Chapter 2
Chapter Two
Clearford House, London, February 1826
A problem was only a bullseye waiting to be conquered. And Samuel Merriweather, Duke of Clearford had a talent for hitting bullseyes. With knife or mind, he rarely missed. Of course, when he did miss, it tended to be by a spectacularly disastrous margin.
Not this time, though.
The matchmaker would arrive any moment. One bullseye hit. His unmarried sisters would find husbands with less effort and fewer complications than heretofore. All it took was entirely divorcing himself from the situation.
The second bullseye had just been hit as well. His own problem—find a wife he could not ruin with a connection to his scandalous family—entirely solved now. Well… soon it would be.
“A widow?” Samuel stared out at the garden in the middle of Grosvenor Square, abandoned at this time of night. “And she’s already aware of the library’s existence?”
“She participates in the monthly book exchanges,” Lottie said. His eldest sister sat straight and prim in a chair in the family drawing room. “She knows well the risks, and she accepts them. A marriage to you would offer no new ones.”
A surprising solution to a problem he’d not known existed eight months ago. His eldest sisters secretly ran a lending library. For erotic books. They’d done damn well hiding it for years, explaining away any scandal that had arisen because of it. Sometimes he felt a glow of pride in them. They were foolhardy but clever. He didn’t particularly want to think of them reading those books. But they seemed no worse for it, and their husbands did not care. Why should he?
Except for one tiny thorn stuck in his hide, radiating pain, promising infection.
If he married, he’d be bringing an innocent woman into a potentially volatile situation. He’d almost been blackmailed into marrying an unsuitable woman last Season because of the library. Who knew how many explosions were planted around him, waiting to go off? He could not ask anyone to risk the sort of infamy that saw one shunned by society.
“It could work,” he said, seeing beyond his sister’s reflection in the glass, past the street, and to the gas-lamp lined garden beyond. Marry a woman who knew , who already risked scandal? He could have his heir without harming someone else.
“But is it what you want?” Lottie asked.
He blinked to refocus, found his sister’s wavering reflection, the gold of her hair, the roundness of her belly filled with her second child, her sharp, intelligent countenance. Those softer in the reflection. Or softer because of her question?
“You do not have to settle, Clearford.” Lady Templeton sat near the fire, her hands folded neatly in her lap as she regarded him. “You could demand your sisters stop.”
“What use is that?” Samuel asked, each word weary on his tongue. “The damage has been done, the risk of scandal created. They might as well be happy.”
“We’ve been over this, Samuel,” Lottie said. “ You must be happy as well.”
“I must be married. That is all.” Those words even wearier, heavy like stones.
“You could have married at any time.” Lady Templeton’s blue eyes probed deeper than Samuel wanted them to, and he crossed his arms over his chest to keep her from prying into his heart. “But you’ve put it off. Year after year after year. If it was simply marriage and an heir you were after, it would have been done already.”
True.
He’d been waiting for an arrow to hit the bullseye of his heart. As of yet, no one possessed an aim good enough to even glance off one of his ribs. He could waste no more time being a foolish romantic.
“At least speak with the matchmaker for your own benefit, Clearford,” Lady Templeton said. “You are in more need of her than Felicity. A woman of advanced years will be able to understand a man of advanced years such as yourself.”
God, she made him sound so old, but surely he wasn’t as long in the tooth as the spinster who would arrive tomorrow. “I have no need of Lady Emma. Tell me the widow’s name.”
“Dowager Marchioness Huxley,” Lady Templeton said. “Rosalie. Second wife to Marquess Huxley, widowed five years ago and eight months after her marriage. No children. She joined our group a year after her husband’s death. Other than her reading preferences, she is perfectly polite and well-mannered.”
“And pretty,” Lottie added. “Four and twenty years of age.”
“She is younger than you. Younger than Andromeda and Prudence. Younger than the twins. By two years.” He was grumbling. A plain fact, that, and not one that would bother most men. But he didn’t want a wife younger than most of his sisters. It felt… odd.
Another fact—no matter his grumbling, he’d run out of time to be choosy.
“A young wife is best.” Lady Templeton stood and picked a cautious path toward him. “You do need an heir, after all, and it is not guaranteed you’ll receive one with the first babe.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose. What a headache.
