by Erica Vetsch
He tugged at the tie holding his hair, shaking out the shoulder-length locks and tossing his head back. With practiced movements, he gathered the hair into a queue at the base of his neck and wound the tie once more.
Would he bother himself with her concerns, or would he, like her father, expect her to remember her place?
Was her marriage just one more good thing that God had given, only to snatch it away or change it into something she must bear instead of enjoy?
“I have been quite busy of late. I have many responsibilities.” He crossed his arms again, studying her. His eyes looked dark from this distance, but she knew they were the color of a sky before a storm.
“Am I not one of those responsibilities? Whitelock has many responsibilities, including two small children, yet he seems to find time to be with his wife and even seems to enjoy her company.” The comparison had been impossible not to draw, especially after hearing how the earl and countess had fallen in love while fixing up his country estate. Perhaps if Charlotte and Marcus could find a project like that, they could begin to find ways to share each other’s lives.
Marcus’s tilted his head. “Ah, Whitelock. You realize they had their struggles early on? ‘The course of true love never did run smooth.’”
“‘True love always encounters difficulties.’ A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a favorite of mine.” Charlotte paused. Were they really crossing swords using Shakespearean quotes about love?
Did she love Marcus? Did she want to? She certainly hadn’t expected it. Affection perhaps, and companionship, but love?
It was difficult to love someone you rarely saw. They needed to find some common ground if they were going to progress in their relationship beyond polite strangers.
“Is that what we’re experiencing? Early troubles?” On our way to true love?
“I suppose it is only natural. I’ve never been a husband before. It’s not unexpected that I should make some mistakes along the way.” He stood. “I can see I have been neglectful of your feelings. I will endeavor to spend more time with you in the future.” He frowned, his thoughts turning inward, as if trying to figure out where in his schedule he could fit her.
“What about right now? Perhaps you could teach me to use one of these.” She crossed the room and removed a weapon from the wall, testing the weight in her hand. Never having held a sword of any kind before, she felt awkward. But if this was something that interested Marcus, she wanted to learn. And now that she had his attention, she was loathe to leave.
He took the weapon from her hand. “If you want to learn fencing, we should begin with a foil, not an epee.”
Humor laced his tone, and indulgence, and she could have taken offense, but she decided to forbear. For now. As long as the indulgence didn’t turn to patronization. She couldn’t abide to be patronized.
“The foil is a training weapon, very light, and as you can see, the end of this one has been blunted for safety.” Marcus offered her the hilt across his forearm. She took it, clasping the grip.
“Feel the balance. Move over there and wave it about a bit.” He took a matching foil from the rack and stacked his hands on the grip, pressing the point into the floor. “Just don’t hurt yourself.” He must have noticed her umbrage, because he shook his head. “It’s easier to do than you’d think. I know from experience.”
She made a slow arc with the foil, then a faster one, hearing the metal rip through the air. “Do you often find yourself embroiled in fencing matches and duels?” Why else would he have this room?
“Not often. However, I was a soldier, if you remember. I keep up on my skills as a hobby.”
Which made sense.
“Here.” He waited until she lowered the foil before coming to stand beside her. “Copy my movements.”
He adjusted his stance so one foot was placed ahead of the other, the sword level with the floor. She followed suit, but he wasn’t satisfied and moved behind her to adjust her arm and angle.
She bit her lip with concentration, listening as he instructed her in various movements, enjoying his hands on her arms, his voice close to her ear. He was as lithe as a cat, light on his feet, and sure of himself. She felt clumsy and tentative but exhilarated to be with him and learning something new.
He moved to the center of the room, facing her.
“You practice alone first, then with the mannequin, and then with a partner. It takes years to become proficient, decades to become a true master.” He pivoted, slashing the foil downward in a graceful motion.
“And are you a true master?” She couldn’t get enough of watching him. As always, she truly enjoyed their time together, craving more. Did he enjoy it as well?
