The Paid Companion | Herophine

Chapter Four

"Just think, you will be able to go to all the most exclusive balls and soirées," Charlotte said, looking dazzled. "And you will wear elegant gowns."

Lucy, ever the pessimist, affected an air of dark foreboding. "If I were you, I would be very cautious around him, Josephine."

Josephine and Charlotte both looked at her.

"Why do you say that?" Josephine demanded.

"A few months before I met you, I was employed as a companion to a widow who had connections in Society. She was unable to leave her bed, but in the months that I was with her, I learned that her chief pleasure was to keep up with the affairs of the ton. I recall some gossip about Hero Fiennes Tiffin."

"Go on," Charlotte pressed eagerly.

"At the time he was engaged to marry a young lady named Sydney Graham," Lucy continued. "But the on dit was that she was terrified of him."

Josephine frowned. "Terrified? That is a rather strong term."

"Nevertheless, she evidently regarded him with great fear. Her father accepted Tiffin's offer, of course, without bothering to consult with Sydney. After all, his lordship is extremely rich."

"And then there's the title," Charlotte mur mured. "Any papa would want such an alliance in the family."

"Precisely." Lucy poured herself another cup of tea. "Well, as it happened, the young lady was so frightened of the prospect of marrying Tiffin that one night she climbed down a ladder from her bedchamber and fled into the teeth of a terrible storm with a man named Roland Burnley. At dawn, Sydney's father found the pair in the same bedchamber at an inn. Naturally the two were wed immediately."

Charlotte tilted her head slightly. "You say that it was the young lady's father who pursued the couple? Not Tiffin himself?"

Lucy nodded, her face somber. "The story is that when he received the news that his bride to be had eloped, Tiffin was in his club. He calmly announced that the next time he chose a fiancée, he would go to an agency that supplies paid companions and select one. Then he went into the card room and played until dawn."

"Good heavens," Charlotte breathed. "He must be as cold as ice."

"He is, by all accounts," Lucy confirmed.

Josephine stared at Lucy, dumbstruck. And then the humor of the situation overtook her. She started to laugh so hard that she was forced to put her teacup down before the contents spilled onto the carpet.

Lucy and Charlotte stared at her.

"What is so amusing?" Charlotte asked sharply.

Josephine clutched her sides. "You must admit, Hero has certainly made good on his vow to obtain his next fiancée from an agency," she managed between giggles. "Who would have thought the man had such an ironic wit? What a great joke he is going to play upon Society."

"No offense, Jo," Lucy muttered, "but your new employer sounds even more eccentric than Mrs. Egan. I would not be at all surprised if he proved to be the type who will attempt to perpetrate outrages upon your person."

Charlotte shivered, but her eyes were very bright.

Josephine grinned. "Nonsense. I have interviewed a sufficient number of truly lecherous employers to know one when I see one. Hero is not the sort who would force himself on a lady. He possesses far too much self-control."

"He certainly does not appear to be a very passionate or romantic gentleman, either," Charlotte said, clearly disappointed.

"Why do you say that?" Josephine asked, startled by the observation. She thought about what she had glimpsed in the earl's smoky green eyes. Something told her that the reason Hero wielded so much self-control was precisely because he did possess a passionate nature.

"Any other gentleman endowed with even a modicum of romantic sensibilities who had been told that his fiancée had run off with another man would have given chase," Charlotte declared. "He would have snatched his lady from the arms of the man who had carried her off, and then challenged the other gentleman to a duel."

Lucy shuddered. "They say Fiennes Tiffin's blood runs cold, not hot."