by Eva Leigh
Seeking relief from the oppressiveness of her feelings, she teased, “How deeply romantic. Are you turning from anthropology to poetry?”
“What rhymes with kinship systems?” He raised an eyebrow.
“Flagship Tristams?”
He kissed his fingertips. “Perfection.”
A moment later, they both broke into laughter. She leaned into the release, allowing the absurdity to ease pressure from the hurt at the center of her.
“Thank you,” she said.
He looked baffled. “For what?”
“For listening to my self-indulgent diatribe. The next time we meet, I’ll be less of a sapskull.”
“Reminds me.” He rifled around in his pockets before producing a crumpled piece of paper, which he held out to her. As she read it, he went on. “At a private home in Chelsea, there’s a temporary exhibition of medieval woodcuts that’s open to the public. I heard that some examples of early studies of reptiles were included. Come with me tomorrow?”
“I would,” she said at once. “Only . . . woodcuts of lizards aren’t exactly your bailiwick. Is there anything there that would interest you?.”
The corners of his eyes crinkled. “The whole world interests me.”
“If I was talking to anyone else, I’d say that statement was an exaggeration. However, it’s you, so I know that you mean that with complete honesty.” She smiled fondly at him, her good friend.
It was a wonder that he was still a bachelor. He never even spoke of lovers. Why could no woman ever see what a wonderful man he was? But, then, finding people who could support your scientific interests was a difficult task. He was also poor as a churchmouse, which, unfortunately, meant that he hadn’t the financial means to court anyone.
Sebastian returned her smile, then pulled out his timepiece. “Damn. Supposed to be at McKinnon’s bookstore to pick up a special order.” He bowed, then asked, “I’ll see you tomorrow? We’ll meet at the exhibition?”
“Tomorrow at the exhibition,” she said brightly. Grace shooed him toward the door. “Now go, and enjoy your new books.”
“There is nothing more enjoyable than new books,” he said solemnly. “Except old books.”
“Truer words . . .”
With a wave, he left the reading room. She stood alone, torn between gratitude and despair. Gratitude for Sebastian’s camaraderie, and despair that Mason had put her firmly in the classification Amica asexualis.
Nothing would ever change that. She was as fixed as a pin through a butterfly.
Seb took advantage of his long legs to walk quickly from the Benezra. Brisk afternoon air cooled his face.
He needed distance between himself and Grace, distance that would help clear his head and remind him of some Very Important Facts.
She was the daughter of an earl and could trace her ancestry back to before the Tudors.
He was the son of a man who’d made his fortune from mining and selling iron, and his grandfather had been a blacksmith with barely any literacy.
Her pin money was likely ten times the amount of the pittance that was his quarterly allowance.
In four years, not once had she looked at him with anything warmer than friendliness.
She was besotted by Mason Fredericks and only Mason Fredericks.
She owed Seb nothing. He couldn’t feel anger or resentment that she considered him strictly a friend.
But, damn, none of that made it easier to hear about her infatuation.
He neatly dodged around a liveried messenger hurrying down the street, and sidestepped around a fallen meat pie someone had dropped. Physical action came so easily and without thought. He could settle into the movement, confident that his body would perform as it needed to, even excel in the motions required. At least in that regard, he had full confidence.
Oh, and thanks to the fact that he couldn’t secure money to fund field research, he knew his way around a library.
That totaled up to two areas of expertise. When it came to talking—more specifically, wooing—he devolved into a stammering blancmange.
Which was one of the reasons why he never tried to say anything remotely flirtatious with Grace. He’d never tell her that her gray-blue eyes reminded him of the sea at dusk. Or that he could spend hours contemplating the curve of her neck. Or give voice to the fact that when he saw her, he forgot anything unpleasant that had happened to him earlier in the day and it was as though the sun had broken out from behind a heavy cloudbank, brightening everything within him.
The reason—the only reason—why he could talk to Grace at all was because she thought of him merely as a friend. He didn’t lose his awareness of her as a woman, but so long as she valued his platonic companionship, he’d keep all thoughts of kissing his way across her collarbone to a minimum, thank you very much.
The sign for McKinnon’s came into view. He breathed out, letting the last of tension slip from his body.
“Afternoon, Mr. Holloway,” the bookseller called from behind a table laden with tomes of every size. “A moment, and I’ll head back to fetch your order.”
“At your leisure, Mr. McKinnon.” Seb slipped between the bookshelves, which, along with the Benezra Library, formed the walls of his spiritual home. He had to content himself with other people’s research, since having the funds to actually go out into the field—outside of England—and conduct research of his own was a distant dream.
Grace stepped into the foyer of her home, her face heating as she recalled her mortifying conversation with Mason. Then Sebastian had listened so patiently to her bemoaning that humiliating interaction. He always listened—one of the reasons why she was so grateful to call him a friend.
“Oh, thank goodness you’re home, my lady!”
She paused in the act of handing Katie her bonnet as Grenville, the butler, hurried forward. Grenville’s mouth was tight, and creases of worry fanned out from the corners of his eyes.
Considering how he had once calmly announced at teatime that a fire had broken out in the kitchen, the butler’s tense expression shot alarm through Grace.
