by Jo Beverley
All had been done in an effort to rid his memory of Virginia Warren.
Now there was a woman he never should have gotten involved with. Virginia spelled trouble right from the start, but he had been blinded by her sultry beauty and his own ardor.
And he would not let that happen to him again. Which was why he could not let down his guard with Colette. Especially the modern, forward-thinking, independent, and beautiful Colette. If someone like Virginia could devastate him so thoroughly, then Colette Hamilton would surely destroy him for good.
Now debating whether or not to let his presence be known, he observed the scene for a while longer, oddly enjoying Colette sitting with his father. Perhaps she sensed him, but she suddenly glanced toward the doorway and stumbled over the words on the page, losing her place. His father turned toward him and offered a lopsided half-smile.
“Good afternoon,” Lucien said.
Colette nodded at him and closed the book, directing her gaze toward her father. “I would so love to stay and continue reading with you, Lord Stancliff, but I should be going now, for it is later than I realized. I shall return again next week.”
Simon held out his hand to her and Colette took his gnarled hand in hers, smiling at him. Touched by the affection between them, Lucien muttered, “I did not mean to intrude. You may continue reading if you wish, Miss Hamilton.”
Without meeting his eyes, Colette rose from the chair and gathered her things. “I’m sorry, but I really must be going home now.”
She brushed by him as she passed through the doorway. Lucien stood immobile for a moment, gave an apologetic glance to his father, and then hurried after her. Colette had continued walking at a brisk pace along the corridor but he managed to catch up with her at the top of the staircase. Reaching out, he touched his hand to her shoulder. She paused, but still did not look at him.
“What are you doing here?” he asked softly.
Colette flinched away from him, shrugging her shoulder to avoid contact with his hand. Taking a step down the stairs, she finally looked back up at him. “I was not expecting you to be home, but I was here doing the job I agreed to do.”
What was she talking about? What job? His perplexed look annoyed her.
“Your library, remember?” she prompted him, her tempting mouth frowning.
He shook his head in blank puzzlement.
“I was working in your library this afternoon, and I thought I would visit with your father before I left since I promised him that I would the last time…”
Stunned, Lucien stared at her in mute surprise. He had completely forgotten about his hasty invitation to help select books. Given what they had shared later that night, he would have expected her to disregard their earlier agreement about his library. Besides, he did not think he could bear the temptation of having her in his house. “After what happened between us, why would you do such a thing?”
“Why?” she echoed in affronted outrage.
For a moment he thought she might slap him, but then she squared her petite shoulders and held up her chin proudly. God, she was gloriously beautiful. Standing there on the staircase, poised to defend herself, she was a woman unlike any he had ever known. The overwhelming desire to pull her into his arms and kiss her once again washed over him in staggering waves. The memory of being buried deep within her and the sound of her voice crying out his name called to every nerve in his being. He clenched his hands tightly to keep himself from grabbing her and doing just that.
“Contrary to what you believe about women,” Colette began, her voice laced with passion, “I gave you my word that I would help with the library, and I committed to read to your father. What kind of businesswoman would I be if I let my emotions guide me? Since you seem incapable of answering, I shall answer for you, Lord Waverly. If I allowed myself to cry and wail anytime my feelings were hurt by a man, I would not remain in business very long. However, no matter how fervently I wished never to see you or set foot in this house again, I did not let my emotions overrule my business decision.”
Impressed by her argument more than he wanted to admit, he remained silent as she stared at him, her incredible blue eyes flashing with anger.
“With Granger’s consent this afternoon, I have arranged for the library furniture to be delivered next week, and I shall return in a day or two to oversee the stocking of the shelves with the first book delivery. Good day, Lord Waverly.” She turned with an imperious toss of her silky curls and began to descend the stairs.
Lucien stood motionless, watching her go; fighting the urge to reach out and grab her, to stop her from leaving by carrying her back up to his bed and making love to her for days and days.