It didn’t have to be. “Very well. Arrange a meeting. If she’s agreeable to me, and I to her, we’ll wed as soon as the bans can be called.”
Lottie used the arms of her chair to lumber to her feet. “Give yourself time to come to know one another, Samuel. No need to make a decision this very moment.”
He strode for the door. “Decision made. I’m going out.”
“It’s late.” Lottie glared at the night-dark square of window across the room.
“I need air.” He swung down the hall, the front door and freedom growing closer with each rapid step.
He was grateful. Despite seeing five of his eight sisters married in the last eight years, he felt a complete failure. He’d certainly done nothing to help them find suitable husbands. In fact, his meddling had in at least one case caused his sister pain. He rubbed at his chest as he stepped outside and crossed the street. The groan from the gate opening into the Grosvenor Square garden covered the groan from his lips, and after the click of the latch catching, the silence of the night swallowed him whole.
Shaking the Duke of Clearford’s habitual armor loose and letting it fall, he welcomed the quietude of the night. Welcomed the soft glow of the lights already lit in intervals around the garden, welcomed the low shush of the wind through the trees. Welcomed Samuel Merriweather back into existence if only for half an hour.
Clouds weaved gray striations across the navy sky, hiding stars and obscuring the moon. A dark night but for the lamps, but light enough to pick his way to the center of the garden, to the bronze statue of King George I atop a horse facing the eventual sunrise. The gas lamps barely reached here. Only a glimmer or two sparked off the statue’s weather-dimmed exterior.
“Hello, Georgie old boy.” Samuel sank to the grass below the statue and rested his elbows on bent knees. “It’s an excellent plan, isn’t it? The widow?”
George did not answer.
“Of course you married for more mercenary reasons. I don’t judge you. But I always thought I’d be different. I’m trying not to complain. I’m aware there are many excellent reasons to marry, excluding love, yet sometimes the heart outwits the brain. I had hoped…”
What a fool he was, talking to a statue at five and thirty years of age. He fell back into the grass, stretching out as far as he could in every direction, closing his eyes. Why did he feel like he’d just drank an entire jug of curdled milk? Sour. Churning. Sick. Like he wanted to run until he couldn’t smell or taste it anymore.
The grass near his ankles swished, and the breeze made the tree branches creak, and a soft, startled squeak broke through the silent night.
His eyes popped open. The clouds had rolled away from the moon, and it bathed the garden in pale yellow light, illuminating a woman’s face. She was a collection of shapes and impressions in the moon’s dim glow—wide eyes, pale skin, parted mouth, and white teeth, all of it collected beneath a cloak, the color of which the night hid well. The moon shone around her head like a crown.
He curled up, propping himself on his elbows behind him, unable to look away. She seemed a fairy spirit sent to tempt him. A moon maiden meant for mischief.
“You scared me,” she gasped, clutching her cloak to her chest. Her voice was soft as morning with a rich Scottish brogue. She took a fortifying breath and shook her fears away, dislodging the hood of her cloak, which fell down her back, revealing a halo of copper to tease the moon crown the sky had coronated her with.
He jumped to his feet as a cloud rolled over the moon, irritated. With himself for scaring her or with her for the snap of accusation in her voice? His brain sank claws into the irritation. “You almost trod on me .”
“One does not expect to find gentlemen growing in the garden. Besides, you nearly tripped me.” Cast once more in shadow, he possessed only her voice to interpret her by, but that gave all he needed. Tart and strong. She did not waver in her annoyance.
“One does not expect to find… women walking… in the… garden.” Hell. That’s exactly where one expected to find them walking. Too tired to make sense. He chuckled.
She did, too, and his ire melted like fog in the morning sun. He should be indignant, but he didn’t have the energy for it. Easier to let himself be charmed by her boldness, amused by her repartee.
“Is this an English habit I’m unaware of?” she asked. “Lying in the grass at night? Seems odd, but as this is my first time in London, I’m willing to admit I have much to learn about its customs.”
Humiliation should be flailing him alive right now. But the humor in her voice kept embarrassment far away. Perhaps yesterday, or even this morning, he’d have pulled himself up tall, lifted one disproving brow, and refused to participate in her idle chatter. But God, he was tired of being so damn serious all the time. And he faced a lifetime of seriousness soon. What was one night of idle amusement?
