But for now, she had nothing. Absolutely nothing except for an impossible mountain of debts and her relative anonymity in this massive city. She was invisible to just about everybody, and that was exactly how she preferred it.
She knew full well that the debt collectors would not rest until they were settled, which would take many years, if ever. She knew that they would soon be in London to look for her, if they were not there already. She fully expected that they had sources in London looking for her, or waiting for the merest hint or rumor of her.
Time was not on her side, so all she had, for the present, was her invisibility.
Oh, Colin, she thought, as she often did and had so often done before, what do I do?
But, as always, there were no answers from him, and she was on her own to formulate a plan.
So focused on her situation and lost in her thoughts was she that she did not notice the bustling of the streets, nor anything except the path before her, and she quite suddenly found herself slammed against another person, one much larger and stronger than she. It was all she could do to avoid toppling over, and his hands on her arms was the only balance she had.
“I beg your pardon, please excuse me,” said the man, and she felt her stomach clench in apprehension of the face she was about to see.
Colin.
Against her will, she looked up, her hands very innocently resting on his forearms for balance, though she was now quite steady in that respect.
The power in his blue eyes caused a fire to sear her hands, seeming to burn through the thick gloves where she touched him.
His eyes were wide as they met hers. “You…” he finally breathed.
She swallowed a cry and prayed her composure would remain intact. It was sheer agony seeing him in the flesh now when she had just been clinging to her memory of him. But the reality of him… She could not move, could barely breathe.
“I knew it was you,” Colin said softly, his hands still at her arms, ignorant as to her torment. “I knew I had not imagined you.”
She could not bear this. “Excuse me.” She dropped her hands and tried to go around.
He held her fast in place. “No, you are not excused, wait a second.”
“No, sir, you are mistaken, please let me pass.” Panic was beginning to rise within her. She was not yet able to steel herself against him, had no defenses, and absolutely no strength to draw upon.
Still he held her. “I am never mistaken. I know you and you know it.”
“No, sir, you do not, now please!” Her voice was becoming shrill and they would draw attention soon. He would not let her go, she knew it, so she closed her eyes and stomped with all of her might, driving that slight heel of the too-small shoe into his toes.
He grunted in pain and released her, and she dashed around him.
But he recovered quickly, and called after her, “Susannah Merritt, whatever are you doing in London after all these years?”
She halted suddenly and whirled, horrified at his volume, his identification of her, and how her name on his lips still made her heart dance. Her traitorous heart pounded against her ribs, an unsteady cadence of pain and fear, worrying at who might have heard, and what sort of emotions the man before her was engulfed in.
Without thinking, without even considering it, she rushed forward and stopped a hair’s breadth from him. “Do not call me that. Do not even speak to me,” she rasped fiercely, her words more of a sob than anything else. “Forget you saw me. Forget everything. Please.” That last word had come out as a plea, begging him, and herself, to forget him, and them, and all possibilities that had ever lain therein.
His face was one of utter confusion, anger, surprise, and yes, curiosity. But his eyes were pure ice in their assessment of her, and she could not bear it.
She took advantage of his frigid silence, and whirled around again, dashing between people and buildings and carriages, desperate to disappear into their depths. She was grateful for the crowds, for the inability of London’s finest to notice anything, and for her invisibility.
On and on she ran, tears burning her eyes. She was panting, hardly able to catch her breath, and her legs ached furiously. She did not hear any sort of pursuit, but she did not stop until she had reached her building.
Rather than enter, she moved to the alley just beside, leaned against the brick, and let her sobs finally be freed, covering her mouth to stifle the depth and despair of her cries.
Colin walked back towards his house slowly, every step dragging as if weighted down by chains. He had stood there in the street for so long he had begun to draw comment, but none of those even remotely registered in his mind. He could not acknowledge a single person, let alone their questions or teasings or flirtations.
He could not do anything except stare at the place where Susannah had disappeared.
Eventually, he had come to himself and turned around to go back the way he had come, whatever his purpose or errand had been entirely forgotten. And was now completely irrelevant.
So. She was here. He had not imagined her the other day. That was a slight comfort, as he had never before devised her appearance so vividly. But it was also the single most disconcerting thing he had ever known in his life.
He was angry. How dare she invade his life in this manner when he was already experiencing so much turmoil. And with her return into his world, she brought along painful memories that he had spent years burying. But all was forced to the surface now, the wounds as raw and exposed as the day he sustained them.
Anger had never been a sensible thing for him, and that had just been made evident again. His rage outstripped his good taste and behaviors, and bared its fangs in the light of day. Perhaps it was for the best.
What angered him the most was how beautiful she still was. Why could she not have grown ugly and old and fat and wrinkled in the intervening years since they last met? It would have given him a righteous sense of justice to see her so altered, and he would have felt no qualms whatsoever about hating her all these years. But no, she was not so altered. She was more beautiful than she had been at sixteen, which seemed so impossible to comprehend that he was sure he had conjured that by sheer imagination.
