Chapter Six
She’d locked the door, which was no great surprise. He’d left Emily in their room at the coaching inn to see to his horses and rig, arrange the hiring of fresh cattle for tomorrow, and take Frieda for a much-needed walk. That last Emily had agreed to only after he’d pointed out that the dog needed exercise and relief. He’d had to swear on his soul he would not allow her to escape.
His various tasks completed, he took a brisk walk with Frieda. He’d been sitting for too many hours not to feel a need for physical exertion. Frieda had no trouble keeping up, and he rather fancied she’d be equally able to accompany him on one of his longer training breathers. Like him, Frieda was big, ungainly, and hellishly strong. She was also enthusiastic and affectionate.
Back at the coaching inn, he and the dog bounded up the stairs to the rooms he’d let. Two servants were there setting out the meal he’d ordered for them while Emily looked on. He kept Frieda on a short leash because she was equally intent upon making friends with the servants and snatching the roast they’d just set down.
Emily stood by a small table, hands behind her, looking serene and painfully beautiful. She curtsied. Too late for regrets for either of them, though, oddly enough, he had few. Perhaps even none. “My lord.”
Yes, of course. They must maintain the fiction that they were already a married couple. “Good evening,” he said. “My dear.”
His married friends were familiar, if not demonstrative, with their wives. He could do the same with Emily. When he approached her, there was an audible metallic thunk when she leaned against the table. He hadn’t intended to kiss her, but he did, a gentle press of his lips to her cheek. He breathed in the faint scent of lavender. At the same time he kissed her, he reached around and took the poker she had concealed. He returned it to the andiron. He could not help a smile at the idea of her gripping that poker, fully prepared to commit mayhem in defense of her person.
Since he did not dare release Frieda while the servants were here, he next put the dog in the bedchamber and closed the door, much to Frieda’s vocal dismay. He dropped his valise by the door, and hung his coat and hat on the nearby pegs. “My apologies for the delay in returning to you.”
“I wasn’t the least bit worried.” She made a face at him when he glanced at the fireplace.
“Always a pleasure to travel with a fearless woman.”
She smiled fondly at him, and even he, who considered himself, if not entirely immune to her, at least highly resistant, had a moment’s shock at the impact of that smile. But she, too, was playing a role—and playing it beautifully.
The younger of the two servants caught sight of her smile and stopped in his tracks. He gaped at Emily until his colleague gave him an elbow in the ribs. The servant was young, yes, practically a boy, but he ought to know better than to stare like that at any woman.
Emily turned her attention to the desk. She’d placed her hat there and spread out the ribbons to dry; it had begun to rain during the last hour and half of their northward drive.
The younger servant continued to gaze at her. “An angel,” he said slowly. “The most beautiful angel I’ve ever seen.”
Emily kept her back to the room, to all appearances unaware of any of them. A deliberate withdrawal. While Emily was absorbed in ensuring the ribbons of her hat would be dry by morning, Bracebridge escorted the servants to the door. He handed each a coin before he shut the door after them.
The moment he shot the bolt, Emily turned around. Well. So. Yes, a woman of her beauty attracted notice, but it had been plain even to him that the youth had made her uncomfortable. For the first time, he wondered whether she found such attentions unwelcome. What a peculiar position to find himself in. All this time, he’d assumed she would be insulted if she were not admired. “He ought to have been better behaved,” he said.
She shrugged, her expression smooth and untroubled. There’d been a time when he’d never doubted what she was thinking. Now he had no idea, and that unsettled him.
He released Frieda from the bedroom, inordinately relieved by the distraction of her frantic greeting of them both.
While he was busy rubbing the dog’s belly, he said, “There should be something for her, Em. Would you mind?”
She found the plate of raw meat he’d ordered and set it on the floor. “There, darling dog.”
Bracebridge was struck by how well and truly his life had changed. Emily Sinclair was now his responsibility. No matter how little they had in common, their lives were permanently entwined. “Give me a moment to wash up.”
She sat sideways on a chair, by turns watching Frieda and him. He flicked raindrops from his sleeve and withdrew his pistols from his pockets. He never traveled without them. He did wish he’d delayed leaving on this trip long enough to bring Keller, his valet, with him, but that would have meant a return to Rosefeld. An elopement would have been infinitely more difficult.
At the smaller table, he pushed her hat aside to make room for the weapons. Three letters slid from underneath the hat and onto the floor.
