Nearly a Lady (Haverston Family Trilogy #1)

by Alissa Johnson

  He began tapping his finger again and looking at her as if she were a particularly fascinating riddle. It was, she decided, slightly preferable to being laughed at.

  “I find it intriguing,” he replied at length. “And frustrating.”

  She felt herself blush at the first and frown a bit at the second. “I don’t see why you should become frustrated. If I want something, I will ask for it.”

  “Will you?” His voice was an incongruent mix of hope and skepticism. Suddenly, he stood and came around the desk. Before she could even think to ask what he was about, he’d taken the seat next to hers and shifted them both so they faced one another with their knees brushing.

  In an abrupt change of mood, he grinned at her and leaned forward in his chair to take one of her hands in his.

  “Ask me for something now.”

  Bemused, she looked down at their joined hands, then back at him. “What?”

  “Ask me for something,” he repeated. “Something just for you. Anything at all.”

  He was so obviously delighted by the idea, so adorably excited with his wrinkled cravat and mussed hair. She couldn’t possibly deny him.

  A thousand requests flew through her mind. Big things, little things, ridiculous things. A new stable. A pair of draught horses. A thousand pounds to spend on custard-filled pastries.

  But then the sun broke out from behind a cloud and sunlight filtered through the windows into the room. She watched the effect it had on Gideon’s eyes.

  Lighter in the morning, she thought, and spoke without thinking.

  “You.”

  Gideon dropped her hand and reared back. “Beg your pardon?”

  Oh, bloody hell. She hadn’t meant to say that aloud. She’d barely been aware of thinking it.

  She searched frantically for a way to cover her blunder. “You . . .” she began, drawing the word out, “. . . can buy me a draught horse.”

  That sounded lame even to her own ears. And to Gideon’s as well, apparently. He was still looking at her as if she’d gone off and slapped him.

  He grabbed his cane and rose to walk around the back side of his chair like a man in need of a shield. “That is not what you meant.”

  It certainly wasn’t. And there was no way for her to backtrack now.

  Very well, she would charge forward. It had to happen sometime. She couldn’t go on wondering how he felt indefinitely.

  “No,” she said, “it is not.”

  Gideon swore under his breath. “I was under the impression Lilly instructed you on what a lady should and should not say to a gentleman.”

  “Certainly she did. But . . .” In for a penny, in for a pound, she told herself. “Well, you’re not just any gentleman, are you? You’re my friend. A friend who kissed me, and one I have found I very much like kissing back—”

  “I apologized for that,” he broke in. “And I will again. I am sorry.”

  “Why?”

  He visibly started at the question. “What do you mean why?”

  “Why are you sorry?”

  He hesitated. “. . . Because it was a risk to your reputation.”

  She knew a badly delivered lie when she heard one too. “What nonsense. We were on a dark, rarely used road in the middle of Scotland the first time. Who in the world would have seen us? And—”

  “Other people use roads,” he pointed out.

  “And make quite a lot of noise doing it,” she retorted, growing increasingly annoyed at his evasions. “Did you expect a coach-and-four to sneak up when we weren’t looking?”

  “That’s not the point.”

  “I fail to see that you have a point. Why are you sorry you kissed me?”

  “Because . . .” He trailed off, leaned hard on the back of the chair. Winnefred waited for him to gather his thoughts, but when he lifted his face to hers again, she could see it wasn’t his thoughts he’d been gathering, but a cold, hard resolve. “Because I cannot marry you.”

  He is the brother of a marquess.

  Winnefred could have sworn she felt something inside her break.

  There it was then, the reward for her risks and work and patience.

  One more rejection.

  Gideon watched as the color drained from Winnefred’s cheeks, and anger, the kind that came from wounded feelings and damaged pride, flashed in her eyes.

  “I’ve not asked you to marry me,” she said stiffly.

  She was so beautiful, he thought miserably. He’d only wanted to give her something for herself. Something from him. How had things gone so wrong?

  His hand gripped the handle of his cane until his fingers throbbed. “There are certain attentions a gentleman pays only to the lady he intends to make his wife.”

  “Oh?” Her voice took on a brittle, mocking tone. “Are you a virgin as well, then?”

  “I . . . No. Winnefred—”

  She threw a hand up. “Don’t. It isn’t necessary for you to explain your decision. You are brother to a marquess, and I am the uneducated, ill-mannered daughter of a nobody.” She stood up, her face a mask of barely controlled fury, and spun around toward the door. “Excuse me.”

  He caught her around the waist from behind before she made it halfway across the room. He couldn’t let her leave, not like this. “Stop. Winnefred—”

  “Let me go.” She threw an elbow out and caught him mid-chest.

  “Bloody hell.” Ignoring the sudden loss of air, he shifted his weight to his good leg, dropped his cane and wrapped both arms around her struggling form. “Stop. Let me explain.”

  Her only response was to bring her heel down, hard, on his toes.

  “Damn it, Winnefred.” He lifted her off the floor. “It has nothing to do with—”

  She delivered a painful kick to the shin of his good leg.

