The color drained from Valentine’s face, turning her porcelain skin to alabaster. “I don’t understand.”
Tristan was at her side in an instant. He rested a hand on the small of her back and guided her to a nearby settee. “Sit down and I shall explain.”
Once he had her established on the settee, he sank down beside her. Her skirts bunched around his legs in a profusion of brown wool and starched petticoats. He was aware he was too close, but he made no effort to set himself at a distance. How could he think of propriety when she was looking so lost and vulnerable and utterly dear? When the faintest scent of her perfume sent his senses reeling?
Orange blossoms. A sweet, feminine fragrance that turned his brain to mush and caused his heart to thud heavily in his chest.
He wished to God his father, Stokedale, and Lady Hermione would see fit to leave. But they showed no interest in going. They were each watching with avid attention. Each waiting for him to tell them what the devil it was he was talking about.
“The illustrations in your book of Bible verses,” he said. “In Yorkshire they were covered with ink. I never saw them properly until yesterday. When I did, I recognized them. At least, I recognized the drawing you recreated on the frontispiece.”
“The stag and the lion,” Valentine said.
Tristan nodded. “It’s from a coat of arms. Initially I didn’t know which, but a visit to my club soon answered the question. It belongs to the Baronage of Rutherford.” He paused, worried he was overwhelming her. But there was nothing for it. She needed to know. And, if the scraps of conversation he’d overheard before entering the room were any indication, so, too, did Lord Stokedale. “The late Baron Rutherford had three sons,” he said. “The youngest was secretary to George Fortescue, Earl of Worthington.”
“Rutherford’s youngest son,” Lord Stokedale repeated. “By God, now I remember. He accompanied Worthington here in the spring of ’34. And then again that summer. Worthington and my father were consulting over some political matter. Something to do with the poor laws.”
“Val Rutherford,” Lady Hermione said. “Astonishing.”
“Valentine Rutherford,” Tristan corrected. He gave Valentine a fleeting, private smile. “I told you I had never before met a woman named Valentine.”
“I thought I was named after a saint,” she said. “It’s what Papa always told me.”
“You were named after your father,” Tristan said. “Your natural father. The man who Lady Sara Caddington went to meet at that inn in Surrey. The man in whose memory she sketched all those stags and lions and wrote all those mournful, romantic Bible verses.”
“He never came.”
“He couldn’t. He died when the fire broke out. His mother tells me he was attempting to rescue two servants who were trapped in an interior room. He managed to save them in the end.”
“At the cost of his own life,” Lord Lynden said. “I remember the incident. It was in all the papers.”
Tristan couldn’t remember it himself. He’d been too young. Just a child, really. And all he had learned in the years that followed was that the Palace of Westminster had been largely destroyed in the conflagration. He’d had no knowledge of the people affected by the blaze—and certainly not of the twenty-year-old man who’d perished.
“Do you suppose she read it in the papers?” Valentine asked him softly. “And that was why she was sitting in the church and weeping?”
He took one of her hands in his. It was small and slim and cold as ice. He held it gently in his much larger grasp. “I suspect so.”
“You said she was too proud to go home.”
“I believe her heart was broken,” he said. “And that whatever her father said to her was unforgiveable.”
“It was,” Lord Stokedale said abruptly. For a weighted moment it seemed as if he would say no more. And then he spoke again, his tone brusque. “He told her he wouldn’t accept her child. That she must consent to send it away. She refused. At the time I thought…” One fist clenched at his side. “I thought it was merely her damned pride. But if she loved Rutherford, and if he’d died in such a way…”
“She would never have given up her child,” Lady Hermione said. “Not for worlds. Not our Sara.”
Tristan looked at Valentine’s pale face. “Does it help to know the truth?”
Her brows knit. “Yes, but…”
“But?”
“This lady you saw in Westminster…”
“Your grandmother.”
“Does she know about me?”
“I didn’t tell her,” he said. “That must be your decision. But if you decide you’d like to meet her, I don’t think she’d turn you away.”
Valentine’s fingers curled around his. “You visited her this morning. And you discovered all of this…” She searched his face. “I still don’t understand why you did it. After what I said to you yesterday—”
“I’ll tell you why,” he interrupted. “But not here. We will talk in the carriage.”
She blinked. “What carriage?”
“The one I have waiting in the drive.” He heard Lady Hermione make a sound of dismay, but he ignored her. He hadn’t come this far to be thwarted by an overprotective Caddington relation. “Shall we take our leave?”
Valentine cast an anxious glance to Lord Lynden and Lady Hermione.
“Never mind them,” Tristan told her. “Come. The horses will be getting restless. I didn’t plan to linger.” He stood and, much to his relief, she allowed him to pull her to her feet.
“St. Ashton,” Lady Hermione said. “This is beyond anything.”
“Let them go, ma’am,” Lord Lynden said. “Miss March has had enough for today.”
Tristan met his father’s eyes. For the first time in his life, he saw no judgment or condemnation in his sire’s gaze. Instead, much to his amazement, he saw understanding. Perhaps even a little pride.
