Chapter Twelve #3
She closed her eyes and warmed herself as Sabine gently stripped her of her sodden stockings, unhooked her gown and let drop the weight to her feet.
Nell stepped out of the pile of fabric, letting the disappointment of an expensive gown ruined prick her only once.
There were many disappointments in life.
She would deal with those after she dealt with Lord Beckett.
That was the next task, and she dared not muddle her mind with other possibilities.
Sabine brought her a warm dressing gown—she must have tucked it in next to an ember-filled bed warmer, for the fabric slid like warm water along Nell’s arms. Then Sabine unpinned Nell’s damp hair—wet despite her wool bonnet’s protection.
She finger-combed out the tresses, while allowing the small braids to fall where they may.
“I’ll bring up a tray. Would you like me to stay in the room?” Sabine asked, rubbing warmth into Nell’s still-frozen hands.
“A chaperone?” Nell asked, amused that she could be north of thirty and need one.
“If you like. Or Jacobs standing by,” Sabine said and Nell understood what Sabine was trying to tell her.
She was safe. She was protected. She need not do anything she did not want to do.
Despite the difference in their classes, Sabine and Jacobs would happily boot an earl out on his ear if he said or did anything amiss.
Nell felt her heart swell. “Thank you, but I think I shall be fine. I don’t believe that Lord Beckett is the type.”
Sabine’s features darkened. “None of them seem the type. That’s how they do it.”
The flash of Monsieur Cobb’s winning smile came to her. “No, none of them seem the type,” she agreed. “But I know Lord Beckett well enough. And we have difficult things to discuss.”
Sabine nodded. “All you need do is shout, and we shall be awake to hear you, and come at a moment’s notice.”
There were footsteps on the stair, and then the sharp rap of knuckles on her bedchamber door. Not Jacobs’s soft alert, but the forceful announcement from Beckett. Was he the type? Nell suddenly wondered, a jolt of fear piercing through.
Sabine opened the door, and there stood Beckett, wearing rough trousers that were too short, held up by braces, as the top button was held gaping open, but secured with string, stretching across.
Beckett’s broad shoulders took up the full expanse of Jacobs’s shirt, also rough spun.
Jacobs looked embarrassed, or perhaps sheepish?
Beckett looked utterly foolish wearing the threadbare cast-offs of a much smaller man.
“Laundry day is upon us, mistress. I haven’t any nicer attire that isn’t soiled,” Jacobs told her, ushering the humble earl towards the fire. The honorable lord was barefoot. “Nor have I done my darning. Haven’t a stocking or a sock that doesn’t sport a hole or five.”
Nell bit back a giggle. “Thank you Jacobs, for your generosity, in any case.”
“If you agree, we could offer his lordship your other dressing gown?” Sabine said, looking at the earl as if she too were scandalized by his lack of clothing.
Jacobs moved the dressing chair and the vanity chair over to the fire, arranging a tableau that would keep them warm.
“No, thank you,” Beckett said quickly. “This is adequate, and likely good for my pride. Thank you, Jacobs. Your kindness is well-noted.”
“A blanket then?” Sabine suggested.
Beckett grimaced and gestured that he would welcome a blanket to cover himself, and Sabine rushed to accommodate him.
Nell motioned to the door with her chin, and Jacobs and Sabine left, but not without Sabine reminding them of her return with warm refreshments. Then the door shut to keep the heat in, and they were alone.
“Madam, I am humbled before you,” he said, bowing deeply. “You look very much like a queen of old.”
“Then I shall grant you the boon of sitting by my fire, my lord. For we have much to discuss.” His words were charming, but she could not allow herself to be charmed away from their purpose tonight.
This discussion would determine her future.
Would she remain as she was—independent with financial struggles, or would she agree to marry him, allowing his wealth to solve her immediate difficulties?
Could they ever return to the couple they were that single afternoon of butterfly-kissed happiness?
“Shall we start at the beginning?” Nell asked.
“A very good place to start,” Beckett agreed. “And you mentioned you had questions for me.”
“Indeed.” But Nell would not give him any more hints. They both stared into the fire, neither wanting to delve into the difficulties ahead. Nell supposed that alone should be a comfort.
“A question for a question, then,” Beckett said. “You are dedicated to your correspondence. With how many men do you correspond?”
