At the call to dinner, she slipped her arm into the dowager duchess’s and couldn’t contain her pride at not even noticing John. But once in the dining room she sat next to the dowager and realized one chair was empty.
John rushed into the room. “Please forgive me.”
Very well. She hadn’t noticed him in the drawing room because he hadn’t been there. But she also hadn’t noticed his absence, which was much the same thing.
He sat down opposite Claire and explained, “It took longer than expected to find my old clothes.”
Which did not quite fit him anymore, Claire noted with dismay. When he’d left five years ago he’d been a couple of inches shorter and much, much thinner. He was still lean, but his shoulders stretched the maroon coat taut and the black breeches clung indecently to his thighs.
“Pea soup, my lady?”
Claire started and nodded at the footman, who ladled the liquid into her bowl. She would have to spend the entire meal facing John.
She spooned up her soup and listened to the others chatter excitedly with the prodigal son. His inky black hair was ragged, but the longer locks lay nicely tousled about his head. His face had lost the smoothness of youth. It was firmer, more rugged, even though he had now shaved.
Behind his spectacles, his midnight blue gaze found hers and Claire couldn’t look away. Again, he looked as if he wanted to kiss her.
She silently groaned at her wild imagination. Pursing her lips she asked, “Where have you been all these years, John?”
The familial conviviality around the table died a sudden death. At her curt tone everyone stared, first at Claire and then at John.
“Touring the Continent,” he said without even a blink.
“Oh, you’ll have to regale us with stories of the places you’ve visited,” Emily said cheerfully.
Claire did not relent so easily. “You toured the Continent during the war? What did you do, sit on a grassy hill and watch the battles unfold?”
John shifted his gaze to his pea soup and set his spoon down carefully. “During the war I went farther afield. But after Waterloo I made the traditional stops in Europe: Paris, Vienna, Barcelona, Rome.” He glanced at Emily. “I brought some trinkets for the children.”
Happy conversation resumed, with a discussion of his brother’s growing family. Claire’s sister and Allerton had a son, a daughter, and another child on the way. The house never knew much quiet.
Claire usually loved to talk about the little ones, but just now she was disconcerted by John’s response. When they had first met, he’d worked in the Foreign Office as a translator. Had he given that position up merely to “tour” the Continent? Had he been so eager to get away from her?
Footmen in the green and gold Allerton livery removed the soup dishes. Claire took a fillet of the main course, salmon, and brought a forkful to her mouth only to find John staring at her again. A shiver raced up her spine.
Dash it! She set her fork on her plate without taking a bite. “I am surprised you did not purchase a commission in the army,” she commented, in what she hoped was a conversational tone and not an accusatory one, though the latter better described her feelings. It rankled that he had gadded about Europe—just like her father—practicing his fancy languages while a war ensued, fought by young men such as Stephen who’d served with the 52nd Regiment of Foot. Though she didn’t like to admit it, she’d thought more highly of John.
Again, everyone else stopped speaking and eating, the tension hovering like a thick fog. Lord, the month would be long if the entire family continued to behave in such a manner whenever she and John talked.
This time he didn’t look away from her when he spoke. “I tried to join the army. Though I would like to think I could have proved useful in some manner, they wouldn’t have me.”
Well, then, she had to give him some credit. But why would the army reject him? Because of his eyesight, or was he just considered too weak? She’d never heard of anyone else being rebuffed, especially a man with money for a commission, but then none of the family seemed to have an issue with his answer.
Without any hint of rancor, John moved on, asking Allerton about his estate, Bellemere. The conversation turned to farming and Claire ate her salmon in silence.
Suddenly her skin prickled. She looked up…into John’s eyes, which burned with an emotion she didn’t recognize. Or didn’t want to recognize.
Then he smiled.
Claire reached for her goblet and downed the last of her wine, her heart pounding all the while. Oh-so-serious John rarely smiled, but when he did his eyes sparkled like the most beautiful sapphires and he looked more like the young, carefree six-and-twenty he was. She could not stop the soft smile that shaped her own lips, nor the small sigh that escaped. At least when he smiled he didn’t look as if he wanted to kiss her.
Except…his smile lost its cheerfulness, turning more sensual, and now he gazed at her from beneath hooded lids, once again giving her the impression he wanted to whisk her upstairs to a bedchamber and ravish her.
“Let us have dessert!” the duke ordered in a sharp tone that jerked Claire out of her fanciful reverie.
Footmen swarmed the table, clearing away dishes while Claire silently chastised herself. Her immature romantic tendencies were sprouting again. She was engaged, and they were sitting at the dinner table with family. Of course John wasn’t making sheep’s eyes at her.
She could not, however, stop herself from taking out her irritation on him. She knew she was being ungracious, if not downright impolite, with her intrusive questions and brusque manner; everyone in the family had to have noticed how strident she was this evening. Nevertheless, an irrational force made her ask, “What do you intend to do now you are returned?”
“I think I will re-enter Society and find an heiress to wed,” he announced without any hesitation.
