Harlequin Historical July 2020 - Box Set 1 of 2

by Virginia Heath

  He had already got into his breeches and was thrusting his arms through his shirt. When his face appeared it was frowning. ‘How far forward can we go dragging all that poison along with us? We need to discuss it, Lydia. We need to work through it. Let’s give our marriage a fighting chance. I…’ He closed his eyes and clenched his fists briefly, then his intense blue gaze locked with hers. ‘I care too deeply for you to settle for half measures. Because it turns out I want it all!’

  That flash of temper told her all she needed to know. He cared. Truly cared.

  ‘Are you trying to tell me you still love me?’

  He waited a beat, then grabbed a cravat, turning his back on her again to wind it impatiently around his neck. ‘I care…deeply.’

  Lydia allowed that to settle for a moment, revelling in the warm, overwhelming sense of rightness his clumsy declaration created within her. ‘That’s a start.’ And all at once that was enough.

  ‘We need to cancel that damn armistice!’ His big hands were making a dreadful mess of his knot. ‘And once this stupid shooting party is done, at precisely one o’clock, we are going to talk. Even if it means we argue! I can cope with shouting. I can even cope with your tears! But I cannot go another day without chopping back those blasted brambles!’ Then he ripped the ruined strip from his neck and shook it. ‘I hate these blasted things!’

  ‘Oh, Owen…’ She threw the bedcovers aside and walked towards him. He cared for her still. So deeply he was getting himself in a state. ‘Let me do it.’

  He stood as still as a statue as she wound a fresh cloth around his neck, but his breathing was erratic and his eyes kept dipping to her naked breasts. ‘Do you realise that when you are flustered your accent slips?’

  He winced. ‘I’m trying to lose it.’

  ‘I wish you wouldn’t. Around me at least. I’ve always liked it. It reminds me of the old Owen I fell in love with.’

  ‘And how do you feel about the new Owen?’

  She couldn’t resist teasing him a bit. ‘He is growing on me.’

  ‘That’s a start, I suppose.’ He couldn’t resist looking a little pleased at the news. ‘One that gives me something to build on. Then maybe—after we have tackled the past—you might consider adoring me again.’

  ‘I think we both know I adore you already.’ She finished the knot and looped her arms around his neck. ‘So much so I fear I may need to monopolise all of our appointment later showing you exactly how much.’

  ‘We really do have to talk, Lydia.’

  ‘No. We don’t.’ She pressed her lips to his. ‘Because, as I said, the past doesn’t matter any more.’

  ‘It doesn’t?’ He was finally smiling, too, now, hope swirling in his eyes, confirming this was the absolutely correct thing to do.

  ‘Of course it doesn’t.’ If the past was holding them back and upsetting him so much, then she had the power to banish it all. ‘Because…’

  ‘Because?’

  She couldn’t resist kissing him again to draw out this most significant of moments.

  ‘Because… I forgive you, Owen.’

  He stiffened. Pulled away. All the cosy intimacy and heartfelt confidences suddenly blasted away by an Arctic gale.

  ‘You…forgive me.’ The usually stormy irises of his deep blue eyes hardened into ice crystals.

  He shook his head, briefly looking uncharacteristically broken and beaten down before the usual pride and bravado had him standing taller. ‘God, I’m a blasted fool!’

  Like a whirlwind, he grabbed his boots and his coat and, while she stood there impotent and shocked to her core, marched to the door. Lydia had never seen him so angry. Usually he waved his arms about and created lots of bluster—but this was different. It was quiet fury. Molten. All-encompassing.

  As he grabbed the door knob, he spun around, his expression livid. But his eyes…

  His eyes were pained. There was hurt in them. So much she could hardly bear it. Unthinking, she took a step towards him, needing to make it all better, but he stayed her with one coldly raised palm, all the heat and desire of a moment ago replaced by utter disgust.

