by Anne Gracie
“I saw nothing untoward at all,” he assured her. “And I apologize for any distress I caused you and your husband.” He pressed a couple of gold sovereigns—all he had on him—into the woman’s shaking hand, mounted his horse and rode off.
Damn, for a moment there he’d thought he had the bastard.
Chapter Fifteen
Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life. Security is an insipid thing.
—WILLIAM CONGREVE, LOVE FOR LOVE
Dusk was falling as the carriage bringing the girls to Ashendon turned into the driveway. At the same time, Emm saw her husband riding across the park from the opposite direction. He rode slumped in the saddle, as if weary and dispirited.
Emm hung back as he dismounted and waited for the girls to alight, greeting each one with a nod and words Emm couldn’t quite catch. She wanted to give them a little private time together; they were family, after all. She was the stranger here.
It was not for her to welcome Rose and Lily to the home in which they’d been born.
But they could have been strangers for all the warmth they showed. Of the girls, only Lily made any attempt at a warmer greeting, reaching up to plant a shy kiss on her brother’s cheek. He seemed not to know quite how to respond, bending toward her slightly so she was able to reach his jaw.
Watching their caution with each other, their awkwardness, Emm felt a rueful pang. Somehow, she was going to make these disparate, wary people into a family. She was determined on it.
She hurried down the front steps to greet them. “You made good time, then, Rose, Lily, Georgiana. Did you have a pleasant journey? The weather was in your favor, though it’s getting quite chilly now.” She hugged each of the girls—even Georgiana, whom she barely knew, and who responded awkwardly, allowing the embrace rather than welcoming it.
“And who is this fine fellow?” She went to pat the dog, but he was more interested in sniffing out his new territory and leaving liquid calling cards on every nearby tree. She exclaimed over his size and noble carriage and heard her husband snort behind her.
She turned to him and was on the verge of holding out her hand to him when she decided to take the bull by the horns and begin as she meant to go on. She stood on tiptoes and planted a light kiss on his cheek. “I hope your day was productive, Lord Ashendon.”
He frowned and opened his mouth to say something, then stopped.
Emm didn’t wait for any further reaction. If he disliked the familiarity in front of the girls, he would no doubt tell her later. She turned to the girls. “But what am I doing letting you stand around in the cold. Come inside. You’re just in time for dinner. We won’t bother changing for dinner tonight—just freshen yourselves up—I’ve just ordered hot water sent up to your bedchambers. It should be there in a few minutes.”
They entered the house in a group, the girls chattering about the journey, responding to the questions she threw at them. Emm turned toward the stairs, but Rose’s gaze fell to the great hall. With a small exclamation, she walked forward and entered the room.
“What have you done to this place?” Rose stood in the center of the hall, her brow wrinkled, gazing around her. “It’s almost unrecognizable.”
Her words gave Emm a guilty pang. She hadn’t even considered the girls’ feelings when she’d had the great hall stripped of the items she found repugnant. She’d briefly considered her husband, but he hadn’t seemed to care what she did—but for the girls this place had truly been their home, apart from the years they spent at school.
She’d done her best to make it less like an armament museum and more like a family gathering place. A roaring fire burned in the enormous fireplace, and she’d had comfortable chairs gathered around in groups, instead of the hard chairs that had been placed formally around the perimeter. She’d covered the stone flags with warm and colorful rugs, and some embroidered screens that had been found in the attic helped protect the inhabitants from drafts.
“Yes, it’s all . . . lighter, and emptier, but somehow cozier,” Lily agreed. She pointed and gave a little laugh. “All the heads and antlers are gone.”
“Heads?” Georgiana looked around. “Antlers?”
Rose nodded. “Deer heads, antelopes, a nasty-looking boar, all kinds of heads—and swords and pikes and things—the bloodthirsty trophies of our ancestors. Most of Papa’s beloved prizes have gone.” She turned to Emm with wide eyes. “What have you done, Miss Westwood?”
“Lady Ashendon,” Lily corrected her.
“Oh, heavens, no—call me Emm or Emmaline,” Emm said, “now that we’re sisters-in-law. You too, of course, Georgiana.”
“George,” the girl muttered, “I only answer to George.”
Emm turned back to Rose. “I’m sorry if the removal of your father’s things distresses you, Rose, but your brother gave me carte blanche to—”
“Oh, it doesn’t distress me at all,” Rose interrupted, her eyes dancing. “It was ghastly before—George, you can’t imagine—with dead eyes staring down at you from every corner. So gloomy and depressing.”
“People who cut off the heads of animals and nail them to a wall are nothing but savages!” George declared.
Lily hugged Emm enthusiastically. “It’s wonderful, Miss—I mean Emm. So much friendlier. All the Hollow Knights and the Dismal Ancestors—that’s what Rose and I called them—have gone. You didn’t throw the Ancestors out, though, did you? Because George might want to see her family. There’s a painting of Cal as a boy that looks just like her. Or is that in the gallery?”
“I wouldn’t mind seeing a picture of my father too,” George muttered diffidently. “Not that I care, but . . . I’ve never seen him.”
