Harlequin Historical September 2021--Box Set 1 of 2

by Christine Merrill

  His father covered his ears and Michael felt all the hairs on his arms rise as the poor dog let out a third yowl, trailing away into a whine. Then he threw himself dejectedly down on the rug and stared up at Michael as if all the ills of the world rested on his furry shoulders.

  Michael smiled. ‘Cleo is his lady love.’

  ‘Can dogs have such a thing?’ his father asked, surprised.

  ‘They can,’ Michael said, smiling. ‘Dogs love each other deeply, just as people do.’ He laughed, and the feeling was as deep and freeing as seeing the light in Olivia’s eyes when they had awakened together at the inn. It was a feeling he had refused to name until today, a feeling that he could no longer deny.

  Liv had sent him a message and he did not need a piece of paper to tell him what it was. She loved him, and she was waiting.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Hugh had finally achieved his goal. He no longer needed a guard to keep her in the house. Since Michael had gone, there was no reason to run away. If he did come for her, she needed to be in the first place he would look.

  She had been hoping for something that would be serious enough to make Hugh either summon him or send her away in disgrace. But, two weeks after their night together, her monthlies had come, removing any hope of an unexpected child.

  Another unwanted bonnet had arrived from the milliner’s, a probable message from Alister about another plan for elopement, as if he thought that the horrible things he had said in Mrs Wilson’s flat could be undone with nothing more than time. She had turned it away unopened, hoping that the message was sufficient to make him leave her alone.

  The days dragged on, empty of chess games and clever conversation. Breakfasts with her brother passed in miserable silence. If he noticed her unhappiness at all, he chose not to acknowledge it. This morning, he pushed the marmalade in her direction as if it were the solution to all her problems.

  ‘No, thank you,’ she said, pushing it back down the table.

  ‘It is your favourite,’ he coaxed.

  ‘What is wrong between us cannot be solved by a spoonful of preserves or an extra lump of sugar in my tea,’ she replied.

  ‘But you must eat something,’ he said in a gruff tone that barely disguised his concern. ‘Starving yourself will do nothing to change your circumstances. You are wasting away.’

  ‘If you truly cared about my wellbeing, you would let me go,’ she said.

  ‘Go where? With whom? And what would you do when you got there?’ he said, obviously frustrated. When she did not answer, he added in a tone that was almost gentle, ‘No matter how it seems to you, Liv, I have acted with your best interests at heart.’

  ‘Then please stop helping me,’ she said, throwing her napkin aside. ‘If I have any more help from you, I swear it will break what is left of my heart.’ Then she rose, leaving her breakfast uneaten, and stormed down the hall to the sitting room to begin another empty day.

  All men were idiots. Especially men like Michael Solomon. He had not answered her gift, though she was sure the letter that accompanied it had been quite plain. She had sworn that her words at the inn had been nothing more than lies told to protect him from the wrath of her brother. Though she still loved him as much as ever and still wanted to marry him, she had been afraid of inflaming Hugh’s temper by eloping right in front of him. Now that things were calm, it would be even easier to sneak away than it had been on that day.

  They could even take the dogs with them. She had added a playful line in her note about the need to reunite Caesar and Cleopatra, telling him that the poor bitch was pining for her mate and begging him to at least show the pugs some sympathy and to visit her in the garden, where they could talk, just as they used to.

  It had been over a week. He’d had ample opportunity to return her dog or at least smuggle in an answering note. But he had done nothing. Apparently, the fact that he had not spoken of his love for her on the night they were together had meant exactly what it seemed to. His feelings for her were not as deep as they should have been, and his offer of marriage was made simply to coerce her into bed.

  Not that trickery had been necessary. She had been the one to trick him. When Peg had told her of the act of love, she’d been speaking of a man who had been willing to fight to get to her. She’d had no advice to give on what one should do when one had chosen unwisely. Michael Solomon had promised the moon, then taken the money her brother had given him and disappeared.

