Chapter 13

CHAPTER 13

“ Y ou mentioned that Duchess Sarah is visiting Penelope and Maxwell today,” Stephen began with a mildly curious air as a maid served braised duck and new potatoes at the table. “Can I ask…?”

Having been dreading such a turn in the conversation ever since Stephen’s coach first drew up to the front door of Heartwick Hall, Annabelle now held her breath with trepidation. She could not entirely set aside Frederick’s previous casual comments about her brother horsewhipping him for their illicit, if incomplete, liaison.

Lord Emberly had arrived an hour earlier and agreed that he and Annabelle should stay for luncheon before they returned to Colborne House. This final meal of her visit was both a joy and a torture to her, glad to be Frederick’s presence for a little longer but acutely conscious of how much must be hidden from Stephen.

“Yes. My stepmother will be sorry not to have seen you, Stephen,” Frederick thankfully cut in before the question itself could be fully worded. “Walden Towers is no great distance away but her occupation with my sister is such that I am confident that she will not be back before you leave.”

“Then it is fortunate that I have arrived to collect Annabelle. If Duchess Sarah needs to remain at Walden Towers now then…”

“This duck is very well cooked,” Annabelle spoke up, now taking her own turn to cut her brother off before he could say anything that might require her to lie or tell a disruptive truth. “Don’t you think so, Stephen?”

She and Frederick had agreed at breakfast that they must be highly circumspect in Stephen’s presence, heading off such inflammatory topics and avoiding too much direct conversation or eye contact with one another. While neither of them considered that they had done anything so very wicked, Stephen was unlikely to be of the same opinion.

Lord Emberly paused and nodded absently in agreement with Annabelle’s compliments on the food. Then, however, his eyes returned to Frederick as though he might pick up his unwanted line of inquiry about the dowager duchess yet again.

“You and your mother must be so relieved that your father’s condition is now stable, Stephen,” Frederick put in, smoothly and politely changing the subject. “Your letter was a great surprise to Annabelle, as it was to me, but the news it contained was obviously welcome.”

Dry and serious in manner today, Stephen had already told them at length about the air and weather in Norfolk and the opinions of several physicians on the best course for the Duke of Colborne. Their father’s health seemed to be the one topic guaranteed to engage his attention.

Annabelle flashed Frederick a smile of appreciation for his clever deflection before remembering that she was not supposed to smile at him at all today and looking down at the table with a self-conscious expression that made Stephen glance at her with puzzlement.

“Naturally, my father’s present respite is more than we could have hoped for a month ago,” he said. "Physicians are reluctant to speak of improvement or any likely extension of life, but he is certainly more comfortable and that is a great deal to be thankful for. I do hope Annabelle has not worried too much while she was away from us. She seems so pensive today.”

This comment made Annabelle blush guiltily. While she loved her father dearly, he had been ill for so long that her concern for him was a constant background companion she had learned to live with rather than a daily worry at the front of her mind. Stephen might take such an attitude for callousness.

“I was very grateful to hear that Father is so improved,” she said dutifully. “I only hope it will continue as long as possible.”

“Yes, there have been other respites and false hopes, haven’t there?” Stephen sighed. “You are right to be so cautious, Annabelle. I will do the same.”

“Will he remain in Norfolk for the whole summer?” Frederick asked.

“Perhaps even until the end of the year. We will join them there after the season.”

With a pang of irritation, Annabelle noted that her brother had not even considered the faintest possibility that she might meet a suitable marital prospect during the season.

“But what if I were to find a husband this season?” she asked impulsively.

“A husband?!” Stephen exclaimed, starting in astonishment. “What can you possibly mean, Annabelle? I know of no suitors for your hand.”

Frederick’s face was full of warning as he looked at Annabelle across the table, slightly shaking his head, but all rather too late.

“Have you met a man of interest?” Stephen pursued her, “You wrote to me of no one, Annabelle.”

“It was only a theoretical question,” Annabelle muttered but her brother was now staring at her rather hard and she did not know what he was seeing.

“Doesn’t Annabelle’s outfit become her?” Frederick suggested with somewhat forced jollity, attempting to change the subject again.

She was, in fact, wearing Madame Deveaux’s neatly cut walking dress in violet-tinged gray and she knew that it did become her. She also knew that Frederick’s appreciation of the dress’s low neckline and easy fastenings was genuine.

Yesterday, his fingers had successfully loosened its bodice while they walked in the woodland near the lake and his mouth had covered Annabelle’s breasts with kisses for a glorious five minutes before he stopped himself.

