“You didn’t put it with the post, did you?” Sophia grabbed her by the shoulders. “Tell me you didn’t post it.”
“Why? Didn’t you want me to?”
“Of course not!”
“But what about Gervais? How is he going to know to come for you if he never receives the letter?”
Sophia let out a strangled sigh. “Gervais is never going to come for me. Gervais doesn’t exist.”
“What?”
“He doesn’t exist. I made him up. My real painting master is a balding prig called Mr. Turklethwaite. I’d lighten my tea with paint before I touched his forearm, let alone any other part of his body.”
Sophia shuddered.
Lucy was stunned. “But, the letter …”
“Was
your
idea!” Sophia exclaimed in a loud whisper. “I thought you were suggesting a bit of fun, just like you proposed writing that letter to the pirates. I thought you understood.” Her face softened. “All that talk about wishing for something so hard it would come true …
Lucy, I thought you
understood
.”
“I do,” she said, thinking of her own infatuation with Toby. Lucy took her friend’s hand and squeezed it. “I do understand. Oh, but how did you ever invent such a sordid tale in the first place? The sketching, the … the
painting!
The rabbits and cabbage!”
“The
wine.”
Sophia rolled her eyes. “And, so long as I’m being momentarily honest, the envy.”
“Envy?”
“Yes, of course, envy! You’re getting kissed under trees and worked over in cupboards, and I’m getting lessons in geometry!”
Lucy smiled despite herself. This probably wasn’t the moment to tell Sophia she’d just been kissed to distraction in Henry’s study. “But if Gervais isn’t real,” she asked, “then whose address did you give?”
“My
modiste’s.”
Sophia cringed and let go of Lucy’s shoulders. “Oh, I’ll be ruined,” she moaned, putting one hand over her eyes.
“Don’t be ridiculous. Your name wasn’t on the letter. It isn’t even in your hand.”
Sophia uncovered her eyes. “You’re right. But how brilliant!
Madame Pamplemousse sells more gossip than gowns. That letter will end up in the scandal sheets, and all of England will be mad to find out who wrote it. We’ll be the talk of the drawing room all winter long. We’ll be infamous!” She grabbed Lucy’s hand in hers. “Oh, tell me you posted it!”
“I didn’t post it.”
“Well give it to me, then. I’ll post it myself.”
“I can’t.” Lucy brushed past her and exited the room. She went down the corridor to the next room. The latch rattled in her hand. It was locked. She turned around and jumped at the sight of Sophia’s nose three inches from hers.
“What do you mean, you can’t? Where is it?”
“Er …”
Lucy was saved by a series of male shouts emanating from the courtyard. She crossed the corridor and entered the first open room. She hurried to the window and wrenched it open. Footmen scurried about in the courtyard, brandishing torches and shouting directions to one another.
Sophia put a hand on Lucy’s shoulder and leaned over her, craning her neck. “They must have found her.”
Lucy turned from the window and started back toward the door. She froze in her tracks. This was Jeremy’s room. She looked around.
The fire was banked and growing dim. The bed had not been slept in; the counterpane remained unwrinkled. There were no personal objects to speak of. No book lay on the bedside table. No flask awaited filling at the bar. No discarded cravat hung from the corner of the mirror. Only two objects in the room evidenced his occupancy.
Two valises, standing at attention by the door.
He was leaving.
“Well, come on then.” Sophia tugged at her elbow, and Lucy followed numbly.
Of course, Lucy thought as they hurried down the corridor. Of course he was leaving. Why else would he be leaving a note for Henry in the middle of the night?
“What’s all this, then?” Kitty stepped into the corridor, rubbing the sleep from her eyes with one hand and clutching the neck of her dressing gown with the other.
“Aunt Matilda,” Sophia called over her shoulder as they breezed past. “She’s wandered off again. All the men are out searching for her.”
Lucy and Sophia started down the stairs, and Kitty hurried after them. “Wait!” she called.
Sophia stopped, and Lucy halted likewise. They stared at Kitty.
Kitty huffed. “Well, I’m not going to be left here all alone.” She planted one hand on her hip and leaned against the banister.
“Come along then,” Lucy said with a shrug, resuming her progress down the stairs.
Really
, she thought. Kitty was insufferable. One would think she’d missed her invitation to a garden party.
Lucy led the sisters out through the manor’s massive front door.
