“Have my horse brought round,” he said, and strode from the dressing room without answering the question in Beaton’s eyes. Downstairs, he went into his study, drew out a clean sheet of paper and scrawled a note on it. He gave it to Beaton when he came to announce that his lordship’s horse had been brought round.
“See that this is delivered if I do not return,” he said. Beaton took the proffered note though his gaze was troubled.
“My lord, if I may be so bold—”
“No,” Colter said softly, “you may not. There is little to be said now.”
It was true. Whatever came after, he was done with turning his back. Done with letting it go.
The Moreland house on Curzon Street wasn’t far from the Leverton house, and he would visit Celia’s cousin when he was done. It was the least he could do. And by some miracle, there may be word about Celia.
Garner, the new butler who had replaced the ancient Karns, opened the door to him while a stable boy held his horse.
“I won’t be here long, Garner,” he said, and strode past him across the gleaming black-and-white floors to the wide staircase. He went immediately to his father’s room.
The door stood slightly ajar, and he shoved it open, then came to an abrupt, disbelieving halt.
Beyond the sitting room, he heard an unmistakable soft drawl. He recognized that tone, though he had to move closer to hear what she was saying. Celia.
Brewster hovered anxiously over the earl, tucking the edges of a blanket around him as Celia stared at him.
Her heart pounded furiously in her chest and her mouth was dry, her hands shaking. This was the face of the man who had haunted her waking and sleeping nightmares, the man who had taken so much from her with his careless indifference.
Yet he was old, frail, a broken man now, though there was a fierce vigor in those hooded eyes that was familiar. The pockmarked flesh sagged, and one side of his face looked as if it had melted into disuse. Palsied hands gripped the gold head of a cane, and it was obvious from that dark stare that he knew her.
She wanted to rail at him, to howl her anguish and hate after all these years, but no words would come. It had taken her so long to get here, to finally drum up the courage and damn the risks, and now she couldn’t speak. Oh God, she’d struggled so hard, overcome obstacles and waited and planned for so long, and now that the time was here she saw that fate had dealt with him much more harshly than any vengeance she could manage.
Just retribution had caught up with him despite her.
Drawing in a deep breath, she said finally, “I…think I made a mistake in coming here. I’ll leave—”
“Do you think you can just barge into my home and tell me that it’s time we talk, then leave without giving me an explanation?” The earl banged the end of his cane on the floor. “Come closer, so that I can see you, girl.”
His voice was surprisingly strong, emerging from that ruined face and summoning all the old memories, the old arrogance. It was suddenly as if she had first met him again, heard his peremptory demand to see her mother.
She took two deliberate steps closer so that gray light from a bank of windows fell upon her face. For a moment he did nothing, but she saw the instant recognition in his face as his mouth worked soundlessly.
He remembers me!
Oh God, she shouldn’t feel so exultant but she did. If she was to be denied vengeance, then the satisfaction of seeing his face when he realized who she was would have to suffice. He knew her. He knew the child whose life he had ruined with his cruel actions.
Moreland started up, but his wasted body wouldn’t cooperate and he only rocked a little, his clawlike fingers losing their grip on the gold head of the cane so that it pitched forward to clatter on the floor. This time his voice was hoarse, sounding wrenched from him.
“Léonie! It’s you.…”
Celia stood frozen as the blood drained from her face. “No…”
It was more a moan than a denial, a despairing cry from her that sounded like the wail of a child.
“He doesn’t really know you, it seems,” a woman’s voice behind her said. Celia dragged her gaze from the earl to see an elegant woman enter the room, her bearing and poise unmistakable. Then she saw Colter; he stood just outside the door, his gaze impassive.
Her heart leaped when she saw him, but he looked at her with a detached gaze, his blue eyes darkly questioning.
The same blue eyes stared out of the woman’s face, but they were calm and clear.