“More than proficient but less than a master. I would need more time and practice than I can afford to advance my skills. But I get by.” He lunged at the mannequin, poking the blunted tip into the center of the chest target.
When her arm was tired, far sooner than she wished, she begged off. “I am woeful and weak.” She panted, feeling the curls on her forehead clinging to her skin.
“Just unpracticed.” He took the foil from her hand. “You did well.”
She took a clean towel from the stack on the table and patted her temples. The long table held not just towels but a pitcher of water, and beyond that a variety of knives and sharp objects. She picked up a thin blade with a polished walnut handle. “You have quite an arsenal here. Are you proficient with all of them?”
As an answer, he picked up a narrow blade, flipped it in his hand to hold it by the point, and flicked it across the room, where it thudded into a pillar—much used for the purpose if the pits, splinters, and punctures were any indication—where the knife quivered for a moment.
A flicker of déjà vu flitted through her mind, and she froze. The action was so like what her rescuer, Hawk, had done that night in the Hog’s Head Tavern in St. Giles that she blinked.
He strode across the room, yanked the knife from the wall, and checked the point. “That’s enough for tonight, I should think. I don’t want you coming up here without me, do you understand? From tonight, this room is open by invitation only.”
A mask had dropped over his face, his features remote and cold. Perhaps he was remembering something from his soldiering days? Or perhaps he regretted sharing this part of his life with her? Or any part of his life?
Charlotte gathered her shawl, sad that their time together was ending on this note. Had they made any progress in their relationship? She hadn’t said all she had meant to, but perhaps a little at a time was best?
But as they walked down from the upper floor he put his hand under her elbow and said in a friendly tone, “I am thinking we should host a party before the Season is over. In fact, before Easter.”
She stopped on the stairs, gripping the banister. “A party?” He hadn’t shown the least interest in being social since their wedding, and now he wanted to host a party? Where had this notion come from? “What kind of party?” Had God heard her prayers regarding her marriage and already been working toward a solution? Would God do something like that for her?
“Something revolutionary. House parties are all the rage during the summer and through the winter holidays, but what if we threw a house party here in London? We can invite a select group as our guests to stay here for a few days, plan some outings, and then finish it all with a grand ball. I don’t think anyone’s given a masquerade ball yet this Season. We’ll be completely novel from beginning to end. What do you think?”
A house party in London? A masquerade ball? Was he quizzing her? Or was he serious?
“What’s more, I want you to have the planning of the entire affair, with my humble input if you will allow. You’re correct that I have been neglectful of you and our duties in society. A party will be just the thing. Something we can work on together and fulfill the expectations of the ton.”
Charlotte descended the stairs slowly, her mind reeling.
At her bedchamber door, he paus
ed. “Perhaps we can discuss particulars over breakfast tomorrow?”
Sharing breakfast for the first time with her new husband? Excitement at the possibility coursed through her, and she wondered how she would get to sleep.
Which she needn’t have wondered about, because Marcus followed her into her room and closed the door firmly on the outside world.
Neither slept for a very long time.
He hadn’t meant to spring the idea on her quite so precipitously, but he needed to get her thinking about something other than his knife-throwing abilities. He’d nearly let the feline out of the burlap there. The minute the blade had thudded into the wood, he’d seen the almost-recognition jump into her eyes.
He hadn’t meant to fall asleep in her bed either. And yet when he woke, with her in his arms, his feeling of contentment surprised him. Still, he wanted to respect her privacy. She was a lady, after all, and would expect her husband to return to his own sleeping chamber at night. So as light filtered through a crack in the drapes, he left her room for his own to bathe and dress.
He had never before planned a weeklong house party or a ball, and he wasn’t sure where to begin. The idea had originated with Sir Noel, who hadn’t minded being roused from his bed in his Belgravia home a week ago once he’d heard Pippa’s theory on the assassination.
“Stock fraud?” He’d paced before the darkened fireplace in his dressing gown, a cold pipe clamped between his teeth. “We’ll need to get our hands on the records from last spring. I’ll put someone on it right away.”
