by Delia Parr
When the bell over the door announced another customer, Mrs. Wallace paused and looked past Annabelle. “Please look around. I’m almost finished here,” she announced before turning her attention back to Annabelle. “I’ll see that everything is delivered this afternoon.”
“Since it’s a surprise, I’d rather pick everything up tomorrow morning. You’ll be open by ten o’clock?” she asked.
“Yes, ma’am. I will.”
Annabelle smiled. “Then I’ll see you tomorrow at ten.” She turned to leave but froze when she saw Eric’s wife standing just a few yards away from her. Even though they had not been introduced at the Sullivans’ ball, there was still a chance that Eric’s wife had seen her and someone else had told her Annabelle’s name. If she had, she might be tempted to introduce herself now.
While that posed no immediate problem, Annabelle could not take the risk that she would mention to Eric that she had met the new Mrs. Graymoor. She might also describe Annabelle in enough detail that he would be curious about a woman who looked like the secret wife he had divorced.
Fortunately, the woman was so intent on studying an assortment of imported wool that she did not look up to see Annabelle. Once the shopkeeper ushered her new customer into the side room on the opposite side of the shop to show her something else, she also gave Annabelle the chance to slip out of the shop unnoticed if she was very, very careful not to make a sound.
Heart pounding, Annabelle tiptoed as quickly as she could to the door. When she spied the coach sitting directly outside through the small display window, however, she hesitated. The curtains were drawn tight against the cold and wind so she could not see inside. Although she doubted that Eric would have accompanied his wife while she was out shopping, she could not take the chance he had. If he picked the exact moment she decided to step out of the shop to lift the curtain and peer outside, she had no hope at all that he would not recognize her.
When she heard the two women return to the main room of the shop, she was near panic. There was no way she could leave, and there was no place to hide.
Miraculously, the two women walked to the rear of the main display room, so engrossed with their conversation neither woman seemed to realize she was even there. Treading softly, she escaped into the side room closest to her and turned her back as if she were interested in skeins of wool she could barely see through her tears.
She waited five minutes. Then ten more. By the time Eric’s wife finally left, twenty minutes had passed and Annabelle’s pulse was racing so fast, she was growing faint.
She waited a few more minutes before she turned her head, just in time to see the coach pulling away, and nearly collapsed with relief. Gathering up her courage, she rushed out of the room, convinced that Harrison had already gone inside the Refuge to search for her.
The shopkeeper gasped the moment she saw her. “Mrs. Graymoor! I thought you left a good while ago.”
“That’s what I’d planned, but I couldn’t resist taking a peek at some more wool before I left. I’ve also reconsidered and I’d like you to deliver everything to the Refuge this afternoon,” she gushed and hurried out the door.
Fearful that Eric’s coach might turn around and come back in this direction, she picked up her skirts and cape and ran back the entire length of the square. By the time she reached Harrison’s coach, she was panting for breath and the cold air had turned her throat raw. She looked up at Graham. “Mr. Graymoor. Did he go inside the Refuge?”
The driver shook his head and pointed at the coach as he started to climb down to help her embark.
She waved him back. “I’ll have my husband help me, if I have need,” she insisted and opened the coach door by herself. “I’m so sorry I’m late,” she said and climbed aboard without giving Harrison a chance to help her.
When she dropped into the seat across from him, he reached over to pull the door closed.
“I’m truly, truly sorry. I was so worried that you’d have to charge around looking for me again or just leave me here to teach me a lesson.”
He laughed and tapped at the roof to signal Graham to start them for home. “On the contrary. I’ve learned my lesson. As I see it, I have two choices when I’m picking you up to go anywhere. I can simply wait for you in the coach, or I can stop at the harness maker today and have him make a special leash you can wear so all I have to do is give it a tug to let you know I’m waiting.”
She pursed her lips and put both hands on the seat to keep her balance when the coach rounded a corner. “I should hope you’d choose the former, rather than the latter,” she quipped. “I suppose I should be thankful you didn’t decide to leave me here so I’d have to hire a hack to take me home again.”
“You should have known I wouldn’t leave. Not without you,” he said, turning her own words against her.
Her heart skipped a beat, and she wondered if becoming friends with this man might be inviting precisely the kind of trouble she did not need. At the moment, she had more trouble than she knew how to handle—trouble that would not go away until Eric Bradley and his wife left the city.
Or she did.
Harrison left after dinner to spend the afternoon with friends, and Annabelle’s plans for the afternoon definitely included a nap to calm her frazzled nerves. Before long she’d need to dress for another late evening in the city, where she feared Eric and his wife would also be in attendance.
Instead of napping, however, she had sat at the dining room table with nearly three dozen invitations Harrison had brought back from the city mansion that he expected her to respond to in short notes he would take back with him tomorrow morning to have delivered. After sorting the invitations into two piles, she had spent an hour declining daytime invitations directed to her, just as he told her to do.
