Chapter 26
CAPTAIN JOHN CALDER
Brookhouse must have been slightly penitent, for after dinner he kept conversation among the men rolling at a breakneck speed. No one had time to ask anything about his supposed secret.
The moment we joined the women, I went to the bookshelf, grabbed A Treatise on the Blood, Inflammation, and Gunshot Wounds, and spent the next hour pretending to read intently so no one would dare disturb me.
I finally closed the book. An hour should be long enough for me to retire to bed without suspicion.
I stood, and not a moment after, Harriet, on the other side of the room, stood as well and made her excuses to those around her.
I glanced her way and our eyes met. She held my gaze just longer than was customary—just long enough for me to know that it wasn't a coincidence she was leaving at the same time I was.
She wanted to speak to me. I froze. Where had this glance been the first day we’d arrived, when I expected it?
Where had this glance been when I was frustrated with Miss Blackwell for keeping us apart? I’d been desperate for it then. Why did it have to come now?
But then Brookhouse stood as well, and I was pulled out of my stupor. Blast the man, how many problems was he going to create for me this evening? Even if I didn’t know what to think about having time alone with Harriet at last, one thing was certain—I needed it.
I didn’t wait for either of them and instead strode out of the room first. As soon as I was out of the door, I turned quickly to my right and ducked into a small, dimly-lit servant’s corridor.
They exited together, not touching, but Brookhouse was laughing at something Harriet had said. Or, knowing Brookhouse, he was laughing at something he had said. Harriet was smiling at him politely, but her eyes were searching the stairs and the other side of the corridor—for me.
I flattened myself against the wall and prayed that Brookhouse would, for once in his life, do something useful and leave Harriet to find her way back to her room alone.
Their voices carried, Harriet's soft tones a contrast to Brookhouse’s booming ones. The next time I hazarded a glance at them, Harriet was no longer looking for me, but was smiling broadly up at Brookhouse.
It was that smile of hers, the one that had made me fall for her, and here she was, using it on Brookhouse, and he seemed just as taken with her as I had been.
Deuced women with their smiles and tantalizing softness. How were army men supposed to steel ourselves against such attacks? Battle did nothing to prepare us for coming upon women in corridors or empty shepherd’s crofts.
Harriet dropped her eyes from Brookhouse’s face only to have them land on me. Her laughter hitched and her eyes widened. I gave her a very short nod and then tucked myself back into the corridor.
Their voices quieted and then stopped. I heard Brookhouse’s footsteps fade away, but I wasn’t certain if Harriet had left with him. I straightened my shoulders and walked out of the corridor.
Harriet was there. Waiting.
We were finally alone.
For the strangest moment, I felt a splash of regret for interrupting her time with Brookhouse. The laughter that was painted on her face only moments ago was now washed away. She was still beautiful, of course, but she was back to being the calm, quiet woman she’d always been around me.
If we were to marry, would I be able to make her laugh like that? Had I when we were together six years ago? Most of my memories were of me laying burdens at her feet while she listened.
Had I mistaken pity for love? I had been young enough to do so. She seemed like a saint listening to me about my family and trying to understand how lonely I felt. But I couldn’t think of a single moment when we’d laughed together.
Had I wanted a home and family so fiercely I hadn’t considered how much joy we would have in each other’s company?
We were finally at the same house party, but neither of us had tried as hard as we should have to be together.
When did Harriet, the person, become less important to me than Harriet, the goal?
Had I ever thought of her as the woman she was?
Or had I only seen a future version of her?
Perhaps the Harriet of my dreams wasn’t even real.
And I’d stopped dreaming of her days ago—maybe even weeks ago, when my dreams shifted to an elusive woman in white.
“Did you want to speak with me?” I asked quietly.
Harriet nodded, and her calm, quiet exterior shifted. A sly grin slid onto her face and her dark eyes sparked with mischievous excitement. I stepped back and put a hand against the wall.
I didn’t want to be the reason her eyes glowed. Not anymore.
