With one hand, Mr. Cardiff reached behind him and nudged her more fully behind him so she was well hidden from his brother’s view. “Go back inside, Niall.”
“Do you really expect me to ignore what I just saw?”
“I expect you to do what is best for the lady’s honor. She came out to help with birthing the kittens. I came to help her when she hadn’t returned soon enough. Nothing more. Nothing untoward has happened.”
Emma tugged the silk sleeve again, and finally it moved into place. She was mussed, certainly, but not really much more than anyone would expect from her. Especially if they believed she’d been out near the stables helping to birth kittens, or any number of the other things she so often indulged in.
Lord Trenowyth hefted a sigh. “I wish I thought anyone would believe that, anyone at all, but everyone in that drawing room saw how you two were looking at one another all evening.”
In the stillness of the night, the soft tread of his footsteps echoed like the closing of a tomb. Each step brought him closer to delivering a sentence—Emma could feel it all the way to her bones—the very sentence that would seal her fate. She fought down her panic, tucked the hair that had escaped its knot behind her ear, and moved to stand beside Mr. Cardiff.
Now was not the time to attempt to hide. They’d already been discovered, so it wouldn’t serve any purpose.
Lord Trenowyth passed his gaze solemnly over her and then pressed his lips together in a tight line, like a disapproving papa. “I do sincerely apologize, Miss Hathaway, but I’m afraid both you and my brother are fully aware of what must be done.”
What must be done? She shook her head, as though such a simple action might possibly alter what his words implied.
“There’s no reason we have to marry, Niall.” Such a horrified tone carried in Mr. Cardiff’s voice, a gasp escaped Emma’s lips.
She jumped back slightly. He hated her. He had always hated her, and he always would, and he certainly did not want to spend the rest of his life married to her. She ought to have trusted her initial instincts, not allowed herself to be fooled by overheated emotion. There was no need or love on his part. Merely lust.
She couldn’t bear to spend her life tied irrevocably to a man who so plainly loathed her mere presence. She shook her head but before she could speak, Lord Trenowyth moved closer to them.
“There’s every reason. Every reason in the world.” He crossed his arms over his chest and leveled his brother with a commanding stare. “If you don’t marry her, she’s ruined. Do you really think Burington will ever forgive you for such a thing? Do you think Morgan would forgive you? Miss Hathaway is one of her dearest friends in this world.”
“She doesn’t have to be ruined if you don’t say anything,” Mr. Cardiff nearly shouted. He dragged a hand through his hair, glaring at his brother. “If it stays between the three of us, no one will know. Not Burington. Not Morgan. Not any one of those blasted people in the drawing room who can’t mind their own matters to save their lives.”
“The whole house will know soon enough if you keep shouting like that,” the earl shot back. “For that matter, half the countryside is probably well aware of the fact that you’ve compromised Miss Hathaway right this very moment.”
“If you would have just stayed inside—”
Lord Trenowyth advanced on Mr. Cardiff and poked a finger into his chest. “Stayed inside? You can’t think to blame this on me, Aidan. I came after you because you’re my brother, and I thought it would be better if I were to find you than—”
“Than who?”
“Better than me.”
When David came around the corner of the house, his sandy-brown hair shining in the moonlight like a beacon and disappointment etched into his brow, Emma couldn’t stop the tears from pooling in her eyes.
How had this happened? How had she allowed it to happen? It was devastating enough that Lord Trenowyth had found them, but with him, there was a possibility he might agree to his brother’s suggestion. But David…David would never let something like this pass.
“David,” she started, but her words were hardly more than a blubbering, gibberish sort of sound coming through her tears.
“You’ll make this right, Aidan,” David said, ignoring Emma’s protestations. “You were warned what would happen if you mistreated my wife’s sister in my home, and yet you have done worse than I ever would have imagined.”
“Which is precisely why I can’t marry her,” Mr. Cardiff growled. “Do you really want your sister-in-law to be subjected to me for the rest of her life?”
