“I do hope you will not be gone too often during the evenings and at night,” she said to joke with him in return.
“My duties do not restrict themselves to daylight.”
“I understand that.”
“But I shall be with you as often as I can.”
“When you are not busy with your young students, who will come to admire your teaching skills as much as I do.”
His shoulders squared with pride. “I did not know that.”
“How you could you not—?” She bit back the rest of her retort. He had worked so hard to make this deception seem real that she must not do anything to betray the truth. “Now you do know.”
“Yes. I will keep teaching in the village, but once we wed, I shall bring my few books from the parsonage to here.”
“Here?” she asked, astonished.
“Just until a new cottage is built. As generous as Lord Bannatyne is reputed to be, I have no doubts that he will arrange for a lovely home for his sister-in-law and her husband. A very fine house that will be of the quality the daughter of a baron would expect.” His gaze grew distant. “A very, very fine house.” He looked at her again and smiled. “We can reside there even after I am granted the living, for the parsonage is intolerably small. It worked well for a bachelor vicar, but not for a vicar and his wife.” He kissed her hands again, then released them. “I must go now and ask Mr. Hallett to prepare the banns to be read for us. I do not want to wait any longer than we must to wed.”
“My sisters—”
“Will surely change their plans to be here in time to help you prepare all that needs to be done to celebrate our wedding.” He grinned. “And do let Lord Bannatyne know that I will finish the work I began in the library. I will not abandon it half-done.” He scurried out of the breakfast-parlor.
Sian frowned at the chair where he had sat. Arthyn had seemed more excited about the possibility of a new, larger cottage and the connection to Gideon than he had to have her as his wife. If he had acted that way because he believed that was how a poor curate would react to the late Lord Nethercott’s youngest daughter’s consent to his proposal, she must try to accept that. Becoming accustomed to the dichotomy of his life would be difficult, but the rewards, as she had learned last night, would be wonderful.
The door to the kitchen opened, and a maid emerged to collect the dirty dishes. Sian gave her a smile but said nothing as the maid went back through the door, closing it after her.
Rising, Sian went to look at the stormy morning. Her bright spirits seemed to be down-pinned instead of more jubilant. That made no sense. She had told the man whom she loved that she wanted to be his wife. Everything should be perfect.
So why didn’t it feel that way?
Something moved behind her, its reflection in the glass catching her eye. She turned, clasping her hands, as she watched the ghost from Nethercott Castle begin to emerge from wherever it was when she could not see it.
It no longer seemed strange that the ghost had no face. She had come to recognize that either he could not—or chose not to—form an expression. Just as she had learned that the ghost never came to her unless there was something he needed to say or to discover. His curiosity was as powerful as her own.
“You have been changed, daughter of Nethercott Castle,” the ghost said without the pleasantry of a greeting.
“Why do you say that?”
“It is obvious. There is a bounce in your step that was not present before, and I cannot mistake the joy I have seen in your smile this morning.”
She did not hesitate. For all she knew, the ghost had witnessed her accepting Arthyn’s proposal. “I am to be married.”
“With no qualms this time?”
“None at all.”
“That is good.”
“Yes, very good.” Her smile returned, but wavered when she remembered saying much the same words to Constantine. She must tell him about the betrothal before he heard it from someone else. But she had no idea where he and Lord Pitchford were to meet. The marquess’s house? Possibly, but it could be many other places as they planned their next move against the wreckers.
“I wish you great happiness.”
“I believe I will be very happy as Arthyn’s wife.”
“Arthyn? Arthyn Trembeth?” The ghost shook his nebulous head, then flickered and began to recoil back into the world of spirits. He said something more, but she could not understand any words.
“What?” she called after it. “What did you say?”
The ghost was gone.
She gripped the back of a nearby chair. Even without being able to see the ghost’s expression, she had seen his form grow taut. The ghost had not been pleased with her announcement. No, that was not right. The ghost had been pleased until she spoke Arthyn’s name.
“Even the ghost doesn’t know the whole truth,” she said aloud. Was she trying to convince herself as well as the ghost? She had not made a mistake this time. She had agreed to marry Arthyn because she loved him! Not as the mild-hearted curate, but as the fiery Wraith who had awakened her every sense. Her hope that he would share that secret with her now that they were betrothed had not yet come to fruition, but it would.
Wouldn’t it?
* * * *
At a knock on his bedchamber door, Constantine watched Peters go to the door. He hoped it was only a maid bringing fresh linens. He was desperate to read the reports from the Home Office that Pitchford had given him. It did not matter. He could not concentrate on them when his mind was filled with images of Sian.
Sian smiling, Sian laughing, Sian filled with joy. . .Sian ashen and frightened.
Blast and thunder! He had been a selfish lout to allow her into his life. Worse, he had involved her in his work. He should have kept his mouth shut from the first moment he saw her walking along the cliffs. He had worried—justifiably, he had learned, as days passed—that she would let her heart’s desire to give her sister a wondrous gift compel her to make more forays along the shore where the wreckers lurked.