I glanced at the door to the drawing room. At any moment, someone could walk out and find us together. We weren’t in a compromising position, and there would be no scandal if we were found, but we would lose this chance to speak privately.
She noticed my glance, grabbed my elbow, and tugged me back into the corridor I was just hiding in.
Once out of sight, she dropped my arm. “I have a message for you.”
That was not at all what I was expecting. “You do?”
She nodded, eyes sparking again. “From Evelyn.”
“From Ev—Miss Blackwell?” I don’t know what exactly I was expecting the first time we were alone, but this wasn’t it.
She nodded. “She wants to speak to you. Can you meet her in the library tonight?”
“Tonight?”
“Yes, after everyone has retired.”
“You want me to meet with your cousin in the library after everyone has retired?” Must I repeat everything she said? Apparently I must. None of it was making sense.
Her dimples deepened. “Yes, or rather, she wants to meet with you and speak to you about something privately. I’m simply trying to arrange it for you.”
I stopped myself from repeating her again even though I was still just as confused. Why in the world would Miss Blackwell want to meet with me privately? Even if she did, why would Harriet be the one arranging it?
“Do you know why she wants to meet with me?”
Her grin broadened. “I might.”
She did.
My mind raced. I must be missing a piece of this puzzle. Why would the woman I thought was waiting for me to return from war so we could marry want me to meet with another woman alone? “And you condone this meeting of ours?”
“Definitely.”
“What if someone were to come upon us—”
Harriet tossed her hand to the side with a nonchalance that didn’t match the seriousness of the occasion. “You could say you were both looking for something to read.”
“And if it was Mrs. Wickerton?”
That at least gave Harriet pause. But after a moment’s hesitation, she shrugged. “What harm could she cause?”
I stepped forward. When Miss Blackwell had thought of me as a threat, she’d spent a week actively shielding Harriet from me.
But now, when Miss Blackwell might need protection, this was how Harriet reacted?
“She could spread the news like wildfire. Spreading gossip seems to be her sole mission in life. Nothing would give her more pleasure than forcing marriage between us if she found us there.”
She let out a long, slow breath as if she was the one who needed to recover from my outburst. “I think it very unlikely Mrs. Wickerton will visit the library late in the evening.” She raised a solitary eyebrow. “And even if she does, solid marriages have started off on worse footings.”
“But . . . ” I didn’t know what to say. Harriet looked almost delighted at the prospect of me possibly being forced to wed her cousin. I kneaded my forehead. Exactly what kind of situation had I gotten myself into?
“Miss Pryor?”
“Yes,” she smiled sweetly at me. It was a smile I desperately hoped I’d been misreading all along.
I stepped back to put more space between us. “That summer we were together. When you left . . . ” How could I word this? “Did you perhaps . . . misplace a glove?”
She tipped her head to one side, eyebrows furrowing. “Misplace a glove? I don’t think so.”
“A kid glove. Tan leather.” I spoke clearly, as if the more carefully I used my words, the more certain I would be to understand her answer.
She stilled, her eyes widening. “I did!” She scrunched her nose. “Mama was livid. I dropped it somewhere, or perhaps my maid lost it when packing my trunks.” This time when our eyes met, hers were filled with a kind of nostalgic wonder. “What a funny memory. How did you even know of it?”
I focused on taking breaths in and out. I’d faced muskets and death, waged war and bound wounds, lived and nearly died with that glove giving me the courage to continue on. I’d relied on it, blessed it, and only recently come to resent the power it had over me.
And she had dropped it by mistake.
I pressed my lips together. A lightness in my chest was bubbling up toward my throat, and if I wasn’t careful it was going to escape as laughter.
“What?” she asked, wrinkles of concern forming at the sides of her eyes.
I chuckled. I couldn’t help it. I’d been so wrong. So very wrong. I covered my mouth with my hand and shook my head, needing a moment to let the absolute absurdity of the situation settle to a point where I could speak.