“Oh,” she said too quickly. “I’ll get them.”
Since they’d landed near his feet, he stooped to retrieve them. For several seconds, he stared at the direction written on the topmost letter. He glanced at the other two as well, but those were unexceptional since they were directed, respectively, to her sister Mary and to the Duke of Cynssyr.
The silence filled with the soft shush, shush, shush of him tapping a corner of that first letter on the others. “I believe,” he said at last, “that I am within my rights to ask. Why are you writing to Mr. Harry Glynn so soon after agreeing to marry me?”
She was unperturbed, so it seemed—a face of angelic innocence. Was she pretending to be unconcerned now the way she’d pretended not to notice the young servant’s reaction? Rather than answer him, she crossed to the desk and lifted her hat to reveal several more letters. She picked them up. “Aldreth, Thrale, Lucy, Anne, Clara. I wrote anyone who might be of assistance if I found myself stranded here. Including Mr. Glynn.”
The edge of his mouth twitched down. “Why would you be stranded?”
She neatly stacked the letters and held out her hand for the ones he held. He tossed them onto the table. They slid across the surface. One of them came to rest against the butt of one of his pistols. “Em.” He had no idea what to make of this and, therefore, no idea whether he should be amused or offended or something else entirely. “Why would you be stranded?”
“Misfortune.” She returned his three to the stack and squared all of them. Though she had her back to him, she turned her head toward him. The line of her cheek was devastating in its perfection.
He folded his arms over his chest. “What sort of misfortune?”
Once again, she spread out the ribbons of her hat, adjusting them to avoid them coming in contact with his guns. “You might not have returned.”
The idea of his leaving her here was so ludicrous, he laughed out loud. “Did you think I would prefer to sleep in the stables? I promise you, I have little fondness for a bed of straw.”
She continued to smooth out the ribbons. It was something of a shock to realize she was quite serious. However inconceivable it was to him that he would abandon her, she believed he might.
“But, no,” he said slowly, “you cannot have thought I would prefer to sleep in the stables. You wrote eight letters and expected you might be obliged to post them.” He drew a sharp breath. He knew her too well and not at all. “I took Frieda with me. Did you believe I would abandon her, too?”
“Certainly not.” She clasped her hands behind her back. There was nothing in her expression or the way she held herself to suggest she was anything but calm and possibly amused. He’d seen her like this dozens of times, surrounded by admirers whose adoration she appeared to accept as her right. Did she? “It’s plain you are fond of her. I’d never have let you take her otherwise.”
“You believed I would abscond with your dog?”
“I was uncertain which was the worse result.” She licked her lips, the first sign he’d seen so far that she was discomforted. “Stranding me with Frieda or stranding me without her.”
He still did not know whether he was offended or chagrined that she would believe him capable of such a thing. Perhaps both. They had been at loggerheads often enough that she might be justified. Might be.
“You feared I would abscond with your dog and leave you to whatever fate might befall a young woman alone? Strike that. You thought I had more concern for your dog than you?” By God, she did. He had no idea what to make of that. Yes, he was offended. But he could not blame her, not entirely. And if he were to be honest with himself, there was blame here for him.
She released her hands, and he was distracted by the ring on her fourth finger. A quick-witted deception on her part, for it was merely the ring she always wore, turned around as if it were a wedding band. “You’re being willfully obtuse.”
He took a mental breath. He would never speak so roughly to any of her sisters, nor any other young lady of his acquaintance, as he was prone to doing to Emily. “Enlighten me. Please.” Still, he did not sound kind or patient. “I mean that sincerely.”
She glanced away, then faced him and replied so forthrightly he decided he must have imagined he had wounded her feelings. “You like Frieda better than me.”
“You can’t be serious.” But no, no, this was not how he ought to behave with her. Not now. Not under these circumstances. Those words, if said to him in such an incredulous, scornful manner, would have offended him. He cocked his head in a tight nod of acknowledgment. “Forgive me. Please continue.”
She made fists of her hands. “Your abandonment of me was only one of several possible misfortunes I considered.”
“My God, you are serious.” Very well. He was offended, for she appeared to have no understanding of the insult she’d dealt him.
“You were gone over an hour.”
“I had a great many things to see to and your dog to exercise.” The Emily he knew was frivolous and reckless and vain, and that was not the woman he faced now. “I would not leave any woman like that. It’s unimaginable.”
