“Talk to me.”
She jerked her gaze to him. “You can read me so easily, Owen?”
He stared at her a moment, taking in every curve and angle of her face, memorizing the bow of her lips, remembering how she tasted and felt in his arms. He skimmed through the images and sounds and feelings of every moment they had spent together since they met. And he nodded.
“It isn’t that I’m so very good at it naturally,” he said softly. “But that you have captured my attention so singularly that I cannot help but mark every tiny change in you. I see the way your hands clench in your lap, the way your cheek twitches ever so slightly and how your lips turn down just so. You’re troubled, and you don’t want to tell me why. But I want to hear it, Celeste. It’s the only way we can solve the problem.”
“She told me she didn’t kill Erasmus,” Celeste said. Then she folded her arms and arched a brow. “And I’m sure you will think me the biggest fool…but I believe her.”
Chapter 16
Owen hadn’t responded to her declaration, and Celeste shifted in her seat with increasing discomfort. Of course he would think her a fool now. Of course he would push her and her observations aside. She hated it, even if she’d known all along that it was how men treated women. Even ones who pretended respect and kindness always turned out this way in the end.
Still, she’d had to say it, hadn’t she? Had to defend Pippa in some way.
She lifted her chin. “My intuition may not be evidence, but I do trust it,” she continued. “I know what I saw and heard and felt.”
He wrinkled his brow. “Do you think I’m going to argue with you?”
She opened and shut her mouth as she gaped at him. Had she misread his reaction? “Well…yes.”
“I have no intention of doing so,” he assured her. “Had I no faith in you and your ability to understand and follow your instincts, I would never have asked for your help.” He folded his arms, which made his chest flex against his jacket a fraction. She tried not to focus on that. “May I ask some further questions?”
She blinked. “Er, yes. Of course. This is your case, after all.”
“What made you believe her?”
She pursed her lips as she replayed every interaction with Pippa since the beginning. Especially the conversation that very morning. “When we spoke of the murder, Pippa was so horrified by the idea. That Erasmus might have suffered in his last moments gave her no pleasure. Unlike me, she loved the man once, that was clear. She mourns him on some level, or what she believed him to once be.”
“But she was angry with him,” Owen said.
“Very much so,” Celeste agreed. “She is good at metering it, but it is there. Angry as she might be at his actions, though, she also didn’t seem to be bent on harming him for them.”
“She had no reason to tell you she wanted to defend someone else he’d harmed. If she were the culprit, I would think she’d try to avoid that at all costs. Perhaps even push blame.”
“Yes. She in no way tried to deny her emotions. Or that she might have wished Montgomery came to grief as atonement for his behavior at some point. But when it came to his murder, she was very clear. She would not and could not do something so terrible, Owen.”
He was examining her very closely now. As if she were the evidence he had to parse out. Then he nodded. “Sometimes those feelings that come deep within our soul are important. I have certainly put suspects lower on my list because I had a sense they could do no wrong, and vice versa. If you believe Phillipa, I accept that. She must remain on the list, but I will not put all my resources into the effort. There are better paths.”
She blinked. “So you…believe me?”
“Of course. I said as much, didn’t I?”
She couldn’t move for a moment—she was struck silent by that simple acknowledgment of her value as a partner and a person. When was the last time she’d felt such a thing? Years, perhaps. All the way back to when Harriet was her governess, probably, and had told her she was capable of so much more than what she had experienced most of her life.
And now this man sat across from her in a narrow carriage and gifted her with the same belief. The same acknowledgment. She couldn’t stop herself from launching herself across the carriage and into his arms. He caught her with a gasp of surprise, but she smothered it with her mouth.
Kissing him was always spectacular. The man knew how to move his mouth against hers, how to break past her barriers, physical or otherwise, and delve so deep she thought she might drown from it. He knew how to worship and arouse and make her feel weak with need and powerful with desire.
