True of Heart (Regency Shakespeare Book 3)

by Martha Keyes

  “There is no doubt of that. I think she might take to speaking to Mr. Devenish herself if I don’t do it soon. I shall have to ensure she has no time alone with him tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?” Ruth slowed as she set the final piece in place.

  “Yes.” Philip sighed. “A dinner party at Alice’s—the invitation extended without any approval from me.”

  “Your move first,” Ruth said. “Well, we have this afternoon for a lesson if you feel you need any further preparation. And I shall engage to keep Mr. Devenish occupied tomorrow evening if you are truly concerned about what your sister might do. I’ve not spoken to the man, but I have no doubt I can find a topic that will keep his attention for some time.”

  Philip opened his mouth only to shut it again. Ruth assumed she was invited.

  At his silence, she looked up, her smile becoming less certain. “What?”

  He grimaced. “Alice insists that the dinner be a small, intimate affair. I believe the Devenishes are the only ones she intends to invite.” Philip nearly reached out a hand to take Ruth’s as he watched embarrassment appear on her face. “I want you to come, believe me, but—”

  Ruth waved a hand and laughed, applying herself to the chess game again. “No, no, that is wise of your sister. I am completely unnecessary at this point. It will be a good opportunity, I think. Perhaps the last step in the journey.”

  And then it hit Philip, square in the chest. The sum of it all—of his thoughts and feelings. He didn’t want to spend an evening with Miss Devenish. He didn’t want time alone with her. The only person he wanted more time with was sitting across from him, the pawn in her hand hovering over a black square.

  “Ruth.” Her name came out without his permission.

  She looked up, the flush of embarrassment still fading from her cheeks, and he stared at her, like seeing her for the first time. Was this what it felt to be in love? Never tiring of someone’s company? Feeling able to talk about everything or nothing?

  It was. He knew it in that moment as well as he knew anything. It was just as Ruth had said: the sort of connection that is inexplicable and yet undeniable.

  His breathing quickened, and he felt the call of the unplucked string stretch between them again.

  “What is it?” Ruth asked.

  He looked at her wondering eyes, so expressive without the distraction of the spectacles she had worn at church. A small crease still ran across the bridge of her nose, fading evidence of the fact that she had been wearing them—a reminder of who Ruth was. And who she wasn’t.

  She was everything Philip was forbidden from wanting: poor, unknown, unimportant, with a reputation that hung upon the thin thread of her disguise—a thread that could be snapped at any moment, heaping condemnation upon her—and him. And he was falling in love with her.

  He was already in love with her.

  And still she looked at him. He glanced down at the signet ring on his right hand, worn by his father and grandfather and great grandfather. A reminder of the sacrifices the Trent men have made, his father had said when he had given it to Philip on his deathbed. Now it is your turn to wear it—to remind you of the duty you owe your forebears.

  Philip twisted it on his finger then looked up at Ruth. “Do you ever tire of doing your duty? Of putting your family’s needs and wishes above your own?”

  She held his gaze, and he watched the hesitancy in her eyes and the emotion in her throat. She said nothing.

  “You have cut your hair, dressed up as a gentleman, fought in a duel, courted danger and condemnation for weeks—all for your family. Do you never tire of it? Of making decisions that will please everyone else but you? Or are you simply so pure-hearted that such things never trouble you?”

  She clasped her hands in her lap, lowering her eyes. “I am far from being pure-hearted. And duty is certainly a heavy burden at times.”

  “At what point, then, does it become too heavy? At what point does duty become tyranny?”

  Ruth sighed and met his eyes again. “I don’t know.”

  He sat back in his chair, letting his head fall back. “My entire life, I have been told that my duty lies here”—he raised his hand, and the signet ring glinted in the sunlight that streamed through the window—“with my family, my ancestors, the men who wore this ring—men I never knew, apart from my father. Time and again, my father told me of the sacrifices made by each of the men who came before me—from my fifth great grandfather, awarded a barony for services to the crown; to his son, who was granted the viscountcy. The question was always what I would do, what my contribution would be. I thought that, if I could answer that question and prove myself, perhaps I would be worthy.” He interlaced his fingers, letting them rest on the table.

