by Georgie Lee
‘And there was nothing you could do for them.’ It wasn’t an accusation, but a statement of support and tenderness which almost crushed him. He didn’t deserve her or anyone else’s pity for what he’d failed to do.
‘No. I’d stitched captains back together, saved unconscious seamen from being pitched overboard by proving they were still alive, but there’d been nothing I could do for my sister or her poor babe.’
‘It’s not your fault they died,’ she offered as if hearing all the regrets and second guesses which continued to torture him.
He’d spent too many nights contemplating if he should have done something different, tried some procedure he’d read about. He still wondered if he could have saved one or the other, or both of their lives if he’d been less cautious in his treatment. ‘I’m not so sure. Neither is Rupert and sometimes, I suspect, my mother.’
‘Not her. She’s too kind.’
He closed the book on castles and the gilded title caught the sunlight from the window behind him. ‘She never talks about Leticia.’
‘Most mothers do so love their daughters. It must be difficult to realise she’s gone.’
‘It is, for both of us. Leticia was my greatest supporter. She was the one who first found Mr Berkshire. She pursued him for weeks, begging him to read my manuscripts, the ones she used to critique and edit. He finally gave in to her just so she’d stop pestering him.’ He smiled at the memory of Mr Berkshire blustering on in faux outrage during their first meeting while Warren had been on leave. Leticia had beamed at the publisher’s compliments about her tenaciousness and Warren’s gratitude for it. The humour in the memory left him and he pressed his fingertips into the top of the desk, bracing himself against defeat. ‘She believed in me when I needed it the most. Then, when she needed me, I failed her.’
‘You told me the night you helped Lady Ellington there’s very little medical men can do except patch people up and hope they survive.’
‘Most of the time they don’t.’
‘But sometimes they do. I’m sure there are many sailors who are still alive because of what you did for them.’ Marianne studied him like the apparition he’d once seen aboard ship in the middle of a fever—an angel of strength with a hint of vulnerability beneath her gossamer silk. A vision like Miss Domville was the reason why men believed in mermaids. They were peace.
‘Yes, there are.’ The faces of seamen who’d left his sick bay to return to their lives or their stations trickled through his thoughts. He had made a difference to some men, and in the end, through his hard work, to his and his mother’s lives. He smiled at Marianne, amazed at how, when he’d been so determined to help her, she was the one helping him. Whatever man she decided to finally reveal her full self to would be lucky. Despite all his protestations about avoiding distraction, at this moment he very much wished to be the one she chose.
‘Enough of my tales of woe.’ He shoved his experiences into the dark hold in his mind and beamed at her like he did his admiring readers, refusing to ruin their time together with all his misery. ‘It’s your beautiful music I want to hear today.’
She cocked her head at him as if to say she wouldn’t forget what he’d told her, or allow him to evade revealing more of himself in the future. ‘Weren’t you listening to me play while you wrote? Isn’t it the whole reason I’m here?’
No, not the whole reason.
It was becoming more difficult to lie to her and himself. ‘May I see your composition book?’
She clutched the ink tighter, as if he’d asked to peek under her petticoat. ‘Why?’
‘I’m curious. I’ve been listening to you all morning. I want to see what you’ve accomplished.’
‘What have you accomplished?’
He picked up his manuscript and held it out to her. ‘Five chapters. Not an entire novel, but it soon will be. I’ll let you read it when it’s done if you’ll let me see your composition book.’
She waved away his manuscript and with an ‘as you wish’ shrug made for the music room, making it clear he was to follow. He didn’t mind. From behind, he caught the faint outline of her figure from the light coming in the window filtering through her dress. It emphasised the tempting curve of her hips and the slenderness of her waist. She approached the Érard, set the ink next to the composition book on the stand and sat at the keyboard.
He stopped in the middle of the room. Lancelot rested at his feet while Marianne posed one foot over the pedal. Her bearing was as alluring as the arch of her neck beneath the loose blonde curls brushing the nape. He trilled his fingers on his arms where he crossed them, wanting to sweep her skin with his lips and savour the sweet melody of her sighs.
Unaware of the desire for her more than her talent making him shift on his feet, she spread out her long fingers over the keys. Her hands slid across the black and white, drawing from the instrument something of her soul. The beauty of it drowned out everything—his story, his grief, even his desire for her. Her music was no longer something to fill the background while he worked. It was everything and each note wrapped around him like he wished her shapely arms would do.
The complexity of the composition reminded him of her experiences with the world. She’d suffered more of its ugliness than she deserved, just as he had in the Navy. Her loneliness rang in the mournful bass beneath the treble. It reminded him of the creaking timbers and snapping sails during the dark nights when he used to stand at the balustrade staring out at the darkness. The overwhelming solitude of the sea crept into a man’s soul like the damp did everything aboard ship. Even now, late at night when he rose to stare out at the dark gardens or stood in the midst of a London crowd, he sometimes shivered with the memory of it.
She hadn’t shaken her isolation either. She knew what it was like to be alone among many, to carry sadness like buckets of seawater, never able to scrub away the past. Someone so young and innocent didn’t deserve to suffer the way he had during his first days in the Navy. He would make her happy, see her smile not with stoic reserve but the unrestrained joy of a young lady. In freeing her from her past, he might forget his too.
