Chapter 3 #3
“Have you not heard?” A faint smile touched her lips, though it lacked warmth. “Lady Slight no longer has affairs, darling. She has become quite a bore in recent months.”
Sebastian lifted a hand, rubbing it across his face as he tried to make sense of all this.
No longer has affairs?
He remembered her mention of recent changes, but he had not grasped what she meant. Had she truly turned away her paramours?
By choice? Or necessity?
His thoughts turned briefly to the odd collection of servants he had encountered in her home. Could it be that she had lost favor with the ton? Perhaps her servants had deserted her, eager to avoid being tarnished by the same brush of mysterious scandal that now hung over their mistress.
But no.
Sebastian had maintained correspondence with numerous members of the beau monde, and no whispers of scandal had reached him.
Then what has changed?
The question pressed upon him as he collected his thoughts.
“You wish me to … what? Share the holidays with you until Christmas, and then you will tell me where the painting is?”
Harriet’s smile returned, and for a moment, Sebastian felt a flicker of relief at seeing her good spirits restored.
“Precisely.”
Yet even as the word left her lips, Sebastian sensed something was off. Beneath the sparkling facade, Harry was hiding something. He recognized the signs, the same air of pretense she had worn the last time they had met. The last time she had pretended she would leave for Italy with him.
But after so many years apart, he no longer knew her well enough to discern what she was truly about. So, he thought, perhaps the best method of uncovering the truth was to spend time in her company in order to draw out her secrets.
And retrieve the painting on Lorenzo’s behalf.
Yet another thought murmured at the edges of his mind. Perhaps the best way to close the book on their past was to spend these weeks together before bidding her a proper farewell.
What was it Marco had said at the breakfast table? “We cannot give up on the future when it has so much more to offer than the past.”
Perhaps a couple of weeks in her company would be enough. Enough to lay the past to rest. Enough to finally let the memories go.
“All right. What does it entail?”
Sebastian left Harriet’s townhouse with plans arranged for the morning. Despite the singular nature of their agreement, he found—much to his surprise—that he felt lighter than he had since first reading Matteo’s letter to his sister so many months ago.
Progress.
Lorenzo would be pleased that progress had been made.
And Sebastian would observe Harriet, see her as she was now.
And he would come to understand that it had been written they remain apart.
Perhaps grow relieved, even, that he had never tied the knot with the young Harry who was now the Widow Slight.
When he witnessed her perfidious nature firsthand—not through the letters of friends, but with his own eyes—his heart would mend, and he would be free to build a new future of his own choosing.
Yet as he climbed into the waiting carriage, settling into the squabs, a thought came unbidden. What if she is not the woman they say she is? What if she never was?
When the carriage finally came to a stop in front of the Scotts’ modest town estate, Sebastian was no more settled on the bargain he had struck or Harriet’s true nature.
Despite her detractors, Sebastian had always seen her potential.
Seen into the heart of her. But perhaps he had been a besotted youth, blinded by his passions.
Or perhaps it was as he had told his brother …
Harriet had never had the opportunity to prove she could reject her father’s influence to carve her own path.
Shaking his head to clear his conflicting thoughts, he entered the house and made for the library where Lorenzo was certain to be awaiting his arrival.
His friend was at a library table, surrounded by a stack of history books about the Tudor period. Lorenzo had been combing through them for days in an attempt to understand the British world of three hundred years ago. He looked up, his lean face drawn as he greeted Sebastian.
“Did the widow tell you where the painting is?”
A twinge of worry nagged at Sebastian as he tried to calculate the best way to answer.
Lorenzo had grown ever more agitated regarding his quest to secure a name for the unrecognized Matteo as a great master of the Renaissance, and Sebastian was not sure how he would take the news that there was yet another delay.
“Lady Slight knows who has it, but she will not inform me until I fulfill a request.”
Lorenzo frowned, pushing back a lock of jet-black hair as he sank back in his seat. “A request?”
Sebastian cleared his throat, feeling decidedly uncomfortable as he tried to think how to explain his unusual bargain with Harriet.
“I am to spend time in her company until Christmas.”
Lorenzo’s face fell, his black eyes unexpectedly sympathetic. The Italian was single-minded in his quest, not often taking the time to notice what troubles others were contending with.
“I am sorry, Sebastian. I know you are reluctant to revisit the past.”
Sebastian nearly burst out laughing. “You assume I agreed.”
Lorenzo had straightened in alarm at the mere possibility he had not.
“Did you not?”
“Of course I agreed.”
His friend exhaled in relief. “Just so. I knew you would not let me down.”
Sebastian crossed the room, taking a seat across the table to gesture at the books.
“Did you find anything illuminating?”
“I found your British history is bloody and complicated,” Lorenzo replied in a frustrated tone. “Other than that, tell me about the painting again.”
Sebastian leaned back to think, as if they had not discussed this a thousand times. Lorenzo’s mission to uncover Matteo’s body of work was why they were in England.
“It references an Arthurian legend.”