Chapter 12
London, ten days later, early in the morning
Edward’s father dropped the gazette trumpeting his heroism at Lord Leontius’s house party.
“Says you got shot,” said the old man, gesturing to the newsprint.
“Not harmed,” said Edward jauntily, rocking back on his heels with good cheer.
“Pity.”
Edward could do naught but laugh at his father’s entirely expected reaction. The marquess was nothing if not consistent.
“So the treason rumors have been put to rest. And you’ve come to collect your horse,” said the marquess, standing at the window overlooking the stables while lighting a cigar that seemed to be rolled mostly with moldy tobacco.
“My associate is down there now to saddle Tencendor.”
“And I suppose you think this gossip in the gazettes will restore you to your place in this family? To reinstate your allowance? It took you an age to counter the talk.”
Edward studied the mural on the ceiling of his father’s study, admiring the cherubs despite the fact they’d cracked and peeled in the last century while his family failed to maintain the house.
A house that would be his sooner rather than later if that blood-soaked handkerchief on his father’s desk was any indication.
“You are my heir; of that there is no doubt,” said his father. “Heaven help me.”
The old man returned to his great desk and fiddled with a drawer, the lock on which gave his gnarled fingers some trouble. From an inner chamber, he removed a box.
“But before I restore your allowance, I need you to take your responsibilities seriously! No more of this breeding business nonsense! You need to find a gel, preferably young and stupid, and marry her. Get a child on her, and then another.”
Edward merely gazed at his sire with a raised eyebrow.
“Take that,” said the marquess, pushing the battered box to the end of the desk. “When you’re married, I’ll restore your allowance.”
“Restore my allowance?” asked Edward, picking up the box and stowing it in his coat. “Don’t you think the loss of my business and support of a wife — not to mention those many children — warrants an increase? Wartime inflation—”
“Damn you and your resistance to lawful, respectable matrimony!” bellowed his father. “I should have shot you when the idea first came into my head.” He looked to the open box of twin dueling pistols. They were missing.
Edward lifted the antique guns he had snatched, admiring the patina on the barrels. “The ruling class should really reconsider having firearms lying about,” he said, checking the trigger. “Someone might get hurt.”
“Before you seduce some chit who deserves better, I want to know something, boy.”
Dick Stone’s eyes shone in the light from the study window, gazing upon his father for what might be the last time. A pity he’d never been a good pater; Edward wouldn’t make the same mistakes with his own children.
“Those rumors have been hanging about your head for years, and you only now dispel them. Is all of this some knavery? Let me not discover that this is a trick!”
“It is no trick,” said Edward, turning to go. “I simply gave up on going through life alone.”
His father huffed, clearly not believing that something like friendship or love might ease the path of one’s life.
“Oh, and if you turn to the fifth page of that gazette, you’ll find the wedding announcements.”
The marquess froze.
“Including mine. We are gazetted,” said Edward with a flourish.
The old man dove for the paper, frantically flipping the pages.
“I’ll send my man of business to set up the accounts,” said Edward as he walked out the door of the study. “Once I hire one.”
In the hallway, Edward paused beside the wall hangings bearing the Chasterly cipher, a relic from the brief moment Parliament rid itself of the English king.
How many times had he been chastised before these tapestries that bore witness to his tears and humiliation for real and imagined crimes of the most trifling sort?
He hated those things, and under his direction, they’d someday be packed away.
Perhaps burned, depending on how he felt then.
He crossed his arms and closed his eyes, pulling the twin triggers. One pistol merely clicked. The other lodged a ball of good size right in the middle of that cursed monogram.
***
“Ho there, sir!” called a voice he knew well.
“Ho there, Lady Millicent!” he called back. “Is my wife still with you?”
“Gesù, Tencendor, step lively now!” exclaimed Tabby as she led the giant warhorse onto the street despite being many magnitudes smaller.
“You got him,” said Edward, coming forward to stroke his beloved friend’s snout. “Your stepmother got you for me.”
“Stepmother,” groused Tabby, petting the beast’s flank.
“Didn’t think to bring him breakfast, did you?” asked Lady Millicent, opening her reticule to reveal an alarming number of apples. She began feeding the jumpy horse, to Tencendor’s great delight.
“Say, Lady Millicent, you wouldn’t have a use for these dueling pistols?” asked Edward, holding the cursed things up to the sun.
Her whole body stilled, then she shoved the remaining apples in Tabby’s hands so she could investigate the treasure.
“Probably best not to load them, but perhaps you’d like to have them about your person.”
“Would I ever,” she said, tossing her battered umbrella in the gutter and taking up the twin guns.
As Edward mounted Tencendor again at last, he called down. “Tabitha Stone, it’s high time we returned home.”
Tabby placed one foot on top of Edward’s boot and hopped in front of him on the horse, her husband’s old breeches making the maneuver possible.
