Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
E leanor did not usually delight in misbehaving, or misinterpreting instructions, but when Ravenscroft had forbidden any of her friends or family from visiting them, he had not explicitly stated that she could not visit them in turn. Thus, the day after she had located Abigail and brought her back to the manor house—with the promise of compensation she would pay through her pin money if necessary—she left to visit Olivia.
If nothing else, she wished for a friend to confide in about this entire situation—and the mess that she had made of it all.
“ Ella !” Olivia’s face beamed past her butler’s arm as Eleanor was admitted to the house. “May I still call you Ella? It is such a delightful name, and so easy on the tongue. I’m so glad you have come! Mama said it was awfully audacious of me to write to you on so little an acquaintance, but I just knew you were like me and wishful of a friend. That will do, Gregory,” she added to the butler. “I will take Her Grace to the drawing room.”
“Of course, Miss.” The butler inclined his head and creaked away to do his duties elsewhere.
“He’s an old bore, but he’s been in the family forever,” Olivia whispered. “While we were in America, he took care of the house here, and I believe he came to half believe it was his, although you may be sure he would never admit to such a thing on the rack. But enough about me! You must tell me a little more about yourself. You are now a Duchess!”
“…Yes,” Eleanor said after a second where she tried to order her thoughts. They entered a well-appointed, bright drawing room. To her relief, she found no one else there. “I am very fortunate in a great many ways.”
“You should just hear the way your stepmother talks about you now.” Olivia plonked herself on the sofa with a decided lack of grace. “If she is to be believed, you have been close ever since she married your father, and she is expecting an invitation to the Duke’s house the moment you have emerged from your wedded bliss.” Olivia grinned as she poured them both some tea. “Of course, I didn’t believe a word of it. The Duke picked you, so he cannot have terrible taste, and I simply cannot imagine he wants that woman hanging around him. No doubt she has already decided which parts of his fortune she will use for herself.”
Eleanor allowed herself a grim smile. That was just like Margaret. And something about Olivia’s bright prattling made her feel more at ease than she had almost anywhere else in the world. She could not confide about the alarming desires she had experienced with the Duke during their recent encounters, but she could confide some things, she decided.
“Ravenscroft has said he will not allow her to visit,” she said. “Or anyone, in fact.”
“The brute!”
“No, I believe it is common in marriages of this sort. We did not know each other before we married, you know. It was entirely a match made for convenience. I believe he was under some obligation to marry one of my father’s daughters.”
“Well, at least he showed some good sense choosing you, but Ella, you must not believe that cutting a wife off from her friends is acceptable behavior for any man.”
“Is it not?” Eleanor raised her brows. “I thought it was perfectly normal for gentlemen to have very particular notions about what they want from their wives.”
“Oh, perhaps in terms of temperament. And no doubt he would not want a scandalous wife—I suppose I should never marry a Duke, for I believe I am born for scandal.” She waved a dismissive hand. “But that is neither here nor there. Are you telling me he has been laying down the law?”
“Why does this surprise you?”
“Why, merely because no wife should put up with such a thing! And you, too, should not. Do you wish to be trapped in a miserable marriage for the rest of your life? I know many a lady in that situation, and be assured, it is not very pleasant.” Olivia put her teacup back on her saucer with deliberation. “If he does not already like you, and I cannot see why he could not—but let us follow the thought to its conclusion—then you must make him fall in love with you.”
Eleanor laughed, despite herself. “What a ridiculous thing to say! As though I have the power for that.”
“Of course you do! All you need do is seduce him.”
“ Oh ?” She raised her brows, uncomfortably aware of the warmth in her body at the prospect. “You say that as though you have experience in this matter.”
“Things are different in America.”
“Not that different, I fancy.”
“No,” Olivia admitted with a dimpled smile. “Not that different. And perhaps I do not have personal experience, but can any lady say she has gone through a London Season without being witness to at least one assignation?”
Eleanor glanced down at her hands. “My experience with the ton is not that extensive, I’m afraid,” she said, neglecting to mention that the only assignation she had been even partially witness to had been her own. And that one she had been decidedly more than witness to.
And, mortifyingly, it had been with her own husband. One who seemed disinterested in pursuing things further.
“The issue is,” she said, looking back up into Olivia’s sympathetic face, “I simply don’t think I can seduce him.”
