Night Shadow

by Catherine Coulter

  “You were right,” Knight said to Lily at luncheon. “Not a blessed thing.” Saint John, as Lily now called the young tutor, was speaking to Theo, neither of them paying any attention to Knight or Lily. Laura Beth was happily forking down Mimms’s plum pudding. Lily merely nodded, saying nothing. Knight fell silent, and Lily knew he was trying to decide what to do about Monk and Boy.

  She was on the point of excusing herself when Knight said suddenly, “Lily, please come into the drawing room in, say, ten minutes. I have something for you.”

  “What? What?” Laura Beth said.

  “None of your affair, snippet,” Knight said. “Sit still and finish your plum pudding.”

  “What?”

  “Laura Beth, Cousin Knight wants you to be quiet or else he’ll send you to the nursery.”

  “That’s an excellent threat, Theo,” Knight said. “It’s cold up there, Laura Beth, and you would probably freeze Czarina Catherine’s toes off.”

  The child laughed.

  “Mama, I’ll go spend some time with Sam.”

  “Thank you, Theo. John, you deserve some rest.”

  “Theo and I are going riding later, Mrs. Winthrop. That will be my outing.”

  “Another martyr,” Knight said to no one in particular.

  Exactly ten minutes later, Lily closed the drawing room door. “You wanted to see me?”

  Knight brought out a huge box from behind his back. She stared at it. “What is it?”

  “Why don’t you open it and see?”

  She walked slowly toward him. “If you like what you find, perhaps you’ll give me a kiss,” he said.

  “Perhaps,” she said and took the box. He watched her carry it to the spindle-legged marquetry table. She lifted the lid and pulled away the silver tissue paper and gasped.

  “Knight.”

  He said nothing, merely watched her lift the exquisite white silk gown from the box. The rounded neck was edged with Valenciennes lace, as were the long, fitted sleeves and the hem. The moment he’d seen it, he knew that it had to belong to Lily.

  “It’s your wedding gown,” he said after a long moment of silence.

  She looked stunned. “It’s incredible, but—”

  “No buts, if you please. When I visited Bishop Morley, I also went to the modiste and talked her out of it. It should fit you. Her assistant was about your size and I judged it on her.” He paused, realizing he was carrying on at a fine clip and Lily was as silent as a drugged mouse.

  Her head was lowered.

  “Lily?”

  She shook her head and turned her back to him.

  Knight frowned. “It doesn’t please you?”

  “Of course it pleases me, you idiot.”

  He grinned. “I was beginning to think you’d turned into a female watering pot on me. I know the groom isn’t supposed to see his bride in all her finery before the wedding, but—”

  “No, you shan’t.” She turned around to face him, and to his surprise, she looked as composed as a saint. “Thank you, Knight. You’re very kind.”

  He regarded her intently. “Perhaps you’ll contrive to believe it, Lily. As of this time tomorrow, you’ll be my wife and all of us will be a family. It isn’t such a repellent thought, is it?”

  She shook her head. “We couldn’t find the jewels,” she said, and he wanted to throttle her.

  “I see,” he said at his most sardonic. “If you had, you would have escaped from here—this scabrous prison—in the dawn of the morning, just as you did from Damson Farm.”

  “Yes,” she said, and he took a step toward her, throttling a very real alternative to him now.

  Lily clutched the gown to her breasts and took a quick step back. “I should like a marriage of convenience.”

  He stopped cold in his tracks. “You what?”

  “A marriage of convenience. For three days perhaps?”

  “A very short marriage of convenience. After three days you will decide you want me in your bed?”

  “Please, Knight, just three days. That isn’t too long, and I would very much appreciate it.”

  “I begin to see. You still hope to find the nonexistent jewels, then? Three more days to search without the fear that I’ll get you with child?”

  She was silent.

  He was enraged. He grabbed the gown, wadded it into a ball, and threw it across the room. “Madam, you may have three years, thirty years. I don’t care. I will give you fifty thousand pounds. You can leave. You can’t, however, take my children. Do you understand me?” He grabbed her arms, shook her, and shouted, “You won’t take my children! I won’t let you!”

