Daisy looked mulish. “I know what’s proper but I can’t and won’t desert a friend in need. The viscount got cut trying to help me, didn’t he? Fine thanks if I let him rot away alone upstairs without so much as a thank you, because ‘a lady doesn’t go into a fellow’s bedchamber unless they’re related!’ I keep telling you-I’m not a lady! And if I were, I wouldn’t want to be that kind of one. Anyway, if he’s in bed with a knife wound in his chest, and I’m fit as a fiddle, I don’t see how he could compromise me! If he even wanted to, that is,” she added.
“Anyone would want to compromise you, Daisy,” the earl said gallantly. “Though I doubt even Lee’s up to it this morning. He’s not exactly rotting away upstairs, by the way. He’s well attended and is doing fine, but yesterday took a lot out of him and the doctor’s draught slowed him further. He’s no danger to anyone but himself, if he insists on doing too much.”
“What say you, Mrs. Masters?” he asked Helena. “Daisy clearly will have her way. I don’t want her climbing in the window. Why not agree and look the other way-metaphorically, that is. I won’t tell if you don’t.”
Helena frowned. “But the servants…”
“Don’t gossip, they’re loyal to me, to a man and woman,” the earl said. “I trust them implicitly.” He saw her hesitation, and took pity. The woman obviously had morals and didn’t want to take her salary if she couldn’t provide what she’d promised.
“If Geoff thinks it’s all right, then, certainly, so do I,” Daisy announced.
Helena saw the fond look on the earl’s face as he looked at Daisy. “Very well,” she said with resignation, “What can I say?”
They went up the stairs, into the long hallway, and finally paused outside an oaken door.
The earl eased the door open. “Lee?” he called, “are you ready for company?”
“I was from the moment I heard they were here,” Leland’s voice said. “I’m decently dressed and delighted to receive them. Show them in, if you please.”
Daisy followed the earl in, but had eyes only for the man in the huge bed. Leland was lying down, propped up on pillows, but otherwise she’d never have guessed he was in any way hurt. He wore a maroon dressing gown over a white shirt and gray breeches, and if it weren’t for the fact that he wore morocco slippers instead of boots, he needed only a neck cloth to look ready for a stroll down the street.
It was true he was pale, but that only made his eyes look bluer, as he looked at her. She caught her breath as she met that calm regard. “Welcome,” he said, “I’d bow, but my bandages are so tight, I might sever my body at the waist, and I think I’ve treated you to enough gore already. Thank you for coming; I’m glad the sight of my blood didn’t put you off me forever. How are you this morning? I love your gown, Mrs. Tanner; the color brightens my day.”
It hardly needed brightening, Daisy thought. The drapes had been pulled back from the windows and the room was flooded with morning light. It was a handsomely appointed room, with rich carpets and ornate furniture. Her nostrils twitched. There was no stale, medicinal smell of a sickroom here; instead the room bore a slight familiar and delicious scent of soap and warm sandalwood.
“I got you a book and some sweets,” she said, ignoring his compliment. “But it looks like you don’t need for anything.”
“Oh, but I do,” he said. “I needed company desperately. Not that Geoff isn’t delightful, but he’s woefully short on gossip.”
“Well, so am I,” Daisy said, as she took a chair the earl moved to the side of the bed. “All I can tell you is that it’s a beautiful day.”
“Then let’s make some gossip,” Leland said with a tilted grin.
“I’m only here because they promised me you couldn’t,” she said.
She heard Helena take in a breath, and the earl laugh. Daisy smiled as she realized how much easier it was to talk with the viscount when he was safely confined to his bed.
He laughed. “They can’t promise what they don’t control, Mrs. Tanner. But never fear! I’m on my best behavior. That’s not difficult this morning. Did you know I creak when I move, like Prinny in his corset? Very distracting. But you, Mrs. Tanner, tempt me most awfully. And speaking of distractions, Helena, I see you’re wearing the gown Mrs. Tanner told me about. I’m so pleased. You look splendid in it. Not that the lavender didn’t suit you, but you glow in saffron, just as Mrs. Tanner promised.”
As Helena smiled and thanked him, Daisy tilted her head to the side. So it was “Helena” so soon, and no correction offered, even when her companion was such a monster of propriety? And four “Mrs. Tanners” in a row? She doubted it was an accident. A glance at the light dancing in the viscount’s dark blue eyes told her it wasn’t.
“You can call me Daisy,” she told him grudgingly. “Save yourself some breath that way, and I guess you need it today.”
He put one hand on his heart. “I’m moved almost to tears. Thank you, Daisy. Is that your given Christian name, by the way?”
Daisy’s face flushed. “My father always called me that, so everyone else did, too. But I was given the name Deidre. He thought it was too formal for”-“a little redheaded sprite” was what her father had said all those years ago, but that she wouldn’t share-“a little girl. Daisy suits me, though. I don’t think I’d even answer to Deidre if I heard it.”
“ ‘Deidre of the sorrows,’ ” Leland quoted thoughtfully. “Yes, I can see it doesn’t fit a little sprite like you. Have I said something wrong?” he asked when he saw her start.
“No, it’s just that was what he said. Anyway,” she said, trying to collect herself, “sometimes a name you get by accident is the one you keep. Funny, that. Even my father forgot Daisy wasn’t my name. Years later, I asked if the fact that it wasn’t my real name on my marriage lines made them invalid, but the magistrate said no, since everyone knew me as Daisy.” She sighed with remembered regret. “Well, it was a long shot, but I tried. So it seems if you use a name long enough, it’s yours to keep.”
Leland watched her, seeing how bleak memory brought sorrow to her face. “Why, yes,” he said. “In many ways. If I suddenly turned to nothing but acts of charity and repaired to a monastery, I’d still be called a rake. Not that I plan to do that!” he said in mock horror, to make her smile again. “My injury didn’t frighten me that much. I’d need to be struck by an axe, not a knife, for that kind of repentance.”
She smiled at him as his lips quirked in a real smile, too. Their eyes met in acknowledgment of the joke. It was a curiously intimate moment for Daisy. She liked the feeling she was sharing something amusing with another person who understood; she hadn’t done that since she was a girl and had shared secret jests with her best friend. When she realized that a second later, her eyes widened.
What was it about this man? He wasn’t handsome, not by half. But she found herself increasingly appreciating his arresting, angular looks. She’d passed so many years in a place where females were in the minority that she’d thought she’d met every kind of male. But she’d never met one like him, so full of manners and yet also filled with mirth and clever wickedness. He spoke as lightly as he moved and seemed to take nothing seriously except fashion. And yet he was strong and virile.
He was a novelty. She thought that might be it, entirely. At least she hoped so. In time, after meeting more fellows like the viscount, she might come to regard him with fondness, not the disturbing mixture of pleasure and alarm she felt whenever she met his gaze. As now, when she felt like squirming because of how he was watching her with rueful amusement and yet with sympathy.