The Earl and His Lady: A Regency Romance (Branches of Love Book 4)

by Sally Britton

  That wasn’t the promise he wanted. He opened his eyes to look at the black glove she wore, reminding him of too many things at once. His loss, and hers. The reason he could not tell her everything he felt, how much her safety mattered. What was at stake for him, should she fall ill.

  “Abigail died after complications with scarlet fever,” he said at last, the words nearly choked from him. “And I cannot lose you too.” Let her make of that what she would. It was the truth. If he lost Virginia now, with his feelings new and undeclared, if she fell ill and did not recover, Lucas did not think he would either. Ever.

  He didn’t look at her. He couldn’t. He didn’t want to see her reaction to his words, to what they implied. She wasn’t ready for him to bear his heart to her.

  Silence hung between them. He could feel her tense beside him. Her gloved hand at last moved, sliding from his arm.

  Lucas sighed and took up the reins, slapping them lightly against the horse’s back. The gig moved forward, to the Hall, and Virginia said nothing to halt their progress. She remained silent, and he dared to glance at her from the corner of his eye.

  Her face was pale, her lips white and clenched tight. Her eyes unfocused, her thoughts obviously turned inward. Was she thinking over what he said, or how he had said it? Would she speak to him of Abigail? Promise not to go on her visits?

  When they returned to the stables, Lucas stepped down without a word to the groom who came forward. He held his arms out to help her down, and Virginia stepped into them. The fabric of her gown against his ungloved hands was soft and smooth, her waist trim and an excellent fit to his hand. But he thought little on that and more on how she kept her eyes averted.

  “Please see to it the basket is returned to the kitchens, and the gloves to my man for cleaning,” Lucas said to the groom, then offered his arm—as always—to Virginia.

  She took it and walked with him. Mere steps from the side door, she spoke at last.

  “I understand your concerns, Lucas. Thank you for telling me.”

  That was all. She didn’t say another word. Virginia released his arm and went ahead at a quicker pace, leaving him to stand in the doorway. Lucas watched her go, a piece of his heart going with her and leaving the rest to beat painfully inside his chest.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Dinner was a strained affair that evening, though Virginia did nothing to alleviate the tension between them. She barely said two words to Lucas, and he remained silent as well. She excused herself as early as possible, intent on gaining her bedroom and its blessed peace.

  What happened between them regarding visiting her tenants, though she could not accurately explain it, had strained their relationship. She could feel it between them, as if they had been holding on to opposite ends of a string and, pulling in two different directions, waited for it to snap. His demands, his fears, couldn’t rule her actions.

  Virginia shut the door behind her, in the room that had been hers since Charles brought her home as a bride, and leaned back against the cool wood. Though the summer sun should have kept the room lit, even at the after-dinner hour, the clouds had moved in again and everything was dark as night.

  She found her way to the lamp on the mantel and the tinder box. Once she had light, she pulled the chord to summon Louisa.

  When Charles’s illness became severe enough he could not leave his bed, Louisa had assisted in her undressing every night. But before, when the room adjoining hers had belonged to Charles, it was he who saw to that task. He’d never minded.

  Her cheeks warmed at the memories that came with that thought. Virginia hurried to her dressing table and sat, pulling pins out without regard for gentleness. It was better to distract herself, to move with haste and purpose. Just as she’d done all things since the morning after her husband’s death.

  The boys needed her to be strong. The people around her needed to see her as capable and practical. It was up to her to keep her children safe and—

  “Good evening, my lady.” Louisa entered the room, a smile on her face. “Turning in early for the trip tomorrow?”

  Tomorrow? Virginia bit her bottom lip and glared at herself in the mirror. In the morning, they would start back to Annesbury Park. Lucas and she had agreed that matters were well in hand and they could return earlier than expected. At the time, she’d been glad she’d rejoin the boys sooner. However, with the rift between the earl and herself, and a long carriage ride before them, Virginia wished the journey could be put off.