  ‘You can take your blasted forgiveness, madam—and you can go to hell!’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Owen was still fuming several hours later when he learned the Earl of Fulbrook was dead. One minute he was doing his damnedest to look like a man having a good time in front of his host while internally screaming at his blasted wife, the next he was flying through the Aveley woods desperate to get to her.

  He found her in their room overseeing the last of the hasty packing. She looked pale, shocked and so very alone it broke his heart.

  ‘I suppose you’ve heard the news.’

  He nodded. ‘His heart.’

  ‘Ironic, really, as I never realised he had one.’ She stuffed an impatient hand in a glove. ‘Is it normal, do you suppose, to feel nothing? Because I am numb, Owen. Almost indifferent.’

  ‘He wasn’t an easy man to love.’

  ‘True… He was much easier to hate. Yet now I do not know how to think.’ She reached for the letter on the nightstand and handed it to him. He recognised Randolph’s ostentatious sloping handwriting on the front. ‘Word was sent to the club late last night. He died alone. Maybury found him.’ She exhaled loudly. ‘A depressing end, all in all.’

  One Owen uncharitably felt was fitting. ‘The carriage is ready. We can have you home in a matter of hours.’

  ‘Justin will need me to organise the funeral. He’s not good at that sort of thing.’

  ‘But I am. I can do it all for you.’

  ‘And wouldn’t that be ironic, after everything that’s happened. I do not fool myself dear Papa had any affection for me, but I know he hated you. He wanted you hanged, Owen—yet you would still offer to plan his funeral?’

  ‘For you, Lydia. Not him.’ She was lost, not herself and in dire need of someone to take control, so he held out his hand. ‘Come…let’s go. Then we’ll work out what needs to be done.’

  She allowed him to lead her to the carriage and sat there staring blankly at nothing while he arranged everything around her. His men had saddled his horse, but he couldn’t leave her. Not when all the light had dimmed in her eyes and all her fight was gone.

  ‘Tie him to the back.’ A decision he would undoubtedly regret when cold droplets of sweat were already trickling down his spine. ‘I will ride with my wife.’

  Owen sucked in his last lungful of fresh air and pulled open the door, only to have Lydia blink back.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘I’m not leaving you alone.’ To prove that fact to himself as well as her he flopped heavily on to the bench next to her, slammed the door shut and bashed on the ceiling. His stomach lurched at the same time as the carriage did and he tried to ignore the oppressive walls closing in. He was bigger than four blasted airless walls.

  She must have sensed his discomfort, but said nothing as they rattled out of the Aveley stable yard and on to the long gravel drive. By the time they finally got to the end his blood was pumping so loudly in his head he could barely think. Then he felt her hand. Like an anchor. Sure and solid and clasped around his.

  ‘Would it help if we opened the windows?’

  Owen wanted to smash every pane. ‘It’s freezing outside.’

  She ignored his flimsy stoic protest to release the catch on both and then retrieved two thick blankets from beneath the seats as the frigid December air buffeted them both. He refused his with a curt shake of his head, relieved he could at least breathe now, but feeling ridiculous to be in such a state. Here she was in her hour of need and he was a panicked mess. Instead of being nauseatingly noble, he just felt nauseous.

  ‘Before you crucify yourself for feeling scared, know that I appreciate the gesture. I really don’t want to be alone.’ When she found hi
s hand this time she laced her fingers through his. ‘It means the world you are here.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be anywhere else.’ It was true, even if he could barely breathe.

  ‘My head is spinning. So many disjointed thoughts and memories all bombarding me at once. I can barely make heads or tails of them.’

  ‘I’m happy to listen… They might take my mind off things.’ Although the solid comfort of her hand was helping. That and the knowledge she wanted him by her side.

  ‘His last words to me were, “Do your duty.” Not “Thank you” or “I’m sorry” or anything even mildly placating to make me feel better. Just, “Do your duty, Lydia.” Then, once he had his money, he washed his hands of me. For the life of me I cannot fathom how he justified all that. Do you suppose he regretted it all? Do you think, in his last moments, he even spared me a thought?’

