They kept country hours, eating an early supper. Sometimes Lucy rode in the long summer twilight. The grounds of the estate were extensive, and the stables, though not enormous, did boast several fine hunters.
All in all, theirs was an idyllic existence, save for the huge uncertainty they labored under. When would Ivan return?
Valerie wrote twice more. First, that they were delayed in York, visiting Sir James's family, but still intended to come to Dorset. Then, that they would arrive in Dorset the last week in July, after visiting first with Valerie's family in Arundel.
Ivan wrote as well, but his posts were little better than curt notes.
Business keeps me in York for another week, the first one said. Then two weeks later, I travel to Wales regarding a new business venture.
He did not indicate when they might expect him in Dorset.
Lucy tried not to become morose, but it was impossible. Reading could not distract her. She lost her appetite. Even the smell of food began to turn her stomach. On the afternoon Valerie and Sir James arrived, Fenton, the ancient butler, had to rouse her from an impromptu nap on the Chesterfield couch in the library. Antonia awaited her in the foyer, and together they went outside to greet their guests.
Valerie was nervous. Lucy saw that plainly. But the girl approached her godmother without hesitation, holding tightly to her husband's arm. "May I present my husband, Sir James Mawbey," she began, deferring to her god mother's greater age and rank.
"I know who he is," Antonia retorted. She eyed the unsmiling young man and the faintly frowning Valerie. "Don't give me that look, girl. I am entitled to my ill humor, for you have embarrassed me to no end. Answer me this. Is there no chance for an annulment?"
Sir James bristled. "Madam! You have no right—"
"No chance at all," Valerie interrupted her outraged husband. "We are legally wed, and even if we were not, there is no turning back. We love one another."
The dowager countess gripped her cane with her bony fingers, kneading its crystal head. "Very well, then. You are wed. Come, give me a kiss and let us go inside. This heat is enough to make a person faint."
As quickly as that did the tensions disappear—at least the ones emanating from the old woman. Valerie too was relieved and hooked her arm gratefully in the dowager countess's. Sir James, however, was less accepting, and he stared suspiciously at the old woman.
It fell to her, Lucy realized, to soothe his ruffled feathers. "Come, Sir James. You are family now and all will be well."
His arm was stiff beneath hers, and his manner even more so. "She is not likely to forgive me my lesser standing in society."
"I believe she already has," Lucy pointed out. She gave him a long, steady look. "I wonder what it was in your childhood that caused you to dislike the peerage so—and yet at the same time continue to use your courtesy title."
She expected he would take exception to her rather sharp words. To her surprise, his brow furrowed in thought. "It is a curiosity, I know. And one I have considered more and more of late. The truth is, I should have married you, with your quick mind and unexceptional background," he said quite bluntly. "Instead I fell in love with Valerie. Who is also quite intelligent," he added hastily. "But she does not share our particular interests, yours and mine."
Lucy gave him a wry smile. "Perhaps your brilliant mind is better complemented by her social standing. I am known to be every bit as annoying as you."
He grinned at that and she grinned back.
They had come into the front parlor and there was no further opportunity for so frank a conversation. But Lucy knew she'd found a friend in Sir James. If she'd had any doubts about his suitability for Valerie, the last of them disappeared. While they seemed unsuited on the surface, the truth was, they complemented one another very well.
In Valerie, James had found the perfect unspoiled girl who was, nonetheless, a woman. A personality he could mold, with a face and figure he could love. As for Valerie, she'd always been the middle child, lost and ignored in the hubbub of family life. But in James she had found an austere fatherly sort of man who showered all his attention on her.
Their curious marriage was going to work. Lucy was sure of it.
If only she could feel as sure about her own.
* * *
Chapter Eighteen
I'm not ill. Truly," Lucy protested.
Valerie studied her, doubt written plainly on her face. "Your appetite is nonexistent. Your color is off." She tried to press her hand to Lucy's brow, but Lucy ducked her head.
"I'm perfectly fine," she vowed. "It's just all the changes in my life. Marriage. A new home."
"A husband missing?" Valerie softly added.
Lucy grimaced. They were sitting on a garden bench just off the front drive, watching the sunset. Today marked seven weeks she'd been at Westcott Manor. Seven weeks and six days since she and Ivan had wed.
Seven weeks and five days since last she'd seen her husband.
Thank heaven Valerie and Sir James were here, else she would long ago have gone mad. So much for backbone.
Grief. Anger. A crushing despair. She'd been tortured by all those emotions, separately and together, and in dizzying sequence. She wanted to strangle Ivan. She wanted to hold him and never let him go. She wanted this awful waiting to end.
But most of all, she didn't want anyone to guess what she'd already guessed: that she might be with child. Her heart clutched every time she thought of it. Her child. And Ivan's. As joyful an event as it was to her, however, it was equally sorrowful. For Ivan seemed to have abandoned her to the country and, in the process, their child as well. When he found out about her condition, she feared it would drive them even farther apart.
"How is James's article coming?" she asked, determined to steer the conversation in another direction.
As she'd anticipated, Valerie gave her a brilliant smile. "He's working on it now. We shall be leaving for London day after tomorrow to get it to the publisher's in time for the September issue of 'Hasting's Journal for Research on the Human Brain.'"