* * *
Marianne never once turned to look at Warren, confident he was there. She couldn’t tell him how difficult it had been to be torn from the Protestant School and Mrs Nichols. She couldn’t express how much it seared her heart when the letter from the Smiths had arrived after Madame de Badeau’s scandal. If it hadn’t been for Lady Ellington holding her while she’d cried, the piece she played would be darker and uglier.
Marianne moved into a more chilling stanza, her fear even this great lady would eventually leave her echoing down the length of the piano wires. There was nothing binding Lady Ellington to her any more than there had been the Smiths or the Nichols. Unlike them, Lady Ellington wasn’t paid to care for her, she just did. Marianne feared Lady Ellington’s regard would one day turn to disgust and she’d be as alone and wretched as she had been in Madame de Badeau’s house. Lady Ellington was the one bright light in her life, until she’d met Warren.
Moving to a softer portion of the piece, she threw a subtle glance over her shoulder. She could see nothing more than the silhouette of Warren near the windows at the edge of her vision. He listened in respectful silence, not interrupting or intruding into the undefined space which enveloped her while she played. Even without seeing his expression, she knew he didn’t listen with leering amusement as though she were an overly adorned Cyprian, but because he wanted to hear what she couldn’t express in words.
She almost snatched her hands off the keyboard and ceased to play. Even without seeing his expression, she knew he heard the deeper meaning beneath each carefully chosen note just as she’d empathised with his pain over his sister and all he’d endured in the Royal Navy. She might not have witnessed the smoke and bloodshed of battle, but she’d fought her own war against the vile men
and women who’d demeaned her for years. Like him, she’d experienced the grief of being ripped away from someone who’d cared for her. Mrs Nichols hadn’t died like Leticia, but after the Peace of Amiens had failed and the blockade had ended all correspondence with France, it was as if she had passed away.
Marianne played for his anguish and hers, but with a hope they could overcome it. She drew strength from his presence and touched each key with passion, putting all of herself into the music until at last she reached the end and the final note vibrated into nothing.
He didn’t clap or compliment her, but came to sit beside her on the bench. Lancelot remained where he was on the rug. The cold tones of her piece faded under the heat of Warren’s arm next to hers. She turned to him and admired the serenity which softened the lines at the corner of his mouth. They didn’t speak, as raw and open to one another as if they were naked. The vulnerability didn’t frighten Marianne or make her raise her defences like some kind of drawbridge to shut him out. He laid his hand over hers where it rested between them on the bench. His pulse beat a steady tune against her skin, drawing her to him like the Érard did every day.
She turned her hand over and curled her fingers around his. The peace and safety which filled her at Lady Ellington’s swept through her. There was no reason to fear Warren, not with her person or her heart. With him, she wouldn’t be alone. It was as terrifying as it was exhilarating, like his leaning towards her. She titled her face up to his and closed her eyes.
The meeting of their lips struck her as hard as the first time she’d heard an accomplished organist perform Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. She’d never willingly surrendered to a man’s affection, determined to remain in control of her urges and her body in a manner Madame de Badeau had failed to master. Today, she tossed it all aside as Warren slid his hand along her jaw. She shifted closer to him, raising her arm so his free one could wrap around her waist and pull her tighter against him. The press of his chest against hers and the weight of his breath across her cheeks was as glorious as the fine silk of a new dress.
She rested her hand on his arm, marvelling at the hardness of his muscle beneath the linen. It wasn’t the strength of a Navy surgeon who could wield a saw, but the writer who spent every day dedicated to his craft. He didn’t work for only fame and notoriety, but for the safety of his family and a home no one could take from him. She wanted to slip into the circle of his comfort and protection, forget everything he’d told her in the other room and all she’d conveyed in her music. None of it mattered except him and the peace of his embrace.
It didn’t last.
‘Warren, are you in here? Your mother said you were working.’ A man’s voice broke the quiet. Marianne stiffened beneath Warren as the sound of boots on the adjoining study floor banged through the stillness. ‘Where are you?’
* * *
‘Damn it,’ Warren cursed as he jumped to his feet and hurried to the far side of the instrument. He placed as much distance as he could between them before Rupert strolled in as though he owned the house.
‘What are you doing here?’ Rupert took in the room with amazement. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in here.’
His curious gaze fell on Marianne. Her once-languid spine had gone stiff beneath Rupert’s interested gleam. There was nothing else about her, not a touch of colour in her face or the nervous casting down of her eyes to suggest there’d been anything more going on than her playing for Warren. It still wasn’t enough to put Rupert off.
‘Good afternoon.’ Rupert bowed to her, his greeting more salacious than salutary.
‘What are you doing here?’ Warren demanded. No introduction was necessary. They’d met at Lady Cartwright’s.
‘Now there’s a warm reception,’ Rupert complained before he focused again on Marianne, or more correctly, her chest. ‘Miss Domville, it’s a pleasure to see you again. I hadn’t expected it to be at Priorton.’
‘Where did you expect it to be?’ Her question was as sharp as it was challenging, but it failed to knock the cocky arrogance out of Rupert.
