Her Rebellious Prince (Scandalous Family--The Victorians Book 2)

by Tracy Cooper-Posey

  “A week to reach London from Pandev? Modern postage systems are simply amazing,” Great Aunt Annalies said, her tone light. “All the countries the letter has passed through have reached agreements with each other to distribute the other’s mail or pass it on. Mail reaches its recipient more often than not, despite wars and disasters…the diplomats could learn much from postal systems.”

  Ann got to her feet and moved around the table. “Here,” she said, her tone kind. “Sit and read it, Elise. I will serve breakfast this morning.”

  Elise let Ann pull out a chair for her. Her half-drunk cup of tea was placed in front of her, far enough back to give her room to open and read the letter.

  From the corner of her eye, Elise could see Great Aunt Annalies had returned to reading her newspaper. Beatrice still watched Elise curiously, but only between bites of her haddock and eggs. Beatrice would have to leave shortly for her work at the lace factory.

  Elise turned the letter over. The seal on the back was indistinct. It had been blurred by the stamp being moved as it pressed into the wax. Carefully, she broke the seal and unfolded the letter. There was only a single sheet, also a thick and creamy paper with a coat of arms pressed into the sheet at the top.

  Elise wanted to drop her gaze to the words beneath the salutation, to gulp down whatever Danyal had said to her as quickly as possible. Only she could not afford that romantic indulgence.

  So she made herself read from the very top of the sheet.

  November 7th, 1888.

  My dear, sweet Elise;

  Elise looked back at the date once more. More than a month had passed between the writing and the sending?

  She dropped her gaze back to the body of the letter once more.

  My dear, sweet Elise;

  I torture myself by writing a letter I know will never be read by you, but it is far less a punishment than I daily face, knowing I have put you aside. I move through my days, barely interested in the responsibilities which I claimed made it impossible to have you in my life. I call myself a fool, as I measure the depth of my mistake with every beat of my heart.

  I dream of you, which brings its own agony, for upon waking in the morning I am reminded that the inadequate dream is as much of you as I will ever possess.

  Yet by the time I stumble to my bed, a moment which arrives later and later with each passing day, I am once more acquainted with the brutal truth—that if I am to serve these people, who most desperately need a leader to guide them through the troubled times they face, I must give up any hope of seeing once more the woman I most want in this life.

  So I write this letter, which I know will never be posted, and pour my heart upon the page, for it is the closest I will ever come to saying aloud the words which press upon me too often, these days: Come back to me, my lovely Elise. Ease this ache in my heart. Amend the great error I have made. Come to me, and when you are in my arms, I will never let you go.

  With all my most wretched, abject and foolish love,

  D.

  Elise dropped the sheet to the table and put her hands over her face.

  “Oh, good lord… Elise!” Ann shook her shoulders. “What is it? What is wrong?”

  “Nothing. Everything,” Elise said into her hands.

  “Take her into my morning room, Ann,” Annalies said, her tone brisk. “The boarders will be down in a moment or two.”

  “No, no, I am recovered,” Elise said, and put her hands down once more. She tried to smile reassuringly at Great Aunt Annalies, who had risen to her feet, but instead, her eyes flooded with tears, which spilled before she could blink them away. Her vision blurred.

  “This way,” Ann said, tugging Elise gently around.

  “Take the letter,” Annalies added.

  Elise reached blindly for the letter and let Ann lead her into the tiny sitting room that was for Great Aunt Annalies alone to use.

  The room wasn’t really a morning room. It was on the wrong side of the house. Gray dawn showed through the lace at the window. It had snowed overnight.

  “I can’t sit in her chair,” Elise protested, when Ann led her to the lady’s wing chair pulled up by the fire. “The hassock will do.” She sank onto the hassock and stared at her lap and the folded letter, her heart thumping unsteadily.

  Ann hovered by her and patted her shoulder.

