“And?” she pressed, ignoring his melancholy and hating the thought of waiting two weeks but more than prepared to do it for such a concession.
He shrugged. “You do realise you’re setting foot on the road to perdition? And not blindly, either. The path is lined with sodding great painted signs proclaiming, turn back before it’s too late, abandon all hope ye who enter here, and the end is nigh!”
Eliza couldn’t help it; she giggled. He grunted, but she just wanted to hug him. He was so busy trying to save her from him and only succeeded in making her want him more. He was so serious and grave and utterly adorable. She wondered, when was the last time he’d had fun? Perhaps all the circus performances had been fun, but she suspected that Nic had worked hard at it and taken that too seriously to find any fun in it too. She longed to ask him, but knew now was not the time.
“You’ll do it, then?” he asked, wary now.
Eliza nodded. “I don’t want to, and I shall miss you dreadfully, but if you promise, upon your honour that you will keep your word and spend time with me…”
He stared at the ground, arms crossed, kicking at a small stone with the toe of his boot. “You are assuming a great deal to imagine I have any honour.”
“Nonsense,” Eliza said briskly. “Don’t try to sell me Banbury stories, Nic. If you had no honour, you’d not be trying so hard to stay away from me. You’d have swept me up and taken my dowry and everything else that comes from marrying the daughter of a duke. You’re not doing anything of the kind, though, are you?”
He gave a mirthless laugh. “No, I’m not an utter bastard, just a real one.”
“Don’t say that. I don’t like that word.”
“Well, you’d best get used to it. You’ll be hearing a great deal of it if you get your way in this.”
“Nic,” Eliza said with a sigh, giving into the desire to move closer to him, reaching for him, but he took a step back.
“Two weeks, Eliza. I ought to say six months, you know. I would if I had an ounce of decency, but….”
Eliza hung onto that but with everything she had.
“But I’m too damn selfish to wait a moment longer. I want you too much and you might actually come to your senses if I give you any more time.”
She smiled at him, delighted and heartened by the admission.
“Yes, you smile, my little lamb,” he said, though his expression was softer now, the wry amusement in his eyes genuine. “All the way into the lion’s den.”
Eliza did smile, her heart light and happy, and quite comfortable knowing that he’d got it quite the wrong way about. She was the lioness, and he had no idea what she was capable of.
Come to that, neither did she, but she was quite prepared to find out.
Chapter 8
Dear Em,
I am sorry that I did not write sooner but sending me daily letters reproaching me for not doing so does not make me reply any quicker. I do have important things to do, like schoolwork.
No, I have not read The Ghosts of Castle Madruzzo. It sounds silly. There are no such things as ghosts for one. We do have a copy of the book, however, though no one seems to know where it has come from. No one is admitting to having bought it, anyway.
―Excerpt of a letter from Lord Frederick Adolphus (younger son of the Duke and Duchess of Bedwin) to his cousin, Miss Emmeline Knight (Daughter of Lady Helena and Mr Gabriel Knight).
3rd April 1839, Beverwyck.
“You’re very good to spend so much time helping me with this,” Eliza said, putting the papers they’d been studying back into the folder.
Figuring out the sums involved in creating her school and keeping it running had been driving her to distraction until Louis César had surprised her by offering his help. Vivien too had agreed to come along, partly to chaperone, partly because she had the mind of a rapier and was excellent at plotting. Between them, they had taken great strides.
Louis César shrugged and accepted the paper that Vivien had been studying as she gave it back to him, handing it to Eliza to add to the rest.
“The pleasure is mine, I assure you. I enjoy playing with numbers and I have never lifted a finger for any charity but my own before now. I admit, it gives me a rather self-righteous sense of well-being that I had not anticipated. Added to that is the delight of returning home and driving Nicolas quite out of his mind with jealousy at having spent an entire afternoon in your company.”
“The poor dear,” Vivien said, giving a wicked chuckle that rather suggested she was thrilled by this news.