“Who was it, Peters?” he asked when the gangly valet closed the door and crossed the brightly patterned rug half-hidden beneath the mahogany tester bed and cupboard.
“A note, my lord.”
Taking it, Constantine read it quickly. Sian requested a few minutes of his time before dinner tonight and asked him to meet her in the solar. For a minute, he considered seeking her out immediately, because she must not have realized that he had returned from St. Gundred. He folded it and set it on the floor beside his chair.
He picked up other pages and began reading. At first, the report was similar to others he had received, but the third page contradicted everything on the first two. Those two pages had outlined what he needed to do in the coming weeks. The third page insisted he come to London immediately. Holding the pages side-by-side, he examined them. The handwriting was similar, but not exactly the same. Had someone inserted this page after removing an original one?
He could ask Pitchford’s opinion, but it would be a waste of time. The only thing the colonel had wanted to talk about this morning had been that, with Gillis’s death, Constantine’s work in the parish was done. When Constantine argued that the wreckers had already begun to reorganize, Pitchford told him he was wrong.
“I have heard them speaking of their next attempts to lure a ship onto the rocks,” Constantine had said that morning, wondering why the colonel had taken this stance.
“Talking about a task and being able to accomplish it are two very different things, as you well know, Con.” He had picked up his glass of brandy and swirled it to catch the firelight from his hearth. “You have let yourself become too caught up in capturing the wreckers’ leaders. Now one of them is dead, and the other must be in hiding, fearing for his own skin. Why can’t you see that you have succeeded?”
“I have done nothing.”
“Who knows? Your presence here might have panicked some of the wreckers and led to Gillis’s death.”
>
“Wreckers do not panic easily.”
Pitchford laughed. “Every man panics when faced with the gallows.” He tilted back his glass and drank what remained in it, then grimaced. “I am tired of these poor vintages.”
“I can have some better bottles sent down from London.”
“I would appreciate it. Until I can get my own affairs in order and stop my children from raiding my accounts, I must be dependent upon your generosity. I will miss you, Con. Not only have you been more loyal to me than my own children—who think only of my money—you brought some excitement into my otherwise boring existence here at the end of the world. Despite that, I do believe you should return to London and report to the Home Office.”
“Are you making that an order, sir?”
“If I must, Con.” Pitchford had set his glass on the table beside his chair. “You came here to put the wreckers to flight, and you have done that. Even though I will miss your company—and the company of Miss Nethercott—you need to think about your future. Your talents can be put to better use elsewhere. So, if you wish it to be an order, it is. Go to the Home Office and discover what they want you to do next.”
Constantine had not tried to change the colonel’s mind because it was obvious nothing would budge him. When the colonel had given him these pages as Constantine was leaving, he had told Constantine to read them and learn why Pitchford was insistent.
Had the third page been inserted by someone in the Home Office after his most recent reports arrived? The news of Gillis’s death and the chaos among the wreckers could have changed Lord Sidmouth’s opinion that was expressed in the first two pages. But even though this was possible, Constantine’s instincts said there was something not quite right, but the only way to find out exactly what was wrong meant going up to London and asking in person.
Another knock came at the door. This time, after folding the pages and putting them atop Sian’s note on the floor, he waved Peters aside and went to the door himself. Maybe an interruption would put a halt to the endless circles of his thoughts. Could Pitchford be right? Was he so obsessed with putting a complete end to the wreckers that he could not see the partial victory right in front of him?
“Trembeth!” He had not expected to find the curate on the other side of the door.
“I am sorry to disturb you, but I saw you return a short time ago, and I wanted to speak with you.” Trembeth looked past him to the valet. “Privately.”
Motioning for Peters to leave, Constantine opened the door and stepped aside to let Trembeth enter and the valet leave. He closed the door and asked the curate to sit on the windowseat. Trembeth complied, but could not hide his agitation.
As soon as Constantine was once more in his chair, the curate blurted, “Lastingham, I thought you should be the first to know that Miss Nethercott has accepted my proposal.”
Only years of training to conceal his emotions kept Constantine from choking out a shocked, “What? Why would she do something so want-witted?” Instead he asked in a tone that suggested he was barely interested in the topic, “What caused this change of mind in her? She was adamant she wanted the full fortnight to consider your suit and obtain her sisters’ blessing.”
“Do you think me a fool to ask such a question when she has given me the answer I wished for?”
Yes, you are the greatest beef-head I have ever met, refusing to see how you are wasting your students’ time with lessons they will never use. “Then I suppose congratulations are due.”
As if Constantine had not spoken, Trembeth stood and began to pace from the cupboard to the window and back, saying, “Maybe I should have asked what brought about her change of mind. I had come to believe in the past day or two that she would not give me the answer I hoped for. She seemed distant and preoccupied and, if I were a betting man, I would have wagered she was trying to avoid sharing my company. But this morning, she eagerly said yes, telling me how she admired me and what I was doing for St. Gundred. I had not guessed she had so much respect for my abilities as a teacher.”
