‘I already know,’ Pavia said staunchly. ‘He’ll be here.’ But her father only smiled like a cat with cream. Her stomach sank. She knew that look. He didn’t just think he’d win, he thought he already had. Dear lord, panic gripped her anew. In her haste to make the wager, what had she missed?
* * *
Cam snapped his watch shut, eyes riveted on the taproom door. Pavia was late. Beside him, Ferris Tresham tried to offer consolation. ‘Maybe she’s stuck in traffic. She’s not that late. It’s only four o’clock.’
‘We don’t have time to spare,’ Cam barked at his friend. ‘This is the military. The boat leaves on a schedule. If the tide turns, we’ll be delayed.’ His stomach was a mass of knots. He’d vacillated from elation to worry constantly the last two days. Should he have let her go back to her father’s house? Should he have taken her away that day in the park? What if someone found out what they’d planned? He’d tried to be discreet in acquiring items for Pavia, but had he given his plan away with those purchases?
‘Major, this has come for you.’ A young subaltern held out a note and saluted.
‘Thank you.’ Cam unfolded the paper, foreboding growing. He scanned the short lines and passed the note to Ferris, his insides tightening. She wasn’t coming. She’d changed her mind. He tried to hold on to reason. That couldn’t be true. Two days ago she’d been terrified to be left behind. ‘What do you make of this?’
‘I am sorry, old chap.’ Ferris looked up from the note with solemn concern.
‘That’s it? The woman you love tells you she’s not coming and you just accept that? Would you have accepted that from Anna?’ Ferris had only been married a scant year. Surely, there was still some romance left in his soul.
Cam stood up, restless with inaction. ‘Something must have happened. Every time she’s changed her mind, or pulled away from me, it has been her attempt to protect me, to sacrifice for my supposed better interest.’ He slapped the table. ‘Don’t let the boat sail without me. We can wait an hour without losing the tide if we have to.’ Didn’t she realise by now that she was his greater good? His better interest? He was going nowhere until he heard the denial from her own lips.
‘Cam, wait, what are you doing?’ Ferris rose, confused. ‘How do I keep a ship in port?’
‘Make something up.’ Cam was halfway to the door, already running. ‘Tell the Captain we’re waiting on late supplies. I don’t care. I am going to get her.’ In the street, he hailed a hansom. ‘Fast as you can, good man, to Mayfair. Bruton Street.’
The driver grumbled. ‘Traffic’s at a snail’s pace today.’
‘Do you what you can.’
Cam gave up on the hansom with five streets to go. He could cover the distance faster on foot. It was nearly four-thirty. They’d never make it back to the ship in time. He hoped Ferris had a creative excuse ready for the captain.
The town house was eerily still, Honeysett’s guards manning the gate as if it were the royal palace. ‘Let me through!’ Cam barked with militant authority. The front door opened before he reached the steps. Honeysett standing in the frame. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I am claiming my wife,’ Cam answered, aware that the guards had closed ranks behind him.
‘She does not wish to be claimed. Did you not get her note saying she changed her mind? Seems a life of following the drum is not for her after all. No surprise there, she was raised for better.’
For a moment, old doubt surfaced. Pavia was raised for better. Perhaps she had indeed decided to stay behind, to pursue a future with the Marquis. He pushed the doubt aside. ‘Then let her tell me herself.’
‘Cam, is this any way to behave?’ Aylsbury stepped forward at the door. ‘You’re making a spectacle out of yourself.’
‘I could say the same for you, Grandfather.’ Cam smelled a conspiracy now. Game was afoot. ‘Lowering yourself to visiting the home of a businessman? Do you let Honeysett call the shots?’ He could not see beyond the two men, but if they were here, on their front step, trying so desperately to send him away, then it was a surety that Pavia was within.
His grandfather hated scenes. Well, Cam would give him one. Cam raised his voice. ‘Pavia, I am here! Come out! I want to speak with you!’
‘Will you hush?’ his grandfather scolded, the old man’s head wildly thrashing around to see if the neighbours were watching yet.