  “Worthy of what?”

  He exhaled on a shrug. “Of the title I bear? Of the power I hold? Of the respect and admiration people regard me with, which I have done nothing to merit?”

  Of love. The last word stuck in his throat, refusing to be spoken, and he looked away.

  Her hand came to rest on his, and she looked at him intently, leaning forward onto the table. “Duty certainly has its place. But I believe that it is most effective when it is driven by love, not wielded as a threat or a weapon. Indeed, what good is a title or an estate or a fortune if all they afford their keepers is a crushing burden of responsibility?” She touched the signet ring thoughtfully. “They are tools to be used with wisdom and not to be taken for granted or squandered carelessly, but surely they should grant as much freedom as they do obligation.”

  He stared at her hand on his. As much freedom as obligation. He had never considered the freedoms that his position afforded. But where did the obligation end and the freedoms begin?

  She leaned in closer, and their gazes met. “I cannot imagine that you will be the most effective Viscount Oxley you can be if you are living under a shadow all your life—unsure if you measure up to some impossible standard, or believing that your worth depends upon meeting that standard. The title was created for you, not you for the title. It is largely imaginary—a simple piece of paper, is it not? But you”—her mouth turned up with the hint of a tender smile—“you are real. Flesh”—she squeezed his hand—“blood, a beating heart, a lively mind. And you alone determine how much that piece of paper defines you, for better or for worse.”

  He cupped his other hand over hers. He wanted Ruth, wanted her hand in his as it was now, her smile always in his sights and her laughter ringing in his ears. He wanted to finish what they had started in the drawing room.

  He leaned in, eyes trained on hers, ever-aware of the soft lips through which Ruth’s breath warmed his face. Her gaze remained fixed on his, the same intensity reflected in her eyes as he felt coursing through him. He reached a hand to her cheek, and her eyes shut, dark lashes fluttering lightly, telling him that she wanted the same thing he did. He narrowed the gap between them, and a chess piece clunked onto the board as footsteps sounded outside the door.

  Ruth drew back, and the door opened.

  “I think we might simply take the stage back to Marsbrooke on Thursday morn—oh! Oxley. Didn’t know you were here. Chess again, is it?” Topher came over and looked at the board, his brows coming together. Philip’s king lay sprawled upon it, knocked over by accident. “Can’t say I see how Ruth won that game, but I have never been very good at chess, you know.”

  Philip rose from the table, heart still puttering wildly. “I shall leave you to discuss the details of your return—I have some business with my sister I should attend to.” He shrugged on his coat. “I hope you know that you are welcome to use my uncle’s carriage or my own. It is quite needless for you to travel on the stagecoach.”

  Ruth rose slowly from the table, uncertainty in her eyes and color slightly heightened. Why was it so difficult to leave her?

  He gave a slight bow and left the room.

  The door shut behind Philip, and Ruth swallowed down the hurt rising like the lump in her throat a
nd the tears making her eyes burn. It was like reliving the day before—yet more bitter and more sweet.

  “I must say,” said Topher, “it is good of Oxley to offer his carriage. I would much rather that than going by stagecoach.”

  Ruth gathered up the pieces on the chess board. The thought of leaving Philip behind—and being left behind….

  “You seem almost as anxious to leave as you were to come,” said Ruth.

  “I am.”

  Ruth looked at him.

  “There is nothing for me here,” he said. “I should have known that before I came.”

  They both should have known it. “If you could go back, knowing what you know now, would you have come in the first place?”

  Topher tapped his hat against his leg, brows drawn together then shook his head. “No. I don’t belong here—I probably didn’t then, and I certainly don’t now. London has everything to offer those with enough money and consequence to afford it. We have neither.” He looked up at her. “Would you have come?”