  Great Aunt Annalies sailed into the room. “Now, what is this all about, Elise? Ann, you should leave us. The girl won’t speak freely while you are here. Go. Go along. I will take care of your sister.”

  The sitting room door shut with a firm thud.

  Great Aunt Annalies settled in the wing chair, her black bombazine gown brushing the hassock.

  Elise lifted the letter and held it out to her. “It would be simpler if you read the letter.”

  Great Aunt Annalies didn’t take it. “It seems to be a rather personal letter, to leave you in such a state, Elise. Are you sure?”

  “You have been privy to every aspect of Danyal’s visit here and what it…how I felt about that. You may be able to offer me some insight now. Please read it.”

  Great Aunt Annalies resettled her spectacles and took the letter and unfolded it. She read it quickly and frowned. “Oh dear. I see…” She folded it once more and held it back out to Elise.

  Elise looked at her expectantly.

  “He has put you in a pickle, hasn’t he? I would damn the man for his inconsideration, only it sounds as though he is living in a type of hell already.” Great Aunt Annalies gave Elise a weak smile. “You both agreed nothing could come of any relationship, my dear. Nothing has changed which might affect that decision.”

  Elise swallowed. “He has asked me to go to him.”

  “Yes, about that. The phrasing is…odd. Not that I am any judge of a man’s poetic abilities when in the throes of such a confession. My dear, darling Rhys preferred action to speeches. However, it seems this letter was never meant to reach you.”

  Elise wrung her hands together. “The date is over a month ago,” she pointed out.

  “Yes, I noticed that, too,” Annalies replied. “The envelope…it matches the stationary?”

  “Yes, but…” Elise bit her lip. “The seal was blurred.”

  “Hmm…” Great Aunt Annalies took off her spectacles and cleaned the lenses with a fold of her gown. “It seems you have a choice, my dear. You can abide by the agreement between you, remain in London and carry on with your life. Keep the letter as a reminder of a sweet time in your life and nothing more.”

  Elise shook her head. “I was doing that already, Aunt Annalies. This…it changes things.”

  “No, it does not,” Annalies said crisply. “It is an untimely and inconvenient confession which merely extends your recovery, that is all.”

  Elsie squeezed her fingers together. “I didn’t know that he…loved me.”

  Great Aunt Annalies nodded. “Then he maintained enough honor not to burden you with that truth before he left.”

  “You knew?” Elise’s astonishment stole her capacity to say anything else.

  Great Aunt Annalies’ smile was indulgent. “I was in love myself, once,” she said gently. “I know the signs. Did you truly think everyone believed that little tale you told yourselves about learning to despise each other?”

  Elise stared at her, scrambling to put her thoughts together. “You didn’t say anything…you let Danyal very nearly live in the house with us!”

  Annalies sighed. “If I had not, you would have found a way to meet and linger in each other’s presence, anyway. I merely facilitated the plan so I might keep an eye on both of you.”

  “You might have told me,” Elise said, at last, feeling winded. “I would have run away, or something! There are very good reasons, inarguable reasons, why we cannot be together. You even agreed with them!”

  “Yes, they are solid enough reasons,” Annalies said, her tone placid. “Which is why your choice is either to stay here and abide by those reasons or go to him as he asks
and see what comes of it.”

  “Nothing can come of it,” Elise replied, her heart aching. “It would be…be the worst sort of teasing, to go there, knowing I must return.”

  “If that is so, then why are you still arguing with me, hmm?” Great Aunt Annalies’ tone was gentle. “When I said a moment ago that you should let this letter go without response, you should have nodded and gone back into the dining room to serve breakfast, but you did not. You sit here still, trying to convince yourself that travelling to Pandev is out of the question.”

  “It is!” Elise cried.

  “It is perfectly possible,” Annalies replied. “All it requires are funds and a Deringer in your reticule, just in case.”

  Elise opened her mouth to speak. To protest, perhaps. But no words came to her. She instead squeezed her hands together once more.

