Chapter Twelve
Gibb elected to walk to Bruton Street, in part so he could rehearse what he wanted to say. Silly to feel as nervous as a virgin about to discover the delights of the flesh, but there it was. He trembled and had such a toad—it was bigger than a frog—in his throat it threatened to choke any words he tried to utter. He’d best lose it soon.
The temptation to peel off and head for his club was almost impossible to ignore. Only a fierce will, and the knowledge that if he didn’t turn up at eleven Evangeline could and no doubt would write him off, kept him walking in the correct direction. He greeted a crony absently and watched the man stare at him as if he had lost his mind. Gibb, not the other man. Gibb accepted he was known for his attention to politeness, and awareness—not due to a lack of them. But then, he knew something others did not. He accepted it was too late to rectify his mistake with his friend, except apologize when they next met, but he hoped not too late with Evangeline.
The next hour would define his future.
To his annoyance it didn’t start off in the right direction.
The doorman stared at him long and hard before he admitted that ‘Mam-sell’ was expecting him. Then he’d had to be shown a room to duck into to avoid a crony of his late mama and her obnoxious husband-hunting daughter. The doorman had smirked as he’d hidden Gibb from sight, and Gibb swore he was left in the closet-sized room for longer than necessary. Even so, he thanked the man. For that couple to spy him would be the final straw. Then, if that wasn’t enough, before he’d climbed the last flight of stairs, Eloise had cornered him, taken his arm, marched him into her workroom and proceeded to interrogate him. As he had no intention of sharing his thoughts with anyone except Evangeline it was a difficult ten minutes of verbal sparring on his behalf and enough hard-hitting questions on hers to make him squirm. When Eloise let him go, he could see she was unsatisfied and unsettled and he could do nothing to allay her fears.
Somewhat rattled, he knocked softly on Evangeline’s door. At least she opened it promptly and stood back to let him enter. Then, uncertain, he hovered.
“Oh, for goodness’ sake, sit down.” Evangeline waved toward a comfortable chair set near the blazing fire. “You look like death warmed up.”
“I feel it.” Gibb grinned against his will as he sat in the chair she indicated and crossed his long legs elegantly—or so he hoped. They could look like a tangle of ropes for all he knew at that moment. “Is it any wonder? I gave an acquaintance the cold shoulder by accident, have been scrutinized by your doorman, had to hide like a criminal to avoid the Countess of Marksham and her odious daughter and had the thumbscrew interrogation by Eloise. All before noon.” He rolled his eyes. “On top of a fitful night’s sleep.”
“Poor thing.” She patted his shoulder. “Then if I offer you ale?”
“I’ll take it,” Gibb said. “And pretend it is noon. Truly, I have suffered.”
“So you say.” She gave him a sympathetic glance.
Did he look as haggard as he felt? It must be convenient to pour the liquid and keep your hands busy. He had to force himself not to pick at his nails or twist his fingers together. How pathetic.
“Let us hope this will help.” She passed him a tankard. “Perhaps if you just say what you want?”
“That is so easy to say and not so much to do.” Hadn’t he spent most of the night agonizing over how to explain himself? “However, I will try. Promise you will hear me out and let me finish?”
Evangeline looked surprised. “Of course, but why do you think I may not?”
Gibb grimaced. “I don’t know. All I understand is this is important and I am not at my most articulate at the moment. It…” He hesitated. It had to be said. “It worries me.”
“That something does is obvious. You are unraveling my tablecloth and performing contortions with your ankles. Spit it out and relax.” She smiled. “Have a drink. It might help.”
Gibb exhaled loud and long. “I think I had better.” He swallowed some of the ale. “Thank you. I never thought I would need this for courage.”
Now Evangeline looked worried. He watched her every move from under his lowered lashes. Would she understand? He thought her sympathetic and far-seeing, but… He bit his lip and forced himself to wait until she had poured herself some water and sat in a matching chair at right angles to his.
“Tell me what is on your mind, Gibb, before I copy you and I end up with no table covering and so tied in knots I’m there forever.”
Now the ‘moment’ had arrived, Gibb was amazed to find himself ready to speak. Whatever the outcome, now was the time to open up and be honest.
Evangeline waited with as much patience as she could muster while Gibb rearranged his legs, sipped some ale then leaned toward her without warning.