  Ruth set the final piece in the chess box and shut the lid softly. She had no answer for that question. If she had not come, she would not be hurting as she now was. Was two or three hundred pounds worth having tasted the sweetness of something that could never be? And what of her friendship with Philip? Could she truly say she would forgo that association, even with the pain it had brought?

  She lifted her shoulders. “I don’t know.”

  Topher nodded once. “Is he going to offer for her?”

  Another question Ruth didn’t know the answer to—hardly wished to know the answer to. When they had nearly kissed the day before, Ruth had easily convinced herself that it had been because Philip was picturing Miss Devenish in her place. And when Ruth had reminded him who actually stood before him—whose lips were nearly close enough to taste, he had apologized and left immediately.

  But today…today he hadn’t been thinking of Miss Devenish. And Ruth didn’t know if she wanted to strangle or embrace Topher for his inconvenient entrance. For it was clear by Philip’s abrupt departure that he had been carried away, on the cusp of doing something he didn’t wish to do—not truly.

  He might feel something for Ruth, but he did so against his better judgment. He could no more neglect his duty than Ruth could abandon her family. It was ingrained in him, and one conversation—one wishful conversation—could not undo a lifetime of training.

  “I believe so.”

  Topher nodded once, but Ruth saw the way his jaw and throat worked against the emotion. “And what if he does so after our departure? Shall he send the money to us in Marsbrooke?”

  Ruth shrugged. She knew they needed the money. That was what all this had been about. But she never wanted to see it or touch it.

  Topher looked at her for a moment then walked over and wrapped his arms around her.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Philip held the solid wood of the pistol butt in his right hand, arm extended and left eye shut. It had been some time since he had come out shooting alone, but he had needed fresh air—and something to shoot.

  His eye veered away from his target slightly, landing upon one of the marks in the tree from when he had taught Ruth to shoot. He could remember the way she trembled as he stood behind her—at the time, he had assumed it was fear as she thought on the prospect of the duel. Now he wondered if she hadn’t been feeling the same thing Philip felt now whenever he was near her.

  He didn’t doubt that she cared for him the way that he cared for her. He had seen it in her eyes over the chess board the day before, and it had been that realization which had acted like a magnet, pulling him toward her.

  Opposites attract. He had heard it before, and it never resonated more than now. For Ruth was his opposite in all the ways that mattered to Society—in all the ways that mattered to someone tasked with improving the Trent legacy. And yet, never had he felt so akin to someone, like finding a piece he had never realized he was missing—a piece of him no one else understood.

  He pulled the trigger, and a shot rang out. The ball barreled through a leaf on the old oak tree, breaking it from its stem and sending it fluttering to the ground.

  He let the pistol drop to his side.

  He knew what his heart wanted. It had taken him some time to recognize it—he had been too fixated on what he should do to see what was happening.

  He wanted Ruth.

  No, it was more potent than mere and passive wanting. It felt much more like need, like thirst, hunger, or fatigue.

  His horse let out a small grunt, and Philip glanced up at the sky, shading his eyes. “I know, old boy. Time to go.”

  He still needed to dress for dinner before making his way to Alice’s, and he cringed at the thought. The Devenishes could be in little doubt of what Philip’s intentions were. He was staring duty in the face—unavoidable.

  He thumbed the crest of his signet ring and walked toward his horse. How had he gone his entire life—all thirty years—only to fall in love with the very woman he had tasked with helping him win a wife?

  That Ruth loved him in return was something he couldn’t bear to reflect on for more than a moment. It was too good to be true—and too far out of reach now that he had finally realized it. She was a better person than he, no matter what Society believed of her. Even the worst thing he knew of her—her deception and lies—betrayed what a good heart she had.

