Mask of Nobility (Scandalous Scions Book 4) Page 11

  Lilly waited by the fire until Jasper returned from outside. She held her hand out to him. “Poor Bronwen!” she breathed, as he took it. His hand was cold, telling her the chill of winter was here. She pulled Jasper closer to the fire.

  “Tor was right,” Jasper said, holding his hands out to the flames. “There is no possible future for them. It’s better to make the cut now. Although…there may yet be long term consequences we must deal with.”

  Lilly stared at him. “A child?” she breathed. “Surely, Bronwen would not be so foolish—”

  Jasper laughed and pulled her into his arms and kissed her forehead. “My love, you were that foolish, remember?”

  Lilly rested her head on his shoulder. “That was different.”

  “Was it?” His voice rumbled against her cheek in a very agreeable way. “Neither of them are in a position to reveal their true feelings.”

  “Oh dear.” Lilly lifted her head. “We must be kind to Bronwen, now.”

  “Yes, we must.” He pulled her back against him. “Although this whole affair and Rhys’ misery, too…it has reminded me of how very lucky I am to have you.”

  She rested her hand on his chest. “And I, you, my love.”

  Jasper lifted her chin. “We should not forget the lesson,” he said, his voice low. “I think we should try again.”

  “For another baby?” The faded memory of tiny George lying still in his crib, the last sight she’d had of him, flickered through her mind and stirred her heart.

  “Yes, another baby,” Jasper said. “Life goes on. Let’s not waste it. Let’s give another baby a chance for a full life that only we can give them.”

  Lilly’s heart filled. “Yes,” she breathed. “To share all we are so very lucky to have. Yes, we must.”

  “I love you, Lady Lillian,” he murmured and kissed her.

  Chapter Twelve

  Rhys had grown to hate the sight of snow falling upon London’s streets. It was a sign of mushy, muddy days ahead and a coldness in the air that chilled the bones. Now, though, as he sat watching snow fall through the window of the upstairs sitting room, he decided he had never seen anything so wonderful in his life.

  It was wonderful because he was watching it fall.

  “It’s snowing,” he whispered.

  Anna put down her book and took off her spectacles and looked through the window. “How lovely! I do like the first snowfall of the year.” She reached and picked up his hand where it rested on the arm of the chair and squeezed it.

  Rhys was able to squeeze back, a massive milestone in his recovery. For weeks, he had been unable to hold anything and had to be helped to sit up in the bed. Now he could shuffle a few steps by himself into the sitting room, to fall exhausted into the chair by the fire.

  Benjamin reported to him every day, there by the fire. He would summarize the business affairs of Davies, Baker & Sutcliffe, Rhys’ law firm on Middle Temple Lane, before returning to the Wakefield townhouse in Grosvenor Square for the evening. It had taken Rhys many months to understand the domestic arrangements in the Wakefield house, for Ben had been closed-mouthed about it. When Rhys had arrived at the truth, he had been astonished and mildly offended.

  Anna snapped him out of his squeamish distaste. “If I had been married off to a prince in Europe, you would be in the same position as Benjamin, Rhys. Do not turn your nose up at his happiness. All three of them are blissfully happy with the arrangement. You cannot judge. They are not flouting it about London and they are preserving their reputations.”

  “Except all of London will eventually know,” Rhys pointed out, perplexed at his wife’s far more forgiving nature in this matter.

  “All of London may suspect, only no one will know for certain, except the family and none of us will say anything to outsiders. You know how it goes.”

  Benjamin’s supreme contentedness had confirmed to Rhys that the unconventional arrangement did seem to work for them. From observing Sharla and her husband, the Duke, Rhys was finally able to put the matter to rest in his own mind. No one was suffering. No one was unhappy. If that was so then, indeed, who was he to judge?

  He instead enjoyed being able to squeeze his wife’s fingers, even a little and be glad for the snow falling.

  “It will soon be time for afternoon tea,” Anna observed, glancing at the clock on the mantel shelf. “Would you like to stay up after tea? Maybe see if you have the strength to last to dinner, tonight?”

