“It would take me longer to argue with you than for you to do what you want to, so just try to hurry, please,” Titania said in a grumpy voice.
“You know I am right, that is why you are so cross, miss.” Titania sat in silence as Sarah brought the tangled mess under control, bolting to her feet as soon as the last hairpin was laid to rest.
“Now may we be off? And what now?” Titania asked in dismay as the door below was heard to open. She could discern the low hum of male voices, and her heart leaped into her throat. Was it possible—? She could barely contain herself as she heard Stillings’s slow tread on the stairs.
“The Earl of Oakley to see you, miss,” Stillings intoned blandly, as if he—and the whole staff, for that matter—were not perfectly aware of how their mistress felt about this visitor. “I have put him in the study. Are you receiving?” Titania rushed past him without answering, running down the stairs, then slowed to a leisurely pace as she approached the doors. She took a deep breath.
“My lord,” she said in a demure tone, looking down as she entered the room. “I did not get a chance to speak with you to thank you for escorting me home the other night.”
Titania was shocked to see his face was gray and drawn. He strode toward her, gathering her in his arms as he started to sob.
“What is it?” she asked, her voice muffled by being crushed against his huge chest.
“My father. He was attacked last night at his house, and now my stepmother is accusing me of having perpetrated it. My father and I saw each other, we were reconciled, something that made me almost as happy as—” He stopped speaking, instead withdrawing from the safe circle of her arms to prowl around the room.
“Attacked? But where? And how? Is he all right?” Titania sat down, her hands unconsciously clutching the skirt of her gown.
Edwin turned to face her, his expression one of unrelieved anguish. “He is thankfully alive, but unconscious. The doctors say there is nothing that can be done for him, at least not until he gains consciousness...if he does.”
“And what is your stepmother accusing you of?”
“She...she says I broke into their house and attacked my father in his study. She did not actually see anything, of course, but she may have misinterpreted something I said when I was there. She...she has reasons to wish me ill.”
“Surely you can prove you were somewhere else when your father was attacked?”
“Perhaps, but perhaps not. You see, he was attacked at about the same time that I was escorting you home, and as you know, I walked. I ended up at a tavern. I am afraid there are a few hours there that are a bit fuzzy for me.”
Titania pushed his unresisting form onto the sofa. “Sit there. Let me—Stillings!” Stillings arrived so quickly Titania suspected he had been listening at the door.
“Stillings, we need tea and pen and paper, please.” Stillings nodded, shooting an apprehensive look at Edwin.
Edwin sat, his head resting on his hands. Titania perched on the sofa next to him, taking one of his hands from his forehead and holding it in her lap.
“You know this will be cleared up. Someone will remember seeing one of you last night, even if you were seeing two of everyone. Your stepmother—why would she falsely accuse you?”
Edwin looked down at their entwined hands, silent for a moment as he ran his fingers over her palm. The contact made Titania remember their proximity last night, and she felt herself starting to blush.
“My stepmother is—was my betrothed,” Edwin explained in a low voice, still stroking her hand. “I did not know until the other day; it’s hard to believe someone did not tell me, if only to see my reaction. She must still hate me a great deal.”
They sat there, silently holding hands. Despite everything, Titania felt oddly at peace, as if the tumult in her heart had been stilled for just a moment.
“Well, then, Lord Worthington—”
“Edwin.”
“Edwin, then. Can you tell me your movements, I mean,” she said, feeling herself blush, “your activities, um, where you were last night?” She moved over to the desk, where she could hide her face.
“Well, I attended the party. Walked through the garden. Escorted you home.” She heard him stand and saw his feet plant themselves next to her desk. Titania was unable to resist looking up.
The expression on his face must have reflected her own, since he gave a lazy smile, then glanced over to the door. A careless Stillings must have closed it behind him. Edwin’s eyes returned to hers, and his smile deepened. She rose slowly, feeling a tingling awareness start somewhere in her stomach and rise up through her chest.
