Chapter Thirty-One
Another dance with another debutante. Julian forced a smile as he led her back to her hopeful mama.
Each girl he danced with was perfectly suitable. Perfectly elegant and poised. Able to carry on a perfect discussion of the ordinary topics, and smile in a perfect way. They were all perfectly… perfect.
But they were all a near replica of the last. True, their coloring might be different. Brown hair with hazel eyes, or blonde with blue eyes. They were lovely in their own ways. But none had the alluring combination of fiery gold curls and warm brown eyes a man wished to melt in.
It wasn’t just Lainey’s face he missed. It was her compelling conversation.
If ever she’d spoken to him of the weather, it had been to inform him of rainy seasons and draughts. Not the predictable drizzle of a London spring.
“It certainly is damp of late, is it not, my lord?” Miss Wendell said as he spun her around the dance floor.
“Yes, it is. I predict it will get increasingly warmer as we move from spring into summer,” he answered with only slightly disguised sarcasm.
“Oh, yes. I hope you are correct.”
The chit hoped he had decrypted known weather patterns for their geographical climate correctly? He might have asked, but there were at least six or seven words in that thought she possibly wouldn’t understand.
Yes, Miss Wendell was lovely and she was no doubt competent in embroidery and playing the pianoforte as she’d been raised to do. It was an injustice the way noble families treated their daughters as if they were to be nothing more than frills. Substance was frowned upon. Miss Wendell would be a proper countess, just as any of them would be.
But she wouldn’t be the perfect partner in life. Not for him.
He left the ball soon after and returned home. Bentley came in to assist him.
“Are you all right, my lord?” the man asked.
“No. In fact, I wish to change into something for the club,” he said as Bentley hung up his evening jacket.
“Very well. I’m sure whatever is bothering you will be much easier to contemplate with a head full of whisky.” The man didn’t even attempt to veil his sarcasm.
“Why do I keep you, Ben?”
“Because I tell you the truth.”
“I could do with a little less truth at the moment.” The truth was time was running out. His thirtieth birthday was imminent. He needed to find his bride so there would be time to see to the wedding. But he couldn’t bring himself to make a decision.
“Is there anything I can do?”
“Can you make Elaina Bantham a proper countess?”
The valet let out a sigh and shook his head.
“No. Though I daresay if she were a proper countess, you would probably not find her as alluring.”
“You are probably right. I am between the proverbial rock and hard place. I need to do the right thing for the people who are counting on me.”
“Which is not the right thing for you?”
“It isn’t. The longer I’m away from her, I’m sure she is the only right thing for me.”
“It is a difficult decision. I have faith that you will choose correctly.”
Julian nodded though he didn’t have the same faith.
The way he saw it, he had two choices. The honorable one and the selfish one. The honorable one led to a life of disappointment, and the selfish one was piled high with guilt.
At his club, Julian waved off invitations to sit with the other bachelors. They certainly wouldn’t have any answers.
He was heading to a private booth when he spotted Lord Darlington sitting alone at a table by the window.
“Good evening. I didn’t know you were a member here,” Julian said, startling the man who offered a smile and gestured to the open seat in front of him. Julian sat and poured them each a drink from the bottle he had purchased.
“I rarely need to come. It is my place of solace when things at home are in turmoil.”
Julian’s heart rate picked up. “Has something happened? Is everyone well?”
He waved his hand in a soothing gesture.
“Yes. Everyone is of good health, if not good humor.” He shook his head. “My wife is quite put out with me and my niece… Well, I’m not sure if she will ever forgive me. Apparently, I am at fault for giving her freckles and not seeing that she was proper enough, of all things.” He rubbed his temples. “I thought I was giving her a good life with us. But perhaps I should have raised her like the rest of the young ladies of the ton.”
“She is perfect the way she is.”
“I thought so. And, of course, my wife agrees. But she also thinks I allow my dear niece to hide away from her problems. When her come out didn’t go well, I allowed her to give up. But who can look into those trusting brown eyes and deny the girl anything she asks? A stronger man than I for sure, because I can’t do it.”
Julian laughed and shook his head. “Nor I.”
“Lainey is in pain and since my wife cannot help her, she is blaming me. But things will settle now.”
Hearing of Elaina’s pain made his stomach clench. He was responsible. He shouldn’t have even kissed her when he knew they couldn’t be together. Everything they’d done, everything they’d shared, had given him an ample supply of memories. But what good are memories if they caused too much pain to recall?
“Time heals all wounds,” Julian said though he wasn’t sure he believed it.
Lord Darlington nodded in agreement.
“I suppose so. Maybe a little longer for a young woman in love.” He shook his head. “I shouldn’t have shared that, but I guess it wouldn’t hurt for you to know, she fancied you. She was upset that she wasn’t good enough to be a countess. Unrequited love is quite difficult to recover from.”
