A Companion for the Count: A Regency Romance by Britton, Sally (open ebook TXT) 📕

stature, with a sprinkling of freckles across her nose. Brown hair, blue eyes. Pretty. But young.

This was the woman to whom his secretary objected, and his king would likely approve, if Luca wished to pay her court.

A movement behind Lady Josephine drew his attention to another young woman, a woman with dark hair, an impish nose, and brown eyes that met his briefly before her gaze dropped to the ground. She was a few inches shorter than Lady Josephine, dressed as finely, with a smile hiding at the corner of her mouth.

“Lord Atella, allow me to introduce my companion, Miss Emma Arlen. She is my dearest friend and has helped me devise all manner of entertainments for your stay with us.”

Miss Arlen curtsied, her smile disappearing completely, and her gaze did not raise to his again.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Lady Josephine. Miss Arlen.”

The duke spoke again, his deep voice commanding. “My younger children, two daughters and a son, will meet with us in the garden for refreshment after you have recovered from your journey.”

Luca bowed again. “Of course.” He gestured to his secretary. “Allow me to introduce Signor Torlonia, my personal secretary. He will assist me in matters of state and correspondence with my king and His Royal Highness, Prince George.”

All the introductions made, the duke called the butler of the household to show Luca to his suite of rooms. Luca cast one last glance at Lady Josephine, determined to offer her his most charming smile, but she looked behind her at the same moment. His gaze skipped over her shoulder to Miss Arlen, who peered back at him with one eyebrow raised.

He forced his attention away, following the butler up a staircase, then another, and through a hall dominated by a painting of the duke.

Torlonia quickened his step to walk beside Luca, whispering so as not to be overheard by the butler. “The Lady Josephine. Che bella. And such eyes. She will be a distraction if you are not careful.”

Luca nodded once, sharply. But rather than think of blue eyes, he remembered a pair of brown beneath a skeptically raised eyebrow.

Chapter Two

Emma continued to feign reading while Josephine fretted at her side. The beautiful weather and scent of the last blooms of summer were not enough to deter the duke’s eldest daughter from her concerns.

“He is so old. At least a decade older than I am. What is Papa thinking?” Josephine asked, keeping her voice low enough that it would not carry to the other side of the terrace where her father and the Italian count sat in conversation.

Glancing up from her book, Emma first took in her friend’s deep frown and then the foreigner in their midst. “He is not yet thirty, I would wager.” Emma looked back down at her book and bit her lip to keep from laughing when Josephine groaned.

“I am nineteen, Emma. He is too old.”

“I am twenty, dearest Josie. He is not too old. You are simply determined not to like him.” Emma turned another page. She was rereading One-Thousand and One Arabian Nights, one of her favorite story collections. “You could give him a chance.”

“Stop teasing me.” Josephine sat down at last on the stone wall around the fountain, folding her hands tightly in her lap. “I haven’t any desire to marry at present. Especially someone who will take me far away from my family. Even if the count were the perfect man, I cannot think I would want him.”

“No one is making you do any such thing,” Emma reminded her, giving up on reading her book. She closed the pages and put it down on the stone beside her. “Your father asked you to help keep Lord Atella entertained. That’s all you must do, and I am here to help you.”

Isabelle and Rosalind, Josephine’s younger sisters, were sitting politely on a couch brought out to the garden for them to practice behaving themselves in company. Their mother, the duchess, and Miss Sharpe, their governess, sat in chairs on either side of the girls.

“Do you remember when your mother and our governess used to hover over us like that?” Emma asked, nudging her friend with a shoulder. “As though they were afraid we would start spouting nonsense or stand on our heads the minute they looked away.”

A brief smile appeared on Josephine’s face. “They had good reason with the two of us. Remember when the Swiss ambassador visited Papa, and we made all those horrid faces at his secretary?”

“The secretary was an ancient goat.” Emma did not bother hiding her gleeful grin at the memory. “He kept telling the ambassador, in French, how lovely we were. I am fairly certain he should not have noticed that girls of thirteen and fourteen were lovely.”

“I quite agree.” Josephine picked up Emma’s book. “Oh, are you reading this again? How can you like this story? I find the sultan horrid.”

“I find him rather amusing.” Emma didn’t bother hiding her smile. “And it isn’t just one story. I like them all. Arabian Nights is one of my favorite collections. Thank goodness your father has all the volumes. Even if he insists on hiding a few.”

The duke had purchased every volume of the Jonathan Scott translation for Emma and Josephine years before, thinking them something his children would enjoy. Of course, after he read the stories himself, a few of the volumes disappeared from the schoolroom. Apparently, the tales were not all appropriate for young readers.

“Do you think he’s handsome?” Josephine asked, idly turning the pages of the book in her hands.

“The sultan? Or the goat? Or your father?” Emma asked, leaning back enough to trail her hand through the cool water of the fountain. “You know I have always thought the duke quite refined.”

Josephine scowled at her. “The ambassador, Lord Atella.”

“It doesn’t matter what I think.” Emma glanced in the direction of the duke and ambassador again. The duke sat at his ease, while the ambassador, dressed all