  Great Aunt Annalies smiled. “You remind me of your Aunt Mairin. She sat in front of me in the same state which you are in, once.”

  “Aunt Mairin ran away to Paris during the Siege,” Elise pointed out.

  “And if she had not, Iefan would not have understood how much he needed her.” Great Aunt Annalies removed her glasses once more. “Go to Danyal, as he asks, Elise. Until you stand before him, he will not understand how much he is willing to pay to keep you there.”

  “Or he may send me straight back to London on the next train!” Elise cried.

  “And if he does, then you will have your answer, will you not? You can settle here and become the spinster you have told everyone you intend to become…and you will have seen a smidgen of Europe and the East, too.”

  Elise stared at her, confounded.

  Great Aunt Annalies patted her hand. “This will all make much greater sense once the Danube lays behind you,” she said gently.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Nothing made sense to Elise, not even when she had crossed the Danube. Nor when the train rattled and swayed its way into the little station in Sofia. She was still frozen with fear and wondering and a silvered, static-charged hope that kept her almost unable to sit, when the even older train pulled out of Sofia, heading for Pandevitsa, the royal seat of Pandev.

  As the train wound through steep valleys, Elise reread Danyal’s letter, then carefully stowed it in her reticule beside the tiny Deringer that Great Aunt Annalies had pressed upon her on the Euston station platform, five days ago.

  The money Uncle Iefan had given her was in a pocket sewn upon her petticoat, except for a pound she had in her reticule to pay for daily expenses.

  The journey was nearly over and her hope was building anew, despite having spent the intervening five days of travel attempting to convince herself that it was merely a fool’s hope she held.

  When she considered what might happen when she reached Pandev, the doubt would rise and almost choke her. Elise could barely imagine what awaited her. Would Danyal learn that she had arrived in his country? Would he send for her? Or would she be forced to present herself at the palace and request permission to speak to him?

  Would she be turned away without seeing him?

  Elise tried to halt the endless worry. Not for the first time, she stole a glance at the rough-looking men sitting in the coach with her. There were no first-class accommodations on this train—nor had there been any on the train to Sofia. Everyone sat on the hard, wooden benches lined up in pairs down the length of the carriage, no matter who they were.

  There were a great many people here who looked grim and determined. They were dressed poorly, but they were not grimy with toil for they had no work to carry out. Everywhere Elise went, these men of disguised leisure seemed to linger and watch her with brooding expressions and suspicious gazes.

  “Anarchists and good-for-nothings,” the concierge at the hotel in Vienna had explained to Elise, for he was an Englishman, and eager to speak his native tongue. “Europe is full of them, these days. You should watch yourself, Miss. They steal from anyone, given half a chance. Most of them can’t pay for their supper and won’t work for it, neither, because working for the upper classes is a betrayal of their creed.” He nearly spat, remembered where he was and cleared his throat, instead.

  Elise was very glad of the gun in her purse, after that, even though she had little idea how to use it. Pointing it in a menacing manner might have to be enough, if it came to that.

  So far, though, the angry men she had seen—and they never seemed to be alone, she realized—so far, such men had done nothing more than scowl at her.

  She was glad of the simple dark brown travelling suit she wore. She had considered it utterly plain and sensible, but here, among rough-clothed and poorly shod workers, the suit was not ostentatious and didn’t draw the eye. She wore sensible boots, a minimum of petticoats, and her bustle was barely worth mentioning, when most ladies these days had to recline or sit sideways in order to accommodate their bustle upon a chair. Her hat bore only a single length of braid around the brim, and no flowers or netting or other embellishments.

  Even so, Elise wondered if she should have removed the hat and travelled bare-headed, or with a shawl over her head, the way many of the women she had seen on these trains had done. A shawl certainly looked warmer.

  The snow here was deep and crisp and perfectly white, even where people had trampled it down to a solid, frozen blanket on the ground. It was too cold for the snow to melt and turn into black slush, the way it did in London when it snowed at all.

