“I think it’s time for Jake and me to go home.”
Chapter Eleven
The following night, Lord Stratford invited Will and Mr. Briggs over for dinner. Meg wasn’t looking forward to the evening at all. Nevertheless, she hadn’t told him not to come. As much as her reasoning mind told her to push him as far away as possible, for some reason, when it came to her speaking the words of rejection she knew she must say to him, they just wouldn’t emerge.
After she’d hurriedly dressed for dinner and left Jake in the kitchen, which had become his favorite room of the house—he loved to gaze at the motions the servants made of chopping and kneading, and he even enjoyed watching the scullery maids scrubbing the dishes—she knocked on the door to Serena’s dressing room.
“Who is it?”
“It’s…” Meg hesitated, then said, “me.” The servants knew who she was and who Serena really was, and Serena promised that they were trustworthy, but she still had a difficult time saying her name was Meg when the world knew her sister by that name.
“Come in,” Serena called.
Meg opened the door to find her twin standing before a tall looking glass with her red-haired maid standing behind her, tugging on the strings to her stays. Serena glanced over her shoulder at Meg. “I’m getting fat,” she announced. “This thing is tighter every day.”
“Nonsense,” Meg said. Serena possessed healthy, womanly curves, but no one would consider her fat. Her weight was ideal, a weight Meg wished to be. On Caversham’s ship, food had always been simple and often scarce. Here, the heavy, richly seasoned foods the earl’s cook made weighted Meg down and made her feel out of sorts, but she’d tried to eat and had managed to put on a few pounds.
“Besides,” she added, “you are with child. Gaining weight is inevitable, you know.”
“But not this early on,” Serena said with a groan.
Meg reached for the strings from the maid. “May I help?” she asked, suddenly feeling shy. She and Serena had dressed each other from the time they could walk. But now, it seemed… awkward. Serena had someone else to do it for her.
Serena’s gray eyes flitted toward her. “Of course,” she said quickly. “You may go, Flannery. I will call for you if I need anything else.”
“Yes, my lady.” With a shy smile in Meg’s direction, the maid exited from the room.
Meg worked on Serena’s stays in silence. She managed the strings with practiced ease—she’d spent many an hour helping Sarah with her stays, too.
“Is something wrong?” Serena asked after a few minutes.
“What makes you say that?”
Serena’s grin was wry as she looked at her sister in the mirror. “You don’t make it a habit of coming into my room while I’m dressing.”
Meg felt even more awkward. Her hands stilled on the strings. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “Should I go?”
“You should not.”
Looking down, Meg tugged on the strings one final time, then began to tie them. “Remember how we used to help each other dress?”
“Of course I do. How could I forget?”
“I don’t know. It was so long ago, it all feels like a dream. It doesn’t even seem real anymore.”
“Oh, it was real.”
Meg turned to fetch Serena’s petticoat, which was lying over a nearby chair. As she helped her sister into it, she said, “I came… Well, I wanted to ask you something about Will.”
Serena nodded, but her shoulders stiffened. Serena had been rather tight-lipped when it came to Will. It was obvious that she and Will cared about each other, but Serena rarely spoke of him in Meg’s presence.
“What about him?” The petticoat settled around Serena’s shins, and she reached for her blue silk dinner dress hanging from the nearby clothes press.
“Why didn’t you tell me about his boy?” Meg couldn’t help the edge of despair that colored her tone.
Serena’s empty hand dropped. Slowly she turned to face Meg. “You know about Thomas?”
“I do.”
“Did he… tell you about him? Introduce the two of you?”
“Yes.” Meg gazed down at the Persian carpet cushioning her feet. “Both.”
“I’m glad.”
Meg didn’t know what to do with her hands, so she clenched them at her sides as she looked back up at Serena. “Why didn’t you tell me about him sooner? Why did you let me find out… that way?” The words seemed to be emerging faster than she could control them. “How could you have let me continue on so long blind to the fact that Will has a child?”