Miss Pryor—for I had no right to think of her as Harriet any longer. The Harriet I’d pinned all of my hopes and dreams on had never existed. I had conjured her from a broken heart and a misplaced glove.
She crossed her arms over her chest. “I don’t lose gloves often enough for it to be this amusing.”
I swallowed hard. “No, it isn’t you that is amusing.
It is me. I simply . . . ” What? My folly was my own and the last thing I wanted to do was burden her with it.
But she’d been so instrumental in my life, or rather her glove had, that I needed to say something.
“You were very kind to me that summer. I hope I thanked you then. But on the chance I was so buried in my own struggles and forgot, I want to thank you now. You were the first person to believe in me after my family left. And I needed that.”
She blushed softly, but I could read her better now than when I was twenty-five. She was happy she’d been able to help me, but her pleasure ran no deeper than that. “It’s been good to see you doing so much better. And I’m glad I have the chance to help you again. With Evelyn.”
Evelyn. Evelyn wanted to meet with me alone in the library.
“You won’t tell me why?”
“Oh no. She most certainly should be the one to do that.”
I held her gaze. The gleam in Miss Pryor’s eyes held a secret I’d pay thousands for.
It was a gleam of promise—promise that had nothing to do with our summer together and everything to do with the woman who spent a long night watching over me in a cold shepherd’s croft.
The most logical assumption would be that Evelyn wanted to make a plan for how to deal with Mrs. Wickerton after Brookhouse’s indiscretion this evening.
But would a mere planning meeting make Miss Pryor’s eyes light up like this?
“When did she ask you to do this?”
Her eyes managed to brighten even more. “After the two of you spent the morning trying to outshoot each other. What happened out there? Evelyn came back very . . . flustered.”
I swallowed hard. That was before Brookhouse let our secret fly.
My heart stirred and a feeling of almost overwhelming lightness enveloped my frame.
The sensation was not new. I’d been trying to control the warmth and nervous energy Evelyn had put in my soul since before I even knew her name.
She had haunted me and I’d resisted it. She befriended me and I pushed down every craving that made it clear friendship would never be enough with her.
But I no longer had to ignore or suppress my feelings.
I was free to savor every catch of her breath and glint in her eye.
I was free to dream about a kiss I couldn’t remember.
I was free to risk my happiness. For once, the possibility of reward outweighed my need for security.
“Tell Miss Blackwell I will meet her tonight.”
The smile that blossomed on her face was full—so much broader than any other smiles she ever gave me before. “I will.”
The moment she was out of my sight, I fell back against the wall and put both hands over my heart. It was pounding so erratically, I wasn’t completely certain it wouldn’t need attention.
I hadn’t been able to stop thinking of Evelyn since I woke up and found her watching over me.
I thought about her.
Not the life she might give me or how she might fit into my plans.
Just her—the way her skin and hair smelled of citrus.
The way her hair tumbled down her back. How casually she held a pistol.
Her phantom fingers in my hair and those lips I’d somehow managed to kiss.
The way she was so concerned about me and my health, even though I dismissed her worry.
She was the one person who’d pleaded for me to stay, and I left her.
I knocked my head against the wall. How could I have been so foolish?
Waiting six years to see Miss Pryor again had seemed like an inconvenient part of my plan, but one I accepted without question.
Waiting an hour or two before having the chance to discover exactly why Evelyn wanted to speak to me privately would be an eternity.
As much as I’d tried to convince myself I wanted to take the known course and the easy victory, now that I could honorably choose Miss Blackwell, I found I was very willing to march into this battle with no reserves.
I came to this house party determined to court Miss Pryor, but I’d done almost nothing about it. She hadn’t even noticed my intentions. No one had, except Evelyn.
I was going to pursue Evelyn, and I was going to do it so blatantly there would be no overlooking it. By tomorrow, there wouldn’t be a soul in this house who didn’t know my heart had been captured by Evelyn Blackwell.