Blackhaven Brides (Books 5–8)

by Lancaster, Mary

  Fifteen minutes later, she jumped as his hand reached across the desk and closed on her wrist. She stopped midsentence, staring at him. Then she heard what he had, Serena and Tamar laughing together as they approached the gallery. For the space of only one heartbeat, she let herself wallow in his touch, and then she drew her hand free and shoved the book in a drawer.

  Hastily, she dragged a newspaper toward her instead.

  “Come through in a minute or two,” Gervaise murmured, and strolled out of the room.

  She swallowed back a surge of hysterical laughter. Could anyone but Dawn make clandestine assignations with a man like Lord Braithwaite solely for reading lessons?

  *

  “The children dine, too?” Miss Farnborough said in wonder. “I thought they would eat in the schoolroom. How kind you are to them.”

  “It is never too early for them to learn table manners,” the countess declared, although it crossed Dawn’s mind that she simply wished to spend time with her younger children whom she had not seen for three weeks. “Of course, we would not have them at a formal dinner party, but I count you quite one of the family.”

  How is she one of the family? Dawn wondered. She was never here before yesterday. Of course, Lady Braithwaite wished to make her one of the family by marrying her to the earl. And she had placed them together at the table. Gervaise did not appear to mind. He was his usual, civil, entertaining, attentive self.

  Dawn, in peculiar pain, tried to ignore the sight by joining in the younger girls’ lively chatter. But some she could not help overhearing.

  “Do you care for the theatre, my lord?” Miss Farnborough asked him.

  “I’m unfashionable enough to prefer a well-performed play over the racket of the audience.”

  Miss Farnborough laughed breathlessly with shy delight. “Why, I thought I was the only one who wished for peace to enjoy the play. Her ladyship was telling me you have a theater in Blackhaven.”

  “Indeed, we do. We were privileged to see its first pantomime at Christmas which was one of the funniest I have seen anywhere. But I believe there is a new play on this week.”

  “Hamlet,” pronounced the countess, who had clearly been eavesdropping, too. “I believe we should go tomorrow evening.”

  *

  By the time she reached the theatre in Blackhaven the following evening, Dawn had the odd sensation of drifting in the wind, being pushed this way and that by unseen hands. It was if she no longer had any control over her life, which both bewildered her and angered her, though she had no idea where to direct her fury.

  She traveled to the theatre in a carriage with the Tamars, while Gervaise went in the first carriage with his mother and Miss Farnborough. She had barely seen Gervaise all day. He had been away from the castle until dinner time. And when she had gone down to the library at the usual hour, she had found not only Gervaise but Miss Farnborough, with their heads together at his desk.

  The sight was like a blow in her stomach. For an instant, she could not breathe. Then, she would simply have crept out again, except Gervaise looked up. Even the rueful smile he cast her did little to alleviate the pain. She had so wanted–neededthis time alone with him. Yet her anger was as much with herself as with Miss Farnborough, for she hated the demeaning jealousy that clawed at her.

  As though she had merely dropped in to collect a book, she walked over to the nearest bookcase and plucked a volume off the shelf at random.

  “Ah, Miss Conway,” Miss Farnborough said with her sweet smile. “You, too, have found this delightful room.”

  Dawn smiled back, rage in her heart. “Of course. But I am surprised to see you here. Are you not afraid of being thought bookish?”

  Miss Farnborough was not so innocent. She caught the taunt at once, for her eyes narrowed infinitesimally before the smile came back. “Oh no. We are merely talking of the latest news.”

  “Of course you are,” Dawn murmured. “I look forward to hearing about it at dinner.” And she had walked out again.

  At the theatre, the good-natured crowd waiting to be allowed in, parted for the Tamars. People called greetings in the foyer, though she barely heard them. Tamar ushered them upstairs and to the left, past several curtained-off boxes to one close to the end of the passage. There the countess and Miss Farnborough occupied the central position overlooking the stage. A great number of the audience gazed at the Braithwaite box, many bowing or waving.

