by Mia Marlowe
“Twenty minutes.” Perhaps she should feign a fit of vapors. It would at least get her off the dance floor.
“Good,” he said. “It will give people time to forget what they think they heard.”
“Are you mad? They didn’t think it. They heard it and they’ll never forget. Lady Ackworth certainly won’t.”
And again the music called for a half-note rest just as Caroline said the old gossip’s name. She couldn’t seem to stop the words that came next. They tumbled from her lips of their own accord into the gaping silence. “That woman holds a grudge till it squeals to be let go.”
Red-faced, Caroline felt as if she were watching herself from outside her own body. Surely this wasn’t really happening. Or if it was, it wasn’t really happening to her.
During the next pass, she and Lawrence were supposed to place a hand on each other’s cheeks as they circled. He managed to also place his thumb squarely across her mouth.
“Might I suggest you refrain from speaking for the duration of the dance?”
She nodded. Yes, that was exactly what she needed to do. In fact, she might never speak again.
It should have been simple enough. All she need do was keep her feet moving in time to the music. Unfortunately, under the lilting melody of the strings, she heard a buzzing sound, as if a hive had been upturned. When she glanced around the room, careful to flick only her gaze, not turning her head, she saw the word spreading. A quick tête-à-tête behind a fan here, a leaned-in whisper there, Caroline’s ill-timed utterances were flying around the room.
If Lady Ackworth hadn’t heard what Caroline had said about her firsthand, she’d no doubt receive countless second- and thirdhand versions of it.
There was no way around it. When Lady Ackworth and her minions finished their work, Caroline’s social standing would be reduced to rubble. She’d read about unfortunate folk in India who belonged to no caste at all and had no place in society Perhaps she ought to revise her travel plans to include that subcontinent, where she might find some kindred spirits.
No, Zanzibar is still my siren song.
The next time she came together with Lawrence, she couldn’t resist a sigh.
And a word or two.
“There’s never a ship bound for Zanzibar when you need one,” she said wistfully, then realized she’d spoken aloud in yet another sudden silence. The lifting of the quartet’s bows had caught her again. “Oh, for heaven’s sake! How many rests can there be in one dratted piece of music?”
After the short, prescribed rest, the strings continued to drone on.
There was no point in continuing to dance. She couldn’t pretend she hadn’t been caught acting like a complete ninny again.
The broad double doors at the far end of the drawing room had been propped open to let in fresh night air. They were perfectly lovely doors, Spanish made, with iron studs and carvings of angels and lutes and pear trees. At any other time, Caroline would have been fascinated by the bulky foreignness of the design.
But she wasn’t drawn to the Spanish doors. Instead, the dark opening between them called to her.
Not waiting for the music to end abruptly again, Caroline clutched her skirt to lift her hem slightly. Moving quickly, yet trying not to seem hurried, she abandoned Lawrence in line. She pressed through the crowd that ringed the dance floor and made for the way out with as much dignity as she could muster.
Only at the last second did she begin to run.
Chapter 18
None of us can turn back the hands of a clock. But that doesn’t stop us from wishing we could undo the past.
—Lawrence Sinclair, who would undo several things, given half a chance.
Lawrence had wanted to be alone with her so badly it bordered on sickness. He’d imagined several circumstances whereby he might spirit Caroline out of the ballroom and into Lady Frampton’s moonlit garden.
This was not one of them.
He left the line right after she did. It made no sense for him to remain; he no longer had a dance partner. He felt no sting from the buzz of whispers around him. Caroline wasn’t running from him. She was running from her own poor luck. He chafed a bit that he couldn’t box the gossips’ ears on Caroline’s account, but he bridled himself.
He also didn’t follow her out into the garden immediately. It would not serve her reputation for him to trail her like a puppy. So first, he stopped at the side table where punch was being served and collected a cup for her. Then he made his way to the open doorway as unobtrusively as possible. If he drew more attention to her hasty exit, she wouldn’t thank him for joining her in her heliotrope-scented exile.
The last thing Caroline needed was more scandal.
Once through the door, he stopped under the portico and pulled out the small flask of whiskey he kept in his waistcoat pocket.
And I thought I’d be the one drowning my sorrows this evening.
He took a sip for himself, then poured a generous amount into the cup of punch. Then he began to search for Caroline in the darkness. The moon had slipped behind a bank of clouds, so he couldn’t locate her by sight. Instead, he found her by following the soft sound of sobbing.
She’d gone to ground in a secluded corner of Lady Frampton’s neatly organized garden. Under a trellis that had not yet been completely covered by a creeper, seated on a stone bench, Caroline was crying her eyes out.
“Come now. There’s no need for tears.” He handed her the punch. Before he could warn her about the whiskey, she raised it to her lips and downed the whole cup. She came up sputtering and coughing.
“What on earth was in that?” Caroline wheezed.
“Just a wee dram, as my old fencing master used to say. It’s meant to do you good, but not if you knock it back like it was Almack’s weak lemonade.” Lawrence sat down beside her and patted her back. If she’d been a man, he’d have pounded between her shoulder blades to help her get back her wind. After half a minute, her breathing returned to normal and she calmed down. “There now. Feeling better?”