Like all her other emotions, Lucy's feelings toward Valerie and James's imminent departure were twisted and confused. They were the quintessential newlyweds, so utterly in love that she could scarcely bear to be around them when they were together. They made her own poor excuse for a marriage seem even more pathetic than it was.
But if they left she would have no distractions at all. Misery would be her only companion. That and Antonia, and Ivan's infrequent posts. His travelogues, she called them in her bitterest moments, for they were always sent from different locations. York for a week. Three days in Scarborough, then back to London before leaving for Portsmouth. It did no use for her to write back to him, for he seemed to be constantly on the move.
With an effort she suppressed her unhappiness and smiled wanly at Valerie. "You will come back to us after that, won't you? We shall be so lonely here without you."
Valerie patted her hand. "I would love to, of course. You and Lady Westcott have been so kind to have us these last few weeks. But James has his lecture series to reschedule. And the fall term at the Driscoll School will begin soon. Then there are his quarters, which I have not seen, but which I expect to be no better than any other bachelor's abode. I fear I will have my hands quite full making it livable, let alone comfortable." She cocked her head. "Perhaps you would like to stay with me a while in September and help me with my redecorating. Oh, yes," she added with rising excitement. "It would be so wonderful if you came to London with us."
Lucy pushed back a stray curl the evening breeze had loosened at her temple. Perhaps she should return to London. Though she was not certain if Ivan was there, his friends were bound to be, and they might shed some light on his whereabouts, if not his behavior. Besides, she was tired of hiding out in the countryside as the pathetic, abandoned little wife. Better to return and face society as the new, razor-witted Countess of Westcott, she decided as the idea took root. Better to make a big sp
lash in town before the season ended. And maybe, just maybe it would bring I Ivan out of his hiding.
"I believe I shall come to London with you," she stated with new confidence. "I'll have the town house reopened and we can stay there while your apartments are made ready."
A worried expression replaced Valerie's excited one. "What if... That is, do you think—"
"Do I think Ivan will be in residence there? We shall soon see," was Lucy's grim reply. "We shall soon see."
Three days later she had her answer. He was not in residence there. But the butler had it from the cook whose sister was in service at the Varneys' that the Earl had made an appearance at a dinner dance there, not a week earlier.
He'd been in a foul mood. He'd danced with every woman there, nearly come to blows with Lord Haverling over his sister, then quarreled as well with one of his friends and parted early—already well into his cups.
Lucy listened to the news from the reticent butler with arms crossed and one foot tapping an agitated rhythm. She didn't know what hurt her more, his attentions to those other women, his determined avoidance of her, or his obvious unhappiness. But no matter what, he had no right to treat her so poorly. And no reason.
"Have someone determine where he is residing, for I wish to send him a message."
The butler nodded. When she did not continue, he bowed and turned to leave. But Lucy was seized by a demon, it seemed, for she stopped him before he reached the door. "Also, Simms, I would like to meet with you and Cook and the housekeeper. The sooner the better. I mean to plan a reception—a grand reception, actually—to introduce my cousin and her husband to society before the hunting season begins and everyone repairs back to the country."
That she'd only just decided to do so—and that she knew nothing whatever about planning a society fete—was immaterial. Valerie deserved it, and as the new Countess of Westcott, Lucy would be expected to entertain. Soon enough, when her pregnancy became obvious, she would have to retire from society. Between now and then, however, she refused to let anyone feel sorry for her.
Besides, it would kill two birds with one stone. She would launch Valerie and establish Sir James in the society he professed to dislike. And she hoped, she would flush Ivan from whatever hole he'd gone to ground in.
Valerie was ecstatic when she heard the news, Sir James less so. But he would do anything for his precious wife, and so he reluctantly agreed to attend. To plan the grand evening Lucy contracted with Madame Leonardo, a French widow who hired herself out to plan and oversee only the poshest of society parties.
It was Lucy's intention to make this the crush of the season. The fact that it had apparently been a very dull season, save for the shenanigans within the Westcott family, worked to her advantage. Lucy knew the ton was inordinately curious about her recent marriage. A chaperone and the bastard earl—a Gypsy bastard, no less. Then there was Valerie, arguably the prettiest young lady to come out this year, who had chosen a penniless scholar when she might have had almost anyone.
Oh, yes. There would be few people, if any, sending their regrets for the Westcott reception.
But whether or not Ivan planned to attend Lucy could not predict. One person she did not intend to invite, however, was the dowager countess.
She soon learned that Ivan was staying with Giles. Every time she went out she half expected to run into him. She hoped to. She dreaded the very possibility.
She didn't go out much. Mornings she took to staying abed—to hide the awful nausea that overcame her upon rising. Afternoons she spent recovering from the morning. That left only the evenings and she did her best to play the role of the high-spirited countess out in society. She laughed; she flirted; she danced with anyone and everyone. Unfortunately, she was usually too tired to stay out very late, and that spoiled the image she was trying to create. She would fall into bed exhausted. Then, with the new dawn the cycle would begin anew.