  She met Louisa’s curious eyes in the mirror and swiftly nodded. “Yes. I thought it would be wise to rest well tonight. One never knows about the coaching inns, after all.”

  “Yes, my lady.” Louisa went about her duties efficiently, chattering about seeing old friends and the news of the community. Virginia smiled and murmured a response when required, but attending to the conversation was difficult with her thoughts flying in several directions.

  “My lady,” Louisa began, brushing out Virginia’s hair in preparation to plait it, “I was wondering if there is anything you would like me to bring back to Annesbury Park. Any of your personal items.”

  Virginia pulled herself from her thoughts at this question. She had considered it herself a time or two in the preceding days. “Yes. I have a list.” She looked down at her dressing table and opened a drawer. “I think just a few things. But I have gone this long without them, they obviously are not essential. If we haven’t room, take one of the trunks from the attics.”

  “Yes, my lady.” Her maid took the list and read over it. “What of your gowns?”

  Virginia started and met the maid’s eyes in the mirror. “I have no mourning clothing here, Louisa.”

  The woman ducked her head. “I know, my lady. If you will permit me to say, we aren’t certain when we will return again, and it may be practical to keep a few gowns in reserve, for after.”

  There would come an after, Virginia knew. One day, the mourning would be put off. It was sometimes difficult to remember that color would be part of her life again. Often, she tried not to look at herself in the black and gray ensembles she wore now. They were a stark symbol of her loss, meant as a reminder for her and the world.

  “What would you suggest we bring, Louisa?” she asked, curious. Her maid was thinking far into the future, it would seem.

  “There were a few gowns you had made for the London season that you haven’t even worn. A few day dresses, an evening gown or two. I could put them up nice in a trunk for the right time, my lady.”

  Virginia rose and went to the wardrobe, opening it slowly. Her things had been stored in the dressing room for the visit, but she knew her favorite gowns, the newest gowns, were here. She looked inside, studying the shining fabric of a gown she had commissioned nearly a year before. A celestial-blue evening gown, which glimmered with different shades of blue and green depending upon the lighting.

  When she had been fitted for it, by her favorite seamstress in London, she had thought it the most beautiful dress she’d ever owned. But after Charles became ill, it hardly mattered if she had a pretty gown or not. She’d left it behind, and all the memories she had meant to build while wearing it. The gown was like a wished-for dream that had never come to pass.

  “Bring this one, too,” Virginia said, laying her hand on the fabric. It would do her well to remember to dream, once in a while. Charles would not want her to give up on dreaming.

  Louisa took her leave at last, promising to be up early to finish packing, and Virginia was left alone in her bed.

  Alone. In Bath, when the doctor required she take a room separate from her husband, it had been an adjustment. Though they kept their own chambers, they were rarely without one another at night. To find herself apart from Charles had been difficult, but she’d adapted. The past several months, first with Christine and then at Annesbury Park, she’d not struggled too often to fall asleep. Not really.

  But here, at Heatherton Hall, where she had spent less than a dozen night
s in a bed without Charles, things were different.

  She’d hardly slept at all.

  Perhaps that lack of sleep had led to her argument with Lucas. Had she been more rested, more herself, would she have responded to him the same way?

  She tossed from one pillow to another, squeezing her eyes closed.

  Did she owe Lucas an apology? If he’d said right away why he didn’t wish her to make visits to those afflicted with the fever, if he’d explained first, they never would’ve had reason to argue in the first place. Didn’t that make it his fault?

  Virginia pulled the blankets up to her chin.

  Lady Abigail Calvert had succumbed to scarlet fever. That didn’t mean Virginia would. She had a strong constitution. She’d nursed her own husband through consumption without falling ill even once.

  But the fear in Lucas’s eyes, the sorrow in them, had not been for Abigail.

  Virginia dismissed that thought by sitting up in her bed. Sleep would not come swiftly. Her agitation with the situation remained too great.

