Chapter 33
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
ROWEN
Rowen stood still at the cold window of his study, freezing night air sweeping under the casement into the dimly lit room. His waistcoat lay discarded over the arm of a chair where he’d tossed it hours ago, his abandoned cravat slung over it.
It was past midnight, yet it might as well have been noon to him but for the dark streets of London below. The wet cobblestones glistened under the torchlight. The rattle of distant carriage wheels and the strike of horses’ hooves were a constant ache in his skull.
A shuffle and grate behind him had his head turning, but he knew who it was. Morgan, keeping the dying fire alive in the hearth.
“Leave it, Morgan. Go to bed.”
“Your Grace, is there not anything else I could—”
“Nothing. Absolutely nothing.” He brought the heavy crystal glass to his lips and finished off his third brandy. “Go.”
“As you wish.” The door clicked shut.
On an exhale, he went back to his desk for the hundredth time this evening. Papers everywhere. Maps. Reports. Sealed missives. Unsealed, read letters. The candles had dripped their molten wax on his desk.
Sitting in his chair, he poured another drink, stretched his legs, his boot heels digging into the Persian carpet. He picked up Zandra’s letter and read it once more. Her handwriting steadied him. Unsettled him.
As she’d promised, she wrote to him every night to inform him how she’d spent her day. Each letter had been amusing with her pointed observations and droll remarks. Her description of the island since the failed military expedition at Morbihan had cast a pall over its inhabitants was striking.
Despite the liquor seeping through his veins, warming his blood, Rowen’s every muscle drew tight. He missed her. Expected her to appear in the doorway at any moment. Hear her strong, clear voice calling out to him. He rubbed his neck as he continued to read.
But it was this chance encounter with Lord Enggers that twisted in his gut. Of all the timing in the world. She was there alone, and he had appeared and spoken to her.
Rowen had every confidence in Zandra being able to handle such an encounter. But now that Rowen was investigating him for his role in Morbihan, and Enggers knew the truth could be found out, he was dangerous. He let out a ragged sigh. More dangerous than ever before.
Sinking further in the chair, he leaned his head against the cushioned back as he stared at the leaping, crackling flames. He was much relieved that Stephan had been at that party and had stepped in, interrupting Enggers accosting his wife. And not only was Enggers in Jersey but so was Frederica.
Again, he read the paragraph where Zandra described Stephan’s new poem.
“Mysterious,” she had noted. “Rather dark and unusually bleak for Stephan.”
Her beautiful face clouded his vision. If only you knew the true cause, my darling.
Shortly before the royal wedding, Rowen had received a coded message from Stephan. The poet relayed that he had heard rumours that the handful of survivors of the Morbihan massacre might have found refuge somewhere in the Channel Islands. He would investigate and communicate what he discovered.
Then, the day after Zandra had left for Jersey, another message arrived from Stephan, confirming that survivors were hiding in Guernsey.
Rowen’s fingers tightened on Cassandra’s letter.
He folded it with precision. He would need more from Stephan.
At once. The relentless cold draught in the room swept over his bare chest, but his flesh remained ablaze.
After the royal wedding when Zandra had told him that she wanted to leave, a cold slithering monster he’d never known before had clawed at his soul. Fear. For the first time, he felt her slipping away from him, from their life.
His gaze went to the small landscape painting on his desk.
A fishing boat on the seashore they’d rented on holiday in Sicily eons ago, painted in swirls of reds and blues and golds.
She’d had it painted for him by a local artist as a remembrance of the wonderful holiday they’d had when they’d first arrived.
After that, the tide had turned for them. Rowen brought the glass to his temple. He’d engineered that turn, hadn’t he?
The image of him and Hugh in bed with Zandra flew back at him, and his insides hardened. He crossed to the hearth and stared into the flames, remembering.
Hugh, on his Grand Tour at the time, had shown up in Naples, and Rowen had invited him and his travelling companions to a number of social events.
He’d noticed Cassandra and Hugh talking often, laughing, and dancing together at the parties they’d attended.
She had never had the opportunity to flirt with young men her age at dinners, and assemblies, and balls like other young noblewomen.
Hugh was obviously besotted with her. And what young lady her age would not have been keen on such an attractive young lord? If circumstances had been different, Rowen was quite sure that she very well could have married Hugh and been his Countess of Ryvves.
Then there’d been the party—a special party Rowen had arranged at a villa outside of Naples, which he’d rented for the occasion.
This gathering was only for his inner circle of friends, English and foreign, who had an appetite for exchanging partners, enjoying multiple partners, and indulging in partners of their own sex.
