CHAPTER TEN THE RAKE RETREATS #2
Penelope studied him. Her gaze shifted over his shoulder.
Gabriel did not turn. He knew Eleanor had entered because the room changed.
Not visibly. Conversations continued, musicians played and a footman nearly collided with a marble pedestal while admiring Frances Pembroke’s gown.
Yet Gabriel felt Eleanor’s presence with the same instinct that had allowed him to recognise her beneath a male disguise days later, though that moment had not yet occurred. He looked despite every plan.
Eleanor stood beside Arabella near the ballroom entrance.
She wore a gown of deep green silk, modest in cut and rich enough to ensure no one mistook the colour for wallflower grey.
Her dark hair had been arranged simply, without the sensual curls of Mrs. Grey, and no mask hid her eyes.
Miss Finch had attended the reception. But she no longer looked invisible.
Eleanor spoke to Catherine while surveying the room with quiet confidence.
Her gaze crossed Gabriel once and moved on without hesitation.
His body reacted as though she had touched him.
Memory struck in a series of intimate fragments: Eleanor naked above him; her lips against the scars on his side; the warmth of her breast beneath his cheek; the expression in her eyes when she realised she loved him. Gabriel turned back to Penelope.
“Help me,” he said.
The countess’s brows lifted. “With what?”
“Flirt with me.”
“I usually require greater incentive.”
“Your husband believes your new Italian music master is pursuing you.”
“He is pursuing my maid.”
“I can correct the misunderstanding.”
Penelope’s gaze sharpened. “You want someone to see.”
“Yes.”
“Someone you are attempting to protect through emotional idiocy?”
“You always had a gift for poetry.”
“No.”
“Penelope.”
She sighed.
“Very well. But if this ends with a woman striking you, I shall applaud her.”
Gabriel took her glass and set it upon a passing tray.
Then he began. He leaned close, lowered his voice and offered the smile society expected to precede adultery.
Penelope placed one hand upon his sleeve while he complimented her eyes, her gown and the memory of a summer afternoon they both knew had occurred under very different circumstances.
Gabriel ensured the performance could be seen.
He laughed at her answer and touched one finger to the ribbon at her wrist.
He looked toward Eleanor only once. She was watching.
Pain struck before he could prevent it. Eleanor’s face remained composed, but Gabriel knew her.
He saw the brief stillness in her shoulders and the way her fingers tightened around the closed fan she held.
The cruelty had worked. He felt no relief.
Penelope said something he did not hear.
Gabriel answered with the phrase he used when attention failed him.
“My dear countess, no jewel in this room could rival the colour of your eyes.”
Penelope stared.
“You told me that six years ago.”
“I was younger and more original.”
“You told Lady Cowper the same thing ten minutes ago.”
Gabriel smiled. “Her eyes were a different colour.”
“Still more original than this performance.”
A third voice entered.
“Has he explained that he repeats compliments?”
Eleanor stood beside them. Gabriel had not seen her approach. That in itself should have warned him. Penelope’s eyes brightened with immediate interest.
“I had begun to suspect.”
“He also uses self-mockery when a conversation becomes inconvenient,” Eleanor said. “If that fails, he asks a question concerning your desires and allows you to believe the subject changed naturally.”
Penelope looked at Gabriel.
“Does he?”
“Constantly.”
Gabriel recovered his public smile. “Miss Finch has developed an unfortunate interest in analysing innocent social behaviour.”
“Innocent?” Penelope asked.
“Compared with his usual conduct,” Eleanor said.
The countess laughed. Gabriel experienced the peculiar sensation of watching two intelligent women dismantle a persona he had spent a decade refining. Penelope squeezed his arm.
“I believe you have become predictable, Ashcombe.”
“So I am told.”
“That sounds serious.”
“It is terminal.”
She looked from Gabriel to Eleanor and understood enough to make departure tactful rather than obvious.
“Miss Finch, it has been illuminating.”
“Countess.”
Penelope leaned near Gabriel’s ear as she passed.
“She is magnificent. You are a fool.”
Then she left them beside the conservatory. Gabriel glanced toward the surrounding guests. Several had noticed the exchange, though none stood close enough to hear every word.
“Your intervention was unnecessary,” he said.
Eleanor opened her fan.
“So was your performance.”
“I was speaking to an old friend.”
“You were displaying her.”
“Penelope consented.”
“To being used as a message?”
“She understood.”
“How fortunate that one of the women involved did.”
Gabriel’s smile tightened. Eleanor saw it.
“You are attempting to drive me away,” she said.
