‘I could do it.’ She shrugged her perfect and completely exposed alabaster shoulders. ‘If I say so myself—I have quite a way with cravats. My brother always preferred my knots over his valet’s.’ She reached out her hand to take it, and he momentarily considered running for the hills before he reluctantly relinquished it and wished he were dead.
While he stood as still as a statue, engulfed in a sultry sea of jasmine, and fully and painfully aroused beneath his coat, she looped the linen around his neck. ‘What sort of a knot do you want?’
He couldn’t think of a single knot. All their stupidly pretentious names had escaped him. ‘Whichever you think is best.’
She stepped back for a moment, tapping her lips in thought as she studied him, drawing his eyes there now, too, and reminding his needy body how much those lips enjoyed being kissed.
‘To be frank—I think you should always avoid the fussy. With your height and breadth and handsome face…’ Her teeth suddenly decided to worry her bottom lip, drawing the plump skin so achingly slow beneath it he almost groaned aloud. ‘In fact…’ she offered him a shy and almost tentative smile which he could not begin to decipher ‘…the more I think upon it, I believe a simple cascade would suit best.’
Owen managed to nod and then held his breath again while her fingers went to work, trying and failing to ignore each accidental brush of his neck and the scant few inches of charged air between them.
Or at least it was charged for him. She was so engrossed in the knot she was obviously not similarly afflicted.
She gazed up into his eyes and all at once he remembered how she used to gaze up at him, back when he wouldn’t have hesitated to dip his head and taste her mouth, wondering if she still possessed that earthy passion which had always tipped him over the edge. ‘Do you have a stick pin?’
Another curt nod before he held out his other hand and uncurled his clenched fist, mortified to see he’d clenched the damn thing so hard the ostentatious sapphire Randolph had talked him into wearing had made a deep indent into his palm. He held back the wince this time—just—hoping she wouldn’t notice the damning evidence of how completely she affected him without even trying.
‘Blue…like your eyes.’
Which had been why his meddling friend had insisted he wear it. To match his equally blue patterned-silk waistcoat. The tailor had called it periwinkle, which was a ridiculous shade for a grown man to be wearing. Owen never should have agreed to it. He probably looked like a blasted dandy! One who was trying too hard to impress a certain lady with his refined gentlemanly tastes, who only thought him fundamentally decent, but whom he suspected he still adored.
‘Randolph picked it.’ Seeing as she was already in the process of arranging the jewel in the folds, he stared up at the ceiling rather than stare directly down her cleavage, wishing he had worn black or beige. Dull colours which would help him blend into the wallpaper seeing as the ground was resolutely refusing to open and swallow him in his hour of need. ‘Should I change?’
‘No… Blue suits you. You look…very dashing.’ Her fingers left his neck to smooth his lapels before she finally stepped back, looking every inch as awkward about what had just transpired as he did. Had she sensed he was practically aflame with desire? He certainly hoped not.
‘Isn’t it funny the pair of us took separate sartorial advice from Mr and Mrs Stubbs?’ Her index finger played with a loose tendril against her neck. She had such a sensitive neck. And ears. She used to sigh when his teeth nibbled them. ‘Nerves always make me doubt myself and I cannot deny I am anxious about our first public appearance.’
‘Just look them dead in the eye and smile unapologetically.’ The firelight was picking out the copper in her hair and throwing enticing shadows on her skin. Owen couldn’t seem to stop gazing at her or ignore the loud voice in his head which was suddenly insisting they forget all about Lady Bulphan’s soirée to stay home and get reacquainted. ‘If you appear as if you happily belong there, nobody will question it.’
‘Is that your secret, Owen? Bravado?’
Yes.
Obviously.
The public face of the new Owen Wolfe was a complete fabrication. A battle-ready suit of armour which he could don at will. Except around her apparently. Around her it was as flimsy as a cobweb.