A blessed reprieve, that’s what it was.
He sat on the grassy platform lifting old Georgie. “If I tell you that it is a very honored custom, will you sprawl in the grass with me?”
“Certainly not. Now I see you’re nothing but a rogue. A wolf. And a smart woman never sprawls with that sort.” She ducked her head. If the sun replaced the clouded moon, would he find her cheeks pretty and red? “A smart woman doesn’t sprawl at all. I should return home.” She glanced over her shoulder as she murmured the last bit, her body leaning backward with a single step away from him.
He hadn’t meant… hell. “I did not mean to insult you or… or to imply—”
Her laugh seemed to rustle the tree leaves better than the breeze. “I’m aware. I should leave, though. Good evening.”
“Good evening.”
She bowed and stumbled back toward the shadows, and it felt like she stretched something in him to a breaking point with each step.
“Wait,” he called.
She paused.
“Sit with me? Just for a minute or two.”
She drew herself up tall, tipping her chin high. “That is an inappropriate request, sir. We do not know one another.”
He should ask for her name. Then they would know one another. But he didn’t want to. Whoever this moon maiden was when the sun poured itself across the sky didn’t matter. Who he was when dawn broke—of no importance. Tomorrow, the Duke of Clearford would court a widow for duty and obligation. Tonight, Samuel Merriweather would flirt with a stranger. If he didn’t fall in love with his future wife… well, then at least he’d have this final, mad flirtation. Harmless. And somehow also essential.
“We do not have to know one another to enjoy a moment of companionship.”
She snorted. “Companionship? Is that what rakes are calling it? I am no fool, sir.”
“I am far from a rake. I couldn’t rake even if I tried. And I don’t think I ever have.”
“You do not think ? Hm. I’d prefer more certainty than that.” But, miracle of miracles, she ambled toward him and sat on the other side of the platform, much beyond arm’s reach.
His lungs drew breath more easily, the weight of the dark sky lighter with someone to share it.
“Did you trip and fall?” she asked. “Is that why you were hugging the ground?”
“No. I… I merely wished to disappear for a few breaths.” Mad to admit the truth to this stranger, but he needed to say it, needed to admit it, so he could move on from it with the strength expected of him.
“Ah.” The softest, smallest sound, yet in it a world of understanding. She’d known the desire to disappear before. “That’s easiest to do laid out beneath the sky. It’s so very big.” She stared straight ahead, and her profile waved the slightest bit at the lips. Biting one? “Makes one feel so very small. Almost not there at all.”
Exactly. “Are you visiting Lord Macintosh?”
“I am. How did you know?”
“The man’s family is extensive. And mostly Scottish. They seem to keep a rotating schedule of visitors, so his guest chambers are never empty.”
That earned another laugh, and that laugh lifted his soul higher than it had soared in years. Because he’d caused it. He should ask if this young beauty knew the matchmaker. But those were daytime worries, heavy and cold, and they might make the moon disappear again. Would she disappear with it?
“It is difficult to tell,” she said, leaning into the empty space between them, “in the dark and all, but I have the distinct impression you are suddenly sad.”
“I am remembering mistakes. Remembering obligations and problems I must face once I leave this garden.”
“The things that made you wish to disappear?”
He pulled up his knees and rested his forearms on top of them. “Let us speak of something else.”
She rustled. “We should not speak at all. I’ve been warned of London’s many dangers. And I am well aware of the dangers of men, no matter what city they inhabit.”
Well aware . Hopefully not personally aware. “You need not fear me.”
“I think… I think I believe you. You are too sad to fear.”
He laughed. “I should argue with what feels oddly like an insult, but I cannot. I find myself sad often these days.”
“Is sadness an epidemic?” she whispered, almost to herself. Then slightly louder, her face tilted toward him, she said, “I wandered outside for fresh air. To help me think. I, too, like to disappear from time to time.”
“Take all the fresh air you need. You are safe with me. I am too pitiful to pose a danger, remember.” He scooted an inch farther away from her—evidence of his good intentions. “I’ll even pretend you are not here, entirely invisible.”
“I believe you. But… I do not wish to be invisible right now. I’ve had quite enough of that recently.”
