Chapter Seven
The carriage wheels rattled as they encountered stray pebbles along Rotten Row. The sun warmed my cheeks, tipped up to meet it. It wasn’t as though I had to worry about developing freckles. I already had too many.
“How is your ankle?” Pauline asked. Her voice was so soft that it was nearly overpowered by the clomp of horses’ hooves and the light babble of voices from the strolling couples and other carriages we drove past.
I fought not to grimace. “As well as may be.” Truthfully, it still throbbed with vigor even while resting. I should have stayed at home, abed, but after Rose and Mary had left, I hadn’t been able to rest in peace. My mind was awhirl with my problem and what I would do about it. Truthfully, I liked neither of their solutions, but I didn’t care for Papa’s edict, either. All I wanted was for my life to remain exactly how it was.
However, time continued to pass. No matter what, my life was about to change. I had to gird it onto a path I could envision living on for the rest of my life. If only I knew what that was.
A flash of color caught my eye to my right. Beneath the pleached hornbeam, the branches growing intertwined to form a natural wind breaker of sorts, was that flash of yellow a sprig of Fritillaria imperialis? I hadn’t known that anyone had planted crown imperials along Rotten Row.
“Wait—”
Henry didn’t seem to hear.
Blast! We would have to circle the entire park before we returned to this spot. I was tired of waiting for opportunities to come my way. I had to seize this one.
When the carriage slowed to pass a knot of strolling ladies, I jumped out the door to the ground. A white shaft of pain sprung up my calf and I gasped. I smiled tightly at the women as I hobbled away, trying not to show the agony that gripped me. Why had I done that? Brainless!
“Miss Francine!”
Unable to speak, I didn’t answer Pauline’s call. I focused on the crown imperials, their bell-shaped heads pointed toward the ground as if they hung their heads in shame.
“Henry, stop the carriage.”
Upon reaching the flowers, I spread my shawl upon the grass and lowered my rump onto it. The moment my weight lifted off my injured ankle, the stabs of pain reduced to a dull throb. I released a sigh. Leaning forward, I massaged my bandaged ankle as I examined the cheery plant in front of me.
A chuckle warmed the air from behind me. “Only you would jump from a carriage to pick wildflowers.”
Julian. The awareness of him rippled through me. I ducked my head. Not now. We’d only seen each other a couple of hours past. Not only had he refused to give me any explanation for why he’d thrown our friendship to the wayside and ceased to write, but he’d also denied me a kiss. Perhaps it had been foolish of me to ask, but…I couldn’t face him after such a refusal. It was humiliating.
In a small voice, I told him, “I haven’t touched the flower. I prefer not to uproot it for no good reason.”
Why couldn’t my parents see that the same was true of me? I thrived where I was; there was no sense in transplanting me elsewhere. I didn’t foresee myself taking to a convent, nor living life alongside a man I neither respected nor cared for. I liked my life exactly the way it was. Unfortunately, I wasn’t a plant, or Mother would have been altogether too happy to keep me.
With difficulty, I shoved to my feet. Julian lunged to help, cupping my elbow as he bore my weight. He bent to retrieve my shawl for me. I snatched it out of his hands but couldn’t look at him. I didn’t want to see his eyes dance with good humor, as though nothing had passed between us this morning. The phantom touch of his lips tingled across mine, a memory. I swallowed hard and turned away.
“Thank you, Mr. Beckwith.”
“Francine…” His voice was low, intimate, and dark with disapproval. I turned away before I witnessed whether or not his expression matched.
Near five feet down the line, a ragged gap in the hornbeam might provide just enough room to slip through. I glanced behind me. Pauline lifted her skirts and danced as she tried to pass a clump of women who seemed determined to block the grassy strip next to the lane. She wouldn’t arrive soon enough to save me from spending time alone with Julian. I opted for escape instead.
My shawl balled in my fist, I arrowed for the gap in the hedge. As I squeezed through, the branches snagged at my hair, encouraging it free of my coiffure. Locks fell free to frame my face as I reached the other side.
I found myself in a narrow hovel. Given the irregular shape and the overgrown grass and weeds, it wasn’t man-made. It was enclosed on all sides by the hornbeam, a tall wall of greenery granting me privacy, but not a reprieve from Julian. He slipped into the hovel after me, barring my exit. The branches knocked his hat free. He retrieved it but didn’t bother donning it once more. He rolled the brim between his palms, not quite meeting my eyes.
“Francine, are you avoiding me?”
“Yes.” At the very least, I’d like to be.
He raised his gaze, his brown eyes hurt. “Why?”
My mouth dropped open. I couldn’t find words. He had the gall to ask me why?
As he stepped closer, he tossed the hat onto the grass next to the opening in the hedge. He lowered his voice. “Is this about the kiss?”
Yes. No. Hell and damnation, I didn’t know! I wrung the shawl in my hands. He hadn’t kissed me, not properly, and that was part of the problem. I felt heat rise in my cheeks at the reminder of that particular humiliation.
Worse, he stood close enough to rouse the memory again. The play of his breath on my lips and the brush of his mouth over mine. I’d liked it. Perhaps too much. Clearly, he hadn’t felt the same.
“Don’t pretend like we’re friends. Not after all this time.”
I’d made that mistake and look where it had led me.
Something dark crossed his face and he stepped even closer. “Of course we’re friends.” He wrestled the shawl out of my hands and threw it somewhere in the vicinity of his hat. “Look at me.”