  “I do feel stronger, today,” Rhys admitted. He sighed and glanced through the window. “I am trying, at least.”

  “There is no rush,” Anna replied. “You can take as much time as you need.”

  Rhys laughed. It came out wheezy. “I can’t take forever,” he pointed out. “The offices will not run unattended for long.”

  Anna froze.

  “What did I say?” Rhys asked, alarmed.

  Anna got to her feet, her blonde locks, that she had let down in the privacy of their own sitting room, swung with her movement. With stiff motions she stepped to the door, then back again.

  “Anna?”

  She dropped in front of his knees and rested her hands on the blanket covering them. “Rhys, my darling…you cannot go back to work. Not ever.”

  Rhys stared at her. His heart stirred, which added to his fright. Mortenson insisted upon avoiding shocks and efforts, of pacing himself. “Not work?” he repeated, his lips numb.

  “Benjamin is more than capable of running the business now,” Anna said. “I’ve listened to his daily reports. They’re boring, because he is managing things perfectly well. The office can run without you now, Rhys.”

  “What would I do?” he asked, flummoxed.

  “Whatever you want,” Anna said swiftly. “How often have you spoken of traveling? Europe? Even America. Sadie is there.” Her eyes glittered. “Let me take you and Alice away from here. Somewhere warm, where we can be together for…a while.”

  Rhys closed his eyes, wretchedness pulling at him. “Alice…”

  Anna shook his hands. “You must retire, Rhys. Leave your affairs to Ben and the others. It’s their turn now.”

  Rhys shook his head. “Old men retire,” he whispered.

  Anna got to her feet. “I love you, Rhys Davies. I will not sit idly by and watch you work yourself into an early grave. I insist you retire, so I can love you when you are an old man!”

  Her tears welled and fell, yet she did not make a sound.

  Rhys held his hand out to her. “Shh…shh…my love, yes, if that is what it takes to make you happy, then I will retire.”

  Anna did sob, then. She rested her head on his knee and wept while he soothed her. To be able to stroke the faded gold locks of her hair made him profoundly grateful. He would do whatever she asked to keep doing so for many years to come.

  That was how Stamp found them, when he delivered the letter from Lilly, about Bronwen.

  * * * * *

  After the flurry of the Princess’ arrival, greetings, inspection of children and hugs and kisses, Warrick poured Lilly and Annalies tea and left them in the morning room.

  The Princess got up from her elegant pose on the chair and stood in front of the fire. She pushed her hoops aside and put her foot on the guardrail, like a man, with her elbow on the mantelshelf.

  Lilly smiled at the display. It was just what Bronwen would do, if she were here.

  “Where is Bronwen?” Annalies asked, rubbing her brow.

  “She is either out walking, or in her room,” Lilly said. “Since the Archeduke left, she has not once stepped inside the library, when she would spend all her days there.”

  Annalies winced. “To cut herself off from books…this is bad, Lilly. Tell me about their association. Tell me everything.”

  Lilly sighed. “I would be guessing at most,” she confessed. “They were both more discreet than the grave.”

  “Then speculate,” Annalies said. “I cannot help her if I do not know what ails her. Tell me about…Tor, did you s
ay he calls himself?”

  “What he asked we call him,” Lilly replied. “Apparently, only his father ever used the name.”

  Annalies’ direct gaze met Lilly’s. “That is interesting, isn’t it?”

  Lilly sighed. “He is an interesting man…” she began.

  * * * * *

  “Bronwen. Wake up. Bronwen, sweetheart. Time to wake and speak to me.”

  The voice was familiar. Bronwen roused reluctantly, for sleep was such a pleasant retreat. She preferred the long moments before sleep took her, when the weight of the world slipped away and she floated, unfeeling, drowsy and warm.

  She could hear Tor’s voice in such moments. She could remember his hands upon her with a clarity that was denied her upon waking.

  “Bronwen!” Sharper this time.

  A hand on her arm. Shaking her.

  There was no defense against the physical assault that would let her stay asleep. Bronwen opened her eyes with grudging slowness.

  Her mother stood over her. It was her mother who shook her so forcefully.