Eliza could hardly pretend she wasn’t thrilled either.
“Is he really jealous?” she asked sceptically, wondering if Louis was just being kind and putting her mind at ease.
He snorted. “He’s been like a bear with a thorn in its paw all week. I promise you, outside the two of you, the only person more eager for this ridiculous two-week period to be over is me. He will interrogate me the moment I step inside the door. How was Eliza? Is she well? Is she looking after herself? Did you overtire her? Is she still having headaches? Has Doctor Archambeau arrived yet?”
Eliza laughed with delight at the gruff manner Louis adopted to mimic Nic until he mentioned the doctor. That made her frown.
“Why would he think Doctor Archambeau was coming back? Does he know him?”
Louis César hesitated. “Ah.”
Eliza stared at him very hard, and Louis met her eyes, unblinking. She let out a ragged breath.
“Nic sent for him when I was ill. Papa said the doctor had refused to come but changed his mind because… because someone was blackmailing him or threatening him.”
Eliza’s heart was thudding, and it was hard to breathe.
“Eliza,” Louis said, sounding wretched. “He did it because he was going out of his mind with worry for you. I don’t know what he had to do to persuade the doctor to come, but… I do know it will have cost him dearly.”
“Cost him how?”
Louis shrugged. “I know only one man who could have arranged such a thing, who might have brought pressure to bear on the doctor with such speed. In fact, he is a friend of ours, but… he’s still not someone it is comfortable to owe a debt to.”
“But he did it for me?” Eliza said, her heart aching with a dizzying mix of gratitude, love and frustration that Nic had put himself in such a position for her.
“Can you imagine his feelings, Eliza? I did not realise at the time, but he was at his wits’ end. Nic wanted to protect you, to be with you, and he could not even ask how you fared. The fool did not even tell me of his feelings, but I know now that those months were the worst of his life. He was terrified of losing you.”
“He was?” Her voice quavered with emotion, and Vivien reached across the table to take her hand.
“He was,” Louis assured her.
“Yet he won’t speak to me,” Eliza retorted. “He insists on keeping us apart.”
Louis gave her a crooked smile. “My brother is a contrary devil, as you will discover. He will do anything, sacrifice anything, for those he loves… whether or not you want him to. It is in his nature to protect those he cares for, no matter the cost to himself. I am quite certain he still views me as a skinny little boy.”
“For those he l-loves,” Eliza repeated, still reeling after hearing that. “You think he loves me?”
Louis pursed his lips. “I think I have said too much and, if Nic finds out, he will kill me. I cannot put words in my brother’s mouth, but… I have never seen him behave like this before. I know you are important to him, more important than he cares to admit, but if you want to know more, it must come from him, not me.”
“I understand,” Eliza said, though she wished she could speak to Nic now, this moment. “I only wish I could ask him. Having to wait another whole week….”
She broke off, too frustrated to find the words.
Louis returned a wry smile. “Oh, I know, my dear Elizabeth. Believe me, I know, and I give you my word, I will do w
hat I can to shorten it.”
Nic snatched up the newspaper on the table and flung himself into the nearest chair when he heard Louis come in. It was lowering enough to have spent the best part of the afternoon pacing with impatience for his brother to come home. He was damned if he’d let Louis know he’d been doing it.
“Good afternoon, Nic.”
“Oh, you’re home, are you?” Nic said, striving for nonchalance from behind the racing times.
“That’s upside down,” Louis observed with amusement.
Nic jolted and made himself actually look at the newspaper in his hands, which was not upside down. But he hadn’t known that, and now Louis knew it too. His brother gave him a self-satisfied smile. Nic growled and flung the paper aside.
“Well?” he demanded tersely. There was little point in dissembling now. “How is she? Is she well? How are her plans progressing?”
“Eliza was in very good spirits, apart from complaining vociferously that she still has another interminable week to wait before she sees you again.”
