Deceived (20 page)

“I would like that.”

Josie let out a long sigh before she spoke again. “Perhaps I shouldn’t be so hard on the Woodley men. You know, Gabriel is actually a very decent fellow.”

Juliet did not confirm or deny her own feelings on that subject. “And what of your fiancé?”

Josie stared out at the garden again. “More than decent. He is wonderful.”

“Then why are you standing outside on the terrace with such a sad look in your eyes?” the healer asked softly.

Josie flitted her gaze toward her new friend. “Did I look sad?”

“You do,” Juliet said.

“You said you didn’t belong inside,” Josie said slowly. “I’m not certain I do either. I mean, look at Evan. He’s devilishly handsome and he’s very popular in the right crowds in London. I fear they are all looking at me and wondering why in the world he would choose me.”

Juliet tilted her head and examined Josie closely. She shifted under the scrutiny and prayed Miss Gray wasn’t asking the same question.

“Do you really not know?” she asked instead. “You can’t see the way he looks at you?”

Josie’s lips parted. “The way he looks at me?”

Juliet nodded as she said, “Oh yes. I noticed it at Lady Audrey’s wedding when you first arrived the shire, and every time I have been in the room with you two I have noted the same. He is obviously very attracted to you. Do you really doubt that?”

Josie sighed as she thought of the way Evan touched her, kissed her and reassured her of her beauty. When he said it, she actually believed that it was true.

“I suppose I do know sometimes,” she admitted with a blush. “But is it so obvious? Everyone else seemed shocked.”

Juliet laughed softly. “I think it’s harder for those close to us to see the change in people. I speak a great deal with Lady Woodley and she has told me you have been a friend to the family for a great many years. Especially to Claire. That is how they labeled you, so to see you take on a new role probably does surprise them. But if it helps, I didn’t see it as an unpleasant surprise.”

Josie smiled. Juliet had such a soothing way about her; she couldn’t help but be reassured by her words.

“Thank you for listening to me,” she said. “I know I sound a fool—”

Juliet shook her head. “Not in the slightest. I think most of us question our place every now and then, don’t we?”

The terrace doors opened behind them and both women looked back to see who had joined them. Josie’s heart leapt as she saw Evan step out onto the terrace, his eyes searching for her. When they settled on her, his gaze grew heavy-lidded, sensual.

Juliet patted her hand. “You know, I think I should check on Lady Woodley. This excitement will have to be monitored.”

“Thank you again for your kind ear and support.”

“It was my pleasure,” Juliet said as she moved toward the house with a slight incline of her head for Evan. “My lord.”

Once she had gone inside, Evan moved toward Josie slowly. “You have made a new friend.”

She nodded. “I think I have. Juliet Gray is a very nice person, I can see why your mother likes her so much.”

Evan reached out and suddenly his hand covered hers on the stone surface along the top of the low terrace wall. “If she helped you, then I like her too.”

“Helped me?” Josie repeated, though her mouth went dry as he smoothed his hand back and forth against hers. The rhythmic touch was hypnotic and erotic at once.

“You slipped away from the crowd and I saw the look on your face. I would have come sooner to check on you, but I was detained by well-wishers.”

Josie shifted and broke her gaze from his. “Am I so transparent?”

“Only to me, I suppose,” he said. “You left because you were uncomfortable.”

She almost denied his claim, almost shoved her emotions deep down inside where he wouldn’t see them. But then she thought of what Juliet had said about him caring for her. She knew that to be true. It wasn’t love. But it was something.

“I was a little,” she admitted. “But now you are here and I find myself less so.”

He smiled at that admission, and the hand covering hers lifted to touch her cheek instead. The desire she’d seen in his gaze when he first entered the terrace flared again and her body responded in kind.

“My mother tells me that Audrey and Jude have already departed London for their wedding trip and it is too far for them to come. But she believes Mary and Edward could join us by the weekend if the news is sent today,” Evan said softly. “Once they arrive, we could marry any time after I obtain the special license.”

Her heart leapt. “So soon?”

He nodded.

“But we don’t have to rush,” she said, trying to quell the returning anxiety that gripped her. “After all, no one knows the truth about why we were engaged so hastily.”

His eyebrows lifted slightly. “No one but us,” he corrected. “We know the truth.”

She frowned. “Are you overcome by honor again, Evan?”

He barked out a laugh that made her jump in surprise. “God no,” he said when he regained his composure. “The opposite, actually. You see, Josie, I don’t think I could wait any longer to have you in my arms again. In my bed again. I want to be with you, so my reasons for hasty marriage are actually quite the opposite of honorable.”

Her lips parted at that unexpected admission. Unexpected and entirely erotic as she thought about all the pleasure they would soon share.

“When we are married,” she whispered, “There will be nothing hidden. Nothing denied.”

“Nothing at all,” he agreed, his voice almost a purr.

She leaned in closer and tilted her face toward his. “Then I utterly approve of this speedy union, my lord.”

“Excellent,” he chuckled before he slipped his fingers along her cheeks, tilted her face higher and pressed his lips to hers.

She expected the kiss to be passionate, as it had been when she agreed to be his bride, but Evan surprised her. His lips were gentle against hers, coaxing even though she freely gave. When his tongue finally slid out to trace the crease of her lips, she opened hungrily, but he did not devour. He seduced slowly and with finesse. And her knees shook at the idea that this was what he could do to her just as easily as sweep her off her feet.

She lifted her hands to grip his biceps as she lost herself in him for this moment in time. The love in her swelled and she found herself wishing it would never end. If they had passion, she had to hope that one day they might have more. And that once their wedding came and went, they would continue to grow the bond that had started in such wonderful and unexpected ways.

