Harlequin Historical July 2020 - Box Set 1 of 2

by Virginia Heath

  ‘Heaven forbid he insults the Marquess of Kelvedon!’

  ‘Perhaps he needs a little more time… In fact, I am sure all he needs is a little more time. You know how he likes to control things and you caught him unawares just now. He wasn’t expecting you today. None of us were. To be fair, we didn’t even know you were back from Scotland.’

  ‘To be fair? What did you expect? That I would stay there for ever?’ Sometimes his lack of thought mirrored their self-absorbed father’s.

  ‘Of course not… But you sent no message.’

  ‘I wasn’t aware I needed to send word to be allowed home!’

  He reached for her hand and squeezed it. ‘I know it’s no excuse for his behaviour, but things haven’t been easy since you left.’

  ‘You don’t say. Try marrying a complete stranger!’ An outright lie, but certainly the truth as far as her brother was concerned. Owen might not be a stranger, not in the biblical sense either, but he was certainly no longer her friend either. Not that Justin had ever known she had once befriended then fallen in love with a servant. She had planned on telling her menfolk when she was old enough to marry Owen without their permission, when they were not in any position to stop her choosing her own mate even if it meant certain banishment. At sixteen, she had been prepared to sacrifice everything for him and probably would have if he hadn’t resorted to what he did. After he was arrested, and with her mother so ill and so distraught at his treachery, admitting she had been complicit in bringing a thief into the house was out of the question. ‘Things haven’t been easy for me either, Justin!’

  He acknowledged it with a curt nod. ‘The Marquess took your elopement badly and blamed us for not keeping a closer eye on you. Because of his strong connection to the government and his loyal friends in the Lords, Father has been worried about the repercussions. The last thing we want is to fall foul of those men.’

  ‘But I am his daughter. I suppose that counts for nothing in view of Lord Kelvedon’s superior connections. Better to fall out with me than an old lecher who couldn’t pay the asking price!’

  ‘You know how the ton works, poppet.’ He patted her hand as if she did not and she was sorely tempted to slap it away. ‘We are not yet in a financial position to alienate our allies. Then there is the press—who have been an absolute nightmare and have printed such vitriolic lies, the family has not come out of things well.’

  ‘By that, you mean the press have had more sympathy for me and Owen than Papa and the awful Marquess.’ Lydia had gone against her new husband’s advice and had read every story in Gertie’s comfortable parlour. While the reports of their purported ‘secret love’ were the stuff of fairy tales, not many had expressed their outright outrage at the elopement. Largely because Randolph had successfully turned Owen into St George and Kelvedon into the dragon. ‘In which case, Father’s perceived loyalty is now misplaced.’

  ‘He’s not going to change his mind today, Lydia. If we push him too far, too soon, he might never change his mind at all. Give it a few weeks…’

  ‘Weeks? Or months?’

  Through the confusion came acceptance and the realisation that, while she was devastated, she wasn’t at all surprised by what had just occurred. It had been stupid to expect gratitude for her great sacrifice when her father had never thanked a soul in his life for anything as far as she was aware. All he had ever cared about was himself and his elevated position within the ranks of society.

  She also knew he would happily leave her floundering in purgatory for as long as it took to completely and convincingly dissociate himself from her scandalous behaviour—never mind that it had been at his unbending insistence. She had done her duty and now she was no longer his problem. Always the inconvenience. A daughter instead of the spare he had so desperately wanted. Yet without her, dear Papa would currently be doomed and publicly shamed in court and his entire flimsy charade would have collapsed in a far bigger scandal than the one she had been ordered to cause. And to rub salt in the wound, he had the gall to publicly shame her! It beggared belief.

  ‘He hasn’t even sent my things, Justin!’ Anger at the injustice swiftly replaced the hurt. ‘Or am I to be left with just the clothes on my back? Does he also expect Owen to now pay for an entire new wardrobe as well as all the other frivolous debts he bailed our father out of?’

  ‘I shall try to get your things sent to you.’

