Chapter Nineteen
The room was dark. Only the faint, reddened glow of coals shone in the hearth. Somewhere in the darkness Jones waited, unseen and unheard.
But she knew he was there. Beyond the mounded coverlets, beyond the bed curtains standing sentry on either side of her, a man filled the room with his unseen presence.
He’d slipped into her room just after she’d blown out the candle. A shadow in the corner, behind a chair and drapes.
Fear should be weaving through her. Instead, Jones was a comfort, out there in the dark of her room. He’d not left her alone to face the terrors of the night.
Trust wandered in and out of the dark as well. Trust in Jones.
The house settled into silence. She could not hear Jones’s breath, nor any movement. Not the shush of boot against floor, or even a rustle of clothing.
She could not say the same for herself. Her breath sounded harsh in her own ears, though her body made no noise. Each muscle was tensed, unable to move, ears straining for Wycomb’s arrival as much as a sign from Jones. Everything hummed beneath the surface of her skin, a slow, unseen rush of unease and disquiet.
“Where are you?” She barely spoke the words, the whisper lifting from her lips before her mind knew she’d said them.
“I have not left.” It was not an answer to her question, and she smiled in the dark to hear it.
“What will you do if he comes? If he recognized me and he comes here?”
“Protect you.”
The words floated through darkness and time, not anchoring her to this room or her fear, but something different. She pulled the coverlet up to her chin and let it wash over it her, let Jones’s presence fill the empty places in her so terror could not hide there.
A scuff of boot on floor filtered through the darkness, then a scraping sound. “I’m opening the window, my lady, to better hear the noises outside.”
Cat breathed in as cool night air slipped into the room, still carrying the scent of rain. Distant carriage wheels rumbled over cobblestones, overlaid by raucous laughter as people moved along Park Lane. Each sound echoed in the small, inset courtyard below her window.
She would not have thought to open the window to hear Wycomb coming.
“How long have you been a spy?”
He was quiet a long time, and she thought he had not heard her. Then his murmured words filled the dark.
“Since I was a boy.”
“A boy?” Surprise rippled through her body, and her voice rose as she shifted in the bed. “Is your father a spy, then?”
Again he was silent, but she knew now that he had heard her. Perhaps he was weighing his words, or thinking on them at least. It seemed so when he finally, slowly, said, “I don’t know my father. Or my mother.”
Sorrow etched a mark into her heart, as did shock. She could not imagine living without that knowledge.
“I was abandoned at a foundling hospital, my lady.”
More shock. More sorrow. And tears, she discovered, gathering behind her eyes. She opened her mouth to speak, but the words did not come. There was more here, more for him to say. More to Jones himself than being a spy or an abandoned babe, but she would not pry further.
He didn’t continue for a long moment, so she asked a simple question.
“How late will you stay tonight, Jones?”
“Until Wycomb returns. If he identified you, he will not wait until the morning.” He moved now, though she could not hear him, precisely. But the air moved and awareness slipped over her skin.
Suddenly she saw his shadow, above and to the right. Broad, square, straight. Blackness against darkness. She sensed he was looking down at her.
“I do not ask for pity,” he said softly.
“Nor would I give it.” Sorrow, yes, but not pity. Pushing up to seated, she let the coverlet fall where it may. “Where you come from is important, but only in so far as where it sends you.”
“I suppose that is true.” He stepped forward and moved as though he would sit beside her, then stepped away again. Still he stood above her, looking down at the bed. He would not be able to see her, any more than she could see him beyond vague shadows that were darker and lighter than each other. “Where did your past send you, my lady?”
They existed in a different place now, somewhere outside of time. Outside of the separation of class and society, of his life and hers. So she answered with truth.
“To unhappiness. My past is a burden and joy, Jones, though I would not change it. I am trapped, and I cannot see a way out.”
“Trapped by what?”
