Harlequin Historical May 2020--Box Set 1 of 2

by Sophia James

  It was done and she deserved such a penance. It was finished and this was to be her punishment, left in the bridal chapel to find her own way home, left to the wits she had about her to see her family safe.

  When a conveyance was procured she jumped aboard and sat down on cushioned leather, unmindful of the small puddle of wet coldness that was pooling around her.

  In another two moments they were outside the chapel and her mother and sibling tumbled in.

  ‘You lied to us, Adelia.’ These were her mother’s first words. ‘I think your husband hates you.’

  ‘Better hatred than homelessness,’ she replied and wiped the mucus from Charlotte’s running nose with the back of her cold hand.

  Her mother laughed at that, a sound so unexpected that Adelia could only stare.

  ‘You are exactly your father’s daughter,’ she said as the horses moved off.

  ‘I sincerely hope not.’ She bit at the soft flesh on the inside of her mouth to stop herself from saying more.

  * * *

  Simeon dropped off Theodora under protest of his not coming in and spending the night with her. Unwinding her hands from around his neck, he tried to be gentle, shifting her weight from leaning upon him, dodging the kisses that she insisted on bestowing. Once back in the carriage he also had Tom to contend with.

  ‘Your wife might wonder where you are, Sim.’

  ‘I doubt it.’

  ‘I personally had expected at least a bite to eat.’

  Simeon laughed. ‘There is a pub around the corner that serves a good meal. We will go there and you can choose whatever you like.’

  ‘Your bride didn’t really have the look of a harridan.’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘A harridan. An ice queen. A harpy. All the things that were said about her in society. I thought she seemed afraid more than anything and Theodora Wainwright was hardly making things easier.’

  ‘She knows I keep mistresses,’ Simeon pointed out grimly.

  ‘Well, more normally it is at a distance, surely?’

  The truth of this was worrying him, but he could not afford to feel guilty. She had tricked him into this whole ridiculous debacle after all.

  ‘Usually marriages of convenience have a modicum of civility. I am afraid to say, Tom, that mine does not. But I have been generous in the contracts and that, after all, was what Adelia Worthington wanted the most.’

  ‘Adelia Morgan now, Sim. Though perhaps that may not signify if you don’t mean to consummate the union.’

  Simeon frowned. ‘Oh, I most heartily do not. Non-consummation of this farce of a marriage could be my only way to dissolving such nonsense at a later and more private date. But right now I need to go and get stinking drunk. A few hours of oblivion are exactly what is called for and I mean to find them.’

  * * *

  Back in Athelridge Hall Adelia shut the door and stood there, silent, unmoving, feeling the terror shift a little, feeling the embarrassment finally dislodge.

  She had brought them home, her mother helped up to bed by the ageing Mrs Cranston. Charlotte had stomped off without speaking apart from the usual tirade about hating her family.

  Tonight with all her own concerns piling up Adelia took little mind of her younger sister’s anger and instead ordered everyone a plate of hot food from the kitchens and went to her own room.

  The wedding dress was indelibly stained now. From the mud on the road, from the rain, from Charlotte’s streaming nose and her mother’s thickly applied powder where she had slept fitfully against her shoulder on the drive home.

  She peeled it off, the petticoats beneath following, and was pleased to have the rudiments of the day gone. The flowers in her hair she was more careful with for she had spent a good deal of time in the making of the small embellishment. She laid them on her side table, arranging the ribbons in soft tailed streams. The silk boots of her grandmother were ruined. She could do nothing for them save throw them in a corner to be dealt with in the morning.

  Then all that was left was her, pale in the candlelight. An unwanted wife. A nuisance. She thought for a moment she might lie down on her bed and cry, but shook her head hard at such cowardice.

  Was Simeon Morgan at this very moment laughing with his red-haired mistress at the ridiculous farce of their union? She’d seen the woman cuddling up to him in the carriage as it had left, glued to his side with a close familiarity.

  Her own future looked bleak.

  If they did not consummate the marriage, her foothold here at Athelridge Hall was far less certain. Just once would be enough. Once to make the vows legal and binding and permanent. And if she got with child then all the better, for the whole world would understand her tenure at the Hall rather than joining her husband in London and the gossip might stop.

  A knock at the door had her reaching for a blanket and securing it about her. Mrs Cranston came in with hot potato soup and fresh bread smothered in salty butter.

  ‘I had not expected you all back quite so soon, Miss Adelia, and your mother is having a fit of crying for all she is worth. I take it the wedding was not a success?’

  ‘Perhaps not, but it is done now. I am the new Mrs Morgan.’

  ‘And do you think it was worth it?’

  ‘I hope so.’

  ‘You are braver than anyone I know and you have always made the best of a bad situation. I pray that your new husband realises what a treasure he has had the luck to find and is repentant.’

  ‘That, Mrs Cranston, is very doubtful, but at least from now on there will be food enough on our table.’

  ‘And you won’t be off so much hunting and gathering. Well, that is a relief.’ She stopped for a moment, measuring her words. ‘Would he hit you, Miss Adelia, in anger? Like your father did?’

