Chapter 20
Adelaide tensed as Swindle wrapped a hand around her waist and asked: “What is your real name?”
“It doesn’t matter. I left her in the past.”
He stiffened then drew her closer. “Mine is John. My father manned a pole barge. In his absences, my mother ran a household of five boys with a heavy fist. I was the oldest, so I went to work with my father soon as I was big enough.”
His accent deepened, the pretense erased, “Observed and listened best I could, jumped off that boat and swam for something different.”
His hands soothed her shoulders, drawing her against him, “Maybe we could stop running. Together.”
In answer, Adelaide drew him in for a kiss, and didn’t tell him the truth.”
Adelaide, Chapter 14
When Fitz had requested that Noelle meet someone who would “support his cause,” this was not what she had anticipated.
“Other than the lady who is to be my wife, she’s the most important woman in my life,” he said, looking out the window of the carriage. Noelle glanced at Bridget who smiled encouragingly.
“You’re taking me to the Viscountess?”
He nodded, adjusting his cufflinks. “Yes, perhaps if I do so, you’ll see that I’m serious and stop flirting with marquesses. Especially desperate and destitute ones.”
She looked up at him from where she’d been idly twisting her hands in her lap. “Which you yourself will also be if you do not marry me, or some other lady of consequence.”
He leaned toward her, his head tilted to the side. She saw the glint of his eyes and knew she’d struck a nerve. There was something dangerous in those eyes, something that promised her ruination. Whatever the cool blue flash of his eyes threatened, she wanted.
“Bite your tongue, wicked girl,” he leaned in closer and looked down at her lips like some hungry wolf who’d swallow her up. Lowering his voice, he warned, “Or I shall bite it for you.”
Noelle gasped and looked to her chaperone. She was not sure at first if her governess had heard his words or not. She was looking up from her book at the pair of them as if she was deliberating whether she should intervene or not.
Noelle leaned back against the seat and averted her eyes. Why did her mutinous body send ripples of anticipation at his words, his very forward words? She moved the curtain aside to glance out the window, to distract herself. Her thoughts settled on the topic of the viscountess, a safe subject.
She could remember a blonde lady with the bluest eyes she’d ever seen laughing on her mother’s arm as their children played on the vast lawn of Brookevale.
She could remember this woman at their house for Christmas.
She could remember this woman and her mother dressing for balls, likely not terribly much older than Noelle herself was now.
Now, Lady Viola, Dowager Viscountess Ludlowe, lay sprawled on a large canopied bed, propped with dozens of frilly pillows. Her hair was in a braid. Her eyes were sunken in her pale face. She belatedly disguised a cough as they entered.
“Oh, it’s my Fitzwilliam,” she said his name as though it took the energy right away from her.
He sat at the side of her bed and took her into his arms for a hug. Despite her frailty, he held her both tenderly and firmly. Noelle took in the way his mother’s eyes closed, the way she inhaled him. She would trade nearly anything for another such embrace from her own mother.
All Noelle could think of was the last time she had seen her mother, she had been an invalid, clinging to life, and Noelle had been too afraid to speak.
Noelle had inched closer to her mother on slow feet and held her mother like she was made of glass.
She hadn’t thought about it in such a long time, choosing instead to focus her memories on the brighter spots. Now, she wished she had it to do over.
“Let me look at you,” The Viscountess was saying, reclining, moving her son’s hair from his face. “So handsome, you’ve grown into such a fine man since the last time I saw you.”
“It’s merely been a couple of weeks, my lady mother.”
Lady Ludlowe let out a small laugh that dissolved into a cough. Noelle noticed that the handkerchief she held to her mouth was tinged with blood.
“And you brought a friend with you?” the dowager asked.
Fitz looked at Noelle with admiration, she could feel his appreciation across the room.
He could make the largest rooms seem small and intimate when he looked at her as though she were an extension of his own body.
He held out his hand to her, his smiling eyes prodding her to step forward and take it.
“Mother, you remember Lady Noelle Pembrooke? I’ve brought her to say hello.”
Noelle gave a small curtsy, “My Lady Ludlowe.”
The frail, beautiful woman looked to Noelle, then looked to her son knowingly.
Warmth shone in her eyes so similar to Fitz’s.
“I see. Lady Noelle, it’s been some time; but I remember you. You are a very lovely girl, my dear. Unlike the others, you always were the spitting image of your handsome father; though I’d never have told the rascal as much. He likely already knew. Come closer, please.”
Noelle stepped forward slowly, Fitz took her hand in his and planted a kiss, holding his mother’s hand in the other. “My two ladies in the same room at last,” he said.
Noelle could see the frail woman give Fitz’s hand a warm, light, squeeze.