He knew how to make her feel appreciated and respected and important, too.
His arms tightened around her, fingers digging into her back as she arched against him, but before they could go any further, the carriage began to slow. She felt it turn, and he went still as he drew away from her.
“I would very much like to finish that later,” he murmured, kissing her again, this time much more chaste, before he smoothed a hand over her hair.
“So would I,” she agreed as she shuffled back to the opposite side of the carriage just in time for the door to be opened by a servant. The nerves he had helped to quell with the conversation and the kissing returned in full force.
He must have sensed it—of course he would—because he reached out to touch her hand gently. “Are you ready?”
She forced a smile, though she knew it had to look as weak as it felt. “I’m not,” she admitted. “But let’s go anyway.”
He flashed that grin, the dimple in his cheek on full display, before he got out of the carriage and reached back to help her down.
They stared up at the building together. A bookshop, Mattigan’s, took up the first floor, and Celeste couldn’t help but boggle at the displays she could already see through the windows. Colorful piles of books with expensive gold filigree on their covers, mixed with vases of fresh flowers meant to draw the eye. It was a beautiful shop and one she did long to browse through, even if she could never hope to afford anything within.
The footman who had opened the door for them stepped up. “There is an entrance for Lady Lena’s Salon through the bookshop, but Lady Lena and Miss Smith ask that you use the other entrance.” He motioned for them to follow and they did, through a little gate to a pretty blue door in the side alley. He opened it for them and indicated the narrow staircase just a few steps inside. “To the top and turn right. The door at the end of the hallway.”
“Thank you,” Owen said, and clasped Celeste’s hand gently as he took the lead up the stairs. She trailed behind him, noting the drawings mounted up the staircase. Beautiful sketches that she knew were in Harriet’s hand. Her governess had always loved to draw.
They reached the aforementioned door at the back of a hall, and Owen gave her a glance before he rapped on it. There was scurrying movement from behind and the door opened. Owen stepped aside and Celeste clapped her hand to her mouth.
Harriet Smith stood there, looking just as she had the last time Celeste saw her in person, years and years ago. She had a beautiful round face and sharp eyes that took in every detail about every person she’d ever met.
“Celeste!” she gasped, and suddenly Celeste was being dragged into a tight hug that was so warm and welcoming it brought tears to her eyes.
“Harriet,” she murmured, breathing in the familiar scent of rosemary that had always reminded her of the woman before her. “You haven’t aged a day!”
“I have,” Harriet chuckled as she drew Celeste in with a side glance for Owen. “But you have only grown lovelier. Come in, come in.”
She led them to a big room, stylishly decorated. There were bookshelves on every wall, lined with fiction as well as tomes on topics of justice and politics. Paintings were hung beside them, beautiful originals of landscapes and one of Harriet with a gorgeous woman at her side. There were chairs lining the perimeter of the room, as well as the kind of furniture one would expe
ct in a normal parlor.
But this wasn’t a normal parlor. Celeste knew immediately this was the place Harriet and Lena held their meetings.
“Oh, it’s wonderful,” she cooed as she roamed the room, touching the spines of the books.
“Thank you. We have worked hard to make it so,” Harriet said with a smile. She turned toward the door they had just entered and that smile broadened even wider.
Celeste turned to see the reason and caught her breath. Harriet’s companion in the portrait was passing into the chamber. She had dark, tightly curly hair and flawless tawny skin. Her high cheekbones and full lips reminded Celeste of a painting she’d once seen of Helen of Troy.
“Celeste, may I present Lena Bright. And Lena, this is my dear friend Celeste,” Harriet said as Lena stepped to her side. “And I’m sorry, sir, in all the excitement I did not yet ask your name.”
Celeste blinked and jerked her gaze back to Owen, who had been quietly observing and making no attempt to insert himself in the conversation. “Oh, my manners. Gracious, Harriet, you will think I forgot everything you ever taught me. This is Mr. Owen Gregory. A…a friend.”