Nearly everyone laughed or chuckled, clearly thinking he was teasing. Claire’s dinner turned to lead in her stomach. John merely sat there, his expression perfectly serious, perhaps even a little smug.
Emily scrutinized him. “You’ll need new clothing. We don’t want the heiresses thinking you are a fortune hunter. And you will need to learn to waltz. The girls nowadays will not soon forgive you if you don’t know how.”
Claire pushed her apple tart away, her usual taste for sweets gone. She’d been acting like a complete clod-skull and she wondered why no one had reminded her of her manners. Looking around at all the happy faces enjoying John’s return, she vowed to keep her thoughts to herself the rest of the evening.
Perhaps, too, she should beg Stephen to move up the wedding.
Mercifully, Emily excused the ladies, leaving the men to their port. Feeling as if she had awoken into a living nightmare, Claire dazedly followed the others to the parlor.
***
“Touring the Continent? Unfit for the army?” Allerton mocked every one of John’s earlier words. “The Foreign Office certainly taught you how to dance about the truth.”
Now that the ladies had exited, John pulled off his glove and laid it across the arm of his chair. He’d informed Allerton of the injury years ago, and his redoubtable brother had inquired about it earlier so this wasn’t this first time he’d seen it.
He shrugged at Allerton’s words, though his lies at the dinner table disquieted him more than any he had told over the past few years. “It could be said that I ‘toured’ the Continent. And I was rejected by the army; they shifted me over to the intelligence service even though that’s not what I wanted to do.”
“Yes, well…,” Allerton hedged before taking a swallow of port. “Your talents were put to much better use there, weren’t they? Aren’t you glad you didn’t end up as just another English lad propped up in front of Napoleon’s cannons?”
His brother never hedged, and he tried to govern John’s life every chance he could. “You used your influence to get the army to turn me away,” John accused. Why had he not figured this out before?
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Allerton hoisted his glass in a toast. “Of course I did. You were so scraggy and raw-boned you wouldn’t have survived a week.”
John gripped his port but didn’t raise it. “I wanted to join the army.”
“Don’t quibble, little brother.” Allerton set the glass down with a thump. “I saved you from certain death.”
“There was nothing certain about it,” John snapped as an ugly anger seized him. “Do you even know what I was doing over there? I spent the last five years trudging all over the Continent, pretending to be someone else, sleeping in filthy inns, eating food you wouldn’t feed to your wife’s cat and, despite what others may think, serving my country. My life was in danger every single day, yet somehow I managed to survive without your assistance, dear brother.”
Allerton swept a glance over him. “For the most part. They certainly made a man out of you where I couldn’t.” He paused. “Were you really so dissatisfied with your life of espionage?”
“No,” John admitted. He didn’t regret a moment, though it still rankled that Allerton had meddled in his life again. “I am finished with the Foreign Office, however.” This wasn’t a complete lie; he was working out of the Home Office now. And even if he hadn’t been under strict orders to keep quiet about his present mission, John would be disinclined to share the information with his brother. He was used to working alone and needed no help from Allerton. That much he’d proven to himself over the last five years.
Allerton leaned his arms on the table. “But that’s what you do. It’s who you are. You have to have a purpose in life. Otherwise, and I speak from experience here, you’ll head down the wrong path.”
His undisciplined, former rake of a brother now giving such principled advice? He scrutinized Allerton and found his black hair still too long, nearly to his shoulders, and those blue eyes were as merry as ever, but the words that came out of Allerton’s mouth sounded more like something their mother would have said. John knew Allerton’s relationship with Emily had changed him, but never would he have imagined to this degree.
“May I expect to be endowed with such profound wisdom once I pass the age of thirty as well?”
A blast of laughter, like a horn announcing the start of a hunt, boomed from Allerton’s mouth. He sank against the back of his chair, shaking his head. “You found a sense of humor on the Continent! About time, I say. You were always such a hard nut to crack. I’m not sure what Cla—” He cleared his throat. “Never mind.”
Silence reigned. John didn’t want to discuss Claire. Not with his brother.
Allerton spoke again. Quietly. “I cannot see you idling away your time, John. I could find you another position in the government, or you could take charge of one of my estates that needs more attention than I can give it or—”
“I was serious about finding a wife,” John said. Given his assignment, it was the perfect cover. And maybe it would get his mind off of Claire. “I think that’s enough for now. Do I not deserve a respite? I will find something else to suit me when the time is right.”
Or he would go back to spying. Far, far away from Claire and her new husband.
Sitting across from her at dinner had been torture. Despite having become adept at lying, he hadn’t liked deceiving Claire about his time in Europe or his intentions now he was home. But he smiled inwardly at the memory of her inquisition. She was suspicious of his answers and, as usual, had spoken her mind. There’d been a touch of anger in her eyes too, and in that remarkable blue dress she was so beautiful, so vibrant—and so taken.
Allerton thumbed his glass. “I am sorry matters have come to pass as they have.”
“Beg pardon?” John said, though he had an uneasy feeling where his brother’s thoughts had turned.
“Claire is engaged,” Allerton said.
