To Seduce a Stranger

by Susanna Craig

  The sun was fully up now, and she could hear Garrick in the stables nattering to the horses. But no sign of Mari. Or Edward. With a hum of curiosity, she set off down what might once have been a path. At least, snapped twigs and bent grass suggested someone had recently passed that way.

  Not a quarter mile from the manor she saw a smaller house, made of the same golden-brown stone, its steeply pitched roof and mullioned windows a copy of the manor in miniature. She guessed it must be the Rookery. A few more steps brought her close enough to hear voices, although the speakers remained out of sight at the back of the house. Noir ventured closer, creeping through the undergrowth in search of some unsuspecting rodent.

  “I don’t understand why you followed me here,” she heard Edward say.

  Mari’s voice answered him with a question. “To Ravenswood?”

  “To England.”

  “How arrogant you are. Did you not tell me I was free?” The woman’s lack of deference rooted Charlotte to the spot as she awaited at the very least a reprimand. Aunt Penhurst would have dismissed a servant who spoke so.

  Instead, Edward’s reply offered reassurance. “You are free.”

  “And did you not pay me wages for my work these last months?”

  “Yes, of course. But—”

  “Those wages were sufficient to buy passage on a ship. I was free to do so. It does not mean that I followed you.”

  “Fine,” Edward conceded irritably. “Have it as you will. But you still have not answered my question. Why leave? When I put Regis in charge, he confessed to me his hope that you and he might—”

  “Marry? No, I think not. I never fancied him.” Without conscious thought, Charlotte crept closer, drawn to the story unfolding just out of sight. “In any case, would the whites of Antigua recognize such a union?” Mari demanded. “Could you promise me that my babies would not be snatched from me and put in chains?”

  “You have a copy of your deed of manumission.”

  “A piece of paper can be burned, Mr. Edward. But in England, there are no slaves—”

  “Miss Hol—Mrs. Corrvan taught you that, I suppose?” Something like impatience edged his voice as he corrected himself. The woman of whom he spoke must have been recently married, for the name did not come easily to his lips.

  “She did.”

  “So what will you do here?”

  “Work, I suppose,” she answered after a slight hesitation. “Won’t someone have me as a cook, or a housekeeper?”

  “Is that what you want to do?”

  A pause. “I don’t know. But it’s something to have a choice.”

  “It is. And while you are weighing your options, you might better have stayed with Miss—Mrs. Corrvan. She has two households to manage. To say nothing of how she’s wearing herself to a shadow working to raise support for abolition,” he added in a mutter. “She needs assistance.”

  “And you do not? Mrs. Corrvan is leaving for Yorkshire within the week. But she felt certain I might be of some use here—”

  “Mrs. Corrvan may go to the devil.” He spoke across Mari, and the harsh rejoinder nearly forced a gasp from Charlotte’s lips. “She’s meddling in things she doesn’t understand. Look around.” One arm swept outward, a slash of white against the overgrown greenery at the back of the house. “If I’m to succeed at Ravenswood, I’ll have to find a way to bring this place back from the brink of destruction. All my concern must be for the farms, and the tenants upon them—if any remain.” A moment of silence followed, as if he required a moment to collect himself. “Bad as the state of the manor may be,” he added more quietly, “its care is far from a priority. A housekeeper is far from a necessity.”

  “What of Mrs. Cary?” was Mari’s next question.

  “Mrs.—? Good God. You needn’t pretend—”

  “It was you, I believe, who began the game of make-believe,” Mari observed. A smug smile tugged at the corner of Charlotte’s mouth. “Who is she?”

  “I—I don’t really know,” he admitted. “She appeared to be in some danger, so I—”

  “Stepped in to save her. Oh, Mr. Edward. When will you learn you can’t save everyone?”

  Her gentle question was rewarded with a bitter sound that hardly deserved the name of laughter. “I have known that since I was nine years old, Mari. If only I had learned the lesson just a little sooner, everything might have turned out differently.”

