by Ruthie Knox
“I’m afraid I don’t understand,” Richard said. “What’s this about terms?”
“Sorry, Father,” Winston answered. “It was an internal matter. The board members agreed to offer Neville the promotion, but only if he would marry. We felt a married man would be better suited to the demands of the position.”
Richard had stepped away from the bank six years earlier, saying he wanted to give Winston an opportunity to run things. He was well out of the loop now, but far from ignorant about bank procedures. “That’s … unusual,” he said. “And you’re saying your brother married simply to— Nev, is that right?”
“It’s true the board made me the offer, but that’s not why I married Cath. The timing is a coincidence.” He wanted his father to understand, but even as he said the words, he knew the protest was pointless. Dad couldn’t possibly believe him after what Winston had just said, and even if he did, it would become obvious soon enough that the marriage was a fraud, and that the entire purpose of the ruse had been to manipulate the board into promoting him and strong-arming his father into making the donation Cath needed.
Christ. Viewed from that perspective, it was a thoroughly despicable plan.
“Of course it’s a coincidence,” Winston said, his false, cheerful tone exactly the one Mother used. “Fantastically good timing. Come to think of it, you’d met Cath even before you knew about the offer, hadn’t you? She was at your flat the day I came over to speak with you. It looked like the two of you were already fairly well acquainted.” His smirk spoke volumes, and Nev had to close his eyes for a moment to stem the tide of rage moving through him in response to his brother’s casual lechery. He downed the remainder of his drink in one swallow, holding his breath as the slug burned down his throat.
“Watch it,” he said after he’d regained command of himself. “You’re talking about my wife.”
“Oh, I know exactly who I’m talking about. The question is, do you?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Only that I wonder how much you know about this girl you’ve married. You’ve had so little time to get acquainted, and she is an American. Rather an unknown quantity, I should think. I just hope you haven’t gone and done something we’ll all have cause to regret.”
“That’s enough, Winston,” Richard said. Disapproval had replaced confusion as the predominant emotion furrowing his forehead. “It seems I’ve been left in the dark here, but I certainly hope I know enough to recognize when you’ve stepped over the line. Cath is your brother’s wife, and you’ll speak of her with respect, or I’ll ask you to leave.”
“Thank you,” Nev said. “But I think I’d better be the one to leave at present. I’m anxious to get back to Cath.”
He deposited his glass on a side table with a satisfying thud and stalked out of the room.
He’d find Cath. First, though, he needed to take a walk and calm the hell down.
She’d managed to make a friend. The friend in question was thirteen years old and wearing too much eyeliner, but Cath was in no position to be choosy.
All it had taken was one question—“Is that an iPod?”—followed by a lot of attentive listening as Winston’s daughter, Beatrice, launched into a dissertation on her favorite music, scrolling through the menus on her music player and favoring Cath with twenty-second snatches of various songs and even videos. Cath had made appropriate noises about the brilliance of this artist and the worthlessness of that one, and Beatrice was all hers.
She was glad for the company. Nev had abandoned her to the drawing room, leaving her to fend for herself against his terrifying mother, his sullen niece, and Rosemary, the cardboard cutout who functioned as Winston’s wife. After the horrors of dinner—silverware she barely recognized, which she’d had to try to sort out while on the receiving end of history’s politest inquisition—she’d been ready to take a bow and go to bed. Or at least break out the grappa and start swapping embarrassing stories, the way her family did after a big meal. But no, the Chamberlains had an honest-to-God drawing room, and the women retired there after dinner while the men went off to drink in the library, and Cath had simply had no idea, no idea this sort of thing hadn’t died with Queen Victoria. All they needed was a bottle of good Madeira, and the illusion that she’d stepped directly into 1865 would be complete.
Enter Evita, with a tray that carried what appeared to be a bottle of port and three glasses. Cath attempted to cover up her snort of surprised delight with a fake cough, but she could tell from Evita’s frown that she hadn’t entirely succeeded.
