Eilian swallowed hard. He knew she expected him to remove her corset, but he couldn’t. Another man would have jumped at the chance, yet it filled him with dread. His stomach churned as a cold sweat broke over his forehead and back. He didn’t know what he was supposed to do next. Hadley instinctively knew, everyone seemed to know, and it came as naturally to them as walking. Averting his gaze from her silk chemise, he desperately sought to untangle his spring from the laces. If he didn’t do something, she would. With one final roll of his prosthetic hand, it came free. Relief slowed his racing pulse as he sank back. Had she seen the panic in his eyes?
Resting his lips on her freckled shoulder, he swallowed against the gnarl in his gut. His wife was still waiting, but apart from the race of fear, his mind was blank. When he leaned back to meet her light-eyed gaze, the tension left her face only to slacken with disappointment. His hand shook as he traced her cheek and kissed her once more, but this time she barely pressed back.
His heart pounded. He hadn’t meant to hurt her. He loved her. He loved her dearly and wanted nothing more than to spend his life with her, yet he couldn’t bear to do it. Opening his mouth to speak, Eilian realized there was nothing he could say. How could he tell her that thinking about it made him so anxious that he felt sick to his stomach? How could he possibly talk about desire when he had never experienced it?
The back of his eyes burned as he carefully lifted her off his lap and slipped out from under her. “I can’t. I’m sorry, Hadley, but I can’t.”
Her eyes darted over his fallen features, silently pleading for him to stay. His face grayed as he rubbed his upper arm and ducked into the dressing room without meeting her gaze. The door softly clicked shut behind him.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, Hadley drew in a tremulous breath. She cleared her throat and straightened her back before smoothing and re-pinning her mussed hair. As she picked her soiled dress off the floor, she stared down at her form. What had she done wrong? She replayed her part in their embrace, but she couldn’t understand what would have made him leave. Slipping on a clean gown, she stared at the dressing room door. She could confront him, demand to know what that was all about, but what good would it do? The damage had already been done.
Hadley calmly stepped in the hall and walked toward the grand staircase. Surely there was something in the house that needed fixing.
Chapter Nine
An Unwelcome Guest
Hadley Sorrell’s heels clicked across the polished floorboards. Her eyes swept into each open door, searching for a maid or even Patrick, but thus far, her staff had eluded her. In her hand she clutched two letters; one for each of the important women in her life. To her mother-in-law, she wrote about the possibility of throwing a party at Brasshurst. The dowager countess would know the feasibility of such a plan, and perhaps she would even offer to help her draft the menu or tell her where she could procure a few more servants. The other was addressed to Eliza Hawthorne. Ever since her mother died, her cousin had become her surrogate mother and honorary sister, and she was the only woman with whom she could speak freely. Days like these made her wish Eliza and James had come with them to Folkesbury. As a married woman and a physician, surely she could spread some light on what had occurred a few days earlier. Maybe it was a normal reaction, but she wouldn’t know until she replied.
For three days she had debated whether she should say anything. The night of the incident she stayed downstairs taking apart and cleaning the algae-encrusted mechanisms of the orangery’s pond until she was too tired to reassemble the engine. She left the pieces strewn across the mosaic floor and returned upstairs to soak away the slime and what remained of her misery. When she slunk into their bedroom in her nightgown, she was surprised to find the room dark and Eilian beneath the bed’s canopy with his face to the wall. He didn’t stir as she sank into the mattress beside him, but she knew he was awake. His eyes fixed on the bed curtain while he cradled his stripped prosthesis in his other arm. She hadn’t seen him since he locked himself in the dressing room, and watching his bare back rise and fall, she wondered if he had eaten dinner or if he had gone to bed after she left. Sliding under the covers beside him, she stared at the bed’s gathered ceiling. Words hung in the air ready to be plucked but neither spoke. The hours wore on and the disquieted silence soon faltered into a stiff slumber.
