Was there any creature more tender-hearted than a small boy? And if that small boy had been Ashton Fenwick, he would have sensed the talk and the unkindness behind it.
“There’s always talk, Ashton. You can’t mind it.”
“You can’t ignore it if you’re a very young man at university, where scholarship comes a distant second to bothering tavern maids and learning to hold one’s liquor. I fell in with a bad lot. I knew better. I didn’t even like them. They were spoiled, mean, not too bright, and headed for trouble, but they allowed me to drink with them and invited me to their houses during the holidays.”
Matilda allowed Ashton to take her hand again. “You promised me a happy ending, Ashton.” To the story, at least. Not too much to ask.
“That I did. One of the party, a rotten little devil who’d been sent down from one school after another, took it into his head to anticipate the wedding vows with his fiancée, an earl’s daughter who lived on a neighboring estate. A kidnapping of sorts followed, and it became very clear to me that the lady was not receptive to her intended’s advances. I rode off to seek help, but my efforts were in vain. The young lady was grievously wronged, her sister badly injured. She broke off the engagement.”
An earl’s daughter? “As well she should have. I hope her family pressed charges.”
“You know they did not. She withdrew from society, her sister left the area, and public opinion was divided. Most engaged couples anticipate their vows, after all, and she and her sister ought not to have been out riding on their own land without a groom, according to some. That was utter tripe, according to our young man.”
The temper Ashton claimed to have mastered simmered below his words.
“One takes a groom for safety. Any horse can come up lame, or toss a rider in a bad moment.”
“So she rode with her sister, over familiar terrain, on her family’s land. The group that abetted this crime was a half-dozen drunken lordlings. A groom would not have prevented what happened and might have lost his life trying to. I blame myself for not realizing sooner that the outing would turn malicious. My need to be accepted by those young jackanapeses blinded me to common sense, and two young women paid a very high price.”
“What happened?” Because Matilda could not envision any happily ever afters following such a scandal, except for the violent, dishonorable, pig of a young man, of course. He’d probably found another fiancée with a larger dowry.
“When the young lady withdrew from society, I attached myself to her household and made sure her safety was never at risk again. She and her sister both met good men and have started families of their own.”
That was two happily ever afters—if the men were truly good. “And the rotten little devil?”
Ashton patted her hand. “A lovely, fatal accident befell him. Divine providence at its finest.”
Matilda sat in the lengthening shadows holding hands with a man and simply enjoying the contact. She ought not. She ought to pretend she’d never kissed Ashton Fenwick, hadn’t listened for his footsteps all day, and hadn’t tucked his laundered handkerchief into her clothes press, between her spare chemise and her only pair of silk stockings.
“Why are you telling me this, Mr. Fenwick?”
“Ashton. Because I want you to understand that I know how men can be. I know that a woman can find herself entangled in problems not of her own making. The law is a fine concept, but its enforcement is an unreliable undertaking, particularly when your neighbors, the Bow Street runners, are paid rewards for convictions rather than for thorough investigations.”
“And they have been known to manufacture evidence, intimidate witnesses, and mistreat the accused.” Every time Matilda saw a runner, the fear nearly choked her.
“Your hands are cold,” Ashton said. “Shall we go inside?”
Darkness was falling. Matilda stayed where she was. “I was not wronged by a fiancé, Ashton. I was married in a church, my family in attendance, and when I spoke my vows, I meant them.”
“That was the unkindest cut of all, I’m guessing. You meant them, your husband meant something else entirely. Is he truly dead?”
“Yes.”
“And is that wee lass in the park your daughter?”
Well, of course he’d think that. “She is not. If she were my daughter, I don’t know how I’d bear the separation, but she is not my daughter.”
He enveloped Matilda’s hand in both of his, his grip warm. He’d let her go if she withdrew her hand, though. Of that, Matilda was certain.
“You would die for that child, Matilda. If she’s not your daughter, who is she?”
