LITMIR.BIZ

      ‘My thoughts exactly, but you at least look like you fit in here.’

      ‘And you don’t?’

      She was petite and well formed, her hair a wild bunch of escaping curls and her irises the colour of old whisky. She also had dimples, deep ones in each cheek.

      ‘I am only here to meet someone, but unfortunately I cannot see him anywhere.’ As she stated this she craned her neck as though having one final look.

      ‘Who is it? Perhaps I would know of him?’

      ‘Mr Jasper King. He is the owner of an engineering company that builds railways and bridges all across England.’ A slight blush covered her cheeks.

      The jolt of shock as she mentioned his name came unexpectedly. Jasper was seldom surprised by anyone any more and the feeling took him aback.

      ‘And who are you?’

      ‘Miss Charlotte Fairclough. My sister Amelia and our mama and I run the Fairclough Foundation for needy women and their children in Howick Place in Westminster.’

      Through the haze of the past Jasper remembered seeing a younger version of this woman huddled against an upstairs banister as he had come to pay his regards to her sister after some ball. Charlotte? She had had another name then and he sought to recollect it. As if she had read his thoughts she continued.

      ‘But people more often call me Lottie.’

      ‘I think Charlotte suits you better.’ God, what the hell had made him say that to her, such a personal and familiar declaration? But if she was startled by his words she certainly did not show it.

      ‘I always thought that, too. For a little while I insisted everyone use my full name but old habits soon crept back in and now hardly anyone uses it. Well, Mama does when she is cross at me, which actually is quite often, but otherwise it is Lottie. Plain and simple.’

      The babble of her words was somehow comforting. After the surprise of seeing Susan Seymour and all the undercurrents there, this conversation was easy and different. He leaned back against the wall and decided to stay put for a while. What was it Miss Fairclough wanted of him, though? He could not think of any reason why she would seek him out unless it was something to do with her brother. Before he could be honest and tell her his name she had already gone off on another tangent.

      ‘Are you married, sir?’

      ‘I am not.’ He tried to keep the relief from his words.

      ‘But would you want to be? Married, I mean? One day?’

      She was observing him as if she were a scientist and he was an undiscovered species. One which might be the answer to an age-old question. One from whom she could obtain useful information about the state of Holy Matrimony.

      ‘It would depend on the woman.’ He couldn’t remember in his life a more unusual conversation. Was she in the market for a groom or was it for someone else she asked?

      ‘But you are not averse to the idea of it?’ She blurted this out. ‘If she was the right one?’

      Lord, was she proposing to him? Was this some wild joke that would be exposed in the next moment or two? Had the Fairclough family fallen down on their luck and she saw his fortune as some sort of a solution? Thoughts spun quickly, one on top of another and suddenly he’d had enough. ‘Where the hell is your brother, Miss Fairclough?’

      She looked at him blankly. ‘Pardon?’

      ‘Silas. Why is he not here with you and seeing to your needs?’

      ‘You know my brother?’

      Her eyes were not quite focused on him, he thought then, and wondered momentarily if she could be using some drug to alter perception. But surely not. The Faircloughs were known near and far for their godly works and charitable ways. It was his own appalling past that was colouring such thoughts.

      ‘I do know him. I employed him once in my engineering firm.’

      ‘Oh, my goodness.’ She fumbled then for the bag on the floor in front of her, a decent-sized reticule full of belongings. Finally, she extracted some spectacles. He saw they’d been broken, one arm tied on firmly with a piece of string. When she had them in place her eyes widened in shock.

      ‘It is you.’

      ‘I am afraid so.’

      ‘Hell.’

      That sounded neither godly nor saintly and everything he believed of Miss Charlotte Fairclough was again turned upside down.