‘Invite me in, let me speak with Pavia,’ Cam bargained. ‘I’d hate to force my way in, but I will do it. I think your neighbours would find a contretemps on the front lawn very entertaining.’ That was bravado speaking. He would take out some of Honeysett’s guards, but he wouldn’t get them all, there were simply too many.
‘Pavia!’ he called out again, another scenario coming to him. Perhaps she’d been forced to write the note. What had these men held over her head if she refused to send it? Or had she not sent it all? Was the note a forgery?
‘Cam!’ A shriek followed the reply. It was all Cam needed to leap into action. His wife was inside, against her will from the sound of things. He sprang up the steps, using his speed and strength to barrel past the two men. If she was being held against her will, things had gone too far. It was past time to be polite even to his grandfather.
Pavia was on the stairs, struggling against two footmen, her hands wrapped about the banister, using it as an anchor. She kicked and fought to stay downstairs, to stay visible. So that was their play—Pavia was supposed to have been out of the way, locked in a room upstairs. She looked up and saw him. ‘Cam!’
‘I’m here!’ His sword was out as he raced towards Pavia. ‘Unhand my wife, immediately!’ The sight of the blade was enough to deter the footmen. They fell back. He was beside her. ‘You didn’t send the note, did you?’ It seemed impossible based on these circumstances that she would have.
‘No, I sent nothing. What note?’ She was breathless, her arms about his neck. ‘You came. I thought I would never see you again, that you would sail without me, that I would lose you for ever. They were going to destroy the marriage certificates.’ She was babbling, crying as she clung to him, confirmation that something far worse had happened in this house.
‘Stay with me and behind me, Pavia.’ He gripped her hand, leading her towards the door, towards her father and his grandfather, his sword in one hand, Pavia’s hand in the other. Her father stepped forward to meet him, a pistol in his hand.
* * *
Dear God, would her father shoot Cam simply to widow her? Guns beat blades every time for speed. ‘Cam,’ Pavia murmured a warning. But Cam stood his ground.
‘You both have interfered enough. This ends today. Pavia Honeysett is my wife.’ Cam’s attention shifted to his grandfather. ‘An announcement to this effect will be printed in The Times evening edition, publicly acknowledging our marriage. You cannot erase it now without causing a public scandal. I am leaving this house with her by consent or by force, it matters not which to me.’
A clock chimed the half-hour somewhere in the house. ‘You gave your word, Father,’ Pavia spoke. ‘I won our wager. Cam came, despite your best efforts to convince him otherwise. Love really does conquer all.’
Her father would not relent. ‘You will not take my daughter from this house again.’ The gun stayed trained on Cam and for a moment Pavia feared he would fire. Not to kill, she realised. He was too keen of a strategist for such a mistake. He would never survive murdering an earl’s grandson in cold blood. Aylsbury would not allow such a thing. But he could maim and for a military man like Cam, that would be just as deadly.
Pavia appealed to Aylsbury. Perhaps he would be her unlikely ally if it meant saving Cam. ‘You can’t possibly allow a man to hold a gun on your grandson?’ she scolded, but the old man was stoic in his response.
‘I am waiting for him to see reason. He will be safe the moment he steps away from you. If he is shot, it will be on his own head.’
Good lord—Pavia’s heart sank—they were both mad with revenge. What a pair the Earl and her father made, the two of them so drunk on the need for power and control they couldn’t be logical. What was she to do against two such men? She needed an ally.
There was movement at the doorway to the office. Her mother stood there, her quiet dark eyes ablaze with an old fire. ‘If there’s to be any shooting done, it won’t be in my entrance hall.’ She strode forward, putting herself between Cam and the pistol. ‘I have been silent too long, thinking you’d come to your senses on your own, Oliver.’