“What is it?” she demanded.
“The earl . . . your father . . .” Grenville’s gaze lifted to the top of the staircase, toward her father’s bedchamber.
Grace shot up the stairs, hiking up her skirts to take them two at a time. Every stride made her heart pound harder as countless disastrous scenarios played out in her mind.
In the hallway outside her father’s bedchamber, she nearly collided with a middle-aged man in dark and serious clothing. A servant carrying a covered basin was on his heels. It took her addled thoughts a moment to recall that he was Dr. Campbell, the family physician.
“Lady Grace.” Dr. Campbell bowed. “I’ve just been attending the earl.”
“Tell me what’s wrong with him.” She gripped the physician’s sleeve, dimly noting the whiteness of her knuckles.
“I’ve bled him, and he’s resting now.”
“But what happened?”
Dr. Campbell hesitated. “I don’t want to overset you. Young ladies can have delicate temperaments.”
She fought down a wave of impatience. “You attended my birth, Dr. Campbell, so by now you should know I have no delicate temperament.”
“He suffered a collapse less than an hour ago,” the physician said after a pause. “After examining the earl, I suspect it was angina pectoris.”
Cold sheeted through Grace. God—when her father had fallen ill, she’d been at the library, nattering on about her fascination with Mason.
“I bled him,” Dr. Campbell continued, “but in order to have a full recovery, he must have rest and peace of mind.” He stared at her meaningfully, as if she planned to bang a kettledrum beside her father’s bed.
“Yes, I understand.” She released her grip upon the physician’s sleeve.
“I’ll call tomorrow to check on his progress.”
She gave the physician a distracted nod before heading into her father’s bedchamb
er. The curtains had been drawn, shutting out the last of the day’s light, with the fire and a lamp casting flickering illumination on the too-still person in the bed and the figure seated beside him.
Her mother’s face gleamed with tears, and as Grace moved closer, the countess half rose from her chair with a choking sob. “Oh, Grace.”
“Mama.” She rushed forward to embrace her mother. The countess felt so frail and delicate, her bones as breakable as a dried reed, and for the first time, Grace truly realized that both of her parents were mortal and finite. A shudder ran through Grace’s body. “Why did no one fetch me from the library when it happened?”
“There wasn’t time. One moment, we were having tea, talking about dining with Lord and Lady Pugh, and the next, he was on the floor, face white as paper, and his hand clutching his chest, and I . . . and I . . .”
“Shh.” Grace rocked her mother, painfully aware that their roles had reversed and it was she who now offered comfort. “Dr. Campbell said he can recover with good rest.”
“Easy for him to say.” Her father’s alarmingly thin voice came from the bed. “He’s not engaged to play cards with Lord Liverpool tomorrow night.”
“Papa.” Grace released her mother to kneel at her father’s bedside. She clasped his hand in hers, and he weakly squeezed in response. The sleeve of his shirt had been pushed up to reveal a bloodstained bandage wrapped around his arm.
He was terribly pale, his gaze faintly unfocused as he looked down at her. “Come, now, there’s no need for tears.”
She brushed her fingertips across her face and discovered they were wet. “Is there anything I can do?”
He was silent for a moment. “There is one thing.”
“You’ve but to name it.” She sat up straighter, relieved at being able to take action.
“What I want will help both of us . . .”
“Go on,” she urged.
“I want you to marry.”
She laughed, and then realized that he wasn’t jesting. Abruptly, she let go of her father’s hand. “Sir?”
“Hear him out, Grace,” her mother said as she lowered herself to her chair.
Grace could only stare back and forth between her parents. Clearly, they’d spoken to each other about this. That couldn’t be good.
“I worry about you, my dear,” her father said softly. “Your Seasons have been . . . less than ideal.”
Another sudden, startled laugh broke from Grace’s lips. “Disastrous, more like.”
“We knew you were not quite an Incomparable.” Even in his weakened state, her father spoke with a hint of wry humor. “Still, we’ve held out hope that you might find a man who understood your . . . peculiarities. We’ve hoped, but each year the possibility has grown more and more unlikely.”
Grace pressed her lips together. Having her parent articulate her failings as a Society debutante was a sharp needle piercing between her ribs. True, her parents had been tolerant of her studies, but that was not quite the same as having her work—and her—celebrated.
Her father went on, “My little health episode makes me think about what will happen to you when I’m gone. That time may come sooner than any of us expect.”
“Let’s not talk of that.”
“But we must.”
“I always thought . . . perhaps Charlie might take me in.” She and her older brother were on amicable, if not warm, terms with each other, and his wife, Anne, was kind. Their three children were quite high-spirited, and it was commonly accepted that, wherever they were, at least one piece of china would be broken within fifteen minutes.
“Is that the life you want?” her mother asked. “Reliant on your sibling’s generosity? Having no husband, no children, of your own? Worried that one day, you might not have a roof over your head?”
“I . . .” Constriction gripped her lungs. True, living as Charlie’s dependent was not ideal. His home would never quite be hers, and she’d be, at best, tolerated as the eccentric maiden aunt. If her brother passed away before her, she would have to hope his children would support her into her dotage. She’d be passed around like a worn coat, just a little too good to be thrown away, but too frayed and old to be of use.