“I am sorry to hear that, moon maiden. I am also worried you trust too easily.” Because if he weren’t a gentleman, he’d never be able to resist touching the pale oval of her face, kissing the dark slash of curving lip. But he was.
“Perhaps I do.” She pulled her cloak more tightly around her. “Shall we think together in entirely visible silence?”
He did not want to think. He wanted to talk and to listen to her make familiar words new again in that lovely voice. “What is it your brain is chewing over so thoroughly it needs fresh air to continue?”
She hesitated, a long stretch of silence where she became as still as old George above them. The rustle of her cloak and skirts preceded her answer. “My sisters. I have four of them. Three unwed.” She said unwed as if it were the most debilitating of diseases.
She’d been made for him. Some star had peeked down at him and forged a woman who could understand his woes. “I have unwed sisters, too.”
“You understand, then. It is quite concerning.”
“A veritable plague.”
“They are so very… vulnerable.”
“Yes.” Exactly. He could care for their bodies, keep them well clothed and well-fed, and give them everything money could buy. Yet still the world could shred them like a sharp blade against a sheer length of muslin. And their hearts… little he could do to protect those. They would give them as they saw fit with no input from him, and even if the men they trusted did not deserve it.
More rustling as she slid closer to him, halving the distance between them. He inhaled to steady his nerves, which seemed to leap at her closeness, and along with the night air, he caught the scent of something sweeter. Something cinnamon and something floral. Her? He inhaled again, deeper, dragging it in as if doing so could drag her even closer.
“Who are you?” she asked. She faced him, and he could see the whites of her eyes, see when she blinked, but her face was shadows still beneath the hidden moon at the dim edges of the gas lamps surrounding the garden. So must his face be to her—nothing more than hazy lips moving within a pale oval.
“I am a man with many sisters. Unwed sisters.”
“I was looking for a name, but that tells me more. Even though I already knew that.” The last bit she grumbled as if she was half a breath away from chastising him.
He scooted into the disappearing space between them. “No names, moon maiden. Not tonight.” Moon madness. Him? Fanciful? Not in years. Decades, it seemed. Another life when he roamed wild over the fields and forests surrounding Clearford Castle, a gaggle of sisters at his back, stick swords strapped to their waists, paper crowns topping their hair.
When he realized he was lifting his hand, reaching out, it was too late to stop it. That’s what he told himself, at least, as he pushed a curl behind her ear. He’d never touched anything quite so soft.
“Aye.” The word a breath. “No names tonight.”
“You understand.”
“I think I do. Tomorrow the work begins. But tonight… right now—”
“Just the moon.”
“And us.” She shook her head. “Madness.”
“You read my mind. How do you do it?”
Her tiny shrug somehow brought them even closer together. He flattened his palm against the ground right at his side. Only the width of another hand would fit between her body and his.
Her hand dropped from her lap, fell into that sliver of a space. “I have long believed souls come in pairs. It is the lucky pair who find one another.”
“A romantic notion.” If he flicked his pinky outward, he might touch her. Did she wear gloves?
“Not always. Sometimes two practical souls meet and bond for reasons other than romance.”
“I pity those souls.” A truth he should not have put into the air. He did not have the luxury to pity himself.
“Do not pity them. Not everyone seeks a fluttering heart. Some wish only for a steady rhythm to live by. Something they can rely on.”
His heart fluttered. It had grown wings at the first sight of her, and now it lifted his hand, setting it atop hers. No glove. Cold satin skin stretched over the hills and valleys of her knuckles. Without searching, without seeing, he was able to slip his fingers between hers and curl them, his fingertips trapped between the top of her palm and the grass. Her hand froze. She stopped breathing. Then her fingers curled around his, and her breath warmed the night once more.
“And what do you seek?” he asked.
“That which I cannot have.” The pain in her voice, the longing…
It shattered him.
He looked away. “You are cold. You should return inside.” His hand clenched around hers, revealing the lie. He did not want her to leave.
“I should.”
Yet she did not move. The night air shivered, seeming to perk up to spy on them. The moon peeked out of the clouds, bathing them in light once more. It, too, curious as he about the woman, about himself, about what kind of mischief two bodies could create in a garden alone.
Not alone. They had each other.
“I should go,” she said again.
And when she did not yet move to leave, he wondered what he might do if she didn’t.