He ignored her question to glance at his pocket watch. ‘We should go.’ It came out more bark than observation. ‘By my reckoning all the other guests should be there now.’
It had been his idea they be a little more fashionably late, reasoning they’d get all the gawping and whispers over and done with in one fell swoop rather than dribs and drabs—but that, too, was making him nervous. Especially if he appeared as overwhelmed with his stunning new wife as he was right now. The gauche stable lad rather than the successful businessman. Fundamentally decent, but desperate to be more.
Lydia nodded and grabbed the heavy velvet cape he had not noticed draped over the chair. ‘Yes… I suppose we should.’
She left the room first and they descended the three flights of stairs in total silence. Waiting for them in the hallway was a grinning Randolph and Gertie and a less frowning Slugger than usual.
‘Oh, my!’ Gertie’s hands cupped her heart. ‘Don’t you both look wonderful! Like a princess and her handsome prince.’ He would strangle the witch for that comment later, too. The last thing he needed was Gertie’s well-intentioned matchmaking on top of her successful attempt at turning his wife into a lethal seductress.
It was Slugger who stepped forward to help Lydia on with her cape, and Owen felt stupid at not having the wherewithal to have offered. But as he felt as though he was stood on the edge of the crater of an erupting volcano, his mind resolutely refused to work properly. Randolph gestured to the open door, sweeping into a courtly bow. ‘Your carriage awaits, Your Royal Highnesses.’
‘Carriage?’ She turned to him, concerned, and Owen felt two inches tall.
‘How else are we supposed to get to Lady Bulphan’s?’ He would brazen this out. If it was the last thing he did, he would muster every last drop of bravado to act convincingly nonplussed about the locked box on wheels encasing him and the jasmine-scented enchantress who was scrambling his wits.
Owen stalked in the direction of the mews, expecting her to follow, but she hesitated on the frosty cobbles, then gazed up at the stars and her sigh turned to wispy clouds in the frozen air.
‘As it is such a lovely night and as I am in no great hurry to be a public spectacle, would you mind if we walked? We are less than five minutes away…’
She was rescuing him. He was simultaneously humbled, grateful and thoroughly touched at the gesture. ‘I suppose I wouldn’t mind the walk.’
‘Good…because we need to talk about wallpaper.’
‘We do?’ Because it seemed expected, and suddenly felt entirely natural, he held out his arm and she took it.
‘I was thinking stripes—unless you prefer a pattern?’
‘I like stripes.’ And bizarrely some of his nerves lessened as they strolled companionably together into the night.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
‘Make no bones about it—being invited to stay at Aveley Castle is quite the coup, Owen. And just before Christmas, too! The Aveley Christmas soirée is legendary. Very intimate and very exclusive. They never invite more than twenty people, so to be one of them is beyond impressive. My father would have given his eye teeth for such an invitation.’ It was past midnight and they were walking home from a sumptuous dinner at the Renshaws in Grosvenor Square. ‘The Duke must be very taken with you…or is it the Duchess you have so thoroughly charmed?’
Life had settled into its own rhythm over the past two weeks and Lydia found herself surprisingly comfortable with many aspects of it. She had made great friends with Gertie, which had been lovely, adored helping her with the children and found Libertas feeling more and more
like home. One by one, the individual pieces of furniture, curtains and rugs she had meticulously chosen began to arrive and the barren living room was now a cosy oasis—albeit one her husband rarely stopped in for long.
After their first public appearance, which had gone far better than she could have possibly imagined, they received a flurry of invitations to different events and she and Owen had gone out as a couple at least twice a week since. As he had predicted, the romantic fairy tale, which the newspapers had helped embellish, ensured they were largely accepted wherever they went. While she was in no doubt this was probably more to do with the appetite for gossip than her former standing in society, in the main most were polite at least and some went out of their way to be friendly. A few turned their noses up and she didn’t feel ready to call upon acquaintances again yet, but all in all the dust had settled and most of the initial scandal seemed to have passed.
