She finally moved back up the bed to lie beside him and liked the way he embraced her in his powerful arms. It felt a safe place to be and she closed her eyes and relaxed. She was all too aware of the rise and fall of his chest against her and her slow breathing matched his as the contented tiredness eventually washed over them to send them to sleep.
Seven
Madeline blinked her eyes open as the morning sun streamed through the open curtains onto her face. The fog of drowsiness slowly lifted and as it did the memories of the night before came in her mind. She looked around, but found that she was lying alone on the bed and wondered where Robert was. There was no clock in the room to tell her the time and she sat up.
“You need a shower,” she told herself as she rubbed her eyes.
She glanced at the string pull on the wall beside the bed, but was nervous about who would come to the door of the bedroom if she rang down. Moving to the edge of the mattress, she swung her legs to the floor and was all too aware of her nakedness. The thought of putting her wedding dress back on didn’t exactly appeal, but she wanted to go back along to the room she first used when she arrived at the mansion. She couldn’t exactly walk along the hallway in the nude and got to her feet to walk to Robert’s wardrobe. A quick search found her a robe. It was way too big for her, but she put it on and went to pick up her wedding dress and underwear.
Moving to the door, she cracked it open and looked outside. All seemed quiet, so she stepped out to the hallway and walked along it. When she got to the door of what had been her room for one night, she opened it and walked inside. She immediately moved to yank the string pull and was sure it would bring Gillian upstairs. Madeline saw she was right when a knock on the door was followed by the servant girl walking inside.
“Good morning Miss,” she said.
“I need a shower,” Madeline told her straight away. “Can you switch it on for me please?”
Gillian nodded her head and walked to the bathroom. The sound of the running water started and Madeline followed inside. She waited until she was alone before casting off the robe and getting in the shower. The warm jets of water washed away the stickiness from her body and she spent some time under them even when she was finished washing herself. She eventually got out and covered herself with a towel before returning to the bedroom.
“Have you seen Mr. Cortege this morning?” she asked.
“He left for work at around eight like he always does,” Gillian replied.
“No honeymoon for me then,” Madeline let out under her breath as she walked to the wardrobe to pick out some clothes and underwear.
She was still self conscious about being naked around another woman, but guessed that she might as well just get used to it and dropped the towel to get dressed.
“What time does he usually come back in the evening?” Madeline went on.
“Most days it is sometime between five and six o’clock,” Gillian told her. “Oh…, and while I remember, a telegram came for you this morning.”
She reached in a pocket at the front of her uniform and brought out a piece of paper.
“What is it?” Madeline asked and frowned.
“We’re not allowed to look,” Gillian replied. “And I wouldn’t dream of doing so anyway. It’s your private correspondence.”
Madeline wondered if someone was sending her congratulations on her marriage as she stepped across the room and took the telegram. She opened it and the blood drained from her face as she read the brief message.
“Are you OK?” Gillian asked.
Madeline moved over to the bed and sat down as she stared at the words on the paper to keep reading them over and again. She only looked up when Gillian repeated her question.
“It’s my mother,” she said in a shaky voice. “She’s been ill for a while, but apparently her condition has worsened in the last couple of days. I feel so guilty for leaving her.”
She put her head in her hands and let out a sigh.
“What are you going to do?” Gillian asked.
Madeline remained bent forward with her head in her hands as she considered her options. She wanted to be the dutiful wife for her new husband and running home to her parents the day after their wedding didn’t exactly fit in with that. The minor infraction of refusing to suck his fingers clean during sex got her a hard spanking and went some way to reveal Robert’s dominant nature. That didn’t bode well for her walking out on him, even if there was a good excuse for it, and she wondered what his reaction would be to her asking to go home.
On the other hand, she remembered standing on the platform of a train station only a couple of days before and promising her father that she would come back if he needed her. It already appeared as if he did. She didn’t want to let him down and was also worried about her mother. That left her with a dilemma and she let out another sigh as she raised her head and looked at Gillian.
“I don’t know,” she answered the question the servant girl posed.
Whatever she was going to do, the one thing she was certain of was that she needed to talk to her husband. She didn’t want her marriage to disintegrate the day after it started and she needed to just tell him the problem and hope he would understand her need to help take care of her mother.
“I need to see my husband,” she said. “Can you take me to where he works?”
“Of course,” Gillian said. “I’ll just go and get my coat and let the head butler know what I’m doing.”