A burr of anger flared within her, that a woman could not exist in this world on her own. She would always be subject to a man’s munificence, always be less than because she’d been born a female.
Yet how could she refuse her father his one wish? How would it be possible that, as he lay ill and exhausted, she could deny him this?
“Surely there’s someone you’ve met,” her father said, though his words were enervated. “Some gentleman of means that you might consider marrying.”
“There’s no one—” But that wasn’t true.
There was Mason.
Charming, handsome, intelligent Mason, who accepted her as a fellow natural philosopher. Her infatuation with him could easily grow into something much deeper, much stronger . . . And, it couldn’t be denied, he was a viscount’s son. Her intellectual and material comforts would be assured. He was all things perfect for her future husband.
Save one small problem. He didn’t see her as a future wife.
“Please,” her father murmured as his eyelids drooped with weariness. “Please find yourself someone to wed. For me,” he added.
His eyes closed, and his breathing deepened as he drifted to sleep.
“Go on, dearest,” her mother whispered. “I’ll watch him for now. Have your supper and a bath.” The set of her mother’s jaw indicated no arguments would be permitted.
“Very well,” Grace said. “But I’ll be back later so you can eat and rest.” She kissed her mother’s cheek before leaving the room.
In the corridor, Grace took a few steps before sinking down onto her haunches, gasping as if someone had just rammed an elbow into her stomach.
“Find yourself someone to wed. For me.”
Lord above, she could not refuse her father his wish. But, of all women, how was she to find herself a husband when the one man she could ever think of marrying refused to think of her as anything other than a colleague?
Chapter 3
She was late. She was never late.
Seb tried to smooth out a wrinkle of concern as he waited outside the exhibit in Chelsea, but no matter how he attempted to distract himself by observing the interactions of pedestrians, he circled again and again to worry. Maybe she’d gotten into an accident en route. Or she might have fallen ill.
Surely, if something was awry, Grace would have sent word. He distressed himself unnecessarily. But the gray skies grew heavier with each passing minute, and as he stood on the curb, the first drops of rain spattered on his shoulders. A moment later, the storm began in earnest.
He’d no choice but to take shelter inside the exhibit. So he dashed up the steps of the town house, and, at a footman’s pointed look, wiped his boots on a mat in the foyer. He showed the servant the wrinkled announcement.
“The exhibit is in the downstairs dining room and parlor,” the footman said, pointing over his shoulder.
“If a young woman with dark brown hair arrives,” Seb answered as he removed his hat, “I’d appreciate it if you informed her that Mr. Holloway is waiting for her within.”
The footman glanced at Seb’s threadbare coat and scuffed boots. “Not much of a description. Get lots of young women with dark brown hair coming through.”
“She has a particularly intelligent mien.”
“Oh, well, in that case.” The servant rolled his eyes.
“Her servant will be reading a book,” Seb said through gritted teeth.
“Right, gov.”
Seb resisted the impulse to snap a retort, reminding himself that the task of patrolling rigid British social hierarchy was often consigned to those who served the elite. He would not shoot the messenger—or, in this case, the footman.
After casting a glance toward the front door, he drifted toward the dining room. The soft, murmuring tones
used by gallery patrons rolled out into the corridor.
Inside the dining chamber, which had been transformed into a gallery, framed illustrations covered the walls, and small groups and individuals in fashionable clothing circled the room as they studied the multitude of images. Seb moved to study a rather intriguing picture of a creature that looked to be half fish, half bishop.
“Peculiar, isn’t it?” a female voice asked from behind him.
He straightened and turned toward the woman. Her blond hair gleamed beneath the brim of her stylish bonnet, and she gazed at him coquettishly with wide green eyes. He gulped.
A minute went by. And then another. She seemed to expect him to answer.
Sweat rolled down his back. What was he supposed to say? Something flirtatious? Something droll, or perhaps scholarly?
Words filled his mouth, and yet he could give voice to none of them. It was as though he had been presented with a coffer full of words and he had to select the best ones from the pile. There were too many options, too many ways to speak and fail.
“Er . . .” He coughed into his fist. “Well . . .”
He reached the limit of his ability. No other syllables or phrases made it past his lips.
“Made a friend, Miss Susan?”
With an internal groan of despair, Seb watched as a young man wearing what was likely the latest Continental style approached. The dandy lifted a brow as he took in Seb’s ragged appearance.
“Didn’t know this exhibition admitted charity cases,” he drawled. “How did you get in?”
Heat poured into Seb’s face and his hands coiled into fists. But a gentleman didn’t brawl, and while Seb wasn’t of genteel birth, he understood how public fisticuffs was considered the height of boorishness. The one weapon a refined man could use was his wit.
Seb opened his mouth to say something clever and cutting.
Nothing came out.
Miss Susan giggled. “The poor thing. He hasn’t been domesticized.” She took her companion’s offered arm. “Come, William. If we wait for him to answer, we’ll be standing here until All Souls’ Day.”