Celeste Bradley - [Heiress Brides 01]

by Desperately Seeking a Duke

“He was eighteen! And angry and lost, as well. He loved your father, despite how the marquis favored you over him. He made mistakes, a great many of them. Yet have you not noticed that since your … your crisis … that he has changed his ways? He came back to support you, so you would not be alone.”

  Calder stood abruptly, moving to the window with jerky strides. After a long moment, he passed a hand over his face. “I thought he’d simply run out of money. I thought he’d seen my situation as insurance that I wouldn’t be likely to throw him out.”

  She lifted a hand, but did not touch him. He wasn’t the sort of man one reached out to comfort. “He has changed. He has paid off his debts. He no longer frequents the tables. He hasn’t been blind drunk in years.”

  “Once.”

  “What?”

  “He drank himself into a stupor on the day I told him you had agreed to wed me.”

  “Ah.” She let out a breath. “That was a mistake, you know. I thought the proposal came from him. I didn’t know his full name.”

  Calder turned back to face her. “I figured that out eventually.”

  “You did? Then why—?”

  He looked away. “I liked you. You are … a rather different sort of girl. I thought that if you grew to know me, you might …” He shrugged. “Anyway, it wasn’t as though I could break the engagement without causing an enormous scandal.”

  Too true. It had been threat enough to keep her from doing the same for far too long. “It would have been less of a scandal then than it will be now,” she said ruefully.

  He fixed her with his black gaze once again. “Then don’t do it. At least … at least let the matter lie for now. If—when Rafe returns, there will be plenty of time to straighten the matter out then.”

  Put off the madness until Rafe was back by her side? It was tempting. God, she missed him. Worry tugged at her constantly, like a fishing line snagged on something vital. Oh, Rafe. She wrapped her arms about her chilled midriff. Where are you?

  Calder was waiting for an answer. She took a breath. “But the world is watching, my lord. Won’t anyone think it odd that the wedding arrangements have come to a halt? We must tell the bishop—”

  “We will … in time. Right now, I think it best if we go on as if nothing has happened. Give Rafe time to do whatever he has gone to do. Give the world time to talk of something else. Who knows, perhaps someone will do something more scandalous in the meantime and we will be nothing but a sentence at the bottom of the scandal sheet.”

  Phoebe managed a choked laugh. “That would be lovely. I long to be nothing but a sentence.”

  The corner of his lips twitched. “As do I.”

  The agreement made her uneasy, but she nodded. “We will wait, then. For now.”

  Coward.

  It would only be until Rafe returned. Only until she could tuck her hand in his when she had to face the world’s censure. He would never want her to go through it alone.

  Her reasoning was sound and Calder was right, she knew. So why did she feel as if she’d committed something a little bit like a betrayal?

  Chapter Forty-six

  In the quaint little village of Burnhill, deep in the Cotswolds, Wolfe left the village tavern whistling. He’d thought to bring along enough coin on this venture to tempt a tryst from the pretty innkeeper’s daughter.

  After an hour in his company, Wolfe had left the girl pink-faced and bemused, with her eyes wide and damp but her fingers wrapped tightly around the gold in her palm. She wasn’t likely to squeak—or if she did, what did it matter? Her father wouldn’t like it much, but this wasn’t Wolfe’s village, was it? He and Stick were only here long enough to stop the wedding—

  Then what? He stopped right there in the street at the thought. What would happen when Brookhaven missed his wedding date?

  Why, once he was released, he’d go right back to being engaged to Miss Millbury. After all, it wasn’t as if she wouldn’t forgive a man for being kidnapped!

  Wolfe stood there in the spring sunshine, blind to the way the evening light made the stones glow golden, ignoring that he forced carts and villagers to go around as they stared at him oddly, and contemplated—without the merest glimmer of distaste, he was rather surprised to notice—committing cold-blooded murder.

  At the very least, the brutal murder of Miss Millbury’s dreams.

  The actual murder would have to take place when Stickley was out of the way.