She shot back, “And I am not an idiot.”
“I did not imply that you are.”
“You did. Of course you did.”
“How? In what way?”
“Oh, that is insulting. I am aware of your low regard for me. You made that perfectly clear. Or do you believe I hadn’t the wit to understand you?”
She meant that day in Emmer’s Field, when they had been so near to unrecoverable disaster. Her intensity was something to behold. She was nothing like Anne or Clara. Where they were cool serenity, Emily was fire. “You were perfectly clear, my lord, and I did understand you.”
“I am corrected then, and I apologize yet again. But why those letters?”
Her eyes were chips of icy blue stone. “How much better is your revenge if you leave me here, doubly ruined?”
He bristled. He could not help it. He was justified in the reaction. “You wrote those letters in the belief that I planned to abandon you?”
“Against the possibility that you would.” She tapped the letters while she scowled at him. “When so many things can and do go wrong, preparation for contingencies and alternatives prevents an even worse outcome.”
“I should like to know what, exactly, was your plan tonight if I had snuck away with your dog.”
“To post my letters immediately upon discovering my predicament warranted doing so.”
He’d never have guessed she was capable of this sort of war planning, and he was at once impressed and insulted. “And then?”
“If no one came in three days, and if I was without funds, I intended to walk to Bartley Green. Assuming I was not in jail.”
“In jail.”
She swallowed once. “You have paid for tonight’s accommodations, but how would I pay for lodging over multiple nights? People are jailed for such offenses.”
“Not people such as you.” He snorted. The very idea was ludicrous.
“No? Yet I know for a fact that when one is owed money, it is exceedingly disagreeable to learn that you will not be repaid.” She twisted her garnet ring. “I would have sold this to pay for tomorrow night’s room. If necessary, I was prepared to sleep outside while I awaited responses to my letters.”
“My God.”
“Think what you will of me, but I considered the possibilities and planned accordingly.” She gripped the edge of the table with one hand. “I was prepared for the worst. Do you honestly think I would do nothing until the innkeeper came knocking on the door, demanding to be paid from funds I do not possess?”
“As if anyone would ignore your request for help. Shed a few tears and men bend to your will.”
“How lovely you assume I possess such powers as that.” She gave him a hard stare. “Jail is a penalty I had rather not risk.”
“Your mind is an absolute labyrinth.”
“To be clear, my lord, I believed that last to be very unlikely.” For half a second, her voice trembled, but she mastered herself. “My goal is always to consider the worst outcomes and be prepared for each. Such a habit has stood me in good stead.” She reached into her pocket and withdrew a mesh wallet. “I have these funds because I knew better than to hide my savings at the Cooperage. That was Lucy’s mistake.”
She referred to that infamous day when Sinclair had stolen the present Lady Thrale’s savings and spent every penny on a new carriage and horses.
“There are consequences for a lack of preparation or for trust not warranted by fact or experience. I have this ring—” she held up her left hand “—only because I was wearing it the day Papa removed the contents of my jewelry box. I learn from my mistakes, you see, for I never again put my valuables where he might find them.”
The picture Emily was painting of her life at the Cooperage disturbed him—: her sister’s stolen money, the offhand reference to her father having taken her jewelry, the fact that she, like her sisters before her, had hidden money and valuables away to guard against financial disaster.
“All that might be so,” he said, “but I have not abandoned you.”
“Not yet.”
“I shall not. You may trust in that.”
Her mouth firmed, and she squared her shoulders. “I do not trust anyone.”
“What have you ever encountered in your life that would lead you to believe the world is such a dark and dismal place? If you were stranded here, you would be inundated with offers of assistance at your first murmur of distress. As we speak, there must be fifty men who would give their lives for nothing more than a smile from you.”
“Would they?”
“Of course.”
“People lie all the time, if not in words, then in deed. Gentlemen admire my appearance; they do not admire me.”
“There’s no difference.” He gestured at her. “Look at you.”
“Others overlook my defects at every turn. They are kinder to me than to others, simply because of my face. My appearance does not warrant better treatment. As to being stranded, you know as well as I that it’s happened to other women. Just last month, a woman appeared in a village claiming to have been abandoned. Everyone was kind to her, offering every comfort and amenity. Only, as it happened, she was not whom she said she was. Given that this story has appeared in several publications, I feel it is possible no one would believe a similar story from me.” She sucked in a breath. “In any event, the innkeeper has a right to be paid for the rooms he lets, and while I have some funds, I doubt I have enough to pay for my food and lodgings for three or four days and post to Rosefeld.”