Port! Nev really ought to have warned her. It was too much.
She’d left her wine untouched at dinner, afraid to let her guard down. Evita wouldn’t hear of her declining the port, however, so Cath accepted a glass and set it on the table next to her. She kept her attention on Beatrice, who was now talking about all the places in America she wanted to visit.
“You’ve been to Vegas, yeah? What was it like? Did you see any strippers? I heard you can take classes to learn how to be a stripper. They give you a stripper name and everything. My stripper name would be Aurora Dawn. Or maybe Queen Bea, I can’t decide. What’s yours?”
“Ruby Tuesday,” she said, because Evita was listening, and Cath wanted to see if she could get a reaction out of her. No dice. It would take more than a stripper name to rattle Cruella. She was a pro.
While Beatrice blathered on about school and boys and where her more fortunate friends had gone for the bank holiday, Evita kept glancing at Cath’s glass. Finally, she asked, “How do you like the port, Cath? It’s one of my favorites.”
This was Cath’s cue to take a sip, but nah. She’d never gotten her rocks off letting other people boss her around. “I’ve decided not to have any. Thanks, though.”
“Oh, you must have a taste. It’s a very unusual port, and I only bring it out for special occasions. Rosemary likes it very much, don’t you, darling?”
“It’s lovely,” Rosemary said obediently.
“No, thanks,” Cath said again, hoping Evita would drop it.
She did, abruptly changing the subject. “It’s such a treat to have Beatrice here for the weekend. Grandchildren are such a joy. Do you and Neville plan to start a family soon?”
Evita’s gaze flicked once again to the port, and the penny finally dropped. Not such an abrupt change of subject after all. The port was a test. Evita was trying to figure out if Cath was pregnant.
Of course she would think that. Why else would someone like Nev marry a woman like her? So much for deceiving the Dragon Lady. You could take the mobbed-up Italian Catholic out of Chicago, but you couldn’t pass her off as the sort of girl who wore giant hats to polo matches and sipped port in the drawing room. Not even if you put her in the world’s most boring black cap-sleeved dress.
She needed to answer Evita’s question, but she wasn’t sure whether to address the actual question or one of the implied ones. Are you knocked up? Are you a gold digger who’s after my son’s money? Are you good enough for Neville?
At least she knew the answers. No, no, and no.
She’d botched her one chance at motherhood a long time ago, right around the time she’d set fire to the only shot at love-and-marriage she ever planned to take. What was she supposed to tell Evita? The last time I tried to have a baby, it didn’t go so well? I’ve ruined every relationship I’ve ever been a part of, and it’s only a matter of time before I ruin this one?
I love your son too much to marry him?
But she couldn’t say that. As far as Evita was concerned, Cath and Nev were already married, most likely because Cath carried the Royal Offspring in her low-class womb.
Surprise! No toddler with Nev’s blond hair and green eyes. No womb, in fact. But I’ve got this lovely new wardrobe from Harrods as a consolation prize.
When she opened her mouth to speak, the bland words she’d lined up got stuck behind the painful lump in her throat.
Thank God, Nev showed up just then in the door
way. “I think I’ll steal Cath away now, Mother, if you don’t have any objection. It’s been a long day for both of us.”
Cath blinked back her tears and rose immediately. “Thank you for the lovely dinner, Evita,” she managed to say, pleased to find that her voice only shook a little. “I’ll look forward to talking with you more tomorrow.”
Nev took care of the rest of the polite good nights and steered her quickly from the room.
They didn’t say much as they prepared for bed. Nev’s shoulders were tense, and Cath wondered what had been going on in the library.
Never a dull moment with the Chamberlains.
He’d bought her a nightgown, but she slid between the sheets naked, craving the comfort of his skin against hers. Nev turned out the light and did the same, wrapping one arm around her and pulling her into the curve of his body.
“I’m sorry I left you alone with her,” he said quietly. “I shouldn’t have done.”