Her voice remained low enough for privacy. He looked toward the dancers.
“You overestimate your importance.”
“That might have worked before you taught me to recognise false indifference.”
“I taught you too well.”
“Yes.”
The answer carried neither pride nor apology. Eleanor stepped closer. Not close enough for scandal. Close enough that Gabriel could smell lavender and feel every instinct turn toward her.
“Your technique has become predictable,” she said.
“Predictability should make me easier to forget.”
Something flashed in her eyes. Pain, anger and the same unbearable tenderness he had fled.
“You have greatly overestimated your own simplicity.”
Gabriel’s throat tightened. He wanted to say her name.
He wanted to tell her that no part of this was simple, that he had imagined returning to his house each night and finding her manuscripts in the secure cabinet, the key in her possession and her body in his bed. Instead, he looked past her shoulder.
“Arabella is watching.”
“She is deciding whether to strike you with her cane.”
“An understandable impulse.”
“I am not chasing you, Gabriel.”
The use of his name cut through every defence. Eleanor folded her fan.
“You ended the lessons. You directed the investigation through Julian. You made your choice.”
“Yes.”
“Then do not insult me by behaving as though I am too foolish to recognise why.”
Gabriel met her gaze.
“What do you recognise?”
“That you are terrified.”
A laugh almost escaped him. Nothing in her expression permitted it.
“You left first,” she continued, “because you believe abandonment hurts less when you control its timing.”
His father’s voice returned from childhood. Never allow another person to hold what you cannot bear to lose. Gabriel looked away. Eleanor’s voice softened.
“It does not.”
The tenderness was worse than accusation. Gabriel found cruelty again because it was the only weapon within reach.
“You will recover.”
Her face became still.
“I know.”
“Good.”
Eleanor stepped back. For one irrational instant, Gabriel expected her to argue. She merely inclined her head.
“Enjoy your reception, Lord Ashcombe.”
Then she turned and walked toward Arabella without looking back. Gabriel remained beside the conservatory, surrounded by music and conversation, feeling as though the room had emptied. Julian appeared several moments later.
“You are an idiot,” he said.
Gabriel accepted another glass of champagne from a passing servant.
“I had gathered.”
“Beatrice wants me to take you outside.”
“To duel?”
“To explain human emotion.”
“Then I prefer the duel.”
Julian looked toward Eleanor.
“She loves you.”
Gabriel drank.
“That is the problem.”
“No. The problem is that you believe love creates a debt you cannot survive owing.”
Gabriel lowered the glass.
“Marriage has made you philosophical.”
“Marriage has made me recognise familiar cowardice.”
“Did Beatrice write that?”
“No.”
“Then she has improved your vocabulary.”
Julian’s expression did not change.
“Eleanor will not wait indefinitely.”
“I am not asking her to.”
“You may discover that is worse.”
Gabriel set down the untouched champagne.
“I need air.”
“You need courage.”
“The terrace offers both poorly.”
He left before Julian could answer. Outside, cold night air struck his face.
Gabriel gripped the stone balustrade and told himself Eleanor’s final words had granted what he wanted.
She would not chase him. She would continue without him.
He had protected her from the most dangerous part of the investigation.
Himself. Inside the ballroom, the musicians began another waltz.
Gabriel closed his eyes and remembered her counting beneath her breath while his hand rested at her back.
Pleasure rarely is reliable. He had said it as instruction. He had not understood the warning.
* * *
At Rothmere House the following afternoon, Beatrice proposed kidnapping an earl.
“It would not be kidnapping,” she said. “Gabriel already visits voluntarily.”
“Not if you lock the door,” Catherine replied.
“That would merely encourage him to remain long enough to complete a conversation.”
The Society gathered in Arabella’s visible morning room rather than the hidden library because Barlow supervised workmen repairing a damaged mechanism below.
Papers covered the low table. Clara sat among three ledgers, Sophia had a pile of Finch publications and Frances held a biscuit in one hand while sketching possible disguises with the other.
Eleanor stood at the window. She had told them she loved Gabriel.
The admission emerged without drama after Arabella asked whether his performance at Lady Ormond’s reception had achieved its purpose.
“Yes,” Eleanor said. “He wanted to hurt me enough that I would stop hoping.”
“And did you?” Sophia asked.
“No.”
Beatrice set down her tea. “Then we lock him in a room.”
Catherine sighed. “Love cannot be negotiated through force.”
“Not love. Honesty.”
“Nor can honesty.”
“Julian became honest after being locked in a cellar.”