Pavia watched transfixed as her unassuming mother’s hand curled confidently, without hesitation, over the barrel of the pistol as she spoke. ‘Put the gun away, Oliver. You can’t force a victory—you can’t win this. This is not a competition for tea-leaf crops or access to trade routes. Are you really willing to shoot this man because he loves your daughter? Where’s the logic in that?’ She turned the gun barrel aside. ‘There used to be a time when I loved to watch you compete, to go after what you wanted. It was what I first loved about you. Then your ambition began to eat you alive. I waited and hoped it would pass, but it has only spread. Your ambition threatens all of us now—your daughter’s happiness and even your own marriage is about to be sacrificed to your avarice. Oliver, you have enough. You have more money than any one man can spend in a life time, you have a family that would like to love you if given a chance. Don’t you remember how it used to be between us? Before you were corrupted by greed? Let Pavia claim her happiness and let me find the man I used to love.’
Pavia watched in riveted fascination as the gun lowered, her father’s eyes fixed on her mother, his attention no longer on her and Cam. ‘But, Sabita, it was all for you.’ Her father’s stern brow knit in confusion. ‘So that you would be accepted, so that you would not regret leaving your family, your home, your country, so you would never regret the marriage your brother arranged for you.’
Her mother’s hand smoothed the wrinkles from his brow, her voice soft like it used to be when Pavia was young and had a nightmare. ‘Shh, Oliver. All I ever needed, wanted, was you, just as you were, just as you can be again.’
There were unshed tears in her father’s eyes. Pavia had never seen him cry before, never seen him broken before. But, no, that was wrong. He was not broken now. Her mother had not broken him. Her mother had reclaimed him. Love had reclaimed him. It was almost like watching a metamorphosis before her very eyes. Pavia felt Cam’s arm about her. She glanced his way to see his own gaze downcast, for privacy, for respect, to give her parents the moment. Love had conquered even her father’s hard heart. But not Aylsbury’s.
‘Grandfather, will you step aside? We have a boat to catch.’ Cam sheathed his blade. It could be of no more use. There were more powerful forces at work here than weapons.
The Earl huffed. ‘Sentiment is rubbish. You’ll never be welcome in my home again, Camden.’
Cam nodded. ‘I’m not sure I ever was. The only home that matters to me is the one Pavia and I will make. Mrs Lithgow, your ship awaits. This way, if you please.’
Pavia beamed up at him, relief and love flooding her. ‘I do please. Mr Lithgow, lead on.’
The cabin was small, but it was private, thank goodness. She and Cam had put that privacy to good use the moment he was free of his duties above deck. Pavia levered up on her side, her hand stroking her husband’s chest with idle drawings. ‘I didn’t think you’d come and it would be my fault. I had pushed you away once. I thought you’d doubt me and believe I had decided not to want you, not to want us.’ There was still a fragility between them. They had to learn each other all over again, or perhaps for the first time, or maybe still.
Cam kissed her forehead. ‘You needn’t doubt again. I will always come for you.’ He pushed back her hair, his hand soft at her cheek. ‘Now, what was this about a wager with your father?’
‘He bet our certificate against you showing up. If I won, he’d let us walk out of there together, if I lost, I had to let him erase the marriage.’ She held his gaze. ‘I never want to feel that way again, as if the world depended on you walking through that door.’ She hesitated. ‘But I think I probably will because that’s how it feels to love someone the way I love you.’
He drew her to him and she revelled in the feel of his body against hers, skin to skin, mouth to mouth as the ship rocked beneath them. ‘I know, because I feel the same way, every time I look at you,’ He whispered. Cam gave her a long kiss that stirred her at her core. ‘We’ll keep each other safe, Pavia, I promise.’
She gave a soft laugh. ‘When I looked out at the taproom that first night, I thought I only needed a man, that any man would do. But I was wrong, Cam Lithgow. I needed you.’ From the look in his eyes and the press of him against her leg, he needed her, too. Maybe fairy tales did exist after all.
Epilogue
The Crimea—one month later
‘Are you nervous?’ Pavia reached for Cam’s hand, wanting to lend him support as they waited in the big, notably empty white tent. Moments ago it had been filled with officers of all ranks eager for a glimpse of the man who might be Fortis Tresham. But Cam had insisted the first meeting be private.
Cam shook his head and threaded his gloved fingers through hers. ‘No. Once, I might have been. Once, my life had centred on finding Fortis. I couldn’t accept that he was gone. But now, it is merely one part of my life, not the sum of it.’ He squeezed her hand. ‘What will be, will be.’
