Forget Me Not (The Gents Book #1)

by Sarah M. Eden

  “The one to be held at Falstone Castle?” she guessed aloud.

  He nodded.

  She had managed to put the dreaded event mostly out of her thoughts. The reminder was not particularly welcome. Still, this was a light and easy way to discuss it.

  “I don’t know that I can speak to which is the best. Dances, after all, are not like mathematics formulas, where one correct answer exists. I can say which of those two I prefer.” All three men watched her, each with a different variation of amused. “The allemande.”

  “Capital,” Lucas declared with a grin. He looked to his friends. “I told you she would choose the allemande.”

  Mr. Barrington shook his head. “I struggle to countenance the reality of one person preferring the allemande to the minuet, let alone two.”

  “Ah, but Julia and I share a reason for preferring it,” Lucas said.

  Did they? She hadn’t told Lucas why she preferred it.

  “I am the one who taught her the allemande,” Lucas said.

  He remembered. He had also taught her to play cricket, to climb trees, to fish. Was he the reason she still enjoyed all those things? Was he the reason she preferred the allemande? Likely.

  “You also taught her to trek up a mountain,” Mr. Barrington said, “yet I doubt she prefers that to, say, her mathematics endeavors.”

  “Oh.” She rose and crossed to Lucas. “I finished my book on differentials. I worked out the final equation earlier today.”

  “Did you?” He looked genuinely pleased for her. “What do you mean to study next?”

  “I haven’t yet decided.”

  “Once you have, let me know. If I don’t have a book on that topic in the book room, we can send to York or even to London.”

  She shook her head. “I’ll not put the estate to such an expense, not when there are so many books here at the house.”

  “How did we land on the topic of books?” Mr. Layton’s tone was one of annoyed boredom. “We have not yet settled the matter of dances.”

  Julia faced him with her sternest expression. “I have made my opinion known. Consider the matter settled.”

  Mr. Layton’s eyes danced with enjoyment. “Lucas and Stanley used to tell us tales of fiery little Julia. I am beginning to believe them after all these years.”

  Her heart bubbled a bit. “You told them about me?” she asked Lucas.

  “Of course we did.”

  She didn’t fight the smile that formed on her face. “Did you tell them how adept I am at the allemande?”

  “I don’t know that I mentioned that.”

  She clicked her tongue and shook her head. “A shame.”

  “Show us now,” Mr. Layton said.

  “The allemande?” Lucas chuckled. “There’s not room, and there’s no music.”

  “Grumpy Uncle will hum a tune for you. We can move furniture enough for a sedate demonstration.”

  Lucas took a single step, placing himself between her and his friends, turning his back to the gentlemen. “Simply say the word, sweeting, and I’ll toss them out of the room on their ears. No one will force you into dancing if you don’t care to.”

  Did she wish to be freed? Dancing in front of even this small gathering made her nervous, but doing so meant she could remain in this room a moment longer, and with Lucas. She’d wished for both for days. “I don’t mind, if you don’t.”

  He smiled so sweetly. “I have always enjoyed dancing with you, Julia. And it is not a bad idea to practice before next week’s ball.”

  “What if they laugh at me?”

  “I’ll punch them in the nose,” he said with perfect sincerity.

  “And I’ll kick them in the shins.”

  He grinned. “Do you remember the time you did that to Robert Finley, and he told his father he’d been attacked by a highwayman rather than admit he’d been brought low by you on account of his being a bounder?”

  “His mother is absolutely lovely. I cannot for the life of me understand how Robert turned out to be such a horrible person.”

  “As is the father, so is the son,” Lucas said.

  “Is your father also a jester?”

  Lucas laughed. Heavens, she loved the sound.

  “If the two of you don’t begin your dancing demonstration soon,” Mr. Layton said, “I shall change my vote to ‘the minuet’ and there will be no regaining your victory. My taste, after all, is beyond reproach.”

  Lucas tucked his arm across her back and pulled her close. “Let us prove to them that we are correct on this matter. What do you say?”

  “I think I still remember how to execute this dance, but I intend to blame you if I bungle it.”

  “An excellent plan.” He dropped his arm away. “Gents, help me move the furniture.”

  They had the room cleared in a moment’s time. How odd it was that he had been so very adamant that she not disturb the layout or furnishings of this room but was undertaking a rearranging himself now. Perhaps he was more amenable to the idea of change than he had been.

  Lucas rejoined her in the middle of the room. His friends leaned against the far wall.

  “A tune, Kes, if you please.”

  Mr. Barrington dah-dah-dah’d the opening measures of a familiar allemande. Julia set her hand in Lucas’s, as was required for this particular dance. Despite her warnings, she did remember the steps. They returned to her as naturally as if she’d been dancing the allemande every day in the years since Lucas had first taught her. The steps brought them side by side, each facing opposite directions. Lucas reached across her middle, she across his, joining hands around themselves.

  She smiled up at him. “I used to grow so confused by this part.”

  “I remember.” He held her hand with his arms bent, keeping them nearer one another than was entirely necessary. “You are managing it beautifully just now.”