  Once home, he dressed quickly and made his way to his sister’s, arriving just as the sun dipped below the top of the townhouses in Catton Street. He slipped inside, deciding against ringing the bell. Jon would be annoyed by such casual treatment of his home, but that only made the choice more inviting. Jon’s self-consequence was becoming unmanageable, and, being above him in rank, Philip was in a unique position to challenge it.

  A footman poked his head out from the drawing room at the sound of Philip’s entrance, but, seeing him, offered a bow and ducked back into the room. Muted voices sounded from the room opposite the drawing room, and Philip approached, slowing as it became clear that an argument was taking place.

  “Well, you might have asked me before assuming that I had no prior engagements! I cannot tell you how much it grieves me to have to show Lord Bolton such disrespect, only because of some insipid dinner party for the sake of your insufferable brother.”

  Philip was frowning at the tone his brother-in-law was using, but a smile pulled his mouth at the last words. It wasn’t the first time he had been called insufferable, and the word had come to feel like less of an insult. Certainly he couldn’t find it in himself to regret that his brother-in-law felt that way about him. The sentiment was entirely mutual.

  “I rather thought you would be pleased with me for arranging it.” Alice’s voice held apology and a hint of hurt. “Tonight might well be the final chip falling into place for the match—for Miss Devenish has officially put off mourning, you know, and I think I might persuade Philip to make an offer for her within the week—before anyone else manages to do so. You cannot deny that it is a good match.”

  “That may well be, but why we are required to concern ourselves in Oxley’s affairs is beyond me. A man in his position should surely be able to handle such things without the help of a matchmaking sister. I hope you do not expect for me to exert myself on his behalf beyond hosting the party. I have more than enough to think about with the stack of bills I received from the dressmaker today.”

  Footsteps approaching the door sounded, and Philip drew back, a frown on his face. He hated the way Sir Jon spoke to Alice. She was certainly not the easiest woman to deal with, but anyone who had spent more than a day in her company knew that she was desperate to please—to exceed expectations. Jon seemed not to appreciate that about his wife.

  The door opened, and Jon appeared, stopping short at the sight of Philip. “Oxley,” he said, his brow creasing even more deeply. “I never heard the bell ring.”

  Philip conjured the most genial smile he could. “It must be becaus
e I never rang it.”

  Jon’s lips pinched together in displeasure. “If you will excuse me, I must go dress for dinner.”

  Philip inclined his head and watched his brother-in-law take the stairs to his bedchamber. It bothered him that Jon thought him incompetent—that he recognized that Philip required assistance in his efforts to marry. But he would far rather Jon believe that Alice was the one providing that assistance than for him to know of the Swan. The scorn that knowledge would generate….

  He stepped into the sitting room, just in time to see Alice wipe a tear from her cheek. The sight tugged at his heart. He remembered when Alice had accepted Jon’s offer—she had put on a smile, never admitting how it cost her to give up the future she had hoped for with Mr. Vickers. She had reassured Philip she agreed with their father that it was a much more fitting match. “Sir Jon is kind, you know,” she had said. “And I think that I shall be happy with him, for I have always had such a streak of vanity that, no matter what I do, will not be overcome, and Sir Jon has promised me that I shall want for nothing with him.”

  Well. That promise seemed to have fallen flat. Alice would not otherwise have been shedding tears.

  “Philip,” she said, rising from her chair with a determined smile that twisted Philip’s heart as much as her tears had.

  If he and Miss Devenish married, would they be thus in five years? In a decade?

  “I am glad you have arrived early,” Alice said, “for I wished to discuss the plan for the evening before the Devenishes arrive.” She took him by the arm, leading him out into the hall. “I think I might arrange for you and Miss Devenish to have a few minutes alone this evening after dinner. Jon and I will engage to speak with her mother and father, and you can perhaps take her for some air in the small courtyard—I have instructed that it be lit this evening, and you will be quite private there”—she pressed her lips together, though the hint of a smile peaked through—“just in case you wish to steal a few moments.” She raised her brows to make her meaning clear.