His Christmas Countess

by Louise Allen

  ‘No, nothing is wrong. I need to talk with you, that’s all.’

  So I must be doing something wrong… No, that can’t be it. I know I have not put a finger out of line. Was he unwell? She looked up at his face as he took her arm as they descended the stairs, then sent a footman for their things. He looked tense, keyed up. It must be one of his wretched migraines, although it had been weeks since he had suffered one. Perhaps anxiety about her had triggered it.

  Kate stayed silent and did not fuss, even when they were seated in their carriage. She was finally rewarded for her patience when Grant threw his hat on to the seat opposite, ran both hands through his hair and said, ‘I am sorry to have dragged you away. You seemed to be enjoying yourself.’

  ‘I was, very much. I have made some new acquaintances and that will make the next engagement even better. But it is no matter, there will be many other opportunities to talk with them.’

  ‘There is something I need to speak to you about. Something important.’

  Not a headache, then. Nor did he seem displeased. ‘What is wrong?’

  Grant had not put on his gloves and she peeled off her own so she could slide her hand into his. It was warm and steady and closed around her fingers in a reassuring grip.

  ‘Absolutely nothing is wrong, quite the opposite, in fact, but I think I will wait until we are home before I tell you.’

  ‘Very well.’ Comforted, she settled back and did her best to contain her curiosity.

  *

  In her bedchamber Kate handed over her evening cloak and gloves to Wilson and then dismissed the maid and waited with what patience she could muster.

  Grant was normally reserved, she knew that from experience, but this seemed to be a secret out of the ordinary. Perhaps Prinny had offered him a diplomatic post and he was doubtful whether she was prepared to sail to Brazil. Or he had decided to take Holy Orders. Or buy a very large and expensive yacht. Or…

  ‘Kate. I have never told you this… In fact, I have only just realised it, but this marriage makes me very happy. You make me very happy. I cannot recall ever feeling like this. Not all the time.’

  She hadn’t heard the door open and, lost in fantasies about sea voyages and cathedral closes, she could only stare at him. For a second she thought she heard him say I love you, then her brain made sense of what he had actually said and her pulse seemed to stutter. ‘You… Grant, did you just say that I make you happy?’

  ‘Yes.’ He raised a quizzical eyebrow, seemingly expecting more of a reaction. ‘I realise it is rather a sudden declaration, but is it so surprising?’

  ‘When?’ Her voice was strangely croaky. ‘When did you realise it? I had no idea you had been feeling unhappy.’

  ‘I haven’t.’ He shrugged. ‘Well, about Madeleine, of course. But I had become used to thinking happiness was a matter of fleeting pleasures, of the absence of pain. This evening, at the top of the stairs just before we reached the receiving line, I realised that it is a positive thing, something that can fill me—and all because of you. Not the most convenient location for a revelation of that kind, you must admit.’

  No wonder he had seemed so strange. Kate realised she was simply staring at Grant, unable to articulate a sensible response. Like, I love you. And perhaps you are in love with me and don’t realise it.

  ‘I’m sorry to be so dramatic about it.’ He came further into the room and the door closed behind him with a click that made her jump. ‘But I never speak to you about how I feel for you, how much I treasure what you have done at Abbeywell to make it into a home, how good you are with Charlie. I feel as though you have lifted a weight off my soul that I never realised was there. If that makes me sound ridiculous, I can’t help it. I thought I ought to be open about how I felt.’

  That was heaping coals of fire on her smarting conscience. Grant was offering her an honest declaration of his feelings when she did not deserve it, when she had lied to him in fact and by omission. But there was one thing she could be honest with him about, something she could give him, a response to his declaration. Not the full truth, of course, not that she loved him. She had been waiting too long for him to say it first, now she suspected he never would and her own love would be a burden to him.

  Kate stood up and went to stand in front of him, linked her hands behind his neck and looked up into the steady green eyes. ‘You make me happy, too. More than happy. With all my heart I am glad that you married me.’

  He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against hers and sighed, a long, slow, difficult breath. ‘Kate. Kate, I am sorry I never said these things before. I am not very good at emotions, I don’t know how to be.’