“Mr. Gregory,” Harriet said, shaking his hand, but Celeste still knew her well enough to see she was taking him in, wondering about him. Judging whatever she saw there on the surface.
“Mr. Gregory,” Lena said with a brief smile toward him. Then she turned brown eyes on Celeste. “And dearest Celeste. I cannot believe it has taken so long for us to meet.”
She clasped both Celeste’s hands with her own and then leaned in to press a kiss to each cheek. Celeste found herself stunned by the pure essence of the woman. It was no wonder she was so popular despite all the marks against her that might make that unlikely. Celeste had no doubt Lena wound a spell around everyone she came in contact with and there was no escaping, nor even a yearning to do so.
“Sit,” Harriet insisted, and pointed toward the settee. “I’ll pour the tea.”
She and Owen did as they had been asked, taking the settee together as Lena chose one of the chairs across from them. In a few moments, Harriet joined them with tea for all and for a while their party was nothing but pleasant catching up with old friends. Neither woman mentioned Erasmus or the scandal of his death, and Celeste found herself relaxing.
This was what she had missed. What she had loved finding here in London both with Abigail and Pippa, and now with Harriet and Lena. As they spoke, she watched them together. Their love for each other was plain as day and became plainer as they relaxed around Owen. They sometimes completed each other’s sentences, and from time to time Lena would rest a hand on Harriet’s back or stroke her knuckles.
It seemed so easy for them, and Celeste was happy for Harriet. Her outspoken, intelligent friend hadn’t had the simplest life, and Celeste was nothing but pleased to see her settled and contented. Yet it also made her feel other things. A longing to have that same kind of union. And a powerful awareness of the man sitting to her right. The one close enough that Owen, too, could have rested a hand in comfort on her shoulder. Except that wasn’t the relationship they had. They’d been lovers once, they were becoming…friends, she supposed she might call it.
But beyond that? There was no certainty.
“And so how did you and Mr. Gregory meet?” Lena asked, and the question dragged Celeste out of her musings.
She glanced at him from the corner of her eye. He had stiffened slightly. “Well,” she said. “We…he…”
“We share a few acquaintances,” he supplied with a brief glance at her.
He was trying to protect her. And the fact that he would warmed her to her very toes. And yet when she glanced at Harriet and Lena, she didn’t feel she needed to hide. She couldn’t, at any rate. They might be behaving in a polite manner by not confronting Celeste’s situation, but they knew.
Of course they knew. Everyone knew.
“Owen is investigating the death of my…” She trailed off. “I suppose I cannot call him my husband.”
Saying the words, not hiding away from them anymore, gave her a strange sense of relief. One that multiplied when Harriet looked at her with the exact same affection and understanding as she ever had. Her friend didn’t judge her. But now she realized that she never could have. Celeste felt silly for ever believing she might.
“Oh, Celeste,” Harriet said softly. “I am so very sorry.”
Celeste shrugged. “You have been kind to avoid the subject, but I know you must be curious about my circumstances.”
Lena snorted out a breath and reached for Harriet’s hand. She drew it into her own lap and held it there, cupped between hers, as if she could protect the woman she loved. “Curiosity is fine in measure. We only wish to be supportive, not exploitive.”
Celeste took that in, let it sink into her skin and her bones and her heart. She looked at Owen again, wondering what he thought of her friends, what he thought of her options. She wanted to touch him, as easily as Lena and Celeste sought support from each other.
Instead, she drew a deep breath. “Very well. It would help to talk about this with people I trust. Let me tell you what happened.”
Owen knew Celeste’s story—he had lived some small part of it with her—so he didn’t listen to her words as much as he watched for the reaction of her friends. He wanted her to find support. She had it with Abigail and Pippa, of course, but that was a sisterhood of this pain. Celeste also needed outsiders who would support her, those who wouldn’t ask to lean on her but would only give her a place to lean.
