She needn’t clarify. Jane knew precisely the gentleman referred to. She’d kissed him quite eagerly in the dead of the night. “It was not my intention to put on any type of show for anyone,” she said quietly as they turned down the corridor and then came to a stop beside the first door—her chambers. Or now, her former chambers. “I—”
“Merely spoke the truth.” A wide smile wreathed Lady Chloe’s heart-shaped face. “My brother is unaccustomed to women who speak their opinions.”
The domineering marquess, who’d first greeted her and summarily dismissed her, slipped into her mind. “I gathered as much,” she muttered.
Lady Chloe tossed her head back on a loud, and a not at all ladylike, laugh that would have made Mrs. Belden cringe with horror. “Oh, you are delightful, Mrs. Munroe.” She leaned around Jane and pressed the door handle. “May I speak to you for a moment?”
“I—” The young woman sailed past her. Of course, you may. Jane closed the door behind her and froze.
A determined gleam lit the young woman’s soft blue eyes. “Mrs. Munroe—”
“Jane,” she offered. Lady Chloe Edgerton was not a young lady who’d not yet made her Come Out. She was a woman of one and twenty years. Jane had not been hired as a governess, but rather a companion. Or rather, she had been, before the whole business of being sacked by first the marquess and then his sister.
“You must call me, Chloe.” Gabriel’s sister settled her arms akimbo. “And you’re not leaving,” she said with a firm resolve that increased the beat of Jane’s heart.
Life should have taught her the perils of foolishly dreaming and yet that blasted corner of her heart still filled with optimism and innocence clung to the fragile hope. “I’m not.”
“Oh, no,” Chloe gave a firm shake of her head. She caught her lower lip between her teeth. “Well, at first, I’ll admit, when I learned you were coming from Mrs. Belden’s, I was glad to have you gone.” She claimed Jane’s hands in her own and gave a squeeze. “Now, I would have you stay.”
What would the lady say if she were to discover the nasty headmistress had, in fact, turned her out? Likely she’d name her a forever friend. Since that numbing day in Mrs. Belden’s office, when she’d been sacked from her post and then subsequently stole off and lied her way into Gabriel’s home, terror gripped her. “Thank you,” she said softly.
The young woman applied a gentle pressure to her hands once more and then released her. “He means well. Gabriel,” she clarified and stepped away. She wandered a distracted path around the opulent ivory guest chambers and paused beside the small, mahogany table stacked with Jane’s books. Her lips pulled in a grimace. “He’d have me wed.”
And when that was the goal and expectation for any and every lady in Society, this woman would not. “You would remain unwed, then?” Jane asked, studying the young lady’s distracted movements as she ran her fingertips over the aged and cracked leather volumes.
Jaw firmed with determination, Lady Chloe gave a brusque nod. “I will. Despite my brother’s expectations.”
Despite everyone’s expectations. Having lived a life where her mother was nothing more than a plaything to a powerful duke, Jane had vowed to never surrender her happiness or independence to a man. Curiosity tugged at her. What accounted for this young lady’s like sentiments? Something quelled the question on her lips. A knowledge that it wasn’t her right to know; an understanding that it was a truth Lady Chloe would impart if or when she felt Jane was deserving to know.
“You are quiet,” Chloe observed.
She smiled wryly. “I suspect that is why your brother believed I would not suit.”
Chloe’s eyebrows shot up. “He didn’t?”
Jane bit the inside of her cheek at revealing that fact about her employer.
A small laugh bubbled past Chloe’s lips. “Oh, come. I assure you, you’ve freedom to speak candidly with me.” She dropped her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Particularly about my domineering brother.”