She closed and locked the door. “You’ve already enchanted me with your charms, but there’s a warrant for my arrest being shouted from every street corner. If you assist me to flee, you’re an accessory after the fact.”
He was tempted to kidnap her. Once over the Border, Matilda might be calm enough to see the wisdom of marrying him. As his Scottish countess, she’d be safer than Mrs. Bryce, late of Pastry Lane, had ever been.
“Helen is taking down the handbills as fast as Samuels puts them up,” Ashton said. “The Season will soon start in earnest, and you’ll be able to travel north with me. Please assure me you’ll think about it.”
Matilda took his cuff in her hands and undid the sleeve button. “I’ll think about it.” She extended her wrist, and in an odd exchange of courtesies, they valeted each other. While Ashton made use of the toothpowder, Matilda dispensed with her wig and tended to her hair.
Ashton was tall enough to see her over the privacy screen, though she doubtless thought herself unobserved. Sitting at his vanity, Matilda hunched forward, her face in her hands, her hair spilling about her.
Her posture radiated defeat and sorrow, and that ripped at him with more force than any taunt he’d endured as a bastard Scot coming of age in a world ruled by legitimate English sons.
“Your turn,” he said, coming around the privacy screen. “Do we leave the window open?”
“The fresh air helps me sleep. I feel safer with a window open.”
No woman should need assurances of a means of escape even while she slept. Drexel and his greedy heir would be held accountable. Ashton had made quiet arrangements to meet with Archer Portmaine later in the week to start that process.
Matilda wore Ashton’s dressing gown, and he’d kept his breeches on. They shed their last articles of clothing at the same time and smiled at each other across the bed. She was not a blushing girl, and he wasn’t a callow swain.
Thank God. They climbed into Ashton’s bed from opposite sides, meeting in the middle and entwining bodies as naturally as a couple ten years married.
“I truly do want to marry you,” Ashton said, wrapping an arm around Matilda’s shoulders. “I’ve always carried a restlessness inside. I attributed it to bastardy, because my father’s name was a gift, not a birthright.”
Matilda took his hand in hers. “You strike me as a determined man rather than restless. Your energies are expended to a purpose.”
“The restlessness was for want of you, Matilda. The earldom is my responsibility, but you are my home. You don’t need me to be titled, charming, witty, or tactful, and you don’t care if I’m wealthy or laboring for my bread.”
He knew this the way he knew the contour of her jaw or the rhythm of her breathing. The knowledge was complete, not like a language mastered in slow increments.
“I’ve kept company with many witty, charming titles,” Matilda said, ruffling the hair on his chest. “My father was such a one, and I’m sure the third cousins in Cornwall who inherited his earldom are too. Where were those cousins, where was anybody, when Kitty and I were friendless and orphaned?”
Matilda hardly knew her sister, and yet, she’d risked her life to stay close to the child. “Kitty will be safe, and you will be safe. I promise you this.”
Ashton could go into hiding with her, buy them new lives in the New World, seize the child from Drexel’s grasp, and repudiate the title he’d never wanted in the first place.
Except… Matilda deserved to be his countess, not simply his common-law wife. Their children deserved legitimacy, and Drexel deserved the hard boot of justice applied to his titled backside.
Matilda rose over Ashton, straddling him. “I need you to be safe too, Ashton Fenwick. Helen needs you, your family needs you. Make love with me.”
He wanted to assure her that she too could need him. She could rely on him, and trust him, with her life and with her heart, but Matilda kissed him to silence. She paused to blow out the candle on the bedside table, then set about stealing his heart.
Her weapon of choice was a patience so vast, time became a progression of caresses and sensations. Ashton lost his grasp of the arguments he needed to impress on her, lost track of his list of exhortations regarding her safety. He returned her kiss, became a reflection of her passion, and made her the reflection of his.
Beneath the ecstasy of being loved with such abandon lurked a terror: Matilda could surrender to passion like this only because she’d surrendered equally to despair. Perhaps not tomorrow, perhaps not even this year, but one day, she’d quietly disappear, or worse, turn herself in to the authorities rather than allow any criminal taint to touch those she cared for.
