“Close the blasted door!” shouted Lord Bumbarden.
A crowd formed, curious about the entangled limbs on the settee.
Rothchild should have celebrated. Exposed, Lord Hammerly would be ruined. And yet, she had not understood. She had not waited.
Midsummer, he sat at the lake, skipping stones across the blue, nostalgic.
“Rothchild?” came the voice he knew so well.
The hair on the back of his neck stood at attention.
“Oh, Rothchild! It is you!” A rustle of fabric and she stood next to him, blocking the sun, casting him in shadow. “Your scar… You’re so dashing now.”
His heart caught in his throat. The memories of being here with her flooded back.
“I waited for you, my love,” Cecily said. “Please understand. Lord Hammerly lost a gamble and saw my fortune as his savior. He tricked my father into believing I’d been compromised. Papa didn’t believe my protests. But now, I’m free. Papa insisted the betrothal be broken after Hammerly’s disgrace. I’m free. And I’m yours.”
He tilted his head to meet her gaze.
Her eyes revealed the truth. “Will you have me?” The depths of love shone in her tears.
She had waited! She had understood.
And so beneath the cypress, beside the lake, with the sun at its highest point on the longest day of the year, they compromised each other.
Candor
Lord Eagleton died on a Wednesday. The townspeople rejoiced.
Friday, they gathered at the inn over ale and pasties, plotting.
“We won’t suffer another tyrant’s rule!” shouted one man.
A din of voices rose in assent.
“How do we know the cousin will be different? Same blood runs through his veins!”
The people jeered.
As meetings go, many voiced an opinion, most agreed, and nothing was accomplished.
When Cami left for home, it was not yet dusk. She chose the woods that separated Eagleton Park from the village. She knew the route well, and her terrier, Ferguson, made an efficient enough protector from the highwaymen the deceased Lord Eagleton had employed to line his pockets. His bandits plundered the fanciest of conveyances while terrorizing the villagers. As Lord Eagleton had taken a hefty portion of the profits, the highwaymen knew immunity for their crimes. All crimes.
But Cami could hold her own. As a vicar’s daughter, she was acquainted with sin and villainy.
Beneath the canopy of the forest, the world darkened. Her feet trod on his land, trespassing. She smirked and trod farther. Slats of light shone where the setting sun parted leaves. She inhaled the woody scents, Ferguson trotting at her heels, ears erect and nose sniffing, on the watch for trouble.
It found her in a succession of flashes.
Ferguson barking ferocious yips. The responding neigh of a horse. Black horse flesh rising before her eyes. The world tilting as she fell.
A blade to her throat.
She dared not move. Ferguson continued to bark, the sound muffled and distant. The horse pawed at the ground, unnerved by the terrier. Her eyes focused, time slowed to a normal pulse. Sabre in hand, a masked rider loomed over her.
A highwayman! Fear made flesh in the shape of a man.
Her breath suspended. Oh no, no, no. Erratic, her heart pounded.
“When did highwaymen trade pistols for witchery?” the man demanded.
Eyes wide, Cami mouthed her confusion.
Brown eyes studied her. “You must’ve bewitched the woods to take me by surprise. Nary a sound I heard from you or the pup. Is witchery your only weapon, or shall you also employ your beauty to wrest my gold?”
Ferguson moved between them and growled, prepared to defend his lady.
Finding her voice at the end of the sabre, she asked, “Are you not a highwayman?”
Gruff, he barked, “Do I look like a highwayman?”
A pointed glance found the blade. “You’ll pardon me for saying, but at the present, you do.”
With swift movement, the stranger sheathed the sword then removed his riding mask. He reached a hand to help her rise.
His face was too angular, his nose too hawkish, his eyes too dark to be handsome. Still Cami found herself breathless. Licking lips that had gone dry, she grimaced.
“My apologies,” he said. “Are you injured? You’ve surprised me out of my manners, my lady.”
“Mrs. Black, actually, and I’m uninjured.” She made a show of shaking the dirt from her dress.
“Is Eagleton Park far, do you know?” As if to prove his good intentions, he kneeled before Ferguson and reached out a hand. The traitor of a terrier abandoned his bark, wagged a tail, and licked the palm.
“You’re on the property now. The house is a mile west.”
“You shouldn’t walk the woods alone, Mrs. Black.”
“Yes, well, it’s not your concern. My home isn’t far.” She made to leave.
“You are my concern, Mrs. Black. Allow me to introduce myself.” He sketched a bow. “Lord Eagleton. Newly inherited. I clean up well, I assure you. I shall see you safely home.”
His smile twisted her stomach into knots. It remained so for their entire walk to her cottage.
He had such ideas! A new canal to prevent flooding. A raise in wages. Investment opportunities for the tenant farmers. Building improvements. He spoke sincerely, with an air of excitement. Was it all to be believed? His eyes spoke truth.
But the people had suffered too long under the former Lord Eagleton. They would never trust this new one.
Something bubbled in Cami’s chest. A bold and daring idea.
“You need an ally,” she said. “Someone of the people, someone they trust.”
“Do I?” he asked, brows raised.
She ignored his skepticism. “Allow me to be that person.”