“Colette, wait, please,” he called after her.
She was midway down the long winding marble staircase when Granger hastened to answer the doorbell. Colette had just reached the last step as Lucien caught up with her and Granger opened the front door.
“Colette,” he began again. “Just give me a moment. I’m sorry—”
Lucien stopped abruptly at the sight before him, his mouth frozen in mid-sentence.
Lenora Sinclair stood in the doorway. Lucien recognized her instantly, for his mother had barely aged in fifteen years. As beautiful as ever but smaller than he remembered, she entered the house that had been her home for the first eleven years of her marriage to Simon Sinclair.
It had been a decade and a half since the venerable Devon House butler had opened the door for Lenora Sinclair, the Marchioness of Stancliff. Unruffled by this dramatic turn of family events, Granger calmly waved his arm to allow her entrance and closed the front door as if serving his long-absent mistress were an everyday occurrence.
“Hello, Granger,” Lenora Sinclair said, with an unsure smile, staring up at the tall, craggy-faced butler whom she had known since before Lucien was born. “I hope you have been well.”
“Welcome, my lady. It’s wonderful to see you again,” he murmured in his usual dignified tone. “Shall I bring you some tea? No cream, with two sugars?”
“Oh, you remembered…How thoughtful! Thank you, Granger, that would be lovely.” As Granger made a dignified exit and left them standing in the marble entrance hall, Lenora turned to her son. Her eyes softened and she uttered faintly, “Hello, Lucien.”
Her anxious expression and tentative smile made her seem fragile, not at all the forceful whirlwind of stylish glamour and sparkling brightness he remembered from his childhood. She stood about as high as his chest, the dark hair piled upon her head and hidden by a frivolous bonnet adorned with a peacock feather. A gown of deep blue draped over her still slender form. Her face had grown fine lines, but the porcelain creaminess of her skin had not faded over the years. Lucien figured his mother had to be closer to fifty than forty by now. Her upturned nose and wide emerald-hued eyes, the same shade as Lucien’s, had always been Lenora’s most praised features, and they had held her in good stead over the years. She was still a very attractive woman.
“Hello, Mother.”
How odd to say those words after so many years. Hello, Mother. Mother. He had imagined her return thousands of times when he was a young boy. His favorite fantasy consisted of his waking one morning to find his mother sitting calmly beside his father at the breakfast table as if she had never left, asking brightly, “What would you like to do today, my darling boy? Shall we go riding together? Or go on a picnic?” The very ordinariness of that domestic scene had been such a perfect antidote to the empty chaos his life had become when she left. Of the various scenarios of his mother’s grand return he had alternately prayed for and wished for over the years, none of them ever involved him as a grown man standing awkwardly with her in the elegant hall of Devon House.
He had absolutely no idea what to say to her. She was his mother, but he did not know the woman in front of him.
“I was not expecting you today,” he said woodenly, for lack of anything better to say.
“I’m sorry for calling unannounced
like this. I know we planned for next week, but I…I just couldn’t stay away any longer.”
“Yes, fifteen years is a long time to stay away from your husband and son.” The sarcastic remark escaped his lips before he could stop himself. Honestly, what was her impatience to see them after all those years? She couldn’t wait a few more days to arrive at the time he had agreed to meet her? When he could have been more prepared to see her?
His mother stared pleadingly at him while an awkward silence descended upon them.
A sudden poke in his ribs jarred him back to his senses. He had completely forgotten about Colette. She stood quietly beside him observing the entire Sinclair family drama unfold. Colette’s face, now devoid of her earlier anger, possessed a look of surprised interest and even concern. Lucien’s infamous mother had finally come home. No doubt all of London society would hear of the news by sundown.
“Excuse my rudeness,” Lucien said, noticing the curious looks between the two women. “Mother, may I present Miss Colette Hamilton, a very good friend of mine. Colette, this is my mother, Lenora Sinclair, the Marchioness of Stancliff.”
