by Rose Gordon
Closing her eyes to hold back the tears welling in her eyes, Amelia sank to the bed.
Marrying Elijah was once all she'd ever dreamed about. It was the reason she'd refused her mother's encouragement to allow other gentlemen to court her or call on her. But now that it'd happened... The hot tears she'd tried to keep in her eyes spilled out onto her cheeks.
She lifted her hand and used the back to dash away her hot tears. It was ridiculous to cry over their quarrel. Elijah had told her many times when they were younger that his interest in her was only that of a friend. She'd have done well to have heeded his advice and conducted herself accordingly.
She took a deep sniff and used the tips of her fingers to dry the bottom rims of her eyes. As composed as she could be with tearstained cheeks and a crushed gown, Amelia lifted her eyes and stood.
“Elijah,” she gasped, startled.
He stood right in front of her like a stone wall with that same infuriating expressionless face he'd taken to wearing more often than not recently.
“If you're done now, I'll see if Caroline can find you something to wear until your wardrobe can be fetched.”
For the second time since he'd suggested they marry, she had the strangest urge to grab the heaviest object nearest her and brain him with it. She settled for clenching her fists and letting a string of unladylike remarks fly through her head. “Don't bother,” she said, taking to her feet. “I should hate to have my absence remarked upon. I'll go ask Lady Watson myself.”
“You don't need to do that. I'll speak to Alex in the library and have him speak to Caroline.” He raked his gaze down the front of her in a way that made her feel naked. “Wouldn't you rather have your absence remarked upon rather than the crumpled state of the very dress they saw you in yesterday?”
***
If beautiful young ladies were considered diamonds of the first water, then Elijah was most definitely a cad of the first water. Never had he seen Amelia cry before and to know he'd been the one that caused her tears made it even worse. He was a cad, indeed.
Tamping down the sudden urge he had to turn around and go comfort and apologize to her, he focused his eyes on the little window just above the front door of his brother's estate and kept walking forward.
Henry's impromptu visit this morning had ignited his fury, not Amelia. She hadn't deserved for him to treat her that way. Their sudden marriage and his persistence couldn't possibly be any easier for her than it was for him. But dash it all, it was for her own good, and if she'd stop being so stubborn she'd realize he was trying to help her.
“What has put such a serious expression on your face, son?”
Elijah snapped his head to the side to look at his mother. “I don't have a serious expression.”
A smile spread his mother's lips. “If you say so.”
Were she anyone else, he'd try to deny her charge. Unfortunately, he'd never been very good at convincing his mother she was mistaken.
“Does this have anything to do with your new bride?” The concern in her voice was unmistakeable.
Elijah studied his mother carefully. She and his father had had an arranged marriage and had somehow managed to find a semblance of love, even if his siblings failed to see it, Elijah had noticed their exchanged glances and hidden remarks. That's what he was trained to do. But their circumstances were different. They had to be.
Even though his parents had never been overly affectionate in public nor felt the need to discuss details of their marriage with their children, he knew enough to know the two had only met once before they married, which meant love for them had to have come later. He and Amelia, however, had known each other for most of their lives, plenty of time for love to have formed. His mother might think she could help, but he highly doubted she'd understand unrequited love within a marriage. Or how to fix his other problem.
“It does,” she mused, breaking Elijah of his thoughts.
“No.” He narrowed his eyes on his mother. Why was she even out here? “Say, what has you escaping Caroline's party?”
She idly shook out her dark blue skirt. “I'm not escaping. I just came out for some air.”
A bark of his laughter passed his lips. “Is that your story?”
“As much as it is yours that the look on your face has nothing to do with Lady Amelia,” she said, lifting her eyebrows at him.
He lifted a finger. “I never said that.”
“Mmmhmmm.” She pursed her lips and cast him a doubtful look.
“As a matter of fact, I was thinking about Amelia. In an indirect way.”
Mother crossed her arms, her brown eyes twinkling with all sorts of mischief. “And?”
“I was thinking of how I'll word my request to Alex to have him speak to Caroline about borrowing some gowns for Amelia until her wardrobe arrives later this week.” He'd sent a message to her father, requesting her things be sent to Watson Estate, post haste. But that would still take some time for them to arrive, just as it would take some time to get a seamstress out to make her a new wardrobe.
Mother reached up and tucked a tendril of her auburn hair behind her ear. “I see. Well, I suppose I could help you with that.”
Chuckling, Elijah shook his head. “You'll do anything to escape Caroline's party, won't you?”
“And you'll do anything to avoid telling me what put that expression on your face,” she retorted.
“Indeed,” he acknowledged. It might be rude to admit to one's mother that he wasn’t going to tell her the information she'd requested, but it'd be an outright disrespect to lie to her.
“I'll go see about Amelia now,” Mother murmured. She twisted her lips as if she were debating whether she should say anything more. Finally, she said, “I know no grown man wishes to use his mother as a confidant, but I want you to know that I might be able to help you more than you might think.”
He doubted that, but wouldn't be so cruel as to tell her so. “Thank you, Mother. If you'll just see to it that Amelia is properly attired until something more permanent can be arranged, I'd greatly appreciate it.”