  ‘Try?’ Today she had no patience for her brother’s particular brand of cautious diplomacy. ‘You’ll do more than “try”, Justin! You owe me!’ She had only agreed to sell herself in the first place to save her ineffectual elder sibling. ‘You both owe me! Treating me like this is outrageous.’ She was braced for the scandal—not a pillorying from her nearest and dearest.

  ‘You are right.’ Instantly, he was contrite. ‘Of course you’re right… You should have your things…’ He dropped her hand as the carriage slowed and the entrance to the park loomed. ‘I will have them packed today. I promise. Regardless of what Papa has to say about it.’ As soon as the wheels stopped, he had the latch open. ‘I’ll have it all sent to Wolfe’s club…unless you’d like it to go somewhere else?’ He didn’t even know where she lived. Did he not care or was she reading too much into things because she was angry?

  ‘Send it all to Libertas.’ And suddenly she was eager to get back there, too. ‘Owen and I have a set of rooms on the top floor.’ Which she had hoped her brother would visit her in. ‘It has a private entrance in the back which is concealed from the main road and quite separate from the club.’ She added that as a test, to see if he would ask anything about it or show some interest in her new living arrangements or life or at least give her hope he still wanted to be part of it.

  ‘Splendid.’ He squeezed her hand, clearly keen to be off. ‘This will all blow over, poppet. I promise. Then everything will be back to normal once again. You’ll see.’

  Normal? For him, perhaps, but not her. But there seemed no point in voicing that when he was already staring down the road and wishing he was gone.

  ‘And in the meantime?’

  ‘We will work something out.’

  Lydia nodded as he closed the door, then practically sprinted back in the direction they had come without as much as a backward glance, feeling more alone than she ever had in her life. While she sympathised with Justin—he held hardly any more sway over her father than she ever had—she couldn’t help but feel wounded by his thoughtlessness, too. He was blithely abandoning her to her fate and expecting her to cope with it all alone. It was most unlike him when they had always been so close. Although now she was a married woman, and in view of who she was married to, she supposed that did make things difficult—and Justin had never been good with anything difficult.

  ‘I am fine…thank you for asking.’

  Her sigh misted the carriage window as she watched him disappear down Piccadilly.

  ‘And you and dear Papa are welcome.’

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Gertie had put a flea in Owen’s ear. A big and bothersome flea which had been accompanied by a great amount of prodding, eye-rolling and one totally uncalled-for cuff around the ears when she had caught him eating dinner all alone in his office. He was, apparently, a thoughtless, heartless, spineless fool who should be thoroughly ashamed of himself.

  He had taken his punishment like a man and nodded belligerently, not mentioning the fact that he already agreed with her unflattering summation and was heartily ashamed of himself anyway. Lydia had lived under his roof for two entire days and, apart from one uncomfortable breakfast, he had so far deftly avoided her for the duration.

  However, as much as it pained him, he had to concede Gertie made a valid point. This couldn’t be easy on Lydia and it was his role as her husband—a role which still felt like the most ill-fitting pair of boots—to ease her adjustment into his world before he completely abandoned her to it. Especially
if she was as miserable as the interfering Gertie had been at such great pains to imply.

  It was time to be that bigger man.

  He paused outside the door to the living room, briefly considered whether he should knock and then took a deep breath when he decided against it before actually opening the thing. The room beyond was empty of both Lydia and any furniture, bar the one comfortable armchair Gertie had lent her placed dejectedly in front of the fire which provided the only light.

  ‘Hello?’ His voice echoed in the barren space. ‘Lydia?’

  ‘I’m here.’ Her voice came from behind, making him turn, only to see her sat in the corner hugging a cup of tea, looking so lost and alone it made his chest ache.

  ‘What are you doing on the floor?’

  ‘I thought, for a change, I’d stare at a different wall while I wait for the furniture to arrive. There are only so many hours in a day a lady can shop, especially when the shops have the annoying habit of closing for the evening. Did you get the bills, by the way?’ Her voice was flat. Despondent. ‘I hope I haven’t spent too much. Only you’ve been so busy we haven’t had time to discuss them—so if they are you only have yourself to blame.’