“You know how badly I’ve always wanted a daughter, don’t raise my hopes if you don’t mean it, Fitzwilliam,” his mother said, “Or Lady Noelle’s. A girl this graceful doesn’t deserve you wasting her time. You think you can fool me, but I read the papers.”
Fitz let out a boyish laugh that put his dimples on full, breathtaking display. “So you read about my inheriting the publishing house? Or did you already know about that?”
“I was mostly referring to the dancers and opera singers you’ve been seen with on occasion, but I did know about that. I should have warned you sooner.”
She let out another cough. Noelle could tell that it pained Fitz to question his mother about his inheritance in the state that the dowager viscountess was in; but Noelle knew he wouldn’t push her unless he needed answers.
“Here, mother; let me help you with some water,” he brought a glass of water to her; but her hands were shaking so, he put her hand back down on the bed, and helped her drink from the glass by bringing it to her lips.
“You always were so much more patient than your father,” she said, once she had regained herself, “though you look so much like him.”
Fitz leaned back in a chair and let out a snort, “Father wished he were ever as handsome as I am.”
His mother let out a peal of hoarse laughter as she held her middle. “I do adore you, son.”
Noelle was pained at his expression as he looked away from his mother, and down at his hands, and uttered, “I know there are things that you’d like to change about me, but….”
The Dowager Viscountess shushed him, “I only wanted to prepare you for the future. I see now I went about it the wrong way. I was too hard on you…You showed no signs of being literary, or even having a head for business; but people can change. I like the man you’ve grown to be.
I can see that Lady Noelle does too. I only hope that you do.”
Fitz took her hand and kissed it, it was the most intimate gesture, full of forgiveness and love. Lady Noelle fought the urge to look away. He hadn’t hidden this from her, he had meant for her to share this with him, even without knowing the outcome. When he looked at Noelle, she smiled back at him.
His mother asked, “Now will you run along and leave Lady Noelle and I to chat?”
“I am not nearly brave enough to give her a private audience with you. The scandalous and even embarrassing secrets you might reveal to her…well, we might never recover.” His smile was warm, but there was something real behind it.
Noelle placed a hand on his shoulder, “I’m sure I’ve already heard far worse things of your character than your mother can produce for my ears. And I’ve yet been tempted to run.”
In his mother’s eyes, there was warmth, acceptance. Noelle couldn’t pretend to know the depth of baggage in his family’s past nor did she have a right to know, yet at least; but she could see that it was there.
The dowager viscountess was blinking back tears. “I only wish…wish…wish that I’d…I’d done a better job of shielding you from…From your father…from Cranmer…such horrible, selfish men...were not the example a boy like yourself deserved.”
A vision of the cold, handsome, older gentleman that Noelle had met at the debut ball played in her mind. The man’s face had held no warmth, little more than malice.
Fitz's voice sharpened at the mention of his uncle.
“I can hold my own against Cranmer. Have been for years. Don’t trouble yourself with thoughts of him, mother.”
But the way he protectively clutched her hand, made Noelle second guess.
Was he speaking the truth, or was he shielding his mother from it? Shielding her too?
“Regardless, don’t let him get under your skin. I hope that you will start to listen to what those of us who care for you have to say of you. You are an easy man to love,” his mother brought his hand to her lips and kissed it, “choir boy or no.”
He let out a small snort. “While I do adore you, mother; this has all been terrible for my image. You see, I think Lady Noelle rather liked me as I was. Now that she sees I’m not some penny dreadful villain, she’ll probably refuse my proposal.” He pulled a face. Both Noelle and his mother laughed.
“I’m sure Lady Noelle finds something likable about you; although it can’t be your humility.”
“Perhaps he is altogether too aware of his charm from time to time; but I feel there’s something beneath it…compassion, good humor, dare I think it- a heart?” Noelle gave a small laugh. “He’d have us all believe he’s empty headed and full of larks; but you and I know the truth, Lady Ludlowe.”
Noelle watched his chest swell at the praise.
Just as his smile aimed in her direction spread wider, his mother started into another coughing fit.
He helped her, positioning her with her mountain of fluffy pillows where she could sip from a glass of water.
His hand stroked comforting paths along her back.
The gentleness, the patience he had with her, it pricked Noelle’s eyes.
“I only pray I live long enough to see you settled, I wanted a house full of children… but was never so lucky as my friend Rose,” she smiled weakly at Noelle with the mention of her mother, “Perhaps…perhaps, I’ll live to be a grandmother.”
Fitz made great pains to reassure that he was accepting nothing but the best care for her, and that she’d be fully healed in due time; but Noelle didn’t miss Fitz sniffing the contents of her glass after it was drained, and stowing it quietly into Noelle’s reticule.