He inclined his head. “Sir.”
“St. Ashton,” Lord Lynden said. “Miss March. Mind how you go.”
Tristan led Valentine to the door. It opened ahead of them, as if by magic. How many servants had been huddled outside listening? But it was only Frith who stood on the other side of the door. The old butler looked at Valentine, his eyes suspiciously bright.
“Ma’am,” he said as he handed her her bonnet, gloves, and cloak. “If I may be so bold…you look very like your mother.”
“That will be all, Frith,” Lord Stokedale said sharply. And then, “St. Ashton? Miss March? I would have a word, if you please.”
Tristan’s jaw tightened at Stokedale’s approach. Had circumstances been different, he would have given the fellow the same treatment he’d meted out to Phillip Edgecombe. But one could hardly throw a marquess out of his own ancestral home and into the gutter, no matter how much he might deserve it.
“I’ll do as Hermione asks,” Lord Stokedale said. “In memory of my sister, I’ll acknowledge you in public, Miss March. I’ll instruct my family to treat you with all civility. I trust that will be sufficient.”
Tristan felt Valentine tuck her hand more firmly in his arm. She was trembling, fine shivers that coursed through her small frame like electric shocks.
And, in that moment, he could have happily murdered the Marquess of Stokedale.
Civility? What in blazes! She’d come all this way, looking for the smallest scrap of familial affection, and Stokedale offered her civility? It was all he could do to keep himself from throttling the pompous ass.
Valentine, by contrast, remained outwardly composed. Despite her tremors, her voice was steady. “I thank you for your condescension, sir. But I don’t think we’ll have cause to meet again.”
Tristan fancied he could see a flicker of relief in Stokedale’s eyes. He didn’t remain long enough to be certain. After taking his leave of his father and Lady Hermione, he led Valentine out the door. The butler escorted them through the hall and down the front steps to the carriage Tristan had hired in the nearby village of Bolton Heath. It was a newer vehicle, well sprung and comfortably fitted out. He handed Valentine up into it and then climbed in to sit beside her. The coachman shut the door behind them. Seconds later, the horses had been given the office to start and the carriage lumbered into motion.
“Are we going to the station?” Valentine asked.
Tristan’s pulse thrummed. He was nervous and damnably uncertain. It was a bloody uncomfortable feeling. “No,” he said at last. “We are not.”
“Then where…?”
“I don’t know, Miss March,” he answered. “And that’s the problem. Where we go next is not up to me. It’s entirely up to you.”
Valentine had never seen Tristan look so unsure. Not since the night he’d kissed her in the conservatory. But this was different, somehow. He wasn’t melancholy. And he certainly hadn’t been drinking.
He cleared his throat. “But before you decide our destination, answer me this. Yesterday…in London…”
“Yes?”
A muscle worked in his jaw. “Why did you release me from our engagement?”
It wasn’t the question she’d expected. Indeed, she’d thought he would ask something about her mother or the Caddingtons or even Val Rutherford, the man she now understood to be her natural father. The breaking of their engagement, an incident which, at the time, had seemed to affect him so little, could hardly be of concern to him now, could it?
“There was no need for us to remain engaged,” she said. “Not when I’m settled with Lady Hermione and you’re making such a success of things in Northumberland. Neither of us particularly needs the other anymore, do we? My reputation is safe. And you needn’t fear being cut off from your father’s money. There’s no longer any purpose—”
“Is that how you feel?” he demanded.
She looked away from him. Her fingers plucked nervously at one of her gloves. “I’d never forgive myself if I let you act out of obligation. And you’d never forgive me either. In time, you may even come to hate me for allowing you to make such a sacrifice.”
“A sacrifice,” he repeated. “Is that what you think? That I would sacrifice myself in marriage because I’ve compromised you?”
“I know that you would.”
“With my reputation?” he scoffed. “Any number of people have warned you about me. If you think I’d behave in such a noble fashion, you clearly haven’t been listening to them.”
“I know what your reputation was before, my lord. But you were at a crossroads the day I met you. You have ever since tried to do the right and honorable thing. Even if it made you uncomfortable. It’s why you went to Northumberland.”
He regarded her for a long moment, an expression in his eyes hard to read. “What of your heart, Miss March? In Yorkshire you said it was mine.”
A deep, mortified blush rose in Valentine’s cheeks. She wished she’d never said it. But there was no taking it back. Not now. It was the truth, after all. “So it is.”
“And what about my heart?”
“Your heart?” Her brows lifted in surprise. “That’s never been a concern, surely.”
“The hell it hasn’t,” he growled. “Why the devil do you think I’ve done all of this? Attempting to become independent. Tracking down the origins of your real father. Staying away from you when I might have written or visited or—”
“Because it was the right thing to do. The honorable thing to do.”
“Curse the honorable thing,” he said. “I did it because I’m in love with you.”
Valentine’s mouth fell open. She felt, for one frozen second, as if he’d spoken to her in Ancient Greek or Swahili. The words were so foreign. So shockingly unexpected. She could only reckon that she’d misheard them. “What did you say?” she whispered.