“When you said you didn’t want to see me again, I was hurt,” he began slowly. “Not surprised, because, after all, who would want to spend time with someone who could make no promises about the following week let alone the next month or year? So I admit I went off in a mood of both anger and woe is me. I went north in a begrudging, ‘all is for the best’ frame of mind.”
She nodded, and wiped one eye. “I told myself you would.”
“It didn’t last. I promise,” Gibb told her. “I toiled alongside my workers, worried their crops might not be as good as they could be and struggled to help build a new barn so what crops they did have lasted the winter. Then arranged for their homes to be warm and watertight and reiterated that missing school was not an option if you live on my land.” He laughed. “I was asked if bunking off was not normal. Bunking off is playing truant.”
“Ah, and you do not allow it to happen?”
“Not if they expect to be employed later.” He shrugged. “I feel that to grow and prosper we need education. A chance to understand and learn. I know many do not agree with me.” He quirked his lips. “Think I am too much of an authoritarian. They have a choice. Stay or go.”
“Gibb Alford, why on earth do you imagine you have no feelings?” Evangeline left her chair and crouched at his feet to look up into his smoky eyes and search for something to indicate his mood. “They are there all right, believe me.”
He nodded. “Something an old retainer said gave me food for thought. He told me that some people are born miserable and can’t understand why others are not, and my late wife was one of them. He went on to say he reckoned whatever I did would never have been good enough, and that she had been determined to make my life uncomfortable.”
“That is appalling,” Evangeline said without thinking. “Why on earth?”
“That is a question I suspect I will never be able to truly answer,” Gibb replied. “She accused me of not giving her what she wanted. I don’t think even she knew what that was. Lord, this sounds disloyal, but I have to try and explain my marriage to you.”
“Oh, my dear, you don’t.”
He looked startled. “I don’t?”
“No, not at all. All you have to explain is why you are here now. What is different from before. Why…” She stopped as she tried to put her scrambled thoughts into order. “What do you intend next?”
From somewhere outside an altercation filtered upward and added to the tension in the room. The semi-silence was not peaceful, anything but. It was charged with something indefinable. A coal in the fire flared, spluttered and died. Evangeline moved to alleviate the pain in her knees due to her crouched position. “Gibb?” she prompted. “Is that too difficult to answer?”
“It depends on you.”
“Me? How so?” It was his mindset that had given rise to this situation, was it not? Yes, she had decided enough was enough but in response to his intractability, nothing else. “You are the one who said the way it should be,” Evangeline said, proud of her even, non-judgmental tone.
“And you were the one who said no, it was not acceptable,” he replied equably, without censoriousness. “Now I’m asking you if we can try again.”
Evangeline stood up and surreptitiously did her best to work the pins and needles from her limbs. She needed a clear head as she asked the words that bothered her.
The argument in the street, which had gone silent, started up again. Someone shrieked outside the window and both of them jumped. “This is daft,” she said shakily. “Let’s try to do this in a sane and sensible manner. What do you want from me?”
“A chance to be your friend again,” he said straight away.
“As in how? A friend who you care about to some degree, but aren’t prepared to admit it?”
“I do admit I care,” Gibb said. “Haven’t I just said so?”
“Not in so many words, no. Yes, your actions often do. Look at the way you look after your estates and workers. But words? No, never.”
“That’s common sense, is it not? Does it need to be put into words?”
“Not necessarily,” Evangeline argued. “Plus, there is also compassion shown. However, I digress. That is not us. I’m asking again, what do you want from us, Gibb? In specific, from me.”
He studied her. “I don’t know.”
“Don’t know or refuse to know?” she asked, sick at heart. Had anything changed? “There is a difference between them.”
“I know that,” he said. “And I don’t have a proper answer. I think I care, I’m scared to care and I don’t know if I dare care more than I do now. Is not the fact that I take care of things that could affect you enough? Is that not the sort of care you desire?”
If he thought that, they had not moved on. She bit her lip. “I wish it were, Gibb, but we both know it isn’t. I could not cope on half a loaf. I’m not asking for your undying affection, for you to shield me from all the winds of fate and make sure none touch me. Life isn’t like that. But you are, as you ever have been, putting fences up where none need to be.”
“I’m being as honest as I can.”