  ‘I think not.’

  ‘Then you are indeed lucky. Food on the table and an even temper. There are many women who have far less than that.’

  ‘Mrs Cranston?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Go to bed early tonight. No one will need you for we are all exhausted.’

  A wide smile was returned.

  ‘I shall, my dear, and Mr Cranston shall retire with me after seeing to the doors and the windows.’

  When she was gone Adelia found her old shift and pulled it on, layering a woollen shawl over the linen. There was no fire laid so she tumbled into bed, pulling the quilt across her and leaning back on the pillows she had stuffed last year with goose down. The day had made her feel frozen.

  She no longer had the ring or her cross, but she held the words of the ceremony in her memory and turned them over in her head.

  Troths of hope and love and honour. Empty promises, faithless pledges. Gulping down the soup, she ate the bread, dampening her finger to retrieve the very last delicious crumbs off the plate. Tomorrow was another day and she meant to use it wisely.

  The tomatoes had to be picked and there was a row of onions standing near the kitchen door to be threaded. The three cows needed milking, the eggs needed to be collected and the grass by the main gate needed to be scythed. And those were only the jobs requiring finishing in the first part of the morning.

  She would need to retrieve her ring and cross, too, of course, but lacking the coin to pay the minister back right now, she meant to leave the jewellery there for a week or two. Surely he would keep them safe for her. Surely he would not pawn them to retrieve so few pounds before she had a chance to see to it herself.

  It was her birthday today and no one had remembered.

  Twenty.

  A woman now.

  Reaching for her rosary, she said a quick night prayer before laying the beads back under her pillow. She missed her cross, the piece of jewellery she had inherited from her maternal grandmother when she was born and had always worn. She missed it far more than the expensive
new ring Simeon Morgan had placed on her hand while reciting promises that meant nothing to him.

  The day tumbled across her mind even as the rain outside lulled her into sleep.

  * * *

  It was full black when she awoke, coming into consciousness with a startle. Someone was in the house, she was sure of it, poised on the first-floor landing with the creaky board underfoot. It would not be her mother, for she was afraid of the dark. It would not be her sister, either, for the day had worn them both out.

  The servants had gone to bed—she had heard them leave herself. The Cranston annexe was at the back of the house.

  Sitting up, she listened, tilting her head in the direction of the door. When she heard another creak, she struck a light to her candle and rose, grabbing her shawl in one hand and the heavy brass fire poker in the other.

  Her handle turned slowly and she waited. Then the door was pushed open and she knew immediately just who her unexpected intruder was.

  ‘You.’ She could not disguise her relief. Not a burglar, after all, out to do her harm, but her new husband, his hair wet from the rain and the substantial cloak draped around his shoulders damp.

  He blinked, trying to focus, the red in his eyes telling her he was more than inebriated and that it would not be long before he was also unconscious.

  ‘Needed to…see you, Adelia.’

  The words were whispered.

  ‘Needed…to tell…you something. Forgot.’

  One finger came to his lips and he held it there, signalling quiet.

  ‘How did you know this was my room?’

  He frowned. ‘I asked your…sister. She was…downstairs.’

  ‘Charlotte?’

  ‘Is that her…name? Didn’t know it. Looked…a bit…sad.’

  She should push him out. She should knock him over the head with the poker for the embarrassment of leaving her in the lurch at the chapel in Hyde Park Crescent. She should do both those things, but another thought also struck her.

  She could use this situation to her advantage. It was like a good fortune falling unexpectedly into her lap, her first stroke of luck in years.

  Consummation.

  Pouring him a liberal glass of her father’s whisky, she handed it over, pleased when he took it. The bottle had been brought up a few weeks ago when she had caught a cough and had not been returned to the library downstairs.

  ‘Sit down.’ She gestured to the chair by her bed and he did as she bade him, tucking the folds of his cloak around himself as he smiled.

  ‘Your house is…different here. The colours…suit you.’

  She looked around, seeing the soft shades she had chosen to decorate. Faded yellows, mellow creams. A bolt of light blue fabric she had found in the attic, a leftover from better bygone days.

  The candlelight suited him, too. He looked younger tonight. The gold in his eyes was the same shade as the whisky in his glass, fired by light.

  ‘How did you get here?’

  ‘Hackney. Hired one.’

  ‘All the way from London at this time of night?’

  He frowned as if his sense was returning and he could not quite believe where he was.

  ‘Not right…to just leave you… Should have…seen you home.’

  His hand came out and before she could move he had hers in his grasp, turning it over to trace the lines with a finger. ‘My mam…read palms for a living and…she was good at it.’

  He stopped and she saw the pain in his expression. His skin was warm and his fingers long.

  ‘She said everyone’s future lies in their past. I…used to hope…not.’

  His rough accent was much more pronounced tonight, the burr of the long drawn-out vowels, the rolling r’s and the missed h’s as well as his use of the word ‘mam’. It was the drink, she supposed. Every other time she had met him his words had been more clipped and careful, a melded accent of time and distance.

  ‘Why did you come here?’

  ‘It’s your…birthday.’