Serena sank into the chair her petticoat had been lying over. “Oh, Meg. I am sorry. I just… it was his secret to tell you… or not. It wasn’t for me to reveal such a thing to you.”
“I didn’t want to hear it from him, Serena.”
“I’m sure you didn’t want to hear it at all.”
Meg gave her sister a bleak look. Serena sighed. “Meg… surely you see it. He is devoted to you. He still looks at you the same way he used to.”
“Perhaps most women believe it is all right to turn a blind eye to unfaithful lovers,” Meg said quietly. “But I fear I cannot do that. Perhaps I am too weak.”
“No. You’re not at all weak. If Jonathan did something like that…” Serena failed to hide her shudder. “Well, I don’t know what I’d do. You have every right to feel hurt and upset.”
“Even though it happened so many years ago? Even though we were both so young, and I truly had no claim over him besides a few promises murmured in the heat of the moment?”
“Even so.”
Meg closed her eyes. “The worst of it is, he believed I was alive when he did it. He’d promised me nothing short of the moon only a few months earlier. And then… for him to go and betray that so soon…”
“I know.” Serena’s eyes were dark with pain, as if she truly did understand. “I thought Thomas was Jonathan’s child at first. I cannot begin to describe to you the depth of the anger and hurt and betrayal I felt.”
Meg stumbled around to the chair near Serena’s and almost fell into it. “What am I going to do?”
“You still care for him?”
“How could I not? We not only have a past, but he saved me. He’s been so… kind to me. And… well, I still find him… attractive. More so than I did before, if that’s even possible.”
Serena raised one eyebrow. “Well, I wouldn’t have thought that was possible. You thought him Adonis personified before.”
“And yet he was inconstant,” Meg said, hardly hearing her sister. “He is not the man he’s shown to me. There’s someone else lurking beneath that surface I have always admired so much. It’s someone I cannot like or respect.”
Serena studied Meg for a moment, then she sighed again. “Meg, I don’t want to influence you. I love you so much, and no matter what happens, that will never change. You’re my sister and my twin. I want so badly for you to become part of our family again.”
“But?” Meg asked, her tone and expression grim.
“But I love Will, too,” Serena said. “Not in a carnal way,” she added quickly. “It’s never been like that between us. But I do love him, and my first instinct will be to defend him. Will has made mistakes. We have all made mistakes.”
At Meg’s skeptical look, she amended that last comment. “Some of us have made worse mistakes than others. But despite the terribly hurtful nature of the error he made, he’s a good man, through and through. I truly believe what you see is the true Will. He’s not hiding a wicked side underneath his honorable exterior. He is honorable—”
“How can you call inconstancy honorable?” Meg choked out.
Serena closed her eyes. “It was a mistake,” she said again. “One he repented for and never repeated again for all those years. Even after he discovered I was not you, he never took another woman into his bed. Goodness, he’s never even looked at another woman the way he looks at you now.”
“I want to believe you so
badly, Serena. I want to be able to forgive him. I’m just not sure I can.”
Serena’s look softened with sympathy. “Did you meet Thomas today at Will’s house?”
“Yes.”
“And Will told you the story?”
“Yes. As difficult as it was to hear.” Meg grimaced.
“Thomas is a good boy. He and Jonathan are still very close. And Will has done so well with him over the past months. Like you have with Jake.”
“Except Jake is not mine.”
“He might as well be.” Serena studied Meg for a moment, then took a deep breath. “Meg… you’ve been here for a while now… and I feel I must ask you… What’s wrong with Jake?”
Instantly, Meg stiffened all over. She could virtually feel the brick wall stacking up between her and her sister. “What do you mean?”
“He’s a very unusual child, Meg. Surely you know that.”
“He’s not stupid, if that’s what you’re saying.” That’s what all the sailors had called him, to his face. With Caversham’s blessing. Caversham believed that if they called him an idiot often enough, he would try harder to not behave like one.
Serena looked taken aback. “I didn’t say he was stupid. Just… different. Quieter than most children… and more… extreme, I suppose is the right word.”