“I am very happy to meet you, Lady Stancliff,” Colette said with a polite smile.
His mother gave an eager nod, seemingly relieved to hear a kind word. “And I am pleased to meet you, too.”
Another awkward pause lengthened between the three of them. Lucien could not help but note the very odd trio they made: himself and the two women who ironically tortured his thoughts.
“Lucien, why don’t you escort your mother to the parlor now where you can sit comfortably and Granger can serve tea?” Colette proposed softly.
More grateful for Colette’s calming presence and sensible attitude than he realized, Lucien instantly agreed to her suggestion. “Yes, let’s do that, shall we?”
Colette shook her head and stepped away from him, her motive clear. “I really should be going. It was lovely meeting you, Lady Stancliff.”
He reached out and took her hand in his. Wrapping his fingers around hers, he squeezed her hand in appreciation, his eyes lingering on her. “Thank you, Colette.” To his surprise, she squeezed his hand back before pulling away from him.
“I’ll see myself out,” she said as she walked to the massive front door. As always, her graceful movements mesmerized him. He watched the door close softly behind her.
“She seems to be quite a lovely young lady.” His mother’s voice interrupted his errant thoughts, which had magnetically followed Colette from the house.
“Yes, she is,” he agreed. “Shall we?” Without another word she followed him to the front parlor. He wondered idly if it felt strange for her to be back inside the house which was once her home. He certainly knew it felt strange for him to have her here.
She seated herself on a burgundy velvet divan, nervously arranging her trailing peacock blue skirts flecked with golden thread. Choosing a high-backed brown leather chair across from her, Lucien waited patiently for her to explain herself.
“Is Miss Hamilton a close friend of yours?”
“I don’t wish to discuss her with you.”
“Fair enough.” She smiled anxiously at him, her hands twisting the gold-colored gloves in her lap. “My, but you’ve grown so much, Lucien. You’ve become a handsome man. You’ve definitely got the look of your father about you.”
He merely nodded.
Her voice became soft. “You’re not going to make this easy for me, are you?”
“Make what easy for you, Mother?”
“My return. The fact that I wish to see you again and try to explain some things to you, now that you are old enough to understand—”
He interrupted her more heatedly than he wished to. “Understand what? Why you left us? Why you abandoned your ten-year-old son? No, I don’t understand, but maybe you can understand why I don’t wish to make this little tea party easy for you, because it sure as hell isn’t easy for me.”
After a pause, she looked back up at him. “Yes, you have every right to be angry with me. You were so young when I left, and couldn’t possibly understand my reasons at the time, but I am terribly sorry for what happened. You have no idea what a painful decision leaving was for me to make. And I know that you must have suffered dreadfully, Lucien. I know because I suffered, too. I lost all those years with my little boy, just as you lost them with me. I realize nothing can make up for the choices I made or replace the years we’ve lost together. I do wish for you to know that I missed you every minute and thought about you and worried about you. And that—”
Again Lucien interrupted her. “So worried about me that you never once wrote me a letter or a note in all this time? Do you know what that would have meant to me?”
“Yes, I…It’s just that…You see…” she stammered awkwardly.
Granger chose that moment to enter the parlor with the tea. As the butler silently busied himself preparing their refreshment, Lucien seethed with years of hurt and anger at his mother. How dare she waltz back into his life and expect him to make it easy for her! Did she think he could suddenly forgive her, just like that? Welcome her home with open arms?
Lenora’s hands shook as she picked up the teacup, spilling tea down the front of her gown. She gasped and dropped the cup on the carpet. Granger fussed over her, helping to clean up the mess, as the black liquid seeped into her peacock blue dress.
“I should go,” she murmured hastily, rising to her feet. “Perhaps you are right. I should not have come.”
“Sit down, Mother, and tell me why you are here.” Lucien’s tone of voice brooked no argument.
