Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
C learford House was haunted. True, the ghost kept his distance, never approaching the front door, but Clearford House was his clear objective, his gaze always trained on the windows as they were now. He walked the perimeter of the garden, his face following Clearford House like a flower following the sun. Samuel considered throwing open the window and sticking his head out, waving and yelling at the man as if he were a bird about to befoul a newly cleaned street.
Instead, he propped a shoulder against the window frame and watched the ghost circle.
The Earl of Bransley, pale-faced and all too concerned with the comings and goings of Samuel’s home, was making a nuisance of himself, and if he did not stop lurking soon, Samuel would have to arrange a little chat with him. Felicity said the man was not lurking. But she said it with a small, satisfied smile. She knew. She liked it.
Samuel did not.
In the week since the Coldpepper’s ball, Samuel had taken to keeping watch out the windows, his gaze fastened on the ghost who never presented himself as a suitor, who had said—hadn’t he?—that Felicity was not good enough for him.
Dimwit. Perhaps Samuel should invite him to the portrait gallery and ask him to stand in front of the tree.
Emma disliked that idea, though. She’d been quite stern with him about it the few times they’d exchanged words in the last fortnight—a few minutes in Hyde Park, a sentence or two as she was coming and going with Felicity to some outing, a word exchanged in a loud ballroom, their shoulders an entire person’s worth of inches away from touching. Enough space between them for King George to fit.
They’d had one meeting in the portrait gallery, her soothing his Bransley-shaped fears, and him teaching her to snap her wrist the right way when she threw his knives. He taught from a distance. He spoke with her from a distance.
Any space between them shorter than an arm’s length too much temptation.
Dancing clearly too dangerous. He’d avoided that entirely. He didn’t feel like a friend when he danced with her, had trouble convincing himself those moon garden feelings were false. Tomorrow, another weekly meeting. He’d keep the conversation focused on Bransley. What were they to do with the haunting earl? Particularly if Samuel were not allowed to threaten him!
Perhaps he could simply… scare him off. Samuel’s belly growled. When had he last eaten? But he could not move from his spot if that man circled like a bird of prey. It was for Samuel’s own good that he sent the man running. Bransley must be hungry, too. How long had he been out there? He should go home, eat. Leave Felicity alone.
Samuel made his way downstairs, each footstep quicker than the last, and out onto the street. He could not see the man so well without his bird’s-eye view. But he knew which direction Bransley traveled around the garden. Samuel would take the opposite route.
Setting his steps casually clockwise around the garden, he slipped his hands into his pockets and whistled. He simply wished to enjoy the setting of the sun. No better time of day to stretch the legs, enjoy fresh air, and—
“Hell.” He rocked back onto his heels as he almost ran into a body coming round the corner. “You?”
Lady Emma pointed a finger at him, the other hand firm on her hip, as she marched him backward. “Me! What do you think you are doing?”
No more retreat. He stood his ground, legs wide, arms crossing over his chest. “Walking. In front of my house. I’ve every right to do that.”
Her turn to rock back now when she almost bumped into his chest. But not too far. Her ire kept her close enough to poke him, or gut him, should she so desire. “I told you to leave the poor man alone.”
She was too close. He could touch her. The impulse flinched in each and every one of his fingers. This, what he’d been avoiding. This, what he craved, damn it all.
“What poor man?” he asked. “I’m the only poor soul I see here.”
“You know who I mean. You came out here to threaten him, didn’t you?”
“I’ve no idea what you mean. Such a devious mind you possess, my lady.”
“I saw you watching him.”
“Watching me, were you?” Flirting. He shouldn’t. But he leaned closer, bent his neck, and inhaled. Cinnamon and flowers. What soap did she use? If he stole a bar and used it himself would the scent dull his cravings? For her.
Red rushed across her cheeks. “What I am doing is of no consequence. I thought we agreed you were to leave him alone.”
“But he’s not left Felicity alone. What have you done with him?”
“I sent him away.”
“Thank you.”
Her brows rushed together. “I did it for his sake, not yours.”
“The man’s gone, which is exactly what I wanted. Stroll with me? It’s a fine evening.”
“You’re evading a serious conversation.”
“I’m welcoming it. Tomorrow , when we are scheduled to discuss it. For now… Bransley is gone, and I can relax my watch, and I would like company.” Her company. “Please? I’m rather exhausted from pacing between windows, and I see you are, too.”