“He is,” Meg said shortly. “It is his way.”
“Has he always been like that?”
“He has.”
“I see. I was wondering if this was new, brought on by his recent trauma.”
Meg gave her sister a flat stare. “His life has been riddled with trauma, Serena. And yes, he has been this way for the whole of it. He didn’t even utter his first word until just after he’d turned four… But it doesn’t mean he is an idiot. He just shows his intelligence in different ways.”
“I’ve seen that, too,” Serena said softly. “Not many small children could fit together those tiny puzzle pieces you cut for him.”
“I want to give him constancy. I want to give him a good, stable life so that he can grow up and integrate into society as much as possible.”
“Of course you do.”
“People have called him mad. They have called him a simpleton and an idiot.” Meg wrapped her arms across her chest. “And I won’t hear any of it. I’d rather take him far away than languish in a place where people speak of him like that.”
“I wouldn’t allow it in my presence, either. I never said he was mad or a simpleton, Meg. I only saw that he was different.”
“He is different. He is special.”
Serena nodded. Then she rose from the chair. “Will and Mr. Briggs will be here soon. I should get dressed.” Giving Meg a hopeful look, she added, “Will you help me?”
“Of course.”
Meg finished dressing her sister in silence, finding the familiar chore surprisingly calming to her pulse, which had rioted during the conversation they’d had about Jake. When she’d finished, they went downstairs, and just in time, too, because just as they reached the ground-floor landing, someone knocked at the door. The butler entered from the servants’ wing behind them and gave Serena a questioning look.
“Bring them to the drawing room,” she told him.
“Yes, my lady.”
Jessica, Lady Fenwicke, and Lord Stratford—Jonathan, Meg said to herself, he’d asked her to call him Jonathan—already awaited them in the drawing room. After they entered, Serena went to her husband, slipped an arm around his waist, and gave him a peck on the cheek. “Our guests have arrived. Are you hungry?”
He kissed her on the lips. “Very,” he said in a soft, husky voice.
Meg turned away, feeling the heat rush to her cheeks. She felt quite certain her brother-in-law wasn’t talking about food.
“Oh, you are going to love dinner tonight.” Jessica clasped her hands at her bosom. “With Beatrice’s help, Cook has prepared a truly wonderful meal.”
“Oh, I hardly helped at all.” Lady Fenwicke blushed, and Jessica threw her an indulgent smile.
“She is far too modest. She planned every bit of this meal. Cook helped with some chopping and stirring.”
“It’s bound to be delicious, then.” Serena smiled at both of them, her cheeks still flushed from Jonathan’s kiss.
The butler opened the door and announced Captain Langley and Mr. Briggs. Introductions and greetings went around, but Jessica hardly heard any of it. Her attention was drawn to Mr. Briggs.
He wasn’t handsome in the traditional way—not refined, aristocratic looking, and tall like Captain Langley, and not roguishly handsome like Jonathan. He was rough, with a jagged red scar that crossed his forehead and sliced his eyebrow in two. He had longish sandy-brown hair tied back in an old-fashioned queue. Why on earth didn’t he grow his hair to cover that terrible scar? Jessica wondered. Certainly she’d reject this man for a dance at any ball, even if he was the only gentleman present!
His eyes met hers, blue and piercing, and Jessica quickly looked away. But… oh dear, Captain Langley was introducing them.
“Miss Jessica, this is Mr. Briggs, my first mate on the Freedom.”
She glanced up at him, then quickly away, afraid he’d know her eyes were drawn to that wicked scar. She bobbed a curtsy. “Good evening, Mr. Briggs.”
“Miss Jessica.” His bow was stiff. Pompous, almost. She raised a subtle brow at him. Captain Langley had never been pompous in the least, toward her or any of her sisters, so certainly his first mate had no right to behave that way.
“And you already know Meg,” Captain Langley told him.
“Aye, I do.” He bowed again, equally stiff.
