The Reckless Love of an Heir: An epic historical romance perfect for fans of period drama Victoria
Jane Lark
‘Pure, unadulterated romance’ Best Chick Lit.com“You are reckless, proud, spoiled and everything I dislike!”For Lord Henry Marlow, the future Earl of Barrington, life is for living before he accepts his duty. No wager is too risky or challenge too dangerous – until a racing injury forces the Barrington heir to return home and prepare for his destiny. But the one thing Henry will not do is bow to his parents’ wishes and propose to his childhood friend and neighbour, beautiful Alethea Forth. And he’ll not put up with her disapproving sister, Susan, either, no matter how much he enjoys their verbal sparring…Kind-hearted, bookish Susan Forth has always thought Henry arrogant and self-centred, and has never hidden her dislike of the rogue! But this injured, vulnerable Henry reluctantly brings out her natural compassion, and a shocking desire for the man who is expected to marry her sister! A stolen kiss leads to a forbidden passion – and for the first time in her life, Susan knows what it’s like to be reckless – with a man who is finally learning to care.But when tragedy strikes, their secret love is all that holds them together – and could tear their lives apart…
PRAISE FOR JANE LARK (#u85edf0f1-b597-5902-be2a-9425be8678f3)
‘Jane Lark has an incredible talent to draw the reader in from the first page onwards’
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‘Any description that I give you would not only spoil the story but could not give this book a tenth of the justice that it deserves. Wonderful!’
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‘This book held me captive after the first 2 pages. If I could crawl inside and live in there with the characters I would’
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‘The book swings from truly swoon-worthy, tense and heart wrenching, highly erotic and everything else in between’
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‘I love Ms. Lark’s style—beautifully descriptive, emotional and can I say, just plain delicious reading? This is the kind of mixer upper I’ve been looking for in romance lately’
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The Reckless Love of an Heir
JANE LARK
A division of HarperCollinsPublishers
www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)
HarperImpulse an imprint of
HarperCollinsPublishers
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First published in Great Britain by HarperImpulse 2016
Copyright © Jane Lark 2016
Cover images © Shutterstock.com (http://Shutterstock.com)
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers 2016
Cover design by Holly Macdonald
Jane Lark asserts the moral right to
be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book
is available from the British Library
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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Ebook Edition © July 2016 ISBN: 9780008139834
Version 2016-07-05
Table of Contents
Cover (#u7909821f-3aa4-50b1-9fb8-997e4eb23c2e)
Praise for Jane Lark (#u6e535482-97d6-5cb0-8543-78591bc46476)
Title Page (#ud0c3c091-0382-5629-9f86-2719b6fb52a1)
Copyright (#u38957f2a-66d2-59c4-a6b1-f81ded98333f)
Chapter One (#ub50440ba-9024-5fbd-82f5-66e2ca976fa2)
Chapter Two (#u5ba50366-e067-52da-9f0b-4624a0af4d2a)
Chapter Three (#u44260174-1717-553a-86bc-2a03e2f2f377)
Chapter Four (#u0b703947-9b27-58ce-9741-8d5d43cb68ad)
Chapter Five (#u53a8fd6b-a6ba-5e8b-b247-a32326ccc478)
Chapter Six (#ue621f751-7c26-561a-a8a5-8abb6bf973c8)
Chapter Seven (#ufced710f-30f4-5ea7-8124-018ed3e33683)
Chapter Eight (#u306b477e-e9a2-55e5-b5b9-1aea17ff0902)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-One (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty-One (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Author Note (#litres_trial_promo)
Also by Jane Lark (#litres_trial_promo)
Jane Lark (#litres_trial_promo)
About HarperImpulse (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#u85edf0f1-b597-5902-be2a-9425be8678f3)
The carriage passed between the large stone lions that held the shields engraved with the Barrington coat of arms and entered the Farnborough Estate through the open wrought iron gates. Henry sighed heavily and removed his foot from the opposite seat of his father’s carriage. The carriage had been sent to town to collect him, on his request.
Pain shot from his right shoulder down to the elbow that was held bent within a sling. His left hand lifted and braced the shoulder.
The damn thing killed. He would be glad to get out of this carriage. Each rut in the road had jolted his arm.
He’d dislocated the shoulder in a fall from his curricle and sprained his wrist besides acquiring several bruises and the bloody thing made it impossible to dress or shave himself and he was equally unable ride a horse, or drive his curricle.
He’d been told by the surgeon in London that he must wear the sling for a month while his shoulder healed, and so he had chosen to come home; where at least he would have his father’s valet and his mother and sisters to look after him.
He picked up his hat from the far seat, using his good hand, and put it on as the carriage passed the gate house then began its journey along the snaking avenue, with its tall horse-chestnut trees either side. The trees were covered in pillars of white spring blossom.
Henry looked towards the distance, between the trees, trying to catch the first glimpse of the house.
Home. He felt a pull from it, a tug at the far end of what had once been a leading rein. The land and property that would one day be his had a place in his chest that inspired pride and affection. Yet, he was equally happy to be away from it. Since he’d resided in London life had opened doors and windows he’d not seen through before. He did not regret moving there at all. It would have been hideous here, once he’d finished at Oxford. The restrictions his father and mother would have set over his life if he’d returned to Farnborough would have been unbearable, he would have become their coddled child again. In London he could do as he wished, without judgement.
There.
He saw the house.
Farnborough was caught in a ray of sunlight that had broken through the clouds, the clouds that had been hovering over the carriage throughout his journey.
The modernised medieval property had a particular charm, and it did tug at his heart, regardless of his lack of regret over leaving it, and the childhood he’d known here, behind.
That small tug became an overwhelming sense of coming home when the carriage passed beneath the archway of the oldest part of the house underneath the ancient portcullis of the original castle. The emotion was spurred by the sound of the horses’ hooves and iron rimmed carriage wheels ringing on the cobble and sending metallic echoes bouncing back from the walls of the house around the courtyard.
His sisters came out, surrounded by his father’s giant grey deerhounds before the carriage had even drawn to a halt, followed by his mother—there was another pull in his chest. Love. He loved his family, no matter that he had left them behind here. It had been easier to leave them because he’d always known when he needed them, they were here.
The dogs’ tails waved in the air like flags of welcome on the castle’s walls, as they surrounded the carriage.
A footman moved before the women to open the carriage door. Henry climbed down, gripping the carriage frame with his left hand, trying not to move his right arm, because the thing still hurt like the devil from all the damned jolts it had endured to get here.
The noise of the fountain running at the centre of the courtyard echoed back from the old stone about him; another sound which spoke of home.
Samson, his favourite among his father’s dogs, slipped his head beneath Henry’s good hand urging Henry for a petting. He stroked behind Samson’s ear in an idle gesture, that recalled years and hours spent with his father’s dogs.
His mother came forward, her arms lifting to embrace him, as her face expressed her concern over the sling holding his arm.
“Mama,” He acknowledged as she wrapped her arms about him.
She held him too tightly, though. He pulled away. “My shoulder.” The jar of pain was sharp and twisted nausea through his stomach as well as shooting pain down his arm and across his back. He gritted his teeth, trying not to wince from it.
“Oh, I am sorry. Are you so badly hurt? You have had your father and I worried beyond measure.”
“How far did you fall?” Christine his youngest sister asked. She was not the youngest of his siblings, though. He had two sisters but his brothers out numbered them two to one. Fortunately the younger ones were away at School and not here to disturb him. The eldest, Percy, the next to Henry in age was twenty and at University in Oxford. Christine was seventeen.
“Too far,” Henry answered her.
“Were you winning the race?”
His good arm settled about Christine’s shoulders, in brotherly comradery, as they all turned to walk towards the house, the dogs with them. “Of course. Do you not remember? I always win.”
Sarah, who was eighteen, and to have her come out in London in a few weeks, was walking ahead of him. She looked over her shoulder and smiled. “I have sent a groom over to the Forths’ to tell Alethea you are home. She wished to know as soon as you arrived so she might call and see you at once.”
Henry smiled. God bless Alethea… He would be required to feel guilty within the hour then. Yet they were not officially engaged. It had been an unspoken agreement cooked up almost from their births. A plan formed between his father and his father’s friend, Uncle Casper, Lord Forth, who owned a neighbouring estate.
After Henry’s birth Lord and Lady Forth had been blessed with a daughter—and probably even while wetting Alethea’s head—it had become the perfect plan, to match the two.
The expectation placed upon him had been talked about as far back as he could remember. He’d never disagreed, nor disliked the idea, it was simply that he had not yet gone along with the plot and said the words that would seal the agreement and he had no intention of doing so during this visit home either. His marriage could wait, he was currently very much enjoying his bachelorhood and he was only twenty-three, it was too bloody young to betroth himself.
“I am sure you need to sit down,” his mother said. “You must be tired. Is it painful still? It must be. Have you taken laudanum?”
“I took some when I last stopped, but it is not intolerable, you need not fuss.” Yet he had come home because he’d known they would fuss and he was in a self-indulgent mood; a mood which appreciated their fussing. It did hurt, and his mother’s concern was the best balm—for a spoilt son.
He smiled at his rumination and allowed Christine to take hold of his good hand and pull him over the threshold of the house.
The square hall welcomed him, with its dark, wide, oak staircase, that wrapped itself about the walls, leading, seemingly, forever upward in an angular ascent. He loved the house. It smelled the same—of polished wood, candle wax and his mother’s perfume.
Christine tugged his hand and pulled him on, not to his father’s stately drawing room in one of the more recently built wings of the house, but to their smaller family drawing room. The dark oak panelling and the window full of Elizabethan lead-lined diamonds, made it seem austere, yet to Henry it induced that final sense of being home more than any other place in the house.
He sat down on an old sofa that his mother had had reupholstered in a gold velvet. The room brought back numerous happy memories of his childhood. This was where they had spent their days when he was young, playing and laughing, and many evenings too when he’d returned from school for the holidays—
“Must your arm remain in the sling always?” Christine asked.
“Always, for a few weeks.”
She made a face at him. “You knew what I meant.”
“You should see my shoulder and my arm, then you would have cause to make a disgusted face, I am black and every shade of red and yellow.” His hip was black too, and half his leg, and elsewhere there were other bruises. He’d truly shaken himself up. He’d lived carelessly his entire life, but his fall had made him realise more than just that he’d nearly broken his arm, he had nearly broken his neck, and the thought of that, that he might not have survived was the thing that had shaken him up. He had been given a second chance at life, he supposed. A chance to consider what he had done with his life. If he had died, he would have left no legacy. He’d spent his years carelessly and recklessly.
“Do you wish for tea and cake? You must be hungry…” His mother did not await his answer but turned to pull the cord to call for a maid. “And if you need to rest,” she said when she turned around, “you are in your old rooms.”
It would be as though he had never left home then. He smiled. He’d needed a sanctuary, and comforting, and as he’d known his mother and sisters were here and ready to offer both. “Thank you, Mama.”
He had at first moved to London to avoid her mollycoddling, and yet now he’d received a hard dose of fate’s medicine he’d realised that at times it had a value. His low spirit craved it.
“Here.” Sarah picked up a cushion from another chair, as Samson settled down, laying beside Henry’s feet and resting his head on Henry’s boot as he’d always done. His tail thumped on the floor as it continued to wave. The other dogs lay down on the hearth rug, their eyes on the returned prodigal son. “Sit back, Henry. Rest against this.”
Christine picked up a cushion too. “You may rest your arm on here.”
They arranged the cushions about him so he might sit more comfortably. Then Christine fetched a footstool for him.
He was being truly pampered. It had been a very good decision to return.
~
“Mama! Mama!”
Susan looked at her sister as Alethea hurried into the drawing room, waving a letter.
“He’s here! At Farnborough! Henry is home!” Alethea turned to the footman. “Please have them prepare the carriage.” Then she looked back at their mother. “Mama we must go. If he is in pain…”
“If he is in pain he deserves to be in pain.” Susan said quietly towards the book which lay open in her lap. She was sensitive of all wounded animals and concerned for those in need, but she did not care for young irresponsible men.
“Susan.” Alethea scowled at her.
She had not intended Alethea to hear.
“How can you be so cruel. It was a terrible accident. He has been injured and you are wishing more harm on him.”
Susan closed the book and set it aside. “He was in an accident because he was driving his curricle foolishly. He only has himself to blame and it was only his arm that was injured, he is hardly in a state that requires extreme sympathy.” And even if he was worse Susan would not feel in the least sympathetic as he’d brought it upon himself. It was his family who ought to receive sympathy for having such a careless, reckless son who constantly treated their concern with no regard.
“Then do not come to visit him with me. You may stay here if you intend to be irritable and rude to him. I have not seen him for months. I will not have the moment ruined.”
Susan did not care. She had no desire to see Henry. In her view he had been a spoilt brat who had grown into a spoilt, insensitive, selfish, careless man. She lifted her eyebrows so they must be arched above the rim of her spectacles, making an I-do-not-care expression at her sister.
“Mama, you will come with me. I cannot go if you do not. Please?”
“I cannot. I am busy. You two will have to settle this argument. Susan will have to accompany you. Your father will be returning in an hour and expect me to be here to receive Mr. Dennison.”
Susan sighed and stood up. She was not to escape Henry’s odious company then. “I am willing, if you wish me to join you.” She was not cruel. She would not deprive her sister of his company when Alethea had waited so long for it. She was not selfish.
“He shall not thank me for bringing you when you are in this mood, but at least then I shall see him. Fetch your bonnet and cloak, I wish to go as soon as we may.” Having cast her commands Alethea turned to leave the room.
That Alethea was very well matched to her anticipated fiancé was not something Susan would say aloud and yet at the back of her mind it was a thought she kept in constant hiding. She did not wish to malign her sister and yet the comparison screamed at her at times.
Alethea stopped at the door and turned back. “Aunt Jane and Uncle Robert will most likely ask us to dine, Mama, and so I doubt we shall return until late. You do not mind?”
“Of course I do not mind, but then you must take two footmen with you as well as the grooms; I will not have you accosted by highwaymen.”
“We are only to drive to Uncle Robert’s. It is the neighbouring estate. We will hardly be accosted in the four miles along the highway.”