Chapter Seven
“I prided myself on a modest competence solving mysteries and puzzles,” Hazelton said. “Fenwick bought a damned donkey, Maggie mine. What am I to make of that? A belted earl, and he sashays into Tatts, passes up the finest blood stock in the land, and buys an odoriferous little wretch he can have no possible use for.”
The Countess of Hazelton prowled around the billiards table and took Benjamin’s cue stick from him.
“You are too easy for me to best in this mood, my love. I suspect the greater puzzle is that Fenwick turned down membership in your club. Are you concerned or annoyed?”
In the few short years of their marriage, Benjamin had come to rely on Maggie’s judgment, though he was still surprised when her discernment made short work of his own moods.
“Both, I suppose. I belong to only the best clubs.”
Maggie kissed him. She was a voluptuous armful of redhead, and her kisses were the surest remedy for Benjamin’s foul humor.
“You belong to only the most expensive clubs. Fenwick is a Scot anticipating all the bother of a social Season. If he already belongs to a few clubs, why take on another?”
Maggie’s explanation was simple, and it fit the facts, but it did not fit Ashton Fenwick.
“Fenwick is not tight-fisted,” Benjamin said. “But he’s proud as hell. Are we finished for the evening?”
The hour was early by the standards of the upcoming Season. Some families would have just sat down to their evening meal. Benjamin’s household included two sons, the younger less than a year old. Maggie kept the schedule to country hours, though that would probably change once the social whirl began.
“Let’s go upstairs,” she said. “Fenwick has aroused your curiosity to the point that you’re pacing my carpets. You haven’t been this overset since your second-born had the audacity to waste six hours in the birth process.”
Benjamin settled his arms around his wife. Nothing in all of creation brought him as much pleasure as simply holding the woman he loved—well, almost nothing.
“Perhaps Fenwick has aroused my temper. A donkey, Maggie? What could he have been thinking? Every gentleman, horse, and groom at Tatts watched him leading that beast from the premises. And then there’s this business of avoiding the Albany until the last possible moment. Fenwick is putting up at some lodging house, while one of the finest apartments in London sits empty, and at a price that would buy many donkeys their freedom. He’s forbidden me to attempt any sort of surveillance.”
“Spying is ungentlemanly,” Maggie said in ironically prim tones.
“Also unladylike. What do you know that I don’t?”
Prior to his marriage, Benjamin had dealt with various delicate problems for the realm’s better families, and done so discreetly. He’d used logic, dogged persistence, audacity, and common sense to stop the occasional elopement, retrieve a purloined journal, or find missing valuables.
Maggie’s intuition eclipsed Benjamin’s pedestrian deductions by leaps and flights.
“Fenwick’s tiger is a young girl,” Maggie said. “When he first called upon you, I saw her walking his horse up and down the street. At one point, a braid came loose from beneath her cap. Boys can certainly have long hair, but the way she stuffed the braid back out of sight was feminine, a very young lady vexed by her coiffure.”
“This grows ala
rming,” Benjamin muttered, turning Maggie under his arm and escorting her to the door. “Fenwick asked me to research scandals that occurred between five and seven years ago. He was precise about the time and not about anything else.”
“Perhaps he’s already chosen somebody to wed, and she has a shadowed past.”
“Chosen somebody to wed in less than a week? Even Fenwick doesn’t work that quickly. I was hoping you’d review my journals with me.”
Maggie had been firmly on the shelf when Benjamin had married her. As the daughter of a duke, she’d seen many Seasons from a vantage Benjamin had not. A minor scandal might have escaped his notice. It would not have escaped hers.
“We were still at war then,” Maggie said as they wandered toward the stairs. “And the military has its share of scandals. Poor old Mad George was still nominally the sovereign, while Prinny engaged in unbridled foolishness.”
With Mad George’s death, the Regent—also named George—was on the throne, though he got little credit for what sense and wisdom he had.
“Fenwick said this scandal likely involved a woman, possibly a married woman.”
