab black buttons, then splayed the fabric wide. Before his hands could touch her creamy white skin, a knock at the door summoned. He was about to tell Thomas to enter but reconsidered. Mrs. Brimley wouldn’t approve of being viewed in such a manner, of that he was certain.

  “Just a minute, Thomas.” He pulled a single sheet across her barely attired form. “That will keep the chill off.” He left the room, closing the door softly behind him.

  IN A SEMICONSCIOUS STATE, EMMA HEARD A RATTLING and could well visualize the carriages and cabs outside the window, all the sounds of the bustling streets of London . . . London! She lurched to her elbows in the bed, her eyes widening to a fuzzy out-of-focus yellow room filled with bright winter sunlight, not the drab green walls of her uncle’s residence in London.

  She gulped air, waiting for her pulse to slow and her head to clear. Wind gusts rattled the windowpanes, pulling her attention to the cheerless winter sky and bare tree skeletons outside. Her uncle’s windows looked out on the bricks and stones of other buildings, not sky and countryside. She wasn’t back in London, thank heavens. She sighed relief.

  But if not London, she thought glancing quickly about the room, she wasn’t at Pettibone either. Unless, of course, her bed had magically tripled in size and grown mahogany posters at each corner.

  Confused, she twisted toward the side of the bed, searching for her spectacles on a bedside table. The sheet slipped to her lap, exposing her shocking state of undress. Her breath caught. Merciful heavens!

  She fell back to the mattress, frantically pulling the sheet to her nose. She remembered stifling heat and suffocating layers of wool . . . and Chambers! She groaned. How was she to escape this predicament?

  The door creaked open. Emma quickly squeezed her eyes shut, feigning sleep. Although, in truth, it proved difficult to master the slow breath of slumber when her heart raced like a hackney driver in pursuit of a tip.

  Uneven footsteps clamored across a wooden floor until muffled by a carpet. Water splashed in a basin not far from her ear. The faint scent of bacon rashers and coddled eggs nearly made her eyes water. Go away, she prayed. If left alone she would locate her clothes and spectacles and leave this disastrous turn of events.

  A damp cloth stroked her forehead.

  She flinched, a mere reflection of the vast distance her heart ventured in its leap to her throat.

  “You can open your eyes, Mrs. Brimley. I know you’re awake.” Chambers’s tone spoke neither concern nor displeasure.

  Embarrassed by her situation and irritated by his apparent dispassion regarding same, she shook her head from side to side.

  “Come now. It does no good to pretend. We need to talk.”

  She sighed and opened her eyes, easing the sheet to uncover her mouth, but pulling it taut beneath her chin.

  “That’s better. I thought the cool water would help.” Chambers bent over her, his eyes searching with a surprising degree of urgency, while his voice modulated to a soothing tone much as if he were addressing his dog. She almost expected him to scratch her head, but instead he tenderly swabbed her cheeks.

  “What happened? Where am I?” she asked, already dreading the answer to the second question.

  “In my bed.” His eyebrow cocked. “At least in one of them. The house has several.”

  The skin on her arms prickled. Although the differences between London life and Yorkshire had been significant, surely lying about in a man’s bed, scantily attired, was not acceptable in either city.

  “This cannot be proper.” She pushed back into the mattress, trying to create a little more distance between them.

  “Perhaps not, but in this case it was necessary.” Chambers reached for a glass on the side table. “Here, drink this.”

  He held the glass and let the liquid slip between her lips. She swallowed.

  Liquid fire surged down her throat, exploding in a ball of flame in her empty stomach. Her torso whipped upright into a sitting position, the top of her exposed corset barely missing Chambers’s nose. Gasping, she recovered the fallen sheet and settled back, waving her hand in front of her face.

  “What was that?” she rasped.

  “Just a little brandy.” The corners of his eyes crinkled betraying his amusement. His obvious enjoyment made her particularly wary.

  “Try a little more.” He held the glass in position. “It goes down easier the second time.”

  She waved his offer away, opting instead for a deep draught of cooling breath. Her lungs filled with precious air laced with his exotic essence. She coughed, but the taste of him remained.

  “Why are you doing this?” she asked, grasping control of her breath.

  “You fainted,” he explained. “The brandy will put a little color back in your cheeks.”

  “I suspect my cheeks are bright enough.” Indeed, her face bathed in heat generated by sheer humiliation. He offered the drink again, but she shook her head.

  “No? Then I’ll just place it on the table.” He settled the glass, then dabbed at her cheekbones with the moist cloth. “You might change your mind when you consider your situation.”

  Her situation! Practically naked, neatly installed in a bed he probably used for scandalous endeavors, the last thing she needed was to examine her situation. She shriveled beneath the cover of the sheet.

  “Oh, Thomas recovered these from the carpet.” He reached in the pocket of his morning jacket and extracted her spectacles. Peering through the lenses, he hesitated a moment before polishing them with a cloth from his pocket.

  Irritation stabbed at her, although the reason escaped her at the moment. She released her death grip on the sheet momentarily to reclaim her glasses.