  Bronwen blinked at her. “Mother? What are you doing in Yorkshire?”

  “I came to see you,” Anna said briskly. “Lilly wrote and said you were in need of assistance.”

  “I don’t need help, thank you,” Bronwen whispered and closed her eyes.

  Bitingly cold water splashed against her ear and cascaded down her arm, running beneath the warm cocoon of blankets.

  Bronwen gasped and sat up, staring down at the puddle of water soaking through the fabric of her nightgown and wetting her thighs.

  Annalies stood over her, the water pitcher held up high over her head.

  “Mother!” Bronwen cried. “What on earth…!”

  “That’s better,” Annalies said, putting the pitcher back on the washstand next to the bowl. She brushed her hands. “Dress yourself and meet me in the library. We have things to discuss.”

  “No, not the library,” Bronwen said, her heart twisting.

  Her mother paused at the door. “Very well, then. I am sure Lilly will spare us her morning room for a while. If you do not present yourself there in ten minutes, then I will beg the cook for a bucket of her slops and dowse you in that, instead.”

  Annalies shut the door behind her and Bronwen shuddered. She did not doubt for a moment that her mother would do what she threatened if Bronwen did not appear downstairs within the stated time limit.

  She threw the sodden blankets aside and stripped off the soaked nightgown. Her underthings would not slide over her damp skin. She cast them aside with an impatient hiss, aware of time ticking away. Her dress, the faded muslin, was too thin to wear over nothing. Instead, she pulled the traveling suit from the wardrobe and struggled into it. It was a wrapper style dress, which she could fasten at the front, only the worsted wool was prickly against her skin. There was no time to select another. She tugged her hair out of the collar, pulled up the fronts out of the way and pinned them without consulting mirror and tugged her sleeves into place. She didn’t bother with shoes, despite the deep cold gripping Yorkshire. There was no time.

  Her heart racing, Bronwen hurried down the stairs and into the morning room.

  Lilly sat behind her desk. She put the pen down and capped the inkpot.

  Annalies stood with her hand upon the chair in front of the desk, her other fist against her waist. If she had not been wearing hoops, Bronwen suspected her mother would have her fist planted on her hip, instead.

  “I will give you the room,” Lilly murmured, stepping out around the desk.

  “You are family, Lilly,” Annalies said. “You do not have to leave if you do not wish to.”

  Lilly cleared her throat, then looked at Bronwen. “Would you like me to stay?”

  Bronwen struggled to care one way or another. She gave a small shrug. “If you wish.”

  Troubled, Lilly returned to her desk. “Perhaps a neutral witness may help,” she said, pushing a curl back into place behind her head with an awkward movement.

  Annalies patted the chair. “Sit if you wish. I understand you have not been active lately. Perhaps standing will strain you.”

  Bronwen could feel her cheeks heating. She stayed just inside the door.

  Annalies let her hand drop from the back of the chair. “First things first. Are you with child?”

  The bald question, asked aloud, with Lilly watching, should have filled Bronwen with mortification. Her mother, asking such a question?

  However, no humiliation arrived. Instead, a soft little cry sounded in her mind. Her eyes ached. Blurred. “I hoped I was,” she whispered. “Yet I cannot have even that much of him.”

  Silence sounded. Bronwen did not care if she had shocked them. She had spoken the truth. It was not her fault if they chose to be offended by it.

  She felt her mother’s hands on her arms. “Come along, my dear,” Annalies said softly. “Come and sit. I had not realized how deeply this ran. Come.” She guided Bronwen to the chaise longe and settled next to her.

  Bronwen wiped her cheeks, trying to clear her vision once more.

  Her mother picked up her hand. “You are in love with him, yes?”

  Bronwen looked down at the scratch wool over her knees. “Is that what I am? It hurts to be awake and now he isn’t here and will never be.”

  “He told you that?” Annalies asked.

  Bronwen nodded.

  Annalies tucked her hair behind her ear, her movements gentle. “Would you tell me everything that happened, darling? I can help, if I know…well, not all the details, but the important ones, at least.”

  Because she didn’t care anymore, Bronwen told her. Everything. As she spoke, her energy returned. It was a relief to speak of it aloud.