  ‘I am sure he did.’

  ‘And I am sure you are lying. In those last moments I think he was only capable of thinking of himself. Nobody else ever really mattered to him.’

  Sadly, Owen did not doubt that.

  ‘When my mother died, I recall he behaved as if it was all a dreadful inconvenience to him. How awful is that?’ She didn’t seem to want an answer. ‘But then he was going to marry me off to Kelvedon and completely disregarded all my pleas to spare me that fate, so I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised he was so heartless. Now, all I can feel is guilty.’

  ‘Whatever for?’

  She squeezed his hand. ‘Because he is dead—my last remaining parent is gone—and all I can think about is our argument this morning.’ For the first time since he had heard the news about Fulbrook, there were tears in her eyes. ‘Why did my forgiveness upset you so?’

  ‘Let’s not do this now, Lydia…’

  ‘Why not? You wanted to talk and now seems as good a time as any. I already feel wretched. You already feel trapped. I sincerely doubt we could feel any worse. And you are right. The past is in our way and I so want to move forward. I thought that would be a way through it. A way to stop it all.’

  She glanced up at him, her beautiful dark eyes so filled with sorrow they made him forget the carriage walls. ‘I know your character now. I even admire it. You are an inspiration, Owen. Good and kind and so very noble. Deep down, I have always known that there must have been a very good reason for you to have done such a thing. Unless it was a silly, rash mistake, the sort we all make when we are headstrong and young and think we know everything…’ She gazed at him with such longing. ‘To err is human after all…’

  ‘And to forgive is divine.’ For a moment, he seriously considered accepting her forgiveness. That would be the easiest and quickest way to get on with their future exactly as she said. It would make him the bigger man. But he knew he would be doing them both a disservice to settle for that. It would eat away at them both. Him in particular. She would still think ill of him and he would always feel aggrieved at that. As if she had settled for second-best when he wanted to be her everything. ‘But I cannot accept your forgiveness because I did nothing wrong, Lydia. I need you to see that. I need you to know it.’ He pointed to his chest. ‘In here where it matters.’

  He watched her features crumple and forced himself to harden his heart against it. They both had to face the past. Had to have the tears, the anguish and the arguments. It was the only way. ‘But I saw it with my own eyes, Owen…’

  ‘Just for a moment, try to forget what you saw. Because you saw exactly what you were supposed to.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’ Yet he could see that she wanted to and that meant the world to him.

  ‘People often don’t believe what they see, Lydia—but they always see what they believe. You saw what someone wanted you to believe. And they did a very good job. If I hadn’t been the victim, I would have been entirely convinced of my guilt. The scene was so…calculated.’ The damning evidence had been hidden. Part of it beneath the mattress which had been stripped from the frame by the time they had brought him there. But then, when both Lydia and her brother had been summoned to the scene to witness his arrest, the constable found more. The two worthless candlesticks had been stuffed at the back of his only, tiny cupboard. Behind all his meagre worldly possessions.

  ‘You still want to convince me it was a conspiracy?’

  ‘No.’ His own voice sounded desperate now. Only some of that was to do with the confined walls of the carriage. ‘I want you to view it all with your head and your heart—not your eyes.’

  ‘Now I really don’t understand.’

  ‘When you are clearly happy to forgive me, what possible reason could I have to perpetuate the lie?’ He gently turned her face to his, needing her to see the truth in his eyes.

  ‘I have my life back. A pardon. A successful business. My own fortune. The woman of my dreams is now my wife. I would have to be a fool not to grab your forgiveness with both hands…if I truly were guilty.’

  She was silent.

  After the longest, most significant pause of his life, he pressed his fingers to her breast bone. ‘What does your heart say, Lydia?’

