CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Four years earlier
The ambulatory was made of gray stone, medieval pillars thicker than a man’s trunk, supporting archways that opened onto a small walled courtyard. Liam stepped through one of these archways, half expecting to find his path barred by some kilted ghost bearing uplifted claymore, demanding to know his business here.
Marriage, he would say. I have come here to be married.
But the courtyard was empty. A damp breeze stirred the branches of the weedy tree growing at the center. Liam took a seat on the single bench and studied his companion. An orange tree, he thought—no wonder it looked shrunken and wistful. It had been bred for kinder climates than this one.
From the other side of the wall came a sudden shout of laughter. Gravel crunched, conversation swelled and dimmed. Guests were arriving, greeting old friends as they processed inside. They would not guess that the groom sat ten yards away, alone, without family to accompany him, or friends to give encouragement in this last hour of his bachelorhood.
Melodrama. He’d left behind several friends in the hot, crowded rectory. Drinking friends, sporting friends, chums from his days at Trinity. In their company, this last hour, he had felt increasingly alone. He needed a moment to remember the people who should have been here in their place.
His father: he could have used his father’s advice. His father had known how to keep a complicated woman happy, how to manage the sharp edges of her temper when the world condescended to her, how to keep her laughing, how to provoke and lure her when her quick, changeable interests turned in new directions.
His mother: sharp-witted, strong-willed, restless in her curiosity. Those qualities had proved poorly fitted to what the world wanted of her, but Liam’s father had become her refuge, her inspiration, her joy. Liam knew what she would advise him: Consider your wife your greatest and rarest treasure. Guard her. Protect her. Above all, respect her. For it is a rare treasure that cannot be captured, only coaxed to stay.
His parents had prepared him well, for all that they had left too soon. Their memories would guide him. He knew they would have approved, and not only because this marriage, his bride’s wealth, would save his patrimony. They would have approved of her—Anna—his soon-to-be-wife.
He took a deep breath. The salted air tasted like the sea. He had once dreamed only of travel, of adventure. He had not realized that another person could be one’s adventure.
He wished Julian were here. Jules would listen to these thoughts calmly, without surprise, but with a dash of wry amusement that would help these feelings seem lighter, easier to bear.
Instead, Julian was in India. Liam had expected a cable from him, good wishes. But none had come.
Some noise startled him. He rose, and caught sight of a furtive movement—a glimpse of ivory lace, retreating behind a pillar.
A disbelieving smile lightened his mood. “Come out,” he said.
And his soon-to-be-bride replied, laughing: “It’s bad luck. I didn’t know you were out here!”
She had plastered herself to the far side of the pillar, but her belling skirts spilled into view on either side—tiers of stiffened satin, gleaming like moonlight, embroidered with seed pearls and fringed in thick lace. “You’re superstitious? I wouldn’t have—”
“In this, I am! Don’t come into view.”
“I won’t. It’s your face I mustn’t see—is that right?”
A pause. “I don’t think the superstition is specific on that question.”
She still sounded amused. “Then stay where you are,” he murmured, and reached around the pillar, groping blindly until her hands found his own. Her fingers were warm, soft. As her grip tightened, he felt some last, buried anxiety dissipate. A great peace filled him.
And a jumping, fluttering excitement.
They would be married.
As though she heard his thoughts, she whispered, “Tonight, we’ll be husband and wife.”
“Yes.”
They stood for a long moment, the pillar between them, and he listened to the sounds of her: her soft rapid breath, the faint rustle of shifting satin, the scuff of her slippers across stone.
“I have never felt faint before,” she said. “But I am dizzy with it. This time tomorrow, we will be en route to Paris, and married. Together, with nobody to keep us apart.”
His thoughts had not gone that far. With his hands pressed to hers, his brain had darted squarely toward tonight, and the challenge this dress would pose. “How many buttons?” he asked.
It took her only a moment to follow his meaning, and she giggled. “Hundreds.”
“God save me.”
“Your first test!”