Emm smiled, relieved and delighted with their reaction. “All the ancestral portraits are safe and will be hung with the others in the portrait gallery,” she assured them. “I haven’t yet had time to have a proper look at them myself.” And now that Lily had mentioned it, she wanted to see that portrait of her husband as a boy.
A sudden silence fell as her husband entered the great hall. He surveyed the room silently. Emm waited breathlessly for his reaction.
“I see you’ve begun,” he said, then gave a brusque nod and headed upstairs, leaving Emm not knowing what to think. What did he mean by “begun”? Begun to take over the house? Begun to ruin his home? Begun to interfere? There was no way of knowing.
She turned to the girls, who were regarding her with slight consternation. “Men are hopeless about interior arrangements,” she said lightly. “Either they don’t notice or they hate any kind of change. Now, let me show you to your bedchambers.”
The girls didn’t move. “Is he planning to dump us here?” Rose asked bluntly.
Emm gave her a surprised look. “Dump you? What do you mean?”
“He said, back in Bath, that we could go to London, make our come-out in the spring. We thought when the carriage came, that we were going to London. But here we are. So he’s planning to immure us in the country, isn’t he, so we can’t make any scandals?”
“No, of course not,” Emm told her, though in truth she had only the sketchiest idea of her husband’s plans. “The only reason he married me was so that you could all make your come-outs next season—”
“The only reason?” Lily interrupted, her face a picture of dismay. “But I thought—”
“No, not the only reason, of course.” Emm hastily covered her blunder with a smile. Lily obviously wanted to believe she’d married for love, and Emm was not going to disillusion her. “I didn’t mean it like that. We married for all the usual reasons, of course—but your brother did make it very clear that he wanted me to assist with your come-outs, which of course I am more than delighted to do. As for your being immured in the countryside, there is no such plan. Besides, scandals can happen as easily in the country as in the town, believe me. Now, upstairs to wash before dinner.” She linked her
arm through George’s. “Rose and Lily have their old bedchambers, though I’ve made a few changes, now that they’re grown up, but let me show you your room, George.”
The girl hesitated. “Can Finn come too?”
“Of course, he’s part of the family too.”
Rose didn’t move. “You promise we’re not going to be stuck here?”
“I promise,” Emm said.
* * *
He came to Emm’s bed again that night and made love to her with the same focused intensity, bringing her to the edge of climax again and again, before driving into her, hard and fast, powerful and passionate, until with a loud groan, he took them both over the crest of ecstasy.
Normally Emm drifted straight off to sleep, but tonight she lay sated, dreamy, but wakeful. Her husband slept beside her, his big body curled around her possessively.
He was an enigma, this man she’d married. During the day he seemed so distant and unapproachable, every inch the brusque stranger she’d married, but at night . . . oh, at night, he took her to a state she’d never dreamed was possible.
She’d come to crave his attentions, the embrace of his strong hard body, the feeling of total possession, of utter abandonment.
Only a few days before she couldn’t imagine what it would be like to sleep with a relative stranger, to reveal her nakedness to him, to have him handle and invade her body.
Now she couldn’t imagine life without it, without him, this odd, spiky, difficult-to-know man. She needed time, time to get to know him better, time for him to know her, not just her body. Time to make a real marriage of this arrangement.
But he would be returning to his position abroad in a few weeks.
She woke not long after dawn, feeling him slide out of bed. She blinked sleepily as he wrapped his dressing gown around him. “Going riding again?” Bars of sunlight came through the gaps in the curtains.
“Yes, go back to sleep. I won’t be home until very late.”
“Take the girls with you.”
“I can’t. I’m not going for a recreational ride. This is business.”
She sat up, drawing the bedclothes around her against the morning chill. “Take them anyway. This is their home. I’m sure they’d like to renew their acquaintance with—and in George’s case, meet—the people of the estate.”
“It’s not that kind of business.”
“You can’t put it off, not even for just a day?”
“I’d prefer not to. The girls—Rose and Lily at least—know the estate well. They can show Georgiana around. Make sure they take a groom with them.”
His indifference irritated her. “That’s not the point. Do you realize those girls think you’ve brought them here to keep them out of trouble?”
He blinked. “I have.”
“Yes, but they think you plan to dump them in the country.”
“I do. Until it’s time for them to go to London. I thought you understood—”
“They thought the carriage was going to take them to London. You did say they would go to London.”
“Yes, but not yet.”
“They weren’t to know that. They thought you lied to them, tricked them into coming here.”
His brows snapped together. “Lied?”
She shrugged. “From all I can gather, none of the girls has had much reason to rely on the men in their lives.”
His frown deepened.
“They think you don’t care about them.” She softened her voice. “I know you care, of course, but how do you think it will look to them if, on their very first day here, you abandon them?”
He shook his head, as if that made no sense. “I’m not abandoning them. You’re here.”
She threw a pillow at him in frustration. “Yes, but I’m not their brother. Or their uncle! Rose and Lily have not been home for years. They were sent away to school and practically forgotten. In all the time they attended Miss Mallard’s, the only person who showed the slightest interest in them was dear Lady Dorothea. Your father never wrote or visited, your brother never wrote or visited and you—yes, I know you were abroad, but you still never wrote.” She was pleased to see him flinch.