It was at the opera one night that she ran across Alexander Blackburn. She and Valerie were returning from the ladies' powder room during the intermission and he was standing on the stairs, his arm around the waist of a stunning brunette. Though he saw her at once, he did not acknowledge her except to nod. She, likewise, did not stop to chat. No doubt the woman, who made no secret of her amorous interest in Alex, was not the sort of woman a man introduced to a countess, Lucy told herself. He was behaving in her best interests.
Still, she couldn't help being crushed. He was Ivan's long-time friend, and he would not even do her the courtesy of addressing her. Then it occurred to her that Ivan could very well be in attendance tonight. What if he too had such a woman on his arm? The very thought made her stomach turn.
She spent the remainder of the opera using her glasses to scan the other boxes, and then the floor also. But she found neither Ivan nor Alex. She was as low as she'd ever been by the time they arrived home and she made her way to her lonely bed.
As the days passed with no reply from Ivan, however, she became angrier and angrier. No matter his provocation, he was behaving like a spoiled five-year-old. Notwithstanding the demands of managing the extensive holdings he'd inherited, he had no reason to avoid her this way. He'd forced her into this marriage, yet now he played the role of the injured party.
In her calmer moments she recognized that in his eyes she'd rejected him, just as his mother and grandmother had done. Unlike those cases, however, he'd been able to prevail over her and force her into the marriage. Unfortunately, he had no sooner achieved that objective than he'd abruptly learned that once again he'd been manipulated by his grandmother. And so he stayed away.
When her emotions were less controlled, however, that sort of reasonableness did not hold up. He had never recovered from his terrible childhood and now punished her for the sins of mother and grandmother. He could not punish them so he punished her. It wasn't at all fair, for she was the only one among them who truly loved him.
Whether her mood was controlled by reason or emotions, that one truth remained constant. She loved him. She was furious at him; she ached for him. She loved him.
Ivan was no happier than Lucy, and just as unable to rectify the situation. His initial anger at her—an anger he knew was better directed at his grandmother—had long burnt out. Valerie's utter happiness with her most inappropriate husband had completely doused it.
He'd caught up with them before they'd said their marriage vows, and he'd had a long, stern talk with Sir James. Did he love her? Where would they live? Had he the wherewithal to support her?
Once assured of Valerie's future happiness, he had stood up as a witness for the ceremony that joined them as man and wife.
If he'd had an ounce of sense he would have returned then to London and have had an equally candid discussion with his new bride. But the thought of that conversation scared the hell out of him.
What would it accomplish—to make her admit her true feelings toward him? He already knew she had not wished to wed him. They were well suited physically, but that did not erase the gaping chasm that lay between them. He'd been duped into marrying her. She'd been forced to marry him. If he could not forget the former, could she be expected to forget the latter?
So he'd lingered in York to check on the Westcott holdings there, then traveled to Wales regarding a tin mine. He'd justified it as necessary, for he'd neglected business, and anyway, he needed time to think. But the weeks had passed, and the longer he was gone, the easier it became to stay away. On to Scarborough regarding a shipbuilding venture. Then down to London. Anywhere but Somerset.
He was miserable, though. The night Alex reported to him that he'd seen Lucy at the opera, however, had been the worst. How Ivan had wanted to go to her, to take her in his arms and forget all the mistrust between them. But how could he? After all this time and his inexcusable absence, she was bound to hate him.
So he drank and quarreled, and offended even his closest friends. But he did not go to her for fear that she would reject his apology. That she would re
ject him.
When he received her note regarding the reception for Valerie and Sir James, however, he knew he could avoid her no longer. She'd thrown down the gauntlet, and in doing so, thrust their personal differences into a very public arena. If she thought she could make him look the fool, she was sorely mistaken.
She had made a grave miscalculation, Lucy feared, and she would most certainly look the fool for it. For Ivan had not responded to her post and the reception was this very evening. Around noon Sir James sought her out.
"Would you have me call on him, Lucy? To demand he appear with you in the receiving line?"
Painful color crept into Lucy's face. "No. No, that is not necessary." Unwilling to elaborate, she hurried away. A man could not be forced to behave as a good husband, she told herself. Especially a man like Ivan. He was bent on flaunting all of society's rules—and on punishing the women in his life through her, it seemed.
But oh, how she wished she could force him. Or convince him. Or even just coax him.
She sighed. There was no use wishing for what would never be. She'd learned that lesson long ago, or so she'd thought. It seemed, unfortunately, that she needed to learn it all over again, to accept that fact and get on with her life, such as it was. And first on her list of things she must do was to get through this wretched party she'd planned.
She donned a high-waisted gown with long, close-fitting sleeves. It was teal-blue silk, with an overlay of matching chiffon, shot through with silver and gold threads. The colors of the shawl Ivan had given her. The result was stunning, for she literally shimmered with every step she made. The bodice was cut square, low, and wide, so as to dis play a handsome amount of bosom. And what a bosom it was, she thought as she examined herself in her dressing-room mirror. There was no denying to herself that she was pregnant, for if the morning nausea did not confirm it, her enlarged breasts most certainly did. Her figure had become amazingly lush in the last month. Would Ivan approve?
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