“Very well.”
Elijah waited for his mother to walk off then slipped in the side door. Amelia would probably prefer him not to be around while discussing her wardrobe and now that he didn't have to seek out Alex, he could try to puzzle out the coded missive he'd received along with Henry's missive yesterday.
Only because Caroline was hosting one of her nearly unbearable house parties, filled with games of pall mall, charades, and the most excruciatingly boring game of them all: lawn chess, Elijah would be able to spend time in the library without being interrupted by Alex who likely spent as much time in the library studying scientific tomes thick enough to injure a man were he to drop one on his foot as he did in his wife's bedroom. It was to Alex's good fortune indeed that his wife had the same unnatural interests. Elijah shuddered at the thought. How fortunate he was that Amelia had normal interests.
Elijah pushed open the door to the large room that was three walls of solid books and one wall of floor to ceiling windows that flooded the room with plenty of sunshine.
He reached into his breast pocket and removed the folded parchment that he'd hidden in this coat yesterday when he'd first visited the cabin after sending Amelia off to spend time with Caroline and the other ladies. He fell into a chair behind the oak table and unfolded the note.
Where I be
There I pray
That He be there
Right beside
Thy maiden fair
What the blazes did that mean? Mindlessly, he drummed his fingertips along the top of the table and stared out the window. Sometimes—like right now—he wished he'd have never met that rugged stranger down by the shipyards. If he hadn't he wouldn't be in this mess. Or the one created by this mess.
He sighed and turned his eyes back to the words scrolled across the paper. He hated cryptic messages. Especially those of the poetic variety. Like Henry, he'd always preferred it when given
an anonymous tip written out in simple English. Riddles and rhymes were for those in the nursery, not grown men of seven-and-twenty.
Unfortunately, the fellow who'd been sending them anonymous tips about the prostitution ring he'd been investigating felt different and sent all of his correspondence in the form of senseless riddles.
The hair on the back of Elijah's neck stood on end. Soft almost inaudible footfalls were coming down the hall. Slowly, he folded the missive and tucked it back into his breast pocket just as the door to the library creaked open.
“Oh, it's just you,” Elijah muttered when his eyes collided with his twin.
“Indeed.” Henry said nothing more as he walked across the room and fell into the black chair opposite Elijah. “What's your plan?”
Elijah frowned. “I don't have one yet.”
“I wasn't talking about your evening with Lady Amelia,” he said with a quick grin.
“Just Amelia,” Elijah corrected.
Henry's blue eyes danced with laughter. “Oh, I didn't realize she'd given up her courtesy title.” At Elijah's silence, Henry added, “Or are you just expecting her to?”
Elijah threw his hands into the air. “I have no idea what that blasted female plans to do.”
“You mean besides torture you?”
“Exactly.”
Henry crossed his ankles and leaned back in his chair. “Does she know?”
Elijah studied his brother. “I'm sure she knows something.”
“I see,” Henry said slowly. “And would that something be that you're not the dashing prince she'd always thought you to be but an arse instead?”
“No, I believe she's always reserved those particular feelings for you. And rightfully so.”
Henry shook his head. “I still don't understand why.”
“Because you were always the one being impolite.”
Henry knit his brows. “Pardon me? What did you just say?”
“I said you were always the one who was impolite to her.”
“No, I wasn't.” Henry scoffed. “In my recollection, it seems to always have been you who was impolite. Why just this morning, you said—”
“Forget what I said this morning,” Elijah snapped. “You tricked me into saying it.”
“No, I didn't. You allowed yourself to get distracted.”
Elijah snorted. “Yes, and Alex never meant to let Sir Wallace best him at chess, he just got distracted.”
Henry grinned ruefully. “I still can't believe it. And probably wouldn't had I not seen that with my own eyes. But that was bound to happen eventually. As Alex used to tell us when he bested us, nobody can win all the time.” He shifted in his chair. “But Alex's win at chess isn't what we're discussing. I want to know why you think it's me who's always been impolite to Amelia when it's you who used to run away from her, dismiss her foolish claims of being in love with you, and now you've gone so far as to humiliate her—”
“That was unintentional,” Elijah interrupted. “Had I known she was still behind me, I would have chosen my words with a little more care.”
Henry looked doubtful. “As I said, you were distracted. But why?”
Elijah ducked his head. He might have perfected the stoic expression, complete with a clamped jaw and cold eyes, but Henry knew him too well to believe Elijah was unaffected by his words. “I am married now,” he said at last. “It would stand to reason that I'd be distracted from time to time.”
“But you weren't always married.”
Elijah bridled at his remark and its intended reminder of the hash he'd made of things the night before he married Amelia. “Did you happen to see the missive?”
“I did,” Henry said, frowning. “What's your plan?”
“I don't have one.”
“Why not?”
“Because I haven't had long enough to puzzle out the clue yet to know what my plan should be.”
“You haven't?” Henry burst out.
“No.”
“But you said this morning that you got it.”