“But it will be near dark and we know there are highway men in the area—”
Susan picked up the gauntlet and tackled her mother’s fear. “And no one will know we intend to use that very small stretch of rarely travelled road at that hour. I am sure that highwaymen do not have psychic powers and they would not lay in wait with the potential hope of never seeing a single carriage pass. We will be safe.”
Alethea smiled at Susan, with a look in her eyes that said, thank you, before she left the room.
Susan’s mother shook her head, but her lips twisted in a wry smile. “There is always an answer from you. Your sister should be more grateful.”
Susan did not mean to argue but if there was sense and reason to be spoken or a fact to be taken into account, she would say it, that was all.
Susan gave her mother an amused smile, mimicking the humour her mother had spoken with. “I shall go up to my room and fetch my bonnet and cloak.” She bobbed a very quick curtsy before turning to leave, to prepare for their arduous journey of a few moments.
“Enjoy your day, dear! Give my regards to Jane and Robert!” Her mother called after her.
She did not mind visiting Farnborough really, she liked her aunt and uncle, and Sarah and Christine, Henry’s sisters. And Uncle Robert’s huge library, which was three times the size of her father’s was a strong persuader.
When she walked down the shallow steps to the hall after collecting her things, Alethea awaited her.
“There you are. Hurry!”
Susan smiled. She was as different to her sister as it was possible to be, both in looks and character, and yet they were close. But it was just the two of them, they did not have a large family like Henry’s, or his cousins’. Henry and his cousins had the opportunity to choose the brother or sister who most suited them as their closest confidant, she and Alethea had each other and that was all. Susan was happy for it to be so, though, there was a bond between them that might not exist in a large family.
A footman opened the door. Alethea turned and walked out, at her usual hasty pace.
Alethea was forever in a hurry to experience and enjoy every single moment of life. Susan preferred not to hurry, to dwell on things, to look at them for a length of time and study them in detail, not rush past. She had often stopped Alethea to point out a beautiful view or a wild flower, a butterfly or a bird in a tree. There were so many things that Alethea missed.
Susan smiled at the thought as she stepped off the last stair.
Alethea’s nature was not hers, but it was infectious. She did love her sister no matter that they were so different. Alethea’s enthusiasm could not be ignored.
Susan quickened her pace and hastened out of the door in pursuit.
Alethea was climbing the step into the carriage, her fingers clasping the hand of a footman.
A second footman stood on the plate at the back of the carriage holding the iron bar and an additional groom sat beside the coachman on the box. Susan’s mother had instigated a larger escort for her precious daughters regardless.
Susan took the footman’s hand, climbed the step into the carriage and sat beside Alethea.
“Do you think he may have changed?” Alethea asked when the door shut.
The carriage jolted forward into motion and rocked to the side as the footman who had helped them jumped on to the second perch at the rear.
“It has been less than a year.” Yet it had been nearly a year.
“I know, but he writes of such larks in town, do you think he will think me dull now?”
“He will not think you dull. No one that we know has ever thought you dull.” No one could accuse Alethea of that, she was constantly in motion or conversing.
“But he has the women in London to compare me to and he describes London society as such an improvement on our quiet, country life.”
“Yet the moment he is home he has sent for you. He cannot dislike the idea of your company.”
Alethea looked at Susan and bit her lip for a moment. It was a very slight gesture but Susan noticed the sign of self-consciousness and uncertainty. It was unlike Alethea.
“He did not.” Alethea clarified. “Sarah sent the letter. I asked her to.”
Oh. That redeemed him a little in Susan’s current ill-judgement, if he had not sent for Alethea to come and play nursemaid. “He will love you still,” she reassured. “Merely look at his expression when he sees you and it will show you.”
His brown eyes, the rich colour of sweet chestnuts at the moment their green pods split open, had always lit up with the warmth of an appreciative smile whenever he looked at Alethea. Even when they’d been young he’d thrown glinting looks at Alethea and challenged her to a race or the solving of a conundrum or the telling of the best joke.
But then Alethea had always been the pretty and the vibrant one and Henry the handsomest and wildest. They were well matched.
Susan pressed the tip of her finger on to the bridge of her spectacles and slid them a little farther up her nose. Alethea had golden hair and eyes the colour of forget-me-not petals. She was often called a remarkable beauty in Susan’s hearing. So why would Henry not admire her no matter how pretty the women were in London.
Susan had mousey-brown hair and eyes that were steel-grey not blue. She had never received the same accolade—people did not use the word beautiful to describe her.
It was fortunate, really, that she was not like her sister in character as much as they were unlike in looks, because if she had Alethea’s nature she would be jealous. As it was she was as much in awe of her sister’s beauty as others and she thanked heaven that neither jealousy nor vanity were emotions she was afflicted with. She was quite content to be herself, the less amusing, less charming and less attractive sister. Susan could stand in a room and very easily disappear by simply not speaking, which meant that if she did disappear and leave a room, no one noticed her slip away.
“What should I say to him, when I see him?”
“Hello, perhaps…”
“Do not tease me. Tell me. My stomach is all upside down. I wish it had not been so long. Do you think he will look different?”
Alethea’s questions and her stream of concerns continued as the carriage gently rocked and creaked, navigating the rutted road leading to the Barrington’s estate.
Chapter Two (#u85edf0f1-b597-5902-be2a-9425be8678f3)
Alethea clasped the footman’s hand and descended from the carriage into the courtyard at Farnborough.
When Alethea had let go Susan held his hand and climbed down.
The air was full of the sound of the splashing water pouring from the fountain.
The front door opened. Davis the Barrington’s elderly butler stood there, ready to welcome them.
Alethea immediately said, “I wish to see Lord Henry.”
“He is in the family drawing room, Miss Forth, do come in. Shall I introduce you?”
Alethea was already stepping in as he spoke, she had not awaited his invitation. Davis was used to her ways, though. “There’s no need, Davis. Sarah sent for me. They are expecting us, and we know where it is of course.”
Susan stepped into the hall. Davis bowed to her.
They’d spent many hours here as girls, because their parents were such close friends. The Barringtons were like an extension of Susan’s family, she thought of Lord and Lady Barrington as an aunt and uncle, and called them so, and Christine and Sarah were as good as cousins to her. She had known the boys less, though, because they’d spent so many years away from home, at school.
Alethea led the way again, full of energy, excitement and concern for Henry.
The door to the smaller family drawing room, in one of the older parts of the house, stood open. Alethea did not knock but walked straight in. Then exclaimed, “Henry!” and rushed on.
“Sarah sent me word you were home…” Alethea said as Susan followed her into the Barringtons’ homely drawing room.
The walls and ceiling were covered in wooden panelling, making the room dark, but it had a sense of being frequently used. The walls were full of past and present tales.
“Oh dear you poor thing,” Alethea declared, pulling out a cushion from behind Henry. He sat forward to allow it and looked up at her with a smile of welcome and humour.
He had one arm in a sling, and his feet up on a footstool where Samson rested his head, and his sisters and his mother were seated about him, all sitting forward on their chairs their postures expressing concern, while Henry had been laying back against his bed of cushions looking perfectly content.
There was nothing poor about him, he was busy enjoying every moment of the attention his injury had brought him. A frown pulled at Susan’s forehead. She had a natural empathy for wounded things and people, she could never abide to see anything in pain. She was forever rescuing and nursing injured creatures, to the upset of her mother, who was even concerned about her visiting the sick in case she came into contact with some dangerous illness. Yet her father understood. Twice she had spent the night in the stables with him watching over a foal, encouraging it to take a bottle when it had lost its mother.
Henry’s pretence annoyed her. He did not deserve pity for his foolishness.
When Alethea set the cushion back down, to Henry’s credit, he lifted his feet off the stool and stood to welcome her properly. Samson stirred and rose too. “Alethea.” He nodded his head in greeting, but he did not attempt a bow with his injured shoulder so wrapped up. He did however clasp Alethea’s hand with his free hand and lift it to kiss the back of her fingers. “It is my extreme pleasure to see you again and perhaps the good in the bad of my accident.”
Alethea gave him her flirtatious smile—the smile that made her look her prettiest. A smile Susan had watched practiced before a mirror to achieve its perfection.
Henry’s smile lifted in return, becoming something more personal and his eyes filled with the twinkle they only sparkled with when he looked at Alethea. Alethea had had no need to worry. Henry might wander away but something would always bring him back, and when he came back his eyes said he remembered why he liked Alethea.
For as long as Susan could recall whenever the two of them had come together within half an hour they were whispering conspiratorially and laughing at something shared between them and no one else.
Henry passed his smile on to Susan. His eyes lost their glimmer and his smile twisted slightly giving it an edge of sarcasm. None of his looks were practiced. Henry did not deploy guile or artifice. He was naturally full of rakish charm. Only for Alethea that charm shone, for Susan it mocked.
She gave him a closed lip smile and bobbed a scant curtsy. “Good day, Henry.” Samson slipped his head beneath her hand, encouraging her to greet him.
Henry nodded. That was all.
While he and Alethea had always had an exclusive friendship, he and Susan had shared an undercurrent of hostility—or perhaps on his part it was indifference.
“Good day, Susan.” He still held Alethea’s hand. He looked back at her. “Sit with me.” Then he looked at Susan. “Before you sit would you call for a maid? We’ll have another cup of tea now you are both here.”
She wished to make a face at him for his arrogance but she did not.
“Do not worry, Susan, I shall do it.” His mother rose, “I presume you will both stay to dine with us, so I will need to speak with cook anyway.” She approached Susan and squeezed her hand gently. “Hello, dear.” Then she walked on to call for tea and arrange for them to join the family for dinner.
Alethea sat beside Henry, regaling him with some tale about local society as she undid the ribbons of her bonnet, then took it off and set it down beside her. She stripped off her gloves too, before looking at Susan. “Would you take them for me?”
Without even acknowledging the request Susan moved forward and picked them up then turned and took them out into the hall to find a footman to take care of them. When she did find a man she took off her own bonnet, cloak and gloves.
Alethea had not worn her cloak for fear Henry would be awaiting them in the courtyard and not then be able to observe her figure at its best advantage as she descended from the carriage.
When Susan returned to the room Henry and Alethea were laughing. Susan sat beside Christine, who was also avidly listening to Henry’s conversation. But Henry was her brother, and he had been away for a long time.
The other dogs, Goliath, Hercules and Zeus rose from the hearth rug, and came over to her for a pet, their tails wagging their welcome. Samson had returned to his position by Henry’s feet. He had always had a penchant for Henry over anyone else. Strange dog.
When they drank their tea Susan spoke with Aunt Jane, as the dogs settled back down by the hearth. But afterwards she decided it was time to remove herself. She was not a member of the Henry Marlow Appreciation Society and as the conversation orientated entirely around him she was neither involved nor interested in it. “May I look at the books in the library, Aunt Jane?”
“Of course, dear.”
Susan rose without taking her leave of anyone else, the others were intently absorbed in some droll story Henry was telling about his friends in town. She opened the door and then shut it quietly, wondering whether either Alethea or Henry ever noticed her leave.
She did not care, though, it had always been like that when Alethea and Henry were together. When they’d been young she and Alethea had often played with Henry and Percy, the brother next to Henry in age, when the boys were home from school, and Susan had always trailed behind, forgotten.
In the library, she looked along the spines of the books. She loved Uncle Robert’s library. It had been her sanctuary at Farnborough for years. She came here to be alone. When she had been forgotten, and then finally remembered, this was where people found her.
All four walls were lined with books, floor to ceiling.
Her fingers ran over the bound leather and gilded titles, as reverence swept through her heart.
At the end of the row, on the middle shelf, she came across one of her favourite books, The Native Orchids of the British Isles. She smiled and lifted it out. It was bound in light brown leather, more than a dozen inches tall and a couple more inches wide, and it smelled wonderful. It smelled of the things which made her feel better, security and comfort.
Security and comfort, then, could be found within aged leather and dust.
She smiled more broadly as she carried it over to Uncle Robert’s desk and set it down, then opened it on a random page. Her fingers touched the image, Platanthera bifolia; the Lesser Butterfly-orchid. It looked so dainty, and the illustrator had brought it to life beautifully with lighter colours and deeper shading.
Susan had longed, ever since she was a little girl, to make her own book of painted flowers, the desire for such skill as this illustrator was an ache in her chest. This book had been her inspiration. She had sat in the window seat here and stared at every page for hours.
She sat down in the chair before the desk and turned the pages. The longing to paint like this flourished in her chest again as she considered every minor stroke of the brush.
The images were so beautiful.
To be able to create something that beautiful…
~
It was damned awkward trying to eat one handed, especially with Alethea sitting on one side of him. Christine sat in the chair on his other side, Susan and Sarah were seated across the dinner table and his mother and father at either end.
The soup had been the only simple course, for everything else he’d needed to use a bloody knife and fork, and trying to cut something then spear it was not proving successful.
“Here, let me, Henry,” Alethea pulled his plate over to cut up his food for the third time. “I do not mind…”
He damned-well minded! It was uncomfortable. He did not like the need to be reliant on her in such a way. He hated the need to be reliant on anyone. Yet he bore it gallantly—even though the pain in his shoulder and the rest of his body cast him into a very ill-mood.
Alethea’s lips pouted delicately as she focused on the task.
She’d grown into a very pretty woman. Although he had known prettier in town.
Some of her blond hair had become loose from the knot secured on top of her head. It fell in tiny curls on to the back of her neck. The curls slipped forward as she cut up his food. The back of a woman’s neck was one of the places on a woman’s body he’d always thought the most appealing—he liked the delicate curve.
When Alethea had finished she looked up and slid his plate back towards him. “There.” She sounded as though she spoke to a child, but she said it with a smile. There was no ill-meaning. She was simply being kind.
When Henry’s gaze lifted as Alethea focused on her own food, he caught his father’s eye. There was a look of expectation. He’d seen Henry admiring Alethea. Henry was perfectly happy to oblige their parents and fulfil their wish—but for God sake not yet.
He looked at his plate and pierced a piece of the mutton with his fork. Then looked across the table, to avoid catching his father’s eye again. Susan was speaking with Sarah. He doubted Susan had looked across the table once. Certainly she would not seek to engage him in conversation.
She made him smile, and laugh, in private. She was so different to her sister. Her fingers lifted and pushed her spectacles a little farther up her nose. His smile rose; it was just one of her quirky little habits.