Edwin took her hand, placing it on his chest. She could hear the thump-thump of his heartbeat, and it was as regularly insistent as her own breathing, which had quickened. He drew her over to the sofa, then sat, looking up at her with an expectant gaze.
She lowered herself slowly, her eyes only inches apart from his. Edwin saw the desire mingled with an emotion he was too battered to name, and knew that when he kissed her, he would be able to forget, just for a little while.
It was glorious. It was the best kiss yet. Titania boldly thrust her tongue into Edwin’s mouth, grabbing ahold of his shoulders.
He had never felt so complete as he had at that moment, ravaging her mouth as his hands roamed over her body. Titania was just pulling up his shirt, impatient to get her hands on his chest, when they were jarred by the unmistakable sound of the door opening.
Quickly, Titania scooted back to her side of the sofa, frantically smoothing her hair back and trying to look as if they had been exchanging commonplaces about the weather or the latest party, not on the verge of exchanging her clothing for the feel of Edwin’s naked body.
Miss Tynte narrowed her eyes as she entered the room. “Stillings told me you were receiving the earl, Titania. I hope the visit has been pleasurable?” she finished with an acerbic tone.
Titania could not help it; she began to laugh at the absurdity of it.
“Yes, cousin, the earl’s visit has been pleasurable in the extreme,” she replied, throwing a wicked smile toward Edwin.
“Miss Tynte,” Edwin said, blushing, only to be stopped when she held up a thin, wrinkled hand.
“No, my lord, do not explain. I understand perfectly well, and I also know I am a woefully inadequate chaperone.” With that, she stalked as gracefully as she could to a nearby chair and sat down, a frosty smile plastered onto her face.
“Lord Worthington,” Titania said with a prim nod, as if she had not been sticking her tongue in his mouth just five minutes before, “we should continue our list. Miss Tynte, Lord Worthington has had some terrible news regarding an attack on his father, and his stepmother—Lord Worthington’s, that is—is accusing Lord Worthington of having perpetrated the attack. So we are making a list of the earl’s activities last evening, his whereabouts, that is,” she finished hastily, as Miss Tynte’s eyebrows start to rise.
Edwin rose, clutching the piece of paper that was only slightly wrinkled from having been pressed in between their two bodies. “Miss Stanhope, Miss Tynte, I appreciate your assistance, but I must try to find the perpetrator myself before Bow Street pays me a visit. Very few people were aware my father and I were on speaking terms again, and many would be only too happy to believe—and spread to anyone who will listen—my stepmother’s lies. I cannot sit around and wait to be ostracized, or worse, again. Good-bye.”
He strode out of the study, resolve informing every line of his body. It was in marked contrast to the way he had entered the room, and Titania knew she had helped, even if that help had mussed her hair and left both of them feeling unsatisfied. She recovered from her musings to encounter, once again, the look Miss Tynte seemed to wear most often when regarding her previously reliable charge.
“Titania. You cannot behave like that, not unless the earl is prepared to offer you marriage again, and I do not believe I saw him on his knees just now.”
No, Titania thou
ght, he is in no circumstances to propose marriage, only she did not think it was because he did not trust her. He came straight here, did he not, to tell her about his father? And it was in her arms he found comfort, as well. Things were just about as awful as they could be, but a small glimmer of hope for her future began to glow very slightly inside. She held on to that faint hope when she heard the gossips mentioning Edwin’s name at a party that evening.
“You know, do you not, that he had sworn to see his father in his grave before he would see him married to his former betrothed?”
“I heard he pushed Lady Worthington down to get to his father, so enraged was he. He was making his living as a member of the boxing profession when he was banished by his father.”
“He left that poor man facedown in his library, his desk ransacked and all his books disheveled. What was he hoping to find?”