‘Not with Warren.’
‘Miss Domville is an accomplished pianist. Mother invited her to play the Érard.’ The excuse for her being here sounded about as convincing as the ones the schoolboys used to tell his father after arriving late to lessons.
‘You should come and play for me some time. I’d very much like to enjoy your well-developed talent too,’ Rupert sniggered.
‘Shut your mouth, Rupert.’ Warren rounded the curved back of the piano and placed himself between Marianne and his brother-in-law. ‘When you’re in my house you’ll act like a gentleman to all my guests or I’ll demand the return of my funding for your venture. Do you understand?’
‘I do,’ he stuttered, stunned out of his smarmy regard.
‘Then apologise to the lady.’ He stepped aside and motioned to Marianne.
With the petulance of a schoolboy, Rupert bowed to her. ‘My apologies, Miss Domville.’
She said nothing. Warren didn’t blame her for not offering her acceptance. Rupert’s apology wasn’t heartfelt.
‘Where’s your mother?’ Rupert glanced around, making the lack of a chaperon apparent. Warren wondered the same thing. She’d sent Rupert here, why hadn’t she followed? He’d promised Marianne there’d be no scandal and he’d keep his word.
Marianne rose from the piano and collected her composition book without any stumbling rush of excuses as to why she’d been caught alone with a gentleman. Her expression was as solemn as an angel’s on a gravestone. It would be Warren’s headstone she’d erect for this near miss. Thankfully, his mother appeared, out of breath as though she were in a hurry.
‘Here I am. The cook waylaid me with some silly thing about dinner. Rupert, you were supposed to wait for me,’ she chided, adding more credence to there being nothing out of the ordinary taking place in the music room. ‘Miss Domville, thank you so much for allowing me to listen to your wonderful playing. Lady Ellington’s coach is waiting for you. I’ll walk you to it.’
‘Good day, Sir Warren.’ Marianne dipped a curtsy to him, her eyes revealing little of her thoughts until she flicked a hard glance at Rupert. Without another word, she followed Warren’s mother out of the room.
Once she was gone, Warren headed for his study, doing his best to act as uninterested in her departure as she did. He wasn’t sure her lack of regret was an act or a real desire to be as far away from him and his reprehensible brother-in-law as possible. He didn’t know when he’d find out either. After this mishap, she wasn’t likely to return. Panic reared inside him, but he quickly brought it under control. He’d been in worse fixes and overcome them. He’d deal with this as well.
Rupert followed him into his office, his steps tight.
‘What are you doing here?’ Warren asked again. ‘You weren’t supposed to come until next month’, with plenty of time for Warren to arrange for Marianne to not be here and to avoid a potential scandal. His promise to her was at risk of being undermined and he wanted to pound his brother-in-law into the floor. Everything he’d gained with Marianne had been stomped on by this clod who wasn’t likely to keep his mouth shut about what he’d seen. Curse the fool and himself for being so careless with Marianne.
‘I have some things to discuss with you in regards to the business and they couldn’t wait. I’d like to stay here for the next few days while I visit some potential investors.’ He glanced back and forth between Warren and the study door. ‘I thought you were worried about your reputation. Isn’t it why you were hesitant to invest in me?’
‘It is and it was.’
‘Then what are you doing entertaining a woman like Miss Domville?’
‘You mean a woman with the ear of Lord Falconbridge, the protection of his aunt, the Dowager Countess of Merrell. What should I do? Call her a harlot to her face like you d
id? How many copies of my book do you think the Marquess and his friends will buy then? After your insult, you can kiss any hope of patronage from that corner goodbye.’
Rupert ran his hand through his thinning hair, realising too late his mistake. ‘There must be a better way to curry Lord Falconbridge’s favour than entertaining a woman of her reputation.’
‘Neither of us will have to worry about her reputation or ours if you don’t tell anyone you saw her here.’ His stomach tightened with the whiff of deceit behind the comment, but he didn’t want Rupert to mention Marianne’s presence to the wrong person. If Rupert had a stake in keeping her visit a secret, he was more likely to watch his stupid tongue.
‘Of course I won’t say anything. I don’t want our venture tarnished any more than you do.’
‘It’s not our venture. It’s your venture.’ Warren rubbed his hand over Lancelot’s head as the dog came to sit beside him. It didn’t calm him like it usually did. ‘You’re to stop using my name to promote it.’
‘Yes, yes, I got your letter. I need you to sign the investment papers for my venture,’ Rupert testily clarified. ‘I also need the other half of the money you promised.’
‘I never promised it. The amount I already gave you will have to do.’
‘Damn it, Warren, I was counting on more.’ Desperation replaced the spite in his brown eyes. ‘I’ve already spent the funds from the other investors.’
‘On what?’
‘Necessary expenses,’ Rupert mumbled.
Warren stared at the man, disgusted. ‘You squandered it, didn’t you?’
‘There was a ship and a captain to hire and investors to woo.’
‘How many fancy dinners and bottles of wine fed your cravings instead of wooing investors or paying for crews?’
He had the gall to appear insulted. ‘You’re using these unfounded accusations to renege on your promise.’