“Oh, no you don’t.” David’s eyes narrowed to slits as he advanced toward Mr. Cardiff. “You don’t get to escape this one.” His hands were fisting at his sides, his jaw hard and unyielding.
Emma had never seen him so angry before, with veins bulging in his throat and violence in his eyes. He had such intent purpose in his stride, she feared he might actually rip Mr. Cardiff’s head from his shoulders. She couldn’t allow that to happen, not on her account, so she stepped between the two men and put out her hands as though she could stop David’s intent.
“Let him,” Mr. Cardiff spat out. He took her by the arm and forcibly moved her out of the way before closing some of the distance himself.
They were going to come to blows, if something didn’t stop them…or someone. Emma tried to move between the two men at the same time as Lord Trenowyth attempted to do the same, but it was no good.
But instead of either of them landing a blow upon the other, David put a hand around Mr. Cardiff’s throat and nearly lifted him from his feet.
Emma took half a step forward, nearly stumbling from the tears blurring her vision. “Put him down,” she begged. Her voice cracked, more of a warble than anything.
“You’ll marry her. You’ll marry her so she’s not subject to public censure, but then you’ll leave her here with me and Vanessa so we can protect her from you.”
Emma shook her head. She didn’t want to love the man who would be her husband until he was her husband, but she did want to love her husband eventually. The thought of being married to a man whom she would never see? She couldn’t even fathom such a thing. As ridiculous as it seemed, the thought of being kept away from Mr. Cardiff—or rather of him being kept from her—left a hollow feeling in her gut, stinging like an open wound.
“No,” she said, but none of the men heard her. She swallowed, but her tongue felt too large for her mouth. After trying to swallow again, she cleared her throat to repeat herself, but nothing came out.
“No,” Lord Trenowyth put in, and Emma’s gaze shot to him. “The censure of such an arrangement will be almost as bad as if he weren’t to marry her at all. Miss Hathaway deserves a better fate than that. After all she’s done for Morgan…”
“Yes.” David released his grip on Mr. Cardiff’s throat and gave a curt nod. “What would you suggest then?”
Mr. Cardiff massaged his throat, his eyes mere slits which never left David.
“My brother will marry her, and she will come to live with my family. Then at least it will appear they have a normal marriage. Morgan and I can—”
“Protect her from me?” Mr. Cardiff drawled. He straightened his coat and neck cloth, smoothing his hands over the superfine fabric, but it did little good. Emma could well imagine her gown was in a similar state, which caused her to blush.
“Precisely,” his brother answered.
Mr. Cardiff tossed his hands in the air, but the other two men eyed one another thoughtfully.
“That could work,” David mused aloud. “To the outside world it would appear they were perfectly content together.”
“But we will not be perfectly content together,” Mr. Cardiff shouted, then winced and returned his hand to his neck, “because we won’t be marrying.”
Lord Trenowyth turned on his brother. “You will.”
“Or you’ll answer to me at dawn,” David added.
“This is outside of enough.” Emma c
ouldn’t stand there and listen to any more of their arguments without having her voice heard. She stepped forward into the middle of them, planted her feet firmly into the ground, and put her hands on her hips. “He will not, and we won’t be marrying, because I won’t have him.”
It took every ounce of fortitude she possessed to keep from blanching at the brief flash of pain that swept through Mr. Cardiff’s eyes. But she swallowed hard, steeled her spine, and managed it somehow.
David took her hand, his gaze filled with compassion. “Emma, you don’t really have a choice. And you did come here to find a husband, didn’t you?”
Vanessa had told him that? She must have, or how else would he have known? Every moment she didn’t spend with Morgan and Serena, she was with Sir Henry and Kingley. Emma pressed her eyes closed, saying a silent prayer for an excuse they would accept to come to mind.
Her prayers were in vain. “I did, but—”
“Excellent,” Lord Trenowyth said. “We’ll announce your betrothal to the party tomorrow then.”
“We’ll do nothing of the sort, since I haven’t agreed to anything,” Mr. Cardiff said.