But both Miss Smith and Lady Lena were difficult to read, so he had no idea how they would respond as Celeste let out a long sigh. “And so,” she said, getting up and crossing to the window to look out on the street below, “that is the truth about Erasmus Montgomery and me.”
There was a moment where no one moved. Celeste stayed at the window, back to the group, and Miss Smith and Lady Lena were still on their chairs, staring at each other, unspoken communication flowing between them.
But then Miss Smith got to her feet, crossed to Celeste and turned her away from the window. They stared at each other a moment, and the tension all but came off of Celeste in waves. Then Miss Smith embraced her and Owen let out the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.
Both women were crying when they parted. Miss Smith wiped at Celeste’s tears. “I’m so sorry, love. When you wrote that you were being forced to marry, I hoped it could be a happy union. This…this is not anything I would have wished for you.”
Celeste nodded. “I know, I know. But I do not want your pity.”
“Pity!” Lady Lena leapt up now and joined the pair. “There is no pity here, my dear, I assure you. I may have just met you, but I have known of you from your letters for many years. If there is one thing that is clear immediately, it is how very strong you are. Despite the unfairness of all of this, you are holding up so very well. And you are not friendless, are you? You are not unprotected.”
“Indeed, not,” Miss Smith declared. “You will come and stay with us.”
Celeste glanced toward Owen, and he held her stare. Whatever she wanted to do, he wished her to see he would support her. Only she could determine her future path, and one where she depended upon Miss Smith and Lady Lena was not so very desperate.
Though he didn’t know what it would mean for the two of them. If Celeste detached herself from the other wives, from the investigation, she might very well be detaching herself from him. And that thought left a very empty hole in his chest, even though he would give her anything in the world to make her happy.
“I appreciate the offer,” Celeste said, reaching for Lady Lena’s hand so that she now held on to each woman. “And I may yet take you up on it. But for now, I am staying with Abigail and Pippa. Until this is resolved, it is the best place for me to be.”
There was no mistaking the hesitation that Miss Smith, especially, showed at that decision. She glanced back at Owen, spearing him with a glance for a
long moment before she said, “Lena, my love, why don’t you show Celeste around our home? You can explain how the club works, as well, and her membership.”
Lady Lena’s expression lit up. “Of course!”
“My—my membership?” Celeste repeated.
“Certainly,” Miss Smith replied with a shrug. “You are now a member of Lady Lena’s Salon.”
Though Owen could see the excitement at that idea in Celeste’s eyes, her smile fell. “Oh, Harriet, is that wise? Your salon has a certain reputation, everyone knows about it. Do you want to invite in such an infamous person as myself and drag the scandal of my union with Montgomery into this special space you’ve created?”
“I don’t do anything I’m not entirely certain of, Celeste. You ought to remember that about me,” Miss Smith said with a stern expression.
That didn’t seem to appease Celeste. She worried her hands before her. “I just don’t want to hurt your reputation or Lena’s after you’ve worked so hard to build it up.”
Lady Lena stepped up and slipped a hand through her arm. “We want you, so stop arguing.”
The relief that moved through Celeste was palpable. Miss Smith turned toward him. “And the same invitation is true for Mr. Gregory. If you would be interested.”
He inclined his head. “That is very kind, madam. I have always had a great curiosity about the salon and I would be honored to be a part of it, though I am no great intellect.”
Celeste snorted, and he was pleased to see her expression was no longer so filled with concern and anxiety. “Do not believe him, Harriet. He is always thinking, thinking, thinking.”
Miss Smith nodded slowly. “I can see that about him. Go with Lena now, my dear. I will stay and speak with Mr. Gregory a moment.”
Celeste’s smile fell and she glanced at him. “Owen?”
“I’m happy to talk to your friend,” he said, though he glanced back at Miss Smith and held his gaze there. “Go and enjoy your tour.”
The Unexpected Wife Page 15