  She stared out through the window of the sitting room into the garden, at the tree where he should be sitting. Before she had met him, she had never seen the bench as such an empty place. Perhaps if she saw Cleo, she would feel better. A least they could be miserable together.

  She went to the kitchen and collected the usual selection of scraps and bones, ignoring the pitying looks of the kitchen staff and the worried encouragement to take some biscuits for herself as well. Then she went through the back door and out to the kennel.

  ‘Cleopatra?’ The kennel was empty, and no one answered her calls. Perhaps she was having her puppies. Liv spun around, scanning the grounds, rushing to search under plants and bushes in case the pug was hiding from her. But Cleo was a good dog who never hid. She always came when she was called.

  Then she saw her worst fear. The back gate was open. Cleo had been inconsolable since she had sent Caesar to live with Michael, and now she had escaped to find him. She heard a distant bark and tears choked her throat as she rushed out of the yard, searching up and down the street for a flash of tan fur. She’d lost too much in recent days. She had to find the dog.

  And then she saw the carriage.

  It was parked halfway down the road in the place that always seemed to be chosen when someone wanted to spirit her away from the house, and the door stood open. As she ran towards it, she saw Cleo, a fresh bow upon her collar, hanging from the window. She rushed the last few feet without bothering to see who was inside, reaching for her dog as she took a seat, letting the little animal burrow into her lap and shower her with wet kisses. Then her second dog appeared, popping from a hamper on the seat beside her as if he wished to surprise her.

  The door closed and they set off. ‘I am happy to see that someone here is being greeted with pleasure.’

  Liv turned her head, trying to prevent Cleo from licking the tears from her face as Caesar danced around her feet, tugging at her skirts. Michael was sitting in the seat opposite. ‘You took my dog.’

  ‘Just as you wished me to,’ he reminded her. ‘When you left this house for good, you wanted to know they would be taken care of.’

  ‘Am I really leaving my brother’s house?’ she said, hardly daring to hope, but noticing that he had not said we.

  ‘I came back for you,’ he said, then smiled. ‘Because I knew you were waiting for me. And because I love you.’

  She laughed in surprise. ‘You suddenly believe that?’

  ‘Not suddenly,’ he admitted. ‘I have come to the conclusion slowly, dragged kicking and screaming towards the truth. But I arrived there, all the same. I love you and I am not sure it is possible to live without you.’

  For a moment she was not sure she’d heard correctly. But she was afraid to ask him to repeat it, lest it turn out she had heard wrong. She looked out of the window at the streets passing by. ‘We are not headed for Gretna. I have started for it often enough to know the best way to go.’

  He laughed. ‘No, we are not. There are things that must be settled first. I suspect your brother will be hot on our heels and would stop us long before Scotland, should you still wish to go there. It will be easier to get away if we settle things with him now, rather than letting him run us down.’

  He meant that she must talk with her brother, she supposed. He had been brave enough to stand up to the Duke weeks ago. She was the one who could not seem to do it. Even now, the thought of a confrontation with him left her fee
ling light-headed.

  ‘Is there no other way?’ she asked.

  ‘It will be easier than you think,’ he said. ‘You have let him rule your life and dominate your fears for too long. If you wish to get away from him, you will need to make an effort.’

  Did she still wish to get away? Of course she did. But how many times in the last weeks had she really believed it was possible? Even halfway to Scotland, it had been easy for him to drag her back because her heart had never really left the cage that had been created for it.

  ‘Where are we going?’ she said, looking out of the window at the clean and modest neighbourhoods passing by outside as she felt the carriage drawing to a stop.

  ‘We are here,’ he said. It was no real answer, but he was opening the door and helping her down. If she loved him, she must trust.

  Before her feet had touched the ground, her sister Margaret enveloped her in a hug and a shower of tears. ‘Liv! I have missed you. I have even missed Caesar. And here is Cleo! You lovely little dog.’ She reached down to scoop up the dog that had helped her escape months ago. ‘Come inside.’ She was leading the party up the short walk to a little house, bouncing the dog in her arms. ‘Of course you must remember David.’