  Lily didn’t struggle with him. She was listening to him, really listening. “You’ve known the children less than a month. Surely you can’t care that much for them.”

  He snarled at her, beyond himself now. “You make one move to remove them from my protection and I’ll personally—”

  “Personally what?”

  He stared at her, knowing himself vanquished without a whimper. He hated her in that moment. He hadn’t felt like a normal human being since she’d come into his well-ordered life and turned it arse over heels. He hated not being in control. Of himself or all those about him.

  “God, I wish I could cut you out of my heart.”

  She smiled up at him and wrapped her arms around his waist. He stiffened but he didn’t pull away. She hugged him tightly.

  “Knight?”

  “What, you damnable irritant?”

  “Am I really in your heart?”

  “No, I didn’t mean that at all. It was a momentary lapse, an abberation. What I really meant was that you’re only in my groin. My manly parts have no sense whatsoever.”

  “Oh.”

  His hands were on her arms, rubbing lightly, up and down. “Lily, that sounded like real disappointment to me, as if you really care about me.”

  “I suppose I don’t find you completely repellent, Knight.”

  “Will you marry me?”

  “Yes.”

  “No more three days of convenience?”

  “Not even an hour. Not now.”

  He felt as buoyant as a butterfly. He clasped her about her waist and lifted her above his head. “It’s about time, you silly woman. Kiss me. Like you mean it, like you will tomorrow night when we’re in bed.”

  He lowered her slowly as she kissed him, and she felt the hardness of him, his strength, his gentleness. She kissed him with great enthusiasm and, if he’d but realized it, great innocence.

  The marriage ceremony of Knight Carden Paget Winthrop, eighth Viscount Castlerosse, to Miss Lily Ophelia Tremaine was quite a satisfactory affair, though there were only the children and the Castle Rosse servants in attendance.

  Bishop Morley’s cousin, the eminent solicitor Mr. Drake St. John, gave the bride away, thinking as he gently placed her hand into Lord Castlerosse’s that her groom was the luckiest man on the face of the earth.

  Knight, had he been applied to at that moment for his opinion, would have agreed. As did the children.

  “Mama’s an angel,” Laura Beth told Mimms.

  “Shush,” Theo whispered.

  Sam gave his brother an impatient look and said loud enough for Knight to hear, “Mama is prettier than the Castle Rosse peacocks.”

  There was only one peacock currently in residence at Castle Rosse, and he was a mangy sight. Lily choked.

  “Mama’s prettier than Violet,” Laura Beth said, not to be outdone.

  Sam looked over at the bishop. “Violet is Mama’s mare,” he said.

  Laura Beth, in a spate of confidence-sharing, tugged on the bishop’s black coattails. “Look at Mama’s ring. It’s an airloom and very old because all of Cousin Knight’s papas were old when they got married.”

  “Laura Beth.”

  “But Cousin Knight loves Mama so much he’s marrying her real young.”

  Theo said in a strangled voice, “No, please, Laura Beth—”

  “It�
�s all right, Theo,” Knight said, swallowing a laugh. “Laura Beth just got her story mixed up—well, a part of it anyway. I will ask her after the ceremony where she got this bit of news.”

  “Why, from—”

  Lily reached over and firmly clamped her hand over Laura Beth’s mouth. “Suck your thumb. All right?”

  “But you don’t like me to, Mama.”

  Lily rolled her eyes heavenward and Knight said, “Be still, Laura Beth, or you won’t get a single piece of Mimms’s cake.”

  That did the trick.

  Knight nodded to Bishop Morley, a gentleman blessedly endowed with an active sense of humor.

  Lily heard Knight’s words, strong and deep, and felt him squeeze her hand. Her own responses were equally firm.

  “…I pronounce you man and wife. My lord, you may kiss your lovely bride.”

  “They’re going to cuddle,” Sam said and shuddered.

  “More than that,” Theo said. “Just watch.”

  “Do you mind?” Knight whispered against Lily’s closed lips.