  It would be Christmas day in two day’s time. She would not be home for Christmas, this year.

  Elise was very glad to have the fur muff which Ann had thrust at her as Elise left the big house to catch her train. No matter how ostentatious such an accessory appeared to be, on these barely heated trains, it was a God send.

  She kept her hands inside the roll, where they remained warm, and watched the mountainous land spread out on either side of the train.

  Pandev was a very small city lying alongside the palace and the royal grounds, both of which hugged the steep side of the valley. Elise studied the palace as the train passed by. It was a huge building, with white walls that might have blended in with the snow-covered countryside, except for the silver-gray slate roof, which gleamed dully in the afternoon sunlight.

  It was a beautiful building, Elise decided. What was Danyal doing in there at this moment?

  As they approached the station, the people on the coach got to their feet, murmuring to themselves, picking up their belongings and preparing to alight. The Bulgarian language they spoke was incomprehensible to Elise. She had only managed to make herself understood because many people spoke a little English.

  The brakes on the train squealed against the frozen tracks as it slowed. Elise got to her feet and pulled the small valise she was using down from the overhead rack, and moved toward the door of the train, too.

  The station was full of a great many other people who looked similar to the angry people Elise had seen on the train. She looked over their heads toward the big doors that led outside. Would this city have cabs? Should she rent one and go to the palace? Or find a hotel, first?

  Her heart was hurting. So was her head. She stepped onto the platform and squeezed the handle of her valise, trying to make a decision among the many that presented themselves to her.

  A woman in a simple dark green dress and middle class appointments swept up to her, a smile on her face. “Miss Thomsett. We were expecting you tomorrow,” she said in a heavy accent. “You made very good time!” She held out her gloved hand.

  Elise stared at the hand, then at the woman. She had dark brown eyes and the hair at her temple was streaked in gray. “And you are?” Elise asked, keeping her tone polite.

  “I am Maria,” the woman said, her smile not shifting. “Can I take your suitcase for you? Is that what you call it? My English is adequate only, I am afraid.”

  “I can carry it, thank you,” Elise said, suddenly reluctant to part with the valise.

  “We have a carriage for you, out t
here.” Maria waved toward the exit. “And a hotel, too.”

  “How did you know I would be upon the train? How do you know my name?” Elise asked.

  Maria waved her hand, as if she was trying to find the right words. “We were told you were expected at the palace.”

  “You are from the palace?” Elise’s heart leapt.

  “Ya. You come, now?” Maria held out her hand for the valise once more.

  “Which way?” Elise asked.

  “Come. Come.” Maria gestured.

  Elise followed. Her hope had soared, once more.

  Innesford Manor, Innesford, Cornwall.

  It was shortly before supper when Richard reached the door of Vaughn’s old bedroom, still straightening his bow tie. He was out of practice in dressing for dinner, which made Cian’s suggestion that they enjoy a white tie formal dinner all the more intriguing. He had left Éve fussing in her bedroom, directing the maid on the arranging of her hair and breaking into French when English failed her.

  Richard had dressed as hastily as possible to conserve these few short minutes when he might speak to Vaughn alone. His brother was using his old bedroom to dress for dinner, even though he now used the stablemaster’s quarters over the stable to sleep and hide away from everyone.

  The valet Thatcher had assigned to his brother emerged, carefully carrying a full washbasin. “My lord,” he murmured, holding the door open for Richard with his elbow.

  They skirted around each other and Richard stepped into the room and froze, for Vaughn had his back to the door, in the process of donning a clean evening shirt that he must have borrowed from Cian, for he had arrived with nothing.

  Vaughn’s back was scarred, with old wounds turned white with age, and newer ones, pink and recently healed. Richard counted five of them before the shirt dropped over them and Vaughn turned around.

  Vaughn scowled. “Shouldn’t you be downstairs, sipping champagne?”

  “I will venture down in a few minutes.” Richard could not allow the conversation to simply move on. “Your back…” His voice was hoarse.