Chapter 4
A Very Long Lead
“Wakey, wakey, my little chick. Time to rise and shine.”
Cilly groaned and pulled the pillow over her head. Nichols tugged it away. “Now, now, none of that. I won’t have any slugabeds. You’ve things to do, people to see, and you’ll do it all looking splendid and with a smile on that pretty face of yours, or else.”
“I don’t want to smile.” The words were nigh on incomprehensible, spoken as they were into the nest of covers in which Cilly had buried herself.
She wanted to stay here, in this little cocoon, and not come out until the world had righted itself.
But it wouldn’t, not unless she made it.
She groaned again but gave in to the inevitable.
With what seemed to her a Herculean effort, Cilly pulled herself into a sitting position.
“Well, that’s a nice face to greet the day with,” Nichols remarked with a snort. “Come, now. There is a cup of chocolate, just as you like it, and toast and marmalade.”
Cilly sighed and allowed Nichols to set the tray down on her lap. She stared at it morosely for a moment. “Nichols, tell me honestly. Am I a nice person?”
Nichols laughed. “Not first thing in the morning, no, and not when—” She paused abruptly when she saw the expression on Cilly’s face.
“Oh, pet. Whatever is the matter? You know I’m only teasing you.
Of course you are a nice person. What’s brought this on?
Is this Rivington’s doing? For if he’s upset you, I’ll—”
Cilly shook her head hastily, and then rather regretted it.
She’d like to know just what Nichols might do if Damian upset her.
“No. I’m just feeling a little… adrift. I thought I knew myself.
I thought that behind the facade of Lady Cecilia I knew who I was, and I was still a nice person, I just had a few more opinions and was a little less patient.
But now I fear I’m rather a dreadful creature. ”
She picked up her hot chocolate and took a sip, watching Nichols for her reaction.
Nichols’s expression was one of rueful amusement. “My lady, forgive me for mentioning it, but… have you met your sister?”
Cilly frowned. “Hetty? Well, obviously, what on—oh.”
Hetty was the troublesome sister, the headstrong, bold, opinionated, irrepressible one.
“You like her, don’t you?” Nichols pressed, raising an eyebrow as she shook creases from the gown Cilly would wear today.
Cilly laughed softly. “Yes. When I don’t want to throttle her with my bare hands.”
Nichols nodded. “Well, there you are, then. You’re just more alike than you let on before, that’s all.”
Cilly nodded. She was still vibrating from the touch of Damian’s finger, from the knowledge that he’d been making a point.
You may have my name; you may not have me.
In his eyes, she was likely no better than Miss Bradford.
She had acted almost as badly, after all.
It was hardly a wonder he did not trust her enough to let her know him better.
“He wants a marriage of convenience, you know. No… No children.” She tried to say the words matter-of-factly, but her voice wobbled slightly, betraying her.
Nichols regarded her, one eyebrow quirked. “Oh, aye?”
Her tone suggested she did not believe it.
“No, truly, Nichols. He’s quite adamant about it. I have agreed, naturally, for I forced him into this, but… but I had hoped we might be friends, at least. I fear he will try to keep a distance between us, though. I am afraid my husband will always be a stranger to me.”
It felt good to say it out loud and, other than her grandmother and her sister, Cilly trusted no one more than Nichols.
She found she could not say such things to her grandmother, though, and she did not wish to spoil the early days of Hetty’s marriage with such concerns.
If she did, Hetty might speak to Gideon, who might try to force Damian’s hand, and he had made it very clear such tactics would be a mistake.
Nichols opened a drawer and took out a clean chemise, laying it carefully over the back of a chair. “Well, my lady, there’s many a slip ’twixt the cup and the lip, is all I’ll say. Now, you eat up that breakfast, and I’ll come back with your hot water.”
With this inscrutable comment, Nichols took herself off, leaving Cilly to break her fast in peace.
The Grand Hotel Building Site, Little Valentine, East Sussex, 7th September 1816
Damian stopped at the entrance to the building site where work had recommenced now the grand ball was over.
He wondered how long the hotel would stand.
It was built to last, certainly. Would it still be here in a hundred years, in two, maybe three hundred, even?
Would Gideon’s name still mean something?
He hoped so, even as the thought made him feel somehow less, as insubstantial as an autumn leaf caught in a breeze.
He had no roots to keep him tied. Celia wanted to give him roots.