He could not bear to indulge her in such nobility of character.
When Matilda had shuddered through a silent completion, Ashton held her, memorizing her features with his fingertips. Her breathing slowed, her skin cooled, and she kissed his chin. A thank-you, perhaps, or a good-night.
Ashton shifted so Matilda lay beneath him. He slipped back inside her in one smooth thrust.
“Again, Ashton?”
“And again.” He loved her gently and relentlessly, until “Stay with me” and “I love you” became a unified cry of silent determination in the darkness.
Ashton felt Matilda trying to hold off her satisfaction, but in this, he could not allow her will to prevail. She bested him nonetheless.
When, at the last instant, he would have withdrawn and spilled his seed on her belly, she wrapped her legs around him and kept their bodies joined. Leaving would have made all the sense in the world, and yet she bid him to stay.
He pondered that gift late into the night and was still cheered by it when morning came and Matilda remained in his arms.
* * *
Hazelton paused, half in and half out of Ashton’s town coach. “By the infernal imp, you’re wearing your damned skirt.”
While Hazelton was attired in the old-fashioned splendor of court attire.
“Get in, or leave your backside waving in the wind, for all I care,” Ashton responded. “Perhaps you’re the lone soul of good breeding who’s neglected to read Sir Walter Scott. Kilts are dashing, and I’m told His Majesty looks marvelous in tartan wool.”
Hazelton took the backward-facing seat, and Ashton thumped the coach ceiling twice with a gloved fist.
“George has doubtless been told the same lie,” Hazelton said as the coach moved off. “Pleasant gathering over cards last night. Will you make it a regular event?”
“Possibly.” If Ashton could put Matilda’s situation to rights. “Can you get Hannibal Shearing admitted to your fancy club?”
Hazelton rested his hands on a smooth-grained walking stick carved to resemble the head of a dragon. “If I can get you admitted, I can get Beelzebub himself an invitation. Why?”
“Shearing pines for a barony to appease his lady wife, and I expect he’ll again be disappointed. He’s a decent chap, and I know how it feels to be excluded by people who are no better than they should be.”
Hazelton pretended to study streets he’d been frequenting for years. “You are intent on causing trouble. Your marital prospects are already the subject of bets on the book at White’s.”
“Bet on me being married by George’s next birthday.” August was months away, time enough to address Matilda’s situation and court her properly.
The coach slowed, traffic being a predictable nuisance. “Do you recall asking me to research a scandal involving somebody named Althorpe?”
Well, damn. “I should have saved you the trouble. No need to spade that turf now.”
“I had extensive notes regarding the alleged murder of an earl’s heir,” Hazelton said. “A nasty situation, though the suspect was never brought to justice.”
“Drop it, Hazelton. We can agree justice was never served.”
The distance they had to travel was not far and would in fact have been covered just as quickly on foot. Today, however, Ashton wanted to make an entrance worthy
of George himself, or he would have sprung from the coach rather than continue the discussion.
“Fenwick, a murder warrant doesn’t expire just because you’ve fallen in love. Don’t look so horrified. Maggie put the relevant facts together. Even knowing you, I would never have concluded that you’ve lost your heart to a missing heiress-turned-felon.”
“That’s Kilkenney to you, and if you accuse my lady of murder ever again, I will see that your wee lad comes into his title much too soon.”
“I have questions about the case,” Hazelton said. “Archer Portmaine does too.”
Was this how Matilda felt when the thief-takers dogged her footsteps? “You’ll not be getting answers from me.”
“Was a coroner’s examination done of the body? In every case where murder is suspected, the magistrate must have the deceased examined by a competent medical practitioner, else every wealthy woman whose husband died of apoplexy would find herself accused of foul play.”
