by Lydia Joyce
"Idiot," Victoria agreed softly, tracing his lips with her finger. He kissed it. A queer thought struck her. "You never fathered a bastard on one of those women, did you?"
Surprise flickered across his face, followed by consternation. "I hope not. I never shall know, shall I?" He shook his head. "You .might think me criminally blithe, but I never even considered it before. I took my pleasure where it was offered… and forgot."
"Never considered it? Never thought that your own child might have been left in a doorway or thrown into the Thames?" Victoria stared at him.
"If I had stopped my egocentric whirl for just one instant and thought about anything, do you think I could have still done what I did?" He spoke softly, but the pain in his eyes was sharp, and she sensed that he was asking himself the question as much as her.
"I would hope not."
"So do I." He paused. "If a woman came to me now and claimed that her child was mine, and if it could have been at all possible, I think I would take responsibility. Even if she were lying, the possibility of truth would burden me to act."
"Penance?" She traced her fingers slowly across his chest.
"Noblesse oblige, if you will. I demanded the droit du seigneur, and so I should take the responsibility that comes with the privilege."
"Even if the privilege is paid for in coin?"
"Especially then, I think." He looked down at her belly. "And if you should carry one?"
"I pray not!" Victoria burst out. Raeburn raised an eyebrow, and she explained more calmly. "It is very unlikely, but still.. I may have changed, but the world hasn't. It's no place for a bastard, even a bastard of an earl's daughter. I suppose I would still go to Italy, if I must, for I hate the idea of paying off some poor vicar even worse than my own exile."
"And would you be good then, for your child's sake?"
"I don't know that I could be."
Victoria felt his hesitation, and she gave him a questioning glance.
He took her hand. "If it comes to that, I will make sure that both of you want for nothing."
"Thank you," Victoria said simply. "But now that's the last thing I want to think of. Just kiss me, Raeburn. Tonight, I ask for nothing more."
And he did.
* * *
Chapter Twenty-Two
Victoria sat on the window seat of the Unicorn Room. The sun was barely over the horizon, but there was nothing left to prepare. An hour before, she had opened her eyes to find herself alone with her valise and trunk sitting in the center of the room as they had the evening she arrived, and with a leaden heaviness in her belly, she had rung for Annie to dress her in her old clothes. She would take nothing home that Raeburn had ordered for her.
Now all that remained was to have herself carried down the stairs, an awkward procedure at the best of times but even worse in her crinoline, which she had no choice but to wear or leave behind. And she was almost as reluctant to leave anything of hers behind as to take something from Raeburn. She only wished she could separate her thoughts as easily as her belongings.
There were hours left before she had to leave, and departing now would not make the train at Leeds arrive any sooner. But the walls of Raeburn Court pressed down on her, smothering her, and the duke was not waiting with her; there was no reason to linger. She yanked the bellpull to call for servants to carry out her things—and herself.
Her eyes felt gritty. Had she slept the night before? Had he slept? Surely she had, at least, if only for an instant, for she could not remember when Raeburn left or when her things arrived.
Her thoughts returned to the duke with inevitable inertia. It was as if he'd opened a funnel in her mind, and no matter what she began to think upon, her thoughts turned upon themselves again and again until she was back to him. Perhaps she, too, had poured out through that funnel, for today she felt emptied out, insubstantial, as if her entire being were filled with nothing more than shadows.
She looked around the room for the last time—at the canopied and plumed bed, its fresh, practical sheets incongruous beneath the faded hangings; at the empty chair in front of the fire screen; at the enormous hanging tapestry. A tapestry that hid nothing but a blank wall. There were no secret passages here, nor were there any monsters. Just a man, a sad man who made her dizzy with missing him already, in a moldering old house.
There was a knock at the door, and at her command to enter, it swung open the reveal the footman and the groom. Even through her hollow daze, Victoria saw the suppressed delight in Andrew's step, the joy on his face that even the most carefully constructed polite mask could not hide.