“As for George, from all I can gather the poor child has been raised as a stranger in her own family! Neither acknowledged nor cared for. I know you were ignorant of her existence and cannot be blamed for that, but it’s no wonder the poor girl is stiff and wary, hauled away—practically kidnapped!—from all she knew and expected to fit in as part of a family!”
He’d caught the pillow. He put it aside and eyed her cautiously. “I’m doing my best. It’s difficult.”
She made a scornful sound.
He scowled. “Why are you so cross with me?”
“Because you’re oblivious of those girls’ needs. Don’t you want to be part of a family? No—don’t bother answering—it’s patently obvious you don’t have the first idea. Go on, then, go off on your wretched estate business. I’ll do what I can to make the girls feel welcome. It’s what you hired me for, after all.”
“I didn’t hire you, I married you,” he growled.
She snorted.
Her attitude annoyed him. “And it’s not estate business, it’s . . . government business.”
She rolled her eyes. “Of course, the same mysterious but important ‘government business’ that conveniently arises whenever you want to avoid other family duties.”
He stiffened. “It is important and it’s not in the least convenient. And the reason I won’t take the girls with me is because there is a possibility of danger.”
“Danger?” She raised her brows, not caring that her expression was entirely skeptical.
Cal compressed his lips. It was obvious she didn’t believe him. He hesitated, about to leave, then changed his mind. He was married now; she had a right to know. He returned and sat down on the end of the bed, forcing his mind off the awareness that beneath the bundle of bedclothes, she was all warm and soft and naked. And delicious.
“I’m in pursuit of an assassin.”
“An assassin?” She sat up straighter, hugging the blankets around her. “Tell me more.”
He told her about his job, how it had changed since Waterloo, and the Army of Occupation, how it had become more. . . subtle.
“You mean you’re a spy?”
“No.” He hated that term. “But the world is changing, and in the wake of Napoleon, Europe is being remade; countries and principalities are merging, being annexed or absorbed, new alliances are being made, and it is in our government’s interest to make sure that we are not—shall we say, disadvantaged in the balance of power.”
She nodded. “It’s made the teaching of the globes very difficult too—the changing borders and disappearing countries. I could hardly keep up.”
Cal opened his mouth to point out it was not quite the same thing but decided discretion was the better part of husbandly valor.
He told her about the Scorpion then, and how the pursuit had become personal when his friend Bentley had been shot. “I wish you could have known him. He was a scraggly, awkward, odd-looking boy, all ears and elbows and Adam’s apple, but he had an unquenchable spirit—nothing defeated him, even though he was a walking target to the bullies of the school, such an odd-bod he was.” He gave a rueful half laugh. “He never did learn to box worth sixpence, though he tried, Lord how he tried.”
He was silent a moment. “But a fine, fine brain—I’ve seen men twice his age stunned at his clever reasoning and brilliant ideas. And then . . .” His voice broke and for a moment he had to fight for control.
She slipped her hand into his and squeezed, and the calmness with which she waited and the warmth of her quiet presence steadied him until he could go on without disgracing himself.
He explained how he’d half-recognized the assassin and come back to England
on nothing more solid than conjecture, and how he and a couple of others had been working though the list of men who’d been dismissed from the Rifle Brigade. “We’re lucky it’s a relatively short list—the Rifle Brigade is one of the few regiments that has remained at almost full strength—those sharpshooters are too valuable to lose.”
“So you’re what—looking for someone who left the regiment but who has been absent from their home at odd periods?”
He nodded, pleased with her quick understanding. “Exactly. And today I’m going to check on the last two in my area—Bert and Joe Gimble—two brothers. So I can’t take the girls with me. Besides, it’s a long ride, and I won’t be returning until well after dark.”
“I see.” She was silent a moment, resting her chin on her knees. “I don’t suppose I can argue that the girls’ needs are greater than the capture of a notorious assassin,” she said eventually. “Go on, then. I’ll do my best to make them feel welcome and wanted.”
Cal rose from the bed. “I appreciate it.” He headed toward the connecting door, when she called after him, “Lord—um—Ashendon.”
He turned. “We are not in public, madam. You may use my Christian name.”
She raised her brows humorously. “And yet I am ‘madam’?”
He inclined his head in rueful acknowledgment. “What should I call you, then? Emmaline?”
“Yes, or Emm. And what do I call you?”
“Cal or Calbourne, suit yourself. The girls call me Cal. Ashendon if you prefer—it’s what Aunt Agatha calls me now.” He turned to leave again.
“Cal,” she called.
“What is it now?”
“If it’s dangerous for the girls, it must be even more dangerous for you. You’re not going alone, are you?”
He shrugged. “I work best alone.”
“Then I hope you’re well armed.”
“I am.” Cal closed the door behind him and rang for hot water. Somehow, telling his wife about Bentley had lifted a weight off his chest. She was very easy to talk to, a good and sympathetic listener.