She set the pen down and opened and closed her hand to ease the cramps before attempting to write more notes. She stared at the remaining pile of invitations to evening events Harrison said they would agree to attend as a couple and groaned. She wished she could stay here tonight, and the prospect of attending so many affairs in the city made her stomach quiver.
She had been able to avoid an encounter with Eric’s wife today, but sooner or later it was almost inevitable that Eric would be at one of these evening affairs, and the only way she could avoid that debacle would be to stay right here at Graymoor Gardens. It would keep her safe from Vienna Biddle, as well.
There didn’t seem to be any choice but to accept the invitations, but her mind wrestled with one excuse after another in hopes she could at least stay home tonight. If she said she was tired, Harrison would blame her for getting up so early to walk with Irene and work with her on her lessons. He might even go so far as to forbid her to continue. If she claimed she was not feeling well, he could claim she was overexerting herself by volunteering at the Refuge and take that away from her, too.
She signed her name to the last note she would have to write and sighed. “Short of telling him the truth, I don’t have a whisper of a hope to stay home tonight.”
“What truth would that be?”
Startled by Harrison’s voice, she dropped the pen and splattered ink on the last note she had written. She turned to see him standing in the doorway holding back the baize curtain. “Y-you’re back already?”
He entered the room, letting the curtain fall back into place. “Why don’t you want to go to the museum with me tonight? I hope it isn’t because you’re too tired. If that’s the case, perhaps you shouldn’t get up quite so early or spend the day traveling back and forth from the city, especially when you know we have plans for the evening.”
“No. I’m not tired at all,” she retorted, annoyed that he had developed an uncanny ability to read her mind. “I’ve even had enough energy to respond to all these invitations, just like I promised I’d do.”
He walked over to her and studied her face so intently, she felt her cheeks warm. “You’re not feeling well? Is that it?”
“I’m perf
ectly fine,” she insisted and retrieved the pen she had dropped.
“If you’re worried that Vienna might be there tonight, then you shouldn’t be. She won’t be there. In point of fact, there won’t be more than a few dozen people in attendance, if that many.”
Grateful that he had introduced the partial truth behind her reluctance to attend the affair at the museum tonight, she moistened her lips. “Are you certain she won’t be there? I thought you said this was a very important event at the museum, and from all I could gather at the Sullivan ball, her father is a very important man.”
He grinned. “He is, but this event is strictly for the donors who have contributed more than one thousand dollars to the museum this year. After Peale died four years ago—he was the man who started the museum—and his sons took over, many of the donors lost interest and stopped their support. Paul Biddle, Vienna’s father, was one of them.”
“Why did he stop?”
“Peale’s sons weren’t as interested in keeping the museum open as much as their father was. They had other interests and still do, one of which is a museum in Baltimore.”
“Why didn’t you stop your donation?” she asked, surprised that he would be interested in anything like a museum.
He chuckled. “In all truth, I didn’t even realize I was still a donor until the invitation arrived, which is usually how I find out that the annual donations my father set up are still in place.” He took her hand and helped her to her feet. “Now that that’s settled, there’s something else we need to discuss. Privately,” he said with a wink.
She nodded and walked upstairs with him to the sleeping room they were supposed to be sharing. He raked his fingers through his hair as he crossed the room and plopped down into one of the two chairs that were still sitting where she had put them the day before. “Irene knows that I’m sleeping in the library instead of here with you, and she knows I ordered the warming stove because it’s too cold in there for me to get any sleep.”
Annabelle’s heart skipped a beat, and she sat down across from him. “Are you certain?”
“She told me so herself. This is the first opportunity I’ve had to speak to you privately about it.”
“What did you tell her?” she asked, hoping he had been able to charm the housekeeper into thinking she was wrong.
“I didn’t tell her anything. Fortunately, I was searching all over for you and used that as an excuse to escape. I could fend her off like I usually do, but now that you’ve become so friendly with her, she’s bound to mention it to you,” he said derisively. “What are you going to tell her?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered and pressed her fingertips to her forehead to ease the dull ache that had started wrapping around her head. She closed her eyes for a moment and rejected one excuse after another to explain why Harrison was not sleeping in the same bed with her until she found one that Irene was likely to accept.
She opened her eyes and offered him a weak smile. “I think I know a way to make certain Irene won’t bring up the matter again.”
He sat up a little straighter. “You do?”
She nodded. “How would you feel about being labeled a brute? I promise I won’t make you out to be an awful brute. Just a small one, and all I have to do is stretch the truth a bit.”
Chapter Twenty
Annabelle survived the event at the museum unscathed, just as Harrison had promised she would. Over the course of the next two days, she even survived another evening affair without seeing Vienna or Eric. But her anticipation grew worse by the hour while she waited for Irene to confront her about the unusual sleeping arrangements she and Harrison shared.