  “I was not in this room when I fainted,” she stated pointedly. Her lenses quickly brought his impossibly handsome face into focus, unnerving her further. The enormity of her situation sharpened along with her eyesight.

  “Nor was I undressed.” She glared at him. “I distinctly recall being dressed.”

  That insufferable eyebrow cocked. “Dressed enough for several people if I recall. You fainted from the heat of all those garments.” His smile widened. “Although tempted to leave you prone at my feet, I carried you here for your comfort.”

  For her discomfort more likely, she thought as another wave of embarrassment radiated from her cheeks.

  He shifted his balance, resting one hand on the bedside table.

  She glanced pointedly at his leg. “You carried me?”

  His smile dissipated; he responded with a curt nod.

  “But how . . .” She glanced to see a scowl settle on his face and decided now was not the time to inquire about his injuries. “Who undressed me?”

  “I did,” he answered, his lips pulled to a straight line.

  She groaned, turning her face away from his scrutiny. Was there to be no end to this torture? God must be punishing her for her foolish attempt to win his devil’s bargain.

  “You would have preferred someone else?” Chambers asked. “Thomas? Or perhaps old Henry?” She heard his haughty undertones and well imagined that cocked eyebrow. “I’m afraid there are no women in residence who could assist. I sent for Cook from Pettibone but expediency demanded—”

  “Expediency?” she sobbe
d, turning to face him. “That is your justification?” Tears welled in her eyes. Cook would surely tell her new employer. Her whole fabrication would unravel and her past would be revealed. She’d be returned to London, where her uncle would delight in subjecting her to his perverse and inhumane “corrections,” much as he had her mother. All because she thought she could trick Chambers into answering some questions.

  “Where are my clothes?” The words barely squeezed around the lump in her throat.

  Seemingly unmoved by her outburst, he stepped aside, revealing that what in her unfocused state she had assumed was a chifforobe was actually a chair piled high with crinolines, overskirts, and bodices, in essence the remainder of her entire wardrobe.

  “I know Londoners have some strange customs,” he said with barely concealed ridicule, “but here in Yorkshire, we tend to let the fire provide the warmth and save portions of our wardrobe for another day.”

  A swath burned from her rib cage to her hairline. She understood his taunt. He recognized full well the extent of her foolish trickery.

  After tossing the damp cloth into the bowl, he nodded in her direction.

  “I should mention, that for the sake of your little masquerade, pink is not the color of a widow’s corset.”

  She gasped. Of course he had witnessed what no one was meant to see. It was her one concession to her youth and innocence, her one true expression in a world of forced deceit. That he should be privy to her secret and give voice to her indiscretion added further mortification.

  “I was tempted to remove that as well,” he said, a smile playing about his lips. “But the color suits you. I wonder if I had removed those petticoats, would I have found practical flannel or the thin gauzy drawers of a temptress?”

  He looked at her cover-bound legs as if in moments he would decide the answer for himself.

  Emma sucked in her breath, both humiliated and shocked by his insinuation. “How dare you!”

  Her fists tightened on the sheet covering her to her chin. She wanted to flee, much as she had at their last encounter. Of course then she was only missing her boots; this time she was missing much more.

  Hoping to chase him away instead, she grabbed the nearest item at hand, a pillow, and threw it at him, but he ducked, allowing the pillow to knock askew another “charming” landscape on the wall.

  “Have you no shame? No remorse for what you’ve done!” Tears raced in tracks down her cheeks. “I’m ruined. I arrived in this desolate place with only my honor and integrity intact, and now you’ve taken those, leaving me with nothing.”

  Chambers’s face twisted from flippant humor to a dark scowl. Within seconds he grabbed her wrists and forced them overhead, pinning both wrists to the mattress.

  Shock momentarily paralyzed her, but once she recognized her restraint, she twisted and struggled to no avail.

  “Let me go!” Her attempts to kick her way free skewed her glasses down her nose and brought the sheet to her waist. “Let me go! You, you, blackguard!”

  He leaned low, the black silk of his neck cloth teased the base of her throat, while his face formed a dark thundercloud of malice.

  “I have done nothing to defile your character, Mrs. Brimley,” he seethed. “You have no claim. You may call me all the names you wish, but if you believe this little charade will coerce a marriage proposal, I assure you I have dealt with such threats before.”

  “Marriage?” She stopped struggling, wondering if she had heard correctly. Had he just proposed marriage? She glanced at his face, trying to read his expression.

  His features remained as hard and frozen as the ice topping the puddles on the road. An unanticipated lump of disappointment smothered the tiny spark that had briefly flared deep inside.

  “I have no expectation of marriage, sir,” she said, trying to catch her breath. “I abandoned that course long ago.” She swallowed hard. In truth, the prospects of marriage had abandoned her, not the other way around, but he didn’t need to know that.

  “My present concern is for my reputation. My widow’s pretense allows certain liberties, but this . . .” She looked pointedly from side to side at her arms still clamped in his grip.

  “Oh?” She noted the exact moment awareness penetrated. His narrowed eyes widened and a moment later his ironclad hold lessened, though not enough that she could retract her arms. From her unique position beneath him, Emma watched disbelief chase the storm from his eyes. She waited, a bit breathless from her earlier struggle. His gaze slipped from her eyes to her lips as though he couldn’t believe her words.