“It’s okay.” She paused. “It’s just, uh, she thinks I’m pregnant.”
Cath was grateful she couldn’t see his face. She didn’t want to know if he found the idea amusing or appalling. Or if it pleased him. She didn’t want to know.
He didn’t say anything, but his hand dropped to her stomach, and the warmth helped a little. It wasn’t the end of the world, that she couldn’t have a baby. Sometimes it felt like it, but it wasn’t the end of the world.
She sniffled, and Nev’s arm tightened around her.
“When I was at school, I hated the bank holidays,” he said after a while. “I hated all the holidays. I dreaded having to come here to see my family. I felt terrible about it, because I knew I ought to look forward to it. I ought to like them. But they didn’t make it easy. My mother would spend the entire holiday discovering my most recent faults and nagging me to correct them. Winston was so much older, I admired him terribly, and he’d take advantage, flattering me whenever he wanted me to do something and then ignoring me or, if he got bored, teasing me until I lost my temper.
“The only one whose company I enjoyed was Dad. He would take me out with him to paint. He likes to do landscapes, and he would put me in charge of setting up the easel as he sketched, choosing and mixing the colors for him. It was my favorite thing.”
Where his hand wrapped around her rib cage, she’d covered it with her own, and it rose and fell with every breath she took. There was so much power in his body, it pained her to think of him young and vulnerable.
“I suppose Mother loves me in her fashion, but she wants me to be someone in particular, a son who’s never existed except in her own mind. When I was younger, I wanted that, too, because I thought she would love me better if I could just manage not to disappoint her.”
Cath shut her eyes in the dark, not wanting to have to think about what he was telling her. They had something in common after all. She’d always thought if she’d tried harder to be good, she might have won her mother’s approval. But Nev was wonderful, and he’d tried, and it hadn’t worked for him. Maybe it wouldn’t have worked for her, either.
His lips brushed the side of her neck, and she snuggled closer in response. Breathing with him.
“When I went off to university, I made a lot of resolutions. I’d stop visiting Leyton on the holidays. I’d make a serious study of art. I’d become independent, do whatever I wanted. But I couldn’t stick to it. I spent one holiday alone and missed my horrid family. Even Winston, the bastard. So I visited, and I let my mother pressure me into taking my art less seriously, and I ended up going to work at the bank. The only thing I’ve done on my own is buy the flat, actually. And fall in love with you.”
Burrowing against him, she let his words sink in slowly, like whiskey on her tongue. He loved her. The warmth bloomed inside her chest. It felt good, but she couldn’t trust herself with it. Drink too much, and she’d lose her head.
She didn’t deserve Nev’s love. She’d been waiting for him to figure that out, but now she understood he might not. She was the weapon he’d chosen to wage a very civil war against his family. She and Nev had been playing house in Greenwich, falling in love for all the wrong reasons. Her because she could never resist the lure of a big, messy mistake, not when it came packaged with passion and fun and the potential for heartache. Him because being with her allowed him to thumb his nose at his mother without actually taking any risks. He didn’t have the guts to be a black sheep. She didn’t have the willpower not to.
They brought out the worst in each other. No wonder it felt so good.
“I had a baby,” she said. “I called her Wren.”
The words came out effortlessly, as if she’d already told him weeks ago, making this declaration a mere formality.
He pulled her closer. “The tattoo?”
“Mmm-hmm. She didn’t live. I never saw her. I never even gave her a real name. But I had her, for a while.”
“I’m sure she was beautiful.”
She took a deep breath, then let it out. Let all of it out. “That’s why I can’t get pregnant. Because of how she was born. I had this thing where the placenta detaches, and I needed an emergency C-section. They couldn’t get the bleeding to stop. I bled and bled, and finally they had to do a hysterectomy to save my life.”
Nev leaned forward and kissed her temple.
She wondered if she ought to tell him the rest of the story. Would he want to know about Jimmy? About the dark months afterward, when she could hardly stand the sound of her own breathing? Would he want to know what a mess she’d made of everything?