For days his drones had toiled away on the records and reports of the London Stock Exchange from last year, focusing particularly on the two months before and the two months after Viscount Fitzroy had attempted to assassinate the Prince Regent.
And yesterday when Marcus had arrived at his office, he held a list. Five names. Two they had considered before and three new ones.
“Why keep Trelawney and General Eddington on the list? Did they turn stock profits last spring?” Marcus took in the other names: John Ratcliffe, Cedric Bosworth, Lord Walford.
“No, but just in case our new theory is wrong, it won’t hurt to include them. I’ve gone as far as I can into their backgrounds, and thus far I’ve turned up nothing but that they were in France at the right time years ago.” Sir Noel’s face showed his frustration at not being able to uncover anything more useful.
“What about these other three?” He had learned little about Ratcliffe. He seemed to be just what he was, a courtier and influencer at court, wealthy and political, the occasional frequenter of houses of ill repute. Marcus had met Cedric Bosworth, the father of the boorish Dudley. Of Lord Walford he knew nothing.
“We’ll have to tread carefully. It might be a coincidence, them buying copious amounts of Omnium stock in the weeks before the assassination attempt and selling just after, when the prince survived. They all made at least ten thousand pounds over the course of the targeted four months last year, specifically on government stocks.”
“Did anyone else see returns like those?” Marcus had barely begun to educate himself on investments. He had inherited substantial investments from his father, but he’d left it in the hands of his banker until recently. There was so much to see to as the newly installed duke that he’d left some things untended for longer than he should have.
“There were some impressive moves over that time period, but none on government stock. Several Yorkshire merchants will bear watching. They’re amassing tidy fortunes with their textile mills in and around Leeds and York, and they’re canny with their investments. But that’s neither here nor there as far as you’re concerned.” Sir Noel tapped the paper Marcus had laid on the desk. “These are our targets. And I have an idea how you might get closer to them without tipping your hand.”
And the idea of a house party in the middle of the Season was born.
Marcus checked his reflection in the mirror, running his hand along his jaw, where his valet had just finished shaving him. He could hear stirring in the dressing room next door. Time to breakfast with his wife.
As he made his way downstairs, he couldn’t avoid the guilt that he wore like a coat. She had tracked him down to the attic last night, and she’d confronted him with his shortcomings. And she hadn’t been wrong. He’d been avoiding her, spending almost no time with her since their marriage.
But not because he found her undesirable or boring or tedious. Just the opposite. He found himself unable to stop thinking about her at the most inopportune times. When he should be working on a speech for Lords or was dining with a man who had no idea he was under investigation, thoughts of Charlotte would drift through Marcus’s mind. The way she ran her fingers over the spines of the books in the library as if communing with old friends. The way her hair looked, spilling across the pillow as she slept. The way her eyes had melted when she’d cuddled the Whitelocks’ baby and pressed her nose into the crease of his little neck, inhaling softly.
He even liked the mutinous set of her jaw when she encountered some injustice, or the vulnerability and compassion when she saw her sister at the opera. And her determination to do something to help.
What other woman, what other duchess, would spend her afternoons at a house of rescue for fallen women? Partridge had reported that every day for the past week, Charlotte had gone to King’s Place to help Aunt Dolly. She hadn’t gone shopping, or driving in Hyde Park, or to soirees or parties like any other young woman of the ton would do.
Everything about Charlotte intrigued him, so he had been forced to work harder to keep her contained in his mind. He couldn’t afford to lose focus during work. He wouldn’t let his mind be weakened by sentiment or distraction.
Marcus had finished the first page of the newspaper when she came into the breakfast room. She wore his favorite russet dress with the gold trim, and her hair curled around her face, reminding him of how much he loved to bury his fingers in those tresses and nuzzle the sensitive skin behind her ear.
He rose, laying aside his paper, and pulled out her chair. “Good morning, Charlotte.”