John shrugged and drank his port. “It matters not to me. I met the new Lord Kensworth when I arrived. Are you certain the man is suitable?” Damnation. He should have stopped after the first sentence if it truly didn’t matter to him. And of course a handsome and titled viscount would be suitable for a twenty-three year old who’d made no other match.
“The old viscount died two years ago. With no sons or nephews of his own, the title passed fairly far down the line. Though we’d never met him before, we’ve since discovered Kensworth a fine gentleman…except that he’s a Whig. But I’ve learned to live with that, as he and Claire get on well.” Allerton paused and twirled his port. “If Claire doesn’t matter to you, then why were you all but undressing her with your eyes?”
“I didn’t— I never—,” John sputtered.
Allerton leaned forward, a wicked gleam in his eyes. “Lord Bradwell appointed me her guardian upon his death. If you were anyone else but my little brother, we would be meeting over pistols at dawn.” He laughed and shook his head. “Even in my most dissolute days, I don’t think I ever looked at a woman that way in the company of my entire family.”
John’s skin burned beneath his brother’s censorious gaze, but denial was useless. He had wanted to divest Claire of her beautiful gown and do all manner of wicked things to her curvaceous figure. He had always been adept at hiding his feelings. Most of the time, even those who knew him best couldn’t tell what he was thinking. He had better learn to conceal his passion for Claire.
“I apologize.” He sighed and linked his hands over his waistcoat. “Her engagement took me completely by surprise. I came back thinking she was free and I might try to court her right but… Well, my feelings are obviously irrelevant at this point.”
Allerton laid temptation before him. “It’s never too late. She is not married yet.”
John resisted. “Don’t. It is too late. While I haven’t lived the life of a gentleman lately, I still know how to act honorably. A gentleman doesn’t break up an engagement.”
The words flowed off his tongue smoothly enough, but his brain fogged over. How was he to reside in the same house as Claire for the next four weeks? He wasn’t even sure he could manage four hours. Witness what had happened over dinner.
Chapter Six
John and Allerton rejoined the ladies in the parlor. Despite an impolitic desire to seek out Claire, John lowered himself onto the settee beside his mother, the dowager duchess. When she reached over and gently took his injured hand, he realized he’d left his glove in the dining room.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
His mother’s blue eyes, a match to his own, settled on his face with tenderness. “Why ever would you apologize to me?”
He raised their joined hands. “Polite Society doesn’t want to see such ugliness. I need to make a habit of keeping it covered.”
“We are not Polite Society, John Frederick Reyburn. We are family. And Polite Society can go hang if they care more for what’s missing here”—she squeezed his hand—“than what is present here and here.” She touched his forehead and his chest in turn.
“Did I mention how much I missed you, Mother?”
“Not once in all your letters, you shameful boy.” Her smile counteracted her words. “I am so glad you are home. Now we have two occasions to celebrate.”
Leave it to his formidable parent to forgo beating around the bush. He forced himself to say the words. He might as well repeat them ad nauseam. Perhaps such penance would take the sting away. “Claire is getting married.”
“Kensworth is a fine young man. What pleases me most is seeing Claire enjoy life once again.” She laid her fingers on his arm. “After you left, she was blue-deviled for an entire year.”
What was he to say to that? He had expected his mother to pile on the guilt about his long absence, not about Claire. He glanced around the room and found her talking to her sister, oblivious to his presence. In the end, he resorted to Shakespeare and mumbled something to his mother about, “All’s well that ends well.”
“Indeed,” she replied. “You cannot have been too attached, ending the engagement as you did and then leaving for the Continent so soon. Real
ly, what could have possibly developed between the two of you? You were thrown together for such a short time.”
John ground his teeth. If his mother thought a man couldn’t fall for a woman in a day or two, she was sadly mistaken. He could argue against every sentence his mother had uttered, but he childishly picked the most inconsequential. “We were not truly engaged.”
His mother eyed him with a wide and guileless gaze, but he saw the shrewdness lurking. She wanted to trap him into revealing how he really felt about Claire.
But Claire was marrying someone else. His feelings, past or present, were irrelevant. All he’d had on the Continent, all he would ever have, was the memory of what little time they’d had together. In that carriage.
“Ahem.”
John blinked, returning to the present at the quiet intrusion. “Beg pardon, Mother.”
She tilted her head as if sizing him up. “Well, at last you are home to look for a bride. I hope the thought of marriage will encourage you to settle down in England. You do realize I am not getting any younger? Neither my heart nor my frail body will be able to tolerate another one of your jaunts around the world.”
Ah, there was the guilt he had anticipated. Over this he had no trouble feeling contrite, for he had treated his mother and the rest of the family shabbily. “I am sorry. I regret not coming back sooner.”
If he’d come back sooner, perhaps they would be celebrating his marriage to Claire. His gaze strayed to her again, and in the flickering candlelight she glowed with a golden, angelic haze. Damn his timing. He shoved that useless thought aside and looked at his mother, her smile soft and proud, her body, except for the slightest bits of silver running through her dark hair, barely showing any sign of aging.
How could he tell her he would return to the Continent to spy after his current mission was complete? He couldn’t. Not yet.
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