“Where did you go to this afternoon, Susan? You disappeared.”
Her grey eyes turned to him. Her eyes were a little magnified by the prescription of her spectacles, but not overly so, and her spectacles did not make her look awkward, merely intelligent and perhaps distinguished—
“Withdrawing to the library is hardly disappearing. I walked out of the drawing room. I did not vanish.”
It was a harsh whip from the lash of her quick wit and sharp tongue. Henry laughed. He equally laughed at the thought of her being distinguished, though, she’d never been that—rebellious yes, angry often, and independent always. But distinguished—never. “The library is the answer then. What did you find there? Did you enjoy it?” Of course he was teasing her, it had been one of his favourite pastimes as a boy, mocking her sharp retorts. She was clever, but he was clever too and he liked spurring her. She had always disliked him and perhaps it was his own fault for teasing her, yet he’d always liked her oddness, it amused him.
She was forever stopping to pick a tiny flower in a field, or point out a butterfly or beetle. Alethea, though, was impatient in nature, and so they had often left her sister and her odd observations behind.
Her lips twisted in the same annoyed look she’d always given him. “I enjoyed it very much, thank you.” She looked away from him, at his father, baring the nape of her neck. None of her brown hair had escaped its knot.
It was a very vulnerable curve, it expressed a side of Susan she never showed.
“Uncle Robert, would you mind if I used your book of orchids and copied the paintings in it? I wish to learn how to paint as well as the illustrator and it occurred to me that if I copied the images, it might help me understand how to build that level of detail.”
Henry shook his head as his fork lifted another mouthful. He was truly home. Nothing had changed here. His mother and father were the same, Alethea was the same, and Susan was the same—as bookish, dogged and independent as ever.
“You may borrow it of course. Take it home with you if you wish?”
“Thank you. But may I paint here? Alethea will want to visit Henry and I will need to accompany her.”
“I am in accordance with whatever arrangement suits you, Susan. I shall be out of the house visiting the farms this week and next, or with Rob the majority of the days, so you may have the freedom of the library.”
“Thank you.”
Susan’s thank you resounded with heart felt pleasure. Over painting bloody orchids… He smiled in the same moment his father looked at him.
“Rob is looking for a new ram. We are going to the market together. You might wish to join us?”
“My shoulder is not really up to it.” And he had no interest in competing with his cousin. Rob rented a property from his father and all Henry heard every time he came home was Rob has done this or is planning to do that. His cousin had become the son his father had always wanted and every comment was made with an intent to incite Henry into an interest and a desire to compete. It was one competition he’d not been drawn towards, land management… One day, when he inherited the land it would come with the package of such responsibilities but until then he was happy to avoid it. His father managed it all well enough without his help.
Sarah asked Susan something about the book she’d asked to borrow. Susan responded with animation, the pitch of her voice lifting and a light of excitement catching in her eyes.
She was an odd woman.
The voice in his head laughed. He’d met a hundred women like Alethea in town, but not a single one like Susan. Perhaps because that type of woman did not go to balls, nor mix with men like him. Clearly Susan would not mix with him by choice; she had withdrawn to the library rather than join in the conversation in the drawing room earlier, even though she had not seen him for almost a year.
She was rebellious—not distinguished. The impression her spectacles gave was a lie. He doubted anyone else would call her rebellious, though, that was the side of her nature she saved solely for him.
Her head turned and her gaze caught on his, as though she’d sensed him watching her. She did not immediately look away. Perhaps she saw the laughter in his eyes because her mouth formed a firm line, expressing annoyance. She looked down at her plate and focused on eating.
A little sound of the humour that he tried to catch in his throat escaped his lips as he turned to Alethea again. He coughed, choking on his silent laughter, then smiled. “Now Susan has decreed you will visit me, so that she may paint orchids, you must visit me often.”
Alethea gave him one of her brightest, prettiest smiles. “Susan knows me well enough to be certain I would come. She did not force my hand. You are injured. So she was not being presumptuous if that is what you are hinting at, merely kind enough to understand how much I want to be with you.”
Prettily said, and very commendably done. The sisters were close. Whenever he and Susan sparred verbally in Alethea’s hearing she would step in to defend her sister. Not that Susan had need of a defender, she was perfectly capable of defending herself.
When he answered Alethea his voice turned sickly sweet for the sake of Susan’s hearing it across the table. “Then thank you. I will look forward to your visits.”
But he was truly melancholy and feeling selfishly sorry for himself since his accident, and he would, without any jesting, appreciate Alethea’s presence; she would jump at his every breath to please him. There was much to be said for being at home when he was ill.
Alethea’s bright turquoise eyes, shone with the strength of her happiness. Her moods were as open to a person’s view as one of the books in the library which Susan loved, while Susan, the book lover, held all her pages firmly closed.
“So tell me, then, how are we to fill our time while I recover?” The less joyous part of his return was that he was fully prepared to be bored to death as there was so little he was capable of doing.
“I shall call every day if you wish, and we can play cards or chess. Or I can read to you…” Alethea reassured.
Chapter Three (#u85edf0f1-b597-5902-be2a-9425be8678f3)
The door to the library opened. Susan looked up. She was sitting at Uncle Robert’s desk. Her fingertips tightened their hold on the thin paint brush. “Henry…” What are you doing here? The last words did not erupt from her mouth but sounded in the use of his name.
If she had spoken the words it would have been too rude; it was his home. But having let the tone of them slip into the pitch of her voice she sensed herself colouring when he looked at her with a questioning gaze. She had not meant to be rude, she had merely been engrossed in her work, and caught by surprise. She had not seen him yet today, she had come directly to the library.
He was in dishabille, informal, wearing trousers, a shirt and his sling, he had no black neckcloth or waistcoat or morning coat on. It was unseemly really, but she supposed it was due to his injury, and this was his home—if he could not be comfortable here then where?
He hesitated, the door still open in his hand. Samson stood beside him, awaiting Henry’s next movement.
Some decision passed across Henry’s eyes and he turned and shut the door.
They should not be in a room together with the door shut no matter that they had been raised almost as closely as a brother and sister. Alethea had been treated like his sister too and she was to marry him.
“Sorry,” he uttered in a low tone as he crossed the room, with Samson following, “I forgot you were in here.”
He was not his normal bold, brash self. He looked from her to the leather sofa which stood side-on to the hearth, facing the tall windows. He had an odd expression. He walked past the desk where she worked, towards the sofa.
When he passed one of the windows, the bright spring sunlight shone through the fine cotton of his shirt outlining his torso in silhouette. He was very lean, yet not thin, muscular, in the way the grooms were in her father’s stables. They were the only other men she had seen in their shirts, when they had been birthing the mares.
An odd sensation twisted around in Susan’s stomach. “Where is Alethea?”
“Taking the other dogs for a turn about the garden with Christine and Sarah. I told her I wished to sleep.”
“Then why are you not upstairs?”
“Because I prefer to sleep in here. It is more comforting. I like the smell. It reminds me of my youth.”
“When did you spend any time in this library as a child?” Her retort was swift and sharp, and again her pitch carried a rude note. She could not help herself where Henry was concerned. Heat flared in her cheeks. She never really intended to be rude, he just seemed to prick her ire.
“I spent hours in here, Susan.” His voice did not rise to match her boorishness but purely denied her accusation. “They were just not the hours I spent with you and Alethea. Papa used to bring me in here and we would sit together and go through the books all the time. He taught me to appreciate such things and hold the responsibility for—”
“He must be so disappointed.” She really could not help herself with Henry.
“Why?” He had reached the sofa but before he sat, he turned and looked at her, challenging her for the answer with his gaze as well as the question.
His good hand lifted and rested on his bad arm—as though he was in pain.
She smiled, trying to mimic the mocking smiles he regularly gave her. “Because you are hardly responsible. Only a fool would drive a curricle in a race on the roads, you might have broken your neck not sprained your wrist.”
He sat down, looking away from her. Samson sat too. “Believe me, I am well aware. I nearly broke my neck and in the process dislocated my shoulder, not merely twisted my wrist. Now if you’ll excuse me, Susan, I am bloody exhausted and in agony, I have just dosed myself up with laudanum and I am in no mood for you to chastise me. Let me rest.”
He was much paler than normal.
He lay down without looking at her again and sprawled out flat on the long leather sofa, laying on his back with his bad arm on his chest and one foot on the floor while the other turned so his leg lay bent across the seat, as his foot hung off the edge.
Samson rested his head by Henry’s side, as though asking to come up and sleep beside him.
Perhaps that was why Samson was so loyal to him, if Henry had allowed Samson such liberties when he was younger.
His good arm lifted and then lay above his head as he shut his eyes.
“I shan’t make any noise,” she said, to annoy him.
He opened his eyes a little, his dark eyelashes cloaking his gaze as he looked at her. Samson looked at her too. “I did not doubt it, painting is hardly a noisy activity. Let me sleep if you please, Susan.”
She smiled and looked back down at the orchid she was recreating.
There were very fine green lines on each pale cream petal, and that was what she was seeking to capture, only the lines in the book seemed to give the petals depth, and she had not succeeded in mastering that. Perhaps she needed to use more than one shade of green? But the lines then would have to be very, very narrow and far more cautiously done. She needed to develop a steadier hand.
She leant forward and looked closer at the image. The artist had done them so well she could not even see a different shade.
Henry’s breathing became deeper and slower.
When she heard him move she looked up. Samson now lay on the floor beside him. Henry’s bent leg lifted and his foot settled on the sofa so his knee could rest against the back of the seat. He sighed out. The arm which had lain above his head fell down and hung over the edge of the low sofa so that his hand was placed slackly on Samson’s head.
She looked down at her work and carried on adding detail to the petal she was working on.
The slightly different shade of green did add depth, though the variance of colours in her image was very visible to the eye. She leant a little closer to the book and looked at the shape of the petals. There were different shades of cream too. The artist must have mixed the colours with a tiny amount of black to obtain the deeper shade. It would be hard to mix without making the cream too dark.
Henry was quiet. She looked up. He had definitely fallen asleep. The sunshine from the window stretched across his leg and stomach. Perhaps that was why he’d come in here, to sleep in the sunshine.
Susan, mixed a little of the green with more white to make the colour paler still and attempted another narrow line, trying to make the difference in shading less obvious. She used the paler colour on the lower edge of the lines across the petal. It was better than her first attempt, but not good enough.
Rather than progress to the shading of the cream, she began another petal. She would conquer this skill before she sought to learn another.
While she painted she intermittently glanced across the room to check Henry had not woken and was surreptitiously watching her. The sunshine travelled across his lean body as the afternoon progressed. He did not wake.
If she had more natural talent he would have made a perfect model, Young gentleman in repose.
She smiled as she looked back at her work. Asleep, she would admit how handsome he was—when his personality was not added into the mix. When he was silent, like this, she could appreciate his company. She studied him as she worked, with the same eye that she studied the flower. The waves in his dark brown hair were a little chaotic but he had a very classical handsomeness, with his long dark eyelashes resting against the pale skin of his cheeks…
She carefully painted another flower head, then looked back, he must have slept for more than hour, perhaps even two, she had not looked at the clock. He had appeared exhausted, though, and he was still paler than normal. The sunshine was rapidly advancing towards his face. It would disturb him if it shone on to his eyes.
A huff of sound left her throat as she set down her brush, while her inner voice complained over the need to leave her painting as she rose and walked across the room to the window, to close the shutters. Of course it would affect the light she had to work by, but he had looked exhausted.
Samson woke and his head lifted, slipping away from Henry’s fingers, as he watched her cross the room. She walked over to him, rather than to the window. He did not rise, so she leant to stroke his head. “You foolish, dog,” she whispered. “To save your loyalty for such a man.” Yet animals were like that, they had no judgement of one’s character, if you treated them well, they treated you well.
The cuff of the loose shirt sleeve covering Henry’s good arm had been caught up when he’d moved his arm from above his head, and it had slipped upwards. She noticed dark and vivid, vicious looking bruises that she had not seen from across the room. His shirt had also fallen open into a wide v at his chest, without a neckcloth to hold the collar closed. She could see the little dent at the base of his throat and the first shape of his chest and a sprinkling of dark hair and more nasty bruises.
Her mouth was suddenly dry, and an odd cramp gently tightened the muscles in her stomach. She had always been pulled to the protection of injured things, the sight of something in pain always caught her hard in the middle with a feeling of sickness. Yet this was Henry. Guilt washed across her thoughts. She had been rude to him. She had not cared about his injuries. She had thought that he’d been exaggerating, yet now she could see he had not been.
Her stomach twisted as she looked at his face, with regret. Samson rose and sat beside her, so that she would stroke his head again.
But it was more than a feeling of nausea over the sight of his injuries. Just as she admired the flowers, or the detail in the wings of a butterfly, she admired Henry’s face.
She turned away.
It was definitely not a good thing to look at Henry and feel any sort of liking. She did not want to think him attractive. When he was awake she had no liking for him at all and it was better for things to be like that, he was to be her brother-in-law, and as no one thought her beautiful it was very likely that she would live here in her later life, dependent upon him, as Alethea’s spinster sister. Her father’s property was entailed so when her father passed away her home would be given to a cousin and she would have no choice but to rely upon Henry’s generosity.
He moved behind her.
She stopped and looked back.
His bad arm shifted across his chest moving the sling, as a sound of discomfort escaped his lips. His shirt opened wider, sliding off his bad shoulder. There was a large, much darker, almost entirely black bruise covering his shoulder, with yellow and redness at its edges. He’d said he’d dislocated his shoulder; it must hurt considerably. He had definitely not merely come home to act the invalid, then; he had been seriously injured. The pull of sympathy clasped her.
It annoyed her. She did not wish to feel it for Henry. He did not deserve it. He had done this to himself.
She turned away, went to the window and closed the lower shutters, with Samson watching her. He had not moved away from Henry. The shade half covered Henry to the top of his chest. She walked to the next window and closed the lower shutters over that too so that the shade covered all of him, then turned to go back to her painting.
Henry’s body suddenly jolted and a sound of discomfort escaped his throat. “Damn it!” he shouted on a breath, but his eyes did not open. “Bloody hell! The horses! What of the horses!” Another sound of pain escaped his throat as he moved as though to rise.