Absolute privacy guaranteed, just as his father had taught him.
He’d invited Hugh along, making him swear an oath of secrecy. Hugh had been ever so grateful to be included. Rowen had him send his friends on to Rome without him. The party went on for days.
He’d known Hugh all his life. And all his life, Hugh had worshipped Rowen, respected him, even feared him. Rowen knew he could control him.
So he’d chosen him.
On the second night, he’d invited Hugh to join him and Cassandra in bed. She’d been surprised but agreed. He’d encouraged Hugh to stroke her, to kiss her, and, finally, they’d both taken her together.
Her satisfaction reached new heights, and it had been magnificent to behold. Other times, Rowen had preferred to watch them as someone else’s wife took his cock in her mouth.
Naples allowed for that sort of liberty, and he had enjoyed offering Zandra those twists of the illicit. In Naples, it had become his mission. Such indulgences had become their favourite diversion.
“Diversions, fictions…” Zandra’s anguished words her last night in London cut through him, and he drew a slow breath.
Unlike many of his friends’ wives, Rowen’s wife enjoyed congress without reluctance, confusion, or shame.
Not only was Zandra curious, but she also enjoyed exploring.
Rowen found he greatly enjoyed witnessing her exploring.
He watched her almost every chance that had been afforded to him.
She knew it, of course, and liked it. In those intoxicating moments, they shared a unique and raw connection.
That first time Hugh had penetrated her, she’d reached out to Rowen and gripped his hand. Fiercely held Rowen’s gaze. Given him her cries.
Rowen’s throat burned, and he drained his glass, but the liquor offered no relief. Was it madness that he treasured that memory?
We are quite a pair.
The thought curdled in his blood, and he stilled.
He had thought himself generous. Enlightened. He’d offered her liberties and bold experiences. Gave her a colourful life vivid enough to drown out her pain. His jaw clenched. But was that what she’d needed?
The answer rose and surged through him like the Severn bore—sudden, swift, violent. Unstoppable.
She’d needed substance.
Zandra had enjoyed herself, but, dear God, had he mistaken her strength, her vitality for recovery?
His pulse thundered with the merciless truth.
Had he only given her away? Widened the distance between them?
Rowen hurled the glass into the fire, and it shattered, scattering light and ruin. The flames hissed at him.
The final proof of his failure was when she had settled into a relationship with Hugh. He wiped his loose hair away from his hot face, gulping for air.
The shock of Hugh’s murder and bringing the perpetrator to justice had brought them closer for a time. But after, Zandra had grown quiet, withdrawn, and bitterness had taken hold.
He’d taken notice of it, but hadn’t addressed it.
For many months now, there had barely been time to breathe for either of them.
The royal wedding preparations—which included Rowen being on call to His Highness at all hours—had taken over their lives.
And at the same time, the expedition at Morbihan had exploded, and he became entrenched in the inquiry.
When the royal wedding was finally upon them, there had been a thousand social obligations, one after the other, without pause. And then she’d begged him for permission to escape. Leave London. Leave him.
Rowen supposed Georgina’s announcement that she was with child had pained Zandra as nothing else could. Had he not realised how deep the loss of their own child and the theft of the prospect of any other had cut her? Obviously, Georgina’s news had twisted her heart out of its place.
Her heart… He had failed her heart. Rowen pushed away from the mantel.
A loud knock banged on the door, and it opened. “Your Grace—”
“Leave me alone, damn you!”
Morgan held out a sealed letter. “This arrived for you, Sir. Urgent, the messenger said.”
Rowen grabbed it and ripped open the seal as Morgan withdrew.
He read the report from one of his sources in Parliament.
Even the Foreign Secretary himself had publicly expressed his displeasure with Enggers as more MPs were accusing him of being to blame for the lapse in communication with the British forces engaged at Morbihan.
The British-led force of émigrés had been guaranteed safe passage in case of the battle falling apart, and when it had, and they direly needed that safe passage, none came. Had it ever been arranged as Enggers had promised? Enggers claimed no communication had arrived.
Did he go to Jersey to secure his own version of events with those who had helped him organise the fateful expedition? Make himself appear blameless by greasing desperate palms? Rowen’s jaw ticked as his mind went to Zandra’s mention of Engger’s French Comte.
He slammed the letter on his desk. If Enggers knew that the investigation was onto him, and that Rowen was a part of that secret committee who’d undertaken the inquiry, would he try to harm Zandra in order to threaten him in some way?
Rowen threw the letter into the fire, and the flames consumed it. There was only one thing he was certain of: without Zandra, there could be no victory worth surviving.
All else be damned.