“I wasn’t pacing,” she grumbled.
“Of course not.” He held out his arm.
And she took it. “A short walk only. Night is falling.”
Yes, and it was already growing dark and cold. The day having been gray under the weight of rain clouds, the night proved to be ink in no time.
He pulled her more tightly to his side than he should. Anyone watching from a window, as they had been, would see, would wonder, would eventually whisper. No reason for it, though. They were friends, nothing more. Could he not enjoy a conversation with other women once he wed? Of course he could! Particularly when visible to the entire square! Everything perfectly proper. Except, perhaps, the way his body reacted to her like a starving man at his first meal, ravenous to dig in, almost weeping at the relief soon to come.
Down, loins. No relief today. Or ever. With Lady Emma.
“How is your courtship of Lady Huxley progressing?” Lady Emma asked, her voice soft in the fading light.
“Do you hope to offer advice?” God, anything but that.
“No. Not unless you ask. I find myself curious about the lady, though. We spoke at the Coldpepper ball.”
“And what did you think of her?”
“A lovely woman, an excellent candidate for duchess. Quite… candid in her thoughts.”
“What did you speak about?”
“That is none of your business.”
“I suppose so.” When they reached a path that led into the garden, he opened the gate and guided her through. “Have you considered the jealousy question further?”
“Yes, actually. I think Bransley is eaten alive by it.”
“And the other suitors?”
“Similar. They’ve increased their attentions.”
“And Felicity? She seems… pleased by current circumstances.”
Lady Emma laughed. “Indeed, she does. Not jealous a bit, but giddy from so much jealousy surrounding her.”
“Should I be worried?”
“I’ll let you know when it comes to that.”
He trusted she would, and that made some tightly held worry in his chest loosen, dissolve. With Lady Emma, he need not shoulder all the care alone. “What are your next steps? To match Felicity with someone perfect?”
Her gait slowed, and she rolled her lips between her teeth. “I think—and do not yell—I need to speak with Bransley.”
“I will not yell!”
“You’re yelling.”
“Because you need do nothing about Bransley! Except send him away!”
“Clearford.” She gave him a look. It said settle down . It said stop being a nodcock . It said you do not always get what you want, and you are not always right .
That last he already understood. Didn’t mean he liked it.
He pulled away from her and headed toward the center of the garden. King George would help him think. Above Clearford House, the sky glowed pink and purple, above it a blanket of navy blue. No stars yet. But the world was whirring toward silence, and he welcomed it, needed an absolute absence of sound to hear reason within his own mind.
He sat on the grassy base of the king’s statue, rested his elbows on his thighs, and hung his hands. Hung his head, too. But he heard her approach, saw the sway of her blue skirts brushing the grass a mere inch away from the toes of his boots.
“Explain it to me,” he said without looking up. “Because I see a man who hurt my sister, a man without sense, and I’d rather push him off the top of St. Paul’s than let him anywhere near her. Frankly, I would not even have to move from my perch at a window to take care of him. Choose a knife, take aim… You will advise against that, I presume.” He ventured a look at her, tilting his head back.
Was rewarded with the prettiest, most amused smile curving her pink lips. “No. I cannot say that would be advisable.” She sat next to him, her shawl falling off her shoulder as she folded her hands in her lap.
He tugged it up to her neck, loving the heat of her skin, before falling back onto his palms behind him to stare up at the gray sky. “What, then?”
She rubbed her neck where his fingers had brushed against her, then pulled the shawl more tightly about her, clutching it with both hands against her chest. “We should not trust him.”
“Now you speak sense.”
“And he must earn back any warm feeling. From her. From you.”
“If he can.”
“But he might… just might… deserve the opportunity to do so. And I cannot determine that unless I speak with him first. No. Not me. You. You must speak with him and let me listen.”
“Me? You trust me not to put a knife through his gut?”
“Yes.”
“Do you mean that?” To be trusted to do something right… God, it felt miraculous.
“I do. Since I have known you, you’ve shown nothing but your love for your sisters. As well as a great capacity to grow. Love. And learning. I can imagine no two more admirable qualities.”
She admired him. His heart swelled, nearly breaking his ribs. If she trusted him, he’d damn well trust himself.