The pounding of his heart still informed him that he was not immune to her looks now any more than he had ever been, despite his current emotional cacophony. And for that, he was livid with himself.
In the midst of his overwhelming anger, there was also, he had to admit, a hint of curiosity. Perhaps confusion would have been a better word, but he was curious, as he usually was. The woman he had just seen had been on the verge of a torrent of emotions that he did not dare attempt to filter through. He had seen it in her eyes, in the shaking of her frame, the change in her tone… Even now, he could read her as easily as he had before. And her expression when he had called after her, impertinent and juvenile as it was on his part…
It had been the look of sheer and utter terror, and it had frozen his heart in his chest. And never, in all the years he had known her, had she ever spoken to him in that way.
What in the world could possibly have caused such fear in her? What had happened to make her change so? Why was she hiding? He could very well understand hiding from him, as she certainly had to know that seeing her would give him no pleasure. But she seemed to be hiding from everyone and everything, and Susannah had never been particularly shy or retreating.
The contradiction between the two versions of her had his mind reeling.
But then, fifteen years was a long time. A great many changes could have occurred.
Not that it mattered to him, he insisted to himself as he re-entered his home. He could not have cared less about Susannah Merritt, or whoever she was now, and had absolutely no interest in her being in London, in her life for the last fifteen years, or in what manner she had changed.
She was nothing to him now.
But he could not keep from wondering.
He was distracted for a time by Bitty, whose merr
y greeting of him prompted further questioning, leading to the admission that she had lost Rosie’s comb and would pay dearly for it if she could not find it quickly. Dutiful as ever, Colin considered himself recruited for the search party.
Having sisters was proving quite a trial. Thankfully, he discovered he had a maid in his home who had many younger siblings of her own, and she was more than happy to look after the girls until they settled on a more permanent solution. They were adjusting well, and Rosie claimed to only have gotten lost four times in the house, though he suspected it was closer to ten. Even so, he was surprised at how much he wanted them to feel as though they belonged, as if this were truly their home now.
He let Bitty take his hand and they began to walk from room to room in search of the troublesome comb, avoiding Rosie when they had to, and looking high and low for their quarry. Bitty chattered animatedly the entire time, and it surprised Colin that never once did he find himself bored or irritated by it.
It was an entirely new world that he had entered, and as yet, neither he nor Kit had ruined anything. Even so, he thanked the heavens that his friends would arrive in a few days, and was even more grateful that their wives were coming. He needed guidance on these children, and there was no way he and Kit could do this alone.
In spite of his current desperate search for the comb, and in spite of his chatterbox little sister, yet again his mind wandered, and wondered, and the topic of his mind’s occupation made him more curious than the fact that he was curious did.
And that, indeed, was a curious thing.
Chapter Five
Can I help you with something, sir?”
He barely heard the question, and had a bit of trouble processing the words.
“Sir? Do you require some assistance?”
Now it was firm, and a little louder.
Daft little bird, he was hardly deaf.
“Erm… are you lost, sir? I can help you with whatever you are looking for.”
Colin finally looked up at the soft, rather confused tone of the young woman who had approached him. She was a pretty little thing. He would have noticed that a long time ago, had he been the man he once was. He would have already flirted with her, complimented a dozen or more of her features, spoken words of semi-original poetry, made her giggle, and have her doing him all sorts of favors, some of which might have gotten her fired from employ. Not for indecency, mind, but because it was bad for business.
Now, however, all he could do was smile very blandly and respond, “No, thank you.”
Her smile was rather quizzical, and she gave him a look, no doubt a chance to change his mind.
Impertinent chit, he thought rather harshly when she finally turned and walked away. Why did it matter to her that he did not need help?
He scowled and moved to another part of the shop, looking without really seeing.
Then it hit him. She was perfectly right to repeatedly ask if he needed assistance, and to question his answer. Here he was, a grown man of thirty-two, perusing the items for sale in a modiste shop. And he had been doing so in the stocking section.
With no care for who might see, he clapped himself very soundly on the forehead. He had been completely unaware of where he was or what he was doing, and was two paces short of losing his ruddy mind! What in the world had gotten into him?
An involuntary glower darkened his features as he was brought back to it, yet again, for what had to be the thousandth time today.
Susannah.
Even her name, the mere thought of it, made him bristle and it was all he could do to keep from snarling.
Three days since he had seen her, had spoken to her, and in those three days, she had become his obsession. He had hardly slept, and when he had managed it, his dreams had been plagued with images of her, as she had been and as she was now, and imagining all that had lain between the times. His curiosity bordered on lunacy now, and the secret was dangerously close to coming out.
His sisters had noticed his moods, and the poor things had been confused by his sudden darkness and indifference. They had grown used to his cheerful, teasing, carefree self; they could not reconcile that brother with the one before them. He’d even heard that Bitty had gone to Kit the next time Rosie threatened her. Kit, of all people! It was madness, complete and utter madness.