“Emily, this . . . I—”
She waved him off. “It’s not necessarily that you would leave me, it’s what might happen if you did. Perhaps that makes no sense to you, but it does to me, and that’s what matters. I cannot be easy unless I am prepared for the worst.”
“I’m forced to question my own sanity, for I understood that.”
She went still, and he saw he had offended her. “Pray do not condescend to me in that manner.”
“I apologize.”
She stayed as she was, motionless, the very picture of unconcern, yet as he watched her, he had the most peculiar feeling there was more beneath that perfect exterior than appeared. He shook himself, for that was nonsense.
“I shall do better in the future.” He fetched his valise and placed it on the table beside the washbasin. Emily had evidently already washed up since there was moisture at the bottom of the basin. He poured in fresh water.
He was alone with the Divine Sinclair, a woman he’d lusted after since the day he’d begun to rebuild his life after Anne’s marriage. He and Emily were to be married. This, no matter what Emily thought, was fact. He was done denying himself. Done. “You will not be stranded anywhere. I’m insulted you think so.”
“You might have been set upon by thieves or murdered or kidnapped.”
He retrieved his shaving kit and set it nearby. He missed Keller’s expertise, but he was capable of managing for himself; in the days when he’d been Mr. Devon Carlisle, impoverished and disgraced younger son, he and Gopal had played valet for each other. “I think it unlikely I would have been murdered or lost.”
“Why do you have those pistols?” she asked in a calm voice.
He put his hands on either side of the washbasin and bent his head. “I am compelled to point out that preparedness—” How on Earth did one counteract such an astonishing conviction that the world was a perilous place and that no one, himself included, would protect her? He took a deep breath and gave in. “Never mind. I concede your point.”
“Thank you.”
He unbuttoned his waistcoat and loosened his neckcloth and shirt. He set aside the linen. He could not get his mind away from her fear that she would find herself abandoned. Except . . . except, if one were to look at the situation solely from her point of view, she was right to wonder about his sincerity. He had told her revenge was his motive. He had told her bluntly he had no interest in her, and he had avoided her for more than a year. What reason had she to trust him? He looked at her over his shoulder. “I would never leave you in straits. I intend to marry you.”
“No one intends to be robbed or murdered.”
“Again, point taken. However, I hold out hope of convincing you I shall do everything in my power to see to your safety.”
“Yes, my lord,” she said softly.
Only then did it occur to him that she was as unsettled as him by the reality of their flight to Scotland. Emily understood that the nobility of Lord Bracebridge was but a veneer, and one too easily pulled away. The man beneath that shell was no gentleman, and she knew it. Devon Carlisle had been a prizefighter, was a past owner and operator of three brothels, and to this day maintained his interest in a gaming hell. Moreover, he had not always treated her as a young innocent to be protected from one’s baser urges.
Devon Carlisle had wanted to fuck Emily Sinclair for going on three years. He still did. She was right. She wasn’t safe.
In silence, he washed his hands and face, then the back of his neck and his upper chest. Deftly, he prepared the lather and spread it over his face. He stropped his razor, and when he saw her interest in the process, he turned and addressed her in a calm manner. “As to being set on by murderous thieves,” he said, “even without pistols, I’ve a fair chance of defending myself.”
“I’m sure so.”
He turned back to the stand and the provided mirror. He drew the razor along his cheek and continued shaving. He cleaned up and rearranged his clothes until he was Lord Bracebridge again, gentleman and nobleman. She did not need to deal with Devon Carlisle tonight or ever.
When he was done, he joined her at the table where their dinner awaited.
“Down, Frieda,” she said when the dog came to investigate. Her command had no effect, though eventually, with a sigh, Frieda lay down by his chair. They ate in silence, and he, for one, was grateful. If they were silent, they would not argue.
A tap on the door interrupted them. Frieda perked up. “Excuse me,” he said.
“Of course.”