“My husband sees your mother in you, I believe. You do look remarkably like her, you know,” the countess continued in the same composed tone. “Léonie St. Remy was a most lovely woman, and my husband was obsessed with her. I once thought the obsession would fade with time, that he would forget her. Then she ran off with that American—your father, I presume.” Lady Moreland smiled slightly. “Poor woman. I felt so sorry for her. When my husband decides he wants something, he does not rest until he gets it. And, of course, your mother’s rejection only sharpened his determination. Isn’t that right, my lord?” She turned to her husband, but Moreland’s eyes were blinking rapidly, a sheen of tears filming them.
“Lady Moreland,” Celia began, but the countess put up a hand to stop her.
“No, there’s nothing really to say. I’m sorry about your mother. It must have been terrible for you. By the time I knew what had happened, there was no trace of you. After a while, I thought perhaps you had died as well.” She paused, glanced at Colter and said with a faint smile, “I’m glad to see that you survived, Miss St. Clair. I never wanted my son to find out about it, of course, but it’s obvious that I’ve failed in that endeavor. I did try, Colter, to spare you this, at least. Perhaps I would have if she hadn’t come back.”
Colter had come into the room, his gaze intent on his mother, his tone harsh.
“Are you behind Philip’s actions?”
“Yes. It seemed the best thing at the time. If she’d left and gone back to America with a tidy sum, then you needed never know that your father is a murderer. Oh, yes, Miss St. Clair, I can see by your face that you thought no one knew. I knew. I knew because he told me, the arrogant bastard. He confessed to ease his conscience, and left me to live with the consequences.”
“How could you hide it all these years?”
The countess turned to look at Colter, her brows lifted in mild inquiry. “It’s not the sort of thing one discusses at dinner. There were enough rumors about him, why should I give you and Anthony one more thing to live down?”
Her gaze shifted back to the earl and her tone hardened as she said, “I made him pay for it in ways you’ll never be able to understand. He killed that old man, destroyed Léonie St. Remy, and ultimately he’s responsible for Anthony’s death as well. Oh, Colter, it wasn’t your grandfather who insisted you have the controlling shares of stock in the shipping company. It was I who made your father agree after he sent Anthony there to force him to sign. He knew his father had a fever but the shares mattered most—so I made sure he lost them.” She smiled slightly, but there was no humor in it. “It was the best vengeance I could manage—atonement for Anthony’s death. In a weak moment, he signed them over to you as I demanded he do. Since then he’s been systematically cheating his own son and his investors as often as he could get away with it. Philip has been the only restraint I’ve been able to use to keep him from bankrupting us. A necessary evil.”
“For Christ’s sake, why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you come to me with the truth?” Colter sounded hoarse, his expression intent.
“There was enough natural animosity between you already and I had spent years trying to keep it all quiet.” The fine lines of her face sharpened slightly as she regarded Colter. “Did you think I wanted you more humiliated than you were? I did not. I was all the protection you had. He’d killed one son, and I had no intention of allowing him to destroy you.”
“God…ma mère…”
Mother and son stared at one
another, the blue eyes so alike clashing, searching, unspoken regrets and accusations almost palpable.
Celia felt suddenly like an interloper. Tension hummed in the room, and the earl had not said another word, though he made strange, garbling sounds in his throat that the man behind him tried to soothe. He held a cup to the earl’s lips but Moreland knocked it away with a violent swipe of his hand. Agitated, he strained against the confines of his own body and the chair.
Lady Moreland turned at last to look at her husband. “I think,” she said, “that we should send for the physician, Brewster.”
Brewster looked up at them, and his eyes were faintly accusing. “Perhaps it would be best if I tended the earl in peace until he arrives, my lady.”
“Yes,” she said impassively. “That may be best.”
It was all so strange, but Celia turned with them to leave the room, uncertain what she should say or do, or even if she should try to talk to Colter. He looked so cold, his expression frozen into a carefully blank mask.
