Chapter 16 #2
Rafe shrugged. “I would expect so.”
“Do you want her back?”
“If only to wring her pretty neck.”
Cole smiled slightly. “And then you’ll grant her an annulment?”
“Not if she’s carrying my child.”
Cole eyed his friend speculatively. He’d lay odds there was more to this story than what Rafe had told him. He felt a keen curiosity to meet the woman who’d so disturbed the customary composure of the Earl of Moreham.
“Suppose we drop by Lady Melbourne’s tomorrow and see if the lady is at home to visitors?” he suggested.
“And risk having her turn me away, or worse claim she’s never heard of me? I think not.”
Cole’s eyes took on a speculative light that Rafe, had he looked across the table, would have recognized and instantly mistrusted.
“So,” he said, dropping his voice and leaning conspiratorially close, “what’ll it be?
Shall we wait for her to venture out, then sweep her into your carriage?
Climb through her window and haul her out, tossed over your shoulder? ”
“That’s your style Davenport, not mine.”
“A discreet letter then to Lady Melbourne’s solicitor informing her she’s holding a bit of your prized property?”
Rafe grimaced. “I can see the married state has not quenched your thirst for the dramatics.”
Cole drew himself up with feigned offense. “Very well, Moreham, you always have a plan. Let’s have it.”
“I don’t know,” Rafe snapped, “if I did, would I be playing cards with the likes of Fallsworth or listening to your rattle-brained schemes?”
Cole laughed. “It appears as though this season may not be quite so dull after all. Perhaps I should convince Phoebe to come to town for a bit. A second honeymoon, I’m thinking.”
“It seems to me you’ve had several honeymoons already and a son to mark each one,” Rafe said dryly.
“Ah, you’re just jealous. But you’ll have a brood of your own soon enough.” Cole continued. “Unless, of course, this dark humor is how you propose to win the lady over. I’ve never known snarls and scowls to be an effective method of courtship, but then perhaps French ladies are different?”
Rafe shook his head. “After everything that has passed between us, I never expected she would leave. Without a word, without a note...”
The teasing banter vanished and Cole’s voice softened.
“Perhaps you should take a step back before you set out to woo your wife. Some time in the country to think things through. Check on Elizabeth, make sure she hasn’t talked your stepmother into letting her wear something scandalous for her coming out. ”
“Louisa’s not that out of touch with fashion, but you do have a point.
” Rafe said, smiling for the first time that evening.
It might well give him some time to sort out his feelings for Alix.
Indeed, given time, the burning desire to have her close to him would surely fade.
The swirl of emotions she stirred in him would settle, and he would discover she’d been nothing more than a passing disturbance in his well-ordered life.
“Davenport,” he said, “as astounding as it seems, you just may have hit upon a sensible plan. And to demonstrate my appreciation, why don’t you bring Phoebe and the boys to Moreham Hall for an extended visit?”
The hackney driver laughed as he held the carriage door open for Alix to enter.
“Sure I know where Lady Melbourne lives, everybody does. She and the duke had that great big place on Grosvenor Street, then they up and swapped it for the Duke of York’s house in Whitehall.
They say Lady Melbourne did it because she prefers the chimes of Westminster to those of Saint James.
” He shook his head as he closed the coach door muttering.
“Quality, they’re something different, that’s for sure. ”
About the time Rafe was striding confidently back to Madame Guenard’s, Alix was standing at the elegant front portico of the Melbourne’s home staring in to the forbidding face of the Duchess’s butler.
“Have you an appointment with her ladyship?” he asked in a tone that suggested he sincerely doubted that she did.
Lifting her chin imperiously she said, “Please inform her ladyship that Mademoiselle Alexandre Charlotte de Rabec de La Brou wishes to speak with her. She and my mother, Madame la Comtesse de La Brou, are good friends.”
Casting a dubious look at her rumpled traveling dress, the butler nodded and closed the door.
Willing herself not to fidget, Alix held herself erect; she hadn’t come this far to be put off by an arrogant house servant.
Her hand stole to the thin gold chain at her throat.
She’d found herself touching it at the oddest times, as if it were a talisman that might somehow protect her.
The heavy gold ring shifted between her breasts and she pulled it out and examined it.
A light flickered in the ruby’s depths like some secret red world and Alix found herself reminded of the alcove where she and Rafe had made love.
She dropped the ring abruptly, but not before catching sight of a motto in Latin engraved on the inside of the band: WHAT I CLAIM IS MINE.
Her lips tightened. Rafe Harcrest might have laid claim to her body, but he had laid no such claim to her soul.
She was her own woman. She had escaped the terrors of France, preserved the precious de La Brou titles and someday she would return to reestablish the family name.
If, she thought with wry amusement at the vehemence of her emotions, the butler would just open the damn door.