Time After Time

by Elizabeth Boyce

  Del felt another twinge of emotion, and though she would never admit it to anyone, she knew it to be jealousy tinged with fear. It wasn’t that she wanted to be the one murmuring in Ashe’s ear — she had been studiously avoiding that lately — it was that she didn’t want Ashe to want someone else on his arm. She hated seeing the evidence of her replaceability, hated being reminded of the tenuousness of her life. She had worked hard to ensure a measure of independence for herself, supporting herself the only way she could, but seeing Ashe now demonstrated how easily her fortunes could change. All it would take was the distraction of the newest ingénue, and like a once shiny object stripped of its luster, Del would be discarded in favor of the new toy and soon forgotten. And what would become of her then?

  Her disquieting thoughts were interrupted when Camden leaned down to her, his lips brushing against her cheek. “You are stunning this evening,” he said against her ear.

  Del shivered, she couldn’t stop herself. His breath was warm on her neck, his husky voice like a caress, and it sent every one of her nerve endings buzzing. “Do behave yourself, Mr. Camden,” she said with a playful swat of her fan against his arm.

  “What? I merely paid you an innocent compliment,” he said teasingly.

  “Yes, but the way you said it was anything but innocent.” She gave him a devilish smile.

  Camden pulled her against him. “I confess my motivations are perhaps not completely pure. Something about you makes me want to be a bit wicked.”

  Del’s pulse quickened. She was used to flirting with men — it was her livelihood, after all — but she normally did it in a rote, automatic manner, with no attached feeling or even overly great interest. Flirting with Camden, however, was completely different. This was far from the mechanical exchanges she normally engaged in, exchanges carefully designed to pique the interest and desire of the client. She found herself responding to him quite against her will. When he touched her, her skin heated; when she felt his breath against her ear, she shivered. And when the young, guileless, and normally reserved and ever-proper Camden looked at her with a glint of hunger in his eyes and told her she made him wicked, her heart pounded. It made her quite forget herself — her past, her future, her present surroundings.

  She had almost completely forgotten Ashe and his new companion until she caught a glimpse of him from the corner of her eye. He was staring at her now, irritation tinged with anger showing plainly in his dark expression. He must have seen the exchange between her and Camden, must have seen the way he stood so close to her, his arm snaked protectively around her waist. Ashe would have also seen how Camden made her react, how she blushed at his words and leaned in closer to him. Maybe Ashe could sense the crackling electricity flying between them, maybe when Del’s heart jumped and the attraction flared, it produced visible lightning bolts for everyone to see. It certainly felt as though it could.

  Del knew Ashe well enough to know why seeing her with Camden made him angry. She had been refusing to see Ashe, avoiding him without explanation, and now here she was, at the theater with another man. Ashe was accustomed to having his demands met, his desires catered to, and it was an unpardonable affront to his position and power for Del to ignore Lord Ashe in favor of the young, untitled, and comparatively unimportant Rhys Camden.

  Ashe pulled away from Miss Wilson and took a step forward, looking as if he was determined to fight his way through the crowd and confront Del and Camden. Ashe was aggressive and impetuous; he would think nothing of creating a scene or even engaging in a physical altercation in the middle of the theater. Del moved toward the gallery doors in earnest, no longer content to drift along with the crush of people heading toward their seats. She was eager to put more distance between them and Ashe, though the crowd made forward progress difficult.

  “In a hurry, are we?” Camden asked.

  “I don’t want to miss the beginning,” Del said. Camden clearly hadn’t noticed Ashe glowering at them from across the room, and Del wanted to keep it that way. “Jane would never forgive me.”

  Nodding, Camden stepped forward, grasped Del’s hand, and led them into the gallery. He didn’t jostle or push anyone, he merely drew himself up to his full height and claimed space around them, seeming to effortlessly clear a path to their seats. Del glanced behind her and was relieved that Ashe was no longer visible. The crowd had swallowed them, and there would be no confrontation this evening.

  Camden found their row and led Del to their places, carefully stepping around the patrons already in their seats. Suddenly, he stopped short, and his hand clenched around hers. His abruptness caused Del to bump into his broad back, and she was about to ask him what was wrong when he nodded stiffly to a gray-haired gentleman seated before them.

  “Mr. Hutchence,” Camden said in curt acknowledgment.

  “Mr. Camden,” Hutchence said, returning the nod. His eyes flicked over to Del, and they widened in surprise. Del was passingly familiar with the man; she had seen him at various salons and similar outings. She was quite sure he recognized her and knew her for what she was, and she thought she detected an air of censure at Camden’s choice of theater companion.

  They were saved from further conversation when the gas lamps dimmed, and they moved quickly in order to be seated before the play began.

  “Are you very well acquainted with Mr. Hutchence?” Del asked as they took their seats, hoping to discover the source of the tension-filled greeting between the two men.

  “He’s a business associate of my father’s,” Camden said.

