Her gaze was shrewd. She was right, and she knew it.
Sinclair squeezed her hand. Hers was small, delicate yet strong. These fingers had dipped into his pocket, unhooked his watch, and taken it without him detecting it.
And yet, she had finely shaped hands, skin a bit rough from too much manual work, but he didn’t mind. Sinclair lifted her hand to his lips and kissed her fingertips. Last night he’d suckled these fingers. He’d been half-drunk, disgusted with himself, and he’d needed her. He’d craved to have something of her in his mouth, and he hadn’t been able to let go of her once he’d started.
“Then we’ll make sure he doesn’t find out,” Sinclair said. “Cat and Andrew need you, and I can’t do this without you.” He kissed her fingers again, tenderly. “Everything’s dark for me, Bertie. But there’s a little flicker of light, the tiniest one. It’s above me every night, in the nursery and you next to it.” He pressed her hand between both of his, drawing in her warmth once more. “Please don’t put that light out.”
Bertie looked at him for a long time, a swallow moving down her throat. Sinclair knew he asked a lot of her—had since he’d chased her through the dark streets of London, determined to wrench his watch back from her. This morning he’d virtuously thought he could let her go, to prevent himself taking what he shouldn’t want.
This evening, he knew his virtuousness was a lie. Sinclair wanted her here, needed her, couldn’t let her walk out of his life, no matter what tricks they had to play on the rest of the world.
At last, Bertie smiled. She wrapped her hands around Sinclair’s, her dark blue eyes meeting his gaze over their twined fingers. “All right,” she said. “You convinced me. We’ll draw up the battlements here, and I’ll become the best governess London has ever seen. We’ll face them together, yeah?”
Easier said than done, Bertie thought the next morning. She knew she had to appear to be a well-read, genteel young lady, fit to take on the task of educating the McBride children. Not the simplest task in the world for Bertie Frasier. She’d have to put her mind to how to go about it, but she was determined to. Nobody was going to take these children away from Mr. McBride, not if she had anything to say about it.
Bertie had begun the habit of taking the children for a walk straight after breakfast, after they waved their father good-bye. She’d found they settled down better to reading and things afterward. The previous governesses had forced them to stay inside until they’d done a certain amount of work, and that hadn’t done well, had it?
That morning, in light of Jeffrey’s threats, Sinclair had ordered Macaulay to accompany them everywhere, which was fine with Bertie. Though Macaulay still made her nervous, she was sure even Jeffrey would balk at taking on a giant in a kilt.
Macaulay trailed behind them, his usual taciturn self, but Bertie couldn’t quite forget he was there. He had a presence, did Macaulay.
He kept his eagle eye on the kids as they played—Andrew running, Cat perched on the edge of a bench writing in the book again. Macaulay had been so silent the entire hour that when he cleared his throat, the sound rumbling up from the depths of his large body, it was as though a volcano had begun to bubble over in the quiet tranquility of the park.
Bertie jumped, but Macaulay only fixed a sharp gaze on her and began to speak.
“I won’t lie to ye, lass,” he said in his blunt way. “I saw Mr. McBride with you upstairs after his fancy supper night before last, a-kissing ye.”
Chapter 11
Bertie’s face went scalding hot. Macaulay only watched her, daring her to deny she’d been in Sinclair’s embrace, which, of course, she couldn’t.
“He weren’t kissing me—” Bertie broke off. Explaining what Sinclair had been doing would be much more delicate and somewhat embarrassing. “What if he was?”
Macaulay kept his eye on her, the man looking out of place in this tame, manicured park. He’d be more at home striding across sweeping hills, his kilt swinging, his hair ruffled by a wild Scottish wind.
“I don’t blame you, miss,” Macaulay said. “Ye have to forgive him for it.”
Bertie blinked, her lips parting at this unexpected turn. She’d been sure Macaulay had been about to blister her with an admonishment. “I have to forgive him?”
“Aye. He’s not been himself since . . . well, in a long time.”
Bertie took a breath, trying to recover from the surprise. “Not since he lost his wife, you mean,” she said. Her voice softened. “It was hard on them all, wasn’t it?”
“Aye, lass. This has been a house of grief for a long time.” Macaulay shook his head. “He’s a good man, is Mr. Sinclair, for all his wild ways.”
“Is he wild?” Bertie asked, perplexed again. “But he goes off to a job every day, like a respectable gent.”
“Now, he does. But I was Mr. Sinclair’s batman in the army. We were sent to parts of Africa that would make you wilt away. His men respected him more than anybody, would do anything for him, would die for him. When he was off duty though, whew.” Macaulay took on a faraway look, one that held fondness. “He loved his whiskey, Mr. McBride did, and his pranks, especially on English officers who were prats. He’d make them look like fools, but he was so good a soldier his superiors wouldn’t punish him. He was a fine officer, though. No one better in a fight, always brought his men home.”
Bertie listened, soaking in the information. Mrs. Hill had told her a few things, but this was the first time she’d gotten an outpouring about Sinclair’s past. “Why’d he leave the army? If he was so good at it?”
“Met his wife, didn’t he?” Macaulay watched Andrew leaping over a series of stones he’d set up. “Miss Margaret was a pretty thing. Miss Caitriona looks much like her.”
“I’ve seen her photo,” Bertie said. One smiled from a frame on top of the dresser in the nursery. The picture was grainy and dark, but she could tell that the woman had been quite comely. “Mr. McBride was much in love with her, wasn’t he?”
“Aye, that he was, lass. He resigned his captaincy and went into chambers in London—his grandfather had been a barrister there, and they took him on easily enough. Miss Margaret encouraged him, and he started to rise. No telling how far he’ll go—all the way to the Queen’s Bench, I wouldn’t wonder. He grew famous as a junior, and was offered silk pretty quickly. He and Mrs. McBride were a fine couple, loved by everyone they knew.”