“Oh, dearest, is that all ?” Olivia giggled. “I am certain you can! Listen carefully, and we shall go over all the steps.”
Sebastian stared moodily into the bottom of his brandy tumbler, the remnants of the amber liquid glinting in the dim light. All around him, smoke hung heavy in the air, and drunken men gambled their fortunes away on the toss of a dice.
Usually, when he came here, he felt a modicum of relief, a sense of being a man in a man’s world, and one he had occupied for many years. But today, he felt nothing more than irritated. Here he was, sitting in an armchair that was not his own, drinking alcohol that he had not procured, and all with the intention of avoiding his wife.
After she had disregarded his instructions and barged into his study the previous day, he had known how futile it would be to expect to avoid her entirely in his own house. After all, now she lived there too, it was inevitable they would occupy the same space.
At least he had come here for dinner and would not see her this evening at all. But even that posed no relief. One day, he would have to return. He would have to see her again, and all the desire he had pent up would come bubbling to the fore. How absurd that he could be so attracted to such a shy mouse of a girl.
Except it was more than that. It had been the way she’d responded to his touch. He knew without a doubt that if he had demanded something of her, she would have yielded, and in the most delicious way. Unlike most ladies of his acquaintance, she would understand that pain only added to the edge of pleasure. And he, a man well-versed in such things , could be the one to show her.
A foolish, idle thought that deserved to be exterminated. Yet it lived on in his mind anyway, tormenting him with thoughts of what could never be.
He held out his glass for a refill, then went to join a table. Faro, perhaps, if the play went deep enough. He needed a distraction. And his wife had at least provided him with the fortune left to him; what use was that if he did not spend it?
By the time he arose again, his pockets were considerably heavier, and he was congratulating himself on a night well spent when a hand shot out to clasp his arm.
“ Ravenscroft ,” an irritatingly familiar voice chirped. “I had not thought to see you here so soon after your marriage. Come, drink with me!”
Sebastian shrugged him off. “Enough. Leave me be.” He blinked at Luke, the other man coming into focus. More irritation swamped him. Of all people, Luke ought to know that Sebastian did not engage in such frivolous friendships, especially when one’s connection to one’s so-called friend had already been severed. “I have nothing to say to you.”
“Ah, but I have plenty to say to you. You may wish me to the devil, but he and I are already well-acquainted.” He grinned, no doubt expecting Sebastian to return the expression, not faltering in the slightest when Sebastian did no such thing. “Dinner! We must dine together. What do you say to that?”
“No.” Sebastian turned to leave.
“Why, busy with other invitations?” Luke’s voice was abruptly wry. “Don’t tell me you’ve cultivated friendships elsewhere?” He looked pointedly about Sebastian, but Sebastian had not come with anyone, and he had no one by his side. “I won’t let you push me away.”
“I needed to do nothing,” Sebastian reminded him, the throbbing in his head increasing. Perhaps they had once been close, but that was before he knew the dangers of such things. “You were the one who left, and now I have nothing to say to you.”
“I’m afraid that simply isn’t a good enough reason to decline a meal with me.”
“My reason is that I don’t wish to.”
“Unfortunately, I do,” Luke said, following him outside into the spitting rain. “I will find a way to dine with you, old friend. We will see each other again, and one way or another, we will have a drink like old times.”
Sebastian waved a hand as he stumbled to his carriage, and to his relief, Luke made no attempt to follow him further. As the coach rumbled back toward Ravenscroft Manor, he came to the horrifying realization that his carefully constructed life was falling into disarray.
First the business of his wife, and the marriage that already felt as though it had failed spectacularly. Every assumption he’d made about the quality of his wife and the inevitable outcome of the marriage had proven false. And now this. Luke, a friend who had abandoned him for the West Indies shortly after his parents died, when he was still young and trying to find his way in the world.
Luke, a friend on whom he had once been certain he could depend. Back in London, back in his life, and determined to become a permanent fixture.
Sebastian groaned, massaging his temples and wishing the darkened interior of the carriage would stop spinning. He knew better than to close control of the reins of his life now, especially when this period of his existence left him increasingly open to vulnerability. He could not afford to be vulnerable, not ever but especially not now ; with vulnerability inevitably came disaster and disappointment, and heartache he could not stomach when he had finally gotten to a point where he had everything he had been wishing for.
At least everything, if one did not include the wife.