Her cheeks had some color, and she took her place, glancing up at him. “Good morning. I wasn’t sure you would be here. I’m later than I meant to be.”
“I was a bit behind my time this morning as well.” He poured her a cup of tea. “Shall I fetch your breakfast?” He motioned toward the sideboard, where a row of covered dishes and a plate of pastries waited.
Before she could answer, his mother stalked into the room. “My maid said you had decided to breakfast with the family, and I hurried right down. Why have you been avoiding me? I shouldn’t have to chase you down in order to have a conversation with you. Your brother never neglected me the way you do.” She barely gave Marcus time to stand and reach for her chair before she plopped herself down and snapped open her napkin. “Bring a pot of chocolate, and make up a plate for me.” The dowager looked at the footman waiting beside the door to the butler’s pantry.
So much for time alone with his wife. He sent Charlotte a rueful glance. She responded with a half smile, but despair invaded her eyes.
“Charlotte,” his mother said, “I hope today you will see fit to fulfill your duties as the duchess. Cards have been piling up, and there are calls to make. I can’t do everything myself. Haverly House has long been known for its hospitality, and you’ve been unavailable for a week now. I’m running out of excuses to make for your absence.” She fingered the lorgnette that hung from a diamond pin on her lapel.
Charlotte wrapped her long fingers around her teacup, resting her forearms on the table. “Madam, you needn’t make excuses for me. Feel free to tell our callers the truth.”
“I would if I knew it. Where have you disappeared to for so many days? Are you spending money? Shopping, or adding to your wardrobe? You haven’t been seen in Hyde Park or the tea rooms.”
“Have you been asking around?” Marcus rose and went to the sideboard as the footman returned with a pot of chocolate on a tr
ay. Marcus waved him away when he came to fill a plate for the dowager. “I’ll see to it. You may return to the kitchens until we call.”
“Very good, Your Grace.” He bowed and closed the door as he left.
Marcus filled one plate for his mother, then added toast and jam to another for Charlotte.
“I have not been ‘asking around,’ as you so vulgarly put it.” His mother picked up her fork. “Mrs. Bancroft and her daughter were here yesterday, and they mentioned they hadn’t seen Charlotte, though they’d been on Rotten Row every day last week. And I went to the tea rooms myself three times last week.”
“Madam.” Charlotte’s voice had a bland tone that was like a warning shot across Marcus’s bow but seemed to raise no alarms in his mother. “You may tell your friends, should they inquire, that I’ve been going to King’s Place every day.”
Marcus hid his smile behind his teacup as his mother’s mouth dropped open and she sputtered over her hot chocolate.
“Charlotte, it is impolite to quiz your elders. Stop talking nonsense and tell me the truth. Where have you been going?” She was at her imperious best.
“Madam, I am not quizzing you. I have been going to King’s Place each day to the home of a former prostitute and madam. She has set up a house of refuge for women in that life, offering a hot meal, a clean bed, and medical care to those in need. I would not mind at all if you spread the word to your acquaintances. I plan to do the same. Miss Stokes, the owner of the establishment, is in need of donations of time, money, or supplies. I’m sure the ladies of society would be interested in helping with such a worthy cause.” Charlotte glanced at Marcus, her chin up, her eyes direct.
“Before you ask if I am aware of Charlotte’s actions, madam, I can tell you I am. And I applaud them.” He held his wife’s challenging gaze.
“How can you? Think of the scandal.” His mother’s mouth went tight. “The family name. Visiting King’s Place? What if someone sees her? And coming into contact with”—she lowered her voice—“prostitutes? Those women are what they are through their own choices. It’s not proper for the Duchess of Haverly to even know about them, much less associate with them in such a manner.” She put her fist on the table hard enough to make her cup rattle in the saucer. “I won’t have it, do you hear me? I knew this marriage was a mistake. She was only going to cause trouble. If only you’d married Cilla, none of this would be happening. Cilla never talks back or goes off on her own. She’s been biddable and trainable from the start.”