His guilt knew no bounds where they were concerned. He owed them all his attention and all his efforts, not some mindless and useless lump of a man that ignored them. They already had that in a father, and no one needed to be reminded of that, least of all girls so young.
For pity’s sake, even Tibby had noticed his change, and that was something he did not need at all. It was quite the blessing that she was so involved with the girls and their needs and desires and making them feel at home, or else she might have focused on him entirely and that was one inquisition that he would be powerless against. If England ever needed aid in interrogation, they would have no greater asset than Lady Tabitha Raeburn.
So irritated had she been by his behavior this morning, when he was supposed to be watching and appreciating the girls’ newly acquired dancing skills, that she banished him from the house, his own house, to fetch the new clothing items from the modiste. And so out of sorts was he that he did not fight her, could not even muster up the effort to protest.
That, he was sure, terrified his sisters. Rosie watched him go, wide-eyed and gaping. He could hardly meet her gaze. Bitty had been close to tears, and he had been sentient enough to reach out and tousle her curls in some show of comfort. And Ginny had latched onto his leg and asked if she could come. He had picked her up, kissed her nose, and said no, which she had not cared for at all.
Even Tibby, quite the consummate actress herself, had been aghast. He could see she had not meant to be serious, the dresses were due to be delivered by carriage later that day, along with the items from the milliners, haberdashers, and who knew where else. She had never expected him to obey her now when he never had before. Her worried expression, unabashed and open, showed him just how dire his situation was.
It was hardly his fault he was so tossed about. Everything, every single pang of guilt and twinge of conscience, could lie squarely and completely upon the slender shoulders of Miss Susannah Merritt, as was. And he would quite happily layer each and every one upon them.
Except some small, but mighty portion of whatever semblance of heart he possessed pounded a steady cadence of betrayal quite angrily against his ribs. Lies. It was all lies, and he knew it.
Oh, he was furious, and quite rightly so. Anybody in the world would side with him on that one, he could safely say that. Anyone who had ever thought themselves in love, or found themselves spurned, or both, would have handed him pitchforks and cheered for his cause. He suspected it would be at least two-thirds of London, and that did not count those in various other parts of the country currently hiding from such pain.
No, he could be angry. He could be angry, upset, and confused. He could demand answers or some sort of explanation. He could refuse to see her, not include her on guest lists, and be undeniably cold when unfortunately confronted by her.
All of that he could do.
What he could not do was entirely blame Susannah for being the chief occupant of his thoughts, and the sole topic of his focus. Hadn’t she always been thus? It was her rightfully earned place within him.
It was not her fault he was going mad because of her. That was his own doing.
And blast his interfering curiosity, and his indomitable will, he could not let it go.
He growled in frustration and rubbed at the place on his brow he had hit. What was he doing here again?
Right. The dresses.
He looked around the room, trying to discern if that sweet little assistant was still fluttering about, knowing he would get far more out of her than he would the proprietor of this fine establishment. Older women never cared as much for his charm, despite his best efforts.
The bell of the door chi
med as it opened, and he looked around again to see if the girl would reappear. Surely for the sake of good service, she would have to.
He frowned when nothing happened.
He moved towards the large counter and shelves he saw in a rather poor position in a far corner of the room. Really, whoever constructed the layout and positioning of this place had a very pitiable idea of natural flow and ease of access. Why, he would never have found it at all if he had not been as tall as he was and diligently searching with his keen eye for detail. Not that it mattered, there was no one at the desk to assist anyone at all, let alone the only other patron, who was now heading towards it.
Her plain bonnet was cast down a bit, so she could hardly have seen where she was going well. If she did not mind her footing, she was going to topple over a rather trim mannequin. Suspicious and ever watchful for potential moments of heroism before young ladies, he made his way to possibly intercept the imminent disaster.
Sure enough, she barged headlong into it, and down it began to fall, destined to crash into yet another poorly placed item, a display of ribbons and lace. But, thanks to his fast reflexes and impeccable timing, Colin was instantly there to catch said falling mannequin and thus save the hopefully fair maiden from distress and humiliation.
“That was close,” he said softly with a laugh, his easy rakish demeanor sliding perfectly into form.
“Thank you, sir,” came the relieved reply.
His heart skidded to a halt as he righted the mannequin, straightening himself and stiffening his spine.
Fate was truly unkind.
Slowly, he turned his head only, coldness enveloping him like fog. “Susannah,” he said with all the tautness in his being.
Her blue-green eyes widened and she mouthed his name. If it were possible, she was paler than the last time he had seen her, and she paled still before his eyes. She turned and ran, but this time he was ready for her flight, and caught her arm in a firm grip.
The Burdens of a Bachelor (Arrangements, Book 5) Page 5