Three Weddings and a Murder

by Milan, Courtney

  “But if I valued that dream above my sisters’ happiness, why would I be here right now? You’re more dangerous to me than nightshade, Mr. Wright. The worst sort of man. Scandalous, immoral. Utterly without conscience or scruples.”

  “Don’t forget ancient,” he said wryly. “And penniless. We all know poverty’s my worst failing in most ladies’ eyes.”

  “Not in my view.”

  “No?”

  She shook her head. “No. It’s your presumption I can’t bear. The way you look at me, the way you tease me. The way you touch me.”

  “The way you enjoy it.”

  He wanted to touch her at that moment. Very, very badly. His hand actually trembled with the force of his wanting. He made a fist at his side.

  Not now. Not yet.

  “Do you understand?” Her voice was just a whisper now. Intimate. “I’m risking my dreams, every moment I spend with you.”

  She had no idea. No idea the danger he could pose to her right now. Right here on this bench, thorny hedges and frigid stone be damned.

  “So you see, it’s not self-interest. I truly care for Philippa. She cares for Lord Brentley. If he returns her affections, there’s no reason they shouldn’t be together.”

  Philippa and Brentley? Not those two poetic fools again.

  He shook his head, staring rapt at her soft, pink lips. “You’re still telling yourself you came out here to help Philippa?”

  “Why else would I come find you?”

  “For this, Eliza.” He cupped her face in one hand and caressed her cheek. “Just this.”

  She slid sideways, putting a space between them on the bench.

  He closed the gap. “You spent years dreaming of that perfect debut. It’s time to wake up. Be honest with yourself. You don’t want twelve toadying gentlemen with perfect cravats queuing up for the pleasure of a dance. You want one man. A man who knows you, challenges you. A man who goes after what he wants, even when it’s not proper or right.”

  “There you go again, presuming to know everything about me. It makes me so…” She made a growl of frustration.

  A slow grin curved his lips. “There’s my tigress.”

  This woman didn’t know what she wanted from life. She couldn’t possibly. She’d been prowling that cage for so long, her greatest dream was a romp in the tiny garden she could glimpse through the bars. But beyond it, there were adventures she’d never known to imagine. Vast rivers and mountains and jungles she was born to explore.

  When he looked at her, Harry saw a brave, beautiful, passionate woman in the making. Even if she didn’t yet see herself.

  He rubbed his thumb over her lips. Pink as petals, and just as soft as he remembered. God, he wanted to taste her.

  But he didn’t want to steal that taste. He wanted an invitation.

  He watched for the slightest signal of assent. If she only moistened her lips, or swayed toward him a fraction… He would even accept a gentle tilt of the head.

  She touched his lapel.

  Hallelujah. That would do.

  His pounding blood rejoiced as he drew her close. He forced himself to go slowly despite the mad, juvenile frolic in his loins. He’d waited too long to rush this now.

  “Mr. Wright, I…” Her brows pulled together in a slight frown, and he found it adorable. “I can’t call you Mr. Wright. Everything about you—everything about this—is so very wrong.”

  “Then call me Harry,” he suggested, tilting her face to receive his kiss. “Like my lovers do.”

  “Harry!”

  Harry froze, his lips mere inches from pink-petal paradise. Eliza went rigid in his arms.

  From some distance away, the female voice floated over the garden hedges. “Harry, are you out here?”

  Damn.

  Damn and deuce and blast.

  “Again?” Eliza pushed out of his embrace, her eyes narrowing to slits. “You scoundrel. What’s the matter? Doesn’t Alderfield Lodge have a morning room? You’ve expanded to trysts in the garden now?”

  “It’s not like that,” he told her, inwardly cursing. “Not this time. I swear it.”

  “Go.” She shoved at him. “Go to her, before she finds us here.”

  He stood, pushing both hands through his hair as he stepped out from the shadows. “Yes, Lady Alderfield?”

  The lady in question halted in the path. “You wanted to know if Brentley made his way to the card room. Well, he has.”

  Damn it. He’d been hoping to avoid this tonight. There went the evening.

