“Well, you must meet him. He’s quite striking. Golden hair and lovely blue eyes! But I think I made him nervous.”
It shamed Kate to admit it, but Lucy’s interest in Mr. Penrose inspired a sharp stab of relief. But her heart still hammered as she carried the cups to the counter. “So? How did you find yourself dining with them?”
“My father finally found out more about your Mr. York’s investments. Impressive, I gather. Father was quite eager to invite him to luncheon. If I’d had any warning at all, I would’ve invited you as well.”
“Oh, I’m sure that’s—”
“You know . . .” Lucy put her chin in her hands and leaned over the counter. Her eyes glowed with innocence, and that was never a good sign.
“What?” Kate asked warily.
“When I mentioned your name, I could’ve sworn I saw Mr. York’s eyes light up.”
“Lucy . . .”
“Oh, fine.”
“I’m a married woman—”
“I know. I know. It’s just that . . . There’s something about him, isn’t there?”
Yes. My God, yes, there was something about him. There always had been. Something that drew people to his side. Something that made people smile. Kate had felt honored to be a part of that once, but she couldn’t be part of it now.
She tapped the countertop. “Tell me more about this Mr. Penrose.”
Her words prompted a flood of description from Lucy. Kate was so distracted that she only caught the occasional bit of coherence. Mr. Penrose was apparently both dignified and nervous. Solemn and soulful. Though he didn’t speak much, she could read volumes in his eyes. And despite his reserved nature, he seemed to be much younger than Aidan York.
Kate’s brain spun around the words
Aidan York
, and seemed to get caught there. This situation was fast becoming intolerable.
Lucy’s voice broke through her thoughts. “But it’s just as it should be. I’m far too young to catch his eye at any rate.”
“What?” Kate asked. “Who?”
“Mr. York, silly. You’re closer to his age, I should think.”
Funny that Aidan had seemed old enough to be unobtainable when she’d first met him. She’d thought him so mature and manly. Now she felt old enough to be his governess. She smiled at the strangeness of it all. “Men always like young women, Lucy. It doesn’t matter how old the gentleman is. They’re attracted to girls who are bright and lovely and untouched.”
“Untouched?” Lucy raised a saucy eyebrow, but even as Kate laughed, Lucy’s smile faded. “And that’s the reason I shall never marry.”
“Oh, I don’t mean a man won’t love you once you’ve aged. There are plenty of husbands who don’t stray.”
“That’s not what worries me, Kate. It’s the brightness. It seems an awful trade to make. I don’t want to fade away for the sake of a man. And I think that might be the unavoidable cost. My friends, my sister, and . . .”
She didn’t finish the sentence, but Kate knew how faded she’d become. “And me,” Kate finished. Lucy didn’t know the half of it. Sometimes in Ceylon she’d looked down at her own hands and marveled that she couldn’t see right through them.
“I didn’t mean . . .”
“I know. But it’s true. My husband wasn’t cruel though. He rarely required anything of me, and yet, in that place, I was nothing more than his wife. I filled a role that didn’t truly exist. So sometimes it seemed that
I
didn’t exist.”
Tracing the edge of her cup, Kate realized that whole months had passed like that in those early years. Months when she’d felt nothing. But that seemed another life now. These days she felt so much. Too much.
She looked up to find Lucy watching her with a frown, her teeth worrying her bottom lip.
“What is it?”
“You said ‘wasn’t.’ He ‘wasn’t’ cruel.”
Panic wrapped her chest and seemed to crush her ribs in its grip. She’d grown too relaxed and tripped herself up. “I—I . . .”
“I suspected you’d left him for good.”
“I . . . What?”
“Your husband. You’ve left him, right? That’s why you returned to England.”
Miraculously, Lucy assumed the same thing that Aidan had. Perhaps that only made sense. Who would ever suspect that a woman would pretend her husband was alive when he wasn’t?
Lucy seemed to take her silence as an admission. “I wish my sister would leave her husband. She comes home sometimes, but she always goes back.”
“Perhaps he’s not so bad.”
“No, he’s bad. But they have two children now. If she’d left the first time he hit her . . . But she didn’t. And even if he weren’t so bad, I have to wonder if marriage isn’t all the same. Have you ever known a woman who wasn’t diminished by it?”
Kate thought about it. She sipped her cooling coffee and riffled through her memories. Her own mother had been cowed by her husband. She’d never stood up to him over anything, not even her daughter being shipped to the other side of the world.