  Nine years old. That must have been when he had gone, or been sent, to the West Indies. What a harsh awakening for a child. But if Mari was right—and Charlotte’s own experience confirmed it—Edward still felt a responsibility to take care of others.

  “What’s done is done,” Mari told him. “Now, what do you mean to do with her?”

  “If she’s an opportunist, she’ll soon see there’s nothing for her here and be on her way.”

  Charlotte could not help but bristle at that description of her. An opportunist, indeed. Just what sort of opportunity was she meant to be seeking from a man whose clothing and mode of travel and current situation revealed his lack of fortune as surely as hers had? Did he imagine himself possessed of charms that would entice a woman to attach herself to him, regardless of every appearance against him?

  Her indignation almost caused her to miss Mari’s quiet reply.

  “If she leaves, or you send her off, how long before everyone in the neighborhood has heard some rumor about your wife who ran away? Or whom you abandoned?”

  “Village gossip.”

  His easy dismissal did not sway Mari. “Gossip that could ruin you. It will cost you the trust of the people you hope to help.”

  “You may be right,” he agreed after a moment. His voice sank with the reluctant admission, forcing Charlotte to creep closer along the wall, that she might hear the rest of what he said. “And there’s always the possibility her fears are genuine. She may have good reason for fleeing to this remote spot.”

  “Perhaps,” Mari conceded. “But how will you decide which is the truth?”

  “I don’t know.” A pause. “What do you suggest?”

  Yesterday’s rain had left the gentle slope at the side of the house slick with mud—a fact that Charlotte had been willing to ignore until her feet began to slip. It might have been the way the shade had thinned the grass in this particular spot. It might have been the way she was leaning forward trying to overhear her fate. Whatever the cause, as she put more weight onto her left foot, it slid from beneath her. She threw out her hands, swallowed a shriek as both the rough stone wall and the untamed shrubbery eluded her grasp, then skidded and stumbled the rest of the way down the hill, the speed of her descent aided by a thick coating of fallen leaves that must have been rotting there since last autumn.

  She landed on her derriere at Edward’s feet.

  Noir, who had once more been rubbing against Mari’s ankles, hissed and arched his back, his tail erect and fluffed to three times its usual size. Mari’s eyes went wide and her lips parted in surprise, though no further sound escaped them.

  Only on Edward’s face did shock war with some other emotion. She strongly suspected him of fighting a smile.

  His brown hair lay in tousled waves, not quite so dark now that it was dry. But in the morning light his eyes shone bluer yet, if such a thing were possible. They were fixed squarely on her face as he bent over her, and to her undying shame she giggled like a schoolgirl.

  “Good morning,” he said drily, stretching out one hand to help her up. “Mrs. Cary.”

  * * *

  “I am not an opportunist.”

  Edward looked up from the chipped washbasin, mildly surprised by the outburst. Once on her feet, Charlotte had waited quietly while he persuaded Mari to return to the manor. She had accompanied him wordlessly into the Rookery, even watched without comment while he turned a battered chair upright and made certain it was sound before inviting her to sit down.

  But what had seemed like cooperative silence had actually been stewing, it wo
uld seem.

  “Nor are you a lady’s maid,” he countered as he handed her a square of damp linen. She was once more coated head-to-toe with mud, and her coil of braided hair had escaped its pins and was slowly unraveling, giving her the appearance of a down-at-the-heels Medusa.

  “No,” she agreed after she had wiped the dirt from her hands. “I was really more of a lady’s companion.”

  “Mm, yes. So you said last night.” Not trusting any of the other furniture in the room with his own weight, he leaned one arm against the dusty mantel. “To an elderly widow with property in Antigua.”

  Her gaze darted guiltily to the floor. “The lady by whom I was employed is a widow, although the family’s holdings do not extend to the West Indies, so far as I know. And I did handle her correspondence for a time. Every word.”

  “Including letters to the gentleman with whom you eloped, I suppose?” He nodded toward the ring on her hand.