  Harry muttered his thanks.

  Lady Alderfield glanced about the garden, then gave him a slow, seductive smile. “You’re in no hurry, then?”

  He sighed. He wasn’t the least bit tempted by her. Hadn’t been in years.

  “I’ll be along in a moment.” He staggered purposely and let his voice lengthen into a slurred drawl. “Just walking off my drink.”

  He dropped one hand to his breeches falls, giving the impression that he meant to relieve himself in the hedges. That did the trick. When he checked over his shoulder, Lady Alderfield had gone.

  Eliza emerged from the shadowed nook.

  She gathered her shawl and drew it tight about her lovely shoulders. “You’re not drunk,” she said. “Why do you pretend to be drunk?”

  “Why do you pretend to be good?” He scratched the back of his neck and cast a wistful glance at the marble bench, shrouded in darkness. “I don’t suppose we could return to that moment, even if I made the attempt.”

  She fair hooted with laughter, like some pale, long-necked bird of the night. “No. I don’t suppose we could.”

  Just as well. He needed to get inside, and quickly.

  “I’ll take my leave of you, then. Fare thee well, Miss Eliza. I wish you safe journeys and much happiness. Will you wish me the same?”

  She turned her gaze to the path.

  “Well, at least promise to hate me for all eternity,” he teased. “I so enjoy collecting those impassioned vows from young women.”

  Harry knew he was being an ass, but he couldn’t help it. Perhaps it would be easier this way.

  “Don’t fret, my dear,” he said, more kindly. “You’ll have the better of me someday. We’re bound to cross paths again, and I’m invariably provoking.”

  With a bow, he turned his back on her, striding toward the house. He could feel her watching him go.

  “Wait,” she called.

  Harry stopped dead in his tracks. Because when she called to him like that, he couldn’t do anything else.

  A flurry of light footsteps on slate brought her to his side. When she reached for him with both arms, he went weightless in his boots.

  She didn’t embrace him. Nor kiss him, in some fumbling, innocent way. No, it was so much better and so much worse.

  She set about the task of retying his cravat.

  “I can’t stand this,” she said, tugging on the rumpled fabric. “Every time I see you, I want to put this straight.”

  His cravat wasn’t the only thing she was putting straight. The scrape of starched fabric against his neck made him wild with desire. But he beat down the carnal impulses, resolved to focus on other things. As she worked, he adored the sharp focus in her eyes, the prim set of her lips. He loved that she was fussing over him with such unconscious, obvious affection. His whole body was consumed with a deep, throbbing ache.

  She cared.

  She cared for him. Apart from Brentley and a few other sometime friends, she might be the only person in the world who did.

  And what, pray tell, was the bloody use? She wasn’t allowed suitors yet, and he had no suit to offer, even if she were. Besides, she’d never be satisfied until she had that debut—that one glittering, triumphant night. A silk gown in the latest fashion and a different partner for every set.

  “This is my last chance to see you in Norfolk,” she said, working the starched fabric. “Promise me one thing?”

  Anything.

  Her blue ey
es sought his. “If Brentley wants to propose to Philippa, promise me you won’t stand in his way.”

  Harry quietly groaned. Ask me for diamonds, won’t you? Ask me for the moon, the stars. Ask me to scale the pyramids of Egypt, swim the Nile, and bring you a necklace of crocodile teeth. Anything but this.

  “I can’t promise you that.”

  The flash of hurt in her eyes…oh, it destroyed him.

  “Fine,” she said tartly, resuming her work with new vigor. “You are the worst person I know.”

  “What offenses have earned me that honor? Locking you in a room a year ago with the specific intent to not ruin you? Resolving to keep your sister from a wretched mistake?”

  “Just go on. Walk away.” She sniffed. “Leave me behind. Play cards and drink and consort with loose women. Ruin your best friend’s chances for happiness. But know that you’re the selfish one. You accuse me of being anxious to marry off my sister, but you’re just keen to keep your partner in debauchery. If Brentley marries, that would be a real problem for you, wouldn’t it? You’re a man with no income and a dwindling number of friends.” She finished her work with a sharp, ruthless yank that nearly cut off his air. “Who else will put up with you?”