  Another pause, one made more tragic by the single tear which spilled out of her eye and trickled slowly down her cheek. Then she huffed out a sigh. ‘My foolish heart has never believed you were guilty.’

  He sagged with relief. ‘Then help me prove it.’

  * * *

  They spent the rest of the journey discussing the events surrounding the thefts. Owen asked her question after question and, while she answered every single one of them as accurately as possible, recalling all manner of minutiae, every passing moment which had been buried over the years, all she could properly focus on was the one which was the most important.

  What possible reason could I have to perpetuate the lie?

  Because there truly was no reason. Not that she could fathom.

  That, combined with his ferocious, angry reaction to her heartfelt forgiveness this morning, seemed to point unequivocally to his innocence. Somebody must have set him up—exactly as he had always claimed. But why anyone would do something so cruel was a mystery.

  Owen had said he had always suspected it had something to do with her, but couldn’t put his finger on why he felt it other than it was what his gut told him. Which in turn led to a swirling cauldron of hideous emotions at the thought of all he had suffered because of a gross miscarriage of justice which she might have inadvertently helped cause. And if that were indeed the case, how would they move past it? Was love enough? Could they both forgive and forget or would a part of him always be disappointed that she had ever doubted him? Because she was thoroughly disappointed in herself now.

  But before they tackled that huge obstacle, Owen wanted a blow-by-blow account of everything and everyone she could remember from those fateful last weeks to help him piece together what had happened properly. Her testimony was the missing link, the other side of the coin, and he was correct in his assumption it had never been heard. Nobody had asked her a damn thing in the aftermath of Owen’s arrest. She had been left to deal with her sick mother’s rapid decline while her menfolk were obsessed with the trial, both oblivious to the other heartbreak she was struggling to cope with all alone.

  His barrage of questions churned up all sorts of painful memories of the past which she had not revisited for a very long time, the emotional toll of her mother’s illness being one of them.

  When she hadn’t stolen those scant few hours a week with him, Lydia had been at her mother’s bedside. What had begun as a bad chill in the early spring had rapidly declined into a long-standing malaise her poor mama had not been able to shake. Just before she met Owen, they had travelled to Bath together so she could take the waters. The excursion did initially alleviate her symptoms—but they had all returned by the end of the summer and things took a dire turn for the worst the week after Owen’s arrest.

  Th
e same week he had been sentenced, her mother had died, turning a hideously dreadful time into a living hell. The black pit of despair had taken Lydia a good six months to start to emerge from. Was it any wonder she had buried it all? Yet now she had to face it. For him.

  For them.

  She had promised to write it all down, to create a posthumous diary which he could then compare to the extensive notes and investigations he had made already, to see if there was another clue which might lead to the real thief.

  And on top of it all she also had her father’s death to cope with, combined with fresh guilt and turmoil concerning Owen. It all felt overwhelming.

  * * *

  By the time they pulled into Berkeley Square, she was as wrung out as a dish towel and more confused than ever.

  Bleakly, she stared at her father’s house. As it was too soon for the funerary hatchment bearing the coat of arms to have been prepared, the door had been tied with black ribbons instead. Then the door opened and a sombre Maybury wearing both black gloves and a mourning armband waited, head bent, while a footman rushed towards the carriage door.

  Beside her Owen moved to leave with her, and she shook her head.

  ‘I should probably do this alone.’ There was no telling what sort of state her brother would be in and she didn’t trust him not to exchange a few ugly words with her husband in the heat of the moment. She would need to prepare the ground first. Clear away the obstacles of the past to make way for the future. ‘Just this first meeting. There are personal family things which will need to be discussed and my brother does not know you…yet.’ Although now that her father was gone, she hoped that he would.

  He nodded, understanding, but still helped her down. ‘Would you like me to wait?’

  ‘No… I could be hours. I shall see you at home.’

  For a moment he appeared ready to argue, then stepped aside, but she saw how hard that was for him to do and felt a wave of love for him wash over her. She had married a good man. The absolute best.