Nell looked up sharply. This was not at all what she thought he would ask about. “I don’t know, exactly. Some letters don’t arrive for months at a time, and others are weekly. Perhaps ten? I don’t know.”
Beckett’s lips were thin, and he would not look at her. Was this his concern? Not her past? “Are you—” She paused, trying to parse this new fact. “Are you jealous?”
His brows furrowed and those thin lips moved to a frown. “Of course I’m jealous. I want to know all your thoughts first. I want to have access to all those bits of wisdom that you bestow on others.” He huffed and then choked out, “Do you write under the name Cornelius Smalls?”
Shock bolted through her. How could he know? Her furtive tendrils that she had snaked out into the world over the course of many years were now exposed, and she did not like it. Not at all. Her stomach flipped over and knotted. “How did you know that?”
Now Beckett bothered to look at her. “You have a weekly chess match with my best mate. He was worried about Mr. Smalls, having not heard from him at the regular interval. He was poring over your letters, trying to find a clue as to why you had not returned his note. I recognized your handwriting.”
Nell knew instantly who his mate was. Lord Rincon, whom she initially began writing to over a policy for widows.
She had thought him a good target, given his previous crusades for other disadvantaged peoples.
That he was Beckett’s close friend and confidant was a surprise.
They were not mentioned in any papers as allies of any kind.
But then she frowned. Lord Rincon was not a man who was favored by scandal papers; he was not a rake or a seducer of women.
He was, in all, a very boring candidate for any local London gossip sheet.
“That is why you are jealous? A chess-by-mail game?”
Beckett was silent. Was he wrestling with the absurdity of this? For it was ridiculous in the extreme. She’d never even set eyes on Lord Rincon. The few bits she knew of the man were not ones that would make a lady swoon. How on earth would he be jealous of such a correspondence?
“Not the game, no. But I am jealous that while I could have your vows and body, you would see that your heart should belong to him, not me.”
She turned over the thought. “But I belong to neither of you, nor no one. I am my own woman, Beckett. Whether we marry or no, I am my own person, and I cannot be an object tidied away into a cabinet. Nor am I an appendage for you to wield. I am me. And I am for myself.”
He blinked rapidly. She must have surprised him by this speech, though she could not see why. She had been exceedingly clear in the past how she felt about autonomy.
“I had not thought of it in that way. It is how people commonly speak of love and matrimony. A belonging.” The lines in his forehead deepened.
“But ours would be different,” she said. “If we continue.”
Another harsh laugh from him. “You would cuckold me? Bold of you to say so openly beforehand.”
That made her cross. Why would anyone find their way to cuckoldry when starting from the position of chess-by-post?
It made no sense. Perhaps she should return to her original opinion of him, which was that his mental acuity was deficient.
“Why are you so fixated on sexual fidelity? No, I mean that because you do not wish for heirs, that a union such as ours could be one born of preference and choice. That both of us choose a new path, that each day we are together is of our own volition, a freedom in and of itself. There is no bond other than our own wishes. And that my wishes are weighted equal to yours. I had thought myself incorrect in my original opinion of you, but now I must wonder since your logic is demonstrably faulty.”
Beckett’s soft lips twitched. Nell wondered if this was his tell when bargaining. Did he do this when negotiating bills in the side chambers of Parliament?
“In answer to your question,” he said, letting his words fall slowly.
Did he think her daft? “I am fixated, as you say, on fidelity because I have difficulty believing that I get to have someone so permanent in my life. I do not come upon friends easily. And never in my life have I felt this way for a woman.” His elbows rested on his knees, his pale, bare toes peeking from beneath the blanket and inching towards the fire.
“There are many ways I am not a typical man of my rank. Indeed, I do not possess even a modicum of desire to be so.” He hesitated, choosing his words carefully.
Nell could imagine him tiptoeing through a meadow, not wanting to step on wildflowers.
“I do not keep mistresses. I do not enjoy flippant mating, as if I were a rabbit in spring. I have been with a few women, not many, and mostly out of curiosity, rather than true desire. But I find the experience empty when I do not care for the person. I need more.” Beckett’s voice was rigid and fierce, as if he expected to be castigated for his stance.
It was Nell’s turn to blink rapidly into the fire.