That was such a relief. It was nice to feel able to venture out in the world again, especially as she no longer needed to worry about chaperons or asking her controlling father’s permission. As a married woman, she had more freedom and independence than she’d ever had and was grateful her new husband was nothing like her father.
It was nicer still slowly rediscovering aspects of her friendship with Owen on these quiet evening strolls when it was just the two of them. She hadn’t realised quite how much she had missed it and found herself wishing they spent more time together at home. But he religiously maintained his distance from her there unless Gertie and Randolph were around—or they happened to be en route to or from a social engagement like tonight.
‘As I am sure you are well aware, Wife…’ He slanted her a mischievous glance. ‘I have such a way with the ladies, it is obviously the Duchess. Are you jealous?’
‘Not in the slightest. She has a ridiculously handsome duke who is obviously madly in love with her… Why on earth would she want you?’ Gertie had let slip the real reason, because as usual her husband was annoyingly tight-lipped about anything personal. ‘Aside from your money, of course. I should imagine she is delighted to receive your monthly donation to her orphanage… And her soup kitchen.’
‘Have you been gossiping with Randolph again?’
‘Surely discussing your generosity isn’t gossip? Although why you would keep it a secret is beyond me. Where I come from, people brag about how philanthropic they are.’
‘A few pounds do not constitute philanthropy, Lydia.’
‘Indeed, they do not—but a few hundred do, Owen.’ She nudged him playfully with her elbow, enjoying the solid feel of his arm beneath her gloved hand a little too much. ‘And before you blame Randolph for that titbit as well, I should confess I got it first-hand from the Duchess herself.’ Since discovering he had suffered eight months on a hulk, Lydia had been on a mission to glean as much information about him as she could, justifying it to herself as trying to better understand the man he was now because he was so reticent about telling her anything. ‘Why did you feel the need to keep it a secret when you might have known she would mention it when she extended the invitation?’
‘Because nobody likes a braggart.’
‘Or more likely you enjoy being a man of mystery.’
‘Perhaps a little. Being mysterious has turned out to be very good for business.’
As if to prove him right, as they turned into Curzon Street the long line of carriages was still queueing to deposit eager gentlemen at Libertas. Fridays were always a particularly busy night, especially when the other entertainments and parties finished.
‘For what it is worth, I think it is a very generous and noble thing to do.’ Beneath her fingers, the muscles in his arm tightened, a sure sign he was uncomfortable with the compliment.
‘It simply makes sound business sense. People like a charitable man.’
He was exasperating. ‘Liar. You do it because you know how it feels to have nothing. And you know what it is like to have nobody in the world. You were orphaned at eight, Owen, and stuck in an orphanage until you were fourteen. You hated it. Especially the food. You developed a lifelong hatred of porridge on the back of it. And you were there till you were fourteen because you were too big to stuff up a chimney. Nobody would take you on as an apprentice in the other trades because you were too tall—they thought you would eat too much.’
He stopped dead. ‘You remember all that?’
Why was he surprised? ‘Of course I remember. Once upon a time you used to tell me things.’
‘That was before we had an armistice and agreed never to talk about the past.’
Which he had taken literally, no doubt to vex her, when she had never intended the dratted thing to encompass all their past. Just the bit which always broke her heart to dwell upon. The bit she still did not want to believe, but had to accept. But how to tell him all that without reopening the wound? ‘I also remember exactly where we were when you told me about it. We were in our spot. Behind the trees at the back of the Serpentine.’
‘Hidden from the world.’ She detected a distinct hint of bitterness in that statement as he started forward again as if he were suddenly annoyed.
‘Why do you say it like that?’
‘Because I was your guilty secret.’ Which sounded dirty. ‘And you were ashamed of me… Of us.’
‘I was neither ashamed nor guilty. But I was mindful of the fact life would become impossible for us if anyone suspected our relationship then.’