  ‘Mr Castell,’ Liv said, still breathless with surprise.

  Peg beamed a smile over her shoulder. ‘And our new friend, Mr Solomon. Thank you so much for returning her to us.’

  For a moment, Liv could not seem to manage anything more than a soundless flapping of her jaw, then the tears began to come and she threw herself into her sister’s arms once more, crushing the dog between them.

  Peg’s voice was watery as well. ‘When you didn’t answer my letters, I was worried that something had happened or that perhaps you did not want to acknowledge me.’ She passed the pug to Liv and reached into a pocket for a handkerchief that was already crumpled and wet. ‘Curse these tears. I cry so easily now.’

  Liv closed a hand on her shoulder and searched out Mr Castell to give him the warning glare of an outraged older sister. ‘If there is anything at all wrong, you must let me set it right.’

  At this, her little sister laughed through the tears. ‘You have not noticed? You are being a goose.’ Now, Peg was pulling her into the house, which was small but warm and welcoming. When she withdrew, Liv saw the obvious bulge of her sister’s belly and the warm, protective look that her husband cast her as they stepped over the threshold.

  ‘You are enceinte?’ Liv said, amazed.

  ‘As big as Cleopatra,’ Peg said, grinning. ‘I swear, missing you is the only unhappiness I have had since I ran away. We travelled all over England before going to Scotland. I have even seen the Continent. I wrote to you nearly every day, but you never answered.’

  ‘Hugh would not let me see the post. He is as awful as ever. And I have been so frightened, being alone in the house with him.’

  Peg flushed. ‘We have settled in London for the sake of the baby. I wrote to him, hoping that, now we are married, he would let me visit you. But he refused. You are right. He is horrid. And as far as I can see, there is no reason for it.’

  Liv shot an outraged glance towards Michael. ‘You should not have brought me here. We cannot let Hugh anywhere near the child.’

  ‘Hugh?’ Peg said with surprise. ‘Why would I...? Wait. You really have received none of my letters. Not even the first one, though Lord knows why he would hide that knowledge from you.’

  ‘Not a word,’ Liv assured her.

  ‘Then you do not know.’ Peg looked at her husband. ‘She does not know.’

  ‘Know what?’ Liv said, confused.

  ‘It is not Hugh you have had to fear all this time,’ her sister assured her. ‘When we left London, David and I discovered much about our brother. The murderer was a woman.’

  ‘A woman,’ she said, shocked.

  ‘Someone with ties to Hugh. He entertained a lady in our home on the night Father was murdered. And later he sought to have her committed to a lunatic asylum for her mad and murderous rage.’ Peg shuddered. ‘I have no idea what she has against our family, other than a twisted desire to do what she thinks is best for Hugh.’

  ‘I think I have seen her,’ Liv said, shocked. ‘Disguised, of course. I have no idea of her identity, but she is still seeing our brother. We saw her in Vauxhall. And I think she sent me a letter.’ Had the ragged printing of the bloody note been a woman’s hand? She could not tell.

  ‘She has been lurking outside your house,’ Michael said in a warning tone. ‘I have seen her on the back walk, staring in the windows.’

  ‘He is still obsessed with a woman he knows he cannot have,’ Peg said, considering. ‘Does he not know how dangerous it is, for him and for all of us?’

  ‘I doubt he cares,’ Liv said. ‘Now that you know what love is, would you give up your Mr Castell for the sake of the family?’

  ‘You know I could not,’ her sister replied. ‘Else I would not have left you alone. But I had no idea that you might still be in danger from this woman.’

  ‘I am not,’ she said. ‘But Michael is.’

  ‘It was a man who attacked me,’ he replied.

  ‘Are you sure?’ she said. ‘Did you see your attacker clearly either time?’

  He hesitated and then countered, ‘I am still not sure that both times were not accidental.’