  His smile was warm every time the dance brought them together. And each time, her heart leaped about a little more. This was the sweet and kindhearted Lucas she had known as a girl: so attentive, so considerate, so kind. How she’d missed him!

  The dance came to a close with them standing side by side, hands clasped. He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it. “Well done, sweeting.”

  Precisely what he’d said to her when they would practice the dance as children. Well done, sweeting. She had lived for that praise as a little girl. Why, then, did it hurt a little to hear it now?

  “I concede,” Mr. Barrington said. “The allemande is a very elegant dance.”

  “Indeed,” Mr. Layton added.

  Lucas looked to her. “Shall we dance it at Falstone Castle and fill all the guests with this same awe?”

  To her mortification, emotion clogged her throat, emotion she couldn’t truly identify or explain. She rushed from the room, through Lucas’s chamber, down the corridor, down the stairs, and out of the house.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “Why does she keep doing that?” Lucas asked after Julia’s flight.

  “She has run from you before?” Digby asked.

  He counted off the incidents on his fingers. “When I first returned to Lampton Park, when our parents announced our betrothal, when I asked her not to rearrange the furniture in this room, when we returned from our day of mountaineering . . .”

  “Gads, man.” Digby looked to Kes. “You should have sent for me sooner.”

  “He sent for you? He assumed I would bungle my marriage?”

  Digby shrugged. “You are standing here chatting with the two of us instead of chasing after your distraught wife.”

  Lucas was reaching the end of his wits, and these two louts were having fun at his expense. “The two of you are supposed to be helping me.”

  “And you are supposed to be courting Julia,” Kes said. “Your failure overshadows o
urs.”

  “There’s not much I can do to make Julia want to spend time with me instead of—”

  “Running down the corridor?” Kes supplied dryly.

  Digby rolled his eyes—the only adult of Lucas’s acquaintance who regularly did so. “I watched her while the two of you were dancing. Hers was the expression of a lady who is not indifferent to her husband.”

  “There are a great many flavors of ‘not indifferent.’ Which does she seem to be leaning toward?”

  “The one that says, ‘If I run from the room, by all means, follow after me.’” Digby waved him off impatiently.

  In perfect unison, Digby and Kes both said, “Go!”

  Heaven help him if they were wrong.

  He followed Julia’s path but realized upon leaving his bedchamber that he didn’t know where she had gone from there. He crossed the antechamber to her room and peered inside.

  She wasn’t there either, but he didn’t leave immediately. The room hadn’t changed since her very first day. Even the desk she’d wanted to put in the balcony room that they had moved in to this room was now gone. Surely he’d been clear that she was welcome to—ought to, in fact—personalize her bedchamber. Why hadn’t she? How could she possibly feel like this was her home if there was nothing of her in it?

  “Lucas.” That was Kes.

  “I’m in here,” he called out.

  Kes popped his head inside. “We spotted your runaway wife. She’s on the back lawn being herded by that mischievous dog of yours.”

  Bless Pooka.

  Lucas rushed out, not slowing his steps until he, too, was on the back lawn. Pooka was running literal circles around a bemused Julia. The sight brought a smile to Lucas’s face. His ever-faithful dog was helping him keep pace with his ever-elusive wife.

  He popped his forefinger and thumb in his mouth and let forth a quick whistle. Pooka changed course on the instant and ran to him, tail wagging frantically.

  Julia didn’t meet his eye, but she also didn’t resume her flight. He crossed to her, Pooka at his side.

  Lucas took her hand. “Please tell me what’s upset you.”

  “I’m not upset.”

  “Julia,” he said gently.

  She looked at him at last. Hers was the look of one drowning in worries. “I’m so overwhelmed. Everything has changed so quickly. I can’t find my footing. I can’t catch my breath. It’s too much, Lucas.”

  He slipped his hand out of hers and wrapped his arms around her. “Sweeting.”

  She leaned into his embrace, and his heart flipped over in his chest.

  “I’m exhausted, Lucas.” She moved a little in his arms, not pulling away but resting her cheek against his blue silk coat. “Everything happened without warning, without time to adjust. I feel like I’m losing every battle.”

  “You can claim victory in one extremely crucial battle,” he said.

  From within his embrace, she asked, “Which one?”

  “It has been weeks since I last powdered my hair.”

  He could feel her quiet laughter. Holding her as he was, knowing she was happy, at least for the moment, filled him with a sense of joy unlike any he’d felt before.

  “If only we can convince Grumpy Uncle and the King to forgo hair powders,” she said.

  He rubbed his hand in circles over her back, hoping the gesture would prove soothing. Could ladies even feel such things through the many layers of clothing they were required to wear? “Do you remember when you were five or six years old and you and Charlotte joined Stanley, Harriet, James, and me at the giant rock by the river, and you were so frightened by a tiny spider scurrying across the rock that you jumped into my lap with your jam-covered hands and face?”

  “We met on our rock often,” she said. “I don’t remember that specific time.”

  “Stanley was going to kill the spider, but little Harriet started crying and insisting it would be unkind to kill it. So he moved it to a nearby tree while Harriet and Charlotte cheered him on.”