They laughed together, and he set his forehead against the pillar, greatly needing the cool reproach of the stone to distract his body. It would not do to go down the aisle in this state.
“Everyone is inside now,” she murmured. “I peeked out a minute ago.”
“All your aunties?”
“Yes, and sixty or seventy cousins. Are you certain you’re all right, Liam? I came out here because this gown weighs three stone, and I needed a fresh breeze. But . . .”
Why are you out here? was her unfinished question.
“I was thinking of my parents,” he said quietly.
“Oh.”
“This is the happiest day of my life. I only wish my family were here.”
She squeezed his hands. “But it is. I am here. I’m your family now.”
The breath went from him. It took a moment to find his voice again; the words came out hushed, like a prayer. “How fortunate I am.”
After a moment, she said, “And your cousin is inside as well. He came alone, I think.”
“Yes, his wife took ill, I’m afraid.” So Stephen had told him, when they had run into each other on King Street three hours ago.
What a place for a meeting! For half a second, Liam had wondered if Stephen was following him. As young children, they had been close, but once at school, when the difference in their future stations had become apparent, Stephen had grown resentful. Their relationship had come to feel like a competition—one in which Liam’s reluctance to compete had only made his cousin angrier. Stephen won handily: he was the superior scholar, the better scripturalist, one of the finest debaters that Eton and Oxford had ever seen.
Regardless, he would never become the earl. And now, in one moment, Liam would also become the wealthier of them—destroying Stephen’s only remaining advantage.
There had been an ugly smirk on Stephen’s face in King Street as he’d registered the satchel Liam carried and the bank he’d just left. “Counting your chickens?” he’d asked. “I can’t blame you.”
The letter of credit had suddenly felt heavy and somehow damning.
Liam did not like to imagine that others among the guests might also be smirking, imagining that they perfectly understood the reasons behind this hasty marriage. It was not only about money. Of late, it had nothing to do with money at all. But society would imagine otherwise.
So, perhaps, would she.
“Anna . . .” Adjusting his grip around her hands, stroking her knuckles softly, he wrestled with whether to speak of it. The unusual contract, its peculiar terms, had been agreed on by both of them. But those terms need not dictate their marriage.
“What?” she whispered.
He wished he could see her face. He did not believe he was alone in these feelings.
But what if he was wrong? What if the confession alarmed her? She might fear that he meant to renege on the terms of their contract, and to keep her from her island, her freedoms, which she had declared from the start were all she wanted of a marriage.
Love was the secret around which he danced now as they kissed, flirted, laughed together. Love had not been her aim. But he had fallen in love—and he hoped, prayed, that she had done so as well.
Still, he could not tell her now, when her face was hidden. He would tell her tonight. Or, no—not when hundreds of buttons awaited him. He would tell her in Paris.
From the distance came the swell of the organ. Anna started in his grip. “Goodness! They are starting! And we, out here—”
“Run along,” he said, laughing as he released her.
“Don’t look at me! Promise you won’t! Close your eyes!”
“They’re closed,” he lied, and watched as she broke away from the pillar, lifting the shimmering layers of her skirts so she might run. The clouds, being wise, suddenly parted: sunlight washed over her figure, calling out glimmers from the seed pearls, the silver embroidery and lace, and drawing fire in the ornate braids of her hair.
Just before she disappeared into the church, she glanced back, and her green eyes widened dramatically as they locked with his.
“Liar!” she called, but she was smiling. She was impossibly beautiful. She was the only sight worth seeing.
“I would be a fool to look away from you,” he said. “Even for a moment.”
• • •
The cabin was palatial: four rooms of velvet and silk, tasseled and carpeted in shades of azure and gold. It would be a very comfortable way to sail to Folkestone, where they would transfer to a steamer bound for Boulogne, and thence to the railway to Paris. Liam opened the door to the balcony, closing his eyes to the cool breeze spilling off the water, carried all the way from the North Sea.
“What did your cousin mean today?”
He turned. Anna had come out of the bedroom, where she had unpinned her hair. It sprawled around her shoulders, roiled in glorious abandon across the pale upper swells of her breasts. She still wore the gown, thank God. He had spent the last hour inventing fantasies of how he would remove it. “What’s that?”