Madeline nodded her head. She stood when she was alone and paced back and forth across the room before going to the wardrobe to get her shoes and a coat. She wondered if her leaving was the cause of the deterioration in her mother’s condition and it brought out her guilt even more. Gillian returned in a matter of minutes to lead the way down the stairs and outside to the front of the property.
“Mr. Cortege keeps the carriage with him during the days,” the servant girl said. “It means we’ll need to walk to town.”
“That’s OK,” Madeline replied.
Having a personal carriage was a new experience for her and she was more used to walking anyway. It was how she got around in her home town, so it didn’t bother her that she needed to do it. She urged Gillian to hurry and they made their way down to the gate then out to the street beyond. Her mind remained on her sick mother as they made their way towards the gold depository building, but her nerves began to rise at the prospect of how Robert would react to what she was about to tell him. The streets became busier as they got closer to the center of town and it slowed their progress.
“Are we nearly there?” Madeline eventually asked.
“Yes,” Gillian replied. “We just need to get to the end of this street and turn left.”
Madeline saw the building as soon as they walked around the corner. The burly guards standing at the door were a clear indication of the security and she moved in front of Gillian to make her way towards them. She was stopped as she approached.
“I’m here to see my husband,” she told the guards.
“Mr. Cortege?” one of the men asked.
It was obvious he knew of her and she nodded her head. The guards stood aside to let her walk through the door and she looked around a magnificent reception area. It was beautifully decorated with the obvious intention of impressing customers, but the heavy steel gates that guarded the way further into the building was another sign of the security of the place. She and Gillian walked up to the smiling woman at the reception desk.
“I need to see Mr. Cortege straight away,” Madeline started.
“Is it in relation to your account with us?”
Madeline guessed the woman wasn’t aware of who she was in the way the guard had been.
“No,” she said. “I’m his wife and I need to talk to him.”
“Oh…,” the woman said and the surprise came through in her voice. “If you just hold on a second Mrs. Cortege, I’ll take you through to his office.”
Madeline watched as the w
oman stepped through a door behind the reception desk. It was the first time anyone called her by her new surname and it sounded a little strange to her ears. Mrs. Cortege was who she was now though and she liked that fact. She shrugged the thought aside though as the concerns returned to her mind. Robert may well refuse to let her go back to her parent’s home and she didn’t know what she would do if that situation arose.
“Just wait and see,” she told herself under her breath, but her nerves grew as she waited.
The woman came back out of the room with a colleague, who took over the reception desk duties.
“Just follow me please Mrs. Cortege,” she said.
Madeline told Gillian to wait and followed the woman over to the steel gates. The guard next to them unlocked and opened them and they walked through. The decor in the inner area of the depository was more basic and comprised bare white walls and polished wooden floors. They walked to the end of a long, straight hallway then turned right.
“This is it,” the woman said as they got to a door.
Madeline saw her husband’s name on it and clenched her hands in tight fists. She consciously tried to relax, but the tension rose as the woman knocked. The shout to enter came and when the door was opened for her, she walked straight in. She almost cursed at the sight of Victoria sitting opposite Robert at his desk. It was the last thing she needed and she almost stopped in her tracks. She turned to look as the sound of the door closing caught her attention.
“Is everything alright Madeline?” Robert asked.
She brought her gaze back in front to look at him. She didn’t really want to say anything with Victoria there, but the manager of the gold depository showed no signs of getting to her feet or leaving the room.
“Madeline,” Robert said as he got to his feet.
“Umm…, I have a problem I need to discuss,” she said.
She hoped he would ask Victoria to leave, but he just stared across the room. It was obvious he was waiting for her to go on and there was nothing she could do but oblige.
“I’m sorry to interrupt you at work,” she started, “but I received a telegram from my father this morning.”
“Nothing serious I hope,” Victoria said.
She turned to stare across the room so her back was to Robert and Madeline stared at the nasty smile that only she could see. Victoria kept her voice pleasant sounding when she spoke, but her expression revealed the insincerity of her words.
The hair stood up at the back of Madeline’s neck as a mix of annoyance and hatred welled up, but she did her best to ignore Victoria and concentrate her attention on her husband.
“My mother has been ill for a few months now,” she told him. “But the message from my father says that she has taken a turn for the worse.”
She stepped across the room and handed the telegram to him. He read it and Madeline ploughed on when he looked up to get her request out before he could say anything.
“I feel kind of guilty about it,” she said. “And I promised my father that I would help him if he needed it, so…”
“You want to go home,” Robert finished her sentence.