She walked over, unsure whether to leave him to his nightmare or wake him.
“Fuck! The…” His eyes opened and he sat up.
She turned away but he grasped her wrist.
“Were you staring at me?”
He was breathing heavily, and his blood raced in a fast pace through the vein she could see pulsing beside the little dent next to his clavicle at the base of his throat.
“No. I closed the shutters so the sunlight would not wake you, then you started dreaming and woke up anyway.”
He let her wrist go, sighed and then twisted around to sit upright with both feet on the floor, Samson moved out of his way. His good elbow rested on his knee and his hand held his forehead as his bad arm lay in its sling on his thigh.
“Are you unwell?”
He glanced up at her, and gave her a bitter, wry smile, very slightly lifting his poorly arm. “Do I look well?”
“Did you dream of your accident?”
“Yes.” It was said with a sigh and a pained look. He gave her a more real smile. “I thought my time had run out.”
Heat touched her cheeks as she felt Henry’s particular method of charm deployed. It was still enchanting even when it was mocking. He was too handsome when he smiled. She turned away from him to go back to her painting, and avoid the sense of empathy which clawed at her. “It was your own fault, though, and I would guess you have still not learned the lesson and will race again.”
“Probably,” he answered, clearly not in a mood to go into verbal battle.
She sat down behind the desk and picked up her paint brush.
He stood up and his good arm stretched out, as he yawned. He was standing in the sunlight which shone through the windows above the lower shutters that she’d closed. Again she had the perfect silhouette of his body beneath his shirt.
Embarrassment warmed her skin as she remembered all the bruises on him.
She washed out her brush in the small bowl of water, then wiped it on the rag beside her, before dipping it in the paint to begin another petal. “Must you wear no waistcoat and morning coat? I’d prefer it if you wore more clothes if you are coming in here to sleep while I am working.”
He laughed. “Much as I would love to oblige you, as it is bloody agony to put either on, while I am at home I intend to make free of my comfort and abstain. You are lucky I have bothered to put a shirt on so that I am decent at all.” He walked across the room. “And it is only because Alethea was coming that I endured that feat.” He stopped on the other side of the desk and looked down at her work. “That is a reasonable copy.”
She met his gaze. “Reasonable? I am proud of it. It is much better than I thought I could achieve. I have been studying how the illustrator has captured the shades to give the flower its life-like depth. I know I shall never be—”
The ignorant oaf laughed.
Susan’s eyebrows lifted. He could be so arrogant!
“Sorry, you are just such a ridiculous anomaly. You amuse me.”
“If you are going to ridicule me, leave me in peace?”
“I was not ridiculing you. I was admiring your efforts.”
“By laughing at them?”
“Never mind, Susan. I am too tired and in too much pain to fence words with you.” He turned away. “Enjoy the rest of your afternoon painting.”
“I shall!” she called after him sarcastically, as he walked away. She smiled to herself. She preferred him awake. She felt better with things as normal between them no matter how nice Henry looked when he was asleep, and she refused to be swayed by her sympathy for the rogue, even though she knew he was lucky to be alive—it was his own fault.
She and Alethea dined at Farnborough, and Aunt Jane invited them to stay rather than travel back and forth each day, but Alethea denied the offer because their mother would most likely prefer it if they did not entirely desert her.
Although it was as if they were; they had left home at ten o’clock and would most likely only return in time to retire to bed. The days were not yet long.
Henry remained in dishabille for dinner.
He had a sickly pallor.
Susan watched as Alethea took his plate to cut up his food so that he could eat with one hand. His expression became awkward, and there was no glint in his eyes for her kindness and attention—not even a smile. Perhaps he did not feel at all well?
Yet whether he did or not, it was not Susan’s concern.
She looked at Christine who was sitting beside her and opened a conversation. Yet Susan’s gaze was repeatedly drawn back to Henry as he spoke to Alethea, and she could not stop noticing the small indent at the base of his throat and the dark hairs visible on his chest due to the v formed by his open shirt as she recalled the bruises his shirt hid.
Chapter Four (#u85edf0f1-b597-5902-be2a-9425be8678f3)
Susan walked down the stairs, carrying her bonnet, with her cloak hanging over her forearm. Her bonnet bounced against the skirt of her dress with the pace of her steps as she held it by the ribbons.
Alethea stood in the hall below, already wearing her bonnet, but she was not looking up to chase Susan into hurrying, but looking down at a letter.
“What is it?” Susan called.
“It is from Sarah,” Alethea looked up and met Susan’s gaze. “We cannot go. She says Henry intends to remain in his rooms and so he said it would be a waste of time for me to come.”
“Why?”
“He is feeling too ill, he does not wish to dress, but merely lay abed and rest his shoulder.”
“He did look pale yesterday.”
“I know. I felt so sorry for him. I would sit by his bed and keep him company but I suppose it is not the thing is it?”
“And if he has taken laudanum he will probably wish to sleep.”
“I suppose.”
But Susan had been looking forward to going over to Farnborough to continue her painting and the carriage had already been called.
“Mama!” Alethea called across the hall when their mother appeared from the drawing room. “We cannot go. Henry is feeling too unwell.”
“But I would like to go to paint, Mama.” Susan said as she stepped from the bottom stair. “Do you think I might? I was looking forward to painting again today and Uncle Robert said he did not mind my using the library at all for a whole fortnight.”
Her mother smiled. “If you wish to go, Susan, there will be no harm in it I am sure.”
Susan looked at Alethea, awaiting an offer to accompany her… There was still Sarah and Christine to visit, and after all Susan had only begun her painting project to accompany Alethea.
Alethea turned away and walked towards the drawing room, with Sarah’s letter held tightly in her hand.
Susan looked at her mother. Her mother was very like Alethea in temperament and she always gravitated towards her most exuberant daughter. She turned to Alethea, lifting a comforting arm to offer reassurance. “Alethea. Dear. I am sure he will be well enough to see you again soon.”
Susan loved her mother dearly but they had never understood one another particularly. Susan was more like her father in nature.
She turned to their butler. “Dodds, do not send the carriage away, I will be going but will you call for a maid.”
Dodds bowed slightly. “Shall I help you with your cloak, Miss.” He held out a hand.
She passed it over as her mother’s and Alethea’s conversation grew more distant.
She put on her bonnet and tied the ribbons, then turned so that he could set her cloak across her shoulders. She secured it herself while Dodds opened the door for her.
“Susan…” Her father entered the hall from a door leading out to the rear of the house and the stables. “Where is Alethea, is she not ready? I would have thought she’d be galloping with excitement to call on Henry.”
“He is too unwell for callers. I am going so I may continue to paint.”
His bushy white, eyebrows lifted, and the ends of his waxed moustache twitched. “Alone?”
“It is only to Uncle Robert’s. It is only a couple of miles and I am taking a maid.”
His forehead furrowed while he considered the idea.
Susan held her breath.
“And Susan is responsible enough to manage herself, Casper, let her go it will do no harm.” Susan looked at her mother who had come back out of the drawing room and stood just before the open door.
Only days before her mother had been afraid of highway men, obviously Susan’s responsible nature would frighten them away. Or perhaps it was the ridiculous anomaly she presented. She heard the words in Henry’s voice.
Her hand lifted and her fingers slid her spectacles farther up her nose.
Her father looked at her. “Very well, you may go.”
“Thank you, Papa.” She walked over and wrapped her arms about his neck.
His arms came about her, knocking her bonnet loose, so it tumbled off her head and rolled down to hang from the ribbons about her neck.
“Enjoy your day,” he said into her ear.
“I shall immensely.” They let each other go. “And at the end of the fortnight I shall show you my endeavours. I am quite pleased with myself.”
“Bless you.” His fingertips touched her cheek.
She turned away, without putting her bonnet back on, and walked out through the open door. Dodds was standing outside, speaking with one of the footmen. She had a sense that he had bestowed a warning for the men escorting her to take greater care as she travelled alone with only a maid to guard her reputation. The maid had already taken her place on the seat beside the coachman.
She smiled at Dodds when he opened the door of the carriage, accepted his hand and climbed up.
Within the carriage she righted her bonnet as Dodds shut the door. Then they were away.
She had not travelled in the carriage alone before.
Her heart pulsed quickly as she stared out of the window watching the passing view around the brim of her bonnet.
The tall remains of the walls of the ruined abbey in Farnborough’s grounds peaked above the trees in the distance. The Abbey marked the border of Uncle Robert’s land and Henry’s cousin’s, Rob’s, property. She had known Rob since her childhood too, his father was also a friend of her father’s.
She had always liked Rob. He was quieter than Henry and he’d never been self-obsessed. She liked Rob’s wife too. Caro was also quiet, and friendly, though, she shied away from crowds and strangers. They therefore never attended the local balls but Susan saw them frequently at her parents’ and Aunt Jane’s dinner parties.
The road followed a wall which surrounded Uncle Robert’s estate. The wall stretched for miles, but they were not following it all. It broke at the main gateway and the carriage turned to pass between the open iron gates and the giant lion statues guarding the entrance.
The carriage slowed when the gatekeeper came out of his lodge, but he looked at her father’s emblem on the side and waved them on.
The drive to the house from the gate seemed nearly as long as the journey had been from her home. But it was pretty this time of year, with the huge horse chestnut trees covered in white flowers.
Excitement gathered inside her when she neared the house.
Her new project was stimulating, she had never been very good at idleness, and embroidery and sewing were really not her calling. As the carriage passed beneath the arch into the courtyard, she smiled at herself when her reflection appeared in the glass for a moment. Perhaps she was like Alethea in some ways; she had just admitted she was no good at being idle. Perhaps in her, her mother’s and Alethea’s enthusiasm and constant hurrying and need for activity, was exposed in a desire for an active mind.
Uncle Robert walked out of the house surrounded by three of the dogs. Not Samson.
He stopped and stood still as the carriage turned and drew to a halt then he came forward and opened the door. “I thought Henry had sent word to say do not come.” He looked beyond Susan, clearly seeking Alethea, but then he held out his hand to Susan to aid her descent as the dogs barked their greeting. Once he’d let go of Susan, Uncle Robert silenced them with a lifted hand. They continued to wave their tails.
“He did, but I was ready and I wished to come over and paint anyway. You do not mind?”
“Of course I do not mind, Susan, you know you are welcome. Come I shall escort you in before I go about my business.”
The large dogs walked beside them, tails swishing at the air. If Samson had been among them he would have surreptitiously, out of sight of Uncle Robert’s discipline, nudged Susan’s hip for some particular attention. Perhaps that was another bad habit that Henry had encouraged, and another reason why Samson was so attached to the heir of the family.
She did not see Aunt Jane, Sarah or Christine when they walked through the house. He opened the library door. “There.” He stepped back and let her pass. “You’ll not be disturbed, Sarah and Christine have returned to their lessons now that the excitement over Henry’s return has settled down, and Jane is with Henry, I believe.”
Susan looked at him as she undid the ribbons of her bonnet. “Is he suffering very badly?”
“I believe so, but it is what he deserves, and it may yet teach him the lesson he has kept refusing to learn from me. But today I think he is simply feeling sorry for himself. He has refused to dress because it is too painful, he has said he merely wishes to remain in his room so he might rest without the need for a sling. I am sure he will be up and about again in a couple of days and Alethea may call to fuss over him once more.” Uncle Robert’s pitch seemed to laugh at the idea.
Susan did laugh—at his jocular manner—not at the fact that Alethea would fuss or that Henry was in pain.
As Uncle Robert’s eldest son, and his heir, Henry had been spoilt horridly.
Uncle Robert had often admitted it too and mocked himself for the error of it, although perhaps never in Henry’s hearing. It was usually when he was speaking with her father. Perhaps she was not meant to have heard…
“Shall I have a maid bring you some tea?”
“Yes, please. Thank you.”
“I will have Davis tell Jane you are here, and that you are not to be disturbed.”
She was not always sure with Uncle Robert when he was speaking seriously and when he was making fun. His tone of voice always held a lilt which had a measure of amusement and unless he chose to reveal the humour in his words, sometimes it skipped past her. His manner of mocking life, and himself, made him extremely likeable, though. She supposed it was where Henry had inherited his charm from.
“Good day, Susan.” He bowed his head in parting then turned away. “Come!” he called at the dogs, rallying them. “Susan shall not want you disturbing her, you may go down to the kitchens.”
“Good day, Uncle Robert!” She called as he shut the door.
She took off her bonnet and cloak and set them down on a chair. The maid could take them when she brought the tea.
Her parchment, the box of water paints, her brushes and the book she’d been using were left where she’d used them on the desk yesterday. She opened the giant book and sought a new orchid to copy. Ophrys apifera. It had a petal which looked as though a bee was sitting on the flower. It would be hard to capture correctly and yet she wished to challenge herself, and at least on this there were only three small flowers, others had dozens of flowers on a stem.
Her hand lifted and her fingers pushed her spectacles a little farther up her nose. She bit her top lip as she chose a charcoal to sketch the picture with first.
The room seemed darker today, there was not as much light on the desk. She looked up and realised the shutters were still closed over the windows before the sofa.
When she opened them, her mind’s eye saw Henry lying on the sofa, asleep, a patchwork of ghastly colours.
A slight knock tapped the door. “Come!” The maid who had brought the tea entered. “Set it there please. Thank you.”
The maid bobbed a curtsy and left with Susan’s cloak and bonnet.
Susan poured herself a cup of tea and carried it over to the desk, then concentrated on copying the shape of the orchid correctly.
When the clock in the room chimed once, there was a gentle knock on the door.
Susan jumped. She’d been entirely absorbed in her painting. Her tea cup was still full and the tea within it chilled.
The door opened. “Susan.” Aunt Jane stood with the door handle in her hand. “You must come and eat luncheon with us. You cannot hide yourself away in here all day and starve.”
Susan straightened up and smiled. “Thank you. I will be there in a moment.”
“Very well.” Aunt Jane turned away. Susan dipped her brush in the water to clean it, then dabbed it on the rag to dry it. She looked down at her painting, it was slow work today because there were so many tiny details on the bee petals, but she thought she was progressing well, she seemed to be improving.
The family at the table were Aunt Jane, Sarah and Christine.