Constantine could not silence a choked gasp, but hastily pretended he had coughed by faking another. Trembeth was not the greatest beef-head he had ever met. Constantine Lassiter was.
What a fun game he had thought it was to flirt with Sian as Wraith! It had become a counterpoint to the risks he took with spying on the wreckers. And he had been thrilled from the moment he first encountered Sian while wearing his guise. He had been able to kiss her that night as propriety had forbidden in London, then he had continued the game right through last night in the cave when he granted free rein to his passion for her, a passion that had come to life that first day they met in Town and she had joined him in his subterfuge. He had not spoken the truth of who hid behind Wraith’s mask, because he had been certain that she knew. He thought she had understood why, when he did not wear the domino, he resisted kissing her each time he had the opportunity, why he had fought the yearning that had grown between them, why he regretted the time they had lost and now wanted to savor. He had seen the sparkle in her eyes when she spoke to him of Wraith, and he had believed that glint came from a secret they both shared.
But the joke was on him. She had not known. She had believed that meek and silly Arthyn Trembeth was the alter ego behind which Wraith hid. And, in many ways, he could understand how she had come to that conclusion. What better way to obscure the truth than with a persona that was the opposite of Wraith in every way, save for height? Even the colonel had questioned if Trembeth was involved with the wreckers. Constantine should have been honest with both him and Sian.
“Thank you, Lastingham. I am relieved you do not intend to be an addle-plot in this matter.”
Constantine said something. He was not sure what, but it was enough so the curate took his leave with a smile.
As he sat there and stared at the falling rain, he recalled how Sian had lambasted him for being interested in only the vapid, innocuous young misses who would happily marry him to share his title. He had let her believe that, because she had described what, until he met her, he had considered the perfect woman. Such a woman would be no obstacle for the work he loved. Showering such a wife with gifts would placate her while he continued to serve Regent and King. But everything had changed when he met Sian and wanted her because she would never be satisfied with only a portion of her husband. She would want all of him and give all of herself in return.
The perfect woman for him, if he had room in his life for a wife, and she had agreed to marry a man who was not what she believed him to be. How could he let her wed Trembeth while under such delusions?
Constantine pushed himself out of his chair and, after calling quick orders to Peters in the dressing room, strode from his bedchamber. He went to the solar and waited, his hands locked behind his back in the pose he found best when facing a distasteful confrontation.
When Sian walked in, he lost himself for a moment in the beautiful sensuality of her smile and beguiling curves that were only hinted at beneath her gown and paint-splattered apron. The artistry of her fingers had brought him ecstasy last night, and he wanted her even more now.
“You sent for me, Constantine? To tell me that you are leaving Bannatyne Hall?” She sat and focused her scintillating smile on him. “I will miss you, but I know you must go where your work demands.”
“How did you know that I was contemplating leaving?”
“By the time someone finishes a sentence in the village, it is being repeated here.” She laughed, and he fought his own hands that wanted to gather her to him. “Or it may be that, in spite of your efforts to conceal the truth, everyone knew why you were here and realized that with Gillis’s death, the wreckers would not be a threat for a long time.”
“They are already making plans.”
“Which you will return to thwart if they ever get to the point where they are ready to put them into action.”
He shook his head. Why did she have to sound like Pitchford? Their concurrence
made him question his own opinion, for he respected their clear insight. It was possible he had become too enmeshed in the hunt to see the fox had been exterminated.
“Congratulations, Constantine,” she continued. “I never had any doubts that you would achieve what you set out to.”
“I hear the felicitations are due to you.”
Her smile wavered. “Rumors travel quickly through Bannatyne Hall, too, I see.”
“Is it a rumor you are going to wed Trembeth?” He tried to calm his abruptly hopeful heart, but it refused to heed him, thumping like cannon fire.
“No.”
That fist in the gut sensation almost brought him to his knees. How ironic! Trembeth had been the one on his knees, or on one knee at the very least.
Constantine sat beside her before he tumbled onto his face. “Is this why you wanted to speak with me before dinner?”
“Yes.” She lowered her eyes. What was she hiding? “I would have told you sooner, but I must have missed your return to the Hall. I was busy writing to my sisters to let them know the good tidings.”
“Are you sure they are good?”
“What do you mean?” All expression disappeared from her face, a sign, he had learned, that he had come close to something that unsettled her.
“Trembeth cannot say boo to a goose. He is timid, but anyone looking at him can tell he is hiding something.”
She flinched, and he told himself to pick his words with more care. She believed Trembeth was Wraith.
“You do not really know him, Constantine. He is a man dedicated to helping St. Gundred. He has a fire in his spirit that he keeps banked.”
“Are you sure of that?” If he restated that question enough times, maybe she would start to ask it herself.
“Such fervor can be intimidating. He wants to bring the people to him so he can help them. If he showed the real man he is, some might be overmastered and not wait to heed what he has to say.” She grasped his hands. “I know you understand because your work is more important to you than anything else.”
Sea Wraith Page 21