  Del wanted to ask him more, but the footlights brightened, the curtain opened, and all conversation stopped as Jane entered the stage. Del tried to concentrate on the play, but her thoughts kept intruding. She was unbalanced, like a ship listing in the open sea after a squall, rudderless and without purpose. Being with Camden, she felt emotions and desires she thought she had long since abandoned. She wanted to know him, and not just in the perfunctory, utilitarian way she normally gathered information on men to facilitate and maximize her business dealing with them. Normally, she confined herself to such details as a man’s favorite food and colors, his daily habits, whether he preferred brandy or port, how he took his tea, and other equally mundane tidbits.

  With Camden, she wanted to know so much more, from the mundane to the weighty. What was his childhood like? Was he a quiet, amendable boy or was he naughty? What caused his contentious relationship with his father? Was it always thus, or did the relationship recently deteriorate? Were his dealings with his mother equally fraught? Camden didn’t seem eager to join his father’s shipping business; what dreams did he hold for himself instead? What were his political leanings, and did he think the Cato Street conspirators were purposely entrapped? Why did he reign himself in so tightly when Del had caught glimpses of him in unguarded moments and knew a fiery spirit burned inside him? She wanted to know it all. She wanted to know why he looked at her with such an agonizing mix of tenderness, desire, and bewilderment. Why he had offered her so much and asked nothing in return. Most importantly, she wanted to know why he stirred such ungoverned emotions and engendered such baffling reactions in her.

  Camden was dangerous, she realized. He made her want to let her guard down, to let him into her heart and her life, even knowing how vulnerable that made her. She caught herself having dreams of normal life — of marriage and houses in the country and perhaps a child or two — even though tonight had demonstrated how out of reach that life was. She could never escape her past, never fully divest herself of the Ashes and the Blakelys of her world who thought they had a claim to her, who thought she owed them her companionship until they themselves called a halt to it. And Camden, he could never escape the expectations of his position in life. She had seen the frosty exchange between him and Mr. Hutchence, saw the opprobrium in Hutchence’s glance and the way Camden stiffened in reaction to it, and she knew that there was no
possible future for them.

  However strong the forces of attraction were that drew them together, the bonds of society that held them in place would always be stronger.

  Chapter Five

  Camden sighed heavily as he ran an ink-stained hand through his hair and fought the urge to tear it out in chunks. The night grew late and the other employees had long since left the shipping offices, but he was still sitting at his lamp-lit desk going through the books. It was quiet, dark, and utterly still. Camden hadn’t seen or heard another individual in hours, and though he knew it was ridiculous, he felt as though every other person had ceased to exist and he would be here forever, alone in the world, sitting at his desk going numb from the tedium of the business accounts.

  He wondered what Wittingham, Farber, and Hollsworth were doing while he sat there alone and bored. He imagined they were already in their cups, gambling away their money and chasing girls of easy virtue. He could almost hear Farber’s drunken laugh as he ribbed Hollsworth, and he could perfectly imagine Wittingham’s practiced disdain of their antics. Though he often grew tired of Farber’s and Hollsworth’s excesses, right now he wanted nothing more than to be with them, far away from ledgers, bills of lading, and the specter of his father.

  Though he was not now physically present in the office, the elder Mr. Camden’s judgment and reproach seemed to inhabit the building like an angry ghost. Camden never felt fully free of him, and he knew his father wanted to make sure that was the case. Reminders of him were everywhere, from his tersely worded notes of instruction littering Camden’s office to his father’s portrait hanging on his walls. Even rendered in colored oils, his father appeared to be glaring at Camden, clearly communicating his ire. And like the beady-eyed paintings in a gothic novel, his father’s eyes seemed to follow him everywhere, noting — and inevitably disapproving of — his every movement.

  “You are still here. Good.”

  Camden looked toward the office doorway and thought grimly that the tired phrase “speak of the devil” had perhaps never been so apt. His father stood dressed entirely in black silk, as if in mourning — the death of all cheerfulness and enjoyment, most likely. Although it was still fashionable to allow one’s hair to fall in a few untamed curls or waves, Mr. Camden had wrestled his locks into meek submission and his hair stuck tightly to his scalp, as if the slightest hint of unruliness signaled an unstoppable march into pure decadence. Everything about the man was stiff, somber, and controlled.

  Camden straightened in his chair and self-consciously smoothed his own disheveled coif. “Yes, I’m still here. Just finishing the last of the day’s accounting.”

  “You have finished the receipts and filed the bills?

  “Yes,” Camden said, putting down his pen. His father sounded more gruff than usual, if that were possible, and Camden wondered what sort of dressing-down he was about to receive.

  “You have not been shirking any of your duties to the company, have you?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “You remember where your loyalties lie, do you not? To the company, to me, to the family.”