Uncle Robert was still out undertaking whatever business he was about.
“Is Henry not coming down, Mama,” Christine asked as Susan sat down.
“He is not. He is not dressed.”
“But we are only family, it would hardly matter if he did not have his shirt on.”
Aunt Jane looked apologetically at Susan.
“Susan is like family,” Christine declared, disregarding the subtle reprimand.
Guilt pierced Susan’s side, she had not come here to prevent Henry having the freedom of his home. “I am sorry. I did not realise. I should not have come—”
“Nonsense. Do not be silly,” Aunt Jane chided. “It will do Henry no harm to remain upstairs, and he has been sick most of the morning so I do not think he will attempt luncheon regardless of his state of dress.”
Susan’s guilt cut deeper. “Has he a fever? Uncle Robert said he was only in too much pain to dress.” She had thought Henry in a lazy, sullen mood. Her instinctive sense of empathy, that she had fought yesterday evening, pulled within her.
“It is not a fever; he took too much laudanum without eating and is suffering for it. I think he also took a bottle of his father’s brandy to his room last night to help further numb the pain, and of course nor do laudanum and brandy mix. I think now he has had enough of laudanum.”
Christine and Sarah laughed.
Laughter gathered in Susan’s throat too, but for the first time in her life she felt wholly in charity with Henry. She could no longer deny her instinct to feel sorry for him, and wish to help. He had been in a lot of pain when he’d come to the library yesterday she did not think less of him for seeking to free himself from it.
She would not stay long after luncheon, then if he wished to come down and take tea with his family, shirtless, he might. An image formed un-beckoned in her mind of him lying asleep on the sofa in the library, shirtless, an artwork of bruises.
Once Susan had eaten she returned to the library. She would finish the detail on the flower she was working on and then she would ask Aunt Jane if she might travel home in their carriage.
A maid came into the room at three. “Miss Susan, Lady Barrington sent me to ask if you wished for tea?”
She had worked on and on and forgotten the time. “No, thank you, but is my aunt in the drawing room.”
“She is, Miss Susan.”
“And has Lord Henry come down?”
“No, miss, he is taking tea in his room.”
He must have risen from his bed at least then.
“Susan.” Christine walked about the maid, entering the room with a quick stride. “Sarah and I are going to take the dogs out as far as the meadow, would you like to come? It is one of those lovely fresh days, with a breeze to sweep away the fidgets and a pleasant sky without the sun pounding down upon you.”
Susan looked out of the window. It was a middling day, with a light grey sky, and she could see the breeze was strong as the clouds whisked across it. It would be refreshing to go for a walk before she returned home. She looked back at Christine. “Thank you, I would love to join you.”
Christine smiled. “I am going to fetch my bonnet and a cloak.” She looked at the maid. “Will you have someone bring Miss Forth’s to the hall?”
The maid curtsied in acknowledgement and left them. Christine looked at Susan. “I shall meet you in the hall, then.” Then she was gone too.
Susan tidied up her things and thought of Samson upstairs with Henry, while the guilt she had felt at luncheon skipped around her, taunting her with a pointed finger of accusation.
She shut her paints away in their box, and closed the book. She would not come back until Henry sent for Alethea.
She had maligned Henry in her thoughts too much. He did deserve some sympathy. Perhaps she could offer to walk Samson, as Henry could not take the dog out. Perhaps she should prize Samson free from his precious idol and give him some fresh air too. Henry would most likely appreciate the gesture, and there was little else her sense of empathy might do to be quietened.
She decided to go up to his sitting room before meeting Sarah and Christine in the hall. She knew where his suite of rooms were. She did not need a servant to show her up. They had still been playmates at the point he’d moved into his current rooms.
She left the library and instead of making her way to the family room walked past it and on to the main hall, where the dark, square, wooden stairs climbed upward about the walls. No one was there, the footman had probably gone to fetch her outdoor things.
Her hand slipped over the waxed wood of the bannister as she hurried up the stairs to Henry’s rooms on the second floor.
She remembered his huge bedchamber, and beside that a dressing room and a large sitting room, with a desk and about half a dozen chairs in it. He had been allocated the rooms because he was the eldest, the heir—and the most spoilt.
When she reached the second floor she turned to the right. His rooms were at the end. He’d moved into them one summer when he’d been home from Eton, in his last year there, and he’d made Susan and Alethea go upstairs to look at the space he’d been given solely to show-off.
She walked to the end of the hall and tapped on the door she knew was his sitting room. If he was out of bed and taking tea, he would be in there. If he did not answer she would presume him undressed and still in bed and go away.
“Come!”
Her heart pounded foolishly as she opened the door. She could not see him. But one of the high backed chairs had been turned to face the window and she could see the footstool before it and a tray containing a teapot, cup and saucer, and a small plate of cakes, was on a low table beside it.
“Henry?” she said as she walked across the room. “I—”
“Susan…” His pitch carried incredulity as he stood up before her.
He was not clothed! Who took tea in a sitting room unclothed?
Or rather he was clothed but only in a loose dressing gown that covered one shoulder and was left hanging beneath his bad arm before being held together by a sash at his waist.
He held his damaged arm across his middle. It drew her eyes to his stomach. She had thought him muscular yesterday but today she could see all the lines of the muscle beneath his tarnished skin on the exposed half of his body. He sported a variety of shades of blue, black, dark red, bright red and gruesome yellow, and his shoulder was entirely black as she had guessed yesterday, and the bruising ran not only down his chest but also covered his arm.
“What are you doing here? Being rebellious again? What do you wish for?” His initial tone may have been incredulous, but now his voice mocked her as it always had.
Her gaze lifted to his face. “I thought you were taking tea?”
His eyes laughed at her. “I am taking tea, alone, here, in my private rooms.”
“But, who drinks tea, in…”
“In what?”
Embarrassment engulfed her. She had been about to accuse him of being naked, although he was not quite. She looked at Samson, who had risen when Henry had, like Henry’s shadow. He had been on the far side of the chair.
“You are truly lucky you did not do yourself more harm,” she said without looking at him again.
“As I said yesterday, believe me, I know what I risked far more than you. I was there. Why did you come up here?” His pitch now lacked amusement and had instead become dismissing.
“We are taking the other dogs out to the meadow. I came to offer to take Samson too. I thought you had risen.”
“I have risen, but only as far as my private sitting room so I did not need to strain my damned arm by putting on clothes.” She glanced up when he swore, in response to the un-Henry-like bolshiness in voice, a note that came from pain. “And pray do not look your horror at me for using a bad word. You made the choice to come up here and this is my private room, I will speak as I please.”
“I’m sorry. I’ll go.”
He sat down in the chair, almost deflating. His good hand holding his bad arm.
“It must be very painful.” She took two steps farther into the room.
He looked at her with unamused eyes. “It is, thank you for the recognition? Now you ought to go, before Mama catches you here and then tells your Mama and then you will earn yourself a scold and some penalty…”
“We are not children anymore, I am—”
His eyes suddenly looked hard into hers. “No, precisely, Susan. We are not children anymore. You cannot run around doing anything you wish.”
“Perhaps you should listen to yourself.” Her ire rose and snapped in answer, before she turned away. Because, was that not exactly why he was in this state? He had no right to chastise her for anything she did when he hurtled about the roads racing his curricle with no regard for others. “I will not come back until you send for Alethea,” she said, as she walked back across the room. “So you may run about shirtless all over the house without fear!”
A sharp bark of laughter caught on the air behind her, she did not look back.
“You know you are as bad as me! Admit it or not! You cast your judgements, and yet you are just as rebellious, in your way.”
Rebellious? She turned back. She could not see him. He was in the chair, facing the window, invisible behind it, although she could see Samson, who looked back and forth between her and Henry, his tail swaying. “I am not rebellious.”
“No? Then why are you here, disturbing me?”
“I came to offer to take Samson out and also to see how you are. You looked unwell yesterday.”
“Rebellious with good intent then; but to my room, Susan? Even Alethea would not have come to my room.”
“I would not have walked into your bedroom. I only came to your sitting room!”
There was the low sound of an eruption of amusement in his throat that was not quite a laugh, perhaps more like a growl of frustration, or pain. Even as she was angry with him that sense of empathy had its claws in her.
“Believe me, no other well-bred woman I know would have done this! No matter that it is only my sitting room!”
She let a soft sound of amusement escape her throat as she turned away again. The sound deliberately defied her sympathy, she wanted to annoy him for his skill in disturbing her. “Good day, Henry! I hope you feel a little better in the morning!”
“Good day, Susan! Thank you! You may take Samson with you, I am sure he shall appreciate the opportunity of a run in the meadow with the others, and in the meantime, I shall run around downstairs shirtless and terrify all the maids.”
She laughed involuntarily. Then she lifted a hand to Samson. “Come along, Samson, would you like a walk?” The dog’s tail wagged, in answer, but he looked to Henry for permission.
Henry had many faults, and yet the dog adored him. “Go you foolish, hound,” Henry dismissed him with an affectionate pitch.
Susan’s smile broadened.
“Samson,” she called again. When he came to her side she petted his ear exactly as she knew Henry did, and walked from the room. She closed the door behind her.
The empathy in her stomach had become a different sort of feeling.
In the last three days she had probably shared as many words with Henry as she would have normally shared with him in a month during his stays at home, and she’d found him funny, as well as annoying, and frustrating.
Susan caught her reflection in a mirror on the landing, she was deep pink and Henry would have seen her embarrassment, and yet he had not teased her for that.
She hurried back downstairs to find Aunt Jane, Christine and Sarah, her heart thumping.
The sight of Henry’s bruises and the outlines of the muscle beneath his stained skin hovered in her mind. She had never seen a man shirtless before. But she refused to let herself be unsettled. Christine was right, she was a part of their family, it was not odd for her to see Henry half clothed. He was like a brother or a cousin.
When she walked downstairs, Samson trailing in a disciplined, graceful manner behind her, Christine and Sarah awaited her in the hall.
“Where have you been?” Christine asked, holding out Susan’s bonnet.
Susan accepted it. “Collecting Samson from Henry’s rooms, so he might join us.”
Neither Sarah nor Christine queried her statement, or asked how Samson had been acquired. Yet at the very idea, Susan’s fingers trembled as she tied the bow of her bonnet beneath her chin, and the footman had to take over and secure the buttons on her cloak, because her hands shook too much.
I am embarrassed. She had seen Henry in nothing but a dressing gown, with half his torso exposed. She had held her wits together in his room but she’d known the moment he stood up she should not have been there.
“Are you sure you will not stay for dinner? I do not see why you should go home, only because you have come alone,” Sarah said as they turned to leave the house, the dogs padding about them.
“No, I need to return home. I told Mama I would be back.”
Sarah offered her arm, and Susan wrapped her arm about it, grateful of the gesture as her legs felt wobbly too.
~
When Susan retired for the night, Alethea came to her room in her nightdress. Her bare feet brushed across the floorboards as she walked towards the bed, dispelling the darkness with a single candle that made her shadow dance behind her.
Susan lifted the covers. Alethea set down the candle on a bedside chest and laid down next to Susan. Susan threw the covers back over them both as Alethea turned and blew out the candle. The smell of wax and the burnt wick caught in the air, and the mattress moved as Alethea lay back down in the darkness. The pillow dipped and Alethea’s breath touched Susan’s cheek.
“Did you see Henry?”
“Yes.” She had seen too much of Henry. “I said goodbye to him. He looked in a lot of pain. I actually felt sorry for him, and you know how rare that is.”
“He told me he was very badly injured. He said he’d thought in one moment he might die.”
“He said that to be dramatic, Alethea, you know he did. You know what he is like. He loves being the centre of attention.” Yet Susan had seen the bruising on his body—if he had struck his head as hard? He had not been exaggerating on this occasion. She had said the words, though, because she did not want to think of Henry any differently than she normally would.
Alethea sighed. “I do not think he has any intent to propose when he is here. He still speaks to me as though I am his friend. Do you think he will ever propose?”
“Of course he will.”
“He has not been home for nearly a year. He cannot think of me when he is away, and he’s said nothing about our engagement. Why do you think he is taking so long to propose? I thought this time…”
“I suppose he loves his curricle racing too much,” and he is selfish, arrogant and mean—and funny—and in pain.
Instead of Alethea’s usual bright tone, a bitter sigh rang out in the darkness. “I will be an old maid… And then what if he never asks? Perhaps I should consider others.”
Alethea had never spoken of others before. “But you love Henry…”
“I do love Henry. Yet I am nearly three and twenty. I cannot wait forever.”
“That is not old.”
“It is almost upon the shelf, and I wish to leave home and begin my own family.”
“I am not going to go tomorrow. I said I would wait until he is well and writes to ask for your company.”
“I am not sure he really wishes for my company.”
“Of course he does. Every time I look up you two are speaking exclusively and earnestly. Of course he wishes you there.”
Alethea sighed again. She really was not sure. “May I sleep here?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you.” The mattress dented near Susan’s shoulder and then Alethea’s breath and her hair brushed Susan’s cheek a moment before Alethea’s lips pressed there, bestowing a kiss. The pillow dipped again as Alethea lay back down. “What did you think of the dress which Maud Bentley wore to church last week?”
The conversation slipped into whispered gossip. They talked about fashions, material they wished for, the assembly which would take place this month in York, until their words were claimed by tiredness.
“Good night,” Susan whispered last.
“Sleep well,” Alethea whispered back.
Chapter Five (#ulink_85fac8d5-2ba6-5e97-9591-aa388d59f089)
While they were eating breakfast, each time a footman walked in, Alethea looked towards the door, but none of the footmen entered carrying a letter.
Once the pot of chocolate had been emptied for the second time, Alethea looked at their mother and proposed a trip into York to look for the ribbons, material and bonnet dressings she and Susan had spoken of the night before.
Susan’s mother agreed and joined them, and indulged herself too. It was a pleasant day, but all the time at the back of Susan’s mind there was an image of Henry standing beside the chair in his dressing gown, with half his upper body bared and covered in dark bruising. She was worried about him. She had never felt sorry for him before. She did feel sorry for him now, and the feeling was her constant companion no matter how she sought to distract herself from it. If he was no longer taking laudanum, as Aunt Jane had said, then he would be in considerable pain.