  AT BREAKFAST ON the fourth day of Rafe’s absence, Tessa began to talk of sending Phoebe back to Thornton.

  “I realize that the wedding has not been officially canceled—but there are rumors,” she warned Phoebe blackly.

  Rumors started by Tessa? Phoebe gazed evenly at her aunt. “I will remain here, thank you very much.”

  “But I am your—”

  Phoebe frowned. “You’re not really my aunt, you realize.”

  Tessa blinked. “What do you mean?”

  “You are not my mother’s sister. You are merely the woman who married my uncle.” She turned to Deirdre. “Dee, have you considered tossing this woman from your house in Woolton? I’m quite sure your father left it all to you. I should talk to a solicitor—”

  Tessa laughed lightly. “Why, Phoebe, what a ridiculous notion! I only mentioned it because—what with all the rumors and the fact that the plans for the ceremony have been left uncompleted—I thought you wouldn’t want your … situation … to reflect badly on Deirdre or … ah, Sophie. Decorum must be preserved.” Her expression was prim.

  Phoebe lifted her head swiftly. “Why?”

  Tessa drew back at Phoebe’s glare. “What?”

  Phoebe stood, her body like a coiled spring. “Why must we preserve decorum? Who are we preserving it for? I don’t give a bloody damn what Society thinks anymore. I don’t care what you think of me—you or my father. Rafe is gone, Tessa. Gone!”

  She pressed her hands to the ache in her chest. “He is missing and there is nothing but a hole where he was.” She spun away, too raw to bear the vast lack of understanding in her aunt’s eyes.

  Tessa cleared her throat uneasily. “You are too emotional, Phoebe. You always have been. There is no need to be so—so very passionate about—”

  Phoebe whirled. “About passion? About a love that makes every sunrise a pleasure for the sole fact that I might see him that day? About a man who can see right through the pretty poses and the fluttering fan—who can see me, just as I am, as I truly am—see me and care for me anyway …” Her throat gave out on a gasp and her knees went weak.

  She sat abruptly. “I think …” She swallowed. “I think that I need to be very passionate about a man such as that.”

  She turned back to the fire. “Leave me alone, Tessa. Just … leave me alone.”

  RAFE LOOKED UP from his work and listened. Voices again. This time they were arguing loudly enough for him to hear them clearly. He walk-crawled to the door to press one ear to the thick, slimy wood. On either side of his head, his hands pressed to the door as well, but he paid no attention to the pain of torn nails or the reek of his filthy fingers. Closing his eyes, he concentrated on the men in the house above him.

  Behind him, a new shadow graced the grimy root cellar. High on the wall, there was a new hole—soon to be a window—where two stones had been clawed from the wall with nothing but bare fingers and desperation. It was a small hole, but slowly growing larger. Had the wall not been laid two stones deep he would have seen daylight already.

  Now, listening with all his might, he could hear one bellowing voice clearly and one lighter tenor less so. They were arguing about … a letter?

  WOLFE SLAPPED THE letter they’d found in Brookhaven’s pocket down onto the rickety tabletop and fisted his large hand on top of it. “You know I cannot copy the handwriting! You, on the other hand, have been signing my name for years!”

  Stickley blinked rapidly. “I—what a thing to say!”

  Wolfe rolled his eyes. “See here, Stick, I don’t care. Yo
u keep the practice going and you don’t cheat me more than I’d say was fair, so it doesn’t matter.”

  “Ch—cheat? I—”

  Wolfe’s fist slammed the table with a thud, making it jump, making Stickley jump, and causing a twitch to pass through the aching exhausted shoulders of the man listening downstairs. “Stick, I told you—I care nothing about it. We have a partnership that works. You take care of business. I make sure nothing interferes with that business.”

  Stickley forgot to quiver long enough to sniff indignantly. “And precisely what does that consist of?”

  Wolfe tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. “It consists of making sure that we don’t lose the trust to Brookhaven’s pockets. It consists of making sure Miss Millbury gets a letter from Brookhaven telling her how he just couldn’t face marrying her and how he simply had to take a holiday from the strain of his existence.”