  He let her go then and dug into a pocket bringing out a burnished brown-velvet box. ‘A present to match the ring.’

  Depositing it on the table, he held on to the edge for balance and she wondered if he felt dizzy even as her heart warmed at his gift. He had seen her birthdate on the marriage certificate, no doubt.

  ‘I want things to be…civil…between us. Only that… Was married once before…a long time ago and never wanted to be again…’

  Shock ran through her. ‘What happened to your wife?’

  ‘She died.’ He didn’t say more, his big frame leaning in a graceful arc back against the chair.

  ‘Know the difference, though…between right and wrong. So many things are wrong. Wrong to leave you there…with a sick sister…in the rain on your birthday. Wrong to bring Teddy to the wedding…’

  He’d closed his eyes now, momentarily, a weariness on his face that pulled at her compassion. Simeon Morgan was drunk, but kind with it, and he was not a bully.

  It was enough.

  Lord, thought Adelia, could it actually be this easy?

  ‘She is not…usually…nasty. Just…jealous. Needed to tell you before…’ He stopped and looked around as if seeing the room for the first time. The smell of drink on his breath was strong.

  ‘Before what?’

  ‘Before you went to sleep…on your birthday.’

  ‘Stand up.’ She didn’t waste words and was glad he did as she asked. His height was emphasised here in her room in the eaves of the roof, a tall man with muscles that none of the lords in society seemed to sport. In this light she noticed a white scar across his left cheek near his eye.

  When he saw where she looked one finger rose to touch it. ‘Wasn’t fast enough…sometimes.’

  His smile was lopsided and nearly broke her heart, the child he had been who must have tried to dodge such violence suddenly conjured up.

  He was swaying, too, as she unbuttoned his cloak and then his jacket and threw them on to a nearby chair. The waistcoat beneath was one of embossed satin.

  ‘Too many…clothes. You, too.’

  His glance was on the bed now and she saw desire flare in his eyes, an under-shade of brown in the amber. His fingers touched the straps of her linen nightgown, pulling one side off her shoulders.

  ‘Want you, Adelia.’

  ‘Sit down, then.’ She patted the bed and he almost fell upon it.

  Kneeling, she unbuckled his polished leather shoes, the silver buckles engraved with his initials. Then she removed his necktie as he watched her every move. Like an indolent male lion, power and strength harnessed, but undeniably there.

  Her breath caught and held. It was a dangerous game that she played and one which might go either way. If he was not quite drunk enough…

  He lay back even before she asked him to do so, lifting his legs from the floor and closing his eyes.

  ‘Drunk…too…much. Damn it. Shouldn’t have.’ His breathing evened out into a quiet snore, the sound reassuring.

  With care she removed her shawl, not sufficiently daring to take off her linen shift as well, and climbed in behind him, pulling the quilt across the both of them.

  Eleven o’clock.

  With luck Mrs Cranston would come in to wake her at six. That gave him seven hours to sober up, seven hours to realise just what boundaries had been crossed, seven hours to understand that the wife he had left at the altar in the small chapel on the edge of Hyde Park was now undeniably his. To have and to hold for ever. A solemn and unbreakable vow.

  Moving her arm a little, she held her breath as her touch came up against him, the warmth comforting. He did not flinch and so she left it there, the experience of having someone share her bed for the first time in her life strangely joyful. He was not like any of the swains that she had met across her Season. He
had never mentioned her looks and he certainly had made no real advances towards her, save in that ridiculous first meeting when she had confronted him with her proposal.

  If she closed her eyes and sought the memory, everything was still so vivid. In all honesty she wished he might awake now and touch her again exactly as he had before. Tipping her head, she hid a smile, his waistcoat against her cheek smooth and silken. She hoped he would not be too hot in such a garment, though the night was cool, the cold spell breaking any summer heat and returning the temperatures of spring to early August.

  She could smell the alcohol on him under the musky scent of manhood. He did not use cologne or any perfumes. Smoke lay in the fibre of his clothes and she wondered where he had been since they had left each other in Hyde Park at three.

  She sniffed again. The flame-haired sultry beauty he had brought to her wedding had reeked of some exotic scent, but that was gone. His arm moved suddenly as he turned and came against her, one hand cupping her shoulder.

  She lay deathly still and waited, but his breathing settled again and his profile softened. In the moonlight his hair curled around his ears and was much longer than most men in society wore theirs. He had thick eyelashes and his cheeks were chiselled high. His nose held a break on the bridge, she was sure of it, a relic of his life as a boy, she supposed, given the rumours that were threaded around him.

  A self-made man, a man who would confound all expectations. The thick gold wedding band on his fourth finger glinted in the light.

  Her husband.

  She wished he had come to her bed willingly. She wondered what might happen tomorrow when he realised her trick. She prayed he might wake and turn in the dark to hold her, like he had the first time they met. She wanted the heat from him to seep into her bones and words that were loving to fall from his lips.

  An owl called outside, through the night. It was late and today had been exhausting. Yet she lay listening to his breathing and feeling his hand across her until sleep finally took her down into the dark quiet.