“Please, I insist,” he urged with a gentle smile that held every confidence he would get his way. And he usually did—through sheer charm and persistence. It was what made him so dangerous.

“I cannot leave you to trudge home in the cold, my dear, unaccompanied by a maidservant. Though I must say the chill has brightened your lovely eyes and put roses in your cheeks. You have been far too pale of late.”

Heather bit back the response on the tip of her tongue—that she was no longer in a position to afford a maidservant. Or that Evan himself had been the one to encourage her father’s disastrous gambling habits after her mother’s death, so that he’d squandered whatever remained of his wife’s inherited fortune at the poker tables.

She could have refused Evan’s offer of escort, but she did wish to speak to him alone. And she preferred to do so in private, on her own terms. He would not be happy with her decision, and a displeased Evan Randolf was not a man to be taken lightly.

Reluctantly she allowed him to hand her into the landau and settled into the plush leather cushions. During the short journey, her companion conversed about general pleasantries, but Heather remained unusually silent, uneasy with his proprietary air.

The landau drew to a stop before the modest house she now shared with Caitlin’s Aunt Winifred. Heather had sold her own home to pay her father’s gambling debts, and was living off Winnie’s charity.

“Will you come in?” she asked quietly. “There is a matter of importance I wished to discuss with you.”

Evan smiled benevolently, as if knowing she intended to discuss his suit. He obviously expected a favorable outcome.

Winnie would not be home, Heather knew, for she was shopping for tomorrow’s wedding breakfast, but Bridget should be. The young woman she’d employed in past years to help with her school was also living with Winnie until she found a new position.

Heather accepted Evan’s assistance in removing her coat and hung it on the rack in the hall. She did the same with her guest’s coat and hat, stored his gold-handled cane in the umbrella stand, and then led him into the front parlor.

The small house was not as elegant or spacious as the one she’d grown up in, but the clutter of lace doilies and sepia daguerreotypes and china figurines was attractively arranged to provide an atmosphere of homey cheer.

“Please have a seat. May I offer you tea?” Heather asked as Evan settled himself on the chintz settee.

“Thank you, I would enjoy some.”

She had to repress the impulse to reach for a rope-pull and ring for tea, for Winnie’s house was unequipped with such luxuries. Instead, she excused herself and went to the kitchen in the rear of the house, where she asked Bridget to prepare the refreshments.