He looked handsome in his dark blue uniform, his broad shoulders filling out the long officer’s greatcoat with its polished buttons. Handsome and intimidating, some would say. But not Pavia. He was simply the man she loved and the man who loved her in return. She would follow him everywhere, anywhere. She’d followed him here to the Crimea. It was muddy and cold—even Cam’s status as a major didn’t afford them many luxuries: a bigger tent and better food, perhaps, but not protection from the elements. Still, she’d done her best to make that tent welcoming and there was the joy at the end of every day of lying down beside him on the bed she’d cobbled together out of cots and a hay-stuffed mattress, knowing they were together. That was enough. For now.
A cold wind cut through the tent and Pavia shivered despite the warmth of her wool cloak. ‘It’s a different kind of cold here, isn’t it?’ Cam smiled in commiseration. ‘But we’ll be going home before long, just as soon as this piece about Fortis is resolved.’
Pavia couldn’t keep the surprise from her face. ‘Home? To Little Trull?’
‘Yes.’ Cam grinned. ‘I was going to surprise you later, but now is as good of time as any. I have resigned my commission, effective immediately. This is no life for us. Coming back has made me see that.’
Pavia’s joy faded. ‘But you love the military.’
Cam shook his head, stalling her worries. ‘I loved the military, past tense. Now I have some things I love more: my wife, my marriage, the home we’re making together. It’s time for a new direction in my life.’ He smiled his assurances. But Pavia wasn’t convinced.
‘And your search for Fortis?’ she asked quietly.
‘I can’t spend my life chasing ghosts. It steals too much from the future. For me, that search ends today no matter what happens.’
‘What will you do with yourself?’ She could hardly imagine her active husband content with puttering around the garden all the time.
‘Conall and I have plans for the alpaca syndicate. I shan’t be bored, my dear.’ His eyes twinkled. ‘Perhaps you might like to invest?’ Her father had written begging forgiveness and promising to transfer her rightful dowry to them when they returned. Cam had insisted she keep the dowry, her own money to use as she chose.
‘I should think not right away.’ Pavia gave him a coy glance. ‘I might not have time.’ She bit her lip, debating. It hardly seemed the place for her news, yet the moment seemed right. They were on the
brink of a new start with Cam leaving the military behind and her news would be a new start as well. ‘I have a surprise for you, too. I was going to save it, but I want to tell you now, before anything else happens.’ She drew a quick breath, holding Cam’s eyes with her own. She didn’t want to miss a moment of his reaction. ‘I’m pregnant. We are having baby.’
* * *
They were going to be parents. Absolute joy shrunk Cam’s world to the woman beside him. All thoughts of Fortis, of his final mission, were gone, obliterated. He drew Pavia into his embrace, holding her close, her face shining up at him as they shared this moment. ‘Nothing could make me happier,’ he whispered. Or more complete. That completion was the source of his happiness. Pavia made him whole, his children made him whole. He bent to steal a kiss. Any interlopers could be damned. He loved his wife. He would not pretend otherwise.
‘Ahem. Major.’ A pink-faced corporal shifted uneasily on his feet at the entrance. ‘He is here, sir.’
Cam straightened, gathering his thoughts to the present. ‘Send him in, then.’ Surreptitiously, he felt Pavia’s gloved hand slide back around his, her touch the living promise she’d made to him the night he’d confessed all to her. She was beside him in all ways today. He did not have to face the hope or disappointment of this moment alone. No matter what happened, they would go home to Little Trull and build the life they’d dreamed together. What more could a man ask for?
The corporal moved aside and a tall man stepped through the entrance, stooping to fit beneath the flap. He straightened and met Cam’s gaze evenly with sharp blue eyes the colour of glaciers. Cam was careful to give nothing away as he studied the newcomer; tall, dark-haired, he carried himself with a sense of authority. He waited, letting the other man speak first.
‘They tell me my name is Fortis Tresham,’ the man offered at last. His voice was hoarse, perhaps from illness or from cold, both were common in these parts.
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