He dropped his napkin on the table and answered the door to a maid with an armful of the clothes he’d requested. “Ah,” he said. “Thank you. Your promptness is appreciated.” He slipped a coin into the servant’s hand. He closed and locked the door one-handed. Lacy trim from one of the items he held flipped up and touched his chin. “I took the liberty of asking for additional garments for you. I hope they’ll do until we are able to retrieve your belongings from the Cooperage.”
“How thoughtful. Thank you.” She was so smoothly gracious, yet he now distrusted his ability to correctly divine her mood. No doubt she was, even now, planning what to do if her clothing became lost or a fire obliged them to decamp without any of their effects.
He looked through the items as he walked. “A clean shift, serviceable stockings from the looks of them, a petticoat. They’ll do for now. No gloves.” He frowned. With the weather turning as it was, she needed a better pair of gloves than the cotton ones she had been wearing when she walked out of the Cooperage.
He returned to their meal once he’d put the items on the bed. He poured a small amount of wine into a glass for himself and tasted it before filling hers. The stone in her ring caught the light from the lantern when she picked up her glass. He nodded. “What was your plan if your ruse was discovered?” He waggled his fingers at her hand.
“To say I had recently reduced.” She turned the ring back and forth. “So loose it constantly turns.”
He leaned against his chair and stretched out one leg. His boot knocked against her foot, and he drew his leg back.
Their meal had been excellent, the wine better than decent. He was feeling quite well, thank you. “Your pardon. With chairs like this, there is no comfortable position for a man my size.”
“That’s no more your fault than I am at fault for being shorter than you.”
At least they were not arguing. “I suppose not.”
“Do you hurt?” She touched the hand he’d used to punch Davener and his pulse leaped, both because of her touch and because of the unintended ambiguity of her question. The answer was yes. Yes, he hurt. His soul always ached, even though there were days he did not recall why.
“Some.” He examined his hands. The tops of his knuckles were scarred. A long, thin scar extended across the entire back of his left hand. Across that landscape, bruises darkened his skin. A small cut, though no longer bleeding, hurt whenever he moved his fingers. He’d had much worse. “It was worth it to have laid out Davener like that.”
“I imagine his chin hurts a good deal.”
His response was a laugh.
“I am sorry.”
“As you say, not your fault.” He moved his fingers and embraced the pain. He had touched her with his hard-worked hands. His arms had been around her shoulders, his breath warm against her ear, balancing them on the precipice of ruin. “I am inured.”
“When do you intend for us to depart?”
He looked away from his hands. She had left Bartley Green wearing a practical wool spencer and a lightweight wool traveling gown. She could be clad in canvas, and she’d still take his breath away. “The earlier, the better,” he said.
“Very well.”
He pushed his chair back an inch or two. “We’ll drive for as long as there is light. Longer, weather permitting. If we change horses often and limit our stops, we may expect to be on the road fifteen or sixteen hours at least. I want to reach Scotland no later than three days from now.”
She nodded.
The open bedroom door was no safe place to look, but what was he to do when just past her shoulder, he could see a corner of the bed? “I’ll wake you in time,” he said.
Her eyebrows arched. “Tell me when you want to leave, and I’ll be ready in time. I always am.”
“Four.” He crossed his arms over his chest. Emily was several years younger than Anne. He remembered meeting her—a girl, for pity’s sake—and thinking Anne would have her hands full when that girl was old enough to join the adults. “In the morning.”
She bristled. “You don’t believe I can awaken at will.”
“I doubt my own ability to awaken in time.” He was alone with Emily Sinclair. Alone, with all the social barriers gone.
“No, you don’t.”
She was right, and he found that annoying.
“If you think I need an hour to be ready, you are mistaken. Twenty or thirty minutes is sufficient.”
“Very well then. But I’ll carry you out to the carriage in your nightrobe if you are not prepared to leave.”
Her fork clinked against her plate. “See if I’m not.”
“Then I hope you’ll awaken me in the morning.” Reprobate that he was, part of him entertained the possibility that they’d still be awake at four in the morning.
“We ought to drive straight through until we are in Scotland and our business there is done.”
“Not even I am prepared for a trek that brutal.”
She pushed her food around her plate. “No stopping for anything not absolutely necessary.”
How many plans were spinning through her head? What to do if she overslept, or if he did, or if they both did. Or if the horses bolted. What if there were no fresh horses available after all? “Em,” he said.
“Yes?”
He pushed away the remains of his dinner and gave in to Devon Carlisle’s basest nature. “Will I sleep on a chair tonight?”