Kaleidoscope: A Regency Novella

by Hannah Meredith

  “Before you reject my suit, please look this over.” He tapped his finger on the papers. “It’s a proposed marriage settlement. It confirms that Rydell Shipping will always be your sole possession. You can run the company as you see fit. You can sell it or will it to whomever you choose. I’ll have nothing to do with your company. I don’t want you to think that I would ever take it from you.”

  Oddly, the idea of losing control of Rydell Shipping had never entered her mind. Why this logical conclusion had escaped her was unclear. When a woman married, everything that was hers automatically became her husband’s unless other dispositions of property were explicitly spelled out in the marriage settlement. But for some reason, she had never feared that Luke would ever take what was hers.

  He gave her a hopeful smile. “Of course, I hope you’d allow me to help you wherever possible. I must admit that I enjoyed the research on the sale of Madeira and I’d like to continue in a similar capacity. But the control will always be yours.”

  She didn’t have to look at the papers to know that this was exactly what they said. Luke wanted her for herself alone. This realization bubbled through her like fast moving water over a shoal of rocks, frothing and shooting tendrils of delight into the air. Even Charles had married her to protect her, not because he wanted her above all others.

  But she would not hurt Luke—and she felt that marriage to her might do so. “Luke, you’ve just been given the opportunity to redeem most of your former life. You should find a lady from your own class to love, to marry. You don’t want to be stuck with a wife who is in trade. You don’t want people snickering behind your back that you married a woman of questionable antecedents.” Lord, the words were hard to say, but she needed to make him understand that regardless of their feelings for each other, she was unsuitable. She didn’t want him to become a figure of ridicule.

  He leaned forward and lowered his voice, as if conveying a secret. “Caro, I’ll be marrying the Earl of Kelton’s aunt by marriage, a lady to her fingertips, and a stunningly beautiful one at that. I’ll be the envy of the ton. Your worries are groundless.”

  “I’m sure the Earl of Kelton will give me his ringing endorsement.” She knew how hateful Charles’ nephew could be.

  Luke grinned with boyish delight again. “Actually, I think you’ll find that your nephew-in-law will be offering to provide a wedding breakfast to show his support.”

  She didn’t know whether to laugh or cuff him. “That will never happen.”

  “The wedding breakfast was my half-brother Templeton’s idea. My father will be visiting Kelton tomorrow to suggest it—and believe me, Gerald Rydell doesn’t stand of chance of gainsaying the Marquess of Greyling. Not unless he wants both himself and his mother frozen out of society. My father has spent a lifetime consolidating power and prestige. Kelton will not stand against him.” Luke sounded confident of the outcome.

  “Why would your father do this for me?” Shock raised her voice to a higher register. Such behavior by a marquess seemed impossible. The man had never met her. He was only taking Luke’s word that she would be a worthy addition to the family.

  He picked up her hand and began to place nibbling kisses on her palm. Heat radiated from the touch of his lips down to her toes, and all points in-between. “I told him that you were my happiness. That I couldn’t imagine a satisfying life without you. In short, I told him the truth. So if you don’t say yes, I’ll be forever unhappy and will look like an idiot to my entire family as I sink again into despair.”

  The glint in his eyes was far from despairing. He looked at her with both hunger and love. How could she say anything but yes—and so she did.

  The minute “yes” fell from Caro’s lips, Luke jumped up with a whoop, grabbed her from the chair, and began whirling her around the room. God, how he loved this woman. They made two complete twirling circuits of the table, laughing like children who had found hidden candy. They finally stopped by the sideboard, both gasping for breath.

  “Need I say you have made me the happiest of men?” His words came out in staccato bursts.

  “I know you’ve made me the happiest of women.” Caro punctuated her comment by wrapping her hands around his nape and pulling his head down to hers. Her lips seemed to taste of laughter and happiness. He pulled her tightly against him. He relished the feel of her, a combination of strength and suppleness, like the steel used in the finest blades.