  ‘I understand.’ She thought she did. He had grown up without his parents’ marriage as a model. He had been raised by an elderly widower and married to a woman who had rejected and hurt him. Somewhere, deep inside, in a place he probably didn’t even know existed, he had raised barriers to ever making himself as vulnerable as love would render him.

  ‘You don’t have to say things, to pretend to feelings you do not have. It is enough to know I make you happy. I just need you to know you make me happy, too,’ Kate said, picking her way through, wary of saying anything that would make him suspect she loved him, force him to say the words that would be a lie. ‘You were my Christmas miracle when you found me in that bothy and saved us. I am so glad I am your wife.’ She stood on tiptoe and kissed him, and after the faintest hesitation he kissed her back, slowly, tenderly.

  I must confess, tell him about Jonathan and Henry now. I can’t deceive him any longer. It will hurt him that I have left it so long, but to leave it even longer can only make things worse.

  He lifted one hand and began to pull the pins from her hair, drawing his fingers through it until it fell free on her shoulders. ‘I am going to carry you off to bed and show you just how happy you make me, but before I do, I must tell you how proud I was of you tonight. I know you were nervous and unsure, but you did your best in spite of that and your best was magnificent.’

  There was so much warmth and pride in his voice. If she did not know better, she might have added love. She didn’t deserve any of those feelings, and if she told him the truth about Anna, the truth about her brother, then that pride would vanish, he would despise her.

  ‘Thank you,’ she murmured. ‘It was far less daunting than I feared.’ It had been—once she had assured herself that there was no sign of Viscount Baybrook, or of Sir Henry Harding, blackmailing baronet, either. Surely if Jonathan was in London he would have been invited to such a magnificent event as the Larminsters’ reception? It was less likely that Henry would be there, but he might be in town if he had been both emboldened and enriched by extorting money from Jonathan, and it would be just like him to extract an invitation somehow.

  Grant was working his way into the elaborate fastenings and folds of her gown and she arched her back to help him. I will tell him tomorrow, she resolved. I cannot shatter this moment. I cannot, it is too precious.

  Grant used no erotic tricks, no titillating little games, only the magic of his mouth and his hands and his long, hard body, and Kate realised that she had learned to give with as much passion as she received. When he eased into her, slowly, achingly slowly, she realised that it was the exchange about their feelings that had given them this extra awareness of each other, of what they could be together.

  There was no hurry, no rush to climax. Grant would stop moving and simply lie there, his heart beating over hers, his gaze locked with hers, his body filling and completing her. Then he would dip his head to take her lips and move again until Kate was lost in a spell of sensual, swirling pleasure. They were close, so close.

  I love you, she thought and it was as though it was enough to tip them over into bliss, into a place where they were no longer two people, but one whole being, just as she had dreamed.

  *

  They made love again in the morning when they woke, a passionate tussle of urgency and need that left
them panting and laughing. Grant ducked a flying pillow and pounced on Kate, tickling mercilessly, then subsided, pulling her against his side.

  ‘I needed to laugh with you, Kate.’

  Yes, I needed to laugh, too. I’ll talk to him after breakfast, she thought as they subsided, breathless. ‘Grant—’

  ‘Hell, is that the time?’ He rolled off the bed and made for the door to his room. ‘I’m due at a meeting at the Lords at ten. Ungodly hour, I know, but I promised Pilkington. I think I will be supporting his group over several important pieces of legislation and we must discuss tactics.’ He turned back, looked at her, shook his head. ‘Incredible, I don’t deserve to be so happy.’ Then he was gone.

  Kate was left staring at the door. It gave her no comfort, nor any inspiration. Finally she tugged the bell pull for Wilson. She couldn’t sit in bed all day, her mind a blank. Perhaps a complete confession was not the answer. What if telling Grant about the blackmail made him an accessory unless he reported it to the magistrates immediately? He was loyal and she could imagine he would struggle with his conscience before incriminating her in such a shameful scandal, but he was also honourable. He could not connive at extortion, so he would have to take action.