“She said that?” Nic asked, unable to keep the pleased note from his voice.
Louis sighed. “She will not change her mind, Nic. Why must you persist in staying away from her?”
Nic shrugged. “I must give her the chance to come to her senses.”
“She seemed perfectly rational to me.”
“Louis, for once stop seeing me as some kind of blasted saviour, and actually think about what I have to offer. I have no name, no place in society, my past is full of things that would bring her shame if they ever came to light, I’m probably too old for her….”
“Oh, what nonsense,” Louis said, waving all this away as if it were nothing. “Our father recognised you as his son. Yes, illegitimate, but that still makes a difference. You are the son of a nobleman, the past is dead and gone, and eleven years her senior does not put you in your dotage. What about the Comte d’Orsay, that blasted dandy everyone seems so in love with, though I’m damned if I see the appeal? He married a girl of fifteen when he was twenty-six. That is something to revile. You are a man in your prime and she is hardly a child of fifteen, but three and twenty, so stop being so damned foolish.”
Nic was silent for a long time and Louis let him be, giving him time to think.
“What if I courted her, married her and… and she regretted it? What if she regretted her decision and was ashamed of me, Louis? I don’t think I could bear that. I really don’t.”
“Then she would be the greatest fool that ever lived,” Louis said, his voice harsh with such anger that Nic had to smile. Louis would defend him with his last breath, no matter if he deserved it or not. “But Eliza is not a fool. She is a woman with a strong sense of right and wrong. I like and admire her, and I do not think she would pursue you this way if she wasn’t very certain. Nonetheless, you do not have to marry her at once, Nic. Take your time. She wishes to be courted, so court her. See if there is a future for you both with your own eyes before you run away with your noble intentions.”
“And if her father finds out?”
Louis shrugged. “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
“Or he’ll throw me off the bridge.”
“A distinct possibility,” Louis replied with a crooked grin. “I have heard the duke is most protective of his daughters.”
Nic groaned and put his head in his hands.
“By the way, Eliza is interviewing staff for her charity school this week.”
He sat up at once, regarding Louis. “Are you helping her?”
“Sadly, no. A prior engagement,” Louis said with a sigh. “Though I would be happier if I were there. I believe her friend Miss Vivien Anson and her maid will accompany her, though one does wonder at what kind of people might turn up for such a position. A gently bred young lady with only a friend and maid for chaperone… It is a little concerning.”
“What?” Nic said, outraged. “She can’t go interviewing people with just those two. What kind of positions is she advertising? Who knows what strange types might show up? Doesn’t her father or brother take the slightest interest—”
“I believe she has taken some pains to ensure her father and brother know as little about her efforts as possible. She wants to do this by herself.”
“And get herself robbed or attacked or….”
“Nic, she is interviewing schoolteachers, cleaners and cooks. I am concerned too, but I think you are getting a little overexcited.”
“Do you remember the cleaner in that bloody awful school three streets away from Franconi’s?”
Louis paled noticeably. “Well. Yes, all right, point taken. Though I don’t know what you mean to do about it. I cannot go, and I can tell you now what Eliza will say if you try to stop her.”
“Where is she holding the interview and when?”
“At the school. Wednesday morning. Eight sharp.”
“Fine,” Nic groused. “I’ll go.”
“Oh, but Nic, your two weeks do not end until—”
“Shut up, Louis.”
Louis smirked.
Eliza looked up at the property that was to be her new school and her mouth fell open.
“Goodness,” Martha said.
“Goodness, indeed,” Eliza replied, as something warm and happy unfurled in her chest.