Slowly sinking back to the divan, his mother stared at him. After an uneasy glance between the two of them, Granger wisely left the parlor, closing the door behind him.
“You’ve written me three times in the past month, and you came here unexpectedly today because apparently you could not wait another minute to see us. After over fifteen years, what could be so damn important, Mother?”
She breathed deeply and looked as if she might cry, which Lucien fervently hoped she would not. How much was he to bear?
“There is no excuse for what I’ve done. None at all, so I will not try to make one. I only wanted to see you again, and to say that I am sorry, Lucien. I bitterly regret leaving you and your father. I owe you both at least that small offering. That is all.”
“Where have you been?” He had heard all the rumors, of course. Everyone had. Yet he wanted to hear the truth from her.
“In Europe. Italy mostly. I only returned to England last month. That was when I first wrote to you.”
“Have you always been with him?”
She had the decency to look embarrassed at his reference to the man she ran away with. “Yes, for many years.”
“And now?”
“Now he is dead. And I am alone. Although he left me a very wealthy woman.”
“Father was not wealthy enough for you?”
“Money was never the issue, Lucien…”
“Then what issue was strong enough to lure you away from your husband and child?”
A pained expression crossed her face. “That is between your father and me.” She paused. “Which I can now deduce that he never explained to you.”
“I didn’t need Father to explain to me. I didn’t need anyone to explain to me when every socially aware person in London knew what happened. You ran off with Count Acciani, breaking Father’s heart—”
“Breaking your father’s heart?” She rose abruptly to her feet, her face full of sorrow. “Breaking your father’s heart?” she echoed in disbelief. “There are two sides to every story, Lucien, and you have only ever heard your father’s side. He left me no choice. He forced me to go with Antonio!” She paused and asked breathlessly, “Is he still in his room?”
Lucien stood, and put out a hand in an attempt to calm her. “As I informed you in my letter, Father is not well. You cannot just barge in on him without warning. He has no idea you’ve returned. An up
set like this would—”
Interrupting him again, her voice rising in pitch as she cried, “I don’t care! He is still my husband and I have a right to see him. He cannot keep me away this time. I came all this way to see Simon and I will see him!” She pushed his arm away and rushed from the parlor, running along the hallway. Stunned by his mother’s outburst, he followed her up the stairs and down the corridor to his father’s room.
With Lucien close behind, Lenora flung open the heavy doors intent on her mission to confront her husband. She suddenly halted, stopping in her tracks. Her eyes widened. She stared in shock at the drastically changed sight of a wizened Simon Sinclair sitting hunched before the fire with a shawl around his shoulders.
“Oh, Simon,” Lenora whispered, her expression one of utter devastation. Tears welled in her eyes. “I had no idea…”
Startled by the commotion, Simon glanced up, his expression one of confusion. If he was surprised at his wayward wife’s sudden presence in his bedroom, he did not show it. They both simply gazed at each other in silence, until tears began to trickle down his gaunt cheeks. Slowly and with great care, he stretched out his good arm to her. With a little gasp, Lenora fairly flew across the room to him, sinking to the floor at his feet. She buried her head in his lap. Simon’s hand stroked her hair.
Shocked by the scene in front of him, Lucien was speechless. Somewhere in the far reaches of his mind, he realized his mother was right. Whatever happened to cause her to leave her husband all those years ago was between the two of them, and only they understood why. Obviously his father forgave more easily than Lucien, and for his part, he did not know if he could ever forgive his mother. Feeling as if he were intruding, he softly closed the doors to his father’s suite, allowing them some privacy.
For some time Lucien stood motionless outside his father’s room, unable to move.
Chapter Twenty
What Are Friends For?
“Come now, Jeffrey, please tell me you’ll do it,” Juliette cajoled with her most winning smile as she stood behind the counter of the bookshop. It was rather late in the afternoon and the bookshop was devoid of people beyond the two of them.