"His grace ordered us to get thee first, my lady," Andrew said. "Said he didn't want us dropping thee down the stairs because we were tired from lugging that great box of thine." He nodded at the chest.
"Tell his grace I thank him," Victoria replied. It was only the second time she had spoken that morning, and her voice felt high and thin, buzzing in her ears.
Andrew bobbed his head, and the men drew near the window seat, clasping each other's hands so one pair of joined arms formed a seat for her, the other a back. A few seconds' awkward maneuvering and she was positioned in their arms, clinging to their shoulders as folds of black taffeta swallowed their legs.
"Is thoo well secured?" Andrew asked solicitously.
"Yes."
Without another word, the men ducked through the doorway to enter the dark, twisting stairwell. It seemed fantastic, something out of a sensational novel or a fireside tale, the stone stair that wound down, down, perpetually down into some sort of nether hell. With every step, she swayed in the basket of joined hands, her flattened crinoline scraping her skirts against the stone walls or catching in the embrasure of the occasional narrow window. With every step, she felt herself plunging deeper, away from the light, away from herself, until it seemed that her consciousness was something detached and bobbing on a tether a pace or two behind the two toiling men and the slim black figure hung between.
She was leaving. Leaving Raeburn Court. Leaving him.
The sense of emptiness widened within her, her belly aching from it, her breath coming short as she tried to suck in enough air to fill the vacuum it left. She lurched as the groom stepped unevenly and barely caught her balance in time to keep from tumbling headfirst out of their arms. But she felt no jolt of danger averted, no sudden speeding of her heart. She was numb, too numb to do more than lean back a little more and tighten her grip on their shoulders.
It was with the rushing sense of normality's return that she realized they had stopped—stopped in front of the main door of the manor house, thick and scarred before them. A figure stepped out of the shadows to open it.
Raeburn.
"You came!" Victoria gasped before she thought, before she had time to think.
His smile above his scarf was even harder and more twisted than usual. "I told you I could never stay away from you."
The footman and the groom carried her out the door, but she craned around to keep the duke in sight.
He adjusted his hat carefully and stepped out after them. Following her.
Victoria hardly registered the drizzle that sifted down upon them or the black box of the carriage squatting on the drive until Andrew and the groom maneuvered her inside. She let the men guide her onto the bench, but as soon as they released her, she leaned forward, seeking the duke.
He stood there, filling the doorway for an instant, then he stepped up and ducked inside, settling himself across from her. Her heart jolted, and for a moment, she had the mad fancy that he might be coming with her.
But sanity return a breath later, and that fantasy tattered and blew away.
A minute ticked by, two, but Victoria could find nothing to say. His mere presence seemed to shatter thought, and all that was left was the bold fact of himself, there in the carriage, across from her.
God, how she loved everything about him! His voice, his smell, every sinew and muscle of his body, and, most of all, the intangib
le essence of him that made him speak as he did, act as he did, that made him grow angry or tender or sad. She didn't want to leave him; more than anything she had ever wanted in her life, she did not want to go.
But she must. Her mother needed her, and however madly selfish her thoughts, she could not ignore that call.
And even if her mother's need did not outweigh her own, there was the matter of the agreement—the promised week that would soon draw to a close. Fleetingly, she entertained the idea of demanding to repay the forfeited time with such interest that she would never be out of his debt…
"I didn't want to tell you I would see you off in case I couldn't make it past the door," he said.
"I understand." Victoria glanced out of the carriage into the dim, drizzly morning. "And so I welcome clouds, though we break an axle in the mud."
Raeburn smiled, and this time, there was nothing bitter about it. "But you have always welcomed storms."
"Yes," she agreed. "Though I think I shall never see another without remembering you." Remembering us.
Raeburn's eyes closed briefly, and he swallowed hard. "God, Victoria—" he rasped, but he bit off whatever it was he was going to say.