“Why you?” His eyes searched her face.
“I’ve lived here all my life. I believe what you say, but for the others to believe, you’ll need an ally. I’m the vicar’s daughter and the rector’s wife. You need me by your side.”
“I hadn’t realized I was in search of an advisor.”
“Not an advisor, my lord. A wife.” Her knees trembled beneath her petticoat, her words far bolder than she felt. “Wed me, and the people will trust you.”
“And what do you suppose the rector will say?” he asked, kneeling again to rub Ferguson’s belly.
“I’m widowed, my lord. He was my father’s best friend. It was a convenient match…” if a miserable one. She chastised herself for the thought. He’d not been unkind.
“I see. And ours would be a match of love, or of convenience?”
She flushed, questioning now the wisdom of her impetuous proposal.
Rising smoothly, he said, “I’ll give you my answer before week’s end. For now, know me to be bewitched.” With a touch to his hat, he leapt on his horse and cantered away.
Cami slept not a wink for a week. How could she have been so bold? She had proposed to a stranger! The new Lord Eagleton, no less. But how could she not? She was a good judge of character, and she knew he was a good man. She dared not deny the flutter in her heart.
The end of the week arrived with a town meeting, the new Lord Eagleton presiding.
“Put action to words! Words are empty!” they shouted at his ideas. “How can we trust you? You’ll cheat us!”
When the meeting reached its unruliest, his lordship stood, holding up staying hands. “I promise to show you. I will not be a tyrant lording over you. I will work alongside you. Consider me one of you.”
When he held a hand to her, their eyes meeting, Cami dreaded she may swoon.
“Allow me to introduce my betrothed.”
Chin high, she stood and walked to the front of the room. Placing a gloved hand i
n his, she turned to the townspeople and smiled through her shock and disbelief.
Gasps mingled with sighs and applause. “He is to be one of us,” whispered the room.
Love or convenience? she asked herself daily, weekly, monthly.
The first time he hosted a town meeting to encourage farmers to invest in a canal, she hoped it to be love. The first time she witnessed him stripped to his buckskins, bare-chested and sweaty, shoveling the new canal alongside the laborers, she wanted it to be love. The first time he gazed adoringly into the eyes of their first born, she knew it to be love. A love that grew from a moment of whimsy into a lifetime of respect and trust.
As Lord and Lady Eagleton danced under the stars at the sixth annual fête, the villagers looked on and knew themselves most fortunate for never could there be a more loving lord and lady, with children who played with those in the village, the lines of greatness blurred.
Most importantly, she knew herself to be loved when he touched the back of his fingers to her cheek and whispered his affection. “I was right to first mistake you for a highwayman, Lady Eagleton. You’ve stolen my heart.”
Requited
Polished wood slick against her gloveless palm, Penelope took the stairs to the library.
The familiarity of the gallery leading to the forbidding oak door awakened so many memories, few good. Two naughty siblings oft reprimanded, suitors who courted her father’s title, mandates for her come out, the visit from the solicitor after Father’s death, her acceptance of a position as lady’s companion…
So many memories, few good. At least her brother had not inherited their father’s iron will along with the estate and title. The house was now steadily filling with the sounds of children’s laughter rather than tears. She smiled—a tight smile, but a smile.
Penelope palmed the library door’s handle just as it opened from the other side, pulling her forward into the arms of an unsuspecting man.
Nose met hard chin. Bodies collided. Shoe met toes.
Holding the throbbing bridge of her nose, Penelope said, “I’m terribly sorry. I should have—”
Voices overlapped as the gentleman said, “My apologies, I never thought—”
And then their eyes met.
Had her gasp been audible? Was the thudding of her heart visible?
“Liam!”
His eyes widened in recognition. He took a step back and studied her, searching for something. But what was there to find?
When he recovered his shock, his posture stiffening, he gave a brisk bow. “Penelope.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I’m your nephew’s tutor. It’s good you know that I come on Thursdays so our paths don’t cross again. Had I known you would be here, I…I…” He took a breath. “Excuse me.”
With a curt nod, he was gone in a whiff of aromatic shaving soap.
Pressing a hand to her bosom, Penelope stepped into the library and closed the door behind her. Oh, Liam. She would not cry for the past, for what could have been. He was the one who’d left all those years ago.
Visits to the lake, glances exchanged behind turned backs, secrets shared, hands held in the meadow. Their first kiss had sealed her love. Nothing more than a stolen moment behind the stables before her brother arrived to claim his friend, and yet it had changed her life. He was the only boy she’d ever loved.
And then came the day that ended it all. Penelope blinked away tears she had not shed for ten years.
Had she known he would be at the house, she—she what? Would not have come home? Penelope had had no choice but to return to her brother’s care, at least until she could secure another position.
Her week passed filled with indecisiveness. Should she confront him? Did the reason matter after all this time?
Outside the closed library door she stood, waiting for her nephew to leave. As dull as the Latin lesson sounded, she pressed her ear to the wood, living a lifetime in the deep tones of Liam’s voice.
Rustling. Movement. A chair toppled with a thud. Feet padded in quick succession.