“Please send my thanks again to the duchess,” said Edward, circling Tencendor around Lady Millicent, who was still entirely taken with her new guns.
“She handed Tabby the winnings from her latest go at the Faro tables as we were leaving, which allowed us to purchase the special license so we could be married without delay.”
“High time you made an honest girl of your urchin,” muttered Lady Millicent as she stared into one barrel with great interest.
“Young lady. And she’s an honest viscountess now,” said Edward, setting off towards their rooms.
Tabby relaxed against Edward’s front as they clipped and clopped through the streets. “Was your da in a right state?”
“He was the same as ever. Obsessed with the aristocracy and primogeniture and the family, while holding nothing in his heart. That reminds me,” said Edward, reaching into his pocket to withdraw the box his father had given him. “He gave me something for you.”
“For me?”
“For my wife.”
Edward carefully opened the box before his wife’s eyes and revealed the Chasterly ring.
It sparkled in the sunlight, one of the few cheerful heirlooms owned by the family.
How many wives had watched that ring slide on their fingers with hope, only for those dreams to die in the face of stony indifference?
This marriage would be different.
Tabby snatched the thing up; her love of shiny objects never failed to delight him.
“Oh, I have a ring for you, too,” she said, sliding the enormous stone on the finger she’d promised Edward before feeling about in her coat. She held up the silver flask — now unusable because of the hole from the major’s bullet. “Thought we could have it made into a ring.”
“You mean to put a ring on me, Tabby?” asked Edward, pulling her closer so she could feel how much he liked the idea of her claim on him. One to match the claim she had on his heart.
“I’m afraid I must. One never knows if the other wives will have heard that Dick Stone has closed his business. It can be armor. Again.” She leaned her head back against him, swaying with Tencendor. “I used to think a full belly and a warm place to sleep would be enough for the likes of me.”
“But not now?” asked Edward, his arm securely looped around her waist.
“I don’t think that’s enough for me anymore. Well, I want a full belly, but the meaning has changed.”
Edward growled, wishing they were closer to their rooms so he might fuck his bride yet again.
“And I thought having Tencendor again would be enough for me,” said Edward, his chin resting on his wife’s cropped hair.
“Not now?” asked Tabby.
“Not nearly enough,” he whispered into her ear, liking how she shivered in response to his heated breath and words.
“You think we have something special? That we’ll make it?” asked Tabby, harkening back to a conversation they’d had long ago in Hyde Park as they’d watched a merry trio in love.
“We’ve changed a bit to get to live as our true selves, haven’t we?”
Tabby looked at her togs and shrugged. “Some days more than others.”
“Then it’s fortunate that I love the part of you that’s immutable.
The part that connects me to you so soundly it makes my ribs ache when you’re not right here against my chest.” Edward slid his hand over the ring once worn by his mother and an unbroken line of Chasterly marchionesses.
“Promise me you’ll stay beside me always, my love. ”
“Didn’t I promise that in front of the archbishop?” she asked, teasing him in the way he adored. What he wouldn’t give to toss her on the bed right now and punish her with pleasure for asking such a silly question.
“I’m greedy for you. Same way you are for jellied eels.”
“You know what I like.”
“What about what you love?” he asked hopefully, always wanting to hear her feelings.
“Yes, I also love jellied eels,” she said. He could hear the smirk in her voice and urged Tencendor to step faster. “And I love nobs who won’t let me go when I pick their pocket.”
“Do you now?” asked Edward, getting some ideas. “Like the first time we met? You want to pay the price for your crimes in some slum alley?”
“My lord, I don’t know about that,” she said in her most demure, schooled voice. “You see, I’m a viscountess now. I must think of my family’s reputation.”
“I’ll give you a family,” he said into her ear as he pressed his fattened cock against her rear. She’d kill him yet!
“Even now, I might carry my husband’s heir!”
“If you aren’t, I’ll have you bred in no time.”
“But, my lord, you must let me go!”
“You take the leap first, and I’ll follow your lead,” whispered Edward against her ear, planting a quick kiss on her neck.
“I love you, Edward,” she said with a sigh, pressing her cheek against his waistcoat. “And I’m happy we have my stepson with us again. And I’m happy that I see our street up there.”
“And I love you, Tabitha Stone,” he said. “And I especially love that I’ll have you in our bed again soon.”
“Oh, but I’m hungry! Let’s get dinner first. There’s a new woman selling pies,” said Tabby as they approached their rooms. “Pork this time.”
“Is this an attempt to get dinner out of me?” asked Edward, ruffling Tabby’s clean hair.
“If there’s a baby already, he’ll be starving and upset soon,” said Tabitha, bringing his hand to her belly. “Unless he gets pie.”
“What a convincing wench you are, my dear nug,” said Edward, urging Tencendor on as the sun shone over London.