“I know you think you are, and believe me I appreciate that.” Good lord, she had almost said how she loved him for it. Too much for him to accept, she was sure. “What you say you are able to give me would not be enough, I’d be scared to show my feelings in case they crossed over some invisible line I didn’t understand or know about. You would be ever watchful and on edge. Add that to who we are.” She got out of her chair, shook her head and stood on tiptoe to lean over him and kiss his cheek. His hands clenched around her waist and tightened briefly before she drew back and he let go of her. “It cannot be.” Dare she be open now?
He stood and strode to the window to turn his back on her, and looked out of the panes of glass. Evangeline saw his hands were white as he gripped the sill. She decided not to hold back.
“Gibb, I could so easily love you, and love that isn’t returned turns black and evil. I will not put either of us through that. To be with you would be torture. It wouldn’t be the tortured duke, it would be the tortured duke’s tortured friend.”
He turned around and she saw why he had been given that sobriquet.
“Believe me, I would love you if I could,” he said in an anguished voice. “I do not know if I have the ability to love anyone. It might not be part of my makeup.”
She shook her head. “I doubt that, somehow. You have come a long way since we first met, but you have still shut a major piece of yourself away. Love is beautiful, and like any emotion, be it good or bad, is an integral part of you and can’t be compartmentalized. You either let it in or not. And only you can do that.” There was nothing else she could say. She took her glass of water, wished it held something stronger and took small sips. Too big a mouthful would choke her.
Gibb was so quiet she wondered what would happen next. Eventually he took a deep breath and exhaled with a long-drawn-out hiss. “I need to think again.”
“Then you must do so.” And she needed to make her mind up if she was going to let him know why she was going away for a while. Evangeline decided she wouldn’t, not unless she had to. Those explanations weren’t about to be shared unless he was prepared to be part of her life.
“I’ll be away for a while.” She put her hand over his mouth before he asked any questions. “I also need to think. Now go and continue to make your peace with yourself.”
* * * *
Why, oh, why does nothing ever go according to plan? That knotty question went around in Gibb’s mind over and over again as he went through the motions of his everyday life. He went to his club and spent an hour chatting to his cronies about anything and nothing. Passed half the morning at Tattersall’s and purchased a new horse to be sent to Scotland, and went a round in Jackson’s boxing salon. He proceeded to Manton’s and spent a satisfying half-hour cupping wafers. But most of the time, half of his mind was on Evangeline, not what he was doing. Once they passed in the park as he walked through it from one appointment to another and she was arm in arm with Julia Arthur. He inclined his head, they waved, and as he veered in their direction he was hailed by a fellow peer concerned about a speech he had to give. Gibb sent an apologetic smile to Evangeline, who nodded as if to say she understood. Or so he hoped. Even then it was hard. He wanted to be reassured she was well, and to assure her he wasn’t treating their meeting lightly and was trying to sort himself out more.
He spent one day at Cresswell, and if he chose colors and furnishings he thought she would like he didn’t admit it.
If he fancied he heard her laugh and imagined he saw her skirts whisking around a corner, he didn’t admit it. But when he picked up a hairpin and put it through his lapel, he admitted one thing
He needed to sort himself out and fast.
Gibb went back to town in a somber mood, spent most of his time ensconced in his study and thought things over as best he could.
On the tenth night he once again eschewed all invitations and sat in his study with a large dram.
He’d done enough agonizing, now it was make his mind up time. Gibb remembered something his first tutor had told him. If in doubt, make lists. One pro and one con. Sad though that might be, in this case it could just help him. He’d second-guessed himself so much he was dizzy. Gibb scrabbled in a drawer and found a writing tablet and a pencil and drew a line from top to bottom down the center of the tablet. Then he nibbled the end of the pencil before wrinkling his brow and spitting into his handkerchief. The pencil’s taste was disgusting. It served him right for prevarication. Quickly, before he filled his mouth with the taste of lead again, he began to write.
Con.
What con? Makes me think? Surely that is a good thing? Makes me aware? Ditto. He mentally shrugged. Perhaps a pro list would help him to decide on the cons?
Pro.
Like.
Like a lot.
Doesn’t bore me, or asked for more than I have been able to give.
Patient.
Feisty.
No, not a contradiction.
Interesting, articulate and a good listener. A good heart.
Mine.
The last word made him jerk, stab the page and drop his pencil, but not before it slashed a large line across the vellum, scoring into the sheet below. It amused him to see it had put a thick, dark line though the cons part of his cogitations.