  “Mind our vocal audience? Yes, but I’ll get them. I’m just not yet certain how—”

  His mouth came over hers and it was all Lily could do to stay still and not fling herself against him and hurtle him to the floor.

  When he released her, he looked into her eyes, was pleased with what he saw, and gave her a very male smile. “Think about tonight, Lily. Or this afternoon. Perhaps even an hour from now if I can manage it.”

  Lily was humming, from the inside out. She accepted congratulations, not really understanding the words, but with a smile that never faltered.

  Theo and Laura Beth crowded about them. Sam called from his royally placed chair, “Mama, will we have to watch that all the time?”

  “Watch what, Sam?”

  “Cousin Knight touching you and putting his mouth all over your face.”

  “Yes, Sam, you will. Now, John is going to carry you into the dining room. You’ve been a trooper, and it’s time for your reward.”

  “I want Mimms,” shouted Laura Beth and tried to take John’s hand.

  “I’ll see to them, Mama,” Theo said and ran after his beleaguered tutor.

  “They are wonderful children, my lady,” the bishop said, taking her hand.

  My lady! Oh, goodness, Lily hadn’t even thought about that consequence. “It is kind of you to say so. They were so excited this morning. Mr. St. John, thank you so much for being here.”

  Mr. St. John would have liked very much to resurrect that marvelous privilege, the droit du seigneur, if, that is, he could have demoted the viscount to a peasant. He sighed. Some things weren’t meant to be.

  Mimms had outdone herself. The wedding cake was three tiers with the sweetest frosting Lily had ever tasted. It settled in her stomach, mixing with the champagne and the knowledge that she was now married for the first time in her life, to a man who obviously wanted her female body more than he wanted anything else about her, which, she’d already decided, was quite enough for the present. Perhaps more importantly, he wanted the children. And that was a shock. To him as much as to her, Lily suspected, and smiled as she wiped a dab of frosting from Laura Beth’s mouth.

  “Are you thinking about all the very wicked things I’m going to do to you just as soon as I can clear out the house?”

  “No.”

  Knight managed a very creditable wounded expression. “I expected you to be more malleable now that you’re married, Lily. I am disappointed.”

  “Very well. Yes.”

  “Yes what?”

  “I was thinking that—” She stopped, leaned toward his ear, and whispered, “Actually, my lord, I was thinking about all the wicked things I was going to do to you.”

  He jerked back, so surprised he sneezed into his glass of champagne. In that instant, he pictured her on top of him, her mouth on his belly, her hands moving downward, caressing him as her soft lips followed, and he nearly groaned aloud.

  “Don’t.”

  She cocked her head at him. “It seems only fair to me,” she said. “Can’t I be outrageous on rare occasion?”

  Knight didn’t say another word. He quickly sat down, crossing his legs. He sipped on his champagne, looking not at his wife but at Sam’s rapt expression as he ate his second slice of wedding cake.

  His wife. That had a quite acceptable ring to it. Even though he was only twenty-seven years old. Even though his eldest child was nine years old. Even though…

  “That’s a rather vacuous grin on your face, my lord,” said Bishop Morley as he seated himself beside the viscount. At Knight’s continued grin, the bishop perjured himself without hesitation. “Your father would have been proud. Your wife is a beautiful woman, and is kind and good-natured as well. You are a lucky man, no doubt about that.”

  “My father,” Knight said, staring the bishop straight in his rheumy eyes, “would have shipped me off to Africa, hoping I’d either gain some much-needed sense or rot if I didn’t. You know he had no patience for anything related to the fair sex and a man’s whimsical emotions.”

  “Your father was quite wrong,” the bishop said. “But he was so very amusing, his wit so outlandish, one scarcely ever saw through to the lacks in him. I doubt he rarely noticed them. Odd how you have his wit, my boy, and he didn’t spend more than two weeks a year with you.”

  “Well, he’s laughing at me now, or howling, or whatever it is a heavenly sire does when his earth-bound son disregards all his advice. He was quite like Lord Chesterfield, you know, forever writing me letters crammed with his philosophies.”

