Tears ran down her face as she straddled the windowsill, one leg inside the room and one out, uncertain what to do. If she were to leave, her life would resume and perhaps she would one day find happiness.
Yet, if she were to remain, would she be able to find a way to help the man? She had kissed Edward, not Don Ricardo, and that same flutter inside her had returned. Could he be the man for whom she had wished? He had said he had no feelings for her, but somehow she did not believe him.
Her emotions overwhelmed her, and she remained in that window for some time, uncertain which way to go, both for her heart and for her future.
Chapter Nineteen
Edward dreamed a dream so horrible, he could feel and taste it. In the dream, he had been tied to a stake in the middle of an open field. Annabel walked toward him, a torch in her hand. Although she appeared sad, she also had a determination in her stride as she narrowed the distance between them.
“Annabel,” he said as panic rose inside him, “there is no need to do this! I am not the horrible man you believe me to be!”
With a dismissive click of her tongue, she stopped before him. Her face was devoid of any emotion as she leaned forward and touched the flame to the kindling around his feet. The small sticks caught quickly, and soon a steady fire surrounded him. Thick smoke filled his nostrils and caused his eyes to water, and Edward found breathing difficult.
“Annabel!” he managed to choke.
“This is nothing more than you deserve for what you have done to me,” the woman said, her voice devoid of emotion.
He coughed and hacked, doing everything in his power to clear his lungs of the acrid smoke. “Please!” he said, gasping. “I meant no harm! Please, believe me!”
With a cackle, she threw the torch onto the already roaring fire.
His eyes flew open, and for a moment he wondered where he was. He lay on the sofa in the sitting room of the cottage, but the room was filled with smoke.
The cottage has caught fire! he thought as he pushed the blanket off himself. He jumped from the sofa and immediately wished he had not. His head pounded from the amount of drink he had consumed the night before, and he dropped to the sofa and placed his head in his hands. Rubbing his eyes to take away the stinging caused by the smoke, another thought came to mind causing his heart to freeze.
“Annabel!” he cried, waving his hand to clear the smoke. He once again rose from the sofa, ignoring the ache of his head, and coughed when smoke entered his lungs.
Annabel appeared before him, waving a towel in the air. “I am sorry!” she said, coughing as she flicked the towel once again. “I attempted to start the fire in the cookstove, but I am afraid it did not go according to plan.” She covered her mouth and let out another hacking cough before waving the towel again.
He rushed to the window, threw it open, and then grabbed the towel out of her hand. “Give me that. All you are doing is moving the smoke from one corner of the room to another.” Walking over to the cookstove, he groaned. The flue was closed tight and he opened it. “We need fresh air to clean our lungs, and the cottage.” Without waiting for a response, he grabbed her arm and pulled her through the front door, which he left wide open behind them. Once outside, he placed his hands on his knees and drew in heavy gasps of air.
Annabel also stood hunched over, hands on her knees, spluttering and coughing. Edward turned to her. His plan had been to admonish her; however, as he took in her disheveled look and the smoke that poured from the open doorway, for the first time in a very long time, he laughed. In fact, he laughed so hard that tears ran down his face.
“Are you laughing at me for starting a fire?” she demanded, the hurt in her tone evident.
“No,” he managed to say with a shake to his head. “It is your face that makes me laugh.” She was covered in soot, and tiny strands of hair fluttered around her face from under the kerchief she wore.
“Did I burn it? Please, what is wrong with it? It does not feel as if I burned myself.” She moved her hands around her face, tapping various places gingerly with fingers as soot stained as the dress she wore.
This only made him laugh all the more, and soon he was lying on the ground, clutching his stomach. “No, you did not burn yourself. It is darkened by smoke, and it looks as if you have rolled around in a coal bin!”
She gasped and hurried over to a window. “How horrible!” she cried. “If anyone were to see me…” She pulled the kerchief from her head and wiped at her cheeks.
Rising from the ground, Edward allowed his laughter to die down. Even seeing her in the soot-covered burlap dress, his heart ached with longing for her. For a moment, he soaked in her beauty, her innocence. “Why were you working the stove?” he asked. “I assume you have not worked one before.”
She hung her head. “I thought that if I was to remain…” She paused. “Or rather, since I am here, perhaps I should keep house. I put away the bottles from last night and then thought it would be nice if I prepared breakfast for us. I am sorry.”
“There is no need to apologize,” he said, taking the kerchief from her and swiping at her cheeks, which only smeared the soot. “I think it is quite becoming.”
She gave him an incredulous look. “You find me wearing soot becoming?”
This made him laugh. “No. I find the fact you would try to do something you have never done before admirable. Few people are willing to attempt something for the first time, to leave the comfort of familiarity, and yet you were willing to make that attempt.”
Her pleased blush, or what he could see if it, was a wonderful reward for his compliment. “I thank you for saying so. I suppose starting a fire in the stove is best left to those who know what they are doing.”
“I can teach you if you would like,” he said. “You never know when you will be required to do the like again.”