“He’s selected a bride, then, or the next thing to it. Better still, she’s from an appropriate strata of society.”
At the foot of the stairs, Benjamin stopped to regard his lady by the light of the sconces. “How can you know such a thing? Fenwick might be indulging idle curiosity, chasing down a rumor at his family’s request, or gathering intelligence on a business associate.”
Maggie started up the steps, counting off on her fingers. “First, he came to London to find a bride and only to find a bride. He’s not looking for investments, and his family doesn’t move in polite circles as their English counterparts might. Second, the scandal involves a lady, and Fenwick has a protective streak that rivals the North Sea for width and depth. Third, only ladies—proper, genteel, sheltered ladies—get involved in scandals. Laundresses, alewives, and fishmongers can do as they please. Fenwick might not even realize the extent to which his affections are engaged.”
“Some of us resist engaging our affections,” Benjamin said, opening the door to their apartment, “because we’re stubborn and foolish.”
“I wasn’t stubborn or foolish,” Maggie retorted, preceding him through the door. “I was cautious and slow to trust. We are married now, are we not?”
“The signal blessing of my otherwise dull and unremarkable existence,” Benjamin said. “You’ve given me an idea.”
“I do so love when you get ideas, Benjamin.”
“With you for an inspiration, my love, ideas are inevitable. This idea concerns Fenwick.”
“We ought to call him Kilkenney,” Maggie said, locking the sitting room door. “He should use the title when referring to himself.”
“I’ll take him with me to the next court levee. Once he’s been through that ordeal, he’ll forget all about burned steak, neglected donkeys, and old scandal. Even the Duke of Moreland’s ballroom will be no challenge for him after he’s been inspected by the king himself.”
Maggie’s papa might own one of the finest ballrooms in the land, but the Duchess of Moreland ruled over that ballroom. Sooner or later, Fenwick would have to make his bow to Benjamin’s in-laws, and then the matchmaking would begin in earnest.
When Maggie cuddled close, something else began in earnest behind Benjamin’s falls, and the problem of Ashton Fenwick, his unusual tiger, and his interest in old gossip was forgotten until long after the moon had risen.
* * *
Bad luck had allowed Ashton Fenwick to catch a glimpse of Kitty, and worse luck yet had apparently informed him that Matilda would do anything to preserve the child’s happiness.
“That little girl,” Matilda said, “is nobody you need to be concerned about. She’s thriving, content, and safe, for now.”
Ashton looped an arm around Matilda’s shoulders. “She’s your strength and your vulnerability. That’s how it is when you love somebody. My sister-in-law has quite a temper. She’ll tear a strip off me most days of the week for singing in the library, wearing boots to dinner, ruining my nieces’ supper. I love her scolds, because they mean she’s not truly upset.”
Ashton loved this sister-in-law, and he wasn’t ashamed of that sentiment. Didn’t mince past it as if sneaking an extra apple tart from the larder.
“You love her for finding fault with you?”
“She’s no’ finding fault. She’s taking me in hand, for, as she says, somebody must. When Alyssa is quiet, when she won’t even look at me, I can’t stand it. I’ll do anything to earn her forgiveness. The same malady in a more severe version plagues my brother, for Ewan and Alyssa were and are a love match. She’s a grand woman and always a lady. She amazes me.”
This panegyric for a woman Matilda would never meet caused both heartache and wonder. She’d never heard a man wax so openly affectionate about a female relation, and certainly nobody had ever spoken about Matilda with such affection.
“Are you in love with her?”
“In love—with Alyssa? She’d geld me for even speculating in that direction. Ewan would kill me straight out. If you saw them together, you’d know that their union is inviolable, though they never dote or fawn on each other in public. Their disagreements are high drama, and then they disappear into their apartment for twelve straight hours while I reassure my wee nieces they haven’t been orphaned.”
His nieces would believe him, when they’d have no such faith in their nurses and nannies.
“I can’t imagine that type of warmth between family members. Can’t grasp that it might exist.”