Now both of Jessica’s eyebrows were raised, and she had to restrain herself from crossing her arms over her chest and confronting him. How rude! No polite, “Nice to see you again, Miss Donovan,” or anything like that. He’d practically cut Meg! In their sister’s drawing room, no less.
What an awful man.
Strangely enough, no one else seemed at all perturbed by Mr. Briggs’s rudeness, but Jessica steamed over her claret, keeping quiet and watching him out of the corner of her eye. He was also quiet, speaking only when spoken to and answering tersely, keeping to monosyllables whenever possible. He kept glancing at Meg, and if you were to ask Jessica, she’d say those glances were hateful.
Jessica stood suddenly, and the men scrambled to set aside their beverages and rise as well. “Oh, I’m sorry,” she exclaimed. She waved her hand in her face. “But… I… I feel I need some air. I’m going to fetch my maid and take a turn about the square. Would anyone care to join me? It’s not quite dark yet. It might be dark by the time we return, but rest assured the streetlamps will light our way home.”
She looked at Meg first, who’d just returned into the room from putting Jake to bed. She shook her head “no,” not surprisingly. But no one else seemed inclined to go for a short, brisk evening walk either. With a sigh, Jessica turned to go fetch her maid.
“I’ll go.”
Jessica spun toward the man she had intended to avoid.
Oh, wonderful.
She forced a smile. “That would be lovely,” she said in a clipped voice. And then she left the room to find her maid, hearing his soft footsteps as he followed behind her without a word.
Within a few minutes, the three of them stood in the entry hall and Mr. Briggs was helping her with her rose wool pelisse. She buttoned the two large round buttons, reached for her gloves on the narrow table against the wall, and tugged them on. Mr. Briggs did the same with his own well-worn brown leather gloves, and before she drew on her second glove, Jessica squashed the mad urge to stroke the buttery soft-looking leather.
They went outside onto St. James, and Jessica sucked in a deep breath of the cool evening air. As her maid hovered behind them, Jessica and Mr. Briggs crossed the street, heading toward the park.
Jessica had walked with many gentlemen in the year since she’d arrived in England. When they crossed a busy street such as St.
James’s, most men would offer her their arms. Not Mr. Briggs. Watching him covertly out of the corner of her eye, she wondered what his first name was. Mr. Uppity Briggs. Mr. Snobbish Briggs… She smiled to herself. Wouldn’t it be nice if parents named their children after their personalities?
What would she and her sisters be named, in that case? Serena would be Bossy Donovan, for certain. She was the oldest, only minutes older than Meg, and she had always used that as an excuse for ordering all of them about as if she were the queen.
Meg… Looking up at the darkening sky, Jessica wondered what Meg’s name would be. Quiet Donovan? Reserved Donovan, or maybe Keeps-to-herself Donovan? And though Meg had certainly changed from how Jessica had remembered her, those three names would adequately represent her both then and now.
Olivia would be Sweetheart Donovan—because she had the sweetest heart Jessica had ever known, not to mention that was the endearment her husband had christened her with. Phoebe would be Thinks-she-knows-everything Donovan. Jessica made a small scoffing snort at that.
“What is it?”
She turned to Mr. Briggs to see him frowning at her.
“Oh. Nothing. Sorry.”
“Very well,” he said, and continued walking, looking straight ahead, his face expressionless. Except his eyebrows were drawn together in a frown, making that awful scar bulge.
“I wasn’t”—oh, what was a ladylike way to describe a snort?—“making that noise at you, you know.”
“Ah.”
“Although I was tempted to earlier.”
“Were you.” He said it more as a statement than a question.
“Indeed I was,” she said primly, then she pointed toward the center of the square. “I take the path through the square this way. Do you have any objections?”
“None at all.”
“Well, good.” She turned into the square garden, a green, grassy area crisscrossed by graveled paths. There were a few small trees peppering the square and a huge bronze statue of an English king whose name Jessica wouldn’t have been able to remember even if her life depended on it.
Pleasures of a Tempted Lady Page 14