Never in his life had he suffered such inconstancy of feeling or such confusing thoughts. There were so many parts to this tangle, and Patience seemed to be in the midst of all of it. Very likely he would gain nothing from this but a broken heart, but he could not bring himself to draw back from it.
When all was still and the house dark, Stanton turned from his thoughtful watch over the garden and went back into the drawing room where he took down the note. He opened it and read through it, shaking his head over it.
After his conversation with Aston about the note, it was clear he had no notion that the note had been given to Patience or that she had developed an attachment to him. If only it had found its way into the right hands, Patience may never have felt more than a passing fancy for Lord Aston. How differently these past days might have gone.
What a cruel mistress fate could be.
Chapter Fifteen
The only thing that allowed Patience to go to sleep was the promise of a ride when morning came. However, she awoke to darkness and an ominous roll of thunder.
“No. Not today,” she said, throwing the covers back and running over to the window. She looked out on a grey world and could only dimly see the trees beyond her window. Their branches tossed in a fierce wind, and moments later, the world lit with a furious bolt of lightning.
Gasping, she stepped back, her pulses racing. Just then, her bedroom door opened and Dora came in.
“It’s frightful, isn’t it, miss?” Dora set about lighting candles around the room.
Patience sat back on the bed and pulled the blankets up around her to ward off the chill in the room. “Dashed inconvenient is what it is.” Today of all days, she needed Lord Stanton’s calming presence to help her make sense of everything.
“Now, miss, you’d best not speak so unladylike. You don’t want to slip in front of the company.”
“I needed to go riding, Dora.”
“Well, I’ve had a message from Lord Stanton’s man, and it seems he’s disappointed too.”
Patience sat up, interested in this piece of information. “What was the message?”
Dora chuckled. “Just as I thought, miss. Lord Stanton says as how Mother Nature took him too literally, and that he’s vastly sorry for it. He hopes you’ll go riding with him tomorrow, weather permitting, and looks forward to a day spent indoors with the ladies. Though if you ask me, there’s only one lady he wants to spend the day with.”
“As if he’ll have much chance to speak to anyone besides those Bath-water misses. The Emery sisters will not give him a moment’s peace.”
“Gentlemen don’t like to be chased.”
Remembering what had occurred in the garden the night before, Patience thought Dora must be wrong. Lord Aston had certainly seemed to enjoy being chased by her cousin. If only she could throw that stupid love letter back in his charming, philandering face. But it was still sitting on the mantle in the drawing room where it mocked her every time she entered the room.
Well? Why couldn’t she go and get it now? “Dora, I need to get dressed.”
“But, miss, hardly anyone is awake. You don’t want to go downstairs by yourself.”
“I most certainly do.”
Dora performed her duties, helping Patience to dress and arrange her hair, but she grumbled the entire time. Patience ignored her, not wanting to tell Dora the reason she was so insistent.
Slipping on a shawl to ward off the coolness of the morning, Patience stepped out of her room. Feeling a bit as if she was the heroine in a gothic romance, she glanced both ways down the dim corridor to make sure no one was about to see her. Reassured, she ran to the stairs, glad the thick carpeting muffled her footsteps.
Keeping a wary eye on the grand hall below and listening carefully for sounds of anyone approaching, she hurried down the stairs and into the drawing room. Inside, it was difficult to see, since so little light came from the distant windows. Fortunately, the mantle was made of luminous white marble so she was able to make her way to it even in the gloom.
A rumble of thunder sounded from beyond the windows, making her jump. This adventure lacked only a ghost or a highwayman to make it truly thrilling.
It took a bit of careful searching with her fingers to find the note, but at last she did. An odd sense of relief settled within her and anticipation for the moment she confronted Lord Aston and showed him how very little she cared for his inconstancy.
She tucked it into the bodice of her dress and made her way through the drawing room. She stubbed her toe on an inconsiderately placed chair, but otherwise encountered no difficulty. But as she re-entered the hall, she wondered what to do next. Surely it would take time to find an opportunity to return Lord Aston’s note to him, since doing so in the manner he deserved would require some amount of privacy.
There was nothing else to do but go in search of a cup of tea and some breakfast. It seemed a sadly flat way to end the scene, but after all, this was real life and not one of Mrs. Radcliffe’s novels.
The breakfast room was empty, most of the guests not having risen yet. Unsure if the solitude relieved or disappointed her, she rang for a servant and seated herself at the table.
The butler came in then and did not betray by so much as a twitch of his bushy eyebrows that he was surprised to be serving anyone so early, much less a young lady whom he expected to still be bundled up in her bed. “What can I get for you, miss?”
“Tea, please. And I find that I am quite hungry this morning, so whatever is available will be most welcomed.”
“I believe Cook has just taken some berry tarts from the oven, miss.”
“Thank you, that would be splendid.”
Within minutes, the butler had placed a pot of tea in front of her and a footman had set her place with Lake Blakemore’s second-best china. When the butler also brought her the still-warm tart, she decided that this a very good way to pass the time after all. She rather liked having the table to herself with no one to distract her from her breakfast.