When they reached the door to the sitting room, Celia glanced back. The earl was staring at her, his body tilted to one side in the chair as Brewster attempted to support him. Slack lips formed a single word that was a grating, guttural sound. “Léonie.…”
It was the last word he was to ever say.
30
A cold wind blew across the chalky crags, swept over the barren grounds of Harmony Hill in a soft sighing moan. Winter still lay upon the land, but already there were signs of the coming spring in the tiny buds of crocus that poked purple and yellow heads through warming soil.
Celia stood at the window looking out over the garden, waiting. It seemed she had been waiting for so many days for him to return. Oh God, he had been so distant lately when she ached for him to regard her with something other than that polite detachment that made her want to provoke him into any kind of emotion, even anger.
But there was no honest emotion, not even when they’d been wed at Gretna Green just across the border into Scotland, an “over the anvil” ceremony that was swift and legal and long overdue, if Jacqueline was to be believed. It still shocked Celia, the haste with which he had taken her from his father’s home, the earl’s body not yet cold in his bed, his “grieving” widow left to tend the details that were always necessary when a peer died.
He had silenced her brief protests at the impropriety with his mouth, then his quiet, controlled lovemaking, so that by the time they arrived in the tiny village, she had no more objections, only a kind of numb complaisance.
Yet it’s not the same, she thought with a despairing sadness that enveloped her. He does not look at me as he once did, and I don’t know what he truly thinks!
They existed in an empty life now, save for the nights when he came to her bed, usually with the smell of brandy on his breath, sometimes gentle with her and sometimes with a passion bordering on violence as he took her, his hands rough and demanding.
She had tried once to explain her lies to him, how she had not trusted even her cousin to understand the years of grief and pain and rage after her mother’s death, but Colter had not let her. Instead he had stopped her, his voice fierce as he said, “He’s dead now. Leave it be, Celia.”
No, he would never understand, not at all. There was a wall between them she wasn’t certain she’d ever be able to tear down. Why had he married her? Guilt? Or love? She had to know, and it was obvious Colter would not tell her.
So she’d sent an invitation to Jacqueline to visit. Perhaps her cousin could help her understand.
When she recognized the Leverton crest on the carriage rolling to a halt at the front door at last, Celia left the window to go and greet her cousin.
“Ma petite,” Jacqueline said, sweeping into the hall to press her cold cheek against Celia’s, dark hair a vivid contrast against pale. “How wonderful it is to see you again! Now come, we must have hot chocolate and you will tell me how it is to be a countess, and how happy you are with your so-handsome husband.”
Celia waited until the servant left the parlor to lean forward and pour hot, fragrant chocolate into the Sévres cup that Jacqueline held out. Their eyes met briefly before her cousin’s glance skidded away, as if she was afraid to look too closely into her eyes.
“How is Carolyn,” she asked, a mundane question to ease the tension, “and dear Jules? They are well, I trust.”
“Oh, yes, very well, and Caro sends her regrets. She is so busy lately, tending the details of the wedding and all that is to be done before—The king sent a lovely gift, a huge silver urn engraved with his crest, though what she will do with it, I am not at all sure. A vase for flowers, perhaps.” Jacqueline sipped her chocolate, and the cup rattled slightly in the delicate saucer, sounding as brittle as her voice. “And you, my dearest? All is well with you?”
“I don’t know. Oh, there’s so much I have to say and I don’t know where to begin, or even if I should, but you know it all now, or I think you do—”
Leaning forward Jacqueline put a hand on her arm. “Yes, ma petite, I know all. I found the document, the charges against Moreland, though he was Northington then. I should have confessed when you returned to London, but everything happened so fast, and Northington—oh my, now he’s Moreland—was so anxious to wed you that there never seemed to be the right time.”
“Yes, he was very anxious to marry me,” Celia said, and noted that Jacqueline’s gaze shifted away again. “Perhaps you can tell me why.”
“Why? Oh, it must be obvious, ma petite. He is such an impetuous, forceful man, and obviously so much in love with you. Why, he was a very devil until you returned!”