Cold seized her instantly. The wind whipped straight through her thin shawl and dress. Moonlight filtered through a lace of clouds overhead, and she blinked as her eyes adjusted to the dim silver glow. She hugged her arms across her chest and hastened to follow the line of torch-bearing footmen into the garden. She turned slightly and noticed Marianne had joined the other ladies.
Dread shivered through her as they wove through the garden behind the bobbing beacons of flame. Dread and shame. Because although she ought to have been consumed with fear for Aunt Matilda, the true source of Lucy’s dread was the sight of those valises in Jeremy’s bedchamber. He was leaving.
Her slippers were wet through, and her feet felt like blocks of ice shuffling under her. They prickled with pain. The rest of her was numb. He was leaving, and the wintry wind felt like an ocean breeze in Tortola compared to the chill wrapped round her heart.
The footmen wound their way through the garden hedges, finally gathering around a circular flagstone terrace with a fountain at its center. Oblivious to the cold, the fountain’s nymph and satyr cavorted in their perpetual summer, their bronze bodies weathered to a muted green. Seated at the fountain’s edge, Aunt Matilda shivered inside a vast black coat. Jeremy’s coat.
Lucy and Marianne rushed to Aunt Matilda’s side.
“Poor dear,” said Marianne, wrapping an arm about the old lady’s shoulders.
Lucy grabbed her aunt into a fierce embrace and held on longer than she’d planned. Her usual Aunt Matilda smell, tinged with spice and chocolate and snuff, mingled with
his
scent. Lucy buried her face in the lapel of the coat, breathing in leather and pine and sweet reprieve. He might be leaving, but he hadn’t left yet. He couldn’t leave without his coat.
“How long do you suppose she’s been here?” Sophia asked, looming over Lucy’s shoulder. “She must be freezing.”
Lucy reached into a great black sleeve and found one of the old lady’s papery hands. “Her hands are ice.” She rubbed the chilled, bony fingers between her own.
She looked around. The men stood at the edge of the terrace, conferring with the servants. Kitty went to Felix’s side and assailed him with questions. Lucy was dimly aware of Henry gesturing with a torch and saying something about a pallet and blankets. Her attention was largely drawn to a tall figure in the shadows behind her brother. A broad-shouldered silhouette framed by white linen that gleamed in the moonlight. She couldn’t see his face, but she could feel his gaze on her, burning through the midnight chill.
Then Toby emerged from the shadows and strode into the circle of light.
Oh, thank God, Lucy thought. Thank God she already knew she didn’t love him. Because in the eight years she had spent admiring his physical beauty, Toby had never looked more splendid. He wore a greatcoat that gaped in front to reveal a bare chest. The torchlight bronzed every muscled plane and contour of his torso. His golden-brown hair was windblown and wild. He looked magnificent and pagan, like a piece of garden statuary brought to life. Lucy felt pagan just looking at him.
Beside her, Sophia gasped. “Oh,” she said. “Oh, my.”
Toby brushed past Felix and crossed directly to Sophia. He eyed her from head to toe, his gaze lingering over a few areas in between. “God in heaven, look at you.” He shook his head slightly and jerked his eyes back to her face. “You must be freezing.”
Sophia nodded slightly. Her gaze did its own share of wandering and lingering over his bare chest.
Toby stripped off his coat and flung it around Sophia’s shoulders.
He stood bare to the waist in the bitter night wind, but Lucy could have sworn she saw steam rising from his body.
“Better?” he asked Sophia hoarsely.
She nodded.
“Do you feel warm?”
“Everywhere,” Sophia breathed. She stared up at him, entranced.
“Everywhere … except my feet.”
Toby looked down to where Sophia’s bare feet met the cold flagstones. Without a word, he hefted her into his arms and settled her against his chest. The blue silk of her peignoir flowed over his arms like a waterfall, and her golden hair fanned over his bare shoulder.
“Better?”
Sophia nodded again and made a small squeaking sound, presumably of agreement. Toby looked into her face and swallowed hard.
“Oh, bloody hell,” he said, as though it were poetry. And then he kissed her.
Lucy knew the polite response would have been to look away. Study the cobbled path beneath her feet. Admire the swan-shaped topiary.
Stare up at the night sky. But a polite response was beyond her at the moment. She gaped openly. And since no one around her remarked on the flagstones or the hedges or the stars overhead, she assumed she was not alone.
At last, Aunt Matilda broke the stunned silence. “Lovely.”