Ashton hadn’t known a medical examination was required, though it made sense. “If some meddling buffoon hadn’t obligated me to attend the royal pantomime today, I might be pursuing that very line of inquiry instead of flaunting my knees for the delectation of my less-stylish English cousins. But here I sit, wasting a fine morning, when I should be righting a grievous wrong against an innocent woman.”
The coach lurched forward, nearly tossing Hazelton from the bench. He switched seats so he and Ashton were side by side.
“For God’s sake, Kilkenney, I want to help. If you’d been less cryptic, less stubborn, less impossible—”
Hazelton so seldom lost his composure that Ashton was intrigued—also touched. “Did your countess put you up to this?”
“My count—you think Maggie…? You daft barbarian, I am in your debt. You guarded my interests at Blessings for years and were the sole comfort and confidante of my entirely blameless sister when polite society turned its back on her. Now you… I don’t want to help, I need to.”
“You should shout more often,” Ashton said. “Puts the roses in your cheeks. Be kind to Shearing, will you? He’s poured more money into the royal pockets than is decent. We’ll talk about Matilda’s situation, when a coachy, two footmen, and two grooms aren’t a whisper away, aye?”
“Archer Portmaine should be a part of that conversation,” Hazelton said quietly. “He’s damned canny and has more charm than a mortal chambermaid can resist.”
“And you say the man’s a cousin. Hard to credit, such a divergence of traits in close relations.”
Hazelton let the remark pass, because they were nearing their destination. Ashton had been to court twice previously and thus wouldn’t be required to literally kiss the royal ring, though the day would be tedious as hell nonetheless.
Within five minutes of their arrival, Hazelton was pulled away, and though the Season had barely begun, the room was packed with the well-to-do and well titled—also the heavily scented. After an interminable while of pretending to recall names and titles, Ashton spotted Hannibal Shearing pressed into a corner, where the king’s henchmen would doubtless see that he remained.
“Kilkenney, let’s have a look at you,” drawled a voice that embodied command, amusement, and genuine curiosity.
Ashton turned to behold the monarch in all his corpulent majesty. The requisite obsequies were observed—the deep bow being something of an adventure in a kilt—and the crowd gave the royal person enough room that Ashton could present his finery for inspection.
“Is that badger fur adorning your sporran?” George asked. “Very fierce fellow, the badger. Tenacious too. Rather like our fine English journalists when scandal’s in the air. They tend to unfortunate teeth too, as it happens. How goes it in the Borders, Kilkenney?”
Where George’s extravagances were concerned, scandal was always in the air.
“At the risk of offending my betters,” Ashton said, unbuckling his sporran, “the Borders are among your most beautiful holdings, sir, and we’re faring well. Keep the sporran, from one fierce, tenacious fellow to another.”
The damned thing weighed a ton, and the tassels tickled Ashton’s knees. George looked momentarily perplexed, then touchingly pleased.
“Thank you, Kilkenney.” He leaned closer. “Don’t suppose I can talk you into marrying Hannibal Shearing’s daughter? Damned plaguey fellow haunts me for a mention on the honors list. You and he are nearly neighbors, aren’t you?”
Tenacity was apparently contagious, unlike a grasp of British geography. “His daughters are all spoken for, sir, though he’s much respected in the north, and I’m sure Shearing would reciprocate any kindness generously.”
“Heaven preserve us, here he comes. Kilkenney, your servant.”
The royal back turned, and Ashton’s job became to intercept Shearing as he elbowed, jostled, and pushed his way through the crowd.
“Not today,” Ashton said quietly. “And you won’t get anywhere by breaching protocol.”
“But that’s the thing, Kilkenney,” Shearing retorted. “I’ve observed protocol, I’ve poured a fortune into his damned monstrosity by the sea, and the equally inexcusable—”
Ashton clapped Shearing on the shoulder, hard. “I understand your frustration, but now is not the time. Have you met the Earl of Hazelton? He’s lurking about here somewhere and has a fine holding in Cumberland. You’re nearly neighbors.”
Ashton cajoled, gossiped, and all but pushed Shearing in the direction of the corner from whence he’d sprung, which afforded a fine view of the sovereign, chatting affably with the wealthy and powerful and, all the while, stroking the fur of a dead badger.