In the morning when she awoke, he was sitting on the edge of the bed assembling his prosthesis. At the sound of the bed creaking with her waking movements, he turned to face her. He bent down to kiss her forehead like he did every morning, but as he drew closer, he hesitated, giving her ample time to pull away if she chose. When she didn’t, he reverently kissed her on the brow. Leaning back to meet her gaze, Eilian's eyes were soft with guilt.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
Hadley cupped his cheek, her thumb scratching across his stubble. “I know.”
For the past three days, he had disappeared into the recesses of the house only to reemerge upon being summoned for meals. When they were together, their conversations were sparse and the kisses chaste. Releasing a long breath, she wondered how long it would go on like this.
Hadley stuck her head into the parlor. The pale blue upholstered chairs stood empty and the hearth cool. She could have sworn she saw a shadow move within, but no one was there. As her eyes roamed over the darkened corner of the room, she took a step forward only to collide with something solid. Jolting back, she stumbled into the coffered wall, dropping her letters, but a gloved hand caught her arm and kept her on her feet.
“I beg your pardon, your ladyship. I didn’t mean to startle you,” Patrick began as he released her and picked the missives off the floor.
“It’s fine, Patrick. Actually, I was looking for you. Would you or—” She stopped when she noticed that his lips were drawn straight and behind his spectacles his gaze was tense with worry. “What’s going on?”
“There is a situation in the greenhouse.”
“What sort of situation?”
“Mr. Nash is back. Shall I find his lordship?”
This again. “No, I will take care of it.”
Squaring her shoulders, Hadley marched down the hall. Even if she still had trouble finding their bedroom at night when fatigue made all of the hallways meld into one, the orangery was the one room she had no trouble locating. Hadley paused, listening to the pool’s engine thrum. Now that she had cleaned and oiled its internal workings, its rhythm was less cacophonous, but it was still loud enough for her to hear on the other side of the house. As she rounded the corner of the light-cut hall and crossed the empty drawing room, voices rose on the other side of the French doors.
“Touch one more plant, and I will break your bloody arm.”
“I didn’t come all the way from London to be threatened by the likes a you, ole timer. Her ladyship tol’ me to weed an’ prune, an’ that’s what I’m gonna do.”
“Her ladyship,” Nash spat, “is not in charge.”
Hadley ground her teeth. Mr. Nash was lucky she left her derringer in her bedside table.
Throwing open the door to the orangery, she stormed inside. As she followed the path past the oceanic mosaic and into the murk of the pool’s chamber, the men’s voices grew louder. Standing at the edge of the pool were Randall. Nash and Mr. Bernard. The heavy-browed gardener stood with one hand on his stout hips and gesticulated threateningly with a pair of shears in the other. Randall Nash had his back to the countess, yelling into the gardener’s face despite his added girth. His curled grey hair and fine suit were unmistakable from behind. As she broke through the foliage, Mr. Bernard’s beady eyes brightened.
“Here comes her ladyship now,” he replied with a smug smile. “She’ll set ya straight.”
Nash’s eyes narrowed as he turned to meet the Countess of Dorset’s glare. With the penetrating gaze of a great horned owl, he sliced through her form, cutting across her knees where her jodhpurs ended in wool stockings and piercing her breasts wh
ere they pressed against her shirtwaist. Resisting the urge to straighten her clothing or hair, Hadley came to the edge of the pool with her head high and her back rigid. How dare he invade her home and bully her staff.
As she had seen Eilian do, she turned to the gardener as if Nash was not even there. “What seems to be the problem, Bernard?”
“He won’t let me do m’ weedin’. Says you ain’t in charge.”
“This is ridiculous. Mr. Nash, what problem can you possibly have with our gardener pulling weeds?”
The older man’s gaunt face convulsed, contracting into a pinched grimace. “I don’t have to explain myself to the likes of you. You have no right to destroy this house.”
“I’m not destroying anything!” she cried. “All I want is to weed the garden to ensure that it looks nice for our guests.”
