Nathaniel dismounted, then walked Bumblebee over to his father’s carriage. Rosalind watched as some quiet conversation ensued—first between the two of them, then in a trio with the innkeeper, a bowlegged elderly man with bright, dark eyes and short-cropped white hair.
“The hay is all the horses need,” Sir William said. “We only require stalls; no ostlers and feed.”
“I’ve been allowing them other feed,” said Nathaniel. “They wanted it. And they’ve thrived on it.”
“Those weren’t my instructions.”
“What’s more important? Your instructions or the health of the horses?”
Excellent questions, and Sir William let them pass. With the help of a few servants, he descended the carriage steps, sitting on the bottom one until his wheelchair was worked free through the other set of carriage doors.
Once settled into his accustomed seat, he rolled to the doorway of the inn. And from there, he issued order after order: for the unloading of the carriages, the scheduling of watches over the horses. The parceling out of rooms. The dressing of a family parlor on the ground floor for Sir William’s accommodation.
Rosalind leaned against the white front of the inn, only feet away from the tumult of unpacking. It had been so easy to know what to do before, but now Sir William had supplanted her. When the baronet turned his gaze to her, she straightened up. “How can I help, Sir William?”
He made a dismissive gesture. “You can’t. You needn’t.”
Her shoulders hunched.
The baronet looked up at her, then sighed. “Nathaniel is busy in the stables. He doesn’t really need a secretary. I’ve hired you a nice chamber on the second floor. If you’d like a bath, of course you’re welcome to it. And you must ring for dinner whenever you feel hungry.”
So that was that. She was to be placed properly within the inn, just like the traveling trunks.
Sir William turned his chair, calling for one of the outriders, then issuing some instruction for the following day’s travel.
“Thank you,” she murmured unheard, then stepped inside the inn. Step by step, as she mounted the stairs, she was carried along by the promise of a fete the size of a city.
The evening passed slowly, because every time she left her chamber, there was a servant to trundle her back inside. “Just ask for whatever you want, miss, and we’ll fetch it,” said her benevolent jailers. A meal and a bath only passed part of the time, and then there was nothing for her to do. No letters to write to Sir William or Aunt Annie.
As Nathaniel’s secretary, maybe she could have arranged to visit his room. But it could not be the same sort of visit they had delighted in only a day before. Even if he employed her in name only, she couldn’t let their passion become a transaction. And in her mind, it would be.
Secretaries don’t…
He was worth far too much to her to sully the memory of the night before. It already seemed so much longer since she had been with him.
She could not be sorry for the spell of pleasure under which he’d laid her. But she wondered whether she should have stayed in London and not been greedy for more, only to watch the spell be broken. She didn’t have a reason to be here, other than this false job Nathaniel had given her. And whether it was to spite his father or to keep her close—well, it didn’t matter, did it? She’d lived for ten years going where she was told, with the reasons opaque.
Every reason, every wisdom she’d collected over the past decade, said she should keep her distance. That she should have taken Sir William’s letter of reference and turned on her heel.
Every reason but one: she wanted to be close to Nathaniel far more than she wanted to be wise.
Heart troubled, she fell into an uneasy sleep.
* * *
The morning brought her better cheer, and the group’s arrival in Epsom shortly after midday even more so. Rosalind had decided to pretend she was on holiday, happy to help when needed, but otherwise enjoying the air and the sights that were utterly new to her.
Epsom was a town dressed as a city, its main streets wide and buildings of neat brick quoined with stone. Chimneys poked up like curious heads, and trees sighed in the light sultry breeze. There were ten days until the Derby, and the promised throngs had not yet arrived, but everyone seemed to be preparing. To one side of the street, a servant was painting an inn’s door a fresh bright red; to the other, a maid was scrubbing the front steps of a shop.
“I’ve arranged rooms for us here at the King’s Waggon,” said Nathaniel, halting the party before that edifice. “It’s an easy distance to the Downs.”