  She smiled tenatively, feeling control shift in her direction even though she remained physically trapped by a man more powerful than she.

  With each breath, the lace of her chemise scraped against the starched linen of his shirt. If she filled her lungs deeply, she imagined she would feel the press of his wide, hard chest. For the briefest of moments, she longed for that pressure. Just to know . . . just to feel . . .

  She licked her parched lips.

  “Oh,” he said again, releasing his hold on her wrists and straightening slightly. She let her arms slide to her side but otherwise remained very still; his close physical proximity left room for little else. No etiquette book gave guidance for this exact situation. His gaze dropped to the rise and fall of her exposed corset.

  Heat smoldered deep in Emma’s chest. She knew she shouldn’t desire Chambers’s prolonged stare. But her fingers remained frozen by her side, unable to tug the sheet further between them. The distant toll of the mantle clock broke the spell.

  Emma reached for the sheet, but he was faster. He pulled the sheet up to her neck and tenderly tucked it around her shoulders.

  “I . . . I apologize,” he said, averting his eyes and clasping his hands behind him.

  She wasn’t sure whether he was apologizing for his brusque behavior or his provocative stare. Either way, she surmised such pronouncements uncommon for him.

  The room felt colder, less welcoming. Even with the addition of the sheet, she was chilled.

  “I’d like to get dressed now,” she said softly.

  “Yes, yes, of course.” He edged toward the door, fidgeting with the lapels of his jacket. “Perhaps you’d like something to eat? You didn’t touch the food downstairs and you need to recover your strength.”

  She nodded. Indeed she wondered if his question was more motivated by the faint rumbling of her stomach as opposed to an excuse to escape her presence.

  “Come when you are ready. I’ll wait downstairs.” He turned to open the door but stopped and commented over his shoulder. “And, Mrs. Brimley, only one gown this time?”

  “My lord?” She stopped his progress out of the room. He opened the door but didn’t turn around.

  “How long have I been here?” The excuse given at Pettibone would have enabled her only enough time to secure answers to a few important questions. She hadn’t counted on the morning’s developments.

  He sighed. “I daresay not long enough.”

  Six

  NICHOLAS PACED IN HIS STUDY WITH THE ASSISTANCE of his stick, waiting to hear her footfall on the stairs. What an idiot he had been. He hadn’t intended for his little game to lead to her complete collapse. Although his actions were motivated by his desire for her rapid recovery, instead he had embarrassed the overripe innocent. It would be his own fault if she vowed never to return to Black Oak. He stabbed at the carpets with the tip of his stick. His own damn fault.

  “Brandy, sir?” Thomas stood at the ready with a full glass on a silver tray.

  “Thank you, but no. I believe I’ll need a clear head for this one,” Chambers replied. “I’m afraid I’ve ruined any chance of retaining Mrs. Brimley as a model.”

  “Are you sure, sir? If I’m not mistaken, you thought you had discouraged her on her last visit and yet she returned.”

  “Yes, but this time, I pinned her to the bed like a common trollop.” The memory refused to leave his mind. Mrs. Brimley, tendrils of her
rich brown hair loosened from her struggles, thrashing beneath him. Her breasts swelled and pressed above a corset that mirrored the same color of her flushed cheeks.

  “I suppose that would frighten the girl,” Thomas said with a patient monotone.

  “It wasn’t intentional. I was angry,” Chambers explained with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Still, there was something about her reaction . . .” He remembered her eyes, open wide and trusting, and her smile, so accepting even as he held her captive, and her lips . . .

  His own body had responded immediately with a jolt that had traveled from the tips of his fingers straight to his groin. He had to turn and leave before she recognized the result of their encounter. He winced. She would recognize it. After all, he had drawn her a picture of his very condition.

  Reflecting on both of their reactions, a faint hope glimmered amid his otherwise fumbled handling of events. He glanced at Thomas, perplexed. “The thing of it is . . . I rather think she may have liked it.”

  Thomas raised his brows. “We are discussing the widow Brimley, are we not, sir?”

  Chambers nodded. “What do you make of that, Thomas?”

  Thomas lifted the glass of brandy and took a swallow, grimaced, then said, “I suppose we shan’t require the assistance of Henry’s wife, after all.” He turned on his heel and continued down the hall.

  IMPATIENT, CHAMBERS HEADED TOWARD THE ENTRY BUT stopped just shy of the opening. Mrs. Brimley, burdened by an unwieldy bundle of garments gathered in her arms, silently descended the circular stairway in her old-fashioned, ill-fitting black bombazine. The hem of her skirt fluttered with her advance, briefly exposing slim ankles encased in black boots.

  Delicate ankles, he remembered, that marked the start of a long stretch of shapely calves and what promised to be well-proportioned hips hidden beneath frilly petticoats. Bloody hell!

  What was he thinking! He straightened and readjusted his jacket. Blast her pink corset! He had no right to be entertaining such thoughts about one of those Pettibone women. Indeed the young chit could well be a spinster-in-training. She said as much. He frowned. That would be a waste.