  “How upset will your cook be if we don’t eat what has every indication of being a feast?” he asked. As if preplanned, they both turned to look at the table where the excellent turbot with brown butter and shallots sat abandoned and cold.

  “Aren’t you hungry?” Caro’s voice had a breathless quality that he suspected had nothing to do with their wild dance around the room.

  “Starving. I haven’t had the sustenance that I most need for a fortnight now.” He placed his hands on either side of her beautiful, upturned face. He ran the pads of his fingers from the raven wings of her eyebrows along her temples to her shell-like ears, marveling at the satiny texture of her skin. Her dark eyes mirrored his own hunger.

  In one fluid movement, he slipped an arm under her knees and lifted her into his arms. She gave a brief gasp of surprise, then twined her arms around his neck and nestled her head against his shoulder. He felt a flash of possessiveness. His! She was his forevermore, and he was never relinquishing her.

  He pushed open the dining room door to find the dismissed footmen hovering in the hall. Their mouths gaped in shock. Further away, Perkins swung in their direction, his face a thundercloud of disapproval.

  “She’s agreed to marry me,” Luke called out and made a quick turn on his heel, Caro’s dress floating about them and probably showing an indecent amount of ankle and leg. Caro’s laughter accompanied his maneuver. Perkins stopped in place, suddenly smiling. Her staff cared for her, and they would accept him as husband where they hadn’t been pleased with his position as lover.

  But the husband-to-be was still the lover tonight. He swept her up the stairs. Amala darted out of Caro’s bedroom as they approached. Even she was smiling. How had the little woman known there was a change in his status? Word of an impending marriage could not have traveled through the house so fast. Perhaps it was some mystic eastern connection. Luke realized it was one of the few times he’d seen the little woman smile. It quite changed her face.

  And then the door was shut on Amala and the rest of the world. Here, there was only Caro. And she was all that he would ever need.

  He lowered her to the floor. The slide of her body over his was exquisite, and he again possessed her mouth. The velvet of tongues tangling together. The soft nibbles. The tiny gasps. Mine, his kiss proclaimed. Forever mine.

  Without breaking the kiss, his hands rose to begin unraveling the glory that was her hair. Pins fell to the carpet with the sound of rain on new grass. And then the heavy weight of her tresses was released. He drew back slightly to watch his fingers stoke through the shimmering darkness. Night with stars, he thought, inhaling the spicy scent that rose from the thick mass. Night in a secret garden.

  He turned her in his arms, brushing her hair over her shoulder so he could begin working on the fastenings down the back of her gown. His fingers trembled as they released each one. He’d undressed women, too many to consider. He’d even performed this service for Caro in the past. But he had never done so for his prospective bride. The emotion that now flowed through him shook him to the core.

  When all her discarded finery puddled around her feet and she stood only in her shift, Caro turned and began unbuttoning Luke’s waistcoat. He felt every movement of her delicate hands as if they were brands through the cloth to the skin beneath. He jerked his cravat loose and shrugged out of his jacket and waistcoat. He pulled his shirt over his head, and Caro was again there, kissing his chest and running fingers along the line of crisp hair that arrowed down to his trousers until they settled over the fullness there.

  She pulle
d back to look at his chest, his face, his sandy blond hair. “You are the color of the sunrise,” she said, the first words in this silent room.

  “I hope I will always be your sunrise.” Then he chuckled. “And your sunset and your midday. Any moment on the clock, I will be yours.”

  He lifted her effortlessly and carried her to the bed, pulling the shift from her as he laid her down. He watched her watch him as he stripped off the rest of his clothes. Her beauty caught his breath in his throat and as he came over her, a welling of tenderness brought tears to his eyes.

  Their lovemaking was slow, each movement fraught with meaning, each sigh a song that had never before been sung. He marveled that all of the missteps of his life had somehow brought him here—the one place he was destined to be.