He rather wished he could not include the wife.
He glanced out of the window at the passing streets and frowned at the sight of unfamiliar houses. This was not a part of London he recognized.
“Driver!” he called, banging the roof of the carriage. “Where the devil do you think you’re going? I said to take me back to the manor.”
“Right you are, guv,” the voice came back. “Just this way. A little farther.”
Sebastian pinched his nose, a little of his inebriation receding as frustration replaced it. Finding good coachmen to replace the old was beginning to prove impossible; this man evidently did not deserve the wage he was being paid. Yet, what else could Sebastian do? He refused to hire someone who had already worked in the position, yet for some reason, he had caved to Eleanor’s request to bring back her maid. Foolish, foolish choice. Inanity at its finest.
He gritted his teeth and slumped down the leather seats until his knees rested against the cushions on the other side of the carriage. He remained in that position for the full hour and a half it took them to finally make their way back to the manor. By that time, the sun was beginning to rise, and he wished he had just stayed in his apartments on St James Street. His concern there came from whether his solicitor would hear of it and think he was avoiding his wife.
Of course, that was precisely what he would have been doing, and what he had done all evening, but that was hardly the point.
He paused upon entering the darkened, silent manor. Upstairs, he knew, Eleanor would be slumbering in the bedchamber directly next to his. The one, moreover, with an adjoining door that only he had the key to.
No, he could not return there in his current state of mind.
A candle in one hand, he made his way to his study, opening the door and enclosing himself inside. There was a small sofa by the fireplace; he would make his bed here until the sun fully made its ascent, and perhaps once he knew she had risen for the day, he would retire. That way, he could spend even less time in her company, and crucially out of temptation’s enticing grasp.
But when he raised the candle to make his way to the drinks cabinet, he experienced another major shock of the evening. Instead of its usual disarray, his study appeared—there was no other word for it— tidy. The space he had cultivated to resemble his state of mind had been swept clean. The clothes had been removed, the trays of spent food and dirty glasses equally missing. Paperwork had been set into neat piles on his desk, unopened correspondence laid out for him to read.
Nothing remained in its proper place, the place he had assigned for it.
“The devil take it,” he muttered, striding to his drinks cabinet and opening it, only to find that the brandy he had expected to find there, or at least somewhere, was missing. And there were no glasses. He swept his gaze across his desk, in case he had missed something, and noticed a note in handwriting that looked decidedly not his own.
My dear husband , it read. I took the liberty of cleaning your room so you did not have to be surrounded in such chaos. If you prefer things to be laid out in a different manner, you need only say so to me and I will be happy to make any changes you deem necessary.
Eleanor
His fist crumpled the paper, obscuring the cheerful words.
Of course, she must have come in here and thought she was doing him a favor. That, or she had been highly trained in psychological warfare, and this was her first strategic move.
Well, if they were to do battle, she had selected her opponent well.
He would not give up. And by God, he—
Movement along the far wall caught his attention, and before he knew what he was doing, he had hurled his candle at it. He missed spectacularly, the object in question moving far too fast for him to track, and the candlestick clattered impotently against the wall, its flame quite out.
“ Damnation ,” he said aloud, his heart still pounding, though it had been nothing more than a mouse. No doubt his new wife’s cursed pet, though why of all things she had chosen a mouse was utterly beyond him.
Unless, of course, it had been chosen with the precise purpose of discomfiting him. And how well it had worked.
He dropped his head into his hands. The old familiar fear returned, brought on by anger and the way she so overtly disrupted his plans and intentions. If she stayed in his life, he would undoubtedly get used to the way she carried around. He would become accustomed to the disruption. Perhaps he would even want to rise to the challenge—either to assert his dominance or to win her over—and then he would be stuck once more caring about someone who would have no reason to care for him in return.
Just like Lydia .
His heart, just as it did whenever he thought of her —though it had been rare of late—tightened.
If he gave Eleanor a chance, she would dig just as much of a hole in his heart. It was better, easier , if he put an end to it now. Forced her to leave him so he could go back to his life of never letting anyone be around him for more than a few weeks at a time. Once she had disappeared, everything would go back to the way it should be. Not this new reality in his tidied room and with a woman who could not seem to stop herself from forcing herself into his world.
The sooner she annulled the marriage the better, or there was no saying what would happen—or if either of them would survive the encounter.