Marrying His Cinderella Countess. Louise Allen

in her eyes?

      And it was pitiful—because she was determined to manage her own life, to live a full and independent existence, earn money. Be happy. This wretched attraction was a weakness she must fight to overcome. It was merely physical, after all—like hunger or thirst.

      ‘You look very determined, Eleanor,’ Blake remarked. ‘Claret?’ He lifted the bottle and tipped it towards her glass, holding it poised as he waited for her answer.

      He had called her by her first name without even the fictitious Cousin.

      ‘Yes.’ The agreement was startled out of her and he poured the wine before she could collect her wits and refuse it. ‘Yes, I am looking determined. I was thinking about pigs.’

      Mr Wilton blinked at her over the rim of his wine glass. ‘Pigs, Miss Lytton? Not present company, I trust?’

      ‘Raising pigs. Or a pig. And chickens. I should have thought of it before and bought books on the subject before I left London. But Lancaster is certain to have a circulating library.’

      ‘Forgive my curiosity, Eleanor,’ Blake drawled, ‘but why should you need to know about raising livestock?’

      ‘To eat. Eggs and ham and bacon and lard. I must learn about vegetables as well.’

      When both men continued to look at her as though she was speaking Greek—which she supposed they would probably comprehend rather better than talk of chicken-keeping—she explained. ‘I must make my resources stretch as far as possible. Polly suggested a vegetable garden and poultry.’

      ‘Eleanor, you are a gentlewoman—’

      ‘Who has not, my lord, made you free with her name.’

      ‘What is the harm? I make you free with mine, and Jonathan, I am sure, will do likewise. We have been thrown together for several days in close company—can we not behave like the cousins we pretend to be? I promise you may “my lord” me from the moment you step out of the carriage at your new front gate, and I will be lavish with the “Miss Lyttons.”’

      ‘Has anyone ever told you that you have an excessive amount of sheer gall, my... Blake?’

      ‘I am certain that they frequently think it, Eleanor, although they are usually polite enough to call it something else.’

      ‘Charm, presumably,’ she said, and took an unwise sip of the wine. ‘Oh.’

      ‘It is not to your taste?’

      ‘It is like warm red velvet and cherries and the heart of a fire!’ She took another sip. She had meant to leave it strictly alone, but this was ambrosia.

      ‘Are you a poet, Eleanor?’

      ‘No, a—’

      She’d almost said a writer, but bit her tongue. He might ask her what she wrote, and she could imagine his face when she admitted to the ghastly Oscar and his equally smug sister. As for her desire to write a novel—that would be a dangerous admission indeed. She could just picture the scene: her, after a glass of this wickedly wonderful wine, blurting out that Blake was the hero of her desert romance. He would either laugh himself sick or he be utterly furious. Neither was very appealing, although she thought she would probably prefer fury to mockery.

      ‘A mere amateur at poetry,’ she prevaricated. Which was true. Her attempts at verse were strictly limited to the moon-June-swoon level of doggerel. ‘But words are dangerously tempting, are they not?’

      ‘All temptation should be dangerous,’ Blake said. ‘Otherwise it is merely self-indulgence. May I carve you some of this beef?’

      ‘Self-indulgences can be dangerous, surely?’ Jonathan passed her the plate and followed it with a dish of peas. ‘In fact most of them are—even if it’s merely over-indulgence in sweet things. Before one knows it one is entrapped in corsets, like poor Prinny, or all one’s teeth go black and fall out.’

      ‘Not a danger for any of us around this table,’ Blake remarked, carving more beef and then passing the potatoes to Ellie.

      She wondered if that was a snide remark about her skinniness. Her mother had been used to saying, with something like despair, that she would surely grow some curves with womanhood—and she had indeed begun to just before Mama had died. But they’d seemed to disappear in the general misery afterwards, when she’d so often forgotten to eat properly. At least that had made it easier to be inconspicuous...

      ‘Some bread sauce and gravy?’ Jonathan passed the two dishes, one glossy with butter, the other rich and brown. ‘And will you take more vegetables, Eleanor?’

      ‘Thank you, no. I have only a small appetite.’

      They devoted themselves to their food for a while. The beef was good, and the two men clearly close enough friends not to feel the need to talk of nothing simply to fill a silence that felt companionable to Ellie. They were attentive to her needs, but when their conversational sallies were met by monosyllabic replies they seemed comfortable with her reticence.

      ‘Where is our next destination?’ she asked, when Blake began to carve more beef.

      ‘Cannock, I hope. It is a village north of Birmingham and about another seventy miles from here.’

      ‘A long day, then. At what hour do you wish to take breakfast?’

      ‘Would seven be too early for you, Eleanor?’

      ‘Not at all.’ She was usually up by six on most mornings, hoping to get at least an hour to write before the house came to life. ‘But I will retire now, if you will excuse me?’

      ‘No dessert? This apple pie looks good, and there is thick cream.’

      ‘Delicious, I am sure. But, no, thank you.’

      Besides anything else, her life was not going to hold much in the way of roast beef and thick cream in the future, so best not to get used to them now.

      The men stood as she did, and Blake walked across the parlour to open her bedchamber door, which was uncomfortable. She heard his footsteps retreat back to the table as she turned the key and then lifted a small chair and wedged it under the door handle.

      ‘Isn’t the lock sound, miss?’ Polly was shaking out their nightgowns.

      ‘I expect so. But it is best not to take risks in strange buildings, I think.’

      And not just strange ones. She had followed the same routine every night at home, rising in time to move the chair and unlock the door before Polly came to her room—another reason to rise at six. She had forgotten that the maid would be on her side of the door while they were travelling.

      ‘This seems very cosy. Did you have a good supper?’