  “No matter now. I repeat, my boy, your wife is a fine lady. Now, I must take dear St. John—you’ve doubtless noticed that he’s been gazing at your wife as he would at a holy relic or a plum tart. Still, he’s a good-hearted fellow, you know.”

  Knight sighed. “I know. Most men do stare at her. It can’t be helped. Lily, bless her heart, rarely notices.”

  “Ah, you aren’t a possessive husband, then?”

  “I don’t really know yet,” Knight said thoughtfully, watching Mr. St. John—a portly gentleman old enough to be Lily’s father—pat her hand, then her wrist, then her elbow. He stopped there.

  The man obviously valued his hide.

  Laura Beth tugged on Knight’s trouser leg. “Papa,” she said, giving him a sunny smile.

  “Where’s Czarina Catherine?” Knight asked around the sudden lump in his throat.

  “She didn’t have a nice enough dress to wear to Mama’s wedding. I made her stay in bed.”

  “I should have thought of that. Come up, snippet, and say something wise and intelligent to Bishop Morley.”

  “I don’t like black,” said Laura Beth and poked her thumb in her mouth.

  A wedding night should be remembered until one stuck one’s spoon in the wall, Knight was thinking as he watched Lily speak to each of the servants in turn. A night that Lily would remember—in great detail—and what she remembered would make her smile, even in fifty years.

  Knight looked out through the bow windows in the huge domineering formal dining room. It looked cold, the sky overcast with fat rain clouds. He turned, and saw Lily watching him. She smiled shyly.

  He smiled back, thinking that she would go to bed with him every night and wake up with him every morning.

  At six o’clock that evening, Knight stopped off to say good night to the children, then wended his way downstairs to the small breakfast room where he and Lily would dine alone. Dear John, bless the fellow, was entertaining the boys until bedtime, and that saintly Mrs. Crumpe was Laura Beth’s closest friend for the evening.

  Now, Lily, he thought, it’s your turn. And mine.

  Nineteen

  “How can you be more beautiful than you were only an hour ago? It is obviously a metaphysical question that has no answer.” Knight raised his champagne glass. “To you, Viscountess Castlerosse, my lady, my wife, my helpmeet, my—”

  “You’re fast going downhill.”<
br />
  Lily quickly tapped the fine crystal glass to her husband’s. “To us,” she said, grinning. “It is odd,” she continued, watching Knight serve her plate, “but I never thought to be a viscountess or any kind of ‘my lady.’ There was no money, you see, after Father and I left England, and I was always told that gentlemen only wed ladies with ample dowries.”

  “You had something better than money, Lily, a commodity of which I am already plentifully endowed.”

  “Oh? What, pray tell?”

  He smiled at her and said simply, “You brought not only yourself but also a family. Both very strong inducements.”

  Lily wasn’t certain if he was serious. He seemed to be, but she still didn’t know him well enough to be sure. “Well, the children are wonderful.”

  “And you’re not?”

  “I’m just me, Knight, a woman who is really quite ordinary.”

  “You won’t speak of my wife as being ordinary, if you please, Lily. God, I’m glad it’s over with. Can you admit to feelings of relief at being my wife?”

  “I don’t know,” she said slowly, fiddling with her wineglass. “It’s all been so fast and—well, I don’t know what to think.”

  “I’m relieved enough for both of us,” he admitted. “You’re mine now, and I swear to take good care of you.”

  She was watching his mouth as he spoke; then she looked down at his strong hands, at the moment underemployed with serving her carrots, and imagined how it would feel to have his hands on her—

  Knight stilled. “Stop looking at me like that or I’ll fling you between the plate of roast hare and the bowl of scalloped oysters and have my way with you.”

  “That’s an odd way of saying it,” Lily said, trying to wipe the look—whatever it was—from her face.

  “You’re right. It’s probably more accurate to say that you, my dear, will have your way with my poor body.” That hungry look was back for a moment, and Knight groaned. “Here,” he said and set her plate before her.

  “Mimms has done marvelously.”

  When Knight settled into his chair, he smiled at her and said, “Do you think you can eat something? Just twelve bites, Lily. You’ll need your strength.”