  Camden nodded and said nothing, though he wanted to demand what this interrogation was all about. He knew better than to open his mouth, however. One simply did not demand answers of George Camden. One waited until George Camden deigned to enlighten you.

  “You were at the theater a few nights ago, were you not?” His father walked into the room and stopped a few steps from Camden’s desk. He was not an overly tall man — in fact, he was several inches shorter than his son — but George Camden was so domineering, his stance so stiff and erect, his gaze so intense, that he seemed to inhabit far more space than what his physical self actually occupied.

  “Yes, I was at the theater,” Camden said. He began to suspect what had his father questioning him so aggressively.

  “Tell me, who accompanied you?”

  “A — friend,” Camden said carefully.

  “A friend?” His father said, and Camden heard the note of derision in the question, as he knew he was meant to.

  George took a few more steps forward and placed his hands on the desk. They were thick hands, roughened by work and struggle and ambition. Every callus was a map of a past marked by grinding poverty and stark deprivation. Every cut and bruise was a beacon of the grueling labor he undertook to elevate his fortunes. Every ink stain and smudge of grease was a promise of the even loftier position he hoped to one day attain. A position George expected his son to also strive for.

  Camden forced himself to bring his gaze from his father’s hands and meet his eyes. He would not let himself squirm like a naughty schoolboy awaiting his punishment. He would not stammer and blink as he tried to explain himself to a father who demanded repentance at the slightest perceived indiscretion but would never give understanding or absolution.

  George pushed back from the desk and walked over to the far wall, inspecting the various portraits and framed documents hanging there, as if he were merely engaged in a friendly chat. “I went shooting the other day with William Hutchence,” he said, and Camden was not fooled by the air of casualness in the statement. “He is also a theater-goer, apparently.” He gave a slight emphasis to “theater-goer,” as if the activity were something vaguely distasteful.

  Camden said nothing.

  “He saw you there,” George continued, his back to his son. “With a woman.” He turned to face Camden, his hands clasped behind him. “You were seen with the same woman in the park at least twice. Once before the play and once just yesterday.”

  “Are you having me followed?” Camden blurted before he could stop himself. He hadn’t meant to say more than necessary — no use providing any extra length of rope with which his father could hang him — but his father’s detailed knowledge of his whereabouts was a disconcerting surprise.

  “Followed?” George scoffed. “No. It is not necessary to have you followed. I have told you again and again you must guard yourself at all times. There are always people watching, waiting for you to acquit yourself in a manner that belies your origins, that proves we are not worthy of moving beyond our humble station.” George began to pace the small office. Camden could see redness creeping up his father’s neck and knew he was becoming increasingly agitated.

  “I don’t think — ”

  George slammed his hands down on Camden’s desk, cutting him off. “Dammit, Rhys!” George said, the oath another indicator of his loss of composure. “After all I have done, after all the work and the sacrifice to achieve what we have! For you to just throw it away by appearing out in public — multiple times! — with that — that — whore!”

  “She’s not — ”

  “Do not try to deny it! I have been apprised of who and what she is. It is one thing to discreetly visit one in the darkness of night, if you must. But to be seen in general society with such a creature, to defile the family name this manner — I will not allow it.”

  Camden’s instincts warred within him. He wanted to leap from his chair and come to Del’s defense. He wanted to yell that she wasn’t a whore or “creature” and he wasn’t defiling anything when he was with her. He wanted to command his father to leave him alone, to finally accept that his son was an adult and fully capable of living life without constant interference. But those impulses were tempered by years of being trained — by sharp glances, harsh words, or even a beating if necessary — to obey his father. George Camden demanded compliance in everything, great and small, and nothing was greater than his desire to achieve a level of social respectability to match his newly made wealth. Camden knew his father would abide nothing that threatened to quash his upward progress.

  “Are you even listening to me?” George snapped, leaning over the desk. “You are not to do or say or even think anything that could endanger our reputation or your eligibility for a suitable marriage.”r />
  “But I don’t want — ”

  “This is not about what you want! We have more money than most of the blue-blood lords in this country — hell, half of them are indebted to me for more money than their crumbling estates can ever hope to repay — and yet still they balk at aligning their families with ours.”

  Camden hated it when the subject of marriage came up, and it came up with alarming frequency ever since he’d turned of age. George was convinced the final step to social grace was his son marrying into one of the families — and there were many — who possessed the good name, breeding, title, and respect George desperately craved but who, perhaps through generations of peevish idleness and estate mismanagement, currently lacked the wealth the Camdens could provide. And so Camden was expected to enter into a marriage that amounted to little more than a business transaction. He would exchange money for respect and finally gain the entrance into the highest levels of society that had thus far been unattainable by George.

  Camden knew what he must do, and yet the prospect of such a marriage, of such a cold and loveless life, filled him with dread. He had seen it first hand, had witnessed how decades of empty duty and barely veiled contempt of each spouse for the other had weakened and finally ravaged his mother, ultimately sending her to her grave a few years back.