  “What did you receive for your heroic efforts?” she asked.

  “Jam stains on my greatcoat.” He laughed lightly. “And the sweetest thank you I’ve ever received. You even kissed my cheek. Though I was only fourteen years old, I felt one hundred feet tall.”

  He had held her many times over the years, when she’d been afraid or excited or grieving. And now, as he was holding this grown-up version of her, he found she was soothing him. How tempting it was to simply never let her go.

  “You held me like this after Charlotte died.”

  He kissed the top of her head. “I didn’t know what else to do. Nothing I thought of would have helped.”

  “It helped,” she said.

  He leaned back a little to look down at her. “Is it helping now?”

  She looked up, offering a tentative smile. “It is.”

  “Any time you need an embrace, Julia, any time you need me to hold you, I will do so without hesitation.”

  A pleading quality entered her gaze. “Do you promise?”

  “I give you my word.”

  She rose up on her toes and pressed a kiss to his cheek, just as she had that long-ago day on their rock. This time, however, he didn’t strut about feeling proud of himself. Instead, he kept her close, his hands splaying across her back. Her breath tiptoed warm over his jaw. He turned his face the tiniest bit toward her. Mere inches separated them, less perhaps.

  But she moved again, laying her head against his chest. She could probably hear the pounding of his heart.

  “Julia,” he whispered.

  He felt her take a trembling breath.

  “Did she forgive you for your graceless attempt at the allemande?” Digby’s voice echoed down to them from the balcony.

  Julia stepped abruptly back, forcing his arms to drop away.

  “That man doesn’t realize how easily a king can be dethroned,” Lucas muttered.

  “Perhaps that should be the topic of my next course of study.”

  He offered her a smile and held his hand out to her. “I do have a text in the book room about Charles I.”

  She slipped her hand into his. “It’s worth a look.”

  Here was progress. He could almost forgive Digby’s interruption. Almost.

  They walked back to the house, hands clasped. Julia looked less burdened, though she still didn’t appear happy. Somehow, he would unravel the mystery of her happiness. He wanted her to be truly, fully joyful in their home and in their marriage. But how?

  Pooka yipped excitedly. Lucas paused and bent down to pet the poor thing.

  “You can’t go inside, you troublemaker. Mrs. Parks would have my neck.” He twitched his head in the direction of the doghouse. “Go on with you.”

  Pooka trotted toward his little house but paused and looked back.

  “Go on.”

  The stablehand stepped out in that moment. He seemed to piece the situation together quickly and whistled for Pooka, who ran over with enthusiasm.

  Lucas and Julia continued on, entering the house and moving to the staircase.

  “In addition to Charles I, what topics are you interested in?” he asked as they ascended.

  “I would enjoy another book on mathematics. And Stanley often spoke of geography beyond Europe, which my governess never permitted me to study. He also mentioned the physical sciences, which sounded intriguing. And I have read a great deal of classic literature but know there are a great many more I could add to my list. I am intrigued by history as well.”

  Hers was an extensive list of interests. “You enjoy academic pursuits even more than I realized.”

  “Does that bother you?” Her words emerged hesitantly, adding a bit of worry to her otherwise casual question.

  With her hand still in his, he led her into the book room. Words, he
had discovered, were not enough to set her many worries at ease. She needed to see, to experience proof of his reassurances. At the bookshelves, he pressed a quick, light kiss to her hand before releasing it and pulling the rolling ladder to the section he meant to select from. He climbed two rungs, high enough to search for and find a book he felt certain she would find to her liking.

  He climbed down once more and returned to where she stood. “This is a favorite of mine.” He held the book up so she could see it. “Gordon’s Geography Anatomiz’d. It explores geography throughout the globe, including a part of the world where, in the summer, the sun never sets.”

  Her eyes pulled wide, just as he’d suspected they would. “Truly?”

  He nodded. “And that is only one interesting bit of information in here.”

  She took the book from him, gaze fully on it. “This includes places outside of Europe?”

  “Your short-sighted governess might have found your wide academic interest scandalous, but I think it’s brilliant.”

  Her cheeks colored again. “I won’t tell anyone if you’d rather I didn’t.”

  “Julia, sweetheart.” He took her hand once more. “Any gentleman of sense would be proud to be married to a clever and intelligent lady. I consider myself a gentleman of sense.”

  “Well, I don’t know about that . . .” She smiled, light and genuine. Very real merriment in her expression. He worried less when her eyes danced a bit and her countenance grew airy. More than a mere easing of concerns, her cheery companionship tugged fiercely at his heart. He could easily imagine the two of them having grand adventures together when her countenance sparkled as it did then.

  Lucas quite suddenly remembered another book in his collection that he knew on the instant would be a perfect addition to her self-directed studies. He turned to the shelves to retrieve it. “Oh, Julia. I cannot believe I didn’t think of this one straight off.” He pulled it off the shelf. “I know you particularly enjoy mathematics. And you mentioned you were intrigued by the physical sciences. This one, by Sir Isaac Newton, combines the two topics.”

  She accepted the book from him, reading the title aloud. “The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy.”