  To Dawn, this was worse than entering the ball. Here, she was trapped in an enclosed space, being gawped at by strangers and surrounded by people. Not just in this box and in those to either side, but there was a mass of people in the pit below, and she could hear, almost feel, movement in the box above, which made her feel quite unsafe.

  Gervaise stood as they entered and ushered Serena and Dawn to seats at the front of the box. Here, at least, she could breathe. She tried to smile and calm herself.

  “What is it?” Gervaise murmured.

  “Nothing. I’m fine.” She cast him a quick smile over her shoulder. “I’m better now.”

  “It can get very hot in here,” Gervaise said, indicating the massive chandelier and the vast array of candles around the theatre. “Tell me if you need to go out for air.”

  “Don’t be silly,” she said. “I shall just go.”

  Since he and Tamar settled in chairs a little behind the ladies, escaping without his notice would have proved difficult. But fortunately, when the play began, she forgot about everyone else in the theatre and focused solely on the tragedy unfolding on the stage.

  She was furious when an interval interrupted events, and only just managed to bite her tongue before demanding to know what the theatre meant by it. She was not very used to theatres. When she had been before, she had sat with her brother and sister in the pit, and the show had been largely dancing. The idea of the theatre as a party, a place to meet friends and gossip, was entirely new to her.

  The real world intruded once more, including her sense of uneasy captivity. Worse, the Braithwaite’s’ box immediately filled with people eager to pay their respects to the countess and to meet her new guest, Miss Farnborough. In the crush, Dawn was surprised to find people also sought her out, including Captain Hanson and Bernard Muir. But she found it difficult to hold the thread of a conversation and hoped her nodding and smiling would suffice, as it often did with men. She could no longer see Gervaise, for the men standing in front of her. Her palms were sweating in a most unladylike fashion. She had never been so glad of gloves.

  A voice broke through the wall of noise, oddly shocking. “Miss Conway, what a pleasure to find you still in Blackhaven.”

  Still slightly dazed, she gazed up at Julius Gardyn. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up in fresh alarm. She did not care for his smile, which did not touch his eyes. Whatever he said, he took no pleasure in finding her there.

  “How do you do, Mr. Gardyn,” she managed. She even offered him two fingers in the languid manner that made the Braithwaite girls giggle, and he duly bowed over them. “Are you enjoying the play?”

  “Honestly? Not much. I’m here mainly for my mother’s sake, and to renew old acquaintances. And you, Miss Conway? What do you think of Blackhaven?”

  “It is a charming town,” she replied, “and everyone I have met is most kind.”

  “And curious.” The smile drifted back to his lips. “They are always curious about newcomers. How long have you been here?”

  “A little over a fortnight,”

  “And did you come far to visit your cousins?” He made no pretense of subtlety any more.

  Dawn smiled. “Quite far.”

  His eyes narrowed. Their usual coolness vanished, allowing her a glimpse of temper, before Gervaise stepped around Bernard. “Good evening, Gardyn.”

  “Braithwaite.”

  “I’m afraid my mother has spotted you and you are summoned to pay your respects,” Gervaise said with easy humor.

  Gardyn inclined his head. “It was alw
ays my intention, until I was distracted by your beautiful cousin.”

  As he moved away toward the countess, Dawn released a breath that shuddered.

  A quick frown tugged at the earl’s brow. “Are you quite well, Cousin? Perhaps you would care to take a turn in the corridor?”

  Dawn leapt at the chance, rising and taking his arm without a word.

  “Oh, thank God,” she uttered as they stepped into the cooler passage. Further along, a couple of gentlemen lounged against the wall, talking. Otherwise, the passage was blessedly empty.

  “You don’t like to be so enclosed,” he observed.

  “I feel trapped,” she admitted. “Hemmed in from all directions, even above, with no space to breathe.”

  “Gardyn did not upset you?”

  “No, though I think he wished to. He wants to know where I came from.”

  “I’d love to be able to tell him, but until we have proof, I don’t want him finding it first and destroying it.”

  “You believe he would do such a thing?”