Suddenly, Victoria felt very small and weak and strangely frightened. She was going home, back to her old, familiar role, but the taste of its memory in her mind was alien and angular.
"Please—" she said tentatively. "Would you please hold me?"
Raeburn said nothing, but his eyes glinted in the shadows, and he crossed to sit beside her without a word, his arms slipping under hers and pulling her back against his chest. She laid her head back against him, and he nestled it under his chin. She closed her eyes, emptied her mind, and just took in the feel of his body against hers.
All too soon, they were disturbed by a jerk of the carriage. Victoria opened her eyes to see Andrew and the groom give her trunk a last shove onto the roof. Seconds later, her valise followed, and the groom unwound a coil of rope and began tying the luggage onto the rack.
"I ought not delay them," Victoria said, the words shoving their way up her tight throat.
"I suppose not," Raeburn agreed. His voice was cool, neutral, and she wondered with irrational anger how he could be so calm.
She shifted out of the way, and he stood and ducked out of the carriage, turning back to face her as soon as both feet crunched onto the drive. Her heart tightened as his hazel eyes met hers.
"I expect I shan't even see you in London," she managed, allowing some of the question she wanted to ask to seep into her tone.
"No." He shook his head. "I do not go to London anymore."
"Good-bye, then, Raeburn." She paused. "Byron." All the words she wanted to say, everything she wanted to tell him filled her mind with a raging cacophony until she could manage nothing at all.
"Good-bye, Victoria." And with that, he swung the carriage door shut and was gone.
Byron spun, strode inside, and plunged across the hall into a narrow corridor, his overcoat flapping around his knees. He turned sharply at the first staircase and took the steps two at a time. At the top, he surged forward blindly, across dark galleries, through disused rooms, and up more stairs until he shoved open a final door and emerged in the tower room.
He reached the windows just as the carriage passed the porter's lodge and swung onto the main road, the horses moving lightly at a brisk trot. He stood there frozen, watching the equipage recede into the distance, slowly yet far, far too fast, until it was only a black dot on the road. It dipped completely out of sight over the crest of a hill, and still he stood, straining his eyes for any hint of its reappearance.
Finally, he turned on his heel, half reeling, and collapsed upon the nearest divan.
Gone. She was gone, completely and utterly gone. He snatched up a pillow from the divan where she had rested her head that first night and brought it to his face, breathing against it and trying to sift from its dusty smell any lingering trace of lavender.
There was none. His head tipped against the seat back, suddenly too heavy for him to hold up anymore, and he stared sightlessly over the long, empty road. Until the moment that he shut the carriage door, until the moment the carriage began to roll away, he had not fully believed that she would leave. Some part of him had denied it—had labeled it so ludicrous that it refused to encompass such a thing. But now he knew that he would never see her again. He had told the truth about London—he would not, could not go back. Not when his friends would expect him to play all the old games, not when he could only hope to meet Victoria, at best, across some aging baroness' parlor.
The hand he raised to adjust his hat trembled. It would not be the same, he knew it in his gut, and if it couldn't be the same, he wanted no part of it. If she would not look at him with the same longing in her eyes, touch his hand with the same easy tenderness, speak with the same frankness, and make love to him as truly, then he would rather have nothing at all. As much as he hurt now, it did not compare to what he'd feel to be met with no more than a civil word and a pleasant smile.
He stood shakily and left the room, winding his way slowly back to the Henry Suite. He lit a candle, stripped off his outer clothes, and dumped them on a chair, sinking into its neighbor to stare into the empty fire grate.
Gone. Gone. Gone. The word echoed inside his head like the toll of a bell. He imagined her, bounced along the road in the dark carriage. She had not wanted to go; if the earth itself started spinning backward, that was the one fact he could be certain of. But how long would her regret last? A day? A week? Until she saw her mother again, or until the first London party? A year? Forever?
As long as he knew his would?