“Mr. Devaliant. As we left, he said he was glad that you’d already made your run on the bank, so nothing would keep us from sailing directly.”
He caught back his black smile. “He said that, did he?” And here he’d thought Stephen had turned a new leaf. His wedding gift had suggested so—but there was always a catch with his cousin.
“What did he mean?” Anna asked.
He stepped inside, pulling shut the balcony door. “Only what it sounds like. We ran into each other this morning, before I went to the church.”
She clasped her hands in front of her, squeezing her fingers, a gesture that looked oddly nervous. “At the bank.”
“Yes,” he said, trying not to frown. Was he the cause of her uneasiness? Did she anticipate he would jump on her? He took a seat, to allay her nerves. “I had some business there.”
“On our wedding day?”
“Yes, why?”
“Oh . . . no reason.” She pulled apart her hands very suddenly, then cupped them around her elbows, prowling restlessly around the cabin. “I suppose our mornings proceeded very differently, then. I spent those hours getting plucked and powdered and pressed and curled and sewn into this dreadful gown.”
“Far from dreadful,” he said. “It’s the loveliest—”
“It weighs three stone and it itches. It’s a wonder I’m still breathing.”
Her quarrelsome tone confused him. But he could not resist the opening she offered. He rose. “Allow me to assist you out of it.”
But she sidestepped his reach, fixing her interest on an enameled lamp that stood bolted to the sideboard; with one finger, she traced the raised design. “What business did you have at the bank?”
A sinking feeling came over him. “Nothing of particular interest.”
“Oh? Nothing to do with my accounts, then?”
He took a deep breath. “Anna—”
She faced him. “For my accounts are certainly of interest to me.”
That waspish tone was not fair. “Our accounts, you mean.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Oh, yes, our accounts now. For a woman, once married, has nothing to call her own.”
He caught himself before he could push out a sharp breath. “Oh, come now. That’s dramatic.”
“But true.”
“Your island, all the lands entailed to the earldom of Forth—none of those are mine.”
She lifted her chin, staring steadily at him. “But the money? I assume your business had to do with that.”
These delicate little jabs were succeeding: he felt hot now, his temper pricking. “Yes, you’re right. The business concerned money. I thought to settle some private debts before we left.”
“Private debts? Debts not disclosed to my lawyers, do you mean?”
He felt a twist of shame, which in turn angered him, for he had done nothing wrong. “Forgive me,” he said sardonically. “I did not think to submit my tailor’s bills to Sir Charles. Would he also like my grocer’s address?”
Her lips compressed into a pale, tense line. She bowed her head, her chest rising and falling dramatically, and he knew a sick feeling of having disappointed her—which was not fair, damn it. He’d forgotten a few damned receipts, that was all. “Why so stricken?” Fifty pounds here, twenty pounds there—should he go down on his knees to make requests for each of these payments? Hadn’t she known from the start that he’d not had a feather to fly with? “I settled my debts, Anna. Was that not the whole point?”
He regretted the remark instantly when she paled, and the more so when she said, softly and steadily, “Yes, that was the whole point.”
For that agreement only made him feel further attacked. “Not the whole point, in fact. If I recall, the other point was to secure ownership of your island.”
Her cheeks suddenly hollowed. She turned away.
“Tell me, will you wait until after our honeymoon to have the deed transferred?”
No reply.
“You already had it recorded,” he said. “The sasine. Didn’t you?”
Her slim shoulders lifted in a jerky shrug.
“And when did you tend to that business?”
“I didn’t tend to it,” she said stiffly. “My lawyer did.”
“Sir Charles? I saw him in the church. Thought it was rather odd that he’d stayed for the wedding. But I suppose it was business that kept him here.”
“He is an old friend of my family,” she said flatly.
“I see. Did he go to the General Register before or after we exchanged vows?”
She faced him, her cheeks blazing. “Afterward. The very moment we were wed.”
