He gritted his teeth with such force pain shot along his jawline. “What my wife and I shared . . . was nothing like what we share. So don’t dare confuse the two.”
“Isn’t it, Edwin?” she challenged. “A relationship without trust will only die, and I love you—”
“You love me,” he whispered, joy suffusing his chest.
“But I can’t remain here and watch that grow to hate when you realize you can’t separate me from my past . . . from our past,” she said over his interjection.
“We didn’t have a past.” And now, with her wish, they wouldn’t have a future.
“You had one with my father.”
“Don’t do that.” Edwin shoved back from his seat with such force the chair tumbled over and clattered noisily upon the hardwood floor. “That man wasn’t a father to you.”
She gave him another of those sad little smiles. “I know that.”
That insinuation found its mark. I’m going to lose her. And suddenly Edwin found himself wishing he were still the man he’d been long ago, who’d been capable with words, who’d held an ability to charm. After his marriage, all his trust in himself and his ability to be with people had been flipped around. He swiped a hand over his brow. “I have made so many mistakes in my life, Gertrude.” Too many to account for, but every one of those errors had brought him to this failed moment in his life. “I married my wife, believing our love was enough to conquer all.”
Gertrude hugged her arms to her chest. “It should have been, Edwin.”
“But it wasn’t.” Something told him, with this woman, bold and loving and loyal to her family, it would have been enough. “Nor did my mistakes end there.” Restless, he moved over to the window and stared unseeingly out at the streets below. “I allowed my wife to select a nursemaid. It was a decision that went against my better judgment, and still I let her make the ultimate decision.” And it had cost him so much. Everything.
Or . . . almost everything. Had he not lost all, he’d not have found everything in Stephen and with Gertrude.
“You wanted to believe the best in the woman your wife wished to hire. There is no shame to be had in hoping for the best in people,” she said quietly.
He faced her once more. “No, but there is shame when that decision cost my wife and child their lives,” he said, needing her to understand. Because mayhap if she understood, she could see all the reasons he struggled to trust . . . anyone. “Even my best friend, who’d stood by me in my marriage, came to believe me a murderer.”
A smile so sad it broke his heart all over again turned her lips. “I am not those people, Edwin.”
“I know that,” he said quickly. “I do.”
“Do you?” she returned. “Do you really know that?” she asked without any malice or inflection.
This could not simply be the end between them. The light he’d known with her and because of her couldn’t just go out. Not when it would plunge him, along with his son, into eternal darkness.
“There is nothing I can say, then,” he said flatly.
Gertrude hesitated, and then she shook her head.
“All right, then.” He inhaled slowly through his teeth, concentrating on breathing. How am I still standing? How, when his damned heart was breaking? “So . . . you are leaving.”
She nodded. “I have to. I think . . . we both knew we were merely playing at pretend. There could have never been anything more between us.”
He didn’t believe that. He wouldn’t. “You’re wrong.”
“I’m never wrong,” she said, their words an echo of the night they’d made love. Was it really only just yesterday?
“This time you are, love.”
Gertrude laughed softly. “Oh, Edwin.” His name, spoken as a goodbye.
How am I so calm? He was going to lose her. Nay, he’d already lost her the moment he thundered for a constable. But what had he really offered her before this? He hadn’t told her he loved her. He hadn’t offered his name or respectability. And worse . . . he hadn’t trusted her.
“Please stay,” he begged, all out of pride where this woman was concerned. “At least until a governess is found.”
She troubled her lower lip in that endearing manner he’d come to know spoke of her indecision.
Then, proving himself a bastard yet again that day, he pressed with the one reason she’d never refuse. “For Stephen.”
Gertrude closed her eyes briefly. “Very well. Until we find a governess. And then I’m returning home.”
Home. The gaming hell she’d grown up in and wished to return to.