When they ate breakfast the following morning the awaited letter from Farnborough arrived, addressed to Alethea. Once she had read it, she looked at Susan. “Henry says that he is feeling a little better, and that we might visit tomorrow if we wish.” Alethea looked at their father. “Aunt Jane and Uncle Robert have also extended an invitation for us to join them as a family for dinner in four days.”
“I shall write back, accepting the invitation,” their mother said. “Will you go tomorrow?”
“Of course,” Alethea answered.
She had not given up on Henry yet, then, and perhaps the invitation for them to dine as a family might be to celebrate a happy occasion and Alethea would not need to give up on Henry.
When the carriage turned into Farnborough’s courtyard the next day, Henry walked out from the doorway to greet them, with Samson beside him. He must have been waiting and watching for the carriage.
If he had been awaiting the carriage it implied the sentiment that Alethea had feared lacking was there.
His arm was once more in its sling but he was still not wearing his morning coat, nor his waistcoat, yet a short black, stock, neckcloth held his shirt closed. His good hand idly played with Samson’s ear as the carriage drew to a halt.
He stepped forward and opened the carriage door. “Hello, ladies.”
Alethea took his offered hand and climbed down. “Hello. How are you, truly?”
“Well enough. I promise. I think the journey here just took it out of me, and I did not give my shoulder time to recover. All that it needs is rest and time.”
“And he was consuming too much laudanum to kill the pain combined with brandy. Aunt Jane said it made a sickly cocktail,” Susan added as she gripped the side of the carriage and climbed down.
Alethea still held Henry’s hand. He had not had chance to turn and help Susan. His gaze caught hold of hers and the hard directness in his brown eyes said—rebellious, anomaly—when she did not allow him the time to help her.
She turned towards the house, turning away from the memories in her mind’s eye, of Henry lying on the sofa in the library and standing in only his dressing gown covered in mottled, awful, bruising. Hateful empathy. “I will leave you two to gossip and recover from your days of separation. I am going to paint.” She did not look back nor await an answer but walked briskly on into the house, seeking the sanctuary of the library. If he intended to propose he would not wish for an audience.
The clock chimed twelve times, and almost immediately afterwards there was a hard knock on the library door.
“Come in!”
Henry opened it, and Samson, his shadow, walked into the room. “I have come to see if you wish to take luncheon with us. You are like a mole buried away in here, Susan.”
Rebellious… A mole was far more like the names she expected him to call her.
She rested her brush in the bowl of water and straightened. Her hand lifted so that her fingers could push her spectacles farther up the bridge of her nose.
Henry smiled and walked towards her.
At least on this occasion he’d left the door ajar.
“The other day you called me rebellious, I cannot think of two greater extremes. I cannot imagine a rebellious mole.” She picked up the rag and took the brush out of the water to wipe it.
“You have been considering that haven’t you? I mean you have been thinking about the word rebellious.” His voice mocked, but then he smiled at her. “I said it because you like to hide in corners and pretend compliance when really you will walk away from what is expected of you at every chance and hole up somewhere. You always have. So you see the two are very compatible when they are combined in you.”
She had never thought walking away rebellious. She looked back down at her painting. “I will eat luncheon with you, yes.”
She expected him to acknowledge her answer and turn away, but instead when he reached the desk he leant over, as Samson nudged at her hip for some Henry-style attention. “Very pretty.” The crisp, masculine scent of his cologne hung in the air between them.
His presence and proximity sent discomfort spinning out into her nerves. The awkwardness it engendered pressured her to continue talking. “It is not rebellious to walk away or leave a room, though I admit to having little patience with conversations that do not interest me or—”
“People,” he inserted as he straightened up.
She met his gaze, still wiping her brush although it must be clean. “People?”
“Or people who do not interest you.” One eyebrow rose, and his implication said, people like me…
Warmth touched her cheeks.
She turned away to put her paint brush back into the paint box and tidy up her paints.
He leant over once more. “This is actually rather good.”
She glanced at him. “Thank you for such exuberant praise.”
His lips split into a smile. “There, see, you are a secret hellion. You taunt me horrendously.”
She made an intolerant, impatient face and shook her head at him. “I am painting orchids, not racing curricles. I am hardly a hellion. You are speaking of yourself.” She closed her paints.
“I have never bothered hiding my nature. But you… You and I have more in common than you think. I would gamble high odds on the fact that Uncle Casper despairs of you as much as my father despairs of me. You do not behave in the ways expected of a woman. The only reason you do not race curricles is that a woman is not given one to be able to race, if you were a man you would race—”
“I am not like you. I would not race. Because there is a vast chasm of difference between us, I think of others not just myself. I would not race because I would not wish to harm another traveller on the road.”
He huffed at her, dismissing her argument. It riled her more. “And I do not behave in unacceptable ways—”
“You are not sitting in the drawing room, sewing and talking with the others.”
“I like doing different things to the others, that is all.”
She turned to walk past him.
“Rebellious.” He leant near her and taunted.
She could not win the argument. Her hand lifted instinctively and swiped out at him as her frustration became anger. She struck his poorly arm. “Oh, Henry!” She regretted it immediately as he winced with pain.
“Bloody hell!” He covered his arm and pulled away. Then said more calmly, “You damned hellion.” Even in pain he was mocking her.
“I am sorry.”
He smiled and shook his head. “I do not think I am.”
She did not understand the jest. “Stop teasing me, Henry!”
He laughed. “It is quite inspiring to see you in a temper.”
Her hand lifted once more. He stepped back with his good hand still protecting his injured arm. “Did I say you might be a match to a man with verbal fencing? I might be persuaded to include physical fencing. Please, no more violence, Miss Forth. You will have people think my bruises were delivered by your hand, and God forbid my friends heard such a rumour.”
He stepped forward again and looked down at her work and at the book to compare it. “You are certainly capturing it. It is a charming flower… Which is something I cannot say for the painter.”
He straightened again then, and threw her another smile.
She stuck her tongue out at him as she would have done as a child. He was infuriating, it was no wonder she’d lost her temper and struck him.
His eyes opened wider and his smile lifted, expressing mocked shock, and then suddenly the smile seemed to illuminate the brown in his eyes.
When her tongue slipped back into her mouth, the glint in his eyes became a glow with a greater depth, making his brown eyes as rich in colour as polished mahogany.
Awkwardness pricked. She looked down at her painting. She could not walk away at this moment. “I hope you are feeling better.”
“I am feeling better than I was the day you came to my room, thank you.” His voice held a dry note that sought to highlight again how inappropriate her behaviour had been in daring to go to his sitting room.
Rebellious. She heard the word in his voice, as it had been said a moment ago when he’d leant to her ear. Perhaps she was a little.
Susan looked up. He was very close, she could see every detail of his eyelashes and every shade within his brown eyes. “You could have said do not come in, you know?” The scent of his expensive London cologne enveloped her.
“I thought it was the footman come to take away the tea-tray.”
“You knew it was me when I entered.”
“And perhaps then it was more amusing to not yell at you and make you go away.” His voice had lost its mocking edge and dropped into a low pitch. “…The lesson was better taught by leaving you to discover what your rebellious nature had led you into.”
“Sayeth Lord Henry Marlow, the prodigal son, he who has just been thrown from his curricle in a race and nearly broken his neck and admitted he has probably learned no lessons at all.” Her voice had dropped in pitch too.
His eyes seemed full of questions as he looked at her. Then his gaze travelled across her face, studying her as he’d studied her painting. When his gaze came back to hers, he said, “Quite.” Then he turned away and began walking back across the room, with Samson in his wake.
“I truly am sorry that you were so badly hurt, Henry!” Susan called after him, her awkwardness and her empathy for his pain, pushing her into more words. “But I do not think that anything I do compares!” She had not known what to say, but she had needed to say something to turn whatever had just happened back into something tangible that she could understand.
He turned and walked a couple of steps backwards, with his free hand cradling his poorly arm. “I am truly sorry…Your voice rings with guilt, Susan, as it did yesterday when you saw my bruises. Did you think I had been acting out my pain, and wearing a sling for my pleasure? You… The rescuer of every wounded thing, wild or tame…”
“No.” Her instinctive denial cut through the air, and stopped him moving.
He smiled in that hideous mocking way, that said, I know I am right.
Oh be honest with him, he would be honest with her. “I thought you deserved to be injured. You are the reckless one. It is you who needed to be taught a lesson. But I would not have wished your life endangered. I came to your room yesterday as much to apologise for the meanness of my thoughts as to fetch Samson.”
The rogue looked up at the ceiling and laughed for an instant before looking back at her. The amusement had brightened his eyes. “Think as meanly as you wish, Susan, it will not do me any greater harm than I have done myself. I dare say, on this occasion, I may have finally learned the lesson you wished me taught.” He turned away once more.
“Where are we eating?” She called before he left the room.
“In the formal dining room, Papa is home.”
When they ate, she had intended to sit beside Sarah, but Alethea drew Susan’s attention, and so she could not then walk around the table to sit with Christine and Sarah. She ended up taking a seat on the opposite side of Henry to her sister.
Alethea spoke to Aunt Jane as Henry silently fought to eat his food one handed.
Susan swallowed, she wished to make conversation, to stop herself from suffering with the awkwardness that hung over her. “How are your bruises today, are they improving?” she said lamely.
“Turning from almost black to a lighter purple, but perhaps I have a new one since you struck me.”
She looked at him. “Sorry.”
He smiled. “If we are on the grounds of apologies, then I owe you one too. I am sorry I did not tell you to go away the other day. I should have done. I did not mean my teasing to discompose you earlier, but I can see it has done because every time you look at me you turn a greater shade of pink.”
Oh, she wished to smack him again.
“You are forgiven for striking me, if I am forgiven,” he concluded.
“You are forgiven only if you agree never to mention that I went to your room again.”
A half laugh rumbled from his chest.
Alethea turned and said something to him. But before he turned to reply, he said to Susan, “Are we friends again then?”
“Henry! Alethea asked for your opinion.” his father interrupted before Susan could answer. There must have been some greater conversation about the table they had lost track of. Henry turned away.
Once they had finished eating, Susan rose to return to the library. Every one else stood at the same time. She would have walked on ahead but Henry touched her arm.
“Wait a moment. I have not yet secured your agreement on our pact.”
He had not forgotten his desire for a truce, then.
Alethea walked on with Aunt Jane, and his father walked with Christine and Sarah.
“May we call ourselves friends? I do not think we have really been friends for years. I would like to think of you as my friend, Susan.”
She hated the way he said her name, his enunciation made her stomach twist about with a strange sensation.
He held out his left, good, hand, which was gloveless. She accepted the gesture.
She wore no glove either. The warmth and the softness of his skin surprised her as his hand surrounded hers. Yet he had not held her hand in the way he held Alethea’s hand, he held Susan’s in a firm gesture, his whole hand gripping her whole hand, not merely pressing her fingers.
The queasy feeling in her stomach tumbled over. She had never held a man’s naked hand, except for her father’s.
He shook her hand a single time, firmly, and then let her go. “May I escort you to the library? I wouldn’t mind another look at your painting, we might even persuade Alethea to stop by…” His good arm had lifted as he spoke. He was offering it to her…
She looked at his forearm, before glancing up and then laying her fingers on his arm self-consciously.
Her fingers closed about the sinuous muscle of his arm through his thin shirt. The cotton was so fine she could feel the hairs on his skin.
The strange sensation in her tummy coiled up like an adder waiting to strike.
“So how many flowers have you attempted so far?”
Susan swallowed before answering. Her throat had dried. “I am only on my second.”
“And how many are in the book? I seem to recall about fifty. You will be here for a year.”
She smiled at him. “Or two.”
This was Henry at his most persuasive, he could turn this side of himself on and off so easily. She had always found his charm annoying before, but then it had never been solely directed at her.
Now it was directed at her…
It felt complimentary, and he was surely doing it to make her feel at ease with him again, which was kind. Although it must be embarrassing for him if she was blushing at every moment.
His charm was working, though, she did feel more at ease.
For the second time in her life, she felt wholly in charity with him.
Perhaps he would not make such a bad brother-in-law.
Chapter Six (#ulink_e041d23b-6d71-5a7a-86c1-4dd1196fd84f)
An odd atmosphere arrived in the carriage with the Forths, Henry could sense it even as he looked down into the hall. Uncle Casper’s shoulders were stiff and Aunt Julie’s manner was much more restrained than normal; she far too calmly kissed his mother’s cheek.
Henry walked down the last flight of stairs to the hall as Alethea entered.
She was wearing a light bright blue again so that the material of her evening dress extenuated the colour of her eyes. Susan entered behind her sister, wrapped up in a large paisley shawl, but he could see the hem of her dress. It was a pale, dove grey.
He’d dressed fully for dinner, as the Forths were officially invited guests rather than arriving simply as callers, and so he had his grey waistcoat and black evening coat on over his shirt. His arm was still strung up in a sling, though. Yet it had been less painful to dress, and it was not agony to be clothed now the swelling had declined to some extent.
What remained of the pain, as long he did not make any sudden movements, was a dull constant ache in his shoulder, a soreness in his wrist and stiffness in both. The rest of him was healing quite nicely.
Papa’s valet, who had been shaving Henry since he’d come home, was now urging Henry to exercise his bad arm, but Henry had refused to attempt it for another week at least; he did not wish to send it into agony again.
“Uncle Casper.” Henry bowed in a swift informal movement. Even though there was no relationship via bloodlines he’d always felt as though Lord and Lady Froth were his uncle and aunt—and Alethea like another of his cousins—and truly that was the level of his affection for her.
He swallowed trying to moisten his dry mouth suddenly, as Uncle Casper’s lips lifted in a stiff smile. Definitely there was an unusual atmosphere.
Henry glanced at Alethea as his father came to welcome Uncle Casper more heartily.
He liked her considerably. She was amusing company, funny and entertaining, and she was polite and genteel; she would make the perfect countess when he inherited his father’s title. She was good with people, confident and jolly. He knew full well she would manage a house admirably. She had all the qualities of a wife.
But he was not ready to marry. He was too young. Yet he could feel the nets being set about him.
Four times this week she had hinted at the fact she was not going to wait forever for him to ask and Uncle Casper’s gaze stated that nor did he wish Alethea to have to keep waiting. They were becoming impatient with him.
