Chapter Nine
Sebastian, despite his exhaustion from the day’s manual labor, had not slept well.
Regardless, he was up at dawn with the others to eat breakfast before starting work.
He’d been assigned to the orchard this morning, tasked with picking ripe apples for Mrs. Carter’s party menus.
The sun was just coming up when he set to work, carrying several buckets with him to gather the bounties.
As he moved a ladder under the first Codling tree, he thought about what he’d witnessed the day before.
He’d been tending to the roses in the late afternoon when he saw finely dressed women and men lounging in the shade of the oak trees on the back lawn.
The weather had been warm and a few of them had played a lackluster game of lawn croquet but mostly they lounged about, talking in small groups.
Sebastian attempted to keep his head down, but also had strained to hear bits of conversation.
Sadly, he’d not been able to hear much at all.
He’d caught only a few glimpses of Rose, although he’d heard her laughter several times. And it had nearly stopped his heart.
With his bucket in hand, he climbed the ladder to look for the ripest of the apples for Mrs. Carter’s desserts.
He plucked them, one by one, and laid each of them into the bucket, careful not to bruise them.
It was a quiet morning with only birdsong to keep him company as the sun rose in the eastern sky.
No one from the house, other than the servants, would be up and about at this hour.
Thus, he nearly fell off his ladder when he heard Rose calling to him from below.
He looked down to see her watching him. She lifted her hand to wave.
He hastily climbed down the ladder. “My lady? Is something wrong?”
She shook her head and took a book from the small basket she carried. “I shan’t be able to see you later. I’m busy all day with the guests. But I thought you might need a new book.”
He glanced down at the book in her hand. Sonnets.
“I worried the novel I gave you might be too hard to read at night when you’re tired and thought perhaps poetry might soothe you better after a long day of hard work.”
“How thoughtful of you, thank you.” Sebastian peered at her closely. Purple smudges under her eyes. She had not slept well either. “Are you well, Lady Rose?”
She tucked a stray tuft of hair behind her ear. “Not really.”
“May I be of service?”
“There’s nothing to be done. He’s here. Baron White, that is. And he’s as horrid as I remember. I don’t know how I can possibly…marry him.”
He knew she referred to all that marriage entailed, including giving her body to him. Sebastian’s hands tightened on the ladder rung behind him. The thought of that man touching her—
“My lady, there’s something I must tell you. Something that I think will give you hope.”
She looked up at him, her face awash in the morning sun. He would count her freckles if he could. Instead, he had to give her a little something to keep her from despair.
“What I’m about to tell you must stay between us.”
“Yes, all right.”
“Mr. Hale has hired a detective to look into Baron White’s past.”
Rose staggered backward as if he’d struck her. Her basket tumbled to the ground, the book falling open in the grass. “What?” She pressed a hand to her throat. “A detective? But why—how do you—” She shook her head rapidly. “Why would he do such a thing?”
“He wants to protect you. They all do. Mrs. Carter. Mrs. Blythe. Prudence and Mary. They’re all very worried about you.”
For a long moment, Rose said nothing. Then she sank into the damp grass, her skirts billowing about her, her face buried in her hands. “Oh, the dears. The absolute dears.” When she looked up at him, tears had gathered in her eyes. “A detective. Someone is actually trying to help me.”
Sebastian knelt in the grass beside her, fighting the urge to take her in his arms. “Mr. Hale believes if he can find something scandalous or dangerous, then it will save you from having to marry him.”
“How do you know this?” Her voice was barely above a whisper.
“He told me.”
“But why?” Rose’s expression began to shift, wonder giving way to suspicion. “He doesn’t know you. You’re a gardener. Why would he share something so intimate with you?”
Sebastian’s chest tightened. He tried to think of an answer but came up with nothing. A rising panic made it hard to breathe. She was absolutely right. It made no sense that Hale would speak to him in that way.
“Sebastian? What aren’t you telling me? Did you know him before you came here?”
He opened his mouth, then closed it. The truth sat on his tongue like poison—that he was no gardener, that his real name was not Doyle, that everything about their meeting had been calculated. That her father had destroyed his family. That he’d come here for revenge, not romance.