  Stickley frowned skeptically. “He’s about to be made Duke of Brookmoor. He wouldn’t take a holiday now.”

  “Sure he would. After all, Brookmoor’s been dying for years now. That sort of strain can tell on a man.”

  Stickley reached one hand to slide the letter closer. “Well, I suppose I could duplicate the handwriting—and this one is actually to Miss Millbury herself, so the greeting will be appropriate …”

  He muttered on while Wolfe took the other wooden chair, flipping his coattails out grandly as if he seated himself on a throne. Pouring himself a glassful from the wine bottle on the table, Wolfe swirled it, sniffed it, then downed it in a long easy draught.

  Stickley looked up, glaring over the spectacles perched on his nose. “We’ve only the one bottle left, you know. We’ll have to go back into the village for supplies and I’d really rather not. The less people see us the better.”

  Wolfe thought rather regretfully about the innkeeper’s daughter, who might have been up for another go-round now that she’d already lost her virtue. Still, it was all in good cause. “Agreed.” He corked the wine. Sacrifice wasn’t something he was accustomed to, but this was a very important undertaking, after all.

  Stickley returned to his study, frowning. “I can match the handwriting well enough, but Brookhaven has an extremely complicated signature. Perhaps after several days of practice—”

  Wolfe’s chair came back down onto four legs. “Days? God, Stick, I can’t stay in this moldy cottage for days while you scribble! Think of something else!”

  Stickley shrugged. “I could just forgo the signature altogether. After all, how many fiancés does she have to be jilted by?”

  Wolfe smiled and clapped Stickley hard on the shoulder. “That’s the lad!” Then he leaned back in his chair once more. “I’ve a plan to add a bit of realism myself. I hate to lose that fine horse of his, but it’s a bit too fine for the likes of us. We’d be better off without it.”

  He stood and went to the pile of things by the fire. “It’s a good thing we hadn’t gotten around to burning these.” He pulled a fine blue surcoat from the pile and shrugged into it. “It’s a bit tight, but a fair number of blokes wear them that way.”

  He went to the window to gaze at his own reflection with a satisfied smile. “Oh, yes. Don’t I look the proper marquis?”

  BENEATH THEM IN the earthen vault, Rafe let his breath out in disappointment. He’d heard something about a letter and then their voices had quieted, argument apparently resolved.

  His eyes ached from trying to see in the dimness and his lungs felt squeezed by the ill air, but he turned back to the hole in the wall and began to dig at the ancient mortar with his torn fingertips once more. Phoebe was outside that wall, somewhere, hopefully safe and sound, and he intended to get to her if he had to tear this cottage down with his bare hands.

  One stone at a time.

  Chapter Forty-seven

  When Phoebe entered the master’s study on the sixth day of Rafe’s disappearance, Calder looked up from the papers he was reading. There was a shadow in his eyes that told her he knew something.

  “You have heard from him.”

  Calder shook his head as he stood to show her to a chair. “No, but I have heard of him. I followed the trail of the horse—” He smiled grimly. “Actually, it was a money trail, leading me to the village of Burnhill, where a man matching his description sold one of my horses to a hosteller in exchange for a lesser mount and some coin.”

  “And you are sure it was Rafe.” It wasn’t a question.

  Calder rubbed a hand over his weary face. “The innkeeper described him right down to the silver buttons on his blue surcoat. Rafe never did care to wear gold like the rest of us.”

  Phoebe paced the room, forcing the niggling voices to silence. She would remember his voice. She would concentrate on the way his every touch was a caressing vow. She would roll herself into the bedcovers at night and pretend that the warmth came from him.

  He would return.

  And if he didn’t, she would find him and strangle him with his own cravat—

  She halted, frozen by that thought.

  She would find him.

  Calder’s hired men were doing their best, she was sure, but she knew Rafe. She knew his habits and his preferences—and she knew where he’d last been seen. She could start there, following her instincts and her knowledge of Rafe until she found him. What if he needed her help?