Afraid she’d change her mind, he nodded. “Let me gather Stephen so he might see for himself that you are well.” Edwin turned to go, and then he stopped. “I need you to know . . . all my doubts . . . my inability to trust? It isn’t because of you or Diggory or your family, Gertrude,” he said hoarsely. “I need you to know that. The mistrust that led me to question you? It was only because of me.”
Tears glazed her eyes, crystalline drops that wouldn’t fall but illuminated the sadness in their depths.
Edwin lingered, waiting for her to speak, and when no reply was forthcoming, he made himself leave. To give her the space she needed—for now.
He had until a proper governess was found to prove himself worthy of Gertrude and give her a reason to stay with him long after that.
Chapter 26
Meoowwwww—Meowwwww—Meowwww—Meow.
“And I was saying . . .”
Meow.
Through that cacophony of feline calls, the latest candidate for the post of governess struggled to finish her sentence. The greying woman cleared her throat. “As I was saying . . . achoo.”
Meowwww.
“Bless you,” Gertrude said automatically after the seventeenth sneeze from the prospective candidate.
From around her rumpled white kerchief, Mrs. Beckett glared at the collection of cats wandering Edwin’s offices. “I cannot do this. Not for any—achoo!”
“God bless you,” Edwin and Gertrude said simultaneously.
Collecting her cane, the older woman stood and let herself out.
“choo—” The door closed, punctuating that final sneeze.
“God bless you,” they both called after her.
“Well, I say she’ll not do,” Edwin chimed in almost cheerfully as he dragged the tip of his pen over the governess’s name. Hopping up from his chair, he went, made himself a brandy, and returned to his desk. “I’ve always said one cannot trust a person who doesn’t like cats.”
“In fairness, Edwin, there are . . .” Gertrude did a quick count of the various assortment of cats scattered about the room. “Ten. Ten cats in here.” In the week since she’d been injured and resumed her daily activities with Stephen and finding him a proper governess, Edwin had made it a point of filling the house with whichever stray or mangy tabby he’d found lurking around his residence. “And that isn’t counting the ones you had fetched from the Devil’s Den.”
“Pfft,” he scoffed, coming to his feet. “And here I thought you appreciated cats.” She’d hand it to him. That muscle didn’t tick at the corner of his eye the way it usually did when any mention of her family or the Devil’s Den came up.
There was the faintest thread of hurt.
So that was why he’d done it. The protective walls she’d resurrected trembled slightly. “You’ve brought them here because of me.”
“I don’t mind them,” he mumbled, so like a boy caught with his hand in the biscuit jar that she found herself smiling.
“Ten of them?”
The door burst open, and Stephen came tripping inside. “She wasn’t the one. She—” Several cats bounded toward him, and he darted left and right to make way for the feline exodus. “What in hell is this? You need to stop bringing cats in, Gert. This is too many. Too many,” he muttered, stepping around a particularly fat, lazy cat sprawled on his back.
“I didn’t bring these particular ones in,” she felt
inclined to point out.
Stephen glanced over at his father. “You’re rescuing cats now?” he asked, picking his way over to Edwin’s desk. He sprawled into the chair previously occupied by Mrs. Bennett. “You’ve been spending too much time together.” Stephen made to speak, and then understanding dawned in his too-clever gaze. “You’re doing it because you think she likes them.”
Color filled Edwin’s cheeks, and Gertrude had her confirmation. “Yes . . . well . . .”
He was doing it because he knew she loved rescuing animals. “Stephen,” she scolded.
“I’d rather not talk about your”—his mouth twisted like he’d sucked a lemon—“feeelings for one another.” Her entire body went hot. “Did you find me a governess?”
Gertrude and Edwin spoke, together.
“We’re closer.”
“No.”
Tipping his head, Stephen alternated his stare between them. “Well? Which is it?”
“No, we have not,” Gertrude amended, shooting an unrepentant Edwin a scowl. “But we are closer to finding one.”
Stephen snorted. “Either you have or you haven’t.”
“Precisely my point,” Edwin chimed in. Lifting his glass, he saluted the boy.