Wrong, wrong, to feel a stabbing in his gut—the twist of betrayal, of bitter disappointment. He was a hypocrite, to be sure: he had gone to the bank with their marriage license in hand. Why should her lawyer not have gone to file the sasine the very moment that license was signed?
“Well, then.” He took a ragged breath. “You understand why I went to the bank.”
“Of course.” Her voice was colorless. “We each had business to accomplish. That was the point, as you’ve said.”
But it was not the point. She thought it was the point—clearly it had been the point for her. “Of course, your island could have waited.” No, shut up, he told himself—but now he could not forget how coldly she’d looked at him a minute ago, as though he were some grubbing charlatan, when she herself had not hesitated to enforce her benefits from this marriage. “Your island was not going to drift away, or grow more expensive to keep. But the interest on my debts would have continued to accrue. So I think you’ll see it was sound good sense that drove me to act this morning.”
“Yes,” she spat. “Sound good sense. We are both very sensible.” She sat down heavily on the bed. “Of course, I put the business in the hands of a paid lawyer. I spent the morning doing nothing but thinking of you.”
His laugh felt disbelieving. “My God—that’s not fair.”
“Quite right, fairness doesn’t enter into it. I’m only telling you what I was doing, while you were paying a call to my bankers to instruct them to divert my money south to England.”
Her money—again, she said it.
He dragged in a breath, struggling for calm. “Those were the terms on which we agreed. Were they not?”
She tipped back her head to look down her nose at him, her mouth twisting with distaste, as though he were an overbearing beggar. “Of course.”
He laughed again. This was ludicrous—a fantasy gone wrong in an instant. “I certainly would not have agreed to those terms had I known you would try to shame me with them.”
“Shame? Whatever do you mean?”
“What else do you call this?”
She rose suddenly. To his bafflement, tears seemed to glimmer in her eyes. She dashed at them as she hauled open the door to the balcony.
Tears. Shocked, he followed her outside, into a cool night breeze, thick with the scents of fish and salt water and smoke. The twilight glimmered gently over the Firth of Forth, the lanterns on distant sailing vessels winking like stars. “Anna, what is this? What are we doing?” She was fighting tears. He felt helpless, confused. “Why are you so upset? I would have told you—I should have told you, but it honestly never occurred to me. This was the arrangement we struck. I didn’t think it would . . . distress you so.”
“It doesn’t.” She wiped her eyes once more, then stared fixedly out at the water. “Of course you were right to settle the debts. To act at once, without delay. You were thinking practically. I’m glad of it. It’s good to keep one’s mind on business, even on one’s wedding day. Perhaps especially on one’s wedding day, when one’s marriage is—what ours is.”
He felt struck. Why, her distress might bode well for him. Suddenly it seemed the most encouraging sign imaginable: she was upset because she, too, wanted more from this marriage than practicality.
He touched her arm, not letting go when she stiffened. “My mind was always on you,” he said urgently. “I wanted to get the business done—out of the way, as quickly as possible. So I would need to think of nothing but you afterward.”
She nodded once. “And the five hundred pounds sterling on your person?”
He recoiled. “I—” Was he to be interrogated in this fashion, and to submit meekly, like a child accounting for his allowance?
Moreover, how did she know about the five hundred pounds? Had she been spying on him?
She saw the question in his face, and offered a cool smile. “Your cousin mentioned that withdrawal as well. I found it rather surprising. More so when you let me tip the porter, half an hour ago.”
He gaped at her, battling a true feeling of outraged pride, the sorer for how handily his cousin had fooled him again.
No. No. Resist it.
“I had no small change,” he said flatly.
That was true: Stephen had only given him banknotes. But it sounded like a petty excuse, and her smile widened, sharp as a blade.
“I see. I suppose you intended that money to defray our expenses on the road?”
“Exactly.”
“Yet you also had a letter of credit issued in your name? Not mine. Mine is nowhere on it—I found it in your jacket. You wore it on you to our wedding.”