  He twisted his neck, rasping for breath. “Who indeed.”

  She surveyed her work. Acting on some impulse of dissatisfaction, she reached to tame his hair. As her fingers dragged through the unruly locks, hot sensation swept over his scalp and traveled down his spine.

  “There,” she said, standing back. “That’s done.”

  Oh, to hell with it. Devil take this night and her lovely face and the hopelessness of it all.

  He pulled her into a kiss.

  By necessity, he was firm at the outset, holding her tight and crushing his mouth to hers—because he’d taken her by surprise, and he knew her first instinct would be to squirm and escape. But he also knew beneath the instinct, her true desire was to be kissed this way. Expertly. Passionately. Without apology or excuse.

  And then, once she’d warmed to it and softened in his arms…

  Sweetly.

  Reverently.

  With all the affection and tenderness in his battered, lonely heart.

  She sensed the change in him, and she responded by softening everywhere. She made a sigh of longing against his lips, nestling close and pliant in his arms.

  When the swells of her breasts met his chest, a savage voice rose up within him. It shouted words like possess, claim, take, invade.

  Mine.

  In his youth, he might have heeded that voice. But this was where a man’s advanced age could work in his favor. He was wise enough now to know what he truly wanted from a woman, and what he didn’t. He desired Eliza Cade with every corpuscle in his lusting, aching body—she made him want to thrust and sweat and lick and suck and groan—but he didn’t want to conquer her.

  And he’d be damned if he’d give her any reason to ever regret this kiss.

  He forced himself to be careful.

  So…very…careful.

  He brushed his lips over hers again and again. Cherishing her sweetness. Burnishing that petal pink of her lips to a rose-red, passionate flush.

  Eliza, Eliza.

  She clung to him. It was hell to pull away.

  “There,” he said, releasing her. “That’s done.”

  March, 1812

  “The ceremony will take place Wednesday. We’ve arranged for a license, and the groom is prepared to cover all expenses. The couple have expressed a wish to honeymoon here by the sea before journeying north to—”

  “I DON’T UNDERSTAND,” Eliza said, interrupting her father’s recitation of the letter. She was too impatient to get to the meaning of it all. “Philippa is getting married? In Brighton?”

  Her father scanned the page. “Judging by the date this was posted, I believe she is already wed.”

  “Oh, my.” Looking scandalized, Georgie pressed a hand to her mouth and crumpled into a nearby armchair. “What a surprise.”

  Eliza didn’t suffer the same delicacy of spirit. “But this is wonderful! I didn’t know Brentley was traveling to Brighton. I’m surprised Margaret or Caro didn’t write me about it, but—”

  “Brentley?” Her father cast aside the letter. “What has that wastrel to do with anything?”

  Eliza frowned. She didn’t know what Papa could be mean by “that wastrel.” Surely he was confused. Perhaps the letter hadn’t named Brentley by his title.

  “Lord Brentley of Suthermarsh, Papa. He and Philippa became friends in Norfolk, and that must be why he followed her to Brighton. I’m just thrilled for her, and you will be, too. This might seem sudden, but I assure you it isn’t. From their very first meeting, Philippa and Brentley made a perfect—”

  Papa rapped the desk for silence. “Eliza, I don’t know what you’re on about. Your sister hasn’t married Lord Brentley, or Lord Anyone. She’s married Peter Everhart.”

  What?

  All the air left the room. Eliza was dizzied, struggling for breath. “B-b-but…”

  Her father resumed reading aloud. “‘I regret the haste with which these arrangements must be made, and the shock to you and your family. But as your daughter is of age and Mr. Everhart gives his every assurance of supporting her, I can make no objection to their immediate marriage.’”

  Philippa, married to Peter Everhart?

  “But this can’t be,” Eliza said, dropping into the chair next to Georgie’s. Perhaps she was possessed of some delicate sensibilities after all.