Father and son shared a commiserative look. In her time here, Edwin and Stephen had learned to be a pair; their relationship, though not wholly healed—if it even could be—had evolved. With each day, the anger was being replaced by the deepening bond between them. It highlighted the fact that the great urgency in her being here was no more.
One of the new strays recently taken in—Fat Cat, as she’d taken to thinking of the enormous tabby—waddled over and made an attempt to climb into her lap. She eyed the creature, who might or might not actually be a stray, and took mercy on him. Gertrude scooped him up and, using his soft fur as cover, buried her face against him to keep from giving in to tears: those of happiness . . . and selfishly, of regret for what could never be. “Mrs. Upton is the one,” she finally brought herself to say, setting down Fat Cat and picking up her folder of notes for the candidates they’d interviewed.
Stephen pumped his legs back and forth. “The only one who doesn’t mind if I have weapons and isn’t trying to change me . . . right away?”
Her skin burnt from the feel of Edwin’s gaze on her. Gertrude nodded. “Correct. And she isn’t trying to change you.”
“She will,” he said without his usual belligerence . . . so much of that fury, the one that had lived within him at the Devil’s Den and on the streets, having waned.
Stephen had gone from living a life where card games and freely drinking drunkards and brawls and prostitutes were the norm. All that had been replaced by trips to Hyde Park and Gunter’s and a furniture-maker’s shop. He belonged here. In time, he would completely heal. She saw that now. “I suspect she won’t, and if she does, then your father will find a governess worthy of you.”
Stephen ceased swinging his legs and leveled her with a hardened stare. “You’re talking about leaving.”
“I was not talking about it.”
“Thinking about it, then?”
Gertrude focused her attention on Fat Cat.
Edwin answered for her: “She is.”
She braced for the usual display of resentment and hostility.
“You miss the clubs?”
Except only curiosity tinged her brother’s question.
“Do I miss the clubs?” she repeated, contemplating her answer. She’d not really given much thought to the Devil’s Den. She’d understood that returning to the only place she’d called home was inevitable. The hell represented that which was familiar . . . but it was not a place she longed to spend the remainder of her days . . . and yet . . . she would anyway. “I miss Broderick and Reggie,” she murmured. “And the staff. The guards. MacLeod. But I don’t miss it, Stephen.” She needed him to know that, to find peace in appreciating his new life. And her soul proved as black as Diggory’s, for she was riddled with envy that Stephen should stay and she would return.
“Humph,” Stephen muttered noncommittally. “I miss playing cards and the other boys.”
“I’m sure your father will allow Ned and Beatie and the other children to visit?”
“Of course,” Edwin replied, not missing a beat, and blast it all, Gertrude lost her heart to him all over again. How many other noblemen would allow common street rats and known thieves . . . and worse . . . within their residence, all to bring one’s child happiness?
“Oh, this arrived,” Stephen said, pulling an official page from his jacket front. He tossed it at Edwin.
Were he horrified at having that seal split and the private contents of a note read, Edwin gave no outward indication. He merely gathered the page, read the contents, and then tucked it away. “Thank you.”
That was . . . it? What had been written there? Gertrude sat upright, feeling as she had for so long: the person on the outs, trying desperately to wedge her way in.
“We going?” Stephen asked as Gertrude remained on the fringe, an outsider in the conversation between father and son.
“I haven’t decided.”
In the past, she might have been submissive enough to not interject where it wasn’t her place. She was no longer that meek woman who let the world continue around her, without her. “What is this?” she asked, putting that question to Edwin.
Stephen answered for him. “Lord Charles invited us to dine this evening. My . . . uncle.”
“Haven’t decided?” Edwin and his former best friend had met at White’s, and then he’d retreated once more, to oversee Stephen’s future alongside Gertrude. She’d known him just a month, but she knew Edwin enough to know he wanted a relationship with his brother-in-law. “Well . . . you have to go,” she insisted.
“I don’t have to do anything,” he said in crisp tones only a man raised from boyhood knowing his birthright could manage with such coolness.