George was still holding the sporran when he bid his guests farewell. His Majesty looked for all the world like a fellow who’d been given a toy he’d longed for since boyhood, while all Ashton wanted was a wee dram or three and the chance to turn Hazelton and his cousin loose on the accusations made against Matilda.
* * *
“You’re doing a bunk,” Helen said, stepping directly in front of Matilda. One moment, Matilda had been striding down the alley trying to look like a man with a purpose—she had the finest example of one of those—the next, Helen had dropped in front of her from the hay mow above the mews.
“You should at least take that satchel,” the child went on, falling in step beside her. “Put your coin in your smalls, but carry the satchel like you’re about your normal business. Gives you something to do with your hands, so you don’t look twitchy. You could put some rocks in it and use it for a cudgel.”
“I’m not leaving.” After last night, Matilda couldn’t leave. Her body had known it, her heart had known it, and now her mind was realizing it too. She and Ashton might have conceived a child, and there could be no greater proof that she trusted him.
And he trusted her, for Ashton Fenwick would never allow a child of his to grow up without a father’s love and protection.
Helen skipped along beside her. “If you’re not leaving, Mr. Mac, then why are you in this alley, without his lordship, without a footman, or even old Bedbug to keep a look out?”
“You should not be so disrespectful of his lordship’s valet.”
“Bedbug should not be so disrespectful of me. If you’re not running off, what are you about?”
Helen’s cautions brought to mind Ashton’s last warning: Wait for me, and we’ll talk. In his formal clan attire, he’d been not merely the earl, but the Border lord, ready to defend the realm in lands beyond the monarch’s reach.
They arrived at the end of the alley and had to pause to find a gap in traffic to cross the wider street.
“Pippa sent a note,” Matilda said. “She asked urgently for me to come to her, and she would not have imposed without good reason. I’ll make a quick visit and pick up the copy of my marriage lines and baptismal lines, as well as the deed to the house, because my name appears on each. I also want the bundle I keep with those documents at the bottom of my wardrobe.”
“I could ha
ve fetched all of that,” Helen said. “Whyn’t you send me? D is for daft, dimwitted, and deceptive. His nibs taught me that last one.”
Matilda took Helen by the hand and started across the street. “I’m not deceiving anybody. That evidence could be useful to his lordship, and I should not have left it behind. I’m also worried about Pippa. Her note sounded urgent.”
“Himself will tear a strip off us both for being so rotten damned stupid as to go jaunting about in broad daylight without him. Who brought you the note?”
Helen was dragging on Matilda’s hand, as children will when they’re being led somewhere against their will.
“One of the footmen brought it up.”
“And who brought it to him?” Helen pressed. “Pippa knows damned good and well where the Albany is, and where we bide there.”
“For all I know Pippa gave him the…” Matilda fell silent as they reached the next alley.
If Pippa had brought the note, she could just as easily have come up to the apartment and shared her news in person. Had Pippa asked her beau to deliver the note? He too would have delivered the note in person rather than hand it off to a footman unknown to him.
“She’s alone in that house,” Matilda said, “and I know what that feels like. Pippa has no one to turn to, she’s been loyal to me, and I’ll be back to the Albany with no one the wiser. I also miss Solomon.”
“Jesus in the Middle Temple, I coulda brought you that damned cat. You can’t always be looking after every creature what’s too stupid to look out for itself. You have his lordship to do some looking out, and he has you. My pa always said the Quality is dicked in the nob, and Pippa agreed. Said money and book learning curdles the common sense.”
Matilda took the turn that led down to the alley behind her house, though instead of a sense of homecoming, the scraggly trees reaching for the meager sun struck her as pathetic… and possibly sinister. Compared to the lush greenery of the parks, or the tidy repose of a Mayfair garden, Pastry Lane was downtrodden and messy.
Ashton: Lord of Truth (Lonely Lords Book 13) Page 22