Well let them. He would not be forced. His father may call such an attitude careless. Henry would call it wise.
“Good evening, Henry. I trust you are feeling better?”
Henry turned to face Aunt Julie. “I am, thank you.”
She gave him a look which seemed anxious, before touching his shoulders and lifting to her toes to better reach to kiss his cheek. On a normal evening, in the past, her arms would have wrapped around his neck and her exclamation would have been, “my darling boy!” before she pressed a kiss on his cheek. She had no sons, so Aunt Julie had treated him as though he was her son since his birth. But perhaps her calmness was out of awareness for his injuries.
“It is good to see you again,” he said, before kissing her cheek in return.
A very abnormal half-hearted smile stirred her lips.
They had hoped he would announce his and Alethea’s engagement tonight. That was it. They had received the invitation to dine and misconstrued its meaning.
Damn it, Alethea must have been waiting for him to ask all bloody week and now she had told them he’d said nothing.
“You are looking very well despite your accident.”
“Thank you, Aunt.”
She was definitely restrained—unhappy with him.
He looked at Alethea. She smiled at him, but even her smile was not quite so full.
There had been a conversation about him in the carriage, he’d lay a bet on it. One that had berated his lack of a proposal. But he would not be bloody pushed into it. He would propose when he was ready to be settled, not before.
Yet he was not immune to a sense of guilt.
He turned to face her, as she came to him, holding out her hands. He took hold of them, then kissed the back of them in turn, before leaning forward and kissing her cheek. “Hello, you look very beautiful,” he whispered towards her ear before he straightened.
She blushed, and smiled more naturally. “Hello.”
He smiled too, looking into her very blue eyes, then let her hands slip from his and turned to greet Susan.
He did not normally greet her in anyway, they were too close for formal greetings, and they had no other reason to greet each other with any special welcome. But tonight… He had welcomed her parents having not seen them for months and it would seem odd after that not to say a particular good evening to Susan too.
“Susan.” She blushed, not deeply, but there were very definite roses blooming in her cheeks. She had been blushing every time she saw him since their long conversation in the library, or rather since her visit to his room.
She did not offer her hand. He took it from where it hovered by her waist anyway, and kissed the back of her fingers. Her hand trembled and her grey eyes looked directly into his for a moment before she looked at his fingers holding hers.
She was a funny anomaly.
He let her go, then turned his attention back to Alethea, and offered his arm.
His family and the Forths turned towards the drawing room.
“We shall have a glass of wine before we go through to dinner, Casper, Julie.”
Henry wondered if his father had picked up upon the atmosphere and read it correctly too. If so then Henry would be in for a lecture after they had left.
“You are fully dressed…” Alethea whispered.
“I could hardly dine with your parents in my shirt.”
“They would not have minded.”
“I would have felt a fool, and I think I might have made them feel foolish too.” Sarah had taken charge of Susan and was walking with her. Christine walked beside Aunt Julie, with Henry’s mother, while his father spoke with Uncle Casper. “Were they expecting me to announce our engagement tonight?” He’d learned as young as his boarding school years that it was always better to be direct when dealing with an awkward situation, otherwise awkward situations festered.
She blushed a deep crimson, much darker than the colour Susan had been turning for the last couple of days. Yes, then.
“Yes. I am sorry—”
“You have no need to be sorry. But I am not going to propose to you while I am home. I’m not ready to settle yet, I am young, Alethea, it is too soon, and I will not apologise for it.” He’d slowed his pace, so that the others walked on ahead, then he stopped and faced her. “I am sorry if that distresses you. I know you will make a good wife but I will not commit until I know I would make a good husband and I think that will be when I am older.”
She looked into his eyes—searching for answers—perhaps to understand his feelings. What were hers? Did she think more of him than he thought of her? That thought was a little petrifying.
“But I am getting older too, Henry,” she said quietly. “It is different for a woman. If I wait much longer I shall become too old to be considered. What if you change your mind then? Then I will not have another chance.”
They had always known there was this obligation upon them and neither of them had expressed any disagreement, and yet this was the first time they had spoken about their marriage openly.
“When will you ask me? I will not wait for you for years. I wish to be married and settled.”
There, his speaking openly had led her to do so too. This was the sentiment she had been hinting at ever since he’d returned—that she would not continue to wait.
“I cannot say, or rather I will not, I suppose, because I do not know; someday in the future. You will have to choose whether or not you wait.”
Uncertainty shone in the blackness at the heart of her eyes. “I do not know if I can wait.” Her hand slipped off his arm and she walked ahead.
Touché. He laughed internally, and followed.
When Henry entered the formal drawing room his father was already offering Alethea a glass of wine. The footman poured it as his father turned and asked Susan if she would like a glass.
Susan had removed her shawl. The dove grey colour of her dress suited both her hair and her eyes, and oddly her light grey eyes seemed more striking than Alethea’s blue as she looked at his father and accepted the glass he had taken from the footman to give to her.
Henry walked forwards as the footman poured another glass.
When Henry took the glass, his father’s gaze caught Henry’s and his eyebrows lifted.
His father had picked up upon the atmosphere too and deciphered it. Henry was in for a hard debate when the Forths had gone. His father would be of the same opinion as Alethea. Why are you waiting?
Wonderful. It had been on his initiation that the two families had come together. This meal had been his suggestion, and now he would not be able to bloody digest it. Perhaps he should have spelled his perspective out more clearly when he had written to Alethea from London. Yet it was nonsense for them to grasp at this gesture with such silly hope. In undertaking one rare act of thoughtfulness, which his father had been remarkably pleased by, he had knocked open a hornets’ nest.
Lord, though, he hoped his father had not thought the same. Had that been why he’d been so happy with the idea? Damn. This was not meant to be an enactment of the prodigal son parable. He had not intended the fatted calf to be slaughtered and a toast raised to the fact he had returned home and would remain forever. The intent had only been to see his aunt and uncle before he returned to London.
He sipped from his glass. Alethea had turned her back on him and walked across the room to speak with Sarah.
Wonderful!
Yet to be fair, if she fell out with him and married someone else, he would not grieve over it. His heart was not involved; it would not be broken. It would make no difference to him, other than that when the time came for him to take a wife he would have to look for one.
He looked at the back of her head. Her blonde hair was beautifully and perfectly styled, and then there was the curve of her narrow neck. She bowed her head a little as she spoke to Sarah and it presented the area of skin just above the neckline of her dress. He sighed. His heart may not care but other parts of him would very willingly become involved in a relationship with her.
He breathed in, what were her sentiments? Was it merely compliance with their families’ wishes or did she have some greater affection for him? Perhaps at some point he should ask her that, and that too should become open between them.
“Henry. You are quiet and brooding, neither of which are terms I would use to describe you. Is your arm hurting?”
He turned to face Susan.
It was uncharacteristic for her to approach him and speak to him voluntarily.
Those pale grey eyes were intensely grey tonight, thanks to her dress, which exaggerated the colour just as Alethea’s dress made her eyes bluer. But Susan’s spectacles also seemed to make her grey eyes shine with a vibrancy that had more depth than Alethea’s blue eyes ever did.
Susan had recklessness within her, she might deny it as many times as she wished, but she did, and a dash of rebellion that her sister never displayed.
Alethea may have just told him she was willing to marry someone else if he did not hurry up and place a ring on her finger, but that had not been rebellion, she had merely hoped to gee him up.
“My arm always hurts since I fell from my curricle,” he answered.
“I am sorry.”
He smiled, bless her, she did look genuinely sorry for him, too. Since their truce she had become far more tolerant of him, and he might keep teasing her over her rebellious nature but it was no more than a pale shadow compared to his, while her caring side… She out won him a thousand to one on her ability to care for things.
“I am not complaining, I am only stating a fact, not asking for your pity.”
She started to smile but her teeth pressed into her lip, to prevent it.
He leant a little forward and said near her ear, in a quieter conspiratorial voice. “You have no need to be sorry for me remember, I did it to myself.”
She laughed suddenly, only for a moment, but then she smiled fully. God, had she ever smiled at him before? If she had perhaps he had not seen it up close, but the vibrancy in her smile was quite striking. Alethea had always been the bright, exuberant one. But there was exuberance in Susan, too, it was simply hidden.
“How long before you may take off the sling?”
“Another week or so.”
“You will be well enough to attend the assembly in York then. Alethea will be pleased. You will go?” The last was half question half statement.
Alethea will be pleased…
Of course there was another way to glean the level of Alethea’s attachment to him, he could ask her sister. They were close, they must share confidences. “I am not so sure she will be pleased, she may prefer to use the occasion to flirt with others and throw me off. We have just fallen out because I believe your family had an expectation that I would have proposed prior to this evening, and I have just assured Alethea that she should not expect it during my current stay or indeed in the months following.”
The brightness in Susan’s expression extinguished. “Why?”
“Why will I not propose? Because I am not ready. Is it not better for me to wait until I am happy to settle? I am too young. I like my life in town.”
“You are so self-centered.”
Her words struck him, and spurred him into biting back. “And you are always direct.” He swallowed back his temper. “Will she be very hurt do you think?” That was not really the question he was asking.
“Of course she will. She will be cut by it. How can she not be?”
Cut in what way? Cut through the heart? “I have not told her I will never propose merely that she should not expect it yet.”
“Then that is even crueller. She is not young and you wish to keep her dangling on a line of hope, like a caught fish you are trying to tire.”
Susan was far too quick. “It is not like that. I am not doing it deliberately to vex Alethea or delay—”
“Merely thinking of yourself.”
Damn her. “I am being wise. I am thinking of us both. I do not wish her to be unhappy with me, and I would be unhappy if I married her now. Would that not make her unhappy?”
“You are as self-centered as ever, Henry.”
“And you judge me as poorly as always, Susan.”
“Because you have always been arrogant and only interested in the things which benefit you. You were spoiled as a child, Uncle Robert freely admits it, and you have grown up idle and irresponsible.”
Oh Lord. Idle and irresponsible.
He laughed internally. “And there was I thinking we had shaken hands upon a truce.” He could not defend himself, her accusations were true. He drew an income from his father’s estate and lived in town amusing himself with his friends, and women.
It was doubly amusing, though, that considering all the years he’d known Susan, he did not really know her. That also served to prove her point—he was self-centered. He smiled more broadly. “You are probably right, I was and am. But regardless that does not make it right for me to rush into marriage with Alethea, no matter my motives or lack of them.”
She huffed out a sigh. “And you are probably right.” It sounded as though she was cross that she was forced to agree with him and she looked at the others across his shoulder as though she had had enough of the conversation.
“What is the level of Alethea’s attachment to me?”
Her eyes turned back to stare into his. “You should ask Alethea.”
“I know, but I believe it might set the vipers upon me. At the current time, it is better to ask you.”
“What is the level of your attachment?”
Touché again. “I think I ought to only tell Alethea that.”
“Well there you are then.”
“Dinner is ready, my Lord!” Davis stated to the room in general.
As Susan stood beside Henry, he offered his arm to her. As she’d done the other day, when he’d only worn his shirt, she did not merely lay her fingers on his arm but held it with a gentle grip that did things to his body he ought not to feel stir when this was potentially his future sister-in-law.
He sat between Aunt Julie and Alethea at the table. The latter turned her head away from him throughout the meal, avoiding conversation, and also left a footman to cut up his food.
Instead of speaking to him Alethea talked animatedly to Susan and Sarah, the conversation flowing across the table. They spoke of the assembly Susan had mentioned earlier. It was to be held in a couple of weeks’ time. He would probably be well enough to return to town before the assembly occurred, and yet it was to be Sarah’s first, apparently, so he really ought to stay and show his support and dance with her, as her eldest brother.
Self-centered… The accusation pricked.
He would stay. He did not wish Susan to have further grounds for that charge against him. He could act out some part of the story of the prodigal son: returned to become the responsible heir.
When they had finished eating his mother rose and led the other women from the room. It left him in the company of his father and Uncle Casper. When the doors closed Henry’s muscles stiffened instinctively. It jarred his damned shoulder. But he sensed a need to defend himself.
Davis poured each of them a glass of port while Henry awaited the onslaught.
It did not come, neither man mentioned Alethea, or their hopes that he would propose to her, instead they asked about his life in town.
Once they had finished their port and conversation, they joined the women in the formal drawing room. When Henry walked in, it was Susan who caught his eye first. She was not sitting with the others but was on the far side of the room searching through the music in the chest there, presumably because she intended to play the pianoforte.
She was being different from the others again. But she very rarely sat and joined in conversation.
As she leant over searching through the sheets of music her bottom was beautifully outlined within the thin muslin material of her dress and layered petticoats. He’d never thought about her figure before, Susan was the sort of woman whose personality absorbed attention too much for any thought beyond it… but now he looked… and thought… She had a very handsome figure.
He looked away. Alethea was sitting with Christine who would be excluded from the assembly in York as she was the youngest and not yet out, as it were. But she was gathering information about it as though that information were precious jewels to be held up to the candlelight and admired with reverence.
He smiled at the thought, it was charming to see Sarah and Christine growing up. There, see, he was not entirely self-centered.
He sat beside Aunt Julie, as Susan took a seat at the pianoforte and raised the lid.
She played the instrument extremely well. He could not ever remember hearing her play before. She also sang beautifully, her voice had an enchanting lilt that was very individual, and as she played she shut her eyes and let the music take her somewhere out of the room. She was rebelling again, in her own quiet way, no longer hiding in a corner, or the library, but hiding herself within the music.
If she felt confident enough to simply be whoever she was when she hid away, he wondered how she would act.
Alethea rose and crossed the room, to collect a cup of tea from Sarah. Henry stood.
Now was his moment. He ought to rectify the situation between them.
He crossed the room as Sarah poured out Alethea’s tea.
As Alethea accepted the cup he leant to her ear and said quietly, “Will you walk outside with me? The night is reasonably warm.” Hopefully she would not misconstrue the invitation after their earlier talk.
She looked at him with eyes that judged him with condemnation.
His lips twisted in a half-smile, probably in a mocking expression—he’d always been thick skinned—he’d never really been touched by others’ ill-opinion. He came from a large family and had attended a boys boarding school, such things made a person less vulnerable. “I think we need to continue our earlier conversation and I would rather not do so in here.”