  “Son of a . . .” Eyes watering, he set her back down again. “Listen to me. I can’t—”

  She reared back and might have broken his nose with the back of her head if he hadn’t twisted out of the way at the last moment and blurted out the only thing that might make her understand.

  “I had powder monkeys on my ship!”

  Chapter 29

  The room went still but for the rise and fall of chests and silent but for sound of labored breathing. Winnefred could feel the hard pounding of Gideon’s heart against her back, and his breath was hot and damp against her ear.

  “Do you know what a powder monkey is, Winnefred?”

  She wished she didn’t care.

  She hadn’t expected a refusal from him to hurt so much, to cut so deeply. But it had, and it terrifed her, almost as much as it infuriated her, that he had that sort of power over her. She wanted to steal that power back. She wanted to tell him to take his powder monkeys and go straight to the devil. But the misery in his voice, the quiet desperation that had brought her struggles to an abrupt halt made it impossible to turn away.

  “No,” she whispered.

  “Will you let me explain?”

  No. I don’t want to hear it.

  She gave a small nod.

  “Thank you.” Gideon released her, bent down to pick up his cane, and made his way to a sidebar for a small glass of brandy.

  Watching him pour the drink sent a shiver up her spine. What sort of explanation required a brandy at eleven o’clock in the morning?

  He turned around to face her, glass in hand, and his features set in stone. She remembered being thirteen and hearing the news of her father’s death from a stranger. The messenger had looked then as Gideon did now—reluctant, resolved, and detached.

  “A powder monkey,” Gideon began, “is a small boy who runs gunpowder from cannon to cannon during a battle. He keeps it under his shirt to protect it from sparks. There’s a least one on every war ship.”

  She licked lips gone dry. “You had one on yours?”

  “I had six.”

  “Six? You had six boys on your ship?”

  He laughed softly and without humor. “Oh, I had a great
many more boys than that. Damn near a quarter of the crew was under twenty.”

  He stared at his glass for a long while, as if he might find an answer there, or simply a place to bury the questions.

  “Gideon?”

  “I had no business captaining a ship,” he said softly. “No business being responsible for those boys.”

  “I don’t believe that—”

  “I didn’t want boys on the Perseverance, but you take what you’re given, don’t you? That’s what happens in war. You do the best with whatever you have . . . I thought it best to send them to the hold. In every battle, I sent the youngest to the hold to keep them safe.” He shook his head, downed the contents of the glass. “It didn’t work.”

  She closed her eyes as the horror of what that meant washed over her. “I’m so sorry.”

  In a sudden burst of movement and noise that had her jumping back, Gideon threw the glass against the fireplace where it shattered into hundreds of bright and jagged shards. He whirled on her, his face hard and angry, his muscles bunched so tight she feared he’d shatter as the glass had. “Children! What the bloody hell did I know of children?!”

  “Gideon—”

  “I’ll tell you what I know now! What I learned soon enough! It takes no more than a metal ball and the space of a heartbeat to rip through nearly a half dozen of them!” He dragged a shaking hand through his hair. “Just one ball. One ball and the captain responsible for placing them in the way of it.”

  “No. That’s not true. You—”

  She bit back the argument when a footman knocked on the open door. His eyes darted to the shattered glass, but as was expected of a man of his position, his face betrayed not a hint of emotion. “My lord? Are you or Miss Blythe in need of assistance?”

  Winnefred watched, helpless, as Gideon struggled to pull himself together. “No. No, we are both well. Thank you.”

  “Shall I send for a maid?”

  “That won’t be necessary.”

  “Very good, my lord.”

  Winnefred listened to the sound of the footmen’s retreating steps but kept her eyes on Gideon. The flash of temper had burned itself out, and in its place had come resignation. She wasn’t sure which was worse.

  “Gideon—”

  “No.” He held up his hand. “I’m done discussing it. I only wanted to explain. I wanted you to understand why I can’t . . . I will not be responsible for someone ever again.”

  Someone like a wife, she realized. Any wife. “But—”

  “Let it go, Winnefred.”

  Afraid he would retreat again, she took an argumentative tone. “I’ll not let it go. Because you are not responsible.”

  “You weren’t there,” he snapped.

  “Did you ask for a young crew?” she demanded. “Pay a press-gang or buy their commissions? Did you fire the cannon that killed them? Build the ship that housed it? Start the war that required the ship?”

  “No, I—”

  “There is blame to be placed here,” she pushed on. “But it is not yours. You did the best with what you had—you said that yourself. If politicians and royals and trumped up tyrants who fancied themselves emperors had done their best to care for the people they were responsible for, we never would have had a war—or children fighting it.”

  “Men will always make war.” He shook his head and turned from her to look out the window. “Always. There’s little to be done about it but attempt to stay out of its path, and failing that, find the pleasure in life where and when you can.”

  Winnefred stared at his back, desperately racking her mind for a way to reach him, to help him. And then it occurred to her—

  “Do you . . . Do you care for me at all?”

  He threw a surprised glance over his shoulder. “What the devil has that to do with anything?”

  “Answer the question.” If she could find the courage to ask, he could damn well find the courage to answer. “Do you care for me?”

  “I do,” he said clearly. He turned and held her eyes as if to be certain she knew he meant it. “You must know that I do.”