  Her sister reached for her hand and squeezed it. “I know you fancied him, Eliza. This must be difficult to take.”

  “It’s not that.”

  And it truly wasn’t. She hadn’t dreamed about golden-haired Peter Everhart for years. All her dreams had been invaded by a darker, more devious man. A roguish devil who fed her nectarines and waltzed her about empty rooms and kissed her in gardens at midnight. A scoundrel who’d once told her…

  “Wait.” Eliza bolted straight in her chair. “We can’t let Philippa marry Peter Everhart. What about his…his condition?”

  “What condition would that be?” Papa raised a bushy eyebrow.

  Eliza bit her lip, not sure how to speak of such things to her own father. “You know. They say that at the Battle of Trafalgar, he was… Er, that he sustained some wound to his…” She waved vaguely at her lap.

  “History was never your strong suit, Eliza. During the Battle of the Trafalgar, Peter Everhart would have been in fifth form at Eton. Sixth, perhaps.”

  She put a hand to her brow, ruing her own stupidity. Of course he would have been much too young. She ought to have known that, if only she hadn’t been so muddled by a certain scoundrel’s teasing. Oh, that Mr. Wright.

  “It’s not Everhart’s condition we should worry about,” Papa went on. “It’s Philippa’s. I can only think of one reason she should have been married so hastily and so far from her family.”

  Philippa, pregnant. By neutered Peter Everhart. It was all too much.

  “I just don’t understand it,” Eliza said, numb. “She was so taken with Lord Brentley this past summer.”

  Her father harrumphed. “Then she had a close escape. We all did.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Brentley’s insolvent. It’s all over the papers this week. Been coming on for some years, they say, but the creditors wouldn’t be held at bay any longer. That’s probably why he was hiding in Norfolk at all.”

  “The poor man,” Georgie said.

  Poor man, indeed.

  Eliza had a sinking feeling she knew just who to blame for his misfortunes. His scandalous, dissolute, no-good “friend,” Harry Wright.

  If Mr. Wright weren’t always dragging his friend into card rooms and gaming hells, surely Lord Brentley could have avoided financial catastrophe. He might have married Philippa, and with the help of her dowry, put his estate on solid footing again.

  Now the man had no hopes, and poor
Philippa must bear a child by that shocking seducer, Peter Everhart… If Eliza hadn’t been misled to believe the man was a eunuch, she might have thought to warn her sister.

  This had to be Mr. Wright’s doing, all of it. That was the inescapable truth written between the lines. Everyone knew the man was a bad influence. It made Eliza ill to recall what a bad influence he’d been on her. In the months since their parting, it had been tempting to imagine better of him—because thinking better of his character allowed her to think better of herself.

  But the truth was clear. The man was a scoundrel, and Eliza was a fool.

  She hated him. Hated that no matter how long she lived, he would always be her first dance, her first kiss.

  She bit back a growl, and it was as though she could hear his dark, knowing laugh.

  There’s my tigress.

  With a few mumbled words of apology, she rose from her chair and left the room.

  Georgie followed her into the corridor, quickly catching Eliza by the wrist. “Oh, Eliza. This is wonderful.”

  “Wonderful? How is it wonderful? Our sister has been ruined.”

  “They’re married now. No one will know. Or if they do suspect, they won’t say anything. Such things happen all the time.” Georgie slid her hand to capture Eliza’s. “But this is wonderful for us. For you.”

  “One less sister ahead of me, you mean? I’m that much closer to my debut?” Eliza gave her sister’s cheek a fond touch. “That’s kind of you to think of me, but I’m not forming any plans. I’d never rush you, Georgie. After Margaret’s marriage to Sir Snail-Face and Philippa’s scandal with Everhart…” She put her hands on Georgie’s shoulders. “You are my dearest sister, and I daresay the best of our lot. It would break my heart to see you married without the deepest, truest love.”

  Georgie smiled beatifically. “But I already have that, you see. The deepest, truest love. I’ve had it for years now.”

  Eliza peered at her. “Are you devoting your life to the Church?”