.
“Miss Lacey, please hang on to the post a little more tightly. You are bouncing around like a jackrabbit!”
“Well, I cannot help it if you are pulling me about like a doll!”
Lacey had only been getting dressed for the last hour or so, but it felt like an eternity. The worst part was that they were doing it in her bedroom, where there was a stack of interesting correspondence waiting for her. Her eyes kept straying to it wistfully as the girls first scrubbed her from head to toe and then set themselves with a nearly savage energy against her skin and her hair.
Tell the truth and shame the devil, though, the most interesting thing I usually wait for in the mail is here with me.
She would be lying to herself if she tried to deny how much she had looked forward to Robert's missives. He'd always been her favorite correspondent, even when she thought he was an older man with a good sense of humor. Then he had appeared like a knight from a fairy tale to rescue her from Davis’ ridiculous attentions, and everything had changed.
She hadn't expected to ever meet Robert, and she hadn't expected to find him so very handsome when she did. And then, of course, she had never in a million years thought she would involve him in a scheme like this one. That he had gone along with it told her that he was a man of superior character as well as good looks, and every day that went by, it felt as if a knife twisted a little more firmly in her heart.
Recently, Lacey had felt as if she were walking a very narrow path with a precipice on either side. On one side, things continued as they were, tense and strange and, sometimes, incandescently wonderful. On the other side, she got what she ostensibly wanted. Davis left in defeat, never to darken her door with his ridiculous compliments or poetry again, and then there would be absolutely no reason for Robert to stay with her at all.
When Davis left, Robert would, too, probably with a tip of his hat and a shake of his head, marveling at the complexities of life in the country. Perhaps they would go back to writing to each other, starting up another chess match as they had so often in the past. She would ask about London, and she would tell him about the slow rhythm of the country, the small things that kept her occupied and that filled her dreams.
Would he think of her often? No, she decided, he likely wouldn't think of her at all, beyond to chuckle a little about what he had done one holiday in the country.
The thought made her heart feel as if someone had taken it in both hands and wrung it hard, but what in the world could she do about it? Sometimes, Lacey wished that she had never made this desperate ploy for freedom from Davis. Then she remembered Robert's lips on hers, his touch, his smile, and she knew that no matter what came after, she would never regret this. She couldn't.
The maids finally declared themselves done, and they led her to the tall mirror in the corner. They didn't get many chances to dress her for an event, and they had gone all out. The dress she wore was of thin lavender silk, as fragile as a daydream and shimmering like a distant star. The spencer they'd chosen to go over it was a deeper violet, nearly a perfect match with her eyes, and trimming the edges of the gown and the hem of the spencer were tiny delicate ribbon roses. It rather cunningly created the effect of a spring garden, and despite her low spirits, Lacey smiled a little to see it. Her hair was piled up in the Grecian style, with two pretty ringlets hanging over her ears, and as long as she kept her mouth shut, she would do quite well.
“Thank you both so very much. You did a wonderful job.”
When she glanced at the clock, she decided that she might still have a quarter of an hour to read in the library. Her mother would likely use up every spare moment to dress herself to her exacting standards, and there was no reason to stand around looking lovely for no one at all in her room.
Lacey had scarcely left her room when she saw Robert approaching with a grin on his face. He was dressed in her father's formal wear, but that association faded as she realized how very handsome he looked. The jacket had been altered to fit his athletic form like a glove, and the stark black of the jacket and the blazing white of the shirt underneath gave him a rather sterner air than he usually sported. However, there was a wide grin on his face when he approached her, and Lacey felt herself smiling in return.
“I'm not sure it's entirely appropriate for you to come into the family wing, my lord.”
“It's Robert, and we're engaged. I feel like I have certain privileges to take advantage of.”
Her blood stirred a little when he mentioned taking advantage, and she could feel her cheeks color a little. “Really?”
“Really. Here. Something to get us off on the right foot for the evening.”
She blinked as he offered her a flat wooden box. It was heavy in her hands, and she looked up at him uncertainly.
“For me?”
“Of course, for you.”
A beat passed.
“It's appropriate to open gifts when you receive them, Lacey.”