Rosalind skimmed the pleasant Georgian facade, smiling at the pale green-blue color the shade of a starling’s egg. With a slate roof atop and wide windows on the ground floor, its bright brass sign proclaiming it a Royal Mail stop, it was a cheerful, neat structure. And for now, there was space before and around it. Over the next ten days, as England’s population shook up and settled southward, that would change.
Nathaniel knocked on the door of the crested carriage, then popped it open. “Father, do you intend to stay here too? The ground floor is all taproom.”
“We’ll see about that,” said the baronet. “They were sure at the Queen’s Noggin that the ground floor was all public and family rooms.”
“But you convinced them otherwise. Well done, you. You deserve a medal.” Nathaniel sounded tired all of a sudden. Maybe he hadn’t slept any better than Rosalind had.
She ventured through the doorway of the inn, finding herself in the taproom to which Nathaniel had referred. It was dark brick with dark wood paneling and a smoke-darkened pictures on the walls. A few scattered customers sat at the tables, each with something dark in his glass. The space would be soothing to pounding heads.
Behind a bar, a slim woman was laughing with an older woman in a mobcap. “…wasted all that money on an express! I took it, of course, since postage was paid, and the rider seemed right glad to head home again. But I never heard of this woman. She in’t staying here.”
“What was her name again?” the older woman asked. “Maybe she’s in town. You han’t been here long enough to know everyone, Flora.”
“Rosalind Agate,” said Flora.
Rosalind tripped over a chair, catching herself on the edge of a table with a bone-jarring thump.
“Funny sort of name, in’t?” Flora added, oblivious.
“Never heard of ’er,” added Mobcap. “Keep it a while, I s’pose. Maybe she’ll turn up for the Derby.”
Rosalind untangled her feet, kicking the chair back into place, and almost flung herself across the room. “Excuse me! Mrs.—Miss—I overheard—that is, I’m Rosalind Agate. You’ve an express for me.”
“Oh, aye?” Flora, a pretty blond, set her hands on her hips. “Why should I believe you?”
Rosalind frowned. “Why should you not?”
“Now, Flora,” said Mobcap. She turned to Rosalind, a cunning smile on her plump features. “And glad to see you, we are, Miss Agate. I’m not saying we disbelieve you and all. But I think Flora means a shilling would go a fair way to convincing her.”
“Aye, and a half crown’d be even better.”
Rosalind’s pockets were empty and had been ever since the Kelting fete. “You said the letter had been paid for, so you weren’t put to any expense. Please, give it to me.”
Flora’s hand wandered to her apron pocket, but then she paused. “I’d take that ribbon off your bonnet instead of a coin,” she decided. “That’s right pretty.”
Rosalind gritted her teeth. Considered. “No,” she decided. “I don’t think so. And if this is how the King’s Waggon treats its customers, I’ll tell Sir William Chandler’s party to find other lodging. Ah, here is Mr. Nathaniel Chandler now.”
With a sour look, Flora produced the letter from her pocket before flouncing off. Mobcap at least had the grace to curtsy and mumble an apology before cleaning a glass that already sparkled.
“What was all that about
?” Nathaniel asked, brows raised. “I come in to find you intimidating the servants out of secret letters.”
The paper crackled in her hand. “It’s an express. It arrived for me just a short while ago.”
She turned it over. The handwriting was familiar, and a sick swell of dread caught her. “Aunt Annie. She—something must be wrong at the Eight Bells.”
“Here, let’s find you a private room.” Nathaniel took her arm. With a quick word to Mobcap, he escorted Rosalind through the taproom into a private parlor and shut the door behind them.
This is where Sir William will sleep, she thought dimly, hardly looking around. She cracked the seal and stared at the brief lines.
You are needed at home to protect Carys. Return at once.
Anweledig
Under her breath, she cursed.
“Bad news?” Nathaniel asked.
“I don’t know. Yes, maybe. I-I think I must return to the Eight Bells. Right away.”