Only a very few of Kate’s friends had married before she’d left England, and she’d had no friends in Ceylon. Still, she could not say she knew any woman whose marriage had made her more lively or more vibrant. So was every woman diminished? It seemed so.
She opened her mouth to answer, but then she thought of Aidan’s mother. There was a woman who seemed in no way diminished. She was filled with wild emotion, and by all accounts had only grown more vivacious with every passing year. Though her husband had died when Kate was still in England, he’d been alive when Kate had first known the family. They’d been a fairly happy couple.
“Yes,” she finally said with a smile. “Yes, I have known women who were undiminished by marriage. Perhaps we should only be more careful in our choice of husband. Or perhaps we should be stronger ourselves.”
“Or . . .” Lucy drawled, “perhaps we should avoid the problem entirely and treat marriage like the plague.”
“Even if it involves Mr. Penrose?”
Lucy giggled and the darkness of the moment was gone, just like that.
Kate had spoken of her marriage, and her unhappiness, and it felt like nothing more painful than . . . memory. Just memory, fading as it was exposed to the light.
“Kate,” Lucy said, leaning even closer so that she could speak in a whisper.
Kate narrowed her eyes in suspicion. “What?”
“I’ve heard that in London all married women take lovers.”
She jerked back. “That’s not true!”
“I don’t know. I think it might be.”
“Well,” Kate sputtered, “it hardly matters. We’re not in London.”
“Still . . . Mr. York is from London. Perhaps that is all that matters. He provides the excuse of worldliness.”
“Nonsense! Lucy Cain, you should be ashamed of yourself.”
Lucy shrugged and one side of her mouth tipped up in a sneaky smile. “I’ll see if I can summon up the will.”
“Oh, I doubt you will bother.”
“Probably not.”
Kate rolled her eyes. “Regardless, will you deliver this letter to your father?”
As if her work was done, Lucy stood and clapped her hands together. “I will. Good afternoon then, Kate. Forget I ever said a thing about it.” She retrieved her letter and set off with a jaunty wave.
But of course, Kate couldn’t forget. Not for a moment. Perhaps she did not need to kill off her manufactured husband. Perhaps she could simply think like a man and have everything she wanted at once.
Aidan smiled into the snowflakes as he walked, thinking how Kate must be enjoying the weather. Perhaps he should buy her Sir William Perry’s account of his expedition to the Arctic. She’d likely adore the descriptions of unbearable cold. He made a mental note to have Penrose order the book as soon as they returned to London.
He didn’t want to think about leaving though. He felt content here, and not only when he was with Kate. But at the moment, all his good feeling had to do with the sight of Guys Lane ahead. His heart pressed against his throat in anticipation.
When he turned the corner, there was Kate, as if she’d been waiting for him.
She locked the front door of her shop and turned toward him, and when her eyes widened in surprise, he saw joy in them. Joy for him like embers glowing in the snowy dusk.
“You can’t keep coming here,” she said when she reached him.
Aidan blinked in shock. Whatever fantasies he’d had about how she’d respond after that intimate evening, this wasn’t it. “What do you mean?”
“I can’t have people talking.”
She was concerned about appearances, not his actual presence. Suppressing a smile, Aidan took another step back and clasped his hands behind him.
“I’m a married woman. People on the lane will gossip.”
“Are you asking me to come in through the back?”
One side of her mouth curved up as she brushed past him to walk up the lane.
He followed her around the corner and watched her tug her hood lower before she started walking again.
“There’s no one out in this storm, Kate.”
“That’s why I’m allowing you to accompany me.”
“And may I ask where we’re going?”
“
I
am going to speak to an importer. You may walk with me, but I can’t have you there when I negotiate.”
“Why?”
She stopped abruptly and tilted her head up to meet his eyes. “That’s a ridiculous question.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Aidan. Don’t be dense. If you’re there he’ll speak to you because you’re a man.”
She started walking again, leaving Aidan to follow, slightly dizzy with confusion. Here was another new Kate. This was obviously a woman who had started a shop, despite that ten years before she’d been a pampered girl of the ton and had never worked a day in her life. He would’ve admired this new side of her if she looked at all open to kisses and flirtation, but she looked as if she’d box his ears if he got close. Still, he dared to reach for her hand and place it on his arm to slow her pace.