“Well, what have we here? It appears there is a mouse in the breakfast room as well.”
Surprised, Patience looked up and saw Lord Aston strolling into the room. He looked, she thought, much the worse for wear, especially considering he still wore his evening clothes from the night before. Dark circles smudged the skin under his eyes, and strain showed in fine lines around his sculpted mouth. He also stepped slowly, as if each step jarred some unseen pain.
When the butler came up to him, Lord Aston waved a white hand at him. “Some ale, please. Nothing else.”
As he sat down opposite her, Patience took a sip of her tea. Here was her chance to have it out with him. “I believe you called me a rat last night, not a mouse.”
“Did I? How coarse of me. A charming creature such as yourself should only be compared to songbirds and butterflies.”
Patience eyed him for a moment and then burst out laughing.
“You find my compliment amusing?”
Controlling her laughter, she said, “I am sorry, but I never before understood how perfectly ridiculous you are.”
Lord Aston straightened his languid posture and narrowed his eyes at her. “Perhaps I should have called you a cat.”
Patience looked curiously at him, surprised that his words had so little effect on her. Only yesterday, they would have wounded her past bearing. “I suppose I should regard what you say now as little as I regard all the commonplace flattery and words of love in the letter you wrote me.”
There was a long silence while Aston studied her. She could see that his mind was turning, puzzling over what she had said, but surely her words had been clear enough.
When he spoke at last, his words were oddly punctuated as if he were choosing each with care. “I do not remember precisely what I wrote you, but I am confident that any compliments I offered were far from commonplace.”
Annoyed, Patience stood and walked around the table, her skirts swirling as if caught by the wind. She reached
into her bodice and pulled out the note. “Perhaps we should study it together and decide the merit of each point.”
Lord Aston took the note from her and held it loosely in his long, white fingers. “So sweetly warmed. How fortunate a resting place my humble note has found. I have never before envied a scrap of paper.”
Patience pressed her lips together as her cheeks flushed with color but she refused to let him bait her. “I only want to ask you one question, Lord Aston. Could you not have sought an heiress from some other family? Did you not think it in poor taste to pursue my cousin?”
“My lovely girl. I never think it in poor taste to pursue anything I want.”
The way he looked at her then, the glint in his eyes daring her to press him further, sent her running from the room. As she reached the top of the stairs and turned toward the hall that led to her bedchamber, she brushed against someone. With her eyes on the floor, she did not know who. Then strong hands gripped her shoulders.
“Miss Wendover, what has happened?”
She looked up to find Lord Stanton’s concerned eyes upon her, sweeping over her as if he might determine what caused her distress. All at once he looked so safe, so steady, so protective that she leaned into him. “I…” But she couldn’t form her thoughts into words.
He stepped back a pace from her and looked around. “Come with me.”
In a daze, she allowed him to lead her into a small, seldom-used sitting room. The room was dark, so Patience only walked a few feet into it before stopping.
Thunder rolled outside as if the whole sky would fall down. A flash of lightening showed through a gap in the heavy draperies. She heard the sound of the door closing, and then Lord Stanton walked past her, his arm brushing hers. “Stay where you are a moment.”
She could make out nothing further until he flung the drapes open wide. Amazingly, there was now enough light to see by, though it was faint and grey. Lord Stanton returned to her, taking her hand and leading her to sit in the window seat. He sat beside her and possessed himself of her hands.
“I do not want to light a candle lest someone see the light and find us here. We must be careful, but I must know what has occurred.”
Feeling all at once ridiculous for causing him such worry, Patience forced herself to smile. It was a weak attempt. “I am not hurt, if that is what you mean. Only shocked. I…had discourse with Lord Aston just now in the breakfast room.”
His strong hands tightened around hers. “Did he dare force his attentions upon you?”
“Oh, no. Only, it was his manner of speaking, the look in his eyes. I cannot describe it adequately.”
“I know quite well what you mean. What passed between you?”
She blushed. “When I received your message that we could not ride this morning, I thought it would be a good opportunity to retrieve the letter. And I did get it. I tucked it away for safety and went to breakfast. I was quite alone until he came in.”
“Lord Aston?”
“Yes. And—well, first I must tell you that I saw him in the garden last night…” Her throat tightened. She took a breath and continued softly, almost in a whisper, “With my cousin, Amelia. He was kissing her, though I have never before witnessed kisses like that before.” Her fingers trembled in his until he pressed his hands more fully over hers, the warmth and strength of them giving her assurance.
“Go on.”
“You may have noticed that I was rather shocked when I came back in, and that was why.”
At this point, though she longed to pour the whole story out to him, she realized quite suddenly how difficult this would become. If he had been a woman, someone with whom she was close, she might have been able to share with him how confused she had become. The way she had been jolted from girlhood naiveté, how she had felt a resentful bitterness that Lord Aston had used her so ill. But now, with Lord Stanton so close, so wholly focused on her, she understood fully for the first time why it had also been a relief to have the blinders removed from her eyes.