Last night, Frederick had even come to her bedroom very late, declining to undress or allow himself to be pulled onto the mattress, but instead kneeling beside the bed and almost wordlessly arranging Annabelle before him. Legs parted and nightgown raised to her throat, she had panted, moaned and buried her louder cries in a pillow as he gave his mouth free rein.

Such memories heated Annabelle’s face and sent echoes of pleasure and longing through her body. Recalling them under Stephen’s gaze made her squirm uncomfortably as though he might read her mind and know that she had wished for Frederick to undress and claim her fully rather than kiss her a silent and frustrating goodnight and leave again.

“I’m not sure whether that outfit becomes her,” Stephen commented sternly, only making Annabelle feel worse. “It seems far too modern and fast for my tastes and likely for Mother’s too, especially for an unmarried woman of one-and-twenty. She may want to speak to Mrs. Fenchurch. Did you actually ask her to cut your clothes like that, Annabelle?”

Annabelle remained silent, half embarrassed and half indignant at Stephen treating her like an errant schoolgirl in front of Frederick. Frederick himself looked none too pleased either.

“It’s a high-quality gown made in the Parisian style, by a respectable but French society dressmaker,” the Duke of Heartwick said with a touch of impatience. “There is nothing wrong with Annabelle wishing to look like a woman rather than a little girl.”

“So, I am to expect a second round of dressmaker’s bills in addition to those from Mrs. Fenchurch for this seasons’s clothes? I begrudge you nothing, Annabelle, but you should really have discussed this with me. I might otherwise have returned these bills in error when they arrived.”

“I bought it, Stephen. There will be no inconvenience to your family at all,” Frederick responded, seeming defensive of Annabelle now in a manner that both heartened and alarmed her.

“Frederick,” she said quickly, shaking her head at him in the knowledge that his news was only likely to inflame her brother further. “There is a jacket that goes with this dress, Stephen. It looks quite different when they are worn together.”

Stephen, however, was paying no attention to Annabelle’s assurances on the additional modesty provided by the jacket. As she had feared, the idea of Frederick buying her clothes was at least as offensive to her older brother as the garments themselves.

“Oh? I see. Then you must let me repay you, Frederick,” he said with icy politeness, laying down his knife and fork. "I cannot let my sister be a burden on your purse when you have been kind enough to host her here for my family’s convenience.”

“There is no need. It was a gift I was glad to give. When Penelope was here, I bought her dresses each season.”

“Yes, but Penelope is your sister and Annabelle is not,” Stephen objected. “I cannot let another man, a single man in your position especially, buy Annabelle’s clothing. It is most irregular.”

“It was only a gift, Stephen,” insisted Frederick, refusing to back down. “ I will not hear any talk of repayment."

For a few tense moments the two men regarded one another across the table with narrowed eyes.

“Please don’t let us all argue so on my last day here,” said Annabelle, fearing a full blown argument was about to erupt. “With Father and Penelope and…everything else, we all have so much on our minds at the moment. Stephen, Frederick, please.”

Reluctantly at first, Stephen nodded.

“We are all evidently overwrought,” he agreed. “It has been a trying time. Duke Frederick and I can discuss this matter another time, Annabelle. Let us finish our meal and be on our way.”

“I have no wish to argue,” Frederick returned. “Apologies if I have neglected my duties as host today and let my tongue run away with me. As you say, Stephen, we are all overwrought.”

For a brief second, his blue eyes caught Annabelle’s. Her instant physical response to Frederick’s gaze made her draw in a sharp breath which she had to stifle and mask with a cough in case Stephen noticed its oddity. No other man had ever had such an effect on her. She suspected that no man ever could.

Looking firmly away and fixing her attention on her plate, Annabelle made herself focus on the duck and vegetables until the meal was done.

“The coaches are prepared, Your Grace,” announced Witmore after entering the dining room where Frederick, Stephen and Annabelle were still sitting, largely in silence, over cups of post-luncheon tea. “Mrs. Muggins advises that all Lady Annabelle’s effects have been loaded.”

“Very good, Witmore,” Frederick responded with a nod to the butler, rising from the head of the table and tossing aside his napkin.

At last this awful meal was done. He did not know how much longer he could have tolerated making polite, stilted conversation, tormenting himself with stolen glances at Annabelle’s subdued beauty, and generally pretending to be the same kind of creature as Stephen Elkins. Frederick knew he was not.

It had also been distinctly disagreeable to see Annabelle so pensive and quiet, a world away from the charmingly ingenuous and excitable young woman he had wandered and dallied with around the Heartwick estate so carefully in their last few days together here. He loved seeing her happy. Even more than that, he loved making her cry out in erotic pleasure.

Sending Annabelle away now with her stern and proper brother seemed fundamentally wrong, but Frederick had no right to keep her here, even less to arouse and caress her as he had done, or to physically possess her completely as he longed to do. Still, what right did Stephen have to treat her like a child rather than a grown woman?