“What is it? May I see?” When she handed over the paper, he skimmed it, then shook his head. “This doesn’t mean anything. Who is Ann-well-a…”
Damn. She’d forgotten about the signature. “That’s Aunt Annie’s real name,” she blurted out. “It’s—it—something must have happened that she didn’t want to write in a letter.”
Something to do with Tranc, no doubt. No sooner could Rosalind leave than Aunt Annie could jerk on the strings knotting them. And Rosalind would be pulled back. She had to be, to save her sister—or whomever Tranc turned an eye to next—from the life she herself had lived.
Her throat was tight, so tight she could hardly speak. Secrets clutched at her like iron-banded scars. And they weren’t even her secrets, so she could never be free of them.
Sliding the paper from Nathaniel’s hands, she said, “I have to leave. Can you arrange a hack for me? I’ll have payment sent to you once I arrive.”
“Surely you needn’t go at once. Your sister has two parents and four brothers at home to see to her safety. You could reply—stay a few days, then go…” He looked puzzled, as though he couldn’t understand his own sentences.
“Nathaniel, it was an express. It can’t be put off.”
“Ah. An express. So if I pay a few shillings, I can get you to do whatever I want?” He smacked the plaster wall with the flat of his hand. “Damnation, Rosalind. I can do that. You work for me. I have an ungodly amount of money in my pocket, because you wouldn’t take any before. Take it now, and stay in Epsom.”
How tempting. How tempting it all was; every inch of him, from the flat of his hand now bracing him to the boots that had guided her somewhere private.
“Others have a claim on me too,” she said. “Do you really want to be nothing more than an employer who orders me about?”
He turned to the wall, his palm sliding down, flat. “No,” he said. “No, of course not. Not as an employer, then. As a…someone who wants you to stay. Let your Aunt Annie send her worries to someone else for a few days.”
“It’s not only a few days.” The words almost choked her. “I cannot come back.”
“To Epsom, you mean.”
She shook her head. Just a sliver, as though any greater movement would break her.
He was turned away still, but her silence was answer enough. “To me?”
“Yes.” Thin as a spiderweb, she sounded. But spiderwebs were strong too, and she steeled herself. “This must be the end. I—owe much loyalty to others, Nathaniel, and I’ve let myself forget that. I should not have…”
It would be too cruel to them both to finish the sentence.
Come to you. Kissed you. Allowed myself to fall for you.
I should not have permitted myself to love, because someone will be hurt. And it’s better it be me than someone else.
How terrible that at the moment she realized she could not have him, she came into the full understanding of her love. It was knife sharp and gleaming, a bladed pleasure like the throb of joy she had felt at being home. It cut at her heart.
Balling her right hand into a fist, she covered her mouth and permitted herself a silent sob.
And then her scars tugged, reminding her that her life was not her own.
Quietly, Nathaniel said, “Rosalind. Please. You could stay if you wanted to. You stayed the last time I asked you. Couldn’t you do the same again?”
“I can’t do the things I want to, Nathaniel. You know that.”
He whirled, rounding on her. “I know nothing of the sort. You could stay now if you wanted to. You could look me in the eye.” He jerked her chin up, blue eyes hard. “You could answer my questions.”
He swallowed heavily, dropping his hand from her chin. “You…you could kiss me again, Rosalind. Or agree that I might court you. You could fall in love if you wanted to.” The muscles of his jaw went hard. “So I can only assume you don’t want to.”
She was a terrible liar, Aunt Annie had told her. And so Rosalind could not feign agreement with him. She could not bear to disagree either, to tell him all the things she wanted and had no means of having. At this moment, even sugared almonds and a crown of flowers were beyond her reach. A life with Nathaniel? She might as well wish to fly.
Already the fruitless wanting was painful, like being burned all over again.
“I could kiss you again,” she said. “If that would be enough.”
“Of course it won’t be enough.” He almost growled. “But I’ll take it.”