“Leave it alone.”
“It has been left to go to seed for decades. Am I supposed to leave it that way?”
“You are supposed to mind your own business, Lady Dorset.”
“Don’t talk to her ladyship that way,” the gardener snapped, looming over Nash, who seemed to take no notice.
Hadley raised her hand. “It’s fine, Bernard. Mr. Nash, if you have a problem with me, I would prefer it if you came and spoke to me like a civilized person. If there is a certain plant you are worried about, say something.”
“Why should I speak to an upstart like you? This isn’t your house. You have been here for less than a month and think you own the place.”
Rage climbed up Hadley’s ribs, squeezing her lungs and pumping her body with heat. “No matter what you may think, Mr. Nash, this is our house now. Harland Sorrell is dead. Eilian is the earl now, and I am his wife. We own Brasshurst Hall and everything within it whether you like it or not. Nothing you do or say will change that.”
“We shall see about that. You think you’re entitled to—”
The gardener took a deep breath, about to start again when Hadley laid her hand on his arm. She smothered her anger with a civil smile that would have scared Eilian or her brother and said coolly, “Thank you, Mr. Nash, for letting me know what you think of me, but I have no need of your opinions as I have plenty of my own. I speak for myself and my husband when I say that you are no longer welcome at Brasshurst and we no longer require your services as the estate manager. Now, please leave before I have Bernard throw you out.”
Nash’s sharp brows knit as he scowled, shaking his head and tutting in disgust. “You are making a grave mistake, Lady Dorset. I don’t think you understand the consequences of your actions. Your husband will be very disappointed in you.”
“I know full-well what I’m doing, and no self-important busybody is going to insult me and tell me how to run my household. Get out, or I will call the constabulary and have you arrested for trespassing.”
His hands twitched into fists at his sides. Before she could get out the final word, Randall Nash turned on heel and stormed off into the greenery. Without waiting for Hadley’s command, the gardener charged after him, disappearing into the dense brush. Hadley ran a trembling hand down the front of her shirt. When she heard Nash was in the house, she had expected conflict, if their first meeting was an indication of his temperament, but his words and gaze had cut her deeper than she anticipated. An upstart. Is that what people really thought of her? That she was Eilian’s mistress or servant turned wife? Even if she had been, she wouldn’t have deserved that sort of harassment. In London, where people knew who they were, where they lived, and could guess how much they each earned, did they think she was nothing more than a scheming woman climbing the social ladder by marriage? No matter what they thought about how she got there, the truth was she loved Eilian, and despite what happened the other day, she knew he loved her too.
Stifling her thoughts, Hadley turned to where Bernard had been working. A mound of dead stalks and milkweeds sat at the edge of the pool. Her eyes ran over the discarded bits of grass before returning to the bed of alien flowers and ferns. It was obvious that the gardener had only clipped what couldn’t be salvaged, so why had Nash reacted so strongly? It wasn’t unheard of for old men who were set in their ways to overreact to even the smallest changes, but to threaten to break a man’s arm over weeding a garden was past overreacting. There had to be a reason. She narrowed her eyes as she scanned a row of tightly curled ferns but lingered on a thickly stalked plant that rose from the dirt behind it like a three-tiered fountain filled with daisy heads.
“I lost him, your ladyship,” the gardener wheezed as he loped back to her side.
“Thank you for trying. Do you know how he got out or is he lurking somewhere?”
“I don’t think he’s hiding. How he got out, I haven’t a clue. Like a bloody magician, that one.”
“Bernard, while you’re tidying up, if you find a plant that you are unsure of, leave it be, but if you come across a box or strange object, bring it to my or his lordship’s attention.”
He nodded, his eyes trailing to where the redhead stared. “Should I be lookin’ for anythin’ special?”
“I don’t know yet. Mr. Nash is guarding something, and I would like to know what.”