“Mr. Hale asked me to look after you, as I mentioned before,” he said finally, the words feeling like stones in his mouth. “During that conversation, he said that he’d recently hired a detective.”
Her expression had turned to granite right before his eyes. He’d not seen her look this way in any of the times they’d shared together. She’d always looked at him with curiosity and delight. Now, her eyes had hardened into two scuffed emeralds.
“I tell you only to give you hope,” he said, feeling suddenly quite desperate. “You mustn’t despair, please. The way you’ve conducted yourself, with such goodness and generosity, has endeared you to the staff. They would do anything for you.”
She studied his face as if seeing him for the first time. “There’s more to your story, isn’t there? Things you’re not telling me about your past. The way you can read and the way you speak—they indicate an educated man. Not a man destined to be a gardener.”
Sebastian’s throat went dry. “I’ve told you about my mother.”
“Yes, you have.” She bowed her head, tenting her hands as if to pray. “Still, there’s more that you’re not telling me. I don’t know why you would lie to me, but I know what I can see—that despite whatever secrets you carry, you’re a compassionate, warm man who has made me feel less alone.”
The words made his fingers tingle. Here she was, praising his character while he deceived her with every breath. If she knew who he really was, what he was really after, would she hate him for it?
“All I want of late is to be here in the gardens with you,” she said softly.
“It’s the only time I feel truly myself.
Which makes no sense at all.” She lifted her gaze to meet his.
“What am I to do now? Trust a detective I’ve never met?
Trust servants who, however dear they may be, have no real power?
Trust you, when I’m not even certain who you are? ”
The pain in her voice made him want to confess everything. He reached for his handkerchief, his hands trembling slightly. “You must continue as you are, trusting that Hale will find a way out of your marriage to White. Allow the people who love you to look after you.”
“And if this detective finds nothing? Or if he finds something on Baron White, but Father simply chooses another terrible man for me to marry?” A tear trickled down her cheek. “What then?”
He pressed his handkerchief gently against her cheek, and she covered his hand with both of hers. The touch sent fire through his veins. “Then we’ll find another way,” he whispered, though he had no idea what that way might be.
She held his gaze for a long moment, her fingers warm against his knuckles. “We? You speak as if you’ll still be here. As if whatever brought you here in the first place won’t eventually call you away.”
Sebastian felt the ground shifting beneath him. She saw too much, understood too much. Soon she would piece together the truth, and then—God help him.
“I wish I could promise you that,” he said. “But you’re right to be cautious. You know as well as I that people have motives behind everything they do.”
“Indeed. And I would like to know what yours are.”
“I cannot tell you more than I already have.” He removed his hand from her cheek, though it took all his willpower. “It gives me comfort to have shared these moments with you. At times, I think they may have to sustain me for whatever comes next.”
Rose folded his handkerchief into a small square but did not return it to him. “And now I must go before the rest of the household wakes and finds me gone. Prudence will worry if I’m not in my room when she comes for me.”
He nodded, rising to his feet and offering his hand to assist her up.
For a second or two, she gazed up at him, tears caught in her dark lashes sparkling in the morning light.
The urge to tell her everything—his real name, his true purpose, the way she’d somehow become important to him—nearly overwhelmed him.
She took his hand, and the warmth of her soft skin against his calloused palm sent waves of longing through him. “Lady Rose, there has never been a woman more lovely in the history of the world.”
She smiled, though sadness lingered in her eyes. “And like the roses, my beauty will fade and I’ll be left to wither on a thorny vine.”
“Say it isn’t so.”
“I’m afraid I cannot.” She lifted her skirt and turned away, then paused.
“Sebastian, I’m not sure why I’m saying this, other than instinct.
Please don’t disappear without telling me goodbye.
Whatever secrets you carry, I’ve grown…fond of you.
I would hate to wake one morning and find you simply gone. ”
The words were like a dagger to his heart. He watched her walk quickly out of the orchard, dappled light casting dancing patterns over her retreating form, and knew that disappearing without goodbye was exactly what he might have to do.