She looked up, letting her eyes sweep over his features, lingering on his full, masculine lips. What would it be like to be kissed by Lord Stanton the way Lord Aston had kissed Amelia? Her heart throbbed, and her pulse jumped. She could feel it buzzing in her wrists like hummingbird wings. Because she knew, with a deep intuition, that to have Lord Stanton kiss her like that would be better, sweeter, so much more…meaningful.
“Patience, take care. When you look at me like that, it tempts me beyond what I may resist.”
The sound of her name on his lips was headier even than the way his thumb caressed the back of her hand. “Lord Stanton, I want only to tell you that I am done with my former absurdity. I gave Lord Aston the letter just now, and I want nothing more to do with him.”
The moment hung between them, heavy with meaning and punctuated by the patter of raindrops on the window pain. He raised her hands to his lips and kissed them, slowly and with great tenderness. “I cannot tell you how it pleases me to hear that, but I am afraid that the matter is not yet over.”
“What do you mean?”
“I destroyed the letter last night.”
Chapter Sixteen
By three o’clock, all of the guests had settled down to a day of entertainment indoors. Stanton sat in a chair in the library with Mr. Viceroy and Lord Blakemore. He had spent the morning trying to study a book on land management, but despite his best efforts, he could not force his mind to focus on crop rotations or manure. The words on the page blurred before his eyes as he remembered the sight of Patience that morning, so close that he could see every individual eyelash framing her lovely eyes. But more than that, he remembered the softening in her expression and the quickness of her breath when their gazes had met and held.
After his doubts and frustrations and jealousies of the night before, it felt like spring sunshine warming him, dispelling the darkness, and leaving only light.
Surely he could not be mistaken that she returned his feelings. The look on her face had not been mere interest or friendly admiration. No, it was something deeper—closer to the overriding love and passion he felt for her.
Free from Aston’s shadow over them, he needed only to obliterate the threat posed by that blasted love note. If only he had not been so quick to tear it to shreds and burn it in his wash basin. Someone had made a copy—he did not yet know why—and he did not know which he had destroyed.
Mr. Viceroy stirred, drawing Stanton’s eyes to him. Not for the first time, Stanton wondered what insight the man might have into this mystery. Sitting forward, he considered how he might best approach the topic with Lord Blakemore in the room, but could think of no way to do so without introducing Patience into the conversation.
The distant thrum of the pianoforte sounded through the still house, drifting in through the open library door. The notes were so precise and yet so laden with feeling that Stanton knew at once it must be Patience. He had never before realized that a musician’s style could be so individual, but he thought he would now know Patience’s playing anywhere.
Placing his book back on the shelf where he’d found it, he left the library as if pulled along by an invisible string. His footsteps echoed in the empty hallway, so he walked more softly so as not to draw attention to himself. Pausing in the doorway to Lady Blakemore’s drawing room, his eyes went straight to the piano. As he saw Patience, his heart pounded with desire to go to her side. It was all he could do to hold himself in check.
Her eyes were closed, and her body bobbed gently with the movement of her playing. It was clear she was lost in the music her fingers created so deftly. He imagined that she might look just this way right before a kiss.
“Would you care to join us?” Lady Blakemore said, breaking through his abstraction. “We are about to have a cup of tea.”
The Countess Du’Breven chuckled. She didn’t say another word, but Stanton knew all too well that she was enjoying his lovelorn fatuity.
“No, I thank you. I was on
my way to the stables.”
His eyes returned to Patience. He could no more control them in her presence than he could his heart.
Her eyes were open now, her head tilted to the side as she regarded him. Their eyes met and held, her fingers never faltering on the keys as she drew out the last chords of the nocturne she played. When the last ringing note died away, she smiled at him. Such a small smile that he doubted anyone else could see it. It was meant for him alone. If only he could respond the way he wanted to. Instead, he bowed slightly and turned away before he might reveal himself any more to the other ladies watching him so pointedly.
As he walked away, a swell of feminine laughter followed him. There would certainly be no secret about his intentions toward Patience any longer. And as he walked toward the front door, he paused. Surely there was no better time to make sure Lord Aston knew of his intentions as well.
Instead of going to the stables, something he’d determined to do solely to provide himself with an excuse for not staying in the drawing room with the ladies, he went upstairs in search of Lord Aston’s room. A housemaid directed him to the correct door, and he knocked on it loudly enough to wake the man if he was, as Stanton suspected, sleeping off the effects of late-night drinking. When Stanton had gone down to the breakfast room to find him that morning, after Patience had slipped away to her room, the only sign he’d found of the man had been an empty ale tankard.
Stanton was on the point of knocking again when the door opened. Lord Aston appeared at the door, wearing a robe and a disgruntled expression.
“I need to speak with you.”
Lord Aston looked ready to refuse him, but turned away and left the door open for Stanton to follow him inside.
Stanton looked around the room, at the clothing dropped carelessly on the floor and the empty decanter left on the window sill. But what interested him the most was the piece of folded paper that lay on the writing desk.
To Love a Lord Page 10
