It's Marriage Or Ruin

by Liz Tyner

  ‘Gus was everything you’ve said—I’m sure. Unfortunately when you had him it was between my tenures with you. I was working with a different animal—some child that incessantly whined.’ He squinted at the cards, then held one at his chest as if keeping a secret from himself.

  ‘I see your plan.’ Robert ignored the game. ‘You intend to keep her guessing. You’ll control the household that way.’

  ‘No, Robert. She hardly knows me. In fact, I would say she’s a stranger to me. Albeit, a fetching one.’

  Robert slapped one card on top of another. ‘I feel it in my bones that this will be a disastrous union. You must hire a butler straight away because I am so concerned with your needs that it will be impractical for me to take on more tasks.’

  ‘I have always gambled, Robert. And don’t expect me to add a butler.’

  ‘You never gamble. You make mistakes and call it that.’

  Marcus watched the cards. ‘I am not certain that Emilie cares anything for me. In fact, I was surprised when she told the cleric she would marry me.’ That moment had emblazoned itself in his mind. ‘I thought she’d changed her mind.’

  ‘If you want someone who cares for you, I have found the path to a woman’s heart is quickest and sweetest by avoiding marriage. In truth, they detest it as much as men do. Show me a rich widow who wants to marry and I’ll show you...’ Robert stopped, deliberating on his next words. ‘I’m trying to imagine a rich widow who wants a husband. Perhaps she might need a valet to help her get over those delusions...’

  ‘Stop thinking about other people’s marriages and help me prepare to move to Stormhaven.’

  Robert dropped the cards, letting them flutter to the table, and rose. ‘We are surely not going to that disgrace where your grandparents lived. It was in poor shape years ago and age is as unkind to houses as it is to people.’ He went to the mirror and inspected his hair. ‘Blasted shingles keep falling off the roof.’

  Marcus didn’t answer directly. ‘Tomorrow, determine if any of the maids will go with us. Nathaniel will remain here, so the staff can stay. But we will need trunks packed, food prepared and perhaps tools purchased. We will need wagons loaded. I must employ workmen. I would like Emilie to have trained servants as I am not sure she can adjust to the demands of a household easily.’

  Robert returned, lifting the cards he’d dropped, the rest of the deck in his hand, and he stared at the table. ‘Do you know at which point your senses disappeared? Did you feel them leave your body? Or did you wake and discover them gone?’

  ‘I suppose they slid away, a little each day.’ Marcus reached out to turn over a card.

  Robert pulled another card from the deck and peered at it. ‘If I were you, I could envision a better way to spend my honeymoon.’ The older man didn’t stop his concentration on the cards. ‘I will wake you in the morning and let you know if you have won any games.’

  ‘Thank you, Robert. See that the maid checks on Emilie. Also have the maid remove some clothing from my room so you can bring me something to wear in the morning.’

  He headed to Nathaniel’s room.

  * * *

  The next day, he awoke as his door opened.

  Robert didn’t knock.

  ‘You won many games last night,’ Robert said, cheerily, but then his tone changed to chagrin. ‘But you cheated.’

  ‘I cheat every game you play for me.’

  ‘What is frightful is that you still lose.’

  ‘Do you feel the least wobbly from the brandy?’ Marcus asked. His skull was banging soundly. Wellington’s cannons couldn’t have pounded louder.

  ‘No,’ Robert insisted. ‘I am of stronger stock than you young lords who must groan and lie about all day with damp cloths plastered to your foreheads.’ He tossed a pair of trousers on the bed. ‘Now, rise and dress yourself. You have a duty to do.’

  ‘The sole duty I am interested in would not require trousers.’

  Robert shrugged away the words. ‘A sour miss is scowling the rooms this morning and it would be best suited for the two of you to be together, so that you might rapturously observe each other—or at least prevent her from speaking to me.’

  Marcus contemplated the trousers flung across the bedcovers.