She wanted a home, a family. For all her blithe acceptance of his terms, she was lying to him, to herself too.
Now she would think him cruel. Perhaps he was, but in his experience, if something was going to be painful, it was best to rip the bandage off at once and not sit dithering about it and prolonging the agony.
He wasn’t responsible for this damnable situation, after all.
She had trapped him and, if she wanted to keep him tethered at all, she had best realise he needed a very, very long lead.
He made his way to the site hut Gideon used for an office, nodding a greeting to the workmen who stopped and respectfully touched the brims of their hats. He rapped twice and let himself in.
Gideon looked up from a thick ledger over which he was scowling, his expression one of surprise.
“Damian! I didn’t expect to see you.”
Damian closed the door, looking around him with interest. “Well, I did not like to intrude upon your private time, knowing it would take you from your lovely bride. So, I decided to interrupt your working day instead.”
Gideon laughed and closed the book. He was sitting at the desk Damian presumed had been that of his last accountant, the one standing trial for theft and blackmail and heaven alone knew what else. “You are welcome to do so at any time.”
“You’ve not found a new accountant yet, then?”
Gideon shook his head.
“No, sadly, though actually Hetty has been lending a hand. She’s got a remarkably good head for figures. Better than mine. She tells me your betrothed is even more accomplished, so you may have confidence she’ll keep your finances all neat and tidy if you let her.”
There was a slightly too jocular note to Gideon’s voice and Damian sent him a dark look.
“Pack it in, Deon. We both know our circumstances are hardly the same.”
Gideon got up and walked around the desk, perching on the end. He looked down at his hands, frowning, clearly debating what to say, or whether to speak at all.
Don’t, Damian growled inwardly, but Deon opened his mouth just the same.
“Have you told her about… about Mother?”
“Not your mother,” Damian replied curtly, which was petty, but he was feeling petty today and a little vindictive.
“I know,” Deon said with a shrug. “But I’ve thought of her as my mother for all these years. Hard to change now. It isn’t like I’ve another I can picture.”
Damian moved to the desk, picking up invoices and rearranging things, for no other reason than that he knew it vexed Deon.
“To what end? I’ve told her I shall give her my name and security.
I have agreed to be… respectable. She tells me she can make me acceptable to the ton.
A feat I remain to be convinced of. We shall be,” he hesitated, the word feeling odd upon his tongue, “friends.”
“Friends?” Gideon repeated. “Well, that’s a good start, Damian. An excellent start, considering that—”
“That she trapped me into marriage? Yes, I am being wonderfully magnanimous,” Damian replied, smiling and showing too many teeth.
Gideon sighed. “Damian. I know you think you don’t need or want anyone, but… but Cilly, she’s a wonderful girl. She’s beautiful and kind and—”
“If you like her so much, perhaps you married the wrong sister,” Damian quipped, wondering why he was trying so hard to provoke Deon.
The new accord between them was still fragile, and he did not want to damage it, and yet some sly, conniving devil seemed to live in his head and take control of his tongue and say things he lived to regret the moment they were out of his mouth. But by then it was too late.
Gideon was quiet for a long moment, and Damian resisted the urge to look at him, forcing himself to peruse the plans laid on his desk.
He could feel the tension in the air and knew Gideon was making himself take a breath and count to ten, or one hundred.
He didn’t deserve such consideration when he knew very well he was a pain in the arse. Still, he was glad.
“Don’t you want more than that, Damian?” Gideon’s voice was soft, too reasonable. It made Damian want to throw things, to break something.
“Want?” he repeated, his voice icy with contempt. “What the bloody hell does it matter what I want? You think I wanted my mother to murder our father, that I wished for her to be an evil madwoman? Do you think I enjoy knowing her blood runs in my veins?”
“Damian, for God’s sake!”
Ah, and he had finally made Gideon lose his temper. Huzzah.
“You think I don’t know? Me, of all people?” Gideon exclaimed.
Damian snorted. “Ah, but you got the magic potion, Deon. All your troubles miraculously went away. I don’t have a cure. You know as well as I do, we agreed it would be for the best if we never married, if the line ended with us. No children, no cosy little family… you agreed with me, Deon.”
Gideon fell silent. He could hardly argue the truth of it. “I know. I know we did, but you said yourself, Damian, there’s no reason not to marry, not… not to have a proper marriage. You don’t have to produce children, if—”