“Tell me the truth, please. I know there’s something you aren’t saying. I have to know. I have to know! It’s so different now, and I need to know why.”
Distress creased Jacqueline’s face, and her hand shook slightly as she placed the cup and saucer back on the footed silver tray. “I only meant to help you, Celia, I swear it. It seemed the right thing to do, and it is, truly it is…You will be happy, anyone can see that you are both in love!”
“Oh God.…” Her whisper lay between them, and in the cheery glow of the parlor fire, Celia saw the truth in her cousin’s eyes.
“It wasn’t for love! He married me because he had to.…Oh no, how could you? How could you do that to me?” Surging to her feet, she fought a wave of grief and nausea, sick that he would agree to it, sick that he would go through with it. What had he thought of her? It was no wonder that he’d left so quickly. “Oh God, what have you done,” she moaned, and Jacqueline leaped up in distress, knocking over the chocolate pot.
Dark brown liquid splashed over her yellow silk gown and onto Celia’s green silk skirts, but she ignored it.
“Ma petite, it was for the best, don’t you see? People had begun to talk. No amount of explanation could account for your disappearance, and the whispers…You were ruined! Don’t you understand? And it was so obvious that you love him—Please don’t hate me!”
“Hate you? I could never hate you, but now I’ll never know if he is married to me because he loves me or because of his honor—and I once thought he had no honor! Oh God!”
Her laugh bordered on hysteria, and she clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle the unnatural sound.
Jacqueline knelt beside her, her hands clasping Celia’s tightly, her eyes earnest and swimming with tears. “Did I not tell you once that my Jules thinks highly of him and he is never wrong about people? Oh my lovely child, after all that you’ve suffered…you should have told me about Léonie, for I would have understood. As will he.”
“No, that’s just it, don’t you see? He knows. He knows and he still married me. Now I know why…after all that was said, those horrible things…even his own mother. Oh, you should have seen his face! We were there when his father—the man I have hated for so long—had another of what the physician called his seizures. Shock brought it on, his mother said, but I think it was guilt. Perhaps he did have a conscien
ce, after all.”
She rose from the settee, moved jerkily toward the fire to warm hands that had gone cold as ice. “Afterward—oh, it was all so…so civilized, with the countess offering me tea or chocolate, and Colter standing there like a stone statue, with no emotion or blame or accusations. But his eyes were so empty and I knew he had to wonder why I was there, but he never asked.”
“Because he had to know, petite.” Jacqueline’s voice was soft, sympathetic. “Northington has never been what one would call oblivious to things, and he had to realize that you wanted to confront his father.”
“And realize why I came to England. My entire time here has been based on lies—lies to you and to him. How can we live together with all those lies between us?”
“You won’t,” Jacqueline said frankly, and rose to put her hands on Celia’s cheeks, palms warm and comforting. “When he returns, you will talk to him and the lies will be behind you.”
“Yes, if he returns. He never told me where he was going and I don’t know if he wants to come back.”
“Of course he does! Celia, you mustn’t torture yourself with all this guilt. Yes, you should have been honest, but it is understandable why you were not. Speak frankly to him, and I know all will be well.”
Green silk rustled as Celia surveyed her stained skirts with hands that shook only slightly, and she managed a smile. “I know you’re right. I’ve been a coward and it’s time to face him and the truth. We must start our lives without lies.”
“You are so strong, child, and so brave. Oh, yes, don’t look so surprised. Not many would have the courage to do what you have done, and I know Léonie would be proud of you. You have her courage.”
“Maman never lived a lie.”
“Léonie St. Remy was practical enough to live a lie in order to survive. Do you think we were allowed to leave France during the Terror? No. We had to lie, and steal, and cheat to escape, but we did what we had to because we knew it was the only way to survive. Now.” She came to Celia and took her arm. “Enough of this. When he comes, you will tell him all the truths. There will be no more lies between you.”
A Reckless Encounter Page 28