Sebastian sat alone in his sitting room, sprawled in the upholstered mahogany armchair in front of the fireplace. A half-filled glass of brandy dangled perilously from his fingers as he stared into the grate. Somewhere amongst the black ashes were the remnants of the note Sylvia had left behind when she returned to London. He could no longer remember exactly what it had said. Since reading it, he had been somewhat the worse for drink.
And that was putting it mildly.
He had not left his apartments for three days. During that time, he had drunk more than he had in his entire career as a military officer. More even than in those first months after his face had been cut to ribbons and he had learned that his father and his brother were both dead. He had continued drinking until his head felt as if it had been cleaved in two with an axe handle. Until the painful memory of Sylvia Stafford had been numbed and the taste and smell of her obliterated by the fumes of strong spirits.
What his sister did during that time, he neither knew nor cared. She had been raised at Pershing and had friends in the area. Perhaps she was out making calls? Gossiping with their neighbors? Or perhaps she had gone off to find some other lady from his past to persuade back to Hertfordshire?
But there were no other ladies in his past.
He had lost his heart but once.
Not that he had spent the bulk of his two and thirty years living like a monk, though for the last years it certainly seemed so. He had never kept a mistress. He was a career cavalry officer, rarely in England and only then for brief periods of time. There had been the predictable dalliance with an opera dancer when he came of age. A buxom, red-haired tart who made it no secret that her favors were wholly contingent on the gifts that he gave her. After that, he had done what the other officers did. The occasional night with a willing widow. The occasional visit to a brothel—though he had disdained the rather shabby band of camp followers that serviced a great many of the enlisted men.
And then, three years ago, he had returned to England at the height of the London season. He had arrived in town in the company of another officer, the youngest son of the renowned society hostess, Marianne Fellowes, Countess of Denholm. An invitation was extended to him for the following night. A musical evening, Lady Denholm had said.
“Nothing too formal, Colonel Conrad, but I do like to encourage the officers to come when they are in town.”
Captain Fellowes had been sheepish, but encouraging, assuring his superior officer privately that the evening would not be a complete waste of time. “My mother always manages to find one or two distinguished performers amongst all the young chits strumming at the harp and shrieking Italian love songs,” he had said.
Sebastian had arrived midway through the evening in his dress uniform, aware that it made him appear that much bigger, that much more intimidating. He had not been in the mood to exchange polite civilities about India. His attendance was a courtesy to Captain Fellowes’ mother, nothing more. He sat in the back, grim faced, as he listened to a small selection of singers and musicians, most of which were—as expected—young ladies anxious to exhibit their meager talents.
But when the final young lady had finished on the piano and made her curtsy to the small crowd, a gentleman up ahead had risen to his feet. “I say, Lady Denholm,” he had called out to the hostess. “Why have you not compelled Miss Stafford to sing?”
A short, laughing exchange had ensued between Lady Denholm and several of the gentlemen in the audience. Admirers of Miss Stafford, Sebastian had assumed.
He had not been wrong.
Only then had he seen her. She was seated in the far right front corner, hidden amongst the enormous, full-skirted evening dresses of the ladies that surrounded her. She had stood, clearly embarrassed by all the attention, but not at all missish or falsely modest. She had an abundance of chestnut hair, artfully arranged with jewel-encrusted pins, and the bluest eyes Sebastian had ever seen. She had turned and smiled at the crowd. A genuine smile, despite her blushes, and one that revealed the presence of two bewitching dimples.
And he had been bewitched. Not because she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, though she was quite lovely, but because she fairly sparkled with warmth and light. She had given her admirers a look of good-natured reproof and then, after a word with the hostess, she had approached the piano.
“Who will accompany me?” she had asked
Not bothering to wait for other volunteers, a girl with ebony hair had emerged from the crowd and glided to the seat at the piano. Penelope Mainwaring, he would learn later. A diamond of the first water and Sylvia’s bosom friend. “What will you have, Sylvia?” she had asked in a voice fairly dripping with fashionable ennui. “A ballad? A folk song? A sea shanty?”
Everyone had laughed at that.
“An Irish Air,” Sylvia had replied. “Believe Me, If All Those Endearing Young Charms. Because it is short and we are all longing for our supper.”
The gentlemen had protested, the most vocal of them demanding a lengthy love song. It had been the Viscount Goddard. A slight, somewhat pale aristocrat whose elegant form made Sebastian look a veritable oversized brute by comparison.
But he had not been jealous then. He had not known her well enough to be jealous. He had been merely bewitched. Merely enchanted.
And then she had begun to sing:
Believe me, if all those endearing young charms,
Which I gaze on so fondly today,
Were to change by tomorrow and fleet in my arms,
Like fairy gifts fading away.
