Chapter Eighteen #3
“Yes, that is true,” the captain agreed.
“But now I think maybe Count Zabor did not trust him, for he sent myself and the Royal Guards after Count Anton to ensure the safety of the prince and princess.” He glanced at the princess and said stiffly, “He knew I would die before I let harm come to either of them.”
Callie nodded. “I know that, Captain. I wouldn’t have come into this room otherwise.” She gave Gabe a speaking look.
“Were you at Tibby’s cottage?” Ethan said in a cold voice.
Captain Kordovski raised a brow. “Where do you mean?”
“At Lulworth. Little white cottage, covered in roses.”
Captain Kordovski shook his head. “No, we only met up with the count in London two days ago. It took us several days to discover he’d sailed to England, but we traced him through embassy connections, and from there to the home of the Austrian ambassador, Prince Esterhazy.”
Ethan grunted.
Gabe nodded. It was as he thought. The captain’s arrival had saved Nicky. Nothing else. Nobody else.
“We shall convey the count’s body back to Zindaria,” Captain Kordovski told Callie. “It is the correct thing to do. No matter what he has done, he belongs in Zindaria.”
Callie nodded. “Yes, you are right.”
“And you, Princess, you belong in Zindaria, too, you and Prince Nikolai.” Captain Kordovski hesitated, then said, “You are much beloved in Zindaria, Princess.”
“Me? You mean Nicky.”
He shook his head. “They don’t know Prince Nikolai—he has never made any public appearances.”
Callie nodded. Rupert was ashamed of Nicky’s limp.
Captain Kordovski continued. “I am sure they will come to love Prince Nikolai, but you, Princess—you are very special to us. Zindaria has never had a princess so much loved by the people.”
“Me?” Callie was amazed.
“The whole country is in mourning at your loss.”
“For me?” Callie couldn’t believe it. “But it was Rupert they loved. I saw it whenever I went out in public with him. The people always cheered and waved and some threw flowers.”
Captain Kordovski shook his head. “It was for you, Princess, only for you. Prince Rupert was greatly respected, but he was never loved, not like you. And that is why we need you, as well as Prince Nikolai, back in Zindaria.”
All the Royal Guards bowed and clicked their heels and gave her speaking looks to show their agreement.
Callie smiled mistily at them all. She’d had no idea. She still could not quite believe it, but one thing was clear, she had no choice. She had to go back. “Thank you. We will return soon, I promise.” She did not look at Gabe.
The stone in Gabe’s chest turned to lead. She was leaving him.
They returned to London a lot more slowly than they’d left. Partly that was due to the inferior quality of the horses they’d hired, but also everyone was tired. It was just on dawn.
To Callie’s great disappointment, Harry drove her and Nicky back in the curricle. She had thought, hoped, that Gabriel would have, but he’d been withdrawn and kept himself away from her, organizing horses and men and paying the innkeeper. And ordering his brother to drive them home.
“Will you really return to Zindaria?” Harry asked her after a while. Nicky was asleep, his head in Callie’s lap, both of them wrapped in the fur cloak.
“I have to,” she said. “Nicky is the crown prince. His future is there.”
“And what of Gabe?”
She sighed. “I don’t know. I don’t know what he wants anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
“He barely even looked at me just now. All that time in that horrid little inn, he didn’t so much as touch me or even come near me.”
Harry frowned. “But you know why. I told you before.”
She was bewildered. “No, I don’t know why!”
“He failed you. He expects you to be disappointed in him.”
“But why? Nicky is safe. It’s all all right now.”
“Yes, but Gabe lost him in the first place, and then he didn’t rescue him.”
Callie stared at him in disbelief. “You can’t possibly mean that!
That’s ridiculous. As if I would hold that against him.
I don’t care how Nicky was rescued, I only care that he’s safe.
” She smoothed her hand over her son’s sleeping body as she spoke.
“Not that it would have made any difference to how I feel about Gabriel anyway. As I said, love is not a series of tests.”
“You really do love him, don’t you?”
“Yes, of course. And why do you keep asking me that? Is it so hard to believe? Gabriel is a very lovable man.” She sighed. “He’s a wonderful man.” And she didn’t know how she was ever going to be able to live without him.
Harry gave her a searching look. “I used to think you were using my brother for your own ends.”
“I was. I am,” she said guiltily. Love was an end, wasn’t it?
His face softened. “Yes, but you do love him. It makes all the difference. I don’t want to see him get hurt. Women can do terrible things to a man.”
“Men can do them to women, too,” she said.
“Maybe, but Gabe’s not one to lay himself open to a woman—he’s always been careful. He’s kept himself protected, ever since he was a boy and his bitch of a mother dumped him.”
“His mother dumped him?”
He nodded. “Used him as a pawn in the games she played with our father. Kept him locked upstairs in that house you’ve been staying in, hidden away, as if he didn’t exist. Seven years he was up there and never once saw his father or the other brothers, or their country home, not for Christmas or Easter or anything. And he was legitimate.”
He paused to negotiate a narrow passage between a stationary wagon and a pile of boxes. “The old lady, Great-aunt Gert took him away and his mother didn’t care in the least. Never even visited him. He never saw her again.”