Leaving the gardener to his work, Hadley cut through the greenery and into the cool, bright rooms of the main house. As she crossed each threshold, she glanced inside to make certain they were empty. Mr. Bernard’s reassurances that Randall Nash had escaped gave her little comfort. She couldn’t bear the thought of the man peering at her from some darkened corner, watching her in the one place she could let her guard down. Upon reaching the parlor, Hadley pulled the pocket doors shut and sunk into the sofa. She closed her eyes and lay back with her arm thrown over her face as if she had swooned. Nash trespassing, Eilian acting strange, and the self-imposed agony of an impending dinner party were too much for her all at once. If only swooning meant she could admit defeat and hand her problems off to someone else.
“No more,” she whispered as she rubbed her eyes.
“No more what?”
Hadley shot up. She spun to the right and left before finally looking over the back of the chair only to find her husband staring at her with concerned eyes. Over his shoulder he hefted a brass telescope on a wooden tripod. His grey eyes flickered over her face. Leaning the telescope against the fireplace, he sat across from her and felt her forehead with the back of his hand.
“Your face is flushed. Are you ill?”
“No.”
“Something’s wrong.”
“No, it’s just that nothing is going right. How did you even get in here?”
“Back in the corner, behind the paneling, is a little office. I have been working in there all day, going through some of my great-grandfather’s things. Look, I found a telescope.” He smiled, but when she sat back and stared at the ceiling, he prodded softly, “What happened?”
“Patrick came to fetch me because Mr. Nash came back.”
“Why didn’t he find me? I would have taken care of it.”
“I told him I would handle it, and I did. He’s gone now, disappeared like he did last time. Bernard looked but couldn’t find him.”
“He was in the garden again?”
“Yes, he was all put-out because I told Bernard to weed—” Hadley stopped when she noticed her husband’s brows furrowed thoughtfully. “What is it?”
“I’m not sure. It may be nothing, but when we visited Mr. Talbot’s cousin, Argus mentioned that Nash told everyone he grew silphium.”
“Is that some sort of poppy?”
“No, it was a medicinal plant from Ancient Rome. The last one was given to Nero, but the species was supposed to have been harvested to extinction. Can you show me where he was in the greenhouse?”
She exhaled and sank lower into the cushion. There was nothing in the world that would make her get off the sofa. “Ask Bernard. He was there when Nash came in.”
Leaving his wife on the couch, Eilian trailed down the hallway, dashing past the portrait gall
ery of past earls. In the library, he unbolted the door to the orangery and pushed into the suffocatingly thick air. Sweat instantly prickled his scalp and clung to his shirt as he followed the path to the edge of the pool. With the engine back in working order, the pool no longer reeked of fetid water and had gone from nearly black to a healthy algal green. The heavyset gardener knelt beside a carpet of flowers, ripping out weeds with roots as thick as turnips and tossing them onto the growing mound beside him. When he realized Eilian was watching him, Bernard mopped his brow and climbed to his feet.
“Your lordship. I tried to catch the villain, sir. I really did, but he’s a slipp’ry one.”
“I know you did. Where did you see Mr. Nash?”
“Well, he was right there, sir,” he replied, pointing to the far side of the pool. “Then, he came over here when I didn’t stop workin’.”
Nodding, Eilian paced along the water’s edge. His grey eyes darted over the palms and brush before migrating to the smaller plants. If the ancients gave silphium plants as gifts, they would have to be small enough to transport. From what he could remember from the etchings of it he had seen on coins found in Cyrene, it grew on a thick stalk and had heart-shaped seeds. Nothing here looked right. While he couldn’t name any of the English wildflowers or exotic plants from the Far East, he knew they weren’t silphium. The garden hadn’t been laid out in any sort of order, and while it was obvious that the trees and larger specimens had been planted first, the smaller flowers appeared to have been placed where there was room enough for them. Eilian walked to where Bernard said he had first seen Nash appear. What had the man seen that he couldn’t?
The Ingenious Mechanical Devices Box Set Page 61