  Robert reached for a shirt and cravat and held them at the ready.

  Marcus took his time dressing as he knew Robert didn’t like to wait. As soon as he had tied Marcus’s cravat, Robert held the brush in hand and, after Marcus donned his coat, with a few swift dashes, took the specks from it.

  ‘She’s in the sitting room.’ Robert tossed the brush with a clatter, then aligned it perfectly beside the shaving kit.

  Marcus searched Emilie out and found her, poised with a pad of paper in her hands, determination on her face, ankles crossed.

  Her chalk stopped in mid-air.

  ‘Good morning.’ He dipped his head in acknowledgement. ‘I must talk with you before I go out. I’ll be getting supplies and staff arranged so we can move to the country.’

  She dropped the chalk into a container. ‘That will be a good thing. I do not like this establishment, although I am content to make do.’ She turned as she surveyed the walls. ‘Not a well-lit room in the place. I can hear carriages pass. I would prefer forests and sunshine and cooling breezes.’

  She deliberated on her sketchbook, picked up a pencil and her elbow began to move, quivering while she filled in the shades. ‘Why did you marry me, if you do not plan on having an heir?’

  ‘Emilie. Do not presume for a moment I don’t intend to share your bed. I fully expect to make my presence known and for you to have no complaints whatsoever in that regard.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘But yesterday was eventful. Additionally, it was a trial for you. You married. You spent your first night away from your parents and we’d been awake most of two days. That was no time to begin anew. Nevertheless, before I fell asleep, I did recall your reaction to my physique.’

  Reaching up, he tapped one shoulder. ‘Move over, David. You have competition.’

  He saw a flash of humour.

  ‘Well, I’m not immune to the male form. Artists can be passionate people on occasion.’ She inspected the ring he had put on her finger.

  ‘You don’t sculpt, do you?’ he asked.

  ‘Not yet. I long to learn.’

  He hadn’t promised her the opportunity to sculpt. He wouldn’t accept any marble in the place. He imagined two statues of himself, both naked, perched grotesquely on pedestals at each side of an entrance to a room at the British Museum, with Emilie reigning supreme as she waved a carved rod, indicating points of interest. Oh, that would be thrilling for the men at White’s.

  ‘I want to move to a country estate. Stormhaven lives up to its name. Last time I saw the acreage, it appeared to have been a true haven for tempests and is in sad disrepair,’ he admitted. ‘It will take years to correct it. But you can spare no expense in decorating it. It’s been in my family for centuries, yet no one cares for it.’

  He walked to her. His senses collided with each other, each one fighting for dominance in their awareness of Emilie. Arousal flourished. With a light touch, he brushed an errant lock of her hair back behind her ear.

  In that moment, he understood art. When she moved her neck or her torso, even the slightest, it seemed that the world flowed through her and that she was the centre of everything. A painting of the world and Emilie moved in the hub, spokes of life surrounding her.

  His fingers trailed down, touching the softness of her earlobe. The delicate curve of her jawline. He inhaled the scent of fresh morning soap. His lips parted.

  She let her chin move within his touch, not resisting at all, but melding into him. She stared at him. ‘No one cares for it? It’s been abandoned?’

  ‘Where do you want to live?’

  She slowly
moved her gaze to him.

  ‘I prefer—not here.’ The words broke the spell of their moment together. ‘Robert is unskilled as a butler.’

  ‘He’s a valet,’ Marcus corrected her.

  ‘I promoted him.’

  ‘He’s my valet.’ He delivered the words very softly and with complete assurance.

  She deliberated on the spine of her sketchbook. ‘Based on your appearance, he is a talented valet. He has no skills as a butler, anyway. Keep him if you must.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Mark delivered the words just as his father would. He caught the similarity in tone and couldn’t take the words back, and didn’t know if he would have.

  He turned briefly, his feet facing the exit, but he stopped. ‘Then are you pleased to move, Countess?’