Madeline screwed up her face as she spoke.
“Yes,” she replied.
“Oh that’s terrible news,” Victoria said. “Robert, you must let her go and help her family in this time of need.”
“Yes, of course,” he said. “Victoria is right.”
Madeline’s mouth almost dropped open at his immediate agreement. It left her speechless and she glanced at Victoria to see an unpleasant, fake smile she was getting used to. There was no doubt in her mind that the depository manager didn’t care about her or her family and was only interested in one thing. That was getting her out of the picture to leave Robert staying alone. Her mind went back to the insults that were thrown at her on her wedding day and her hatred for the woman she was looking at grew.
Something else that happened at the wedding flashed in her mind and she brought her gaze back to Robert. When she asked if there was anything more to his relationship with Victoria than business he brushed the question off without answering it. The sudden concern that maybe there was something he wasn’t telling her lit up in her mind and try as she might, she couldn’t shake it off.
“You really don’t mind that I go?” she asked him.
“Of course not,” he said. “I want you to be my wife, but that doesn’t mean getting in the way of you and your family. I’ll arrange for a train ticket so that you can travel home today.”
Madeline’s suspicions were raised further by how easily he was letting her go. She’d expected to be pleading with him to let her go home, but his agreement came without so much as a hint of a protest. He reached for a string pull just behind his desk and it was obvious that he was signaling for someone to come to his office. He walked across to the door and after opening it, stepped out to the hallway.
Victoria got to her feet and edged closer to Madeline.
“Don’t you worry about Robert when you’re gone now,” she hissed in a low voice to make sure it was only the two of them that could hear. “I’ll take care of him for you. I’ll look after him real good.”
The soft laugh that followed grated on Madeline’s nerves.
“You just…” she started, but was cut off.
“Take all the time you want,” Victoria went on. “In fact just do everyone a favor and don’t bother coming back at all. People don’t want you around here ruining Robert’s life.”
“That’s not true,” Madeline snapped back. “I am not…”
“Oh but it is,” Victoria interrupted again. “Robert doesn’t need a two bit whore like you around, when he has much better options. So like I say, I’ll take real good care of him and give him everything you can’t.”
Madeline wanted to slap the smile from Victoria’s face as her anger grew, but the sound of Robert’s voice stopped her doing or saying anything.
“OK, I’ve arranged to get a first class ticket for you on the next train out of town,” he said. “It leaves in thirty minutes, so you can take the carriage to get to the station.”
“I didn’t bring any clothes or other belongings to town,” she replied. “All I have is what I’m standing in.”
“I’ve sent my receptionist to the bank,” he went on. “She’ll get some money for you and also buy the ticket. Just meet her at the station and she’ll give them to you.”
The worry grew in Madeline’s mind that everything was happening too easily and that she was walking out on a marriage that might not be there when she came back. She debated what to do, but in the end knew there was really no choice. She needed to go and see if she could help her mother get better.
“Hurry now dear,” Victoria said. “You don’t want to miss your train.”
“Victoria is right,” Robert said. “If you miss this one there isn’t another until tomorrow.”
Madeline was all too aware of the smug smile on Victoria’s face and the urge came back to slap it away. Robert’s hand on her back led her to the door before she could do it and in truth she didn’t think she would have anyway. For now she needed to concern herself with her sick mother, but she stopped at the door and turned back.
“I’ll miss you,” she said and threw her arms around his neck.
“Send me a telegram to let me know what’s happening,” he told her.
“I will,” she agreed. “I’ll get back as soon as I can.”
She sank into the kiss that pressed on her lips and tears pricked at the corner of her eyes when she finally moved away. She glanced back before turning the corner of the hallway. Her last sight of her husband was of him in conversation with Victoria and she let out a quiet curse at the way the gold depository manager’s hand was on his shoulder.
“Is there something between them?” she questioned under her breath.
Robert’s reluctance to talk about it was a worry that maybe there was something more than business between them, but there was nothing
she could do about it. She told Gillian what was happening when she got back to the reception area then went to find the carriage. It took her to the train station, where she met the receptionist.
Thirty minutes after leaving Robert’s office, she was sitting in the first class carriage of a train heading home and wondering if it spelled the end of her marriage. That thought remained on her mind for the entire journey and when she got off at her destination she walked the short distance to her home.
Bent Over A Barrel Bundle: Western Cowboy Romance (Full Length Novels) Page 45