  ‘Was that a dig?’

  Her dark eyes finally left her teacup and fixed on his molten ones and he breathed a sigh of relief to see her spirit was nowhere near broken no matter how much Gertie had hinted it was. ‘How incredibly perceptive of you to have noticed.’

  He was in no doubt he probably deserved that. ‘I’ve been a bit remiss, haven’t I?’

  ‘Just a bit.’

  ‘I suppose we should talk… Discuss a few things properly.’

  He would hold out an olive branch and try to make amends. As Gertie quite rightly also said, they were stuck in the same leaky rowing boat. If they did not find a way to coexist peacefully, they were both doomed to sink. He really couldn’t hide in the office for ever. He’d sat in it so long, the walls were beginning to close in and he had no outstanding work left to do to occupy the time. In desperation, he’d even resorted to dusting off all the futile investigation notes he and Randolph had meticulously made when they had tried and failed to find concrete proof of his innocence. A veritable hornet’s nest of dead ends and disappointments which wouldn’t go any way towards improving his state of mind.

  ‘Maybe I should order some more tea first? And some cake. You look as though you need a bit of cheering up.’

  ‘What a splendid idea. You order some tea and while it is brewing we can fight over that single chair over there. Although I must warn you, Owen, as I fetched that chair and have sat in this barren room all alone in it these past two interminable days, I’ll fight you to the death for it!’

  ‘I already surrender any claim and will sit on the floor as penance.’ He held out his hand to help her up and instantly regretted it as she took it. There was something about her touch which awoke all his nerve endings and gave his body ideas. The second he had hauled her upright, and only too aware of how natural it felt to pull her into his arms, he severed all contact and tried to pretend he was blithely unaffected, even though he was.

  Supremely affected.

  An unfortunate state made worse by the scintillating waft of her signature perfume and the single dark tendril of hair which had escaped its pins and bounced alluringly next to her cheek.

  ‘I’ll even commandeer a whole lamp from somewhere if you’ll stop scowling at me.’

  It wasn’t as much of a scowl as a pout, reminding him of the way she looked before she used to raise herself on tiptoes to kiss him goodnight and he reluctantly took himself back to the stable block, all those years ago, to relive the kiss for hours. To torture him, one often-visited memory suddenly jumped to the fore again, of the pair of them one lazy spring afternoon in Hyde Park. They had been rolling around among the trees in their favourite hiding place. She had leaves in her hair and was giggling against his mouth until she stopped giggling and dragged his lips back for another kiss.

  Back then, Lydia had loved kissing. And while their trysts had always stayed on the right side of innocent, the feel of her pert breasts flattened against his chest that afternoon had made his unschooled body rampant. But then again, back then, the merest glance at her bosom had done much the same. Those breasts were distractingly fuller nowadays and his body certainly wouldn’t mind feeling them pressed against his chest. Or releasing them from her gown and filling his hands with them…

  ‘I am not sure I am quite finished scowling at you.’

  It took all his strength not to allow his eyes to drop to her bosom now. ‘What happened to our polite armistice?’

  ‘It ceased being polite when you abandoned me to my own devices yesterday morning and failed to return. You didn’t even show me around, Owen! You brought me to a strange place, filled with strange people, and deserted me at the first opportunity. That was very poor form.’

  ‘It was.’

  ‘Most ungentlemanly.’ Her delightful nose poked in the air. ‘Not that you have the first clue how to be a gentleman, of course—but as it is the facade you wish to portray to the world it wouldn’t hurt you to practise it here, too. At least until I am settled and have a table to place my tea upon.’

  ‘You are absolutely right… Most ungentlemanly. I cannot deny it.’ As much as he was enjoying sparring with her, sparring always led to flirting and he wasn’t entirely sure he could cope with that in his current state. ‘I have no defence of that other than to tell you the truth.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘That I am as overwhelmed and confused by our new situation as you are.’