  Perhaps she could establish Lord Baybrook’s situation first. If he was safely married, that was one thing—he would probably go to great lengths to avoid her. But if he were not, he would probably still be smarting from Henry’s demands, leaving aside the question of whether he would think her a loose woman on whom he could take revenge of a non-legal kind.

  Once she knew the facts, then she could truthfully tell Grant that she had fallen foolishly for Jonathan Arnold, Lord Baybrook, but that, when Henry had approached him to tell him he must do the decent thing and marry her, Baybrook had revealed that he was already betrothed.

  But then could she admit to Grant that Henry had known all along about Baybrook’s impending betrothal, had set up a trap from the start? That he had demanded money, not as a settlement on the child, but as hush money so that its existence was never revealed to Baybrook’s future father-in-law, the famously puritanical, and staggeringly wealthy, Lord Harlington?

  Henry had sent her away to Scotland, not to hide her pregnancy, but to hide her from Baybrook and, when the child was born, to keep her out of his reach, to hold as a future threat against payments. When she had protested, told Henry that he should wait, not press demands beyond a decent competence to raise the child once Baybrook was safely married and in funds, he had threatened to take the baby as soon as it was born to make certain he had control and that Kate could not do anything foolish, as he put it. Or honest, she had thrown at him and he had laughed in her face.

  She realised that she did not know what Jonathan’s reaction had been to Henry’s demands for money. He was a rake, but not a fundamentally wicked man, she was certain. Surely he would have made a reasonable settlement on his love child, as soon as he could afford it. But Henry had no intention of settling for reasonable, not with Lord Harlington’s fortune shimmering before his eyes. Jonathan might be paying up, being bled, or he might have told Henry to go to the devil.

  And if he was paying, then she could not, in all conscience, let the blackmail continue.

  Wilson came in, followed by Jeannie, Anna in her arms. ‘She’s fretting over her little tooth, my lady. Such a grizzle, she is, aren’t you, my pet?’ Jeannie handed her to Kate, who tried to soothe her and think clearly at the same time. One thing was certain, she thought as she gently massaged the sore gums, it was a recipe for disaster to sit passively waiting for disaster to strike, or to confess all to Grant when she did not know the facts.

  *

  After breakfast she checked the Peerage and a London directory in Grant’s study, then rang for Jeannie. ‘I would like you to go to this address in Hill Street and see if it is occupied.’ She handed over the direction of what had been Baybrook’s town house before his marriage. ‘I need to know the name of the owner, whether he is in residence and whether he is married. And I need you to find this out without revealing why you are asking.’

  Jeannie knew, she was certain, that Anna was not Grant’s child, although it had never been spoken of between them. She met Kate’s gaze and bit her lip. ‘You’ll be looking for a…relative, my lady?’

  ‘Yes, that’s it. A discreet enquiry.’ She knew she could be putting a strain on Jeannie’s loyalty. ‘It is something about which I need to have all the facts clear before I speak to his lordship.’

  The unease faded from the nursemaid’s face. ‘Aye, I can see that. Can I leave Lady Anna with you directly after breakfast, then, my lady? I could be walking past on an errand, sprain my ankle and have to hobble down to the area door to beg help from their cook. All kitchen staff gossip if they get half a chance.’

  *

  Jeannie came back mid-morning, rather pink in the face and inclined to giggle. ‘I’ve made a conquest, I think, my lady. A Scottish footman at the Hill Street house. I managed to trip on a paving stone outside, right into his arms, and when he heard my accent he carried me down to the kitchen and then back up again after I sat awhile. And he insisted on calling me a hackney.’ She sobered instantly when she saw Kate’s face. ‘I’m sorry, my lady, I’m blathering on. It is Lord Baybrook’s house and he’s in residence with his wife and they’ve just come back to London after their honeymoon tour.’

  ‘Thank you, Jeannie. That will be all. I appreciate your assistance.’

  So now what? The bad news was that Jonathan was in London, but the very good news was that Henry had not managed to do something so dreadful that the marriage had been called off. Although it still might mean that he was extorting money from the viscount, and if that was the case, then she had to stop it. It seemed, more and more, that she was going to have to approach Jonathan directly, assure him of her good intentions and discover just what her brother had done. The thought of Grant getting in the middle of this unholy mess didn’t bear thinking about. He would be furious, he would call Jonathan out—and then someone might end up a widow.