“The trust. The only escape is to marry—and marry well. The Marquess of Hedgewood has already indicated he would offer.” She looked down at her legs, at the two mountains of fabric they created as she folded them inside her arms and rested her head on her knees. “The trust will not end until I am thirty-five or married. I must either let the trustees control lands and people without understanding their hearts, or I must marry and give that same control to a man who will not have the understanding I do.”
“Are the hearts of the people so important to you?” The question was soft, nearly lower than a whisper.
“Yes.” Her father had taught her this. He had understood the value of each person on his lands. They were all part of the fabric of life. “Without the tenants—every farmer and housewife, every fishmonger and blacksmith—the whole would not exist. Each is a part of the whole.”
Her words stretched thin, becoming only silence. Jones, hidden in the darkness, said nothing, and she wondered if perhaps she had said too much.
“I know enough about the ton to know you could wait until the trust is broken and inherit. Your title can be held by a lady in her own right.” There was a shifting in the shadows, as if he had repositioned himself.
“In the interim, the trustees could drive away loyal tenants. I would lose touch with all of my property. They will not allow me access to information nor listen to my suggestions. I have no choice but to marry someone with my views.”
“My lady—”
“I could do it alone—all of it—if only my father had allowed it.” The bitterness in her belly betrayed her, rising to choke her words. Refusing to give in to it, she smoothed the coverlet over her legs and swallowed hard.
“My lady, a trust is customary, is it not?”
“I trained for years with my father. I worked, read, memorized accounts and figures—anything he did, I would do. I know how to run the estates, crops, work with tenants, and manage investments. All of it.” In the end, custom and tradition won over her experience. “He let me believe I could do it, allowed me to think that it would all be mine once I gained my majority. When he died, he put it in the trust and took it all away.”
Disappointment ran deep. Deeper than she had thought.
Looking up at the shadow above her, at the indistinguishable face of Jones, she sighed. “I suppose all of that sounds silly and spoiled. Here I am, lamenting that acres of land and thousands of pounds did not come under my control outright, when so many others have so little.”
Including Jones.
The silence and dark spun out, and she wondered what he thought of her. Perhaps that she was petty and small-minded. Spoiled, as she had said.
“I have never known a lady like you.” The mattress shifted as something heavy pressed on it.
Jones. There on the edge of her bed. Beside her.
He’d twisted his body to face her, hip just brushing her thigh. She could see him more clearly now, though he was still shadowed. The strong edge of his jaw, the lean cheekbones. His expression was hidden in the dark, in the night, but she felt the focus of his gaze as if it were physical.
The soft, gentle stroke of thumb across her lips made her breath shake.
“You have such heart,” he murmured. “You see so much more than any lady I’ve met.”
Warm, strong hands cupped her cheeks. Held there.
“I don’t—it’s nothing.” She didn’t understand what he meant, couldn’t think beyond the hitch of her breath and the gentleness of his hands. Her hands searched for purchase on the coverlet.
“It’s everything.” His lips found hers in the dark. Yearning and need spiraled through her, tangling in her belly.
Arms circled her, drawing her in. Every inch of her body warmed, tingled, throbbed, but it was his mouth that held her. Magic whispered there, in his taste, the touch of his tongue. Careful, hesitant.
Adoring.
It was as if he could not believe she was real.
Her body was hot. Waiting. His mouth was sweet when it pressed against hers. She felt his need, as well, but the gentleness held sway.
She set her hands on his forearms, ran them up his biceps to his shoulders. She let those shoulders ground her, let herself feel protected. He’d removed his coat and there was nothing between her hands and his body but thin cotton. Not the soft, expensive linen that a lord would wear, but simple fabric. Beneath that, muscle shifted as his arms swept around her. One hand splayed against her back, hot and strong through her nightshift. The other tangled in the hair at the nape of her neck, just at that spot before it wove into a loose braid.
His tongue swept along the seam of her lips. She parted for him, shock and desire spinning through her as his tongue met hers. He tasted of man, of rain. Of safety and danger. All of him centered in her, filled her with a swirling, heady tangle of want and pleasure.