It was a weary Titania who returned to her house only a few hours after she had left. She had not seen Edwin that evening, but she had seen Lady Worthington, who was making an appearance at the Lashleys’ party. Titania watched in disbelief as Lady Worthington sopped up everyone’s sympathetic words. How could she come to a social gathering when her husband was lying unconscious?
Titania had to admit Lady Worthington was beautiful, and there was something very fragile in her demeanor. It was no wonder that Edwin had leaped at the chance to be her hero, since Titania had experienced his heroic impulses firsthand.
Now her hero needed rescuing. Could she save him?
DESPITE HIS ADMITTEDLY bad situation—long-estranged father in a life-threatening coma, stepmother flinging accusations madly about, his freedom in peril—Edwin felt oddly happy, places on his body still tingling from Titania’s touch, other parts of his body clamoring for her attention.
After directing his carriage to return home without him, he walked down the street from Titania’s house, beginning to turn his researcher’s brain toward the problem of who could have attacked his father.
Alistair had told him that, in addition to the attack, his father’s library—the one in which they had met earlier that day—had been ransacked, as if the attacker were searching for something.
Perhaps his father had surprised the burglar? Edwin knew the house well enough, however, to know that there were no valuables kept in that room, and in fact, the safe was on the upstairs floor in his father’s private sitting room. Would a burglar have known that?
Surely anyone foolish enough to enter a peer’s house would have done some investigative work first, would they not? But whoever it was did not know the lord was in residence, or at least thought he was out for the evening. He would have to discover if his father’s plans had changed suddenly that evening.
He meandered as he thought until he saw he had wandered back to the boxing saloon. Not a bad idea; perhaps with a clear head and bruised knuckles he could concentrate better.
He stripped down to just his shirt and breeches and headed for the boxing ring. And, like before, he heard his name called in a voice dripping with disdain.
“My lord,” Lord Gratwick called, “have you not had enough of vicious attacks? Perhaps you are looking for a younger opponent?”
Edwin turned, deliberately trying to withhold any reaction from his face. He saw the tall, blond man at the edge of the ring, dressed to enter the ring.
“Perhaps,” the man continued with an insolent smirk, “you would care to join me for a match? It would not be as engrossing as analyzing battle plans to ferret out the Frenchies, but it would give me great satisfaction to pummel you as you did your father.”
Edwin stopped, struck by Gratwick’s words. Anyone who went to the trouble of asking a few questions knew that Edwin was a scholar, but very few people knew his research had any impact on the current war. And yet Gratwick seemed conversant with the details. Maybe he, too, was involved with the government’s war efforts? No, he had recently sold out, and he held no official office. Maybe he was working as some sort of spy? Well, if so, he was a damned bad one, since to comment as he did was tantamount to wearing a sign that said “I’m a spy” around his neck.
No, Edwin thought, watching Gratwick still eying him with loathing, it had to be that he knew something he should not, and his hatred made him careless. Lord Gratwick would bear watching, but not in the ring. If what he suspected was true, he would be hard-pressed not to kill the worm.
Still without speaking a word, Edwin turned back to the dressing area, deciding that discretion was the better part of valor, especially where it concerned his fist meeting Gratwick’s face. Gratwick’s taunts followed him all the way down the hall to the room where he had left his clothes, and it took every fiber in his being not to respond, whether with words or his fists.
“Worthy!” a booming voice exclaimed as Edwin was reassembling his cravat. Funny, he mused, even as polite society deemed him unfit for their polite company, he was finally able to tie a presentable cravat. He smoothed the fabric as he awaited his friend.
Alistair stomped down the hallway, brushing his sleeve with a scowl on his face. He brightened briefly as he saw Edwin’s neckwear, then scowled again.
“Worthy, we have to talk. Your house?”
“WHY IS YOUR STEPMOTHER spreading such vicious lies about you?” Alistair poured more sugar into his coffee, then tasted it and wrinkled his nose. He poured two more heartbeats’ worth of sugar and tasted again. He smiled. “Well?”