“Felix!” Kitty prodded her husband in the ribs. “Don’t you think you should do something?”
Felix snapped his jaw shut and looked to his wife. “Oh, very well.”
He took off his own coat and held it out to her. Kitty shook her head and looked at him as though he were mad. “You don’t mean for me to pick you up?” he asked, his face uncertain. “I’m not sure I—”
“Not me.” She jerked her head toward Toby and Sophia.
“Them.”
Comprehension made its slow journey across Felix’s face. “Right,”
he said softly. Then, a bit louder, “Ahem.”
he said softly. Then, a bit louder, “Ahem.”
Toby and Sophia remained joined at the lips and oblivious to all else.
Felix raised his voice. “I say, Toby.” No response. “Toby!” he fairly shouted.
Toby reluctantly broke the kiss. He kept his eyes closed and his forehead pressed against Sophia’s. “What is it, Felix?”
Felix shuffled his feet. “Sorry to interrupt, man, but I believe this is where I’m supposed to remind you that’s my sister-in-law you’re …
holding.” He absorbed the pointed look Kitty gave him. “Was there something you meant to ask her?”
“Right.” Toby opened his eyes and straightened away from Sophia’s flushed face. He cleared his throat. “Miss Hathaway,” he began, shifting her weight in his arms, “It has been many months now that I have admired your elegance and the beauty of your …” His gaze wandered down her form. “Your character. The attachment I feel toward you transcends …” He looked back up at her lips and paused. “Transcends …”
Sophia smiled and bit back a small laugh.
“Oh, bloody hell,” he said again, bending his head to hers and stealing the laughter from her lips. “Marry me?”
Even if she’d wished to, Sophia could not have uttered a reply. Toby was keeping her lips occupied. Her lips, and—from the looks of things—her tongue, as well. But somehow she managed a muffled squeak of acceptance. Really, Lucy thought, Sophia’s whole body bespoke acceptance.
“Well, then,” said Felix. “That’s settled. Carry on.” As if either Toby or Sophia cared one whit for his permission. If they kept up like this any longer, Henry had better send the footmen off for a vicar and special license, instead of a pallet and blankets. Lucy told herself once again that she ought to look away. But from the general silence, it seemed no one else was looking away either.
But someone was. Someone was looking at
her
. And the hot intensity of his gaze set Lucy ablaze with conflicting sensations. She felt stripped naked and exposed to the cold. She felt blanketed in warmth. She felt bolted to the stone beneath her, and she felt like running into his arms. In one second, she went numb with shock; in the next, every inch of her body burst into exquisite awareness. His gaze was holding her together and tearing her apart, and Lucy’s heart raced so fast, she feared it would break.
Her heart was breaking.
Jeremy watched Lucy watch her life’s dream slip away. No matter how hard he stared, no matter how hard he willed her to look away, she wouldn’t. Her eyes were riveted to Toby’s imbecilic display of ardor and bare chest. She turned deathly pale. Then she flushed.
She shivered with cold, but he saw the sheen of perspiration on her brow.
Her heart was breaking, and there wasn’t anything he could do. She wasn’t his sister. She wasn’t his betrothed. She wasn’t
his
, and that was the whole damned problem.
Any of the others—they could have done something, but they didn’t.
No one cared. Toby, self-absorbed ass that he was, had shuffled his feet for weeks over this proposal, waiting for his perfect moment, only to choose
now
, of all times. Felix, who ought to have tossed Toby’s self-absorbed ass into the fountain for mauling his sister-in-law, had the nerve to laugh. And Henry—oldest friend or no, Jeremy law, had the nerve to laugh. And Henry—oldest friend or no, Jeremy hated him. He was no excuse for a guardian and only a poor imitation of a brother. His sister’s heart and hopes were being ripped to pieces in front of him, and he was either too stupid to notice or too insensitive to care.
Two footmen hastened toward the fountain, bearing a pallet between them.
“Come on, then,” Henry said. “Let’s get back to the house. I’m freezing my stones off out here.”
Lucy and Marianne took Aunt Matilda by either arm and helped her onto the pallet. As the footmen carried her away, a scrap of white fluttered to the ground.
“What’s this?” Kitty bent over and picked it up. She turned it over and lifted the broken seal. “There’s no name.” She unfolded the letter, and Jeremy felt his gut twist into a knot. Her eyes began to scan the page, and she clapped a hand over her mouth. “Oh goodness.” Her eyes widened.