Suddenly it all seemed oh so simple. Evangeline was nothing like Hester. The one thing they had in common was their sex. What a fool he was.
He added three words in capitals to his pro list. I love her.
I love her.
He almost jumped up to shout it to the world. I…love…Evangeline Coeur.
Now he had to tell her and hope to hell she believed him.
* * * *
Five days after they had arrived, Evangeline looked around the pleasant bedchamber her papa had chosen for her and kissed his cheek. “This is perfect. You have gone to so much trouble.”
He patted her hand and grinned from ear to ear and she swore he appeared ten years younger. When he had asked her diffidently if she minded him introducing her as his daughter, what else could she have said but of course not. His pleasure had been worth it. Plus, if she were truthful, it was lovely to have that sense of belonging once more.
I could have had it with Gibb if he’d wanted, we could have had it. In case he chose to visit, Evangeline had dallied in the capital for over a week, citing things to clear up before she left to her papa. Not that Evangeline thought he believed her, but he had nodded and put their departure back accordingly.
But those days had shown her Gibb wasn’t ready to come and talk to her and might never be. She’d left with mixed feelings after exacting promises from Julia and Eloise that they would not divulge her whereabouts.
Now La Belle Evangeline was no more.
In her place was Mademoiselle d’Astre.
“Come back to Rutland.” Iain grinned from ear to ear. “As my daughter.”
“I’ve kept you waiting, haven’t I?”
“Ma chère, it was a labor of love. My daughter at last.”
Evangeline leaned back on the elaborate carved dressing table and studied the man in front of her. “Can you swear you are sure I am your daughter?
He nodded. “As sure as I can be without hearing it from your maman’s lips. We have the same deformity in our finger. You have my beloved Eve’s earlobes. We both have the same blue eyes with the darkness seeping into the blue. The timing fits, your maman would not have slept with anyone else, you detest les tripes and noisettes but adore les amandes. What else? We neither can sing in tune, but both can throw and catch a stiletto without looking. Though I own there you have more skill than I. Do you need more proof?”
She shook her head. “No, Papa. It is enough.”
He smiled. “Then we will go and drink Armagnac and you will tell me why you are triste, eh? Let your papa put it right.” He puffed out his cheeks and raised his fists. “Who must I fight? Pray it is with sabers, not pistols. My aim has never been true with a firearm.”
She laughed as she was sure he meant her to. “No fighting please, Papa. For it is me who needs sorting out, no one else.”
He took her arm and they walked downstairs to the sunny morning room he had designated also as hers, but where every day after lunch they sat for an hour or so and chatted.
“Do you miss him?” Iain asked suddenly.
“Oh yes.” She didn’t pretend not to know who he meant. “Like an ache inside.”
“But still you came?”
Evangeline smiled, although she felt more like crying. “Papa, I would have come whatever happened. I had hoped I could have come with his blessing, but it wasn’t to be. You see, I didn’t pay any attention when he said he had no heart. That he could not and would not give in to emotion. I’m like every other woman, I suppose. I believe in the power of love. I made the mistake of thinking I would be the one who changed him. I did not and I could not bear to wait forever.” She sighed. “Maybe that makes me as bad as him.” She pleated the skirts of her dress with busy fingers.
“What rubbish is this I am hearing, my dear?” The more flustered Iain got, the more Gallic he became. He ran his hand through his once immaculately styled hair and looked for all the world like an agitated cockerel. “Your words are neither sensible nor applicable. He is the idiot, not you. Pah, I wish I could share a piece of my mind with him. Just let me see him. I will give him what for.” He harrumphed.
“Papa, you will not,” she said, alarmed at what the outcome of such a meeting could be. “Promise me? It is my problem, not yours.”
“I am your papa. It is what parents should do.”
“Papa, no. I am a big girl and have to fight my own battles. Your word?” She waited as he waged an argument with himself.
At last he let his breath out in one long whoosh. “Everything that bothers you is my business,” he grumbled, but she could see his ire abating by the second. “Oh, I agree. With reluctance, mind you.”
“Thank you.” Evangeline hugged him tight. “But, Papa, when will this feeling end?” she asked him forlornly.
Iain stroked her hair in a rhythmic, gentle motion. “Ah, if I had the answer to that, I would be happy to share it with you. Sadly I do not, my love. I do not know.”
Nor did she, more was the pity.