  ‘Perhaps if we appeal to Hugh to control her?’ Peg suggested. ‘He thought he would keep us both safe by keeping us from society. Or perhaps he simply did not want us to know the truth.’

  ‘I cannot tell what his motives might be,’ Liv said. ‘But if he is not the murderer...’

  ‘Fairly safe to assume he is not, if he is there to protect you and keeps hiring guards,’ Michael said softly. ‘It was why I did not rush you to Scotland. You deserve time to decide what is best for you. If you think it is safest to live with Scofield, I will take you back there.’

  Liv started, embarrassed that she had forgotten all about the final destination she had been hoping for when he had taken her from the house today.

  ‘Or you can remain here with us,’ Peg reminded her. ‘I have invited you so many times. You can have a season, if you wish. I doubt Hugh will try to control you, once you are out of the house.’

  ‘But...’ She thought he had dragged her back from the inn. But that was not totally true. She had gone willingly, for Michael’s sake. There was no proof that he would have used force, had she resisted.

  And now her heart was near to bursting at the excitement of possibility. She could go wherever she wanted. But the one place she wanted to see was the one that Michael had barely mentioned.

  A stern voice cut through her indecision. ‘She will be coming home with me.’ Hugh was standing in the doorway, arms folded, the two little dogs staring up at him wide-eyed with shock.

  ‘I am sorry, Your Grace. I do not recall inviting you into my home.’ This came from David Castell, who positioned himself between his wife and the Duke.

  Hugh gave an imperious wave of his hand. ‘I am sure there was something in one of Margaret’s letters on the matter.’

  ‘Unless she says otherwise, you will be leaving without Olivia,’ Michael said, taking a similar stance to Mr Castell.

  ‘And what gives you the right to an opinion?’ Hugh said with a cold laugh.

  ‘I am in love with your sister.’

  Liv sucked in her breath, surprised to hear him admit it aloud to someone other than her. It was proper etiquette to approach one’s guardian before offering. But then, it was also to be done before a night of passion, so she could forgive herself for being somewhat confused.

  ‘I wish to offer for her,’ Michael said, ignoring the smirk on Hugh’s face.

  ‘You cannot possibly think I’d entertain the idea that...’

  ‘That you would allow your sister to marry the le
gitimate heir to the Solomon family of Northumberland,’ he completed, stopping Hugh’s insult cold on his lips. ‘My family fortune is chiefly in mining. But my father is recently returned from India and has made his own money in the sale and trade of precious gems. He went to Cambridge with your father.’

  Liv tried not to gasp and failed.

  Michael turned to her with a smile. ‘Much has happened in the last few weeks. I will tell you all about it, in time.’

  Then he turned back to Hugh. ‘If it will make you more comfortable, I will cease my employment as an enquiry agent. I have ample funds at my disposal to live off the interest. I can also move to a fashionable neighbourhood where she might be more at home—’

  ‘I would quite like to see your house,’ Liv interrupted. ‘I have been imagining it for weeks.’

  ‘No!’ Hugh’s voice cut through their conversation. ‘She is not going anywhere but home. And she is not marrying anyone. Even if she was, it certainly would not be you.’ He stabbed a finger in Michael’s direction.

  Liv looked at him, as if for the first time. He was very frightening when he was angry. But she could remember him long before her father had died, when he was a doting older brother and not the strange, cold creature that he had become. If, as Peg said, he was not a murderer at all, then he had much less power over her than she’d thought. ‘I will be of age in three months,’ she said softly. ‘And then I am going to marry Michael, no matter what you might say.’

  ‘You cannot,’ Hugh said, as if the command was all that should be necessary.

  ‘I can and will,’ she said, her strength growing with each word. ‘Since you persist in objecting, I will marry him as soon as we can get to Scotland.’

  ‘I will not allow it,’ he announced.

  ‘Perhaps you can stop me if you carry me bodily from the room,’ she said, considering.