He leaned too far toward her to bump his shoulder against hers. “You’re good at this. How did you start?”
“It’s a tedious story. You do not wish to hear it.”
“I want to hear all your stories.” He should not have looked into her eyes to say that. He’d give away too much of himself. Funny, though, it felt like she already had so much of him, none remained for him to give. When had that happened? Why had he let it happen, so quietly, so completely? A man could survive a scandal, a giving of a kiss in broad daylight with witnesses whispering all about. But to discover a woman held your soul in the soft palm of her hand? To realize he might never get it back and didn’t want it? What need had he for a soul, anyway? Marriage needed it not unless… Foolish thoughts. Foolish man.
She shivered. He wanted to wrap an arm around her. He dug his fingertips into the grass.
“I was engaged to marry a man I was not fond of,” she said. “He was, in no way, a man I could see myself living with day in and day out. So I… I matched him with another woman. Slyly, of course. He hardly knew what I was doing. And then when he came to tell me he must call off our engagement, I pretended to be quite sad but quite understanding.”
“Little actress.”
“Not quite. I may have fooled him, but I did not fool his future wife, and a few months after they were married, she approached me, asked me why and how. I told her they wanted the same things, valued the same things, so it had been rather obvious to me they would suit. And a few weeks after that, she returned, asking me to find her friend a suitable husband. So I did, and after that”—she shrugged—“my reputation only grew.”
“Your father approves, clearly.”
“Yes. I can say without a doubt he approves.”
“Thank you for leaving your home and your usual matchmaking prospects to help me.”
She hung her head, her entire body seeming to buzz, but whatever it was building inside her, she suppressed it and smiled. “I am happy to do it. Should I stay in Edinburgh, I should eventually make all the matches there are to make. Until more ladies come of age, that is.”
“You’re expanding your business, then.”
“Success with Felicity means success with others here in London.”
“Until you marry? Or will you continue after?”
“I will not marry. My father needs me, and my sisters need me. And oh, you know how it is. I know you do. It’s impossible to stop wanting something sometimes. Even when it’s not practical.”
Couldn’t say a damn thing to that. She’d hit the truth like a bullseye.
“I think,” she said, “I might stay in London. Lady Macintosh is eager to give my sisters Seasons when they are old enough.”
Stay. In London. God, what a complication, seeing her across the street every day after he married another woman. He swallowed the lump forming in his throat. “Won’t you miss your home?”
“No.” Such a quick answer, such an absolute dismissal.
“Why?” None of his business, but he could not keep the question locked up. Would knowing help ease this fever he felt for her? Or heighten it to a deathly pitch?
“It is not so much my home as where I’ve always lived.”
Deathly pitch. Definitely a deathly pitch. He inched closer to her, hoping his fingers might find the edge of her skirts. “Then make Lady Macintosh’s home yours.” Even if it killed him. “I hope you find as much for yourself here as we have found in you.”
“Thank you. I have done nothing. Yet.” Her voice so soft, he almost did not hear her speak. “I should not say this to you, but I guess I cannot stop myself.”
When she paused, he bumped her shoulder. “You seem to have stopped yourself.”
She gave a breathy laugh. “I am searching for the right way to say I’m scared of disappointing you. And your sister. And my father.”
He shouldn’t. But he, too, could not help himself. He ran his knuckles down her cheek, and she leaned into the caress.
“I find it difficult,” he said, “to imagine being disappointed by you.”
“Ha.” She leaned away from him, and he dropped his hand to his side as she tipped her face up to the sky, inhaling the night air, exhaling warm breath. Apparently releasing her fears, too, because she faced him and said, “I know dukes do not make mistakes, so you must consider this question in the hypothetical sense. Were you to make a mistake, do you… do you think you could shrug it off, set it into the wind, and watch it blow away? Or… or would it live in you? Curl up in your chest and make every breath a pain, haunt your sleeping hours, and make your waking ones a misery? Were you to make a mistake… could you forgive yourself or—”
“Lady Emma.”
Still, she looked up, her body frozen, her eyes unblinking, ringed by thick, copper lashes.
“Look at me, Emma.” Finally, she did, and it damn near broke his heart at the pain he saw there. “You know I make mistakes. The day we met, truly met, in my study, you threw mine right in my face. And yes… yes I carry them in my chest like breaths, like heart beats.”
“Makes living quite…”
“Humbling.”