  Lilly moved about the room as she spoke and whispered to Warrick at the door. A plate of roast beef sandwiches appeared. Bronwen gulped them down, her hunger stirred by the sight of them.

  It took time to tell her mother everything. The carriage clock on the desk chimed twice while she was speaking.

  Lilly handed her another plate, this one with fruitcake and preserves. Bronwen ate that, too. She couldn’t remember the last time she had eaten something. The rum-ladened fruit cake was ambrosial.

  While she ate, her mother circled the floor in tight arcs.

  Lilly returned to the desk. “Tor was far more considerate than I understood. Thank you for explaining to us, Bronwen.” Her gaze shifted to Annalies. “Your Highness?”

  “‘Highness’?” Annalies repeated and rolled her eyes. “Ha!”

  Bronwen put the plate aside. “Mother, are you angry with me?”

  “I am angry with my stiff-necked, snobbery-oriented relations!” Annalies cried, throwing out her hand. “The devil hang their privileged hides!”

  Lilly’s mouth opened.

  Bronwen felt her mouth twitch toward a smile.

  Her mother whirled, her hoops swaying. “Of course you are good enough for the man! You are my daughter, a descendant of the royal house of Saxe-Coburg-Weiden.” She raised her hands to her head, as if it ached. “That blonde cousin you saw, the one who greeted Tor so intimately? I know who she is and let me tell you, she is less royal than you, darling daughter. I’m given to understand that she is…well, from the wrong side of the blanket.”

  “Really?” Lilly asked, her interest pricked.

  Annalies smiled. Her smile was full of devilment that astonished Bronwen. She could easily imagine her mother slipping through London in men’s clothes, as it was rumored she once did.

  “Let me say she looks nothing like her father and very much like her father’s former secretary, a man who was dishonorably discharged from the French army.”

  Bronwen wrung her hands. “Nevertheless, Tor is right. We are both from two very different worlds. Even if you could somehow make his council agree to the match…” She halted. “How silly to think they would ever agree to such a thing!”

  “That is the silly part of it,” her mother repl
ied. She flopped onto the chaise next to her. “Tor was a most considerate man. He said it himself. He would not make you give up the freedom you have spent years fighting to preserve.” Anna picked up her hand once more. “That is a choice you must make, my dear.”

  “I?” Bronwen swallowed. “You mean, I could just…choose to belong to his world? Just like that?”

  Annalies nodded. “The truth is, you are already a part of his world, by virtue of your birth. You are as much a part of his world as the woman in blue velvet. You only have to step into it.”

  “How do I even begin to do that?” Bronwen asked, her heart beating with a wild hope. “I mean…that woman…and then…me…” She plucked at the itchy wool.

  “You have a decision to make before we deal with the details,” Annalies said, her tone brisk once more. “Is this something you want, Bronwen? Truly want? Do you understand how your life must change, if you chose this path?”

  Bronwen pressed her lips together, thinking of the woman in blue velvet. “I must rejoin society,” she said.

  “Not just rejoin it,” Lilly said. “You must win it over, so that no one will even think to object to your antecedents.”

  “As you did, Lilly?” Bronwen asked.

  Lilly smiled. “I had Jasper to help me.” Her face glowed.

  “While you, my dear, must…” Annalies frowned. “What is that military expression that Jasper uses, Lilly?”

  “Ambush?” Lilly supplied.

  “That is not the word I was thinking of, although it will do nicely,” Annalies replied.

  “I must ambush Tor?”

  “He will resist you, because he believes you want this—” She waved her hand to include the room, the house and the land beyond it. “A life in the wilds, left alone to read and think. He won’t take that from you. You must convince him you want his life more.”

  “How can I do that?” Bronwen said. “I don’t know if I want it at all!”

  “Do you want Tor?” Lilly asked.

  “Yes!”

  Her mother nodded. “That is enough for now. Put yourself on the path and the rest will resolve itself later.”

  Bronwen breathed in and let it out. She felt light and airy, as if she could float. “Can you help me, Mother? Can you show me the way?”