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

care of myself. Does that satisfy you?” The way Josephine asked, her tone, made it sound as though she fully expected another denial to cross Emma’s lips.

Instead, Emma nodded tightly. “Thank you.” Yet that feeling of sinking, of loss, continued to unnerve her. “He is a good man. He will not press you or be so petty as to let the situation between you influence his work with your father.”

Josephine stood and brushed off the skirt of her riding habit. “I think we ought to change and meet Mother for tea. She is always lonely when father is away.”

“Yes.” Emma rose, too, and looked around again at the little tower. “Thank you for sharing this with me, Josie.”

“You are most welcome, Emma. You are my dearest friend.” Josephine started toward the stairs, then spoke over her shoulder, “And I hope you will soon share your secret with me.”

Emma paused. “What secret?”

Josephine shrugged one shoulder and continued down the steps. “Oh, I merely have the feeling you will have one before long.”

Puzzled, but unwilling to continue the uncomfortable conversation, Emma forced a laugh and followed Josephine back down the steps. They only parted ways when they came to their bedrooms, on the same side of the hall, only a few feet apart.

When Emma entered her bedroom, she rang for her maid then went to the window overlooking the gardens. The trees were a riot of colors now, with only a few still green. Most were orange and yellow, red and gold. As the cold crept across the hills and dipped into the valley, autumn meant more than a change to the season. She could feel it but did not know why or what she expected.

She chewed her bottom lip, catching her own expression of uncertainty in the window’s reflection. Would he even want to keep speaking with her, spending time with her, when he discovered Josephine wanted nothing to do with him even after he had heeded all of Emma’s advice?

She rested her forehead against the window’s cool surface, uncertainty making her sick with worry. All she could do was wait.

Chapter Fifteen

Five days spent roaming woodlands and valleys, tromping through bushes, and following barking hounds, ought to have exhausted Luca beyond the point of thought. But there were deals to make while waiting to mount horses, and politics to discuss over brandy, and introductions made and accepted between every activity.

Luca’s intellectual reserves were stretched to their limit as he smiled in the face of men who claimed his nation was too new and weak to have much bargaining power. It took all his bureaucratic finesse to remind such men of Rome’s age and the cultural greatness of the former empire’s lands.

Yet another letter had come to Luca from his father. A letter full of concern for their country, hinting that it might fall yet further from glory. His father had named one of the secret societies. The Carbonari. A group whose leaders comprised the descendants of Italy’s most famous citizens.

And despite the taxing of his body and mind, every night when he turned in to sleep in his room—with Bruno in a cot at the foot of his master’s bed snoring loudly—Luca didn’t immediately fall into his well-earned rest. Instead, he thought of a vivacious woman with dazzling brown eyes and a ready smile.

Not the blue-eyed Lady Josephine, but her companion. Emma.

On the final day of the hunt, when the duke insisted Luca join him in the carriage instead of on a borrowed mount, Luca’s thoughts remained occupied by the smudge of flour on her cheek, her laughter, and her kindness. The way she discussed politics and books with such ease and how she held herself with the same grace and dignity as the noblewomen around her.

They had not been in the carriage long when the duke began a conversation with his son, the only other gentleman in the box with them. No one else who had made up the large hunting party was returning to Castle Clairvoir.

“Were you able to talk any sense into Sir Andrew?” the duke asked, arms folded and head tilted back.

Lord Farleigh had kindly taken the rear-facing bench, though Luca doubted the younger man could know of Luca’s carriage-inspired weakness of stomach. “He insists he will not discuss the matter with Emma. He says she is of an age to make up her own mind.”

Luca’s interest stirred, and he forbid his stomach to interfere while he listened.

“That is a shame. I had hoped he would add his influence to mine this Season in London. As much as we all enjoy Emma’s place in our home, it isn’t fair to her to defer her future to Josephine’s.” The duke noticed Luca’s attention and offered an apologetic smile. “Do forgive us, Atella. I do not mean to bore you with our family’s concerns.”

“Not at all, Your Grace.” Luca ignored a bump in the road in favor of trying to work his way into the conversation rather than ending it. “Your family has taken me in, welcomed me more warmly than I could have hoped. I would never presume to interject myself into personal concerns.” Except that was exactly what he was about to do. “Miss Arlen has become a particular friend. She has a very sharp mind. That is the right way to say it in English, yes?”

“Yes, she is immensely intelligent.” The duke tapped one finger upon his elbow before gesturing broadly with both hands. “Despite this cleverness, she will not listen to reason when it comes to her future.”

Luca tried to sound only mildly interested, not too eager to know more about the woman who had remained in his thoughts for far too many days. “How so, Your Grace?” He glanced at Lord Farleigh, inviting him back into the conversation.

“Her position in our family is more than it seems,” the duke said, also looking to his son. “How did you explain it to that friend of yours?”

The young lord shrugged. “She