by Kelly Boyce
But he hadn’t. He hadn’t risked it.
“You never act rashly,” she said, as if reading his mind. “Everything you do gets mulled over and thought out, all the pros and cons weighed and considered. I don’t mean it as a criticism. This is an admirable quality under most circumstances, but the heart does not know of pros and cons. It knows what it wants and understands that sometimes you need to take a risk!” She pressed a fisted hand against her breast.
How dull she must think him. How cowardly. Yet he could not refute her claim. He did think first and act second. He could not help it. Such thinking had been his mainstay since he’d had to fend for himself in the volatile household of the MacCumbers. Any rash nature he’d once possessed had been carefully tucked away, every step he made thereafter planned and executed out of necessity and survival.
It was this careful control that kept him from declaring his feelings for her. Such rashness would only result in ruination for one or both of them. Especially now. Yet, here she stood, taking him to task for it.
But what did she know of such things? He did not expect her to understand the control he needed to hold things together. To keep from giving into his feelings and taking what he wanted, heedless of the outcome, caring little for the hurt it would cause in the long term.
“It is you who do not understand.” He took a step toward her. Just one. No more.
She swiped at the tears and smeared mud across her cheek. “What don’t I understand, Marcus? That you prefer to live in the safe little world you’ve created for yourself, thinking and mulling and refusing any risk that might upset your carefully constructed apple cart. You didn’t care enough for me to even try. I thought you might have, but your abhorrence of risk far outweighed any feelings you had for me.”
Another step. “That’s not the way it was.”
The memory of it, every breath, every touch, every second had burned itself into his memory and refused to leave no matter how often he tried to banish it. He hadn’t set her aside because he feared the risk. He had set her aside to protect her from the consequences. Society would never countenance a match between the two of them. She would be whispered about, maligned, shunned by the only world she knew. He could not do that to her.
Another step.
“Then tell me,” she said. “Tell me the way of it.”
But he didn’t. He couldn’t. “And what of you? You take me to task for my decisions, but what of yours, chasing after Lord Selward with a desperation that does not become you.” She gasped and he should have stopped but he didn’t. “Do you love him so much that you are willing to risk your own safety—your life—to gain his attentions? And for what?”
“For—” She stopped. Hesitated. Why? What was she holding back? There had to be something. Something that explained why someone as vibrant and alive as Rebecca would trade her future happiness for the title of Countess and marriage to a man who did not possess one iota of the passion he’d discovered when she kissed him.
“What is it? Tell me.”
“He is a means to an end!”
Whatever he had expected, it wasn’t that. “A what?”
She shook her head. “It is Father’s will. There are stipulations in it that I must adhere to or Mother and I lose everything.”
The air stilled around him. The daily noises outside on the street beyond went silent and blood thrummed in his veins.
“Then…you don’t love him?”
She glanced down at the tip of her shoes where mud caked at the toes. “No. I thought I did, in the beginning. But then I got to know him and…” Her voice trailed off and she shrugged.
“Then why marry him?”
“Father’s will states that I must marry a titled lord, or his first son. If I do not, all of his unentailed property, which was to be part of my dowry, will go to his mistress.” She said the last word with a twist of her lips. Nick had told him of the late Earl’s mistress, though not the specific details of the will that could leave her with such a boon should Rebecca not capitulate to her father’s wishes. The late Lord Blackbourne had always been a bastard determined to control everyone around him, but attaching such conditions to his will, forcing his daughter into a life she did not want, went beyond cruel.
Worse still that Marcus could do nothing to save her from it. He did not possess the necessary title. Lord Selward did. Knots twisted in his stomach and a sense of abject helplessness invaded his veins.
He stepped closer to offer comfort. It was all he had.
“But why Selward? Can you not find a gentleman more suited to you?”
“I did,” she told him, glancing up so he saw the sheen of tears in her eyes and his heart squeezed, caught in the talons of fate as it mocked him without mercy. “But he did not want me.”
Except that he had. Did still. He wanted her with every ounce of his being and then some. He wanted her in a way that went beyond the physical and settled in the deepest recesses of his heart. He wanted her body, mind and soul. But he could not have her. Not then and especially not now.
“Either way,” she said. “I do not have the luxury of time. Father’s will states I must marry before my next birthday.”
“But that’s only three months away.”
She nodded. Likely she had it down to the day, the hour. “I do not have time to begin a courtship anew. I need to convince Lord Selward—”
“But your brother will take care of you—” He would take care of her, though perhaps not in the grand style she was accustomed to, but she shook her head before he finished speaking.
“Neither Mother nor I wish to be a burden, a poor relation, dependent on Nicholas for every crumb we eat and every new dress we buy. I know he would do it without hesitation and nary a blink and I love him all the more for it, but it’s more than that. Much of the unentailed property came to Father through Mother’s dowry. She gave up much to marry Father and now, with her family gone, this is all that’s left of her history, her memories. I cannot stand by and watch her lose it—especially to this mistress. Not if it is in my power to prevent it.”
