Lord of Secrets Read Free Page A

stepped toward her. “You’ve had a shock. You should be with family.”
    She was shaking all over. “You have to help my father.”
    “I’ll send for the captain.”
    “He’s not dead.” Her knees gave way, and she reached out blindly behind her for support.
    A strong hand caught her by the arm. “Steady, Miss Whitwell.” Gently, the marquess helped her through the connecting door to her own cabin and eased her to a seat on her berth. “I’ll fetch your cousin for you.”
    “No, don’t go!” She was frantic with alarm.
    “I’ll be back presently, I promise.”
    She seized him by the sleeve. “No, please. Papa can’t be dead! What will happen, if he should be? They don’t—” She choked on the words. “They don’t bury passengers at sea, do they?”
    “Let me fetch your cousin.”
    But in her panic, she couldn’t seem to let go of Lord Deal. One hand still gripping his sleeve, she burst into wrenching sobs.
    “Miss Whitwell...!” Even through the blur of tears, Lord Deal’s expression looked so dismayed that, despite her own hysterical grief, Rosalie couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. He was a virtual stranger, yet here she was, clutching his sleeve in a death grip, her anguished sobs escalating to outright keening.
    He went to his knees, to meet her at eye level. He leaned forward and, somehow, she ended up with her face against his shoulder and his arms wrapped around her. “Shh. It’s going to be all right.” His voice was calm and soothing, so understanding she could almost believe him. “You’ll get through this, I promise you.”
    His reassurance only made her sob harder.
    “It’s a shock, I know. But you’re not alone.”
    “What’s going on here?” Charlie said from the doorway. “Good God, Deal, what did you do to her?”
    Instantly, the warm arms and solid shoulder pulled away. “I didn’t—”
    Charlie crossed to her in two swift steps to peer down into her face. “What happened, Rosie? Did he try something?”
    “She needed help,” the marquess said behind him. “It’s Lord Whitwell—”
    Rosalie raised a shaking hand and pointed to her father’s cabin.
    Soon it was Charlie’s shoulder and Charlie’s arms offering her comfort while she sobbed brokenly. In her confusion she supposed Lord Deal had gone back to his own cabin, no doubt relieved to be quit at last of the awful scene she was making. It was beginning to sink in that her father was really and truly gone, and everything about her life had changed.
    “I should have stayed with him. I knew he wasn’t well and I—I left him alone anyway. If only I hadn’t dawdled so long in Mrs. Howard’s cabin! Perhaps if I’d been here—”
    Charlie shook his head. “There’s nothing you could have done. It must have been his heart. He looks to have gone peacefully, if that’s any consolation.”
    Oh, God. This was what happened when she didn’t look after people. “I should have been with him! Papa was all I had left in the world.”
    “You have me.”
    “You’re going into the army.”
    Charlie gave her a wounded look. “And you think that means I’m just going to abandon you to that rackety Uncle Roger of yours?”
    “Perhaps Miss Whitwell would be more comfortable elsewhere,” Lord Deal’s low, cultured voice said from the cabin doorway.
    Rosalie looked up. The marquess stood with the ship’s captain and the mate just behind him. He looked commanding and self-possessed, the picture of authority. So he hadn’t washed his hands of her after all.
    “Yes, of course,” Charlie said. “You won’t want to stay in here, Rosie, not after—well, not by yourself. I’ll trade cabins with you.” He frowned. “Except you’re going to need a chaperone now. I’d prevail on Mrs. Howard, but I have a single cabin, and so does she.”
    Lord Deal had been conferring with the captain and the ship’s mate in the doorway, but at this he looked their way. “I believe mine is the only other double cabin.