“Would you?”
Her innocent pleading awakened him, and he pushed back the desire that rose. Annabel was not some random woman he could devour. Not that he had been so crass in the past, but the need to protect this woman was strong. Even if he had to protect her from himself.
“Come, we will open all the windows and air out the house.” He wiped away another smudge of soot from her forehead. “Then I will bring in the bathtub and the screen so you may take a bath.”
She swallowed visibly. “A bath? And where will we set up this bathtub?”
He chuckled. “In the sitting room in front of the fire, of course. However, you have no reason to worry, for I will keep my distance the entire time. The screen is a very functional source in giving privacy.”
“I know what a screen is,” she snapped. Then she sighed. “My apologies. I believe your suggestion is reasonable.”
He smiled down at her. The forlorn look on her face tugged at his heart. She had wanted to be a part of the goings on in the cottage. Few ladies of the ton would have even considered attempting to cook.
Miss Annabel Lambert was certainly not like most ladies he had ever known. And knowing that somehow only made her more endearing.
***
It took the better part of an hour to remove the smoke from the house. Even the bedroom retained the smell of coal, and Annabel insisted that the bedding be washed as well as her dresses.
“It is nice enough to hang everything outside, and I can use the bathtub to do the washing.” She had never washed even one article of clothing—well, nothing more than a handkerchief in the bowl in her room, that is—but she was determined to do what she could to ease some of the burden placed on Edward.
“The water is ready,” Edward called from the sitting room. He had shown her how to properly start a fire in the cookstove—who knew what all those tiny parts did!—and he filled two large pots with water and placed them on the heated stove. With the warm weather, the cottage was soon too warm, but once she removed the soot-covered clothing and submerged herself into the bathtub, she was happy for the warmth.
The doors and windows were still
open and a cool breeze wafted through as she worked the soap into a lather. It took three washings before her hair was clean once again, but once it was done, she felt much better.
“I hope you do not plan to dirty that water too much,” Edward called from the other side of the screen. “I am hoping for a bath myself.”
“Then you may want to put on more water,” Annabel called back. “I am afraid that this water will be of no use for a bath, nor will I be able to use it for washing.”
The sound of Edward heaving one of the pots onto the stove told her that he had already thought of this. She hoped he did not make an attempt to peek into the tiny opening left between the screen and the fireplace, but whenever he walked past—she could see him for a brief moment—he not once looked her way, and she made a point of watching whenever she heard him passing. It would not do for him to take advantage of her current state! Juliet had said often that men were more animal than man, especially when it came to women.
“Would you like me to scrub your back?”
Annabel gasped. He would not dare! “Absolutely not!” she said, water splashing over the sides of the tub as she shifted to cover herself as a precaution against any attempt he might make to come around the screen.
He laughed. “Do not worry. I made a promise not to look, and I will keep that promise.”
It took a moment to realize he was teasing her, and she sighed with relief. “Well, I appreciate the offer, but I believe I can wash myself without any assistance.”
“Do not say I did not offer to help,” he said, the teasing now clear in his voice.
She giggled. How strange it was to have him teasing her in such a manner! One would believe they were somehow promised to one another. Or married. The idea was suddenly appealing. Yet, no, he did not have an interest in her, not in that sense. When had she given into flights of fancy?
Stepping out of the tub, she grabbed a towel on a nearby stool and dried herself. She had allowed the dresses that had been hanging on the pegs in the bedroom time to air, and although they had a faint odor of smoke, they were much better than they had been earlier. Unfortunately, the dress she had worn when she had left Scarlett Hall was ruined. She could not wash out the soot that covered it, and without the skills to know how to treat the fabric, the end result was a muted semblance of what it once was.
“I feel much better,” she said with a sigh as she came around the screen only to find Edward bereft of his shirt as he gathered other clothing together.
He turned and gave her a sheepish grin, and she spun on her heel, her cheeks aflame. Why had he not warned her!
“I believe I will go outside and see to the clothes,” she said without looking at him, although she found she wanted to do just that.
“Good,” he replied. “That will give me a chance to haul out the water you used and replace it with clean. I imagine you left it quite dirty.”
She turned to give him a scathing glare only to be reminded of his state of undress. With a screech, she turned her back on him again, which only made him laugh.
“It makes no difference to me if you happen to see me without a shirt,” he said, clear amusement in his voice.
She gave him a sniff. “Be that as it may, I imagine you were brought up with better training than that.”
“I suppose I was at that,” he replied, still chuckling. “However, if I am to bathe, and because you do not wish to be in my company while I undress, perhaps you should be off to see to the laundry.”
Taking her time with the clothes that hung from a line that went from the cottage to a nearby tree, she waited as he pulled the tub out the door, emptied it into a side garden, and returned with the empty tub. Giving him what she hoped was more than enough time to be safely ensconced behind the screen, she went to the door and called, “May I come in?”
“Of course,” he replied.
With a quick glance to ascertain that he was indeed out of sight, she entered the cottage and sat on the sofa.