“But you will.” David’s hand clenched over Emma’s, almost hard enough for it to hurt, then released. “You will, and you’ll be happy about it tomorrow when we make the announcement. After that you’ll never again do anything to harm my wife’s sister.” Then he looked down to where their hands were joined. “I’m sorry, Emma. This isn’t what Vanessa and I wanted for you, but…”
Mr. Cardiff spun around to go back to the house. “But I’ve left her with no other choice,” he spat out over his shoulder. After standing still for a moment, he turned to face Emma. For the first time in their acquaintance, he seemed almost apologetic. And broken, just as he’d claimed to be. “They’re right. I’ve left you with no other choice. As much as you and I both hate the thought of it, you have to marry me.”
Then he spun again and stalked back into the house, grumbling beneath his breath the whole way.
Dragging a hand down over his face, Lord Trenowyth sighed. “I must apologize for my brother, Miss Hathaway. I promise you, this is all for the best. It will be all right.”
For the best. All right. Those words bounced around in her mind, but none of them felt like they would settle and become reality. She nodded for the earl’s benefit, and he left her alone with David.
“Will it really?” she asked him, though she knew he couldn’t possibly answer her question. Not with the truth, at least.
None of them could foretell the future.
He stared at the empty space where Mr. Cardiff had disappeared moments before. “At least, if you marry him, you can keep your parents from worrying.”
“True. But then you and Vanessa will worry in their stead.” She made her way across the lawn to go back inside, her tears now falling freely down her cheeks. David started to follow her, but she stayed him with a hand.
Once she was out of his sight, she bent at the waist and cast up the contents of her stomach in a hedge.
Emma waited until the worst had passed, then made her way up to her chamber alone, unable to stop her body from shaking.
As the houseguests all filed out of the breakfast room the next morning, Emma left Morgan and Serena to seek out Sir Henry. She found him standing by the great Bornholm clock in the front foyer, deep in conversation with Lord Jacob and Mr. Deering.
Emma briefly caught Sir Henry’s notice. After he nodded in acknowledgement, a question in his gaze, she stood off to the side in the corridor pretending to study a painting of a garden. Such an inane thing to be doing, when her thoughts wouldn’t slow down for long enough for her to examine even the frame. A moment later, he was by her side and the other two gentlemen had moved on to some other diversion.
“Exquisite detail in the rose bushes, isn’t there?” he said amiably, then lifted his hand to run along the side and point out a particular area. “I quite like the use of yellow just here. You can almost feel the warmth of the sun.”
She smiled, though she didn’t feel even remotely like being happy. What she was about to do was hardly something she could feel joyful about…and yet, it must be done. “I could use a bit of the sun’s warmth, myself.”
“Shall we go out to see to Kingley, then?” Without waiting for her answer, Sir Henry turned and offered his arm. “I’m certain he would be glad to begin today’s lessons. He’s doing so well, now that he has a purpose and plenty of affection.”
If she went along with him, it would give them a bit of time to themselves, and it shouldn’t arouse anyone’s suspicions about their activities. Not like last night when Mr. Cardiff had followed her out.
So she took his arm. He led her out to the lawn, and Kingley came running to them almost as soon as they were outside.
After they spent a moment scratching him behind the ears, Sir Henry took up Kingley’s lead. “So, Miss Hathaway, what has brought us out here so early?”
She stumbled from his directness but regained her footing and kept going. Before answering, she looked back over her shoulder to be certain no one was within earshot of them. This was not the sort of conversation she had any desire to have overheard, not even by Morgan and Serena, or by Vanessa.
Sir Henry deserved at least that much consideration.
“There is to be an announcement this afternoon,” she finally said when she was certain they were alone.
He squinted off into the distance. “Of Lord Muldaire’s betrothal to Miss Weston? Yes, I know.”
Emma stumbled again. “Miss Weston?” Of course, Serena’s father had been pushing her toward Muldaire, but Emma had thought that he would change his mind once he saw the level of affection his daughter held for Lord Trenowyth.
And Serena hadn’t mentioned a word of it this morning at breakfast. How very odd. But then, perhaps they’d all been caught up in Emma’s news about her own betrothal.