Since the topic had not come up while she sat with Irene outside on the bench feeding the squirrel this morning, she returned to the cottage with the housekeeper ready to bring it up herself once they finished with today’s lesson. She sat down at the kitchen table and handed the slate and chalk to Irene. “Before we start on any new letters, you should practice what you’ve already learned,” she prompted.
Irene was forming letters less awkwardly than when she had first begun, but she set the chalk down now before she finished the first two letters. “I can’t do it.”
Annabelle smiled. “Of course you can. Try again.”
“No, I mean I can’t do it. I can’t hold my tongue a second longer.” She took Annabelle’s hand. “I don’t know why Harrison has left your bed, but bless your loving heart, you’ve been keeping your hurt all to yourself. Is there anything I can do to help?”
Now that the moment she had been dreading had arrived, Annabelle accepted the guilt she deserved for the partial lie she was about to tell. “He hasn’t left my bed. He’s just not sleeping with me all night.” She hoped the woman would assume the blush that warmed her cheeks was due to the suggestive nature of her words rather than the tale she was going to spin that had only a bit of truth to it.
Irene’s eyes opened wide. “Why not?”
“He’s afraid he’ll be embarrassed. Do you . . . do you remember when I first came here, and I had that fading bruise on my eye?”
“I remember. I heard that one of those robbers did that to you,” she replied and narrowed her gaze. “If Harrison took a hand to you—”
“He did, but perfectly by accident. He didn’t mean to hit me, but . . . but I suppose he’s been sleeping alone for so long, he’s not accustomed to sharing his bed,” she gushed. “He’s rather a restless sleeper and he struck me with his elbow. It wasn’t the first time he’d accidently jabbed me, but he’d never blackened my eye before. He’s determined to make it the last, which is why he sleeps in the library, although we’re both hoping that it won’t be for long.”
She paused for a moment and tightened her hold on Irene’s hand just a bit more. “I hope you understand why he didn’t mention it to you before now or why he didn’t explain himself when you confronted him about it. He’s quite embarrassed as it is, which is why I promised him that I’d explain everything to you so you wouldn’t ask him any more about it. I’m sorry. I should have told you about it long before now.”
Irene shook her head. “I never thought I’d live long enough to see him embarrassed about anything, but I suppose I’ll have to get used to the idea he’s a changed man now that he’s married to you.” She touched Annabelle’s shoulder. “I won’t say another word about it. Now let’s get back to my lesson, or we won’t have time for you to show me a new recipe today,” she said, then erased the slate and handed the chalk to Annabelle.
“How has he changed?” she asked as she shaped the letter P.
“You’ll see what I’m talking about next Sunday,” she replied.
Irene remained mum on the subject, and Annabelle tried to be satisfied that she had finally done what she had promised Harrison she could do.
Several hours later, Annabelle had the first real surprise of the day when Harrison dropped her off at the Refuge and told her to hire a hack to go home because he had errands to do that would keep him busy until very late tonight. Her second surprise came only moments later when she found Philip waiting for her outside of the director’s office when she walked into the Refuge.
“I heard about the work you’re doing here and had to see it for myself,” he explained.
“You heard? From whom?” She doubted that anyone beyond the Refuge itself even knew she had been volunteering here—other than Harrison, of course, since this was only her third day here.
“I have developed many reliable sources of information, particularly where you’re concerned.”
When she frowned, he held up his hand. “Most of it is good.”
“But not all,” she ventured.
“Sooner or later, the gossipmongers will find someone else to focus on, and Vienna Biddle will find another man to chase.”
“I hope I’m alive to see it,” she muttered.
He chuckled. “Remind me to tell you a bit more about Miss Biddle later. For now, let’s join the women staying
here so you can show me the impressive work you’ve done.”
“I haven’t done much of anything so far, other than to use Harrison’s money to purchase what these women need to help themselves.”
He offered her his arm. “It seems we have even more in common than my cousin. That’s precisely what I do, although I’m fairly good at attracting donations from men and women who aren’t my relatives,” he said and opened the dormitory door.
Prepared to spend a few very cold hours here, she walked into the dormitory with him. Although the room was far from being as warm as any of the rooms back at Graymoor Gardens, it was remarkably better than it had been yesterday, and she saw the reason why. In addition to a large stack of firewood along the far wall, there was a blazing fire in the massive fireplace, which warmed the women who were sitting in a circle and chatting while they were knitting.
She looked at Philip in amazement. “Did you arrange for the firewood here?”
“I wish I could say that I did, but it wasn’t necessary for me to do anything. My cousin took care of it personally, or so I’ve been told.”
She blinked hard. “Harrison?”
He smiled. “The last I checked, he was my only cousin. In truth, he’s shown little interest in the past about supporting anything that might be considered a philanthropic endeavor, but I must say he’s changed quite a bit since he married you.”
Annabelle frowned. “That’s the second time today someone’s said that to me.”