  That question sent her eyes to the grimy window, as if she hoped to spy a suitable answer somewhere beyond it. “One or two,” she whispered, her voice as far away as her gaze.

  Would Charlotte Blake—or whoever she was—never cease to surprise him? He had expected a hot denial, some other explanation for the gold band she wore. “You are married, then?”

  “I was.” A pause, then she turned and fixed those fathomless dark eyes on his face. “He died.”

  Truth. Or such an excellent performance of it that he could never hope to know the difference. It sounded as if an ill-founded and ill-fated marriage had led to her employer’s disapproval and dismissal, leaving Charlotte stranded in more ways than one.

  And though it ought not, the revelation came as something of a relief. Society gave widows some latitude in their behavior. He had not ruined the reputation of an innocent young woman with his clumsy attempt to help. So long as he did nothing more foolish than he had already done, he would not have to offer her the questionable protection of his name to make up for his mistakes.

  “Is there nowhere you can go?” Even if her marriage had caused a rift, surely her aunt or her late husband’s family could be made to see reason and do their duty by her.

  She weighed the question before replying. “Even if there were, what does it matter if I lack the means to travel?”

  “I offered you coach fare,” he pointed out.

  “You seem eager to be rid of everyone. Even Miss Harper.”

  “I believe she would be better off in London.” He did not need the added responsibility of ensuring her safety. Or Charlotte’s.

  “With Mrs. Corrvan.”

  Must her name be on everyone’s lips? Refusing to speak it himself, he simply said, “Mari is, among other things, an excellent cook. Any household would be lucky to employ her.”

  Charlotte stood and surveyed the room. The cottage was in an obvious state of disrepair, although nothing like the manor house. For one thing, it hadn’t as far to fall. Garrick had spoken honestly about the roof, however. Numerous leaks had left the upstairs bedrooms with rotting floors and mildewed walls. Uninhabitable. Edward had spent last night in this very room, in front of the empty fireplace, hoping the ceiling stayed put.

  “Why not this one, then?” she asked.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Or were you depending upon your wife’s skills in the kitchen, Mr. Cary?”

  “My—? Oh.” He dropped his gaze to the floor. “I should never have said—”

  “No,” she agreed. “You should not. One rescue was quite enough.” Then she continued in a slightly softer voice that pulled his eyes upward again. “Nor should I have encouraged it. But what’s done is done, and now we must decide what the next step will be. Is Miss Harper right? Will rumors have flown so fast?”

  “Well, Garrick believes we are married,” he admitted reluctantly. “I certainly wouldn’t put it past him to have spent last night at the Rose and Raven, regaling the locals with tales of our arrival.”

  “So, if I leave now, it could cause a minor scandal.”

  If she stayed, it would surely cause a major one.

  “No,” he said sharply. “We cannot possibly—”

  “Just what do you imagine I am proposing, Mr. Cary?” Despite her bedraggled state, she managed to convey a good deal of hauteur.

  “I’m not quite sure.” He lifted one brow. “Mrs. Cary.”

  “Although I appreciate your generous offer of assistance, I would prefer not to return to society at present. The quiet here suits me. If you allow me to stay, in exchange, I will . . .”

  Everything seemed to hang suspended in her pause. But what exactly was he hoping she might offer?

  “Why, perhaps I can make this place livable,” she suggested, glancing around once more. “I am not afraid of hard work. I could scrub and straighten—earn my keep, so to speak.”

  His breath, his heartbeat, the spinning of the earth on its axis—all jerked back into their normal rhythms. “It will not be necessary for you to play the parts of both the steward’s wife and a scullery maid.”

  It would be absolute madness to let her stay, on any terms. Only he could not shake the feeling that there was something behind her she wanted—no, needed—to escape.

  He understood the impulse, even as he knew her attempt was likely doomed to failure.

  One simply did not outrun the past.

  “You may remain at Ravenswood if you wish,” he agreed at last, drumming one fingertip against the mantelpiece. “But not in the Rookery.” Having her that close would be an invitation to trouble. Thank God he would be heading to London in a few days’ time.