Sir Henry faced her. “That’s not…? There is to be a different announcement then?”
Emma’s mouth felt parched, no matter how many times she attempted to swallow. “Yes,” she murmured. She really ought to look him in the eye. It would only be right. But every time she attempted to turn her face upward, he was staring at her with such ardor it was impossible to continue looking upon him.
Hurting him had never been her intention, and yet she couldn’t see any way around that eventuality.
He shook his head and a small smile stole over his face—not a smile of a man who was content, but more the smile of a man who dreaded what he was about to hear. Bother and blast. “Go on,” he said when still she hadn’t begun to speak.
Steeling herself, Emma took a breath and then the words rushed out of her mouth. “I am so very sorry, Sir Henry, but they are to announce my betrothal to another gentleman, and I never wanted to cause you pain or give you the wrong impression about a possible connection between you and me, but I fear that it has happened anyway. I do not know what I could ever do to make it all right. No, I’m certain there’s nothing I can do to make any of this all right, because I did give you the wrong impression. I allowed you to think there could possibly be a future between us, and it was very badly done of me to do so.”
When finally she stopped to take a breath, she chanced a glance up to gauge Sir Henry’s reaction. Instead of anger or scorn, she found stunned apprehension in his gaze.
“Please tell me you haven’t accepted Cardiff.”
She stopped breathing abruptly. “You know?”
The baronet gave Kingley a gentle tug on the lead, and the two of them stopped beside her. He turned his pained eyes fully upon her. “Of course I know Mr. Cardiff has been trying—he’s been trying to catch you alone in some way, to compromise you, though I don’t know what his aim might be in doing so. Everyone here knows. We’ve all seen the way he watches you, the way he follows you.”
Emma took a step back, blinking rapidly. Was that his plan? Had Mr. Cardiff been intentionally attempting to rui
n her, as his final retribution for her perceived faults?
True, Mr. Cardiff was capable of just such treachery and worse. Emma had no reason to doubt that, and she had every reason in the world to believe it. Yet she wanted—almost desperately so—to believe anything else. Her stomach clenched in knots.
But why did she want to believe better of him? He had compromised her. He had trapped her into marriage. He had acted dishonorably toward her more times than she could count, and had seemingly made it his sole purpose during David and Vanessa’s house party to be alone with her when he shouldn’t. There was no reason at all to believe he wouldn’t jilt her, leaving her as thoroughly and utterly compromised as she could possibly be.
Nonetheless, there was the matter of his words before they’d been lost in their lust. He claimed he could no longer hate her even though he’d tried. Granted, that was no grand declaration of his undying affection and devotion. But if he no longer hated her, why would he blatantly and purposefully try to ruin her? She’d thought that what they shared had been genuine for him, as it had been for her…but was it truly only lust on Mr. Cardiff’s part? Was he as cold and calculated as Sir Henry would have her believe?
“But—”
“Has he finally done it, then? Has he done something to trap you?” Sir Henry reached out a hand as though to offer a consoling touch, but Emma evaded it. “Please, Miss Hathaway. Please don’t go through with this. Don’t marry him. Don’t announce anything—at least not anything related to Mr. Cardiff.”
Her mouth fell open, but for long moments nothing came out. A thousand thoughts raced through her mind. “I appreciate your concern, Sir Henry, but—”
“Marry me. Marry me instead of him.” He dropped to one knee before her and took one of her hands in his, despite her startled gasp. “Even if he has compromised you, I can give you a comfortable life. I would not see you suffer at his hand, Miss Hathaway, not when you could avoid such a fate with me.” His thumb traced an absentminded path over the back of her gloved hand.” My estate is worth a thousand pounds a year, which is modest but still more than respectable. My hounds account for a larger income each year than the year before, and I expect that business to be worth another five hundred pounds a year or more within the next five years. I know you do not feel such ardor for me as I do for you, but I believe that can come later. You can grow to love me.”
Cardiff Siblings 01 - Seven Minutes in Devon Page 19