Determination blazed in the silver of her eyes as she spoke each word with conviction and purpose. Marcus had never admired her courage more. Or hated it in equal measure. But surely Lady Blackbourne would not expect this of her only daughter.
He closed the gap between them, hoping to make her see sense, to understand there had to be another way that didn’t involve her bartering her future for brick and mortar, or someone else’s memories.
He lifted a hand and brushed at the trail of tears that had begun to dry on her cheek. “Would your mother consign you to a life with Selward in order to hang onto these memories?”
“No. She would never ask such a thing. But I am not doing it because she asked, I am doing it because she deserves better than what she had. Because I cannot live with the guilt knowing my failure took it away from her. That is why I requested your assistance in procuring a proposal from Lord Selward. I would not have involved you otherwise, but I needed someone I trusted.”
He hated to see her like this, planning her future out with clear, calculated logic as if life was meant to be lived in a step-by-step fashion; things falling into place simply because one had planned it.
Though wasn’t he guilty of that too? Hadn’t he done the same thing before a knife had sliced into his gut and taught him that all the plans in the world, all the careful, calculated logic meant nothing? That fate had its own plan and cared little for the desires of mere mortals.
Marcus wanted to say more, to somehow convince her she was in the wrong; that there was another way, but there wasn’t. Even as his mind sped through and cast out scenario after implausible scenario, the truth of it could not be refuted. She had set her course and he could offer nothing to remove her from it.
His thumb caressed her cheekbone. “If I were a lord, I would—”
She took his hand and brought it to her lips, pressing her mouth against the backs of his finge
rs. A sad smile pulled at the corners of her mouth but not enough to stop the slight tremble in her lower lip. “I know. If you were, I would let you.”
And that was all that was said. No declarations, no irrefutable statements. Just a deep understanding that what had started with a kiss a year ago—perhaps even before—had quietly built into an unbreakable bond. Piece by piece, day by day. But in the end, even that could not save them. Save her. Fate, it seemed, would not be denied.
Hang fate.
Marcus slipped his hand from hers and tilted her chin to capture her mouth. Memories paled in comparison the reality of her lips on his, moving, searching. She gasped but did not pull away, then her body leaned into him and he wrapped her in his arms wishing he could protect her from the future that awaited her. He kissed her with a desperation that burned through every vein in his body and pulsed with every beat of his heart.
His hand buried in her hair and held her there, heedless of the mud and muck that clung to her dress and stained his own clothing. He teased her, tasted her and she responded in kind, quick to learn, to let her own passionate nature free of its constraints until they were both locked in an embrace he had dreamed of for the past year. Heat raged through his body like a river after the rain, washing everything else away—the room, the mud, the past, the future. All of it evaporated until there was only this moment, this kiss. This woman.
“Rebecca!”
Lady Blackbourne’s voice carried down the long hallway and reached Marcus from far away, breaking through the fever ravaging his brain and body. He pulled away, resting his forehead against hers as their breaths came in gulps. She grabbed his wrist where his hand cupped her face and clung to him with a significance he understood. He wanted to save her. She wished he could.
Marry me.
He wanted to say the words, but stayed his tongue. She could not. Would not.
For several long heartbeats they stood as they were, staring at each other. Sadness and the remnants of passion imprinted across her lovely features.
“I am sorry,” she whispered. She moved slightly and pressed her lips against his cheek, then quickly stepped away. He shivered from her absence as if he’d been tossed into the cool water of the Thames. She hurried from the room, toward the mother she meant to save, regardless of the expense to herself.
He let her go, unable to offer anything that would stop her.
Chapter Nine
September 20th
How appreciative I am for the wind the sea brings in each day as the last of the summer heat beats down without compromise. The unholy illness that gripped me early on has abated for the most part, though I find myself so very tired most days. The swelling has begun to show and I have had to let out my dresses. Mother has said little, but I catch her watching me when she thinks I do not see. Sometimes with sadness, other times with regret. I despise the worry and upset I have caused her. I wish I could make it go away. If only she knew how much. How it haunts me every time I shut my eyes. But I cannot speak to her of it. And I cannot undo what was done. Oh, how I wish I could.
* * *
The diary entry struck close to home. Marcus’s own despair mirrored that of the young woman’s and he understood only too well the price of folly, the understanding that once it was done there was no going back.
He should not have kissed Rebecca, but if he expected regret to wash over him, he’d be waiting a long time. What if he hadn’t stopped? What if her mother had not called from down the hall and interrupted them? Would he have come to his senses, stopped the madness that had engulfed them in that moment?
No.
He closed the journal.
What had he been thinking?
He hadn’t. Thought had never entered into it. Anger, relief, fear—those were the emotions running riot through him when he’d taken her into his arms and lowered his mouth to hers.
And need.
Yes, need. He’d needed her. Needed to touch her. Needed to convince her to not throw her life away on Selward.
But to what end? He was not a lord and there was not a damn thing he could do to change that one, simple fact. No matter the money in his bank accounts or the land offered him by Lord Franklyn. No matter that he had the loyal friendship of her brother and Spence. No matter that her mother and Lord and Lady Ellesmere considered him a part of their family.