  Only later, when Caro lay spooned against his body, did words seem possible. “I’ll get a special license so we can wed whenever we desire. I’d be happy with tomorrow, but we don’t want this to look rushed. I guess it will depend on when Kelton feels he can host our wedding breakfast.”

  Caro giggled, a surprising sound he’d seldom heard. “You are rather naughty to press Gerald to do this. I would imagine he will choke on the food he serves.”

  “The show of his support as well as my family’s will do much to ease our way, and those of our children, into society.”

  She turned toward him. “How many of those children are you imagining?”

  “Legions. Or however many their mother wants.”

  “I’m not sure about legions,” she said, kissing him, “but right now their possible mother certainly wants.” And then she showed him exactly what she meant.

  Carolyn stood motionless at the window of her ground floor study and watched darkness creep across the garden, dimming the brightness of the summer flowers to gray. How long had she stood here woolgathering? She smiled. Her impending marriage was making her as moony as a girl in her first season.

  She closed the curtains and turned up the Argand lamp on her desk. The light spilled across the packet Patience, David’s now estranged wife, had left for her approval. Patience had made detailed sketches of the proposed bouquets to be placed in the drawing room for Caro’s wedding. Caro personally thought all this fuss was a bit silly, but it seemed to please Patience, and she’d quickly come to like the quiet woman who had seemed to bloom with her husband’s departure.

  Luke seemed to think that being involved in the start of a happy marriage gave Patience a more positive view of the institution. He believed it was good for her to see that not all marriages were based on indifference and deceit, as hers had doubtlessly been. In consideration of Patience’s feelings, for her wedding, Caro wouldn’t be wearing the canary diamond that had belonged to Luke’s mother. It had been Patience’s such a short time ago.

  Caro sat at her desk and began looking over the drawings. Her preference would have been for a collection of bright blooms, but Patience had chosen white flowers. Iceberg roses, hydrangea, and white lilacs glowed amid lush greenery. Patience was a talented artist. Caro smiled. She still favored reds and yellows, but this would be one of her many concessions to being more English.

  Four more days. Only four more days. If time would hurry, she didn’t care if there were any flowers at all.

  A soft noise on the servants’ stairs heralded Luke’s earlier-than-usual arrival. He’d insisted on returning to his nightly arrival and departure via the mews entrance, although she was sure no one in the entire town was fooled, but he said he wanted her to be the blushing bride. Silly man. How she loved him.

  She turned toward the door and her bright smile of welcome froze. Her nephew-in-law Gerald stood there.

  “I guess I’m not who you were expecting,” he said with an artificial smile. “I left Lord Lucien being feted by a few friends at Brook’s and decided this would be a good time for us to have a quiet discussion.”

  “I have nothing to say to you. I have no idea how you got in here, but please leave before I ring for a footman.” She’d often been irritated by, but never afraid of, Gerald. But something about him tonight raised the fine hairs on the back of her neck. His gaze seemed oddly unfocused.

  He sauntered into the room like a man at his ease. “I thought we needed to discuss some details about this breakfast your intended’s family has pressured me into having. I want to make sure it’s exactly what you want. I have no desire to commit social suicide by angering the Harlington clan.”

  His request would have been reasonable had he called during normal hours, but there was something off about his being here now. As he advanced, Caro’s impulse was to leap up and back away. But she’d be damned if she let him cow her. “I think you should come back tomorrow to discuss this,” she said.

  He sprinted toward her, faster than she could have anticipated. She rose from her chair, unsure of whether she planned to shout at him to leave or simply to scream. The opportunity to do either disappeared when he bowled into her, knocking her back into the desk. Before she could take a breath to alert the household, he clamped his hand firmly over her mouth. His weight bowed her body, pressing her shoulders onto the desk.

  She squirmed and bucked against him, but she’d landed at an odd angle. One of her arms was trapped under her body and her feet couldn’t get a good purchase on the floor. She flopped ineffectually, attempting to bring the unencumbered arm high enough to reach his restraining hand or to scratch his face. She tried to shake his hand loose, but his hold was firm and punishing. She wanted to bite him, but he held her jaw tightly closed.