Closing the distance between them with a swoop, he fisted his hands in her hair, tumbling it and sending pins flying. She had expected a sweet good-bye kiss, a gentle farewell, but he pulled her into his arms like a starving man seeking a feast.
His lips covered hers; his tongue brushed against her own. One kiss became many, more—or maybe they were all the same because he never let go of her—and then her hands were on his shoulders, pulling him closer as her thighs clenched, belly heated.
Love is merely a madness, she tried to remind herself. So said Rosalind from As You Like It. She was mad for him; this was mad, to kiss him in a private parlor while an express lay crumpled on the floor. Knowing she must leave. Any minute, she would have to leave. She should not let herself—let him—ah—
With every fall of her hair, every pin that dropped, she felt herself weakening. It would be so easy to beg him to take care of her. To become another of the milkmaids he handled with such grace and good humor.
But they were obstacles. She would not become that sort of thing. She had spent enough time flat on her belly as she healed. She deserved more—and so did he—than for her now to spend her life on her back, her mouth closed against every truth.
Once more wasn’t a lifetime, though. She was desperate not to leave him just yet. To have him touch her roughly as though he could not resist.
He ground her against him, pushing a knee between her legs. She was wet for him, wanting him.
“Take me,” she gasped, helpless against the pressure. A moment to forget herself now, a flood of passion to remember later.
“A kiss is all you offered me,” he said. “So that’s that. That’s good-bye.” He helped her to regain her feet as coolly as though a flame had been extinguished, though his nostrils flared with deep unsettled breaths.
“You think that was only a kiss?” She was reeling, ready to fall upon him again.
“Well.” His smile was bitter. “Close enough. Did you really trust me to do exactly as I said?”
“I always have.”
He shook his head.
This could not be the end, not quite yet. She seized for something to say. “My wager,” she blurted out. “Will you still stake my wager? I want to bet on Epigram. Whatever amount you think right.”
“None of this is right,” he said. “But I’ll place your bet. Come now, I’ll arrange a hack and servant to take you home.”
And so she might go. But her heart, she knew, would remain in his keeping.
She wouldn’t have need of it anymo
re.
Twenty-one
“Rosie? Did you forget something?”
Mrs. Agate had bustled into the vestibule, an expression of welcome on her features. When she spotted Rosalind standing by the door, that expression altered into one of surprise.
For the first time, Rosalind disliked the jingling of the eight little bells that greeted everyone who passed through the doorway of her parents’ inn. Could she have slipped upstairs unseen and unheard, she would have done so.
Not that she had passed through the doorway quite yet. She struggled with her trunk, which bumped and threatened to topple as the contents shifted. A cold May drizzle had spattered the worn leather as she heaved it—with the help of her chaperone, the burly outrider Button—up the steps of the Eight Bells.
She’d sent him on his way before opening the door. Once he’d sworn to her that “Mr. Nathaniel said Sir William owed you wages, and those’d cover this journey.”
Thank God for that. She had spent all her ready coins days ago on a wreath of red flowers and on a lace fichu she’d never yet worn.
“Is everyone all right, Mama?”
“Yes, of course. We’d have written at once if that wasn’t so.”
Her mother’s smooth, confused expression proved to Rosalind exactly what she’d suspected: there was no emergency here. Only Aunt Annie, yanking on a lead line when Rosalind began to wander.
Or Aunt Annie, worried about Tranc. Not wanting to face him alone.
“You’ve brought your trunk with you, Rosie?” Mrs. Agate’s forehead furrowed.
Rosalind gave the simplest explanation for her return that she could think up. Thumping the end of her trunk to the floor, she said, “I’ve been let go.”
Every innkeeper, especially one who kept a well-frequented taproom, had spoken the phrase so often to lazy maids and dishonest grooms that there was no misunderstanding it. Mrs. Agate’s pleasant features changed yet again. Her eyes widened, and her mouth drooped. “Oh, Rosie. By your baronet?”
“Certainly not ‘my baronet’ now.”
A Gentleman’s Game Page 21