  Pacing from her bed to the window, Virginia tried to think on other things. Knowing she’d see the boys in two days’ time comforted her. She had rarely been apart from them since their infancy. Her mother claimed it was unnecessary sentimentality, that servants were employed to allow mothers to go about in society. But Virginia had never understood how people could wish to be parted from their little ones. When the day came for her sons to go away to school, she was not sure how she would get through that time apart.

  She had found Phillip’s model ship and secured it well for travel. He would be pleased to have it back again. Edward would likely spend a great deal of time studying all his rescued shells, talking over where he had found them and what he thought of each crack or colorful line upon them.

  Lucas had been kind to retrieve the shells for her. And his idea to build a similar structure to the crow’s nest would likely give the boys a topic of conversation they would not soon exhaust.

  Lucas’s thoughtfulness, such a key trait in his character she’d noted from nearly their first meeting, was a wonder to her. He remembered every detail of import when a person spoke to him. Having watched him as they settled accounts and went through the steward’s notes, she could appreciate that part of him even more. He recognized discrepancies, even small ones, and could remember different aspects of reports she had only glanced over. His assistance had proven invaluable, though he’d tried to stay in the background, acting as an adviser. Managing without him would’ve been difficult.

  Virginia froze mid-step and folded her arms tightly about herself.

  Why does every thought lead back to Lucas?

  She fought away the answer before it could fully form in her mind. She turned on her heel and went to the door linking her room to the baron’s chamber. To Charles’s bedroom. She touched the handle and took in a deep breath. She had not been inside his room yet. She’d wanted to ignore that it even existed.

  Yet she knew his room as well as she knew her own.

  Virginia turned the handle and pulled the door open.

  It still smelled like him. Like lemons and leather, like his favorite soap, like a thousand days of love and laughter. Her heart lifted but almost immediately the fissures left by his loss broke open again. Virginia stepped inside, knowing her way in the dark. She went to his bed and sat on the edge, breathing deeply, each precious memory cutting into her more deeply. She reached out to his pillow, knowing it would be empty, but needing to remind herself of how it had been when he was there.

  He would nevermore stand in that room, before his mirror, asking for her to adjust his cravat. He would never throw the door open, startling her and her maid, as she prepared for dinner or a night at a neighbor’s home. He wouldn’t watch the rain fall, standing at the large curtained windows that overlooked their rolling hills and the boys’ crow’s nest in the trees.

  Charles would never hold her again.

  A broken sob tore from Virginia’s throat before she realized she was weeping. Covering her mouth, trying to mute the sound, another cry slipped past her lips. Like a child, Virginia shuddered and wept, laying down and burying her face in Charles’s pillows. She sucked in a ragged breath, breathing in that scent that comforted her and tore her apart.

  Her already broken heart cracked further. She curled herself around the pillow, embracing it tightly, weeping. Longing enveloped her; when was the last time she’d felt as safe and protected as she had in Charles’s arms? She could lay her cares at his feet and he would make the world right again, or else hold her until it felt right.

  Virginia had not allowed herself to cry like this since the night Charles had died. Her circumstances would not allow for it. She had to remain strong, for herself and for the boys, for the world to see she was capable of carrying on.

  The world wasn’t watching now, and the boys were far away. No one would know. No one would see her. The boys would not witness her breaking down. This moment would be hers and hers alone.

  Alone. That word had never felt heavier than it did in the darkness, in a room she had never been alone in before.

  Virginia cried until her tears and body were exhausted. At last she fell into a fitful sleep, and dreams troubled by a longing she couldn’t name.

  ¤

  Rising with the sun, though it was a dreary dawn that greeted her, Virginia didn’t call for Louisa to help her dress. She left Charles’s bedroom after straightening the coverlet and smoothing the pillow. She closed the door quietly behind her, determination driving her. Though her head pounded and her body was weary, there was something she must do.