She heaved a sigh. “No. I’m ruined.”
“It’s not so bad as that. I’m no expert, but I believe ruination involves much more than merely speaking out of turn.” He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her.
She blew her nose like a trumpet. “How can you make light of my disgrace?”
“You’re not disgraced,” he said. “After all, nobody died.”
“My dignity has.” Caroline balled the soiled handkerchief in her fist. “And my reputation will die, too, once Lady Ackworth has her way with it.”
Lawrence shook his head. “You give her too much credit. Besides, was anything you said untrue?”
“No. She is the most dreadful old gossip,” Caroline said with vehemence. Then her charitable nature, which he loved so much, rose to the surface. “But I suppose it was unkind of me to point it out so publicly. Oh, for pity’s sake, my mother was right.” She smacked her knee with her fist. “Every time you speak ill of someone, it is a prayer to the devil.”
Lawrence chuckled. “Then by those lights, Old Nick must be a right busy fellow.”
“Evidently not,” she countered. “He certainly answered my ill-begotten prayer with lightning speed.”
Lawrence laughed aloud at that.
“How kind of you to find merriment in my misery,” she said crossly.
He sobered in an instant. “I’m not laughing at you. Just at the whole situation.”
She cast him a glare that ought to have rendered him a pile of smoldering ash.
“A situation that, on second thought, is not at all amusing,” he amended hastily. “But you must admit the timing could not have been better if you and the strings had practiced together beforehand.”
She scoffed, but the corners of her mouth did turn up briefly. “Never let it be said that Lady Car
oline Lovell does anything by halves.”
“No one would ever say that,” he agreed. “You are a force of nature.”
She chuckled a little. “A veritable gale; that’s me.”
“Besides, not everything you had to say was about Lady Ackworth. What was that part about Zanzibar?”
“Just a place I’m longing to see someday,” she said. “In fact, I may have to go there sooner rather than later to hide my shame.”
From the smile in her voice, he could tell she wasn’t feeling nearly as dispirited as when he’d first joined her on the stone bench.
“Why do you want to visit Zanzibar?” he asked.
“Because it calls to me. I know it’s there waiting and it’s bound to be beautiful beyond belief, and I’ve never been anywhere really.”
“I’ve done a fair amount of traveling, but in truth, I’ve never seen anything as fine as the cliffs of Dover. Compared to England, anywhere is overrated.”
“How can you say that? Everything would be so very much different in Zanzibar,” she said. “The flora and fauna, the food, the people—why, even I would be a different sort of person.”
“I’ve never been to Zanzibar,” he said, “but I expect you’d not be much different there from who you are here.”
“Why is that?”
“Because wherever you roam, you take yourself with you. We cannot run from ourselves. Believe me. I’ve tried,” he admitted. “Besides, you’ve no need to flee London just yet. In the grand scheme of things, the sin you committed this evening is a very small one, Caroline. Trust me, it will pass.”
“What would you know about my sins?”
“Nothing,” he admitted. “I only know mine, which is heavy enough knowledge.”
“Oh! I know a bit about your sins, too,” she said, suddenly brightening for some odd reason. “Teddy told me how you and he met. And about how you flattened the jail guards so you could all escape.”
She made it seem as if he’d done something grand. She had no idea that he’d unleashed such pent-up fury in that Italian prison; it was only by God’s grace that he’d merely rendered those men unconscious.
“Did Bredon tell you how I came to be incarcerated in the first place?”
She shook her head.
Lawrence had imagined confessing his past to her. It seemed he was going to get the chance to see if her reaction was the one he’d imagined as well. “I killed a man.”
To his great relief, she didn’t flee from him screaming.
“You served in the military, Lawrence,” she said gently. “I daresay you’ve killed a great number of men. But in your defense, they were all trying to kill you as well.”
“No,” he said. “This was after I resigned from the dragoons and sold my commission.”
“Oh.” Silence yawned between them for what seemed like ages. Then, finally, she said, “I’m sure you must have had reason.”
Lawrence nodded. He’d had too much to drink one night in Rome, and as he staggered back in the direction of his lodgings, he was stopped by a fellow who made him an indecent offer that sobered him in a heartbeat. The man had a pair of children he was selling by the hour.
“Ragazza o ragazzo? Girl or boy, your choice, signore,” the man said, and named a ridiculously low price. Wide-eyed and slight of build, the boy who cowered behind the man reminded Lawrence of his cousin Ralph.
To this day, he couldn’t remember taking his first swing at the man. He only came to himself after the carabinieri pulled him off the pimp. Lawrence had no clear memory of repeatedly dashing the man’s head against the cobblestone street, but the blood spoke for itself.
The children he’d hoped to recue had fled, probably to escape the mad Englishman. They were nowhere to be seen.
“Do you want to tell me why you killed him?” Caroline asked in a whisper.
“No.” He couldn’t tell Caroline something so ugly. “Only that he needed killing. And at the time, I needed to do it.”
She was still as stone for long moments. Then she reached over and laid her hand on his. Her lace-gloved fingertips were cool and soothing. Like a healing balm.