  ‘Oh.’ Her chin moved up. ‘I haven’t been addressed so formally before. That sounds...suitable.’

  ‘I would say you are accomplished already at being able to direct your designs as a peer would.’

  ‘That is indeed thoughtful of you. And I must return the compliment. You are every moment Avondale’s heir.’

  The words moved like a drop of winter’s brandy that had missed warming his throat, but had splashed at him from above and leaked down the inside of his shirt at his back.

  ‘Lady Grayson. I am not happy with the excesses I follow. Gambling bores me. Drinking is no solution because I do not like the things I say when I am dissipated. I feel I reveal too much of myself to near strangers and I do not like it. I require substance. To know my mettle, and not gauge my personality by the enjoyment others expect.’

  ‘For this you married me?’ She pondered the statement, but then relaxed. ‘Well, I am an artist.’

  ‘To me, that is not as important as you might suppose it is when compared to the way you see life. I married someone I once saw when we were children. Then the other night, you consented to marry me and I knew that was the singular opportunity I would have to take a different path from the one I had always foreseen. I had hoped...’ He shrugged. ‘I do not know exactly what I had hoped for.’

  He could not put it into words for her. She’d never understand. He could not see all the colours and he knew they were there. He’d discovered them by accident on the day he’d first seen Emilie.

  She rose and didn’t stop until her skirts brushed his legs. ‘You remember me as a child?’

  ‘You were playing some nonsensical game. I’d been at a window and saw you running to the trees, and wondered what you were doing and investigated.’

  ‘I seem to remember you now.’

  He pressed his lips together for a half-second before replying. He shrugged the words away. ‘I noticed you. That’s all.’

  One soft finger touched his temple, moved down the side of his cheek to his throat and slid down the front of his shirt. ‘I couldn’t miss you now. You were made for inspiration.’

  He could not be in her grasp. Then he realised he was a tad late for that. He had to get her out of his reach.

  ‘I have to get workmen situated so we will have a roof. Terrible leaks.’ He turned, taking a step. He couldn’t acknowledge, even to himself—particularly to himself—how tempting she was to him. She fascinated him. He tried to ascertain why and all that his mind could unlock was an image of her.

  Then she closed the distance between them. She examined him.

  They stood like two strangers at a ball, ready to begin a dance, both aware of the music, yet not sure if the composition would lead them together or apart.

  ‘When we were children,’ she said, words slow, ‘you were the boy...the one who spoke with me the day of Beatrice’s wedding.’

  ‘I had to stay with the children and I didn’t like it. You challenged me to a duel and called yourself a highwayman.’

  ‘You were too old to be with the children and I knew it. I picked you to rob.’

  ‘You stuck a stick at my waistcoat.’

  ‘I did stop short of running you through. With a stick. Which likely would have broken. I requested you to play highwayman with me, but you dismissed it as beneath you. I was too young for you to really notice.’

  He put his hands on her shoulders and brought her closer, his fingers trailing until he had both palms at her cheeks. His thumbs grazed her lips. ‘I noticed you. Your dress was all flounces and your hair had bows. The frills overpowered you in size, and yet not in spirit. You saw none of the fripperies. You enjoyed the sunshine and the lemonade and ran among the oaks.’

  She touched him. His stubble was freshly shaved away, yet she could feel baby-fine hair where his lips began. Perhaps he had a tiny scar, so small as to be invisible if she were not so close, running in a straight line along his cheek. His lips. His mouth felt softer than her own. So delicate. A contrast to the rest.

  He grasped her sides, sending rays of warmth into her.

  Marcus took up all the space in front of her, the scent of shaving and fresh linen mixing with what might have been a hint of brandy.

  She waited.

  His lips touched hers, so gently that it would have knocked her off her feet had he not been pulling her closer.

  She’d not felt herself move. She’d felt nothing, nothing but Marcus’s lips and the wonder of a kiss unleashing so much wildness inside her that she would have never deemed it possible to feel.