Thou wouldst still be adored as this moment thou art,
Let thy loveliness fade as it will,
And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart,
Would entwine itself verdantly still.
She had a low, velvety voice. As merry as it was seductive. It had set a hook deep in his chest and commenced a slow, inexorable tugging. He had leaned forward in his seat, his eyes fixed on her. Her own blue gaze had drifted round the room, focusing on no one, as she sang:
It is not while beauty and youth are thine own,
And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear,
That the fervor and faith of a soul can be known,
To which time will but make thee more dear.
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets,
But as truly loves on to the close,
As the sunflower turns on her god when he sets,
The same look which she turn’d when he rose.
At the close of the song, he had approached Lady Denholm and asked for an introduction. And then, for the next two months, he had contrived to be everywhere that Sylvia Stafford was. Balls and supper parties, Cremorne Gardens and the theatre, picnics in the park, and even the damned circulating library.
Not that it had taken two months for him to realize his own intentions.
He had known that he loved her within the first two weeks. The remainder of his time in London was spent trying, by various measures, to determine exactly how she felt about him.
It had only been that last night in the Mainwaring’s garden that he had dared press her. First by asking for a lock of her hair. Then by kissing her. Afterward, she had brought her small hands up to frame his face, rendering him almost speechless when she kissed him in return.
“How many young ladies have you kissed in moonlit gardens, I wonder?” she had asked.
“None but you, Miss Stafford,” he had answered her truthfully. “None but you.”
He had reentered the ballroom with her shortly after in a state of euphoria only to be instantly overtaken by the Viscount Goddard with whom Sylvia had, apparently, promised to dance the next waltz. Sebastian had leaned against the wall in the corner of the ballroom and watched them, resisting an almost overpowering urge to grab Goddard by his scruff and shake him like the impudent puppy that he was.
The next morning, he had left England for Marseilles, embarking on the overland route that would take him to India.
Once there, his duties had kept him busy from dawn until dusk—and frequently beyond. Skirmishes, both major and minor, had left him fatigued and often injured. The horrors of the rebellion had depressed his spirits. But Sylvia Stafford was never far from his mind. Of an evening, when they were bivouacked outside of a town or cramped together in some vermin infested cantonment, he had written to her. At first respectfully. And then, with increasing desperation.
It had been Goddard who had won her—or so he had thought when her letters never arrived. Sebastian had tormented himself with images of the two of them together, reflecting on the times he had observed them dancing or driving in the park. Realizing that she had never had any interest in a hulking cavalry officer at all. That, very likely, he had forced his company on her and she had been too polite to give him his marching orders.
But that had not been the case.
She had been writing to him. She had even been checking the papers, worried that he had been hurt or killed. And all the while, she had believed that he had been the one who was faithless. That he had ignored her letters. Or worse, been so offended by them that he had turned away from her in disgust.
Though what she might have written to offend him, he had no idea. There was nothing she could have said or done to drive him away. He had been half-mad for her. Yet, when they spoke in the picture gallery, Sylvia had seemed to be convinced that their relationship had ended because of something she said in her first letter. What in blazes could it have been? And why in hell would she think it would have been enough to put him off? Unless…
Unless she had written of some indiscretion with another man.
A sickening jolt of unease shot through him. Good God. Is that what it had been? Some confession about Goddard or another admirer? Had one of them stolen a kiss? Or more?
The thought was devastating.
And yet it made a great deal of sense.
She had told him that she had been very green and very stupid. She had apologized for her over exuberance. And she had said that she was deathly ashamed even to think of what she had written to him then.
Sebastian clenched his fist until his hand ached. It did not make a difference now, he told himself. She did not want him. Not even if it meant she might become a countess. She would prefer to remain a servant rather than spend one more moment in his company.
It was because of his scars, he had no doubt. Because she could not get over the horror of what had happened to his face. Because she found him ugly. Repulsive.
“How dear you were to me,” she had whispered as she touched his cheek.
The single sentence had been playing over and over in his head for the past two days. He had been deeply affected when she murmured it to him in the library, spurred on to take her in his arms and passionately kiss her. It was only now, in the painful aftermath of her flight back to London, that he understood the true significance of her words.
“How dear you were to me.”
She had spoken in the past tense. A fact he would have registered instantly if he had not been so undone by the sweetness of her caresses and the heady perfume of her warm, violet scented skin.
The past tense, Sebastian thought bitterly, because her feelings for him were in the past.
Nevertheless, if Milsom found some sort of proof about Sir Roderick’s role in subverting her letters, Sylvia would have to be informed. She needed to know the truth about what had happened every bit as much as Sebastian needed to know himself.
He would not see her again, of course. He would not force his attentions where they were not wanted. And a journey to London was out of the question. Just imagining the reaction those in society would have to the sight of his face was enough to sap his courage.