“And I did. When we passed the hunting cabin coming in yesterday, I saw that the window in the common room was open so I sent Amelia to spend time with the ladies so I could go retrieve the missive.” Elijah pulled the missive from his breast pocket and tossed it on the table.
Henry groaned. “You've been spending far too much time with Alex. Any more and you just might best him at being the most obtuse gentleman in existence.” He raked his hand through his hair. “What I meant was did you solve it, not retrieve it.”
“Then you should have said that,” Elijah retorted.
“I didn't think I had to,” Henry grumbled. “But not to worry, from now on when I use a word that has more than one meaning, I'll be sure to clarify which meaning I intend.”
“See to it that you do.” He scowled. “However, I did get—both definitions—your other missive. The one about the fellow I apprehended in Brighton escaping.”
“I haven't many other details on that. I'm to meet with a runner tomorrow to see what else he's learned.”
Elijah sighed. “Back to where we were before, I suppose.”
“Or further back,” Henry commented. “Now, they know someone's looking for them.”
Elijah's heart twisted. That just meant Amelia was more vulnerable than he'd originally thought.
Henry reached for the paper he'd left in the cabin for Elijah yesterday and unfolded it. “I spent three hours yesterday trying to solve this damn riddle.”
“I'd spent an entire three minutes trying to solve it before you had to interrupt.”
“Perhaps you'd have had more time if you hadn't spent your time dreaming of Amelia,” Henry said with a chuckle.
Scowling, Elijah grabbed the paper from his brother's hands and turned it around so he could read it. “It isn't what you think.”
“I'm pretty sure that it is.”
Elijah lowered the left corner of the paper a fraction. “Damn,” he muttered, meeting his twin's eyes.
“Have you told her?”
“No, on both accounts.”
“On both accounts?” he echoed, knitting his brows. A moment later his eyes flared wide, then returned to normal; the color in his cheeks heightening, presumably at just being informed that not only had Elijah not told Amelia the truth about himself but that he'd been unsuccessful in bedding her, revealing to her the truth about herself. “I see.”
“I doubt you do.” Elijah sighed and dropped the paper he held to the table. “I can't tell her one without revealing the other.”
“So then...”
“I just need to do my duty and bed her as soon as possible.”
“Yes, well, I don't need those details, thank you.”
Elijah straightened his silver cufflink. “Then we're in agreement because I hadn't planned to share them.”
“Have you been putting it off on purpose?”
“Bedding her?”
Henry nodded. “She is our childhood friend. I can see where it might be difficult to...er...perform.”
Elijah twisted his lips and crossed his arms. Had it been anyone else—even Alex—who'd just insulted his abilities, Elijah would have laid him out. “As it would happen, contrary to what you're implying, I have no reservations about consummating the marriage. She does.”
“Perhaps she doesn't fancy the idea of sleeping with you.”
“I've already guessed as much,” he muttered. “For as much as she used to claim she loved me before we reached our majority, she sure has no interest in me now.”
“Oh?”
“I thought you didn't want details,” Elijah reminded him, forcing a grin.
“That depends. Details about you deflowering Amelia I could do without. Details about how Amelia denies you sound most interesting.”
Elijah snorted. “You would be the one interested.”
“Anyone would.” He flashed Elijah a grin. “Especially if they knew the details of your past together.”
�
��Yes, well, her fascination for me is no more, I'm afraid.” He turned his head a fraction to the side and idly scratched his cheek. “No matter what I do, she pushes me away.”
“She does?”
“She does.” Elijah put his elbow on the table and then leaned his cheek against his palm. “Whenever I try to kiss her, she turns as cold as those marbles we saw in Venice. When I touch her, she jerks and moves away. Or pushes me away,” he added, thinking at how she'd shoved him away earlier this morning when he'd touched her. “It's almost as if I repulse her.”
“Perhaps you do.”
Elijah did his best attempt at a snarl. “She can't possibly find me repulsive. She was about to marry Lord Friar, for pity's sake.”
“That doesn't say much about you then, does it?”
“No. I suppose it doesn't.”
“Perhaps that's for the best.”
“For the best that my wife has more interest in winning boons and eating cake than wanting to be intimate with me?”
The left corner of Henry's lips tilted up. “Is that so?”
“Never mind that. The fact is, I've married an Ice Queen, and short of hell itself, nothing seems to warm her up.”
“Now that could certainly be a point in your favor. At least she'll never take a lover.”
“Indeed,” Elijah forced himself to say. He hated the way his agreement to such a stupid statement felt on his tongue. She might not love him, but she'd positively devastate him if she took a lover. He sighed and picked up the paper he'd set down a few moments before. “Now about this...”
“I don't know why you deny it so,” Henry said, seeming to be reluctant to quit their former conversation.
Elijah's fingers tightened on the paper he held, crumpling the edges. Henry knew. Whether it was his glib tongue or perhaps something far more subtle, Elijah had somehow revealed himself to his brother and for a reason he couldn't explain, being vulnerable right now was the last thing he wanted. “Stop,” he warned in a low tone. “I have no further wish to talk about the icicle I married.”
“Mayhap you just need to seduce her.”