Callie was horrified. It was worse than being orphaned.
“He told me about Great-aunt Gert. She sounds like a wonderful lady.”
Harry snorted. “She was all right, but she was nobody’s idea of a mother, either. Treated both of us like the dogs she bred. Tough, strict, and very demanding. A right old tartar she was; fair, but not the sort to give a little boy a hug.”
“So who gave Gabriel hugs?” Callie asked, her heart moved by the thought of the little boy whose mother didn’t want him.
“Nobody,” Harry said.
“You must both have been very lonely,” she said, stroking her son’s hair as he slept.
“I was all right. Mrs. Barrow took me in as her own, but though she was fond of Gabe, she never dared to treat him as her own. Great-aunt Gert wouldn’t have had it.
’Twas all right for the cook to cuddle an orphaned bastard like me occasionally, but mollycoddle a legitimate son of the house of Renfrew? Not in her lifetime.”
“Then I shall just have to make up for all the hugs he missed out on,” Callie said. “If he’ll let me, that is.” She watched dawn rising over London. She and Nicky would have to return to Zindaria soon. She hoped it wouldn’t be alone.
But she didn’t feel at all sure of that. First she had to tell her husband that she loved him.
Then she had to find out if he loved her at all.
And then if he would give up everything he had for her.
It was too much to ask, she knew. But she had no choice.
And at the very least, she was going to have one more night with him. One more night of love.
The household was still awake when they got back. Nobody had been able to sleep for worrying. Everyone piled into the drawing room and once again, Nicky described his kidnapping and escape, and everyone exclaimed and expressed amazement and horror in equal amounts.
Callie sat wearily, watching her son in his hour of glory.
She’d had no sleep and was exhausted and, despite her relief and joy in her son’s triumph, she was also dispirited.
Gabriel hadn’t said a word to her. He hadn’t even looked at her since she’d promised the captain she would return to Zindaria.
He’d positioned himself at the far side of the room, saying nothing, just watching.
Whenever she looked at him he was looking elsewhere, at Nicky, at Rafe or Nash—anywhere except at her.
She could see part of his face in the looking glass hung on the far wall.
She shifted her position until she could see his whole face and his expression.
He was watching her, she saw. If she turned her head, he looked away, but the moment she turned away from him he was watching her again.
He watched her sadly, hungrily, as if gazing at something he couldn’t have, some fond memory.
Callie sighed. Harry was right. Gabriel seemed to believe her love was conditional on his having prevented Nicky’s kidnapping. The dear, foolish man. She would put him right on that. Right after she told him she loved him.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
“Come along, Nicky,” she said, rising. “It’s time you went to bed. Time we all got some sleep.”
Nicky’s face fell. “But, Mama, it’s morning. The sun is up.”
“No argument, my love. You’ve had a big adventure but even heroes need some sleep.”
“Yes, Mama,” the hero of the hour said dolefully.
Gabe took himself out onto the terrace with a brandy. Everyone else had gone off to bed. He was too depressed to sleep.
A few moments later he jumped as his wife’s soft arms slid around his waist. She hugged him hard. “Thank you,” she said.
“I didn’t do anything,” he muttered. “Nicky rescued himself. I merely bumped into him on the road.”
“On the contrary, you taught him how to ride, and thus gave him the means to effect his own escape, which is a thousand times better than being rescued—or have you not noticed that my son is currently standing ten feet tall?” She hugged him again.
“It’s my fault he was kidnapped in the first place.”
“How interesting you should say so. I thought it was all my fault, but Harry put me right. And I am very sure Tibby and Ethan have been blaming themselves, and Lady Gosforth, too, no doubt, so we could all have a competition for the blame. Or we can all simply rejoice that we have my son back.”
“It was my responsibility.”
“It was our responsibility. But we thought we were defending Nicky by legal means—who would have guessed that the count would send his men over the rooftops in the middle of a party?”
“I should have.”
“I see, well, if you prefer kicking yourself and being gloomy to kissing me, I will just have to find someone else to kiss.”
“What?” Gabe’s head jerked around.
“I have been needing to be kissed and hugged for several hours now, and if you’re not interested—”
“You mean—?”
The most adorable mouth in the world pouted. “Gabriel Renfrew, what do you think I mean?”
He wasn’t going to question his luck. He snatched her up and kissed her, hard and possessively.
With some difficulty, for her skirt was quite narrow, she wrapped her legs around him and kissed him back, holding on tight to him with every part of her, pressing her softness against him and covering his face with moist, enthusiastic, passionate kisses.
“Take me to bed, Gabriel. I need you to take me to bed.”
Gabe could hardly believe it. He’d been given a second chance. He wasn’t going to waste it.
He carried her upstairs to the bedchamber he’d been allotted when they first arrived. His aunt Maude had arranged for their things to be brought back from his brother’s house and placed there. She knew that Callie would not be willing to be parted from her son again.
Gabe had not expected to sleep there, or if he did, he knew he would sleep there alone. He hadn’t dreamed he would get another night with her.