“Well then, we should take our leave,” said Lord Emberly, his face grave although the rest of the luncheon conversation had remained civil if sparse.

“Annabelle, you can go out to the carriage and make yourself comfortable. I shall follow presently.”

“I’ll wait for you,” she said to her brother, flashing her bluebell eyes briefly at Frederick, with a sigh she couldn’t quite stifle.

“I wish to speak to Duke Frederick alone for a few moments,” her brother stated stiffly when he saw that she intended to linger. “Please leave us.”

Seeing the renewed agitation on Annabelle’s face, Frederick made himself smile reassuringly even though he shared her reservations. Whatever Stephen had to say to him, he knew it wouldn’t be good.

“Farewell, then, Lady Annabelle. Your company has been appreciated and I trust we will meet again at Lord and Lady Orville’s ball.”

“Yes, of course. I hope Stephen and I will attend. You have been most kind and generous during my stay, Duke Frederick. I shall miss Heartwick Hall very much.”

Her lower lip trembled as she spoke these final words and the urge to kiss it was strong, making it hard for Frederick to tear his eyes from her face. Thankfully she turned and left the room, breaking their gaze.

Stephen watched his sister go with an uneasy expression and then turned to Frederick once the door to the dining room had closed again, studying him intently.

“I trusted you, Frederick,” said Lord Emberly pointedly. “I trusted you with my younger sister’s well-being, reputation and virtue. You gave me to understand that you were a trustworthy man despite your private unsavory pastimes.”

By now, Frederick was in no mood to tolerate this kind of attack, especially from a man too proud and hidebound by tradition to know how much of life he was missing. Still, he tried to rein in his temper for Annabelle’s sake. She was the one who must cope with the aftermath of Stephen’s mood and its consequences.

“There is nothing unsavory in appreciating women or enjoying physical pleasure and I am not willing to justify my private life to you or any other man, Stephen,” Frederick stated clearly. “For the record, whatever you are implying, Annabelle is leaving my house with her virtue intact. I am not a danger to her.”

“You swear that?” responded Stephen suspiciously. “I’m not blind and the way you look at one another is distinctly upsetting, not to mention the highly inappropriate manner of your buying her indecent clothing. Even if you have committed no physical trespass, Annabelle seems half in love with you and I can’t believe you haven’t encouraged it.”

“I’d swear it on the Bible if you required that. Annabelle is unharmed from her stay here. She leaves Heartwick Hall in as much a maiden state as when she entered it. Anyway, the dresses are perfectly decent, Stephen. Can’t you see she’s a woman, not a child, damn it!”

“Dresses, plural?” registered Lord Emberly with renewed disapproval. “Have you lost your senses entirely since we last met? I will take your word that Annabelle has not been physically dishonored at your hands but don’t you see how this all looks to the outside world?”

“The outside world can go hang,” Frederick commented with irritation. “I see no vice in making a present that brings a young woman so much natural enjoyment without causing her harm. Why should Annabelle be deprived of harmless pleasures for the sake of stupid society rules?”

“Are we still talking about the dresses?” returned Stephen coolly. “You may laugh at me for being old-fashioned but I think you a dreamer for imagining yourself so modern that the established rules don’t apply to you. Well, they do. A man making extravagant and intimate presents to a young and unrelated woman invites scandal and you risk putting Annabel at the center of it.”

“Annabel is innocent and there is no scandal,” insisted Frederick, recalling her in her green silk and mask for Lord Blackwell’s party. “She is someone who could walk safely through a den of libertinage and remain untouched and unchanged by anything she encountered. I wish you could see things only as they are, Stephen, and not through the distorting magnifying glass of social convention.”

“Does Duchess Sarah see things your way, Frederick? I find that hard to believe.”

There was nothing Frederick could say to this remark, not trusting himself to speak at all on the subject of his stepmother’s views, lest this lead to other more awkward questions around her presence or absence. He folded his arms and regarded Stephen in silence as the latter looked back at him thoughtfully.

“It sounds very much as though you’re saying you don’t trust me, Lord Emberly.”

“I trust your word, Duke Frederick, but I don’t believe I can trust your judgement which seems so very questionable in my eyes. While I hope we can preserve the long friendship between our families, Annabelle will certainly not be staying under your roof again. I leave it to you to explain this to Duchess Sarah in your own words.”

“I see,” Frederick answered shortly, biting back the tempting retort that Annabelle would always be welcome at Heartwick Hall should she choose to visit, regardless of Stephen’s edict. “If that is all you have to say, let me see you to your carriage, Lord Emberly.”

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