  Her relief was so great, her legs turned to mush. She wanted to throw her arms around him and laugh. And she wanted to sit down. She ignored all three desires and nodded decisively. “And if we were on a ship right now, right this very moment, and a battle broke out—where would you put me?”

  An instant of fear crossed his face before he could hide it. “I wouldn’t allow you anywhere near a warship.”

  She ignored his evasion. “Knowing what you know now—where would you put me?”

  “This is ridiculous.”

  He sidled away from the window, and her, as if to distance himself from the question. But she wouldn’t let him run. She took two steps forward. “Where, Gideon?”

  “Let it alone—”

  Another step. “Where?”

  He shook his head, pleading. “For pity’s sake.”

  One last step to stand directly before him. “Tell me where.”

  “I’d put you in the bleeding hold!”

  She reached out to cup his cheek with one hand. “Because it’s the safest place on the ship. Because you care for me, and it’d be the best thing you could do for me. What might happen after that would be out of your control.”

  “They were children,” he whispered hoarsely. “They were innocents. I should have protected them.”

  “Even you cannot stop a cannonball.”

  “I should have—”

  “No. There was nothing else you could do, Gideon. Nothing. It just was.”

  Gideon squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. He didn’t want to hear the words, he didn’t want to admit that they might be true.

  It just was.

  He knew that there was a basic human desire to have control, to understand, to know the reasons why. He knew that the drive to discover meaning in the events of one’s life—both large and small, beautiful and tragic—had led men to religion, philosophy, science. And greatness had come from those searches; comfort from the answers they provided.

  But perhaps there were times when an explanation wasn’t to be had, and maybe it was less frightening to blame himself than acknowledge his helplessness, and easier to shoulder the guilt than to accept that no one would be held accountable. But anything, anything at all, was better than contemplating the idea of six young boys dying senselessly in a hold of a ship, and no one being held responsible.

  Someone had to be responsible.

  He drew her hand from his cheek and let it go. “I’m sorry.”

  She searched his face with her eyes. “I don’t understand.”

  “This.” He breathed past the knot of pain in his chest. “You and I. It cannot be.”

  “But you care for me,” she whispered. “And I for you. Why—?”

  “I cared for them too.”

  “But surely—”

  “No, Winnefred.”

  She turned away and, for a long time, stared at the fireplace without speaking. He wanted to fill the silence, but he couldn’t think of anything else to say. There was nothing left to explain.

  Winnefred spoke at length, and without turning back to face him. “Is this . . . Is this your final say on the matter?”

  “It is.”

  She looked at the ground, and put her hands on her hips the way a person did when they were trying to catch their breath. “There is nothing I can say to change your mind?”

  He wished she would look at him. “No.”

  She gave a nearly imperceptible nod of her head. “Very well.”

  This time, when she moved to leave, he didn’t stop her.

  Chapter 30

  For a long time after Winnefred left the study, Gideon stood in the middle of the room and stared into the hallway.

  He had told her. He had told her everything. He had shared with her the burden he had promised to carry alone. He wanted to berate himself for that, but there didn’t seem to be any point. It wasn’t possible for
him to feel any worse.

  This. You and I. It cannot be.

  He’d always known that to be true, but he’d not spoken the words aloud until now. And he’d never intended to speak them to Winnefred. If he had been a little more careful, and a little less self-centered, he would never have had to. He’d known his interest was returned. He’d seen the light of desire in Winnefred’s eyes and felt the way she had melted against him when they’d kissed. But he had willfully ignored what he’d known to be true so he could indulge in his own selfish need to seek her out.

  Well, no more. It was too late to undo what was done, but he could repair what damage he could and make damn well certain he didn’t cause more.

  He would find a way to make things comfortable between them again, just comfortable enough for her to feel easy in his company . . . Which he intended to severely limit in the future.

  There was no avoiding his duty of escorting the ladies to balls and parties, but his free time could be spent visiting friends or relaxing at his club. He could do that. He would do that.

  To prove it, he grabbed his coat, shoved his arms through the sleeves, and left the study. He would spend a few hours at White’s, he decided. He would give Winnefred a bit of time and himself a bit of space. Then he would see about making things easy between them again. Distant, but easy.

  He was reaching for his hat and gloves in the front hall when the front door flew open with a crash.

  Lucien stumbled inside, looking nothing like the proud and aloof peer of the realm their father had hoped he would become. His hair was windblown, the traveling clothes on his tall, lean frame were wrinkled and dusty, and there was set edge to his sharp features that spoke of blind determination and not enough sleep.

  Lucien’s eyes snapped to his. “Gideon. Where is she?”

  Suddenly, despite everything, Gideon felt the urge to smile. “Welcome home, Lucien. How was your trip?”

  “Eventful. Where—?”

  “I am quite well, thank you. You received my letter, I presume?”

  “It reached me in Berlin. Is—?”

  “Lady Engsly?”

  “Dead,” Lucian replied impatiently. “She succumbed to opium poison two months ago.”

  “Opium.” Gideon blew out a short breath. “I hadn’t realized she was an addict. But it would explain the madness, wouldn’t it. Where is Kincaid?”