Penelope stood back as her nephew wrenched open the door and ran down the hallway, screeching with delight that lessons were at an end. Turning, she faced her past.
Lips scowled at her below furrowed brows.
“My brother never mentioned you worked for him,” she said.
“Why should he? We are nothing to each other.”
The words slashed at her, sharp and vicious. At one time, they had been everything to one another.
Stepping over the threshold, she steeled herself to ask, “Why did you leave? I deserve to know.”
Planting clenched fists to the tabletop, he pushed himself to his feet. The turn of his lips, the determination in his eyes, the scent of his starched linen, all so familiar. “You know why I left.”
She wrapped her arms about her waist, protecting her core from more heartache. “My brother said you joined the army.”
“I did.”
“But why? I waited for you until dawn. You never came. Why?”
Liam cocked his head to one side, staring quizzically. “You rejected me, Penelope. Has time erased your words?”
It was her turn to eye him in question. “I did no such thing. We arranged to meet at midnight. I was there. My bag was packed. You never showed. Two weeks later, Nathan announced you had joined the army. How could you leave me?”
Liam covered his face with large hands. In silence they stood.
To her shock, soft laughter sounded behind those hands she knew so well, hands that had caressed her after their coupling beneath the willow, that had stroked her cheek, their touch accompanied by promises of love.
She’d had the misfortune to fall in love with her brother’s best friend, the youngest son of a baronet. He had pretended to love her. With words of ever after, he had taken her virtue then left, never to look back. She had alternately hated and yearned for him through the years.
“I need not ask why you never replied to my letters,” he said, his laughter dying. His hands fell to his sides, limp.
“Letters? You never wrote to me.”
“Penelope,” he whispered, her name haunted on his lips. “I hated you for years for trampling on my heart.”
He stepped forward as though to approach her, but then sighed and halted. “I went to your father that morning and asked for your hand so you wouldn’t be estranged after an elopement. He knew everything. That we had been meeting. That we had been intimate. How else could he have known except from you?”
When she shook her head to deny the accusation, he held up a staying hand.
“Your father said you regretted your actions, withdrew your promises, and came to him for forgiveness, frightened you would be saddled with a nobody. I wrote to you, demanding the truth. Finally, he took pity and purchased a commission on my behalf.”
The truth hit her with a gut punch. She struggled to breathe, her heart racing at the realization of the life stolen from them.
In a blink, Liam’s arms were around her, strong and warm.
His lips pressed to her scalp, his next words murmured against her hair. “You never spoke to him, did you? He never told you I came. You never knew. Oh, I am a fool. Young and gullible, I thought… Oh, never mind what I thought. Is it too late? Penelope, are we too late?”
She burrowed against his chest and wrapped her arms about his waist, not wanting to lose another minute with the man she loved. “It’s never too late to reclaim our lives.”
Persephone
The lattice of the casement window segmented the amber world outside into the yellows and reds of autumn.
“It’s done.” Her father’s voice, firm and controlled, threatened to discompose her. “The contract is signed.
Chin quivering, Sofie pursed her lips to save her dignity. She would not give
him the satisfaction of seeing her cry.
“I should thank you,” she whispered, commanding her voice not to shake. “Never again can you lord over me.”
Tearing her gaze from the window, she met his hard eyes, curtsied, and left.
The haven of her room had been divested of her belongings. They had packed away her life. A final, lingering look was all she gave.
In the foyer waited her mother, the one person Sofie had hoped would fight on her behalf against an arranged marriage to a stranger.
“This is for the best, dear,” Mother said instead in her sweet soprano. “Sir Nathaniel is to be elected Lord Mayor of London. It’s a good match.”
Sofie bowed her head and stared at her hands, willing them, too, not to shake. “Yes, I can see how beneficial it would be for Father.”
She was nothing more than a bartering chip in the politics of men.
An hour later, she was tucked in a hired carriage with her maid. They headed south to meet her betrothed at an inn halfway to London. Once officially acquainted, she and the baronet would proceed together for the wedding and his election.
The carriage bumped along, lulling her maid into a deep slumber but jarring Sofie out of her protective shell. The heel of her palm wiped tears from her cold cheeks.
Three tiring days later, the carriage was within an afternoon’s distance of the inn. The one where she would meet her prescribed life’s mate. If only she could meet another man, her perfect man, and elope out from under the villain who had arranged a wife of good family for political gain.
A light drizzle pattered against the carriage window, blurring the scenery. Sofie had never traveled farther south than Durham. Would London be so very different? Was it truly the mouth of hell? She shuddered. Sinking into the collar of her pelisse and wrapping her arms about her, she leaned her forehead against the window and closed her eyes.
A jolt woke her. Darkness shrouded the carriage. Rain pounded.
Were they far from their destination? Her maid’s face pressed against the window in search of salvation.
In a fractured moment, the carriage swayed, tossing Sofie on her side. The world slid, shook, tilted. A scream pierced the storm, ending with a thud as her maid was flung against the carriage wall. The vehicle toppled to the ground and slid across mud. Sofie clung to the leather strap, her body prone on the side of the coach, her face staring up at the door.
A Dash of Romance (Romantic Encounters: An Anthology Book 1) Page 20