  ‘You are?’

  ‘I am. I have no clue how to behave.’ For two days he had felt like a man trapped in a cave with a nest of funnel web spiders, waiting for the inevitable bite, but never knowing quite when it would come. ‘I know I said we would avoid each other, but that is not proving to be very practical. There are only so many hours a man can bury himself in work.’

  He missed his bed. And her, God help him, which bizarrely was the single biggest reason he’d been hiding. Having her right under his nose was churning up too much of the past. He didn’t want to want her, but that did not seem to stop it happening regardless. And as much as he was sorely tempted to act upon it, how could he when she still believed him to be a thief? Their polite armistice wouldn’t hold for very long when they couldn’t completely bury the hatchet.

  ‘At least you have things to do.’ Her tone was wistful. ‘I cannot even read a book because there aren’t any. Gertie has been a godsend—but I cannot foist myself on her all the time. I’ve shopped all of Cheapside with impunity, but fear if I purchase any more furniture, there will be no space left to put it when it finally arrives. I would love to visit Bond Street or perhaps call upon my old friends and acquaintances, but…’ She shook her head and wandered towards the window, staring out at the night sky cloaking Mayfair, all traces of the previous bravado gone as she rested one dejected hand flat against the glass. ‘But it turns out I am a coward at heart, Owen, and do not feel able to face the world properly until we have faced the scandal together. I need to see the lay of the land.’

  A husband was meant to stand by his wife. Especially in hours of need. While wallowing in his own self-pity he hadn’t considered that either. ‘Then we should go out. As soon as possible. Get that part over with so you don’t feel so hemmed in.’ And perhaps, once she was ensconced safely back into society she wouldn’t be constantly underfoot and he would be able to naturally avoid her rather than hiding. ‘Did you have a chance to look over all the invitations I gave to you?’

  ‘Of course.’ She shot him an exasperated glance over her shoulder. ‘Twice, in fact. It’s not as if I had anything more pressing to do.’ She gestured to the piles neatly arranged on the mantelpiece with a nod. ‘Due to sheer boredom, they have been organised into three distinct categories�
�definitely, maybe and not in a month of Sundays. I’ve even sorted them in date order.’

  ‘Well, that’s a good start.’ He grabbed the first bundle and skimmed the details of the invitation on the top. ‘Lady Bulphan’s…tomorrow. She’s a nice old dear. I would certainly be up for that.’

  ‘I can’t.’ She was back to staring out of the window and sounding sad. ‘Not tomorrow.’

  ‘If it’s still too soon for you, Lydia, I absolutely understand…’

  ‘It’s not too soon, Owen. I think the longer we leave it, the worse it will be. It’s just tomorrow is…’ He saw her shoulders stiffen before she turned around. ‘Merely impossible at the moment. And, much as it pains me to have to admit it, for the stupidest and most shallow of reasons…’ She huffed out a breath and stared at a spot somewhere over his left shoulder rather than at him. ‘You see, I have absolutely nothing to wear.’

  It was obvious she was embarrassed to have even uttered this statement, but attempted to cover it with an imperious flick of her wrist. ‘My father, in his infinite and twisted wisdom, has decided to disown me for having the audacity to marry you.’ She gave him a exasperated shrug when his mouth fell open. ‘And, in the process, has neglected to send over any of my things. Either that or he is holding it all hostage… Who knows?’ Another irritated flick of the wrist which did not fool him in the slightest. ‘All I have are the travelling clothes I packed for Scotland and not one of those gowns are even slightly suitable for an evening soirée at Lady Bulphan’s. Even an intimate one.’ She tried to make it sound flippant and matter-of-fact, but he could see she was hurting. Clearly he had missed something very important while he had been holed up in the office, pretending to be busy. Something not even the intuitive Gertie had discovered.

  ‘What do you mean he’s disowned you?’ The anger was so swift and fast he didn’t have time to mask it. ‘How can he do that when you got him out of debt?’