“Christ.” He stepped backward. “I am not going to defend myself to you. If you think me a swindling con man—”
“I think you an Englishman with little experience of wealth,” she said coolly. “After all, your father left you nothing but debts. You’ll understand, I hope, if I might wish a small measure of oversight as you begin to avail yourself of my—pardon me, our—funds.”
He turned on his heel.
“Where are you going?” came her demand from behind him.
“Out.” Out to wrestle down this furious mood, this dangerous temptation to shove the five hundred pounds sterling in her face, and leave her to figure out later that his cousin had lied: Liam had not taken it from her account. It had been Stephen’s wedding gift, offered in the church, which Liam had tried to refuse, knowing that nothing from his cousin ever came without strings and hidden blades.
But Stephen had insisted. And he, ever the naïve idiot, had thought that perhaps, just perhaps, his cousin meant the gift as a rapprochement, the mark of a new and more amicable chapter in their relations. He had, after all, spent all day moaning and glooming about his absent family. He’d been ripe for plucking, and his bloody cousin had sensed it.
“Don’t hurry back,” his wife called as he yanked open the door. “The maid can assist me with the gown.”
“I will be back before we sail,” he bit out. But he would not stay here and risk saying things he would forever regret. He would go find some peaceful corner in which to get hold of his temper. Then, on returning, he would explain to her calmly what lay between him and his cousin, and why Stephen might have designed this feud to spite him. The ship did not sail until eight o’clock; there was time.
• • •
Anna watched the door close. On a great gasping breath, she threw herself onto the bed and let the tears fall, hot and fierce, soaking through her fingers and staining the coverlet.
Stupid, stupid.
What harm if he wanted her money? She knew he wanted—needed—her money. That was why she had proposed this marriage in the first place. Why blame him now for what had recommended him to her?
But to see the proof of it, so plainly offered—to know that as she’d dressed for their wedding, dreaming of him, aloft on these secret swelling feelings of love, he’d been at the bank, availing himself leisurely of her credit, her cash, her accounts—
It was humiliating.
More humiliating yet, she had no cause to be angry. They had not married for love. Falling in love with him had been her mistake. She would pay the price for it. He should not be punished.
After a few long minutes, she got hold of herself and sat up. The cabin was exquisite. Decked in roses and sateen, ripe for romance. The sky outside was darkening in layers, fading from amethyst to indigo to black.
The mantel clock chimed seven. An hour remained until they set sail.
When he came back, she would apologize. She rubbed her chest, which felt bruised. He would not know how she ached. She would be bright, and apologetic, and cheerful.
She would try to make him love her. But she would not blame him if she failed. If he wanted only a contract marriage, then she would focus on her island, on Rawsey, that gift he alone had given her, the wonder of which would never be diminished even if he broke her heart. Besides, one day—perhaps soon—they would make a child. These were sureties vouched to her by this marriage. She would never regret wedding him, even if this ache in her chest never eased.
But she could make him love her. He was close—she knew it. She could not be alone in these feelings. She could have sworn, this morning in the cloister, he had been tempted to speak to her of love. If only she had stepped around the pillar and looked into his face!
She could go now and tell him everything. Confess her heart. Be brave.
She rose, staring at the door, then made herself sit again. She would not chase him. They had promised each other freedom, and she did not break her vows.
But tonight, she would seduce him. She would not call the maid after all—she would wear this dress until he came back. He’d professed himself ready for the challenge of the buttons. And in Paris, as they toured through the artworks he liked best, she would listen closely, and try to see them through his eyes. He had so much to teach her. And she could teach him, too, for her money was not the best thing about her. What was money? It had not persuaded her aunts to keep her, and it had not brought her joy. Joy came from other things, which money could not buy: knowledge and learning, the lung-burning exhaustion of a good walk, conversations with dear friends on cold nights, evenings on the beach at Rawsey, his laughter, his company, him . . .
He would come back. And she would apologize and kiss him, and he would smile and apologize, too, and they would fall onto this bed and make a child together. Either way, whether his or the child’s, love would be hers soon enough.
She sat, watching the door, and waited.