  She became absorbed by the strength of that idea. Yes. Rafe needed her help. He needed her, she could feel it.

  Why not? She had nothing better to do at the moment and the waiting was fair driving her mad. Calder wouldn’t like it. Nor would the vicar, but she’d already gone a bit past caring what they thought, hadn’t she? She was no child to be ordered to her room!

  The ache in her chest eased immediately. If not happiness, taking action at least brought her a sense of purpose and control over her future. She would find Rafe, rescue him from whatever mess he’d found himself in, and they would come home together.

  Let the bloody world say what it might.

  Calder had plenty to say.

  “Absolutely not! I forbid it!”

  Phoebe shook her head. “With all due respect, my lord, you don’t have a word to say about it.”

  “Well, your father will surely forbid it!”

  She laughed shortly. “My father hasn’t stepped ten feet from your library in days. He doesn’t even know what happened between us, or that Rafe is missing.” She shook her head in disbelief. “He’s gone completely native in Mayfair. It’s going to come as a serious blow to him when he loses your valet and your whisky.”

  She tilted her head and gazed at him with stubborn regret. “I dislike having to act against your wishes when you’ve been so kind to me and my father, but—”

  “But it has not stopped you before and it will not stop you now,” he said rigidly.

  “No.” She took a breath. “It won’t.” She turned to go. “I’m packing a small bag and using my own funds for the journey. I shall let you know immediately should I learn anything new.”

  He did not try to stop her and it was not long before she stood in the front hall in a traveling dress with a satchel in her hands. She’d written a rather evasive note to the vicar—heavens, no need to tackle that mountain just yet!—and a more explicit one to Sophie.

  A knock came at the front door. A footman hurried past her to answer it as she drew her gloves on. She glanced up to see that it was the post.

  Should she wait? There might be something—

  “For you, miss.”

  Who—? It was posted from Burnhill.

  She dropped her other glove to the floor and ripped through the seal on the letter.

  My dear Miss Millbury,

  I regret that I am unable to fulfill my promise to you …

  The letter was short, almost a note, really. As Phoebe stood there in the great marble front hall at Brook House, bag at her feet, a distant part of her wondered at how such great damage could be done with such economy of words.

&
nbsp; The pain in her chest swelled, squeezing the air from her lungs. I have decided against wedding you … as if he’d chosen not to purchase a new suit or a bottle of ink. The image of his back, broad and straight, clad in blue superfine, fading away in the morning mists, leaving her alone in their bed after …

  A single sound escaped her then—a hoarse sob cut brutally short.

  Then … nothing. No emotion but the welcome chill of her control. It froze the pain in mid-thought, leaving it a spiky, weighted ball of ice in her breast. Better that than the roiling, exploding fireball of agony it had been.

  She carefully refolded the letter, keeping the creases sharp. She would investigate the one thread of hope left to her—not that she dared keep faith in it, but she would not take anything for granted, not this time.

  Calder was still in his study. He scowled at her when she entered. “I thought you were preparing for your journey.”

  “I—” She swallowed.

  He must have realized her shock, for he stood quickly and rounded his desk to take her arm.

  “Sit down, Phoebe. What has happened? You look like death.”

  She handed Calder the letter. Her hands were not shaking. “This is not signed. Is this his handwriting?”

  Calder read it slowly. Then he looked up, the truth in his eyes. “Rafe and I had the same tutor. I used to do his work when he scorned his lessons. Our handwriting is nearly identical. This—” He folded the letter and set it away from him as if he could not bear to look at it. “This could have been written by me.”

  Time stopped. The light turned to gray. Even the air in her lungs felt like winter.

  She realized dully that she had crossed the room to stare blindly out the window. She was there, braced against the window with her ungloved hand—yet she felt oddly as though she floated above them both, looking down at two forlorn people in the silence of lost hope.

  Calder took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Phoebe,” he said with gruff gentleness in his voice. “What is the good of loving someone if it goes to waste?”