‘Really?’ It was disbelief this time, rather than bitterness. ‘It obviously had absolutely nothing to do with me being a stable boy who wasn’t good enough and you being an earl’s daughter who was destined to do better.’
‘Absolutely not!’
‘Then why did we creep around? Why did you beg me never to tell a living soul about us?’
‘I was sixteen, Owen.’ They weren’t even discussing the past, yet were still arguing. Her own fault, she supposed, as she had been the one to stupidly dig it up rather than leave it buried. ‘I had barely any freedom at all, if you recall!’ If he was going to accuse her of being selfish and shallow, then she was entitled to defend herself. ‘You know full well my father controlled everything! And I knew if word found its way to him about us, he would have dismissed you on the spot and I would have been sent to some horrible ladies’ school somewhere in the back of beyond run by nuns and we would never have seen each other again.’ A grim fact which had given her so many nightmares at the time. ‘I couldn’t bear that because—’ She clamped her errant jaws shut. That was undoubtedly more information than she was comfortable giving.
Owen’s step slowed and, when hers didn’t, he tugged her back. ‘You couldn’t bear that because…?’
She fumbled for an excuse which skirted around the intensely personal truth, but there was something about the power of his gaze which wrenched it out regardless.
‘Because I never wanted to be apart from you, you wretch. I adored you! I thought once I reached my majority we…’ Her toes were curling inside her slippers and she bitterly regretted wandering down this cringingly awkward path in the first place. This was all too personal. Too mortifying. Too truthful. ‘For pity’s sake! I was sixteen, Owen! Filled with the silly romantic notions all sixteen-year-old girls have.’
‘You adored me?’ The ghost of a smile played at the corners of his mouth and his dazzling blue eyes were twinkling. He was clearly enjoying her abject discomfort and was intent on milking it for all it was worth. ‘Genuinely adored me?’
That he doubted it made her roll her eyes. ‘I was an idiot. Fresh from the schoolroom and green around the gills.’ A trusting, smitten and reckless fool. ‘But I soon realised my mistake.’ All the hurt came rushing back then. The disbelief followed by the crushing grief of his betrayal. ‘And swiftly got over it.’
‘So am I to assume that once you reached your majority, you had plans to run away with me?’
She gripped the edges of her cloak and marched forward without him, furious at herself for confessing that much. ‘I was sixteen, Owen!’
‘But you knew then you wanted to marry me?’ She cursed his long legs for effortlessly keeping pace with her. ‘Were we going to elope?’
Yes.
A mad and romantic dash to Gretna Green.
Although that irony was not lost on her now. All her foolish dreams had come true—in part. This certainly wasn’t how she had envisioned things. ‘I hadn’t thought that part through.’
She felt his hand on her arm a split second before he spun her around. ‘Liar…’
His gaze locked with hers, seeking the truth, and to her utter disgust she feared he saw it. All at once, his eyes seemed darker. The irises stormy. Hypnotic. She felt exposed, vulnerable, but couldn’t seem to tear hers away. He smoothed his palms down her arms until he found her hands, then tugged her closer. He dipped his head a little, then hesitated.
His warm breath caressed her cheek. Her lips tingled with awareness.
Time stood still…
‘There you are!’ Slugger’s voice came out of nowhere from behind the parked carriages, making them simultaneously jump apart. ‘Step lively, the pair of you! Gertie’s gone into labour!’
* * *
‘What have I done? What have I done?’
Randolph was pacing and, after an hour of constant self-flagellation since Gertie went into labour, was on the cusp of rending his garments.
Owen had given up trying to make him calm down, knowing from the last three labours that nothing he did was going to work. His friend would whip himself into a frenzy until he heard the babe cry and saw with his own eyes his beloved wife was alive and well. Then—and only then—would he miraculously and instantaneously become rational once again. In the meantime, he would be a wreck. Which was damned inconvenient because Owen had better things to think about.
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