  It was a plan of sorts, but it did not make her feel any better. Hiding the truth from Grant had been bad enough, but now she knew the extent of his affection and trust, it felt like the worst of betrayals. But there was Anna, an innocent child to consider. And the equally innocent Lady Baybrook, and her own sister-in-law, unwittingly married to a blackmailer.

  Now all she had to do was engineer a meeting with Jonathan and trust to his good nature and discretion. It seemed an awfully big risk.

  Chapter Twenty

  Grant did not come home for luncheon, which was not unusual. What was out of the ordinary was the note that arrived from him on Brooks’s Club notepaper.

  Today, of all days, when I want to be with you, they ask me to meet the Home Secretary! Goodness knows when I’ll get away, but I’ll tell you all about it at dinner, I promise.

  Yours,

  G.

  Kate rang for Jeannie and for Grimswade. ‘I feel like taking the air with Anna. Lord Brooke is going for a walk with his tutor, I believe. Have the carriage sent round, Grimswade, if you please.’

  When the butler had gone she turned to the nursemaid. ‘I hardly know what I hope to achieve by this, but if I see Lord Baybrook, I will try to snatch the opportunity to speak with him. But I do not want him to see Anna, so you must stay in the carriage.’ Jeannie seemed about to say something, but Kate forestalled her. ‘I can’t go out without a maid or a footman, his lordship would be furious. And there is no one else I can trust. But I probably won’t encounter Lord Baybrook.’

  ‘It’s a nice afternoon,’ Jeannie observed. ‘A gentleman might take a stroll to his club.’

  ‘Yes.’ And at least it will get me out of the house. I feel like a turnspit dog on a treadmill.

  *

  Kate gave the coachman a circuitous route that took in a number of shops that she might plausibly want to visit and which brought them via Hill Street to Grosvenor Street. There wa
s no sign of Jonathan’s tall and elegant figure sauntering along, nor when they turned down Berkeley Street towards Piccadilly. ‘It was ridiculous to think I would see him,’ she observed to Jeannie. ‘The number of places a gentleman can be in even the small compass of Mayfair must be countless.’

  And then, as the carriage slowed to a crawl in the Piccadilly traffic, she glanced up Dover Street and saw him. ‘He’s there!’

  Jeannie tugged on the check string, the carriage pulled over to the kerb and they stared at each other. ‘I cannot accost him in the street.’ Kate watched as he reached the road junction, a polished wooden box under his arm. ‘He’s been to Manton’s, the gunsmiths, I think. Jeannie, look, he’s crossing over to Green Park.’

  ‘Hurry, my lady.’ Jeannie opened the door and kicked down the step. ‘You can speak to him in the park, there aren’t many people around. I’ll follow along behind, as if I’m not with you.’

  Jonathan was held up by a brewer’s dray while Kate, catching the attention of a crossing sweeper, was over the road before him. He went through the gate and into the park, not apparently in any hurry, for he strolled past the reservoir and cut across the grass towards the Queen’s Walk. Kate walked briskly, came alongside him when there was no one close and realised she had no idea what to say.

  He must have seen her out of the corner of his eye, for he stopped and raised his hat slightly. And then stared. ‘Madam, do I know you?’ The dawning recognition on his face would have been comical if things were not so serious. ‘Catherine?’

  ‘Yes. Jonathan—Lord Baybrook, I need to speak with you.’

  He had his composure back. His voice was icy, but perfectly controlled. ‘I am sure you do.’ His eyes ran up and down the fashionable outfit she wore. ‘I see you have acquired some expensive tastes on my money.’

  ‘No, I have not. Is Henry demanding payments from you? It is not with my agreement, believe me.’

  ‘Believe you? My dear Miss Harding, why should I believe a word you say? The last true thing you told me was that you were innocent of a man and that I did not need telling, for you were a most uninteresting tumble,’ he drawled. ‘Your rat of a brother informed me you were with child. My child. Is that true or have I been paying out every month for nothing?’ The mask of unconcern was slipping to reveal the fury beneath.