Julian couldn’t swallow. The weight of the man’s words crashed around him.
Lainey thought she wasn’t good enough to be his wife.
He knew well enough what that felt like—to not be good enough—and he wouldn’t want anyone to experience such pain, especially not the woman he loved more than anything.
The woman who was perfect for him. The woman he realized he couldn’t live without. No matter the repercussions. He would do whatever needed to be done, but he’d do it with her by his side.
“It isn’t,” he said quietly in answer to Lord Darlington.
“Oh, I daresay, it is. That thing about loving and losing or never having loved at all,” the man attempted to explain unrequited love, but Julian was shaking his head.
“No. I meant it isn’t unrequited. I love her, Henry. I thought I needed to follow my father’s rules and marry a proper countess, but I can’t do it. Not when I love her and want to spend my life with her.”
The man blinked a few times before a wide grin split his face. “Rose was right. There will be no living with her when she finds out, but it will be fine with me so long as you can make my niece happy.”
“I will do everything in my power to see that she is. In fact, I must go tell her right now. I can’t let her think for another moment she isn’t perfect the way she is.”
He would find a way to take care of the miners and their families. He hadn’t come up with a plan as of yet, but he had to believe he would find a solution as long as Lainey was by his side.
“Oh.” Henry winced. “There is a bit of a problem.” The seriousness in the man’s words made Julian stop in his tracks.
“What problem?”
“She isn’t here.”
“Where is she?”
“Egypt. Or rather she is on her way.”
As was his way, Julian began pacing in the small area near the man’s table.
“She needed to get away and I allowed it.” He tapped his chin for a moment then perked up. “She only left this afternoon. They will be stopping in Calais to load cargo. I can send a message to the captain to wait until you arrive. You could catch the ship there.”
“Yes. Please. I have to catch her, Henry.” And with that he ran out of the club much happier and determined than when he’d arrived.
He nearly bowled Hale over as the man was reaching for the door.
“There you are,” Hale said as if Julian had been intentionally avoiding him.
“Yes, but I must go. Elaina is leaving for Egypt and I must catch her.”
He turned to go, but Hale stayed him by gripping his arm.
“What I have to say will only take a moment, I promise and then you can track her down with a plan.”
Julian glanced toward the street wishing to be on the move, but relented. Henry would hold the ship in Calais. Julian would catch up to her. And if he didn’t, he would find another ship going to Egypt and find her.
“Go on.”
Hale released Julian’s arm and stood straighter.
“I will be purchasing the mines from Osborne when they are passed to him. I will then in turn sell them back to you.”
Julian blinked and as the words filtered in, he shook his head.
“Osborne won’t let them go for a pence. He’ll want more than they’re worth. I can’t ask you—”
“You don’t need to ask. It is what friends do for one another.”
Julian rubbed his forehead as he thought it through. It would solve everything, but…
“The expense. It will be astronomical. I can’t take food out of your family’s mouths to help me.”
“I spoke with Gia and she has agreed to part with a few of her horses to cover the expense. Besides, I’ve been doing a bit of reconnaissance, and I’ve learned of a dalliance between Lord Osborne and a certain Regent’s mistress. If leverage is needed, I will go into the negotiations well-armed.”
Julian felt his lips pull up in a grin. The first one since he’d given up on being with Lainey. If Osborne was fooling around with the Prince Regent’s mistress, he surely wouldn’t want anyone to find out. He would probably give up his own mines in the transaction in exchange for silence.
“I knew there would be a way. I had to trust I would find it.”
“Well, I found it, actually.” Hale brushed at his coat as his chest heaved with pride. Well deserved.
“I can never thank you enough for this.”
Hale waved his hand in a dismissive gesture. “You can name your son after me and we’ll call it paid.” The man laughed to communicate he was only joking, but Julian thought Jeremy would be a fine name for his heir.
But only if he could find his wife first.
“I must go now.”
“Yes. Go find her.” Hale gave him a shove and Julian took off running down the street.
Back at his home he roused his servants and shouted orders so he could be underway to Calais within the hour.
“Do you wish to come with me, Bentley? I know it is a long voyage and we’ve not been home very long.”
“My old bones prefer the warmth of the desert, my lord. Besides… I go where you go. Always.”
“Thank you.”
“Now, let me pack so we can go catch your intended.”
With a pat on the man’s shoulder, Julian went off to his study to send off a few letters. He hoped to catch her ship, but even if he didn’t, he’d catch the next one. He went to his desk and pulled out the bottom drawer where he kept his mother’s ring.
He would find a way to take care of the mines. But first he needed to make sure the woman he loved knew his heart and how perfect she was for him.