“Oh, very well.” Her answer was impatient but forbearing. “Lead on.”
He’d always known Alethea had a rigid strength of character, it would be a valuable quality for a countess. In London life, there was a need to be stalwart and to cling to one’s morals. Although where people set their bar on morals varied, and he knew his bar was far beneath Alethea’s—but that too was a positive. He preferred it that way about.
He lifted a hand, encouraging her to walk before him, towards the French doors which led out on to the terrace. If they stood within sight of the windows there would be no issue with propriety.
A footman opened the door for them to pass through.
Alethea crossed the stone paving, the china cup wobbling on the saucer she held. When she reached the balustrade she set the saucer and cup down on the stone top and looked out over the formal gardens which were etched in bright moonlight. All this would be his one day, and therefore hers too, between them they would care for it and cherish it as his parents did now.
“Sulking does not become you…” he said quietly.
She turned and glared at him. “I am not sulking. I am angry.”
“Why?”
“Because I cannot keep waiting! My life revolves about your whims, whether or not you care to come home, and then when you do come I am left to hover waiting to see if you will ask… It is like this is a game to you!”
Self-centered! The accusation shouted in his head in Susan’s tone. “I do not treat you as part of a game. This is about my feelings that is all.” But damn it, he wanted to know what hers were. “What do you feel for me? Am I breaking your heart by asking you to wait, then?”
She glared at him, her emotion striking him through her eyes. “Is that what you wish for, for me to be here pining for you while you lead a jolly life in town? Susan constantly complains that I see too much good in you. I always thought you better. You are proving her right!”
Susan… He should tell her to mind her own business. “Susan has always had very little tolerance for me; we both know it. Do not let her opinion sway yours. What if all I ask is for another year?” Of freedom, to live life as a bachelor and get the recklessness out of his blood. “At the end of that year then I will propose and we will settle here.”
“I am three and twenty next month and in a year I shall be four and twenty, perhaps I do not wish to wait a year…”
He breathed in. The net was closing in on him. He could not run from it forever, he’d always known that, and yet he did not feel ready to settle, he felt a trap closing about him. But what she said was true, three and twenty was late for a woman to marry. He sighed out. “Why not come to town then this summer and spend time with me there? I still wish to wait a year, but then we may become better acquainted and you shall not feel so excluded.” There, he was not entirely selfish or irresponsible, he could think of her happiness too.
She stared at him, with her lips slightly parted. Her eyes caught the moonlight and shone silver. He had an urge to lean and kiss her but it was hardly in the manner of the moment and he would guess they were being watched.
“Very well,” she answered. Her lips pursed for a moment before she then added, “When should I come?”
“I intend to stay here as long as the assembly and then return to town. You may come anytime you wish. I shall write to you when I am there, and you may let me know when it is convenient for you to come in the company of your father and mother.”
“I should not have asked you that, should I? You do not own London. Of course I may go there whenever I wish, and when I am there I may dance with whomever I wish. I might allow any man who desires it to court me. You may wait a year, Henry. But I may decide not to.” She turned away leaving her cup of tea on the balustrade undrunk, and went back inside.
He smiled. Then laughed.
She had not answered his question, but he did not think her heart involved. He thought her feelings the same as his. There was attraction between them; but the rest was only common-sense; they suited one another and it was what their parents hoped for.
Chapter Seven (#ulink_314fb613-f39d-514a-b504-e202198c2a13)
“What did Henry speak to you about outside?” their father asked Alethea as soon as the carriage door closed.
A tension had lingered throughout the evening because they had all assumed that Henry had intended to propose before tonight, and he had not.
Susan’s father had grumbled about, that boy, during their journey here, and now it seemed that he would continue the same theme of conversation on the way home.
“He asked me to wait a year, and then he said he will propose.”
“Indeed.” Their father grunted.
“It is the most direct he has been, is it not?” Susan tried to encourage a sense of hope.
“It is, and we agreed I might go to town for the season. He suggested it. May we go, Papa?”
Their father nodded. “Well that is at least something.” His hand lifted and his fingers twisted the end of his curled moustache, as his fingers always did when he was mulling over some thought.
“The season is only weeks away,” Susan’s mother responded. “We will need to prepare. We shall have to open up the town house, and have a ball. You must have a presentation there to gather introductions.”
Neither Alethea nor Susan had been brought out into London society; it had seemed unnecessary because Alethea had an agreement with Henry, and Susan had never requested to go and hunt for a husband. But if her family were to go to London then she supposed she must go, and therefore also face introductions.
When Susan and Alethea were alone later, lying in bed beside one another, whispering through the darkness, Alethea told Susan more of the conversation she’d shared with Henry. “You were right, though, it is the most direct he has been with me, and yet I feel as though he is manipulating me, I told him I would not play his game anymore. He said it is all to do with his feelings.”
“I have always said he is selfish.”
“I know, and I told him you have now convinced me of it.”
“What did he say?”
“That you have always had very little tolerance for him and I should not allow your opinion to sway mine. But it is not your opinion that is changing mine, it is him.”
Henry must lose his charm in the moments when he said no.
“I have told him that I will go to town, but if another man courts me I will let him. I have not promised to wait a year.”
Susan smiled into the darkness. “Was he suitably sent into a terror at the thought of losing you?”
“I am not sure he even cares. He asked me if I loved him, but he did not say he loved me.”
“What is the level of Alethea’s attachment to me?” He had asked Susan that too. “Did you say you loved him?”
“No. That would have been utter folly when he is dangling me like this.”
“Do you love him?”
“I do not know. I admire him greatly, he is very handsome, and I like his manner but I am not sure how deep being in love feels… I am not sure if I would even know. How do people know?”
Susan had no answer.
~
Once the library door had closed, Henry’s father asked, “What did you say to Alethea outside?”
When the girls and his mother had retired, his father had asked Henry to sit with him in the library. Henry had known immediately what would come next—a berating.
He was too old for this. “Is it any of your business, Papa?”
“I am hoping that it might be. Would you like a glass of brandy?”
“Yes.” If he must endure this.
His father turned to pour it. Henry leant back against a leather chair, gripping its top with his good hand, beside his hip.
“So what did you say? When is this proposal coming? It was clear to me tonight that Casper had expected it too.” His father turned holding two full glasses. “I think he is becoming as impatient with you as I am. Is Alethea?”
He walked over to where Henry leant on the chair and held out a glass.
“Thank you.”
“Well?” His father looked him in the eyes, and his eyebrows lifted, in the way he had of challenging while smiling. His father was so hard to read at times.
His eyebrows remained lifted, waiting for Henry to speak.
Henry was not inclined to, yet his father kept waiting. Henry had borne numerous interviews such as this over his years both at Eton, and then Oxford. He had regularly been in trouble as a boy, and then as a young man. His father’s way had never been to shout but merely to unnerve Henry, to make him feel guilty and accept the responsibility for his actions—it usually worked well enough. Until he had returned to Eton or Oxford and then the interview and the guilt had slipped from Henry’s mind.
Self-centered.
He refused to feel guilty now. “Alethea is ready to marry. I am not. I have asked her to wait another year. She told me she may or may not wait. But she is to come to town for the season where she will consider my request and other men.”
His father laughed, then smiled and shook his head. “She is a good woman for you, Henry. It is not that we wish to force you, it is just that she is—”
“Eminently suitable and conveniently close. I know. And charming, and sweet, and pretty—”
“And that was not what I was saying.”
Henry sipped his brandy.
“If she is not your choice, Henry, she is not. It is only—”
“That it would be such a perfect union, to join our families, when Uncle Casper has no son. I know.”
His father smiled again. “As you say, for all those reasons, and yet I do not wish either of you unhappy.” His father drank some of his brandy.
“We shall suit. We do. It is merely that I do not wish to marry anyone yet. You did not marry Mama until you were much older, you cannot expect me to hurry into the shackles.”
“You should not think of marriage as shackles if you wish to marry. I was desperate for your mother to marry me when I was younger than you. It did not happen and then I was even more desperate for her to accept me when I met her again.” His father sipped his brandy, then gave Henry another direct, enquiring look, which could be either anger or humour. “What do you feel for Alethea?”
Bloody hell. “That is the question I asked of her outside, what does she feel for me?”
“What did she say?”
“She did not answer.”
“As you have not answered me.”
“I will answer you. I care for Alethea. I am attracted to her. I am not sure if that is what you would define as love.”
His father sighed. “If it was love you would know.” He looked down at his glass and then sipped more of the brandy.
Henry drank the rest of his, then set his empty glass aside, on a table. “I do not believe it is love. But we ramble along well together, you know we do, and I think she feels as much for me as I feel for her. Perhaps while she is in town it will become love. You should not give up on your dream yet, but it shall not be fulfilled this year.”
His father drank the last of his brandy. Then picked up Henry’s empty glass. “Would you like another, and a game of backgammon, as I am unlikely to have your company for much longer?”
“Yes, thank you.” Henry turned and went over to the table to set up the game.
“It has been nice to have you home, and a novelty to have you at home and not to be angered by you on a daily basis.” His father was speaking as he poured the brandy. “When do you take off the sling? When will you leave?”
He told his father what he had told Susan.
“And then…”
“I shall accompany you, Mama and Sarah to the assembly in York. I know that will please Sarah. Then I shall return to town.”
“To sow more oats in furrows I disapprove of.”
“You may hardly talk I am constantly told about your former reputation, even though I would rather not know it.”
“I did not entertain myself in brothels and consort with whores.”
“No, you entertained yourself in ballrooms and bedchambers, and consorted with adulteresses and cuckolded a couple of hundred men in society, I think that worse.” Henry placed the counters on the board with his good hand. Then looked at his father.
His father’s eyebrows lifted again.
Henry laughed. “They are not facts I wish to know about my father, but in town they are facts that everyone wishes to tell me.”
His father set their refreshed glasses down on the table beside the board. “You know if Alethea discovered how you live… or even if Casper, or God forbid Julie—”
“Papa, I live as all young men live before they are wed. You cannot expect better of me than you did of yourself.”
His father huffed out a breath as he sat. “Except that I regret that I lived that way. It brought me no happiness, as your mother will tell you. Given a chance to turn back time she and I would have married when we were young and I would have accepted the responsibility of supporting my father. I shall always consider my wild years, years that I lost or threw away.”
“Well I am in my wild years, and I consider them precious. I am not you, and I am not throwing them away.”
Chapter Eight (#ulink_e6b2577c-2bf0-5cca-9548-130445fb97e6)
The carriage drew to a halt before the Palladian frontage of the assembly rooms in Blake Street. A footman opened the carriage door. Henry climbed out first, and stood beneath the giant portico, then offered his hand to Sarah to help her descend. It felt very freeing to have his right arm back, and yet the muscle had wasted a little, and his shoulder was still stiff and sore.
“Nervous?” he whispered when her foot touched the pavement.
“Excited,” she answered, with a broad smile.
He smiled too. He’d not imagined that accompanying Sarah to her first dance would move him at all, but he had been moved. He was proud of his oldest sister.
She had walked downstairs into the hall with the brightest smile, looking full grown, and beautiful. She had their mother’s unusual emerald green eyes and dark brown hair, and with it styled in such a grown up manner… She had become a woman, and somehow he had missed it until this evening.
He offered his arm to Sarah as his parents descended. “Allow me to be the one who walks you in.”
She smiled at him again.
Emotion clutched tight in his chest. He was the eldest; one day he would be the head of their family like his cousin John, the Duke of Pembroke, was of his. He’d never considered the idea before. Yet his father was healthy, he hoped it would be years before he must take on the earldom. He would rather his father alive and he the heir, who had the time and the money to live a care free life.
They walked into the large assembly rooms. He’d never attended before. It was a long, rectangular room, surrounded with pilasters of beige marble and full of people, music and conversation. Henry could see no one he knew. It was not London.
There was a country dance in progress. He leant towards his sister. “As we cannot join this dance let me take you to find the refreshments.”
People bowed and curtsied as they walked past. Of course amongst these people they stood out because of their father’s title.
Pride burned with a roaring flame in his chest. It must be the first time Sarah had experienced such recognition and it would be the first time she would dance outside their home, or a member of their family’s home. When the season began she would come to London and dance too. His sister, all grown up, and there was Christine to follow her.
A different sensation clasped in his chest, one that was more brutal and aggressively masculine. A need to protect her. He knew too much of London. Too much of what occurred outside the ballrooms. When she came to London he would need to watch her. There would be rakes and scoundrels all about her; men like him and his father.
The thought stabbed him with embarrassment. From that perspective perhaps he could appreciate his father’s view. He would not care for Sarah to know anything of his life in town.
“Wine?” he offered when they neared the refreshment table. When she nodded, he picked up a glass and handed it to her.
“Thank you, Henry.”
Their mother and father approached. “Mama?” He picked up another glass for her.
Several people in the room stared at them yet others came forward, and then the introductions began. “This is my eldest daughter, Sarah… This is my son, Lord Henry…”
The people Henry was introduced to were mostly the merchants and businessmen of York, though there were a small number of untitled relations of aristocratic families. Of course the businessmen and merchants benefited from his father’s patronage and so they were very keen to be introduced to his heir and compliment Sarah. Sarah would have been complimented even if she looked hideous because these men and their wives were merely scraping to gain the interest of an earl.
Henry was glad when the current dance came to its end so he and Sarah could escape all the bowing. His intent, then, was to dance all night and avoid anymore fuss.
He smiled at Sarah, conspiratorially, and lifted his good arm. “Shall we?”
“Yes please.”
Sarah’s fingers lay on top of the fabric of his evening coat. He escorted her on to the floor.
It was another country dance, they stood and faced one another. Her cheeks had turned pink. She was holding the attention of many people in this room, and as many women as men. He presumed the women jealous of his sister’s wealth and beauty. She would have a dowry that would be sought after as much as herself. Yes, he would need to protect her in town.
He winked at her, to make her relax.
She smiled, and then the music and the dancing began.
They smiled at each other every time they came together in the set, and he whispered some quip about their companions. She was laughing each time they parted.
When the dance ended they returned to their parents to take a few sips of wine. Sarah was breathing heavily yet the colour in her cheeks was now from exercise and enjoyment.
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