The building was perfect for her school. All it had needed was some hard work. It needed a great deal of cleaning and painting and some repairs to the windows and doors, and a small portion of the roof that had clearly been leaking. Though she had been enchanted by the greenery about the building, much of it had been neglected and was a tangle of nettles and brambles… or at least, it had been. The weeds were gone, the grass neatly cut. The windows and doors had been repaired and freshly painted, and upon going inside she found it neat and clean as a new pin, the smell of fresh paint heavy on the air, and the spoiled ceiling where the roof had leaked newly plastered. Her hand moved to her throat. It felt suddenly thick, emotion rising there and taking hold. Nic had done this. First, he had made up an agreement for a paltry sum for the lease of the school and now….
“Good heavens. I thought you said there was a lot of work to be done?” said Vivien from over her shoulder. Eliza turned to see her friend looking about her with interest.
“Mr Demarteau did it. He’s had it cleaned and repaired and painted and…” Eliza’s voice quavered, and she laughed. She had been determined to do this herself, to arrange all the work, and Nic, the highhanded devil had done it for her. She ought to be dreadfully cross with him but… but he’d been thinking of her, wishing to help her, and she could not find it in her to resent him for it.
“And that man is yours for the taking,” Vivien said with a sigh. “You lucky girl.”
“But, my lady,” Martha said, anxiety in his eyes. “He’s got a terrible reputation, and you know his grace won’t approve. No one knows a thing about him, nor his brother, for all he claims to be a count, but Mr Demarteau is not even a gentleman.”
“Do you have proof he is not the Comte de Villen, Martha? Or is that just malicious gossip? And neither is Uncle Gabriel a gentleman, if you think his birth is the only thing to recommend him,” Eliza said sharply. “Do you think my uncle is not a gentleman, Martha?”
Martha flushed scarlet and Eliza relented. That had been unfair of her, but her temper, usually so tightly reigned in, was enjoying its freedom. She would need to watch that.
“I’m sorry, Martha. Gabriel has had to fight for his place in society, that is true, but he married my aunt for love and their marriage is one of the happiest I have known. It is true that it is not always easy for them and it has caused them both difficulties at times, but nothing to make either of them regret their alliance. They are devoted to each other, as you well know. Papa would not like my association with Mr Demarteau, I know that, but that is because he does not know him. When he does….”
She trailed off as heavy footsteps were heard along the path outside,
and for some strange reason Eliza’s heart picked up speed. Why she could not fathom, except that some sixth sense had told her what she could see now with her own eyes.
“Nic,” she said, beaming at him. “I did not expect to see you here.”
“Someone had to stop you getting yourself into trouble,” he grumbled, taking off his hat as he came in.
Eliza drank in the sight of him. His dark coat fitted him beautifully, showing off broad shoulders and chest, powerful arms and a narrow waist. His trousers clung to muscular thighs, and she felt a swell of longing to be alone with him. So many men used padding in their clothes to fill them properly, but there was no padding here. Eliza knew that. She remembered the feel of his naked chest under her cheek too vividly to ever forget it.
“Your brother told you I was interviewing prospective candidates today?” she guessed, making a mental note to give Louis her undying thanks for getting Nic here. She made another for Vivien, as the dear, obliging creature was towing her protesting maid farther into the school to give them some privacy.
“He did, and what were you thinking, Eliza? Your friend and a maid? You did not think to bring a footman at least?” he demanded, all stiff and irritated, quite obviously vexed with her.
Eliza bristled. “Of course I did! If you’d taken more notice, you’d probably have seen him on the way in. He is remaining outside and vetting everyone. If they do not appear to be respectable, he will not allow them entry. I do not foresee any problems.”
Nic let out a breath. “Well, that is something, I suppose.”
“Nic, I am not such a fool as all that. Must I keep reminding you of this fact?”
He frowned at her and then shook his head. “No. I know very well you are not a fool and I apologise for thinking it. It’s only….”
Eliza smiled and moved closer, daring to lay her hand on his sleeve. “It is only that you worry for me, and that makes you cross and unreasonable.”
He grunted but did not deny it, and Eliza gazed up at him.
“Stop that,” he grumbled. “I won’t kiss you.”
Dare to be Brazen (Daring Daughters Book 2) Page 10