Tristan looked down at her, a vulnerability in his gaze that she’d never seen before. “I said that I’m in love with you. And I’ve come to Kent with this blasted carriage and four to ask you to come away with me, my fair one. To Gretna Green. To India, or China, or St. George’s Hanover Square. To anywhere you please.” He brought his hand to her cheek. It was large and warm, cradling her face like a delicate treasure. “I’ve come to ask you to marry me, Valentine. Not because I compromised you. Not because of my father’s money or because I must do the honorable thing, but because I love you. More than I’ve ever loved anyone or anything in this world.”
She blinked rapidly against a sudden swell of tears. “Do you?”
“Yes, you little fool.” His deep voice made the words a caress. “I’ve loved you since the moment I saw you in the folly. Since you quoted that Bible verse at me. It was the most damnable thing. But you were right. The winter was over the day I met you.”
“Oh, Tristan,” she said. “This is…” Her voice broke. “This is all quite unexpected.”
The pad of his thumb brushed along the delicate bones of her cheek with infinite tenderness, wiping away the first spill of tears. And then, with a muttered oath, he took her in his arms and kissed her.
Valentine wrapped her arms around his neck and clung to him as his lips moved on hers. He wasn’t gentle. Nor was he careful. He employed none of his rakish arts. He kissed her as if he were a starving man, made insensible from want. As if she were as essential to him as light and air.
“Obligation,” he muttered when they paused for breath. “Is that what you thought I felt for you?” He pressed a kiss to her cheek as he held her. “You mad, beautiful creature. How little you know of men.”
Her fingers twined through the thick black hair at the nape of his neck. Her bosom was pressed tight to his chest. She could feel his heart hammering against her own. “I wanted to believe you cared for me,” she said softly. “But I dared not hope.”
“If I cared for you any more, I would be a candidate for bedlam.”
“You never said anything.”
“No.” His expression sobered. “My words haven’t ever counted for much with women. They came too easily. All the compliments, flattery, and broken promises. I wanted to give you something better. Deeds, not words. I wanted to show you that your faith in me wasn’t misplaced.”
“Of course it wasn’t. I knew that. I’ve always known that. Still…” Her lips tilted briefly in a rueful half-smile. “I wish you’d shown your feelings on occasion. It would’ve saved me many a sleepless night.”
“I would if I hadn’t stayed away. There would have been no hiding it. And then the whole world would have known.”
“Known what?”
“That I love you. That I adore you beyond reason.”
She felt his hands move on her back. He squeezed her corseted waist and brushed kisses over her tightly pinned hair. He couldn’t seem to stop touching her. “That’s not truly why you did all of those things, is it?” she asked. “Going to Northumberland and trying to be responsible. It wasn’t all for me, was it?”
“In the beginning,” he admitted. “But as time passed…Good God, Valentine, you wouldn’t believe it, but I actually like the Priory. If you discount the mud and the weather and the lack of society—”
“You were born to run a great estate,” she said. “It’s what you’ve been raised for all your life.”
“Yes, but I never thought I would enjoy it. I never once believed it could make me happy.”
“Has it?”
“It has,” he said. “As much as I could be happy without you by my side. That I kept away from you a month is nothing short of a miracle.”
Her eyes welled up. “When you didn’t come with us on the journey from Yorkshire, I feared I would never see you again.”
“Foolish of you.”
“Yes, it was rather, when I always knew that you would keep your promise.”
Tristan found her mouth again in a swift, hard kiss before drawing back to look at her tearstained face. “Still weeping, are we?”
“A little.”
“I trust they are tears of happiness.”
She gave a choked laugh and brought her hands to her face to wipe her cheeks. “They must be,” she said. “For I’m so dreadfully happy.”
“You’re forever without a handkerchief, Miss March. It’s a good thing I’m here to look after you.” Tristan released her just long enough to retrieve a clean, square of linen from an interior pocket of his coat. He pressed it into her hand. “Come now. Dry your eyes and say that you’ll marry me. Say that you love me just a little.”
Valentine dabbed at her face with his handkerchief. “Haven’t I said so?”
“No,” he said grimly. “You most certainly have not.”
She met his eyes. The raw emotion she saw there made her heart turn over. “Of course I love you. And more than just a little.”
Tristan’s gaze held hers. “How much more?”
“So much more that, when you left Lady Hermione’s yesterday, I thought my heart would break into a million pieces. And now that you’re here, I think you must marry me straightaway, Tristan. For I never want to be apart from you again for as long as I live. No matter how much you might vex me.”
He bent his head and pressed a soft, lingering kiss to her temple. “To the train station, then. And on to Gretna Green.”
She nodded. “Yes, please.”
“And after that?” he asked. “Where shall we go? London? Northumberland? On a mission to some foreign land?”
“Anywhere,” she told him. “Everywhere. All of those places. It doesn’t matter as long as I’m with you.”
Tristan settled her in his arms. “My own precious love. The feeling is entirely mutual.”