Edwin shook his head, as much at the ridiculous amount of sweetener his friend deemed necessary for his coffee as to answer the question.
“Leticia, obviously, has no liking for me, but I did not realize her antipathy would extend to lying about something as serious as this. I was over at my father’s house the day he was attacked, but I left him dozing in his chair. I was a bit fuzzy the evening he was attacked—I cannot quite recall my movements of that evening, which certainly seems suspicious. But listen to this: I was at Jackson’s salon today, and Gratwick—that toad-sucking worm—mentioned something he should not know about. I know it seems providential for him to say something to me that would implicate him—”
“Especially since there is no question as to your opinion of him,” Alistair interjected.
“Yes,” Edwin acknowledged with a rueful laugh. “He and I never took to each other, and then when I discovered he was a serious suitor for Titania, and what is more, he implied the betrothal was all but announced—I know I have a dislike for him, but that does not negate the fact he might have had something to do with this. What do you know of him?”
“Not much, really,” Alistair replied. “He sold out recently, his uncle passed away leaving him in possession of a title, if not a fortune—eerily similar to you, my friend, but you do have a fortune, do you not?—and he has been playing up his days as a soldier in hopes of impressing the young ladies. Most young ladies, however, have not been impressed by him. He is not a stupid man, but there is something unpleasant about him.”
“That is what I felt,” Edwin said. “I wondered if I felt that way just because he was so obvious in his attentions to the young lady in question.”
“And you were not?”
“And it seemed to me,” he continued mildly, blushing, “there was something desperate about him. Until we started speaking of it, I had forgotten, but Lady Wexford, that blonde woman who is a friend of Miss Stanhope’s, introduced Gratwick to Miss Stanhope. They seemed to be on close terms. I do not trust either one of them.”
Alistair frowned in concentration. “If Gratwick and Lady Wexford had some sort of scheme, that still does not explain where your father would come into it. Those two were not acquainted with him, were they?”
“I do not know,” Edwin replied. Rising hurriedly from his chair, he gestured impatiently for his friend to rise also. “We will not know anything until we find out more about Gratwick and Lady Wexford. I will inquire of Ti—that is, Miss Stanhope—about her friend. Perhaps you could pay a call on Gratwick; I do not trust myself
near him.” Unconsciously, he curled his hands into fists, pulling his shoulders up in an aggressive posture.
“I do not trust you near him, either, but I do agree he bears watching. Why do you get to inquire of the lovely Miss Stanhope, while I have to chase after the rooster-legged braggart?”
“Because she happens to be in love with me, and I with her.”
“Oh. Well, that settles it, then.”
“CLAIRE, HOW LOVELY of you to call,” Titania said, her tone at odds with her words. She had been hoping Edwin would visit, and Claire’s arrival was more than a sad disappointment.
“Yes, well, dear, you did promise to take a drive with me this afternoon,” Claire said, fluttering her hands.
“I did?” Titania queried, searching her mind for the forgotten engagement.
“Yes, do you not remember? Really, Titania, town does age one, but I did not think you would be forgetting things so quickly. Hurry, have someone fetch your pelisse, we should be on our way.”
“But I cannot,” Titania replied. What if Edwin were to come and she was not home?
“You must! My friend, it is crucial that you come with me today. It is of the utmost importance to me. Please—” her friend finished quietly, stretching out her hands in supplication.
“Yes, of course, if it is so important.” A crucial carriage ride? The only thing she could think was that there was some shopping emergency Claire could not handle alone.
“I need to be back soon. Will this take long?”
Claire rolled her eyes, saying with an impatient air, “No, it will not take long. You will be back in plenty of time to catalog your books or whatever you need to do. Now, hurry!” She practically shoved Titania down the steps and into the waiting carriage.
“Stillings,” Titania yelled out the window as the carriage started to move, “I will be back in an hour.”
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