  Her hands searched the back of her wardrobe and pulled out a drab brown gown, more worn than the rest, reserved for the less delicate work of her life. Whether it was caring for her plants, working in the still room, or visiting the ill tenants under her care.

  She didn’t expect to do any such thing today, but her finer gowns required help to do up their buttons. Today, she wanted to slip from the house as quietly as she could, without fanfare or notice.

  She twisted her braid into a knot at the back of her neck and pulled a black bonnet over it. Her gray shawl went over the whole and she left her room. Tip-toeing through the house, she saw no one, and slipped through a side door into the damp morning air.

  The church was a mile and a half away. Cutting across country, Virginia knew she could make good time there and back to Heatherton Hall.

  She didn’t wish to tell anyone of her going to avoid their looks of understanding, their words of half-meant sympathy. She wanted no questions before or after. Seeing Charles’s grave for the first time must be something she experienced on her own terms.

  The grass was damp along the path she walked, brushing against her skirts to soak them with dew. Or had it rained in the night?

  All the heavens do is weep this summer. Virginia looked up at the sky. Lucas worried over the amount of rain. It was too much, too frequent, and not enough sun to dry it up again and wake the plants from slumber.

  Virginia passed over the bridge where Charles would stand to fish with the boys. They rarely caught anything, but Phillip had loved to lean against the rails with his fishing pole.

  She swallowed a lump in her throat and kept going, through a stand of trees and across another field. The church’s bell tower came in sight and her steps slowed.

  Could she make it any farther? Did she truly need to?

  Yes. Charles’s memory kept her moving forward. She loved him. She wished to pay better respect to his memory, to see his final resting place, to do her duty by him.

  In the distance, a rooster crowed. The world was otherwise very quiet when she entered the churchyard.

  The Heatherton barons had not been nobility long, in the way England measured time. Their small church did not have room or the ability to bury people within its walls and under its floors. But the family had a generous portion of land near the eastern wall of the building. It was there she went
, steeling herself against seeing the new gravestone.

  It looked like all the others. Rows and rows of them, rectangles set low to the ground, with curving tops and deeply-carved names, to stand the test of time and the wear of weather.

  Charles Macon, Baron of Heatherton. August 1780 - February 1812.

  His life, everything he was, noted in the coldest and most formal manner. Her eyes pricked with unshed tears. After all, he was not here. His immortal soul was gone home to heaven, if she believed what she heard the vicar preach from his pulpit. And she did. She must. To think of Charles as gone forever—it would be too much.

  She laid a flower down on his grave, plucked from the meadows as she came. It was a meager offering, but Charles had never been one for flowers.

  Lucas’s words came back to her, from days ago. Before their argument.

  “It helped, to ease my thoughts, to express them and imagine what Abigail might say back to me if she was present.”

  Dare she try the same?

  Virginia glanced up, looking around to ensure she remained alone in the cemetery. She took in a shaky breath and whispered words she had not spoken in months. “Hello, Charles.”

  Her heart burned within her, behind the walls she’d built to protect it.

  “I miss you.” Her voice cracked and she swallowed, composing herself. She could not break. Not here. “The boys do too. They are well. Happy, even. They are learning to ride, and you would be so proud of them.”

  Closing her eyes, imagining Charles standing beside her instead of somewhere beneath the earth on which she stood. He would stand near her, his head tilted to one side as he listened to all she said, his expression tender.

  “Phillip is struggling with his place in the world, I’m afraid. He has taken burdens upon his shoulders he shouldn’t bear. Edward only wants to make the people around him happy. They both remind me of you, every day. They remind me of what I’ve lost.”

  “You will never lose me, Virginia.”

  She kept her eyes closed. The words came from her memory, from weeks before Charles had passed, when she held his hand and they spoke of what was to come. The doctor had given them no hope, had left them with a promise to return. Virginia’s heart had fought against the prognosis while her head knew it must be true. Her husband had been failing in strength and health for a long time.