Gertrude bristled. “Very well, my lord.” Edwin thinned his eyes into narrow slits. “Then you should want to.”
“One time, I did. I no longer feel that same impetus.”
“But . . .”
Edwin stood. “If you’ll excuse me? I’ve business to see to.”
“You’re leaving,” Gertrude blurted.
“I’ve a meeting,” he said.
“Forgive me.” She hopped up, sending Fat Cat scrambling. He landed on his feet with a loud thump and emitted a long meow in protest. A meeting? What manner of business did Edwin have to see to? He was a marquess, but he’d not been out in years before their arrival.
“I’ll leave you to your lessons. Stephen.” Edwin bowed his head.
The boy waved.
As soon as Edwin had gone, Stephen shot a foot out, kicking her in the shins.
She grunted. “What was that for?”
“Because you’re wanting to leave, and you have every reason to stay.”
Every reason to stay: Stephen . . . Edwin. They were her every reason: her brother, whom she’d loved with the love a mother surely felt for a child, and Edwin, whom she loved in ways she’d never believed she could feel for a man. He kicked her again. “Oomph. It’s complicated.” Gertrude darted out of the way to avoid another connection between her leg and his well-placed toe.
“Complicated, my arse. It’s easy enough for a child to work through.”
“You’ve never identified yourself as a child,” she teased.
“Don’t try to distract me. He loves you.”
Her heart leapt. He loved her. That euphoric joy rapidly deflated. Sighing, Gertrude gathered his hands close. “You just want me to stay, Stephen, but even when I go . . . you’ll be fine.”
He yanked his fingers back. “This ain’t about me.”
“This isn’t about you,” she unconsciously corrected.
“Precisely. It’s about the both of you. He loves you, Gert. And you love him, and so I wish you’d both get on with it and get married.”
Gertrud
e glanced around the room. “It’s not that easy.”
Her brother ticked off on his fingers. “You get married. You live together. Have some babies. Yes, it is that easy.”
Have some babies . . . which only conjured images she’d never allowed herself to have: of a tiny babe who belonged to her, cradled in her arms. And that imagined babe, with its golden hair and slight cleft in his chin, bore a remarkable likeness to Edwin.
“You like babies. Make some with my father and get on with the rest of your lives.”
Make some . . . ? Strangling on her mortification, Gertrude pushed her chair back and stood. “It’s more complicated than that. And furthermore”—she pointed at him and wagged a finger—“I’ll have you know ‘having some babies’ isn’t as easy as you make it out to be.” She’d helped several of the prostitutes over the years who’d come to Broderick, seeking employment with babes in their bellies, deliver those children.
“Making them is.”
Gertrude slapped her palms over her face. “Oh, for the love of all that is holy.”
“I’m just saying he loves you.”
“Sometimes love isn’t enough,” she cried, that pronouncement ringing around the room and reverberating back the misery of that statement. Hugging her arms around her middle, Gertrude held herself. “There has to be trust, and your father . . . he cannot completely trust me.”
“He made a mistake,” her brother said flatly.
“You . . .”
“Heard that?” He rolled his eyes. “I heard you two jabbering on. Thorne fetched me and told me to come see you. You were with my father.”
My father. How very much her brother now owned those words. Any other time, her heart would be singing with the happiness of that. She winced. “It’s not polite . . .” She let that useless lesson on decorum die. “Stephen, I love him, but I can never change my parentage. It will always be there between Edwin and me.”
Her brother kicked his chair and sent it tumbling over. “You’re being stubborn. You talk about . . .” He pitched his voice to a falsetto. “I can’t ever forgive him, we’ll never be able to trust one another . . .” Stephen returned to his normal gravelly timbre. “Because . . . why? He was mistrustful when he returned to find us gone? Well, I have something to tell you . . .” He stomped across the room, backing Gertrude up as he went, until her legs knocked against the sofa, stopping her flight and tumbling her into the squabs. “You did violate the terms you struck with him.”
The Bluestocking Page 29