Chapter 20 #2
The pieces were so quaint, the king was short, rotund, with a mass of robes, while the queen stood tall and had robes reminiscent of Mary, the mother of Jesus.
Gazing at the Bishop, a man holding a chalice, she wondered aloud, “Who made these?”
“That would be a rather irreverent American my father knew,” Cassian strode into the room.
From the way his robe was wet in places, and his hair was damp, she knew he had bathed as well. He plucked up a pawn, a very short man in rags holding a dagger, “His name was Arthur Bramfield, and he had an odd sense of humor.”
“It seems like your father associated with a lot of Americans,” she noted.
Settling the piece down, he snorted, “He amused himself with them.” Taking the seat across from her, he reclined. “It is how you women swoon over little animals, like you and that kitten of yours—” he paused, “—where is the little furball, by the by?”
“His mother came to retrieve him last night,” she said.
He shrugged while flicking a fingertip over the rook. “—Well, my father thought they were amusing and liked to hear about their new industries and the tensions between the south and the north. I honestly had forgotten about this thing.”
“It was in one of the trunks from your father’s study,” she noted. “Do you want to play?”
Cassian inclined his head, his eyes coasting over the board before he met her eyes. He took the chessboard and nodded to the door. “Come with me. I have a way to make this more interesting.”
Her brows lowered as she stood and left the room. He took her down to the library and trimmed the lamps, then vanished again.
With him gone, she arranged the pieces on the board and then tried to remember some chess strategies. Cassian returned with a bottle of wine and two small glasses.
“Cassian…” she began cautiously, her eyes focusing on the bottle while he poured out a small amount. “Are you sure about this?”
“Yes,” he nodded boyishly. “You only take a drink when you lose a piece. And if your King is checkmated, you take three.”
“Chess is the worst game to play inebriated,” she told him.
“Do you have court tomorrow?” He asked. “A visit with the Prince Regent or a business meeting perhaps?”
She tempered a smile. “No.”
“Then you can play,” he shrugged, while looking at the board. “You are taking the first move?”
“I’ve found myself on the defensive side for far too long lately,” Cecilia replied, while shifting a pawn. “I think I would like to try my hand at being the aggressor for once.”
His brows ticked up, but he followed with his move. Ten minutes in, Cecilia had taken four drinks while Cassian had taken seven.
As he castled his King, he asked, “What did you do today?”
She blinked and surveyed the scant pieces on the board. “I went to visit a few ladies I’d met at Earl Rainsville’s home.”
Grimacing, she took his rook with her last Bishop, knowing he would take that in the next move. It did not matter; she had her eyes on the King and was so near.
“Really…” he did as she expected and took the Bishop. “May I ask who?”
She was in the middle of taking another drink and fighting back the swooping feeling growing in her head. “Lady Jane and Catherine,” she said honestly. “Whitmore had courted them before me.”
“And why did you do that?” Cassian asked as he nudged his lone Knight forward.
She shrugged, “Misery loves company, I suppose.”
He laughed, “Sweetheart, if you asked me, I could have organized five more.”
“No,” she blinked, and slid her Queen forward while eyeing his Knight. “Three of us were enough.”
“Was wine involved?”
“No,” she said. “Tea and cake.”
“I see…” Cassian murmured as he slid his lone pawn in front of her Queen.
Triumphantly, she swooped the pawn. “Check.”
Cassian smiled, and his Bishop swept in and snagged her Queen out of nowhere. Her mouth dropped, and her head snapped side to side—a bad idea as the wine she’d drunk was already taking effect. “What—how?”
He smiled and slid his Queen, which he had moved across the board, to topple her King.
She glared, or attempted to, but by the laughter on Cassian’s face, her glare had fallen flat. Cecilia jabbed a finger into his chest. “That is illegal.”
“I am only saving you the pain of sacrificing your lone Rook,” he said while reaching over the board and snagging it. “This lone fellow deserves to go to the graveyard with dignity.”
She rolled her eyes, “I demand a rematch.”
“With the same terms?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll oblige,” Cassian replied as he pushed from the table. “But we need another bottle of wine.”
“Mind your step, Cecilia,” Cassian murmured as he half-carried Cecilia up the stairs back to her room, trying to hide his smile.
Tipsy Cecilia was truly the opposite of sober Cecilia, something he had found to be true in much detail—that drunken kiss several weeks ago aside.
While they had played their second and third game of chess, with her sipping her wine, she had become a fount of information, telling him things about her childhood and young adult days freely.
In truth, he was at fault for her tipsy state: as he had purposely lost some moves so he could fill her glass again and again. She had lost her self-consciousness bit by bit. He’d led her along with questions.
She’d lost her inhibitions and told him a rambling string of facts about her favorite hobbies as a child, reading he had known, but riding astride was one he had never expected.
She told him what her family was like, rigid and overly staid, as he had assumed, and the suitors her family had rejected before Whitmore.
They reached the top step, and she stumbled, giggling. As he caught her against him, he cautioned again. “Easy, Cece.”
He managed to push the door in and, even with the gloom of her bedroom, managed to guide her to the bed. He pulled the sheets apart and gently rested her on the bed—only for her to pull him down with her.
“Cecilia—”
“Stay with me tonight…” she sighed as he shifted his weight off her.
He wondered if she meant something else. “You are drunk, sweetheart. We cannot possibly—”
“I don’t want that,” she murmured. “I just want to be near you.”
“Excuse me,” he said. “I think I need to get you to write that out and sign it before I get it notarized.”
“Hush,” she rubbed her cheek on his chest. “This was ever so much fun. We should do chess matches more often. I don’t know why we haven’t.”
“Because I do not think getting you drunk frequently is a good idea,” Cassian said wryly. “I have learned more about you tonight in two hours than you have offered to tell me in the twenty-one days since we were married.”
“It has only been twenty-one days?” Cecilia murmured. She gave a large, unladylike yawn, and Cassian smothered his grin. “It feels longer.”
His hand ran up her back. “Do you mean that in a good way?”
She blinked up at him with heavy-lidded eyes, her cheeks were charmingly flushed, and her hair was splayed across the pillows. She was the very picture of wanton innocence.
Even though his body throbbed with interest, he reminded himself that not only was it she who was foxed. “I’m starting to think it might be.”
Cecilia dropped off to sleep with Cassian silently watching her, while trying to wrestle, again, with his emotions. Softly, he turned on his back and tucked his arms under his head to stare at the ceiling.
The iron-clad decision he had made to leave for the Continent was wavering, but now… he shifted his head to look at Cecilia. Could he really leave her, even with the ember of care and protectiveness he had for her blazing bright in his chest?
Maybe it’s time to start putting some distance between us.
A rustle beside him had his head turning to Cecilia, moments before she shifted to rest a hand on his chest. The urge he had just had to leave vanished.
Shifting them to their side, he wrapped his arm around her middle and tucked his face into the crook of her neck.
Maybe just this one time then.