  Gerald steadied her body under his and reached up with his free hand to pinch her nostrils closed. She could not breathe. Dear God, she could not breathe!

  She flailed against him. Tried to bring her legs up to do some damage, any damage.

  And he laughed. “Go on and expend yourself. It will make this quicker. Then Lord Lucien bloody Harlington will have another lover who has hanged herself from the drapery ties and I’ll have the shipping business that always should have been mine.”

  Her lungs screamed for air. She did everything in her power to get free of Gerald, but all her struggles only incited further laughter. Everything she saw began to have shadowed edges and go slightly out of focus. There was a buzzing in her ears. She imagined she saw Luke rise up behind her attacker. Luke who was not Luke, his face distorted into a rictus of rage. Something bright glinted above Gerald’s head, then plummeted like a swooping falcon.

  Gerald fell, pulling her with him to the floor. His weight still pinned her, but his hands were gone. She sucked in great gulps of air. The world around her began to come into focus.

  Luke, now distinguishable as himself, fell to his knees and pushed Gerald off her. He pulled her gently into his arms and cradled her against his chest. “Just breathe, love,” he said. “Nice big breaths. You’re safe now.”

  She didn’t have voice to tell him he always made her feel safe. Breathing became easier in his embrace. She rested back against him as he murmured words she couldn’t decipher.

  Their heads jerked up in tandem as Perkins and one of the footmen burst into the room. “Wha—” Perkins began.

  “Your mistress was attacked by Lord Kelton.” Luke’s voice was so sharp it could have cut glass. He obviously blamed her staff for not protecting her. She tried to explain they were not guilty of anything, but the words would still not come. “Wake Amala to see to Mrs. Rydell.”

  The footman left at a run.

  “Is he dead?” Perkins asked. “Should I get the constable?”

  Luke looked over at Gerald. “I have no idea if he’s dead or not. I hope he is. But don’t bother with the constable. Send someone to Brook’s and bring back Viscount Tremaine. He’ll know what to do to cause the least scandal.”

  The least scandal? If she could just get her breath, she’d laugh. Potential scandal seemed to follow them. “Oh, Luke,” she finally managed to force out.

  He looked at her solemnly. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I t
hink I broke it.” He gestured to the floor next to them. The kaleidoscope lay on its side, the tube curved with a sharp bend at the larger end. “It was the first heavy thing I could reach.”

  Advent of New Patterns

  August 1825

  The buzz of conversation whirled around them. Luke leaned down and whispered in Caro’s ear, “Lady Lucien, if we don’t leave soon we will never make it to Thorneby Hall before dark.”

  “I’ll happily take my leave of our hosts, then, but only if you stop calling me that ridiculous name. I’ve heard ‘Lady Lucien’ enough today to last for the rest of my life.” She crossed her eyes briefly and made him laugh.

  He’d thought he knew Carolyn Rydell well before she’d agreed to marry him, but hidden aspects of her personality had emerged in the extra month they’d waited to say their vows. “It is your name now,” he said dryly.

  “A fact you didn’t stress when I agreed to be your wife.” She gave him a saucy grin and went in search of Templeton and his wife who had hosted the wedding breakfast. Luke didn’t want to point out that the wives of the younger sons of a Marquess were always known as Lady First name. Poor Patience would continue to be called Lady David even if her husband resided in Scotland forever while she stayed in London.

  As if thinking of her made her more noticeable, Luke saw Patience across the room laughing at something Tremaine had said. Living away from David had certainly improved Patience’s outlook on life. Or perhaps it was just being around Tremaine, who was always good company.

  Surprisingly, he’d discovered that his brother Templeton was good company as well. Still stodgy and oh-so-correct, but honestly caring nonetheless. He and Caro strolled over to find him in earnest discussion with Sanjeet about some shipping ventures.