“Then that is all I need to know,” she said. “We will speak no more of this.”
Over the years, he’d often wished he could weep over his misdeeds, but he’d never been able to squeeze out a single tear. Not even at Ralph’s funeral. The sorrow stayed bottled up, seething and writhing. With each passing year, other sins only added to the load.
He’d told Caroline his darkest deed, yet she hadn’t rejected him. Something broke inside him then, and without knowing how it happened, he realized his cheeks were suddenly damp.
Caroline reached up and wiped away the tears.
“You’re a good man, Lawrence Sinclair,” she said. “Anyone who says otherwise will answer to me.”
The moon peeped out from behind the clouds at that moment, and Lawrence saw that Caroline’s cheeks were shining with tears, too.
“Forgive me. I’ve made you cry,” he said, palming her face.
“It’s not you,” she said with a tremulous smile. “If anyone weeps in my presence, I can’t help but join in. Were I not a lady, and unable to take up an occupation, I might have made a fortune as a professional mourner.”
Shaking his head in amazement, he chuckled. How this woman made him smile, even in the midst of the most serious things. It was her greatest gift.
“I would not have you mourn at all. Not ever.” He slowly drew his thumb over her bottom lip. “What must I do to make you happy again?”
She met his gaze, her eyes enormous in the moonlight. “Kiss me.”
* * * *
In that breathless moment, she still wasn’t sure she’d said the words aloud. She only knew they were about to burst out of her heart.
Caroline had never been kissed by any of the fellows who’d courted her during previous Seasons. Not that plenty of them hadn’t tried. Caroline had always found a way to avoid such an encounter, even if it meant ducking and fleeing. She’d simply never wanted any of their soppy, slobbering mouths anywhere near hers. A kiss was unwarranted because she didn’t feel a thing for any of those gentlemen. Besides, it would surely be an extremely messy enterprise.
Now she ached for Lawrence to cover her lips with his.
He was intensely focused on her, but she didn’t feel afraid. She didn’t know what she was feeling. The way her insides tingled didn’t have a proper name.
His hands, still cupping her cheeks, held her perfectly still while he closed the distance between them. When he stopped a finger’s width from her mouth, she nearly wept afresh. Then he leaned the rest of the way and touched his lips to hers.
They were warm and not at all soppy. Then he slanted his mouth over hers and groaned softly. The deep sound made her close her eyes, the better simply to feel. She wanted to open her mouth, to take him in somehow, though she had no idea where that idea came from, or what might happen if she did.
He tasted faintly like the burning liquor he’d put into her punch. She hadn’t liked it in the cup, but on his mouth, the taste was intoxicating. The smell of him, all leather and sandalwood with a hint of bergamot, made her breathing come faster and faster. The world began to spin a bit and she wondered if she might faint.
She melted a bit inside. She was becoming part of him. She nearly forgot her own name.
“Caroline!”
Oh, yes, that’s it.
But it wasn’t Lawrence who’d said it. She’d know that frenzied tone anywhere. She pulled away from him and slid as far as the stone bench allowed.
“It’s Horatia,” she said, pressing a hand to her cheek, thankful no one could see her blush in the dark garden. “She must be looking for me.”
“Could be worse,” Lawrence grumbled. “Could be Lady Ackworth.”
Carol
ine was amazed that she could laugh again so soon after her total humiliation. Lawrence had a way of putting everything in perspective. She swept her tongue over her bottom lip.
And a way of setting the world on its ear.
He rose from their secluded arbor and waved a hand to draw her friend’s attention. Horatia had been searching frantically for her by the hydrangea, where she’d stumbled across another couple in the dark, but now she dashed to the trellis and bench.
“Oh, Caroline,” Horatia said, wringing her hands. “You’ve got to come quickly.”
“Why? What’s wrong?”
“It’s Freddie. I can’t find her anywhere. It’s nearly time for the supper dance and you know how excited she was about dancing it with Lord Rowley.” Horatia shifted her weight from one foot to the other, clearly agitated. “I can’t imagine why she’d disappear just now.”
“Is Rowley still in the ballroom?” Lawrence asked gruffly.
Horatia blinked several times, considering. “No. I don’t believe so.”
“Come then,” Lawrence said, taking charge of the situation. He grabbed Caroline’s hand and raised her to her feet. “We’ve no time to lose.”
Chapter 19
Our vicar tells us we are all capable of change, of being more than the sum of our parts. In theory, I’m inclined to agree. But in practice, are we prepared to do the work required for such a metamorphosis? Ah, there’s the rub. Loathe as I am to admit it, Lawrence may be right. We are what we are. Few of us have the will to change our fundamental nature. And that means even a visit to Zanzibar wouldn’t change mine.
—from the diary of Lady Caroline Lovell, who would still like to give Zanzibar a try.
The supper dance had started by the time Lawrence and Caroline followed Horatia back into the drawing room. Couples were gliding around the dance floor in a waltz. He wished he could pull Caroline out onto the gleaming hardwood with him. It would have been a poor substitute for kissing her in the garden, but at least he’d still have been able to hold her.