“Precisely.”
He stood, but only long enough to swing around and face her, to kneel before her, and take her hands in his. Hers were cold, and he chaffed them between his palms, trying to warm them. “Mistakes are less difficult to bear when they impact only oneself. And they are almost impossible to survive when—”
“They hurt those we are meant to be protecting.” She pulled her hands from his grasp, curling them on her thighs.
“Precisely.” How did she know his heart so well? As if she’d been formed from its worries and its joys, its fears and its desires.
If he were to carve a name into a desk to calm him… it would be hers.
“I want to tell you something,” she said, her thumb rubbing circles in the dark material draped over her thigh. “But I do not think I should.”
“Do what you think best.” He wanted her secrets, all of them, whatever they were. But if he said that, she would not give them.
“Do not yell.”
He lifted a brow, a playful arch. But something sour rumbled inside him, some grumbling warning.
“I made a mistake in Edinburgh. With a match.” Her fingers clenched, and he wanted to soothe them, to rub his thumb along her knuckles until they loosened. But he hung his hands between his legs, useless damn things, and her hands slowly became fists no soothing could conquer. “I encouraged a match between a friend and a gentleman new to town. It seemed perfect, and my friend grew to think she might love him. I encouraged that feeling until he… until he began to say things to me.”
“What sorts of things ?”
“Complimenting me mostly. In ways that seemed appropriate, but when paired with how he looked at me… were not appropriate at all.” Telling this story was pinching something in her, making something deep in her soul hurt, a pain writ clearly on her face, across her taut shoulders, in her angry fist and her shattered voice.
The impulse to touch her nearly knocked him over, nearly setting off a chain of actions he’d never be able to take back, but somehow he checked them all and sat next to her once more, the space between them empty but for the need that felt like lightning. He needed a damn outlet, and he found the knife nestled against his ribs beneath his waistcoat with practiced ease, flipped it open, closed, open, closed.
Only thing he could do since he couldn’t pull her onto his lap, kiss her, claim her, protect her.
“I told myself I was pretending,” she said, “but then he sent me a note, and I knew I was not.”
“What did it say?” He did not yell. He kept his voice as quiet as he would be when he danced up behind this man and sliced a lovely red ribbon into his throat.
“The note said he loved me and could not marry my friend. I wrote back, telling him he was wrong, and then I told my friend she should look elsewhere for a husband, but I did not tell her why. That, likely the biggest mistake in a debacle rife with them. But I’d hoped that would be the end of it.”
“It was not?”
“H-he… cornered me at an art gallery and tried to… tried to persuade me by—” She shivered, and though she tried to trap it, a sob escaped as she wrapped her arms around herself. “No one saw. But he talked. Elaborated. Brag—” The end of the last word caught in her throat. Her cheeks hollow and eyes empty but for a sadness so complete it might carve out the entire world.
Hell. Who cared? The only thing that mattered was her. The gray sky had cleared somewhat, revealing the last waves of pink and purple draining into the rooftops. Above, a navy blanket and stars winking into existence. And Samuel did the only thing he could in full view of all of Grosvenor Square at dusk—placed his palm on her back and rubbed it up and down her spine. A mistake. A risk.
He didn’t give a damn.
“Did he hurt you?” he asked, barely in control of his own voice.
“No-no. Yes. He tried. He kissed me. Would have gone further, but my friend had seen him leave the ballroom. She discovered us. Thank heavens. But she thought I’d lured him there, intent on seducing him.” She gave a hard laugh. “And now all of Edinburgh feels the same. And this is what I should not tell you. I must be in London because no one in Edinburgh trusts me anymore. They all think I’ll seduce their suitors and leave them heartbroken. London is my only hope.” Each word smaller than the last, her voice a dying fall.
He pulled her to her feet. She followed with quick steps as he dragged her beneath a large tree with low-hanging branches. Hidden now. Not entirely, though. Someone still might see.
He didn’t care.
He bent low over her until they shared the air, their mingled breaths growing heavy, fast, frantic for a kiss.
Him at least. Her?
Her gaze dipped to his lips. So perhaps.
The ghost of their last kiss was alive between them, begging to be resurrected.
With one hand, he stroked his thumb across her cheek, the pad of it skating scandalously close to the perfect, secret corner of her lips.
And with the other hand, he gave her his knife.