Though she shot him an annoyed look, she left her hand where it was. He felt her side press against his forearm as she took a deep breath. “I cannot afford the appearance of impropriety. Surely you can understand.”
“Of course. The appearance.”
She turned enough that he could see her eyes slide over his chest. “Yes.”
Aidan’s heart jumped into a crazed rhythm at that one simple word. This was real, this possibility that she could be his again. It wasn’t his mind weaving phantoms into feelings. She felt it too. And even if they were both imagining this pull . . . didn’t that make it real?
He felt light-headed, so dizzy he wanted to laugh. Yet they walked on, as if the world weren’t swaying beneath his feet. As if his heart wasn’t thundering in overjoyed panic.
He tried to remind himself that she was married, but what did that matter to him? He knew well what little hold those bonds placed on women’s bodies.
Kate’s hand left his arm and she said, “Wait here,” before disappearing around a corner. By the time he caught up, the only sign of her was a weathered door swinging closed. The rough, splintered wood of the building rose up at least two stories. A warehouse.
Aidan was left waiting like a lost child. The snow pelted his hat, then dripped off the brim in watery clumps. But the cold no longer cut through him, because all he could feel was the premonition of Kate’s touch.
Kate carried her happy anxiety into the warehouse and turned it into boldness. She glared down at the open bag of roasted beans and snarled at the man who offered it. “You are a fool.”
He snorted in arrogant contempt. “I assure you, Mrs. Hamilton, that this is the finest quality of Coorg coffee on the market.”
“And I assure you, Mr. Fost, that it is not.”
“Madam, if your husband were here to offer you guidance, he would—”
“If my husband were here, you would not try to pass off this rubbish as Coorg.”
He seemed uncowed. “If you will only note the beautiful darkness of—”
“Exactly how many years did you spend living in the East?”
“Pardon?”
“I spent the last ten years of my life on a coffee plantation, Mr. Fost.”
“I’m aware of that, but I doubt Mr. Hamilton allowed you to stroll the fields.”
Frustration flashed to rage, and Kate’s muscles ached with the need to hurt this man. She pointed her finger in his face and bared her teeth. “You listen, sir, and listen very closely. A quarter of these beans were picked green and another half are not much better than that. If you have a functioning brain in that head of yours, you will not send me another crate of less-than-questionable quality and try to pass it off as something better. Do you think my husband would’ve sent me here on my own if he did not trust me with his livelihood? You insult us both.”
He held up both hands, his eyes finally brightening with alarm. “Mrs. Hamilton, please. I swear to you, my London roaster promised me this was an excellent lot.” The man’s placating tone had finally risen to desperation.
“There is really no point in my continuing a business relationship with a man who’s either dishonest or too ignorant to realize his supplier is cheating him.”
She could see him struggle with his pride for a moment before he finally gave in with an inclination of his head. “I apologize, madam. This won’t happen again.”
“It had better not. I’m aware of your tenuous situation, Mr. Fost.” His eyes widened dramatically. “You would do very well to keep me happy.”
“Of course.”
“Other distributors may not even know the difference between stable muck and arabica, but I expect to be treated as a professional.”
“Yes, yes. I can assure you, I will send only the best, the most valuable of my supply in the future. I’m grateful for your understanding.”
A stream of apologies followed her out the door.
Kate sighed as the door banged shut, leaving her in the snowy dusk. Mr. Fost was having a rough spell. One of his major buyers in Leeds had retired. It truly wasn’t her concern, not when her profit was at stake, and she refused to feel sorry for him. But he had done her a service of sorts, reminding her of why she’d started this masquerade in the first place. Without the ghost of a husband behind her, she would not be able to establish a solid footing among the men in this business. And they were all men.
It had only been wishful thinking on her part, to hope to give up her lies so soon. Kate was so wrapped up in her temper that she didn’t see Aidan until he moved away from the wall he’d leaned against. In all honesty, she’d forgotten he was there, and she felt twin jolts of alarm and joy at the sight of him.
“You didn’t have to wait,” she said quietly.
“I’ll assume that was a poor attempt at a joke.”
The snow had picked up. The world was silent around them as she took his arm. The muffled crunch of their footsteps was the only sound in the world as they walked. And her breathing. And her pounding heart.
“I feel . . .” she started, but the words stuck in her mouth, as if they didn’t wish to emerge.
