The Redemption of a Rogue, стр. 34

Oscar was leaning against the opposite wall, and he straightened up as she stepped out. She blinked up at him, almost too discombobulated to find words. He shook his head at her expression. “Every time,” he muttered.

“She—she wants to say goodbye to you,” she said.

He snorted out a humorless laugh. “I assumed as much. Will you go to the foyer and ask that our carriage be brought?”

She nodded and tried not to stagger as she moved off toward the foyer. Her brain was spinning, not just with how easily Joanna had read her, but of the glimpses she’d gotten of the future she might live if she continued down the path she was on.

But also she thought of Oscar. Of the kind of man he had become after years of exposure to that life. And Joanna’s statement that he, too, was broken under that hard façade.

It made her want to…help him. And that seemed a very dangerous desire, indeed.

“Were you truly compelled to stun the poor woman?” Oscar said as he reentered the parlor. “What did you say?”

He found his mother standing at the window, staring down into the street with a far-off expression. She pivoted toward him with one of her courtesan smiles, the ones that never reached her eyes. “Nothing, my love, I swear to you.”

He edged closer. “And what do you think of her?”

She arched a brow. “You care, Fitzhugh?”

They looked out the window together. Imogen was standing on the drive with his mother’s servant, talking to him as they awaited the carriage. She looked more on firm ground, at least. No longer so startled as she had been when she left the parlor.

“Of course I care, Mama. I value your opinion and I always have, even if I don’t always take your advice.”

“I think she is the first lover you have ever formally introduced to me.”

He wrinkled his brow. Was that true? No, that couldn’t be true. “You met Louisa. You met several of the women in my past.”

“Because we ended up at the same opera or party,” she corrected. “That isn’t the same as bringing her to my home as you did today.”

“Because she needs your help,” he said, but that answer didn’t ring entirely true. There was meaning to allowing Imogen into this corner of his life that had always been so private.

He wasn’t certain he liked the meaning. The meaning felt too powerful.

“I suppose the more important question is: what do you think of her?” his mother pressed.

“She’s…unexpected,” he admitted, for it seemed the least revealing thing he could say about her.

His mother laughed. “Very good! Unexpected is one of the best qualities in a relationship.” She leaned in and bussed his cheek, but when she stepped away, she caught his hand rather than letting him go, and clung a little too tightly. “Please be careful, darling. These people your Imogen has involved herself with…they are the darkest part of my world. It is dangerous, even for you.”

“And for you,” he said, squeezing her hand gently.

“Then we’ll both be careful,” she said. “I’ll keep you informed about what I find. You do the same.”

He kissed her cheek in return and then left her, heading out into the sunshine of the afternoon and the woman who was waiting for him in his carriage.

He only wished he could forget his questions about her, about them…about himself. But they lingered in the back of his mind, and he feared he had opened a box with Imogen that he could not close again.

Imogen looked across the carriage at Oscar as the driver turned them onto the main street and set the horses on their merry way back across Town to Oscar’s home. In the shadows of the vehicle, his expression was unreadable. All she knew was that he was watching her. Intently. As always.

“I like her,” she whispered.

His lips fluttered then, that little hint of a smile, and she could have sworn she saw relief pass over his expression before he pushed it away. It seemed he’d learned that ability at his mother’s knee, as well. “I’m glad. She is wonderful. Not normal, but wonderful.”

She heard the true affection in his tone. It warmed her. She had never been so close to her own family, nor felt affection between her husband and his parents or siblings. She saw glimpses of it with Aurora and her brother and mother. But even her friend kept secrets from those she loved, and that opened a gap between them.

“How did she—?” she began, and then cut herself off just as swiftly.

His gaze settled on hers, holding there, unyielding. “Become a courtesan?” he said to finish her question.

She nodded slowly. “It’s not my business, I know. It’s not my place.”

“I dragged you to her lair and left you alone with her to be certainly scarred for life by her directness. I think you’re owed a question or two. She would answer them as easily as I could. She doesn’t consider her past a secret or her life a shame.”

“Then how did it happen?” she asked.

“The beginning of her life wasn’t that different from that of many girls. She was raised in a good family. They hadn’t wealth, but they had some prospects. They were respected. It was assumed she would marry a merchant or a farmer or even a squire, if she was lucky.”

His voice was steady and firm. It would have sounded strong to most who heard his words. But she heard something different. She heard the hint of pain there, under the steadiness. The telltale waver that said his mother was right. This man had broken pieces. He hid them well, as well as anyone she’d ever met.

But he was broken. And somehow that made her feel a little better. He was successful and strong and powerful. He’d become all those things even with the cracks. The pain. The loss. The breaks.

Which meant she could do the same. Perhaps they