“Oh! I'm sorry. I've been dressing for what feels like hours, and my mind has only just caught up with me.”
She felt a strange sort of trepidation as she opened the box, and when she realized what was inside, she gasped.
A set of earrings and a necklace glinted in the soft light of the hallway. At the center of the necklace was a sapphire the size of her thumbnail, gleaming in a frame of diamonds. Two smaller sapphires served for the earrings, and the color, a deep oceanic blue, was perfectly matched, each to each. The set was stunning in its beauty, and Lacey felt a sinking deep in her heart.
“Robert, what are these for?”
“I assumed that when I handed you a box and told you to open it that you would understand that it was a gift. If you think I was just taunting you, I should probably take the time to be nicer overall.”
She looked up into his face, and he was so handsome that she could barely stand it. Inside her heart, something dark and greedy rose up, wanting this in truth and not just as a game. Robert seemed to be enjoying the game aspect of it, treating the country girl like a London heiress.
She backed away from him, the jewelry box still in her hand.
“You can't be serious. This is too much. I certainly can't accept it.”
“Of course, you can. I had it sent from London especially for you. It's a good gift, don't you think, for a girl from her betrothed?”
“But we're—”
The secret nearly spilled out of her in a shout, and Lacey forced herself to take a deep breath.
“I can't accept this.”
“Of course, you can. The jeweler told me that all of London is mad for sapphires this season, and I don't see why Westchester would be any different.”
“No, you don't understand. This is a precious gift. You shouldn't just be... be handing it out as if it were candy?”
Robert shrugged. “Why not? It will look beautiful on you.”
Finally, Lacey thought she understood. She was well-off, and when her mother died, she would be titled. However, that was nothing compared to the wealth that Robert commanded. She looked down at the jewelry in her hands, something so precious and rare. To Robert, he might as well have bought her candy, and now he couldn't understand why she was making such a fuss.
“Robert...”
“Take them.” He sounded monumentally indifferent. “They'll suit you, and if you don't care for them, I'll do better next time. It's all one to me.”
Lacey felt a pang in her chest at how little he cared, how a gift that would have been a courtship gesture from another man was only a joke to him. She wanted to throw the box at him, but that wasn't fair of her, was it? She was the one who had come up with this damned plan, and he was simply a part of it, doing his job and doing it well.
“It's lovely,” she said woodenly. “Please, will you help me put it on?”
“Of course.”
Carefully, Robert helped her thread the earrings into her ears, and then he took out the necklace.
“Turn around, please.”
Lacey wondered if she heard something strange in his tone, at once tender and wistful Then she felt the chill of the necklace around her throat, making her gasp and forget all about foolish dreams. Robert fastened the necklace with a deft touch, but when she went to turn around, he wrapped his arms around her instead, his lips nuzzling her neck from behind.
“Are you well?”
“Quite well, my lord.”
He chuckled, and there was a slightly sad sound to it. “Will you never stop calling me that?”
It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him she shouldn't, not when their arrangement was so very temporary. Instead, she whispered his name, and he pulled her closer to his body.
“God, you have no idea how very sweet you are, do you? You are just pure loveliness.”
He brushed his lips across the tender skin of her nape, making her sigh with pleasure. She had never realized how very good it would feel just to be so close with a man, to feel his strong arms around her body, and to feel the rise and fall of his chest against her back.
God, say something. Say something or you will lose your mind and start to think that this is real.
When she finally found her voice, there was something tremulous about it, but she took care to keep her tone happy and bright. “We do make a very good semblance of a betrothed couple, do we not, my lord?”
For a moment, Robert was so still she thought he hadn’t heard her. Then he stepped back from her, letting her turn around. He was smiling, but there was a chill in his eyes that made her shiver. She wanted to take it back and to tell him exactly what was in her heart, but then he spoke and her words died on her lips.
“We most certainly do, Miss Lacey. Shall I escort you down to the foyer where we can await your mother?”
Lacey was momentarily shocked. She had never heard Robert speak so formally, and she knew he had never spoken so very formally to her.
“I. Well. Yes, please.”
He offered her his arm with all due courtesy, and she took it with a certain amount of caution. She told herself she was just being foolish. There was no reason to feel as if she had lost something.
None at all.