By the time Josie and her mother left, it was late. The house was beginning to grow quiet as Evan walked down the long, twisting hallways that led to the office Edward often used to handle estate business when he was here. Tonight Evan intended to use it to write a few letters to obtain his special license and inform people, including his staff in London, about his engagement.

As he opened the door to the room, he was surprised to find it not dark and quiet, but lit by a roaring fire, all the lamps blazing. When he entered the room, Gabriel rose from a chair beside the window.

“I thought you might come here,” Gabriel said.

Evan barely stifled a sigh at the determined look on his brother’s face. There seemed to be no escaping it.

“Good evening,” he said as he stepped inside and shut the door behind himself. “I wondered where you’d gone. You were there for after-supper drinks with Josie and her mother and then you seemed to just vanish.”

His brother’s gaze darted away and Evan frowned. Gabriel was normally so direct, sometimes even to his detriment.

“What is it?” he pressed as he moved closer.

Gabriel shook his head. “I was simply ensuring Miss Gray was taken home in a carriage. The woman wanted to walk home by moonlight, can you imagine? Why, it’s almost two miles to her father’s home. I had to argue with her for fifteen minutes before she would agree. She can truly be the most frustrating person.”

“Ah,” Evan said, confused by this subject. “I suppose I wouldn’t know. I haven’t spent a great deal of time talking to her about anything but Mama’s care. And on that score, she seems very reasonable.”

Gabriel muttered something under his breath but turned away and it was clear he did not want to pursue the subject further. So Evan turned to another one.

“Why didn’t you return to the family?”

Gabriel faced him again and that guilty, cagey look was on his face again. “What?”

“After you dealt with your situation regarding Miss Gray, why didn’t you return to the parlor?”

Gabriel shrugged. “I assumed the mothers were likely haranguing you and Josie with wedding details. I didn’t feel like throwing myself on that particular pyre, so I took a walk by the lake instead.”

Evan moved to the sideboard behind Edward’s desk and poured two glasses of scotch. When he handed one over to Gabriel, his brother did not refuse.

“Well, you were not wrong in your assessment,” Evan said as he sat down in a chair beside fire. Gabriel joined him. “They are thrilled about the marriage, of course. And since we are rushing to do this, they have many details to plan.”

“I can’t believe you’re doing it at all, let alone rushing it.”

Evan frowned. “But you know why. You are the only one who knows why aside from Josie and myself.”

“Yes, I’ve been thinking about that since last night,” Gabriel said, steepling his fingers together. “Why did you let things go so far?”

Evan stared at the leaping flames before him and pondered the question. “When I began with Josie, you said I knew the line between flirtation and seduction. But it turns out I didn’t. At least not with her.”

“But why?” Gabriel asked.

Evan wrinkled his brow. “Haven’t you ever been with a woman you couldn’t resist? Felt so much desire that it overcame reason?”

Gabriel pinched his lips. “I never lose my grip on reason.”

“I suppose I should say that is lucky,” Evan said with a sigh. “But I don’t think it is. There is something to be said for desire so powerful that it means more than breath. With wanting another person so much that you would be willing to give up everything to be with her.”

“That sounds like more than simply losing your reason,” Gabriel said with an incredulous look.

Evan stared at his clenched hands in his lap. “Perhaps it is more.”

He said the words out loud and he felt how real they were. Oh, he had already admitted he
cared
for Josie. But he cared for a lot of people. No, what he felt for the woman who would be his wife was something a great deal more. He wasn’t ready to name it yet, though. Once he named that feeling, it would be very, very powerful.

And he wasn’t ready.

Gabriel tilted his head to look at him more closely and Evan felt the hawkishness of his younger brother’s intelligent stare.

“Why do you look at me that way?” he grunted.

Gabriel shrugged. “I was just thinking that once you are married, you will have access to your wife’s things. Her letters.”

Evan lifted his gaze slowly and caught Gabriel’s. The same thought had flitted through his own mind, as well, but hearing it stated out loud made it feel…
cruel
.

“You think I should go digging through Josie’s private things in order to uncover information about Claire?” he asked.

“Of course,” Gabriel said with a huff of breath. “When else will we have the chance to look at what Claire wrote to her best friend?”

Evan shook his head. “God, do you hear yourself? You want me to violate my wife’s privacy within, what, the first moments of our union.”

“No!” Gabriel burst out. “I thought perhaps a few hours. She’ll sleep at some point on your wedding night and—”

“God, I hope not,” Evan muttered.

His brother ignored him and pushed to his feet with a frustrated breath. “If you aren’t intending to uncover any information about Claire, then what was all this for? Why did you approach Josie in the first place? Was seduction for nothing? Did you throw away your life to marry her for nothing?”

“No,” Evan said the word firmly. “I want you to hear me. My initial approach of Josie may well have been because I suspected she knew something about our sister. But that ceased to be my purpose long ago. And I can’t use her, Gabriel. I won’t.”

Gabriel groaned. The sound was low and animal and filled with such agony that Evan flinched. He stared up at Gabriel. His brother’s face was twisted in such pain, such loss that Evan felt sorry for him. Gabriel was desperate to save Claire. Desperate enough to do
anything
. And he couldn’t understand why everyone else around him didn’t feel the same.

“I want to help you,” Evan said, standing and moving toward his brother. “God knows I want to help Claire. But I’m not certain that what you want me to do is going to do anything at all to find her or assist her.”

Gabriel spun away. “And so you refuse to try. Even a little.”

Evan scrubbed a hand over his face. “God damn it, Gabriel. I’m not abandoning Claire. When Josie is more comfortable, when she’s ready, I will ask her again what our sister said to her.”

“So in a month or six months or a year,” Gabriel said with a shake of his head. “And what if that is too late?”