Suddenly Jones stilled.
His arms were around her, his mouth on hers, but his body, his breath, had stilled.
He moved away from her, fast and quiet, leaving her cold and alone on the bed.
Loss. Confusion. Both welled in her until they were replaced by fear as the sound of hoof beats grew louder, louder still, then stopped so near the open window there could be no doubt the animal and its rider were in front of Worthington House.
…
“Oh God.” Cat scrambled up, nightshift tangling around her knees. “Is it him?”
“Lay down.” Jones was already gone from the edge of the bed, moving toward the window. The curtains were partially pulled, and he flicked one back to see the street. “Pretend to be asleep, and do not move unless I say. Do you understand?”
“Yes.” Cat was already burrowing beneath the coverlet. It wasn’t protection against a weapon, but she felt safer buried beneath the cotton and silk.
Through the open window, Cat heard the front doors of the townhouse open and the murmur of a sleepy footman. Wycomb spoke sharply, though the words dissolved before reaching her ears. The door closed, its sharp snap echoing in the courtyard.
Then, silence.
She expected her uncle to call for her, to come running upstairs and through hallways. Cat waited, unable to breathe, staring into the darkness above her.
“I can’t hear him.” Licking lips made dry by her own harsh, hot breath, Cat forced her fingers to ease their clutching grip on the coverlet.
“I am right here, my lady. He will not hurt you.” Jones was close to the bed. His tone was mild, but the words hard-edged. “Just stay in the bed so that I know where you are.”
The silence outside her chamber walls was broken by light footfalls measured by purpose. They paused outside the door. Cat went rigid, every fiber of her body fighting not to run.
The door opened a sliver. Candlelight shone through the gap, crossing the bed at her waist. She closed her eyes, pretending to sleep as Jones had asked—and waiting for something else.
Death, perhaps.
Time became interminable, a breath she could not breathe.
Wycomb did not enter but continued to stand at the doorway, looking in at her. Then, slowly, the door closed with a quiet click.
Still, she could not breathe.
More footsteps, fading away now, until there was nothing beyond her door. No one in the room beyond Jones.
She did not know how long it was before Jones spoke. It might have been hours. She thought she dozed as exhaustion gripped her, but if so, it did not last long. When he finally spoke, she discovered he was near her, just beyond the edge of the bed.
“I think it is safe, my lady. But if you do not mind, I shall stay a little longer.”
“Yes.” The word shuddered out. Fear could steal one’s breath, she realized, not because one could see the threat, but because it was brutally difficult to wait for the threat to arrive. “Yes, please. I don’t—”
She didn’t know what to say. Cat turned on the bed, pillowing her cheek on her hands so that she faced him. She realized now he was seated in a chair he’d moved beside the bed. She had not heard him repositioning the furniture, but he was clearly there, leaning forward with elbows resting on his knees. Shadow among shadows. The line of his back was strong and straight, and his shirtsleeves were rolled up to reveal his forearms.
Some small, new part of her thought perhaps it would be easier to fight without the encumbrance of a jacket.
“I won’t leave you. Not until dawn.” Jones raised his head, and though she couldn’t see his eyes, she felt the intensity there. “Wycomb did not recognize you, or he would have entered the room, but I don’t intend to take a chance he’s waiting.”
“What of tomorrow? What if he waits?”
He rocked forward, looked down at his clasped hands. Despair seemed to hang as a weight about his neck. Reaching toward the bed, he whispered, “I cannot stay in this room in daylight, my lady. I would, if I could. I promise I will be watching, as best I can.”
She took his hand. There was no thought in her mind beyond the fact that it was there, solid and strong. He was there, for whatever might or might not happen tomorrow.
“Jones.” She gripped his fingers, unsure what to say, but knowing that this large, rough hand was comfort and reassurance. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome, my lady.” His hand did not move, but remained as solid as before. His fingers curled inward, enfolding hers and warming them.
It was then she fell asleep.