No. He would not go to London. When he learned what Milsom had discovered, he would relay it to Sylvia in a letter. One final letter explaining all he knew of what had happened three years ago.
It would be a suitable ending to this whole painful affair.
Sebastian woke in the morning to the sound of Milsom moving about the room. He was making an ungodly racket. Clanging the water can against the washbasin, clattering the shaving implements, and unnecessarily flapping Sebastian’s shirts about.
“Quiet, damn you!” Sebastian growled at him. “And shut those blasted curtains! Are you trying to blind me in both eyes?”
Unperturbed, Milsom brought him a tray on which sat a single glass filled with a brownish liquid. Sebastian recognized it at once as one of his valet’s noxious tonics, guaranteed to alleviate the aftereffects of a night of heavy drinking. With a scorching oath, he drank it down and thrust the empty glass back into Milsom’s hand.
An hour later, Sebastian was up, washed, dressed, and for the first time in three days, clean-shaven. Milsom had accomplished the whole with an infuriatingly smug expression. “Out with it,” Sebastian ordered as he knotted his cravat.
“My lord?”
“You’ve been three days in London, Milsom. Unless you’ve expended the whole of it jug bitten in a tavern or unconscious in a brothel, I expect you have spent your time attempting to question Harriet Button.”
“Quite so, but I was not entirely sure you would wish to know, my lord. Lady Harker has informed me that Miss Stafford left three days ago. And that you have since been confined to your apartments” —he cleared his throat— “drinking the cellar dry, I believe my lady said.”
“I intend to write Miss Stafford,” Sebastian replied coldly. He met Milsom’s eyes in the mirror of his dressing table. “And when I do, I should like to have the full story. If you know it, Milsom, pray spit it out before I must assist you in doing so.”
Milsom was impervious to threats. “As you say, my lord.” He busied himself clearing away the shaving implements. “I did speak with Miss Button. It was not an easy interview to arrange.”
“Hence the three days.”
“Precisely so, my lord. Miss Button is almost always in company with Lady Ponsonby. I observed them for the first two days, awaiting an opportunity to approach, but it was not until yesterday that Miss Button set out on her own. She went to a chemist in Bond Street. I ventured to speak to her—a course of action which was not, initially, well received.”
“I trust that the purse I gave you was of some help.”
“It was an immense help, my lord.”
“Well?” Sebastian prompted. “What did the confounded woman say?”
“Miss Button told me that Miss Stafford did, indeed, write to you. Twice a week for over half a year, she said. Once a week to follow. There were, according to Miss Button, nearly one hundred letters in total.”
Sebastian’s hands stilled on his cravat. He inhaled deeply. “Go on.”
“Miss Button was under strict instructions from Sir Roderick Stafford to burn any letters that Miss Stafford wrote to you.”
Sebastian had expected something in that vein. The letters would have had to have been destroyed, either by the maid or by Sir Roderick himself. Even so, he was shaken by the enormity of the offense. All those precious letters. Perfumed. Sealed with a thousand kisses. Letters he had waited for so desperately. “And so she burned them,” he said quietly. “Nearly one hundred bloody letters.”
“Miss Button was very loyal to Sir Roderick,” Milsom replied. “To a point.”
Sebastian heard a glimmer of self-satisfaction in his former batman’s voice. He looked up sharply, meeting Milsom’s eyes again in the mirror. “What the devil is that supposed to mean?”
“Miss Button is getting on in years, my lord,” Milsom said. “She is consumed with worries over her impending retirement. A lady’s maid does not make enough to put by, you understand. Miss Button has often been forced to secure the funds for her retirement cottage in Hampshire through other methods.”
“Other methods?”
“Blackmail, my lord. It seems that Miss Button has long been in the habit of collecting various love letters and other incriminating notes from her employers and putting them away until they might be of use to her.”
Sebastian turned slowly in his seat to face his valet, an arrested expression in his dark eye. “She would not have kept Miss Stafford’s letters,” he said. “Sir Roderick is dead and Miss Stafford hasn’t the means to silence a blackmailer. There was nothing to be gained. This Button creature would know that.”
“Exactly so, my lord,” Milsom agreed. “Which is why she was willing to give this to me for a mere fifty pounds.” At that, he reached into the inner pocket of his coat and extracted a small, faded rectangle of paper.
Sebastian’s mouth went dry. “Is that…?”
“This, my lord, is the only letter of Miss Stafford’s that Miss Button had kept. It is, I understand, the first letter that Miss Stafford wrote to you and the one that Miss Button deemed the most valuable. That she had not destroyed it in the last two years is the merest chance.”
“The first letter?” Sebastian asked hoarsely. He reached out and took it with a hand that was suddenly damnably unsteady.
“The first letter, my lord. According to Miss Button.”