Maybe he would. But what was the point? When they got back to Greenwich, she would end it. He needed to find someone better suited to him, someone who could commit and mean it. A wife with long, straight hair and linen trouser suits who could have his children and sip tea in the parlor with his mother. Cath couldn’t be that woman. She could only be who her past had made her.
But at least she’d learned something from him. She knew the difference now between infatuation and love. Their love was a mistake, but it was real. She loved him more than she’d ever loved anyone else.
She turned in his arms, putting them face-to-face in the blackness. “Kiss me.”
He cradled her head in his hand as he brought his lips to hers, smoothing the other hand down her back to rest at her tailbone, where her daughter spread her wings. There was no urgency in his mouth, but their bodies touched in a dozen places, and all of them ignited.
Her fingertips didn’t need the light to find their way along the familiar path to his shoulder blades, down the column of his spine, tracing the shape of his collarbone, seeking out the hollow of his throat. She knew this body. She loved this man.
They breathed together, moved together, skin sliding over skin that soon became slick and hot and combustible. Everything was the same, but it wasn’t. Each time his mouth met hers, in every movement of his hands, she could feel it. He loved her. He’d loved her for a long time. Maybe from the beginning.
Knowing that what they had was a mistake didn’t make it any less real or any less beautiful.
Cath spread her legs and pressed her hips up, inviting him in. Patiently, he kissed her neck, her throat. His hands wandered, fingers lingering at her nipples and catching on her hipbones. Cupping her breasts. Counting her ribs. Slowly, thoroughly, he claimed every inch of her, branding her with lips, tongue, palms. Mine.
When she could no longer stand it, she took him in her hand and guided him between her legs. “Please, Nev.”
Poised at her entrance, he paused to kiss her again. Then he moved into her with torturous languor, a protracted possession that stole her breath and her reason. She gasped against his lips, arched into him, and heard him say her name.
Tears filled her eyes and spilled over. Nev interlaced his fingers with hers and raised her arms over her head. The rings he’d given her bit into the soft skin between her fingers. They weren’t lies but promises, however silently made. He wanted to keep her. She wanted to let h
im. They both wanted for the wrong reasons.
Joined at hands, chest, hips, she could feel his heartbeat, fast and steady, the power he held in check, the banked desire as he waited. She raised her knees, seating him deeper, and wrapped her legs around him.
Still, he didn’t move. He kissed behind her ear, her shoulder. He kissed her cheekbone and found it wet.
“You’re crying, love.”
“It’s okay. It’s perfect, actually. You’re perfect. I’m just a little … overwhelmed. Happy. Terrified.”
“Shall I stop?”
“Absolutely not.”
She felt him smile in the dark. “I wish I could see you,” he said.
“You know what I look like.”
“I do. My beautiful Mary Catherine.”
He kissed her again, long, lingering, his mouth making confessions, his fingers gripping hers tight.
Finally, finally he began to move, and then she couldn’t have talked, couldn’t have stopped for anything. Each time he pulled out, she went a little crazy with the need to have him back inside her. She strained against him, digging her heels in, chasing him with her hips. Frenzied.
He soon gave in to her urgency, moving faster, pushing harder until they were crashing into each other. Nev let go of her hands to bury his palms underneath her, seeking to bring her closer, to make them one.
They lost themselves and fell apart, each safe in the other’s arms. For now.
Chapter Sixteen
Loud as gunshots against the marble floor, Evita’s heels announced her arrival long before she came into view. Nev had been giving Cath a tour of the house, but they’d only made it through one wing—much of it empty rooms full of painfully beautiful furniture under drop cloths—when his mother showed up and asked if she could “steal Neville away for just a moment.”
He dropped a kiss on Cath’s lips. “You can find your way round, can’t you, love?”
She nodded and watched them go, noticing for the first time the similarity in the way they moved. They had the same confidence. Mother and son. Who would’ve guessed?
