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

With some confusion, Luca put a hand to his temple. “You must forgive me. Voluntarily? She chooses to be a companion?”

“Precisely.” The duke’s dark eyebrows pulled downward. “A clever thing, when the girls were much younger. She did not have to answer so many questions, and she helped Josephine learn true and false friends with her ability to be partially ignored by others of rank. But the girls are now women, and even though my daughter insists indifference to courtship, we should not force Emma to do the same.”

“I am still confused,” Luca admitted, wondering if the pounding in his head was because of the nature of their conversation or the swaying of the coach. Likely the latter, influenced in part by the former.

“Emma—Miss Arlen—is my father’s ward,” Lord Farleigh said with an expressive shrug of his shoulders. “She is more of a sister to me—and daughter to him—than she is a servant or companion.”

“She has received the same education, treatment, and even love from our family as my children,” the duke added, looking out the window. “Her father was a dear friend of mine. We grew up together. When Emma’s mother and father died, she was left in my care. When she and Josephine left the schoolroom, Emma insisted she take up the role of companion.”

Another bump in the road did nothing to lessen Luca’s sudden lightheadedness.

Lord Farleigh narrowed his eyes at Luca, a clear challenge in them. “Father tried to tell her it was nonsense. That she ought to be treated according to her station. Her family’s lines go back nearly as far as our own, though through the gentry and minor nobility.”

The duke waved a hand to silence his son, and he gave Luca a stern stare. “You will say nothing of this to others, I trust. Though I hope she changes her mind, I will respect Emma’s wishes on the matter.”

“Of course, Your Grace. None of this is my concern.” Luca suddenly understood a great deal more about Emma Arlen than he had before. If her position as companion meant she acted as a self-appointed guard to Lady Josephine, it was no wonder she had made a point of inserting herself into his attempted wooing of the noblewoman. She served as a gatekeeper to her friend, keeping the unworthy out of Lady Josephine’s company and friendship.

An admirable task, and many a conniving person had likely been thwarted by Emma’s discerning mind.

Had he been one of those deemed less worthy, and so kept away? Yet Emma had spent enough time in his company, had counted him a friend. When he returned to the castle, what would she say? What would her next move be?

The carriage tilted as they went down an uneven road, and that was all Luca could stand. He wrapped the top of the coach in something of a panic. “Stop the carriage!”

The duke’s eyes widened. “Atella, you have turned green!”

Lord Farleigh shoved the carriage door open and backed away, allowing Luca to jump out into the lane and stumble into the woods where he promptly cast up his accounts.

Blasted enclosed carriages. Horrid English roads with their bumps and roots and muddy hills.

Bruno and Lord Farleigh were both on the road when Luca returned, with several of the duke’s men on horseback ahead and behind watching Luca emerge from the trees. With handkerchief in one hand and bottle of ginger-tea in the other, Bruno came forward to help Luca.

“Since you were un ragazzino, Signore.” Bruno smiled sadly, just as he had when Luca had been that little boy. “And you had to be an ambassador, which requires so much travel.”

With a sharp laugh, Luca took the handkerchief to wipe at his forehead and mouth, then he accepted the tea his valet had thoughtfully prepared hours before. It was cold, and didn’t delight the tongue, but the ginger would settle his stomach.

“Would you like a horse, Atella?” Lord Farleigh asked, a painful smile in place. “Or a place atop one of the carriages?”

Again, Luca looked at the two carriages—the duke in one and manservants in the other—and the horsemen all staring. Torlonia had his head sticking out of the second carriage, and his expression was coldly disapproving.

Luca sighed. “I would like to vanish into the air, Farleigh, never to be seen again.” He took another drink of the tea. “But a horse will do for now.”

“Cheer up, man.” Lord Farleigh chuckled. “We all have our weaknesses. A poorness of stomach is better than a poorness of character.”

“Very true.” Luca followed the young lord back to the carriage, and after a few minutes he had a horse beneath him, and they moved forward again. Away from the northern woods and back to the duke’s lands.

Once in the fresh air and with the steady gait of the horse beneath him, Luca’s stomach calmed and his mind cleared. Though his ears burned from embarrassment, his mind sorted the facts he had learned before he shamed himself on the side of the road.

Doubtless, Torlonia would spend some time trying to lecture Luca on that miserable occurrence. But how did one control one’s vital organs?

Better to focus on what the duke and Lord Farleigh had said about Emma Arlen. The protective friend, a duke’s ward as well as his daughter’s companion, with familial connections to one of the most powerful families in England. In Europe, too, given the duke’s rumored wealth and the amount of land he owned at home and abroad.

Though an orphan, her position as the duke’s ward made her an enviable match. The perfect wife for anyone with a wish to maintain close ties with those in power.

What really mattered—the thing that made a bud of hope begin to grow in Luca’s chest—was that he liked her. Perhaps more than liked her, though he could not mentally commit to that. Not yet.

There had been that moment in the servants’ dining hall when he had nearly kissed her, when he had forgotten everything about his