He was not a lord.
He pushed the journal away until it butted up against the deed to Northill Hall that still rested on the table. He had yet to return it. Yet to refuse Lord Franklyn’s offer of the property for the paltry sum of one pound. Pride had kept him from signing the documents, though now pride seemed cold comfort. He had accused Rebecca of not taking a true risk, yet neither had he. Not really. He railed at the restlessness that had plagued him these past few months and yet balked at the solution only a mere signature away.
He made excuses. He owed his loyalty to Lord Ellesmere for all he’d been given. He had responsibilities. He loved his work. The list went on and on. But the truth of it was, he was afraid. He had fallen into the unknown before and the memories of it plagued him to this day.
Sometimes you need to take a risk.
Did he dare?
His fingers toyed with the edge of the documents before he pushed them away with an angry breath. What was the point? He had nothing to risk for. Tomorrow he would return the papers to Lord Franklyn with his regrets.
Tomorrow for certain.
“Sir?”
Marcus glanced up to where Fenton, the Ellesmere butler, hovered at the door. The man moved with the silence of a wraith. “Yes, Fenton?”
“A Mr. Cosgrove is here to see you? He came through the servants’ entrance.” Fenton said the words as if they meant nothing, but the one raised eyebrow spoke volumes with respect to his curiosity over the matter of why Lord Ellesmere’s man of business would be entertaining a servant in the middle of the day. Or any time of the day for that matter, given the hiring of household servants was left to the providence of Fenton and Mrs. Faraday.
“Please show him in and have tea and refreshments brought.” He hadn’t eaten since breakfast and his stomach gnawed at him with distinct displeasure.
Fenton’s eyebrows slowly lowered and he nodded once before retreating down the hallway. Or, at least Marcus assumed he had, as no footsteps were actually heard. Did the man wrap his shoes in cotton cloth?
Mr. Cosgrove arrived a moment later, his hat clenched tightly in one hand—his only hand. The space where his other arm should have been remained empty, the sleeve of his suit neatly folded and pinned.
Marcus blinked, unsure if he should withdraw his own where he’d held it out to shake with Mr. Cosgrove, but before he could, the former Walkerton steward tucked the hat beneath his existing arm in a deft movement and extended his hand. He possessed a strong grip. There was nothing frail about the older man, save for a slight frame and the hint of gauntness that showed under the arc of his cheekbones before being swallowed up by a well-trimmed, snow-white beard. It appeared he had made an attempt to tame the thick waves of hair that drifted around his head like a cloud, but they were less willing to comply.
“I shall assume by the surprise on your face that Miss Caldwell did not forewarn you I lacked an appendage.”
The man’s voice sounded as if it scratched over sand on its way out of his throat and a rumble waited just beyond. Though his tone carried a deep sense of wisdom within it, humor lingered behind his blue eyes.
“She did not,” Marcus admitted. He waved to the table near the window. “Please, have a seat.”
His mind worked quickly, discerning whether the lack of an arm would be of much concern, but as he had not yet determined whether or not he planned on hiring the man, he let the matter drop. It wasn’t just the man’s ability to work that interested him, but his former employer as well.
Mr. Cosgrove settled himself into one of the chairs at the table by the window and Marcus took the one across from him. Upon closer in
spection, the telltale signs of wear and tear were evident on the man’s suit. The cuff of his jacket hand worn thin and signs of darning showed in other areas, though the work had been expertly done and barely noticeable until one was up close. Regardless of the state of his clothing, which belied the hard times he’d fallen upon, Cosgrove carried himself with pride, unbroken by his circumstances. It spoke volumes to the man’s character in Marcus’s estimation and he took an instant liking to him.
“Can I assume the lack of appendage is the reason Lord Walkerton chose not to reinstate you upon your return from service to our country?”
“That is the reason he gave.” His answer left the impression there was more to the story that went unsaid.
“How did you lose it?”
“During a skirmish, my unit was ambushed. We managed to prevail but we lost many a good man, and I my arm, after being shot. Infection had set in and I was given the choice to lose my arm or my life. I had a young daughter at the time. I did not think she’d take kindly to me dying, so I told them to take my arm.”
“And it cost you your livelihood.”
Cosgrove neither confirmed nor denied the claim. “I’ve managed to pick up work here and there, but most people see the missing limb and assume I am unable to perform a job. I have managed to scrape by, though it has been tough at times, I won’t lie. My daughter has been forced to find employment instead of a proper husband so that we can keep food in our bellies and a roof over our heads.”
“And your wife?”
“Gone. Madalene, my daughter, stayed with her aunt until my return from the war, but the aunt has since passed on as well. It is just the two of us now.”
“And you are hoping to find steady work?”
“As any honorable man should. Madalene’s a good girl. She deserves a better life than living hand to mouth. There have been times, I’m ashamed to say, that I have resorted to begging on the streets to put food on the table when decent work could not be found. But I am determined to find a permanent position. Maddie is but twenty and pretty as a summer’s day. I won’t see her life go to waste if it is in my power to prevent it”