But even if her regret did last, surely time would change her impression of him into something else—something more grand or more noble. Fond thoughts distorted memory, and even if her regard did not fade, he could still never be the man she would think him in two years' time.
Perhaps it should be best if her tenderness did wither quickly—
He did not know how long he sat there, with his thoughts circling, circling until they wore grooves in his mind, but the candle had burned down to a nub when a soft scratch at the door interrupted him.
"Come in," he called, looking over his shoulder, and Mrs. Peasebody entered with a laden tray.
"Thoo didn't break thy fast this morning, thy grace, so I brought thee thy dinner early," the old woman said deferentially, her tone unaccustomedly subdued.
"Didn't I?" said Byron vaguely, turning his attention back to the grate. "Well, I must eat. And this afternoon, have Fane come and see me—I've found some more records we need to go over together."
"Yes, thy grace," Mrs. Peasebody said, and balancing the tray in one hand, she cleared the clutter of ugly ornaments from the table nearest him before laying his meal upon it. Silently, she turned to go. Byron heard the door open, but it did not close.
"Yes?" he said after several seconds ticked by. He made his tone flat and uninviting.
"She was a good lass, thy grace; 'tis all I want thee to know. I did not know her so well as thoo, but she still seemed a better lass than thoo is likely to find again."
And without another word, the door shut.
Byron uncovered the plate and started to eat, shoveling the food into his mouth and chewing mechanically. He remembered how Victoria had reacted to the bland fare, amusement and disdain mingled, and then he remembered her very, very different reaction to the peach crumble…
He dropped his silverware and stood abruptly, making a restless circuit of the room. Why couldn't he shed her from his mind? Victoria was only one woman, after all. He should eat and then review the records he wanted to show Fane to get everything straight in his mind first. But he knew with horrible certainty that every entry of every line would somehow remind him of her.
Damn it, how long would it take for him to feel normal again? His preoccupation swung suddenly to anger, and he settled into the emotion with something like relief. He was
unused to this aching, unsettled feeling—but anger, that he knew.
After all, he had a right to be angry. Who did Lady Victoria think she was, sweeping into his house and turning his whole world upside down? Yes, he'd invited her—but to his bed, not to rummage inside his head and change everything around until he hardly knew who he was anymore. And then to flit out of his life, as if she did not owe him more than that!
Byron stopped, whirling toward the mirror over (he fireplace. That was exactly it. That was exactly what was wrong. She had gone and changed everything, and now she was trying to leave and pretend it never happened. He wouldn't—couldn't—let her get away with that.
Some corner of his mind scoffed, telling him that his anger was ridiculous, that it was just an excuse to chase her down and… what? He didn't know. He'd know it when he found her.
But he ignored that voice and threw on his hat and coat, winding his scarf around his face as he burst through the door and ran down the stairs.
How long had it been since she'd left? Two hours? Three? No matter. He'd meet her in Leeds if not before.
He thought of how he looked, his red face scabbed over; not the horrific sight of three days before but still bad enough to draw stares and murmurs. His mouth tightened. If she thought even that would stop him from getting his due, she had a surprise coming.
Reaching the front hall, he heard the rain against the windows, dark with the storm. All the better, he thought grimly as he shouted for his horse. An answering cry arose from the bowels of the house, and moments later, he heard the hurried patter of footsteps as servants scrambled to do his bidding. One of the maids, Peg, dashed in from a side corridor, skidding to a sedate walk when she spied him.
"Mrs. Peasebody bids me ask, is there anything more thy grace needs?" she gasped, bobbing.
"Only Apollonia, saddled and bridled," he replied. I'll fetch what I truly want myself.
There was no sense of time or distance locked in the carriage's black cab, only a jolting, rocking sway that Victoria could not translate into minutes or miles. Her stomach roiled in the darkness, and she did not know if it was the movement of the carriage or the lurching emptiness inside her, but it was all she could do to keep her breakfast down.