“Yes?” Aidan prompted.
“I feel I should send you away.”
“But why?”
“You know why.”
She dared a glance at him and found him scowling at the snowy street. “Don’t let the past years come between us,” he said softly.
“It’s not so simple,” she whispered. “I’ve had a whole life since then. And you don’t appear to have been living as an ascetic monk.”
She felt the jump of startled muscles in his arm. “I haven’t claimed to.”
“Lucy tells me you have your finger in everything.”
“I—I don’t—Pardon?”
“You’re no simple investor. You haven’t been quietly toiling away for the past decade. You’re a rich and powerful London gentleman now.”
She felt his fingers curve over her hand, and Kate slowed to stop. Aidan circled around until he stood in front of her. “Do you know why I’m rich, Kate?”
She shook her head. Snowflakes landed on his lips and melted there.
“Because I was determined to never be supplicant again.”
“Supplicant to whom?”
“To your father. To anyone like him.”
Kate felt the strange pain of a ghost sliding through her. “My father? You really asked him?”
The frown on his face didn’t budge. “What do you mean?”
“You asked for my hand? You truly tried to persuade him?”
Aidan shook his head, and water slid off his hat like teardrops. “What are you talking about? You know I asked him. It was the entire reason we argued.”
“I know.” She nodded, only a faint movement, but she couldn’t seem to stop it. “Yes, of course.”
“Kate.” He lost some of his tension, and he reached for her. His gloved fingers curved under her chin to still her movement. “What do you mean?”
“It’s silly, but . . . He told me you didn’t.”
He tilted his head in puzzlement.
Kate tried to smile. “I never believed him. Not at first. But then . . . you didn’t come for me.”
“Who told you what? You’re not making any sense.”
“My father. He denied that you asked for my hand.”
“My God, Kate! That’s ridiculous. Why would he say that?”
“Because,” she whispered, tilting her chin out of the grasp of his fingers. “Because I told him I couldn’t marry anyone else. I told him I’d already given myself to you.”
“Oh, Kate,” he sighed.
“He said I was a fool. That you’d used me like a . . . like a rag and then tossed me away.”
“No . . .” His face went white. “That’s not true. I asked for permission to marry you. I begged for it on my knees. I swear to you, I did everything but kiss his boots.”
She nodded again, but stopped herself before she got lost in the motion. She couldn’t speak, and the pressure in her throat was one big mass of relief. Despite her initial, violent rejection of her father’s words, at some point they’d rooted in her mind. He’d kicked at one of those stones that held her up, and eventually the seed he’d planted had worked into the cracks like a weed, splitting her certainty wide open. And when that stone had tumbled out, she’d known that Aidan had taken her virginity without any intention of marriage. She’d thought herself in love with a falsehood.
But Kate slid a new stone back into place. Aidan had loved her, and she hadn’t been a fool.
“I did come for you,” he said.
For a moment, she picture him in Ceylon, searching the harbor towns for any sign of her. Her heart clenched in pained hope. “You did?”
“I came to Bannington Hall. Over and over. They said you wouldn’t receive me.”
Her heart fell. “I was with my mother’s family,” she whispered.
He’d never known. He’d said it before, but somehow it hit her now. She’d waited and waited for him to come to Ceylon to rescue her. She’d been so patient. So true.
But slowly, as the weeks had crawled painfully by, she’d realized that he was never coming for her. He didn’t want her. Why else would she still have been on that godforsaken island? Why else would she still have been that strange man’s wife?
Her heart had shriveled up, condensing to a hard, tight knot in her chest, and she’d realized with a quiet kind of horror that Ceylon was her life from then on. Her
life
. That isolated, foreign place her home; that cold man her husband. No one was ever coming to take her away. And so much of her had crumbled then. There might never be enough stones to fix that.
Remembering that first year in Ceylon, Kate clenched her hands tight. Snow bit at her face and she tried to breathe. “I sent letters,” she whispered. “But of course you never got them. Even then, I didn’t think you did.”
His hand touched her again, smoothing over her cheek. “Don’t cry, Kate. Please.”
Was she crying?
“I came for you,” he whispered urgently. His arms curved around her. He pulled her into his arms and moved them toward the shadows of an alley. “I came for you. I swear I did.”
She nodded again, her cheek scraping over his wool greatcoat, but she was crying hard now, gasping for air. He couldn’t truly understand because she’d never tell him.