Not Just a Governess Read Free Page B

would be able to tolerate from any man. So close that Elena was aware of, and yet not overwhelmed by, how much larger and taller he was than she. So close she could see the circle of black rimming the deep grey of his eyes…
    They were, Elena acknowledged as she found herself unable to do any other than continue to stare up at him, the most beautiful eyes she had ever beheld: a deep-smoky grey, with that black rim about the iris, his lashes dark, long and silky.
    ‘Mrs Leighton?’ Adam returned softly, frowning slightly as he realised he couldsmell the citrusy perfume of lemons in her silky dark hair.
    Just as he had become aware, having studied her closely in the nursery a few minutes ago, that she was far from being in her late twenties or early thirties, as he had originally assumed her to be. Indeed, she looked possibly one and twenty at most now that he was standing so close to her and really looking at her intently; the alabaster skin of her face and throat was absolutely smooth and flawless, those wide blue-green eyes seeming to possess an innocence as she gazed up at him warily, her slender figure also seeming that of a young girl rather than a mature woman.
    His mouth tightened along with the hold he had upon her arm.
    ‘Exactly how old are you?’
    She blinked long dark lashes. ‘How old am I?’
    Adam’s jaw tensed as he nodded. ‘A simple enough question, I would have thought.’
    She moistened rose-coloured lips with the tip of her tongue before answering him. ‘Simple enough, yes,’ she confirmed huskily. ‘But is it not impolite to ask a woman her age? I also fail to see the relevance…?’
    Adam’s mouth thinned at her continueddelay. ‘You will allow me to be the best judge of that and please answer the question!’ He had little patience at the best of times—and this was far from the best of times; he disliked, above all things, being lied to, and he was very much afraid, that if Elena Leighton had not lied to him outright, that she had at least been economical with the truth.
    ‘I—Why, I am—I am…’ Elena paused to flex her nape where it ached from staring up at him for so long, as she weighed up the possibility of this man believing her if she were to lie and claim to be five and twenty, an age that surely even he would consider to be sensible. If untrue. ‘I am one and twenty.’ Almost. Well…in eight months’ time, her birthday falling on Christmas Day, her family having always ensured in the past that they were treated as two separate occasions. Not that there would be any celebration of that event this year, for the simple reason Elena had no family left with whom she wished to celebrate…
    ‘One and twenty,’ he repeated evenly, his long and elegant fingers slipping down her arm until they firmly encircled her wrist. ‘That would place you as being a mere nineteen when you were widowed and began youremployment as tutor and companion to the Bambury chit, is that correct?’
    Elena gave an inward wince at this reminder of the reference she had presented to the employment agency some weeks ago, when she had gone to them seeking a placement in a respectable household. A reference, having had no previous experience in employment of any kind, Elena had necessarily to write herself…
    She met Adam Hawthorne’s scathing gaze unflinchingly. ‘That is correct, yes. If you are not satisfied with my work, then I am sure that—’
    ‘Have I said that I am not?’
    Her chin rose slightly. ‘You implied it.’
    Those chiselled lips curled slightly, into what could have been a smile, but was more likely, in this gentleman’s case, to be a sneer. ‘No, my dear Mrs Leighton, I implied nothing of the sort,’ he drawled. ‘Perhaps it is a guilty conscience which now makes you assume so?’
    Elena’s heart skipped several of those guilty beats as she looked searchingly up into Lord Hawthorne’s hard and unyielding face; those grey eyes were narrowed to icy slits, the skin stretched