  “Very well,” she said, sounding relieved, whether at his willingness to allow her to stay, or his plan for keeping himself as far from her as the estate’s business would allow, he could not say. Perhaps a bit of both. “Shall I invent some excuse for our, ah, separation?” The faintest blush pinked her cheeks as she spoke the last word.

  Trouble indeed.

  “I should think the hole in the roof would be sufficient explanation for your residing elsewhere. If it comes up, say I am working to make the place livable again.”

  Raising wary eyes toward the ceiling, she nodded. “Certainement.”

  He was beginning to notice patterns in her behavior. She lapsed into French when she was tired or distracted. She giggled when she was nervous or afraid.

  And he did not want to know even that much about her.

  When she turned to leave he could see debris from her fall still clinging to her. “Wait, Miss Bl—Mrs. Cary,” he said, stepping forward. No, I cannot call her that. “Charlotte.” She paused. “Your dress,” he explained. “May I—?” A glance over her shoulder revealed the problem, and she tipped her head in assent.

  Setting one palm on her shoulder, he swept the other quickly and firmly down her back to brush away the worst of the dirt and dead leaves. Dissatisfied with the result of his effort, however, he allowed himself a second pass, slower this time, over the same soft curves that had been pressed tight against him as they rode.

  Had yesterday’s misadventure taught him nothing?

  Once more, she held herself rigid beneath his touch. “As to names,” she said when he had done, “I believe ‘Mrs. Cary’ will be sufficient when an address in public is absolutely necessary. Living separately, we shall have little occasion for private conversation, thus no need for intimacies.”

  Wise words. Too bad they had come too late. He lifted his hand from her shoulder.

  As she moved away from him, however, he stayed her once more. “I think you will agree we have arrived at what is at best a short-term solution. When you are ready to leave, how shall we explain your absence then?”

  As the question left his lips, it brought with it an unexpected pang. Ravenswood had always been a lonely place. Her inevitable departure would not make it less so.

  “We shall just have to, to—what is the expression? Something about uh, a river—?”

  “We shall cross that bri
dge when we come to it?”

  Her shoulders lifted in a Gallic shrug. “If you say so. These things, they have a way of working out,” she said reassuringly. “I am really quite good at thinking on my feet.”

  “So I gathered.”

  Before she could step away, he reached up to pluck a stray twig from her dark, glossy hair, revealing an angry-looking scratch that disappeared beneath the collar of her dress. When a newly freed lock swept across it, she flinched.

  “You should have Mari take a look at that scrape.”

  “Oh? Has Miss Harper healing skills, as well as culinary ones?” she asked, not looking back at him.

  “She has many gifts,” he replied. “Including the gift of being able to read people.”

  “Are you trying to alarm me, Mr. Cary?” Charlotte raised her hand to cover the nape of her neck.

  “Not at all. I was merely observing that Mari has always been an astute judge of character. Why should that alarm you?” He snapped the twig between his fingers. “Unless, of course, you have something to hide.”

  Expecting his words to produce one of those nervous, tittering laughs, he was disappointed to hear her more characteristic giggle turn into something rather more wry-sounding. “If I do, Mr. Cary,” she said, pausing on the threshold to study him with her dark eyes, “I would venture to guess I am not the only one.”

  Then she was gone.

  Catching himself staring at the spot where she had been standing, he spun on one foot and left through the back of the house so as not to meet her again. As he strode in the direction of the home farm, he twisted the broken twig absently around his finger.

  How had she known?

  He had been hiding something for so long, the secret sometimes felt more real than the lie he had been living. For more than twenty years, no one—not even the ever-astute Mari—had doubted he was what he seemed to be: an orphan who had managed through extraordinary luck not only to survive but to become a self-made man.

  Coming home meant claiming his true identity. Or at least, he had expected it would.

  He had seen almost immediately that there were advantages to continuing the charade of steward a bit longer, however. For one thing, his questions about the estate were more likely to receive honest answers if people believed they were speaking to one of their own.