  He pulled her against him, crushing her into his body, finding her mouth, tasting her and embracing her as if their lives depended on it, but instead of feeling consumed, or captured, freedom blazed within her. And then he stopped, pulled back and waited until she could think who she was and where she was.

  ‘And then we married at dawn.’ He pondered his words. ‘The hour you chose for a duel and which ended up a wedding time.’

  She could say nothing. How could you when Michelangelo’s marble came to life and spoke?

  ‘I want a fresh start,’ he said as he moved towards the door. ‘For myself.’

  ‘For us?’ She didn’t want the distance to grow. ‘I am satisfied with the man who stands in front of me. I did not expect a perfect union, or, in truth, a long one.’

  ‘A fresh start for me. What if there are only a few times in a person’s life that they can truly change the path of who they are and become who they are meant to be? And what if this is my last chance?’

  She turned to her sketchbook and opened it, inspecting a page. ‘My destiny was to have been the same as my grandmother’s and all my female ancestors. To have that journey, I would only have had to notice the men of my father’s parish. I’m fortunate not to have those constraints. Some day you will go your separate way and our lives will remain intertwined through our children, but not our hearts. Our marriage began flawed and will end the same. I accept that.’

  She fixed her attention on him and she inspected his features, amazement creeping into her words and raptness in her gaze. ‘But you are perfection.’

  * * *

  Perfection, she called him. She observed his exterior. Much like everyone else in society did.

  And she was fortunate.

  He was as lost to her as he was to himself. ‘I’m little more than a cutpurse who lives in a fine world. I take what I covet and leave the rest behind.’

  ‘The marriage?’

  ‘Yes. I took what I wished. You were more entranced with Nathaniel. And you shouldn’t have been.’

  ‘He was charming. You should not say such unkind things about your brother.’

  The words stilled Marcus. But he chastised himself. She couldn’t be blamed. She’d been straightforward, sending the note to Nathaniel. She’d not met his brother that night, but had stayed away.

  He’d signed Nathaniel’s name to the missive inviting her to Hatchards. She’d arrived. He couldn’t blame her for that. She’d brought her mother. ‘I would not deny you your art, and you must understan
d, I will have this chance.’

  ‘And you don’t care if I paint?’

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘Then I cannot care how you choose to spend your days. That would be unfair.’

  He had to leave the room before the heat of it choked him.

  At the door, he called out, ‘I will be getting workmen and staff for Stormhaven. The residence may take some industry on both our parts.’

  * * *

  He would end up like his father with too many mistresses to remember if he did not change.

  Yet he was out on the street with a horse, getting his boots scuffed, while chasing after some madness that could bring him no ease.

  He stilled. Perhaps his father chose the women for his ability to forget them. Who knew? Avondale had claimed once, in a moment of utter foolishness, that the new woman he had charmed had given him happiness. He’d ended his search for feminine perfection. He’d found her.

  Marcus had held his fists behind his back and wished his father well before crashing out the door and going back to university.

  The next meeting with his father, they’d not spoken of anything but horses, and then after university, someone at a club had nudged him, angrily, and claimed Avondale was having a new dalliance with the man’s sister.

  Marcus had commiserated and learned that the novelty of his father’s true love hadn’t lingered as expected.

  Marcus didn’t even buy his boots from Hoby, because that was his father’s bootmaker. He refused to follow in those footsteps and bachelorhood was the safest path to that. He could let Nathaniel marry and provide the heir.

  But in simply a few days, Emilie had entered his world and he’d dashed headfirst into a marriage.

  The ink had hardly been dry on the special licence and he’d not given himself occasion to weigh his actions, because if he had, he would still be single.

  But Emilie.

  That day at Hatchards had sealed his fate, tamped it deep with the paperwork, and he’d invited Lady Semple and friends to finish the negotiations.