“Would you like to come and wash my back?” he asked.
Would the man not stop teasing her? “I believe you are quite capable of seeing to your own washing,” she said with a sniff. “I imagine you have been doing so on your own for quite some time.”
“I suppose I can,” he said with an exaggerated sigh.
An awkward silence fell between them, the only sound the splashing of water as Edward bathed himself. Annabel had to fight the images that bounded of him in the bath as he washed himself, and at one point she thought of peeking around the side of the screen. She had never seen a man without clothing. Well, none except the indecent statues represented in books about Ancient Greece. The people of that era were certainly an indecent lot!
Annabel shook her head. She had to do something to keep her mind from such thoughts. "I am pleased that we were able to speak of our pasts last evening. I appreciate you sharing with me.”
He snorted. “I was drunk. Take anything I said with a pinch of salt.”
“Drunk or not, you shared information that was close to your heart, and I was pleased you could unburden yourself.”
Rather than replying, Edward sighed. He did not respond, and Annabel suspected he was embarrassed he had shared so much with her. It was not her intention to make him feel so, and therefore she changed the subject.
“If you would like, I will attempt dinner this evening. Although, I have no idea what I will cook.”
“No, no,” Edward shouted, a loud splash punctuating his words. “I will see to the food.”
She giggled. “But how will I learn anything if you do not allow me to at least help.”
The towel that hung over the top of the screen disappeared, and she almost laughed. He had jumped out of the bath to stop her from attempting to cook. The truth was, she had no intention of touching the cookstove until she had used it at least three times under his ready supervision. However, she was not about to tell him so.
“I have a better idea,” he said, coming around the screen in nothing more than his breeches—no shoes, no stockings, no shirt—as he toweled his hair dry. “I will make meat pies tonight. If you would like, I will show you how to prepare them.”
She smiled. “I would like that.”
It was strange, but the idea of learning to do for herself was appealing, but to be domesticated by a man such as Edward only sweetened the idea all the more.
Chapter Twenty
Lord William Agar waited patiently in the study ready to conduct business with Lord Silas Lambert. Although he had thought he would need more time to secure the money Lambert expected, William was able to collect a majority of the funds without leaving Rumsbury. The remainder would require minimal travel and would be available to him in less than thirty days.
Running his fingers through his silver hair, his mind drifted to Miss Annabel, the bride he would purchase this day. She was an innocent, a woman full of life. She would be a prized possession that he could show off to his peers. They would do everything they could to hide the shock when they laid eyes on the beautiful creature on his arm, the woman who would be his wife and who would soon carry his child. His heir.
Miss Annabel had told him in no uncertain terms that she thought him much too old for him. She also said that she did not love him. Her words only enhanced her innocence, for she was exactly the type of wife he deserved. She would resist at first, of course, but it would not be long before she realized just how quickly any attempt of disobedience would be met with a swift hand.
“Ah, Agar,” Mr. Lambert said, interrupting William’s thoughts. “Forgive me for keeping you waiting. I did not expect to see you for some time, and I only returned myself yesterday to find my home in disarray.” He went to the chair behind his desk. Who did this man think he was? A king on his throne?
William pushed away the agitation. Silas Lambert was an imbecile and did not realize it, so he could not be blamed for the slight of not at least sitting in a chair beside William. If he did not lose his t
emper, William would leave today with exactly what he wanted. The man’s lovely daughter as his intended.
They had conducted many business transactions over the years, but this had to be the most valuable transaction yet, at least to William. For the money he was willing to pay was much like acquiring a priceless work of art. It had no monetary value—no shopkeeper would take it in exchange for payment—but it held a great value to William.
“I was able to secure funds far quicker than I had anticipated,” William said. “In fact, I believe I shall have the remainder in just a few weeks.”
The man across from him set his jaw. So, he had not expected this. What had the man done behind William’s back?
He reached into his coat pocket and produced a bundle of notes. “I have brought a deposit of good faith.”
Mr. Lambert eyed the notes greedily, and his tongue traced his lips as he counted the money. “Excellent,” he said. “This is a generous deposit indeed, and it demonstrates your seriousness on purchasing my daughter’s hand in marriage.”
“You doubted me?” William made little attempt to hide his incredulity.
Mr. Lambert laughed. “Doubted? No. I know you have a true interest in Annabel, and I had little doubt you would find the necessary funds. I was a bit dubious about your financial situation, however.”
“And your finances are better?” William snapped. Mr. Lambert grinned, only increasing William’s ire, yet William forced calm into his tone. “Have you sold another painting perhaps? Or how about…”
Mr. Lambert raised a hand and William smiled. His words had hit a nerve, and he hoped it stung. He did not like this man, but he was a necessary means to an important end.
“I will have you know that great luck has come my way this past year. In fact, my wealth is such that my wife and I will be traveling to Paris soon.”
“Oh?” William asked. “And how soon will you be leaving?” The declaration was not all that exciting, for the Lamberts spent a great deal of time away from home. They could be gone a month or even six at any given time.
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