Daring Deception Part 13

"Christabel, you know you are not to leave the nursery alone,"

Frederica admonished the child, seeing her little face peering round the first landing.

"But, Cherry, I was lonely," said Christabel petulantly. She had obviously just awakened, and was still disheveled from her nap.

"Why am I not allowed on this staircase?" she asked.

"It is ever so much grander than" -- She broke off with a cry as she lost her footing and fell.

Lord Sea brooke jumped forward,~ but Frederica was closer. With a speed she didn't know she possessed, she took the stairs two at a time and caught Christabel before the little girl had fallen more than two or three steps.

Sitting down abruptly on the top stair, she cradled and comforted the frightened, sobbing child in her lap while the earl looked on, his expression unreadable.

At that moment, Lucy came hurrying down the stairs.

"Oh, miss!" she exclaimed breathlessly.

"I only stepped out for a minute, but" -- She broke off at sight of the earl.

"No harm was done, Lucy," he said as she bobbed a curtsey, "but you may take Christabel back to the nursery now. I think she deserves a treat--oh, and give Molly Dolly one as well."

Christabel went willingly enough, cheered by the promise of a treat.

Frederica rose to follow, but the Carol's voice stopped her.

"You really do care about her, don't you, Cherry? I have cause to be grateful to you, I think."

"She is a very dear child, my lord," she re- her heart still beatin fast from the fright just past--and perhaps for another reason she chose to ignore.

"I am just happy she wasn't hurt, that I was near enough to prevent it."

"Thank you," he said somberly, still regarding her with disturbing intensity.

Her cheeks flushed with embarra.s.sment, Frederica blurted without thinking,

"I find I owe you an apology, my lord." Now why had she said that? she wondered furiously as soon as the words were out of her mouth.

"An apology?" he echoed curiously.

"What for?"

She took a deep, steadying breath.

"For what I thought about you... and Christabel's mother.

I know now that I was wrong. "

"What the devil do you mean? Wrong about what?" he snapped, his pensive expression giving way to a forbidding frown.

"I--I was looking about the house and happened on the gallery. I saw the painting of Miss Amity Alexander--your sister, I presume. The resemblance between her and Christabel was quite striking, as you had said." She braced herself, expecting an outburst. Why had she not held her tongue?

The earl glared at her icily for a moment, then let out his breath in a gusty sigh.

"I suppose it was inevitable that you should find out, Miss Cherrystone.

From Christabel herself, if in no other way."

Frederica began to relax.

"I find it quite admirable that you should wish to raise her as your own, my lord, and even more so that you would go to such lengths to protect your sister's memory."

It cost her a pang to admit that, but her sense of fairness compelled it.

Lord Sea brooke snorted.

"I owe her no less, I a.s.sure you. I could be no more at fault for the ignominy of Christabel's birth if I had fathered her myself. It was I, you see, who introduced my sister to the blackguard who betrayed her."

"A friend of yours?"

ventured Frederica.

He nodded.

"A fellow officera captain in my regiment. Amity had always lived quietly, for we hadn't funds enough to give her a London Season," he said candidly.

"I believed I was doing her a fay our when I brought Peter Browning home with me on leave.

Quite congratulated myself that they hit it off so well, in fact. " His mouth twisted bitterly.

"She was such an innocent, and I not much better at the time." Frederica was struck by the parallel with her own situation.

"Why did brothers take such matters upon themselves for their sisters' sakes?

Women were far more capable of dealing with such things.

"He did not marry her?"

DARING D]~Ct~PTION "Oh, perhaps he meant to. But he managed to get himself killed in Spain first. If I'd known what he'd done I'd have finished him before Boney's troops had the chance!"

The thought of what Amity must have suffered at the time nearly brought tears to Frederica's eyes.

"How did she take the news of his death?" she asked softly.

"Not well at all. It is my belief that it broke her mind, in fact.

She would never admit to Christabel's illegitimacy once she was born, and insisted on giving her Browning's name. Kept claiming they'd been married, though of course she had no proof. I did not challenge her on it, but acted as though I believed her. I made certain she had a nurse for Christabel and I visited when I could, which wasn't often. " He sighed again.

"The child has led a lonely life, I fear.

Amity loved her, I know, but she was often ill and unable to spend much time with he rand the nurses I hired for her never stayed long. " He looked searchingly at Frederica.