At one time, Matilda had hoped, if not for affection, then for at least cordial regard from her husband. That hope had lasted mere days after her wedding. She’d conveniently forgotten it had ever plagued her.
Ashton kissed her temple. “Such familial bonds exist, and they’re the only thing that makes life bearable sometimes. A bastard learns that lesson. The rules, the proprieties, the legalities, they matter naught compared to the love.”
The sky held only the last vestiges of light. Even if somebody were spying over the garden wall, they’d not see Matilda stealing these moments with her lodger.
She kissed Ashton’s cheek, and he regarded her in the shadows. “Much more of that, and we’ll be discussing a different kind of warmth, Matilda Bryce.”
How Matilda hated that name. She kissed Ashton again, at the corner of his mouth.
With him, the two kinds of love, familial and intimate, could exist in harmony. He would love his wife as he’d love a dear friend, and he’d desire her as he yearned for a lover. Ashton Fenwick, whether because of his bastard upbringing, his maturity, or his inherent nature, had the courage to love all at once, not in stingy pieces and reluctant morsels.
“I want—” Matilda managed before finding his mouth again.
He smiled against her lips. “You want me?”
She wanted so much. She wanted the sanctuary of his arms, the pleasure of his kisses, the joy of his passion.
“I shouldn’t,” Matilda said, her mouth a half inch from his. She could feel his heat, smell the combination of soap and horse that characterized him at the end of a day.
“Why not?” he replied, kneading the muscles at the nape of her neck. “Why not have some pleasure, Matilda? I’ll be careful, and in the morning nothing will have changed. The terms of my lease remain in full force and effect. Your ownership of the house isn’t jeopardized.”
Her heart would be jeopardized. “If I do this with you, I’ll regret it.”
This. A euphemism for the biggest risk she’d taken in six years and the most mundane of human pleasures, shared by couples dwelling in shepherd’s huts and palaces.
Ashton sat back, keeping his arm around her. “Will you regret it more if you don’t?”
His question landed in the middle of whirling thoughts, like a bucket of water tossed on a Catherine wheel. Whatever else was true, Matilda was a widow and fr
ee to share her favors as she pleased. Even polite society accorded a discreet woman that much latitude.
“My hesitation has to do with hope,” Matilda said, closing her eyes and leaning her head back against Ashton’s arm. Hope that she could not afford to nurture, though she didn’t examine too closely what that hope might entail.
A passing pleasure with Ashton Fenwick couldn’t amount to anything. If the past six years had taught Matilda anything, it was that hoping was a waste of courage.
Ashton scooped her into his lap as easily as Matilda might have picked up Solomon when he was in a willing mood.
“Your hesitation, for which I esteem you, has to do with fear. If you find a space between duty and propriety to take a little pleasure for yourself, will your self-respect remain intact? One doesn’t want to part with self-respect lightly. If it matters, I very much respect you, regardless of your choice. I daresay Pippa and Helen share my opinion.”
But did Matilda have the courage to seize what she wanted without feeling ashamed and hesitant? For six years, she’d been vigilant, self-reliant, and unceasingly careful.
And lonely. So lonely, she’d begun to wonder what all her caution and tenacity was for. The voice of despair whispered that Kitty was well cared for, and even if Matilda lasted the next 346 days, what could a woman in hiding do for a young girl dwelling in the household of an earl?
A relatively impoverished woman whose best hope was a life of quiet disgrace.
Ashton apparently didn’t expect Matilda to reply. He instead recommenced kissing her, on the mouth, the brow, the jaw. His kisses were sweet and gentle, but Matilda was sitting in his lap, and she’d been married for three interminable years.
He was growing aroused.
As was Matilda. She at first didn’t recognize what the restlessness and agitation were, but when Ashton settled a hand on her breast, her discontent eased.
So this is desire. Madness and pleasure in a perfect balance, blended with longing, joy, and a hint of anxiety.
Ashton: Lord of Truth (Lonely Lords Book 13) Page 11