I didn’t want to. I wanted to pretend that I’d never decided to leave my room. In theory, confronting him had sounded like a good idea. In practice, my stomach knotted. I hated confrontation. Better to write a letter, instead.
“Francine, please.”
The pleading in his voice wormed past my reluctance. I raised my gaze from the buttons on his jacket. His eyebrows were knit together with concern. Perhaps even with pain.
The moment I met his gaze, he said, “We’ve always been friends and we always will be. Always.”
“Then why didn’t you write to me?”
I pressed my lips together. It had hurt, day after day, not to receive the letter I hoped to find. After a time, I’d stopped looking, but I’d never stopped hoping. And then he’d shown up in London without even letting me know that he’d arrived. What if we’d never crossed paths yesterday? Would he have come and gone without my knowing?
A shadow crossed over his gaze. For a moment, it felt as though he were a thousand miles away from me again. He opened his mouth. “I told you—”
“‘It’s complicated’ isn’t a good enough answer.” Discontent seethed within me, but saying that out loud made me feel just a little bit at peace.
He threw his hands in the air. “What do you want me to say? That I started a dozen letters to you? I did.”
Starting them wasn’t good enough. I batted a strand of hair away from my face. “No. I want to know why you didn’t send them.”
For a moment, he met my gaze, his expression tormented, then he turned away. He strode the length of the hovel—small though it may be—and turned to face me once more. “I wanted to. I couldn’t get the words right.”
“The words to say what?” I shook my head. It sounded like excuse after excuse. We used to be friends—the best of friends. Why had he shut me out? “You’ve never had trouble before.”
He looked down. His mouth thinned. The sunlight glinted off the brown strands of his hair. After a moment, he said softly, “Things change, Francine. Life changes.”
“It changes how?”
He grimaced and rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m…engaged.”
Engaged. The word rippled in the air between us. I waited for him to take it back, to tell me he was joking, but he didn’t. I couldn’t read the expression in his eyes when he looked at me again.
“Engaged.” I didn’t know what else to say.
“It’s why I couldn’t kiss you earlier.”
I raised my hand to my lips, touching them. But he had kissed me. Not properly, but more than I’d ever been kissed before. If he was so in love, why had he done that?
Marriage was a part of life. I was being pressured to accept a suitor. I didn’t know why I’d thought it would be any different for him. We were both expected to marry and start families eventually. Whether we envisioned that for ourselves or not.
“Congratulations.” My voice was weak. I felt…numb. I waited for the shock to wear off. It didn’t. “I hope you’re happy together.”
What more could I say? He was engaged. Had she stopped him from writing to me?
Had he let her?
“We’re not.”
I jumped at his curt tone and met his gaze again. He took a step toward me. His expression was intense, as if he willed me to believe him. Why?
“We’re not in love. I’m not marrying her because I want to. I’m marrying her because I have to.”
He stressed the distinction. My eyebrows hooked together as I puzzled it out. “Oh. Did you get her…” in a family way? I couldn’t finish the sentence. Julian was a man. He undoubtedly had needs, like any other. But somehow, I’d never pictured him with a woman that way. Imagining it now made me a bit queasy.
“What? No! I haven’t touched her.” He ran his hand through his hair. “I haven’t even kissed her. This…it’s for convenience, nothing more.”
“Oh.” She must have a substantial dowry. The men who sniffed at my skirts were always more interested in my dowry than in me.
Silence stretched between us. I nibbled my lower lip.
“That’s why you won’t kiss me, because you’ve promised yourself to another woman.” My lips burned as I spoke the words. I didn’t like the thought of entering into a loveless marriage for myself, and I didn’t like the thought of him doing it, either.
“Essentially, yes.” He looked defeated. “We haven’t set a date for the wedding yet. I haven’t made any vows yet, but… I’m not a free man. I can’t marry you.”
I crossed my arms. “I never asked you to! All I wanted was a kiss.” Did I still want it?
No. He was engaged. I couldn’t have it. Not from him, in any case. And I trusted no other man the way I did him.
He shrugged but didn’t meet my gaze.
“If you weren’t…” I swallowed hard around the lump in my throat. “Would you have kissed me?”
“Yes.” His voice was hoarse. He looked at me with such an intense look that I almost fancied that he wanted to kiss me now.
It was probably my imagination running wild with me.
“Miss Francine!”
Pauline’s breathless voice shattered the moment between us. Julian stepped away, putting distance between us. As she blockaded the entrance to the hollow, she looked cross.
“Come out of there at once! Don’t you know how many people saw you disappear through here?”
They didn’t know that it was no more than a private nook. It might have led all the way to the Serpentine for all they knew.
I didn’t bother arguing. After so much standing, my ankle throbbed again. I glanced at Julian. “Good-bye. You’d better write this time.”
He smiled. “I hope to see you again before then.”
“Not alone, you won’t,” Pauline chided. “Miss Francine, I take my chaperone duties seriously. I can’t have you escaping my care, especially while your ankle is still on the mend.”
I turned toward my maid. I didn’t know why she was so worried. As I bent to retrieve my shawl, I told her, “It’s fine, Pauline. I’m safe with him. We’re old friends. Nothing more.”
Julian waited out of sight as Pauline and I departed. I didn’t look behind me.
We were nothing more than friends. We always would be. The thought should have soothed me, but it didn’t.