Sebastian stared down at the gently swirling script that made up the direction. Sylvia Stafford’s handwriting. “Did you read it?”
“No, my lord.”
Sebastian raised the letter to his nose and inhaled. He could smell it, very faintly. Violets. He tightened his fingers around it. “You have outdone yourself, Milsom.”
“Thank you, sir. Will you be needing anything else this morning?”
“No. That will be all.”
Still beaming at his triumph, Milsom bowed and swiftly left the room.
Sebastian looked at the letter for a long time, his heart pounding in his chest and his pulse racing. It had been closed with a blob of melted red sealing wax that had long since been broken—no doubt by the blackmail-minded lady’s maid. He was almost afraid to open it, but he was no coward. And whatever Sylvia Stafford had written him three years ago could have no real effect on the present, could it? They were only words now. Harmless, meaningless words.
He unfolded the letter and began to read.
My Dearest Sebastian,
I hope this letter finds you safe and well and pray that the overland journey to India was not too difficult for you and your men. Did your new horse settle? Or has he proved as temperamental as you feared? Captain Fellowes told me the sad tale of how your last horse perished in battle. I was grieved to hear it and know you must have been doubly grieved to lose such a fine partner. I wish with all my heart that your new horse will be as valiant and steadfast as the last.
As you see, I have asked after you, even humbling myself before the captain, who I know thinks me no better than a silly chit who has lost her head over a dashing cavalry colonel. I have tried to remain mysterious, but it is becoming very difficult. Lord Goddard is pressing his suit and I wish I might tell him why I must reject him.
My darling, I have been thinking of you often since last we met. There is so much more I wish I had told you that night in the garden. At the moment it seemed as if I had already said too much. You mustn’t declare yourself! Penelope warned me. He will run far and fast to escape you! Foolishly, I listened to her. I believed that I did not dare tell you all that was in my heart. Now you are gone and despite all my prayers for your safety, I realize that there is every chance I may never see you again. What if something should happen to you without your ever knowing the full extent of my affections?
I love you. There, I have said it. I do not mind to be the first to do so. I love you. There is no one else in my heart. There has never been anyone else. And I hope when you return we might be married. It needn’t take a week of your leave. We do not even have to call the banns. We can be married by special license and then I will return with you to India where I will happily follow the drum. I do not know why you did not ask me in the garden. I thought you would. Every moment I thought it and when you did not, I feared I had done something wrong. Was I shameless? Should I not have kissed you? You must write and tell me, Sebastian. I know you will say exactly the right thing to put my mind at ease.
I can think of nothing but seeing you again. What shall I do with myself now you are gone? There is no happiness to be had anywhere. How can I delight in wearing pretty gowns if you will not see them? How can I take pleasure in dancing when you are not my partner? What joy is there in singing when you are not there to listen?
My love, you must endeavor to stay out of danger. Do not attempt anything heroic. I would far rather you come home in one piece than earn some silly medal or promotion. Not that I would not be terribly proud of you on either account, but I cannot bear to contemplate losing you. I have come to think of you as the only solid, reliable thing in my world.
Papa says I must continue to attend the parties here in town and let the Viscount Goddard drive me in the park on occasion. He says I must, on no account, look as if I am pining. But I am pining, Sebastian. Desperately.
I close this letter with a thousand sweet kisses. When I write again, I shall send you one thousand more. I have an endless supply of them for you, my love. Pray keep safe and come back to me.
I remain your own,
Sylvia Stafford
Sebastian did not know how long he sat there, reading and re-reading Sylvia Stafford’s letter. At some point, he must have retrieved her lock of hair from his pocket, for when he began to return to his senses, it was clutched in his hand, his thumb stroking it in the old, familiar way.
I love you, she had written. And I hope when you return we might be married.
This then was what she believed had driven him away. A letter wherein she had exposed the innermost secrets of her heart. A letter full of endearments and affection. My love, she had called him. And my darling. A letter sealed with a thousand sweet kisses only for him.
He had been a humorless, stern-faced cavalry officer. A second son of little fortune and even less finer feeling. Yet she had loved him. And she believed he had read this letter and been unmoved. No, not unmoved. Repelled! That cursed Penelope Mainwaring had warned her of the very thing. You mustn’t declare yourself! He will run far and fast to escape you!
Sebastian swore low and foul. And then he summoned Milsom.
“Fetch my sister,” he said brusquely. “And then you may start packing.”
Milsom lifted his brows. “Will we be departing for London immediately, my lord?” he asked. “Or do you require additional time to write to Miss Stafford?”
Sebastian cast his valet an ominous glance. “You are impertinent, Milsom,” he said as he carefully placed Sylvia’s letter and lock of hair into his pocket. “But the answer is yes, damn you. We will leave for London as soon as Lady Harker can make herself ready. The time for letter writing is over.”