  Gervaise shrugged. “Easily.” They had walked as far as the staircase. Two young gentlemen were sauntering up from the ground floor. Gervaise turned upward and began to climb. “It’s quieter here and we can skulk until the interval is over, if it helps.”

  “I feel better already. You must think me a very lame creature.”

  He turned his startled gaze upon her. “Lame? Trust me, it is not what comes to mind.” He paused at the turning of the empty staircase, from where they were invisible from the floors above and below. A faint smile dawned on his lips. “I have barely seen you these last two days. I have missed you.”

  “I’m surprised you had the time,” she managed.

  He picked her hand off his arm and raised it to his lips. “I had lots of time for that. Just none in which to actually see you.”

  She felt the heat of his lips through her gloves, and her breath caught. Then he turned her hand and pressed a kiss into her palm. The shock sizzled up her arm and flared through her whole body.

  “Shall we make an assignation?” he asked softly.

  She swallowed. “Why?”

  He bent his head, his gaze dropping to her lips. “Why do you think?”

  “I think you once said you would not touch someone under your protection.”

  His lips stretched into a smile. They were so close she could taste his breath. “But I’ve already broken that rule with you. Now, I might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.” And his mouth covered hers in a long hungry kiss that left her weak at the knees.

  “First light,” he whispered against her lips. “In the orchard.”

  “I thought I was not allowed out alone,” she said perversely.

  “Minx. I’ll allow you the few yards between the castle and the orchard. In fact, I insist upon it, or I’ll come and fetch you.”

  Her body burned at the touch of his. “I think I would like that. Except your mother would throw me out.”

  “No,” he said, kissing her again. “She will not.”

  As voices and footsteps below them grew louder, he pulled reluctantly away and placed her hand more decorously on his sleeve. She felt lighter, happier than she had since the countess’s arrival. He still cared for her. Miss Farnborough had not eclipsed her.

  “The interval is ending,” he murmured, descending the stairs. “At the next, I think we should call on Mrs. Gardyn.”

  “Very well.” Grateful for anything that would keep her in his company and take her out of the box, she jumped at the chance.

  The last of the visitors was leaving the box as they returned. Gervaise handed her back into her chair and settled in his own. But their absence had not gone unnoticed. As the actors came back onto the stage, Dawn felt hostile eyes on her face. She refused to turn and look, but she knew they belonged to Miss Farnborough and the countess. They didn’t bother her. Now that she had spoken to him, now that he had kissed her again, she knew she had won.

  She no longer felt quite so trapped in the box. On the other hand, she could not quite lose herself in the play as before. Instead, all her thoughts, all her senses, seemed to be focused on Gervaise. Even several feet away, she was as aware of him as if he had sat right next to her.

  At the next interval, he came at once to escort her to Mrs. Gardyn, before the inevitable influx of visitors to the countess’s box took place.

  “How do you know where she is?” Dawn murmured as they walked along the corridor, past the staircase and along the next passage.

  “I saw them both when they arrived.”

  They were not the first visitors to the Gardyn box. Another elderly lady with a bored escort, who might have been her grandson, was there already, and Julius hovered close by. Inevitably, he saw them at once.

  “Mama, we are honored,” he said loudly. “Look who has come to pay his respects.”

  The old lady turned at once with her sweet smile. “Why, my lord, how kind of you,” she began, and then, as her gaze flickered over Dawn, she broke off abruptly, her eyes widening with more horror than startlement. “You!” she gasped. “But you’re dead!”

  A chill swept through Dawn, driving the blood from her face. Gervaise’s hand covered hers in quick comfort.

  “How can she be dead, Mama,” Julius said reasonably.

  “Indeed, ma’am,” Dawn said recovering somewhat. “We met at the ball.”

  Mrs. Gardyn reached for her with a watery smile. “Oh, forgive a silly old woman! Of course we did. My mind lives in the past, alas. When you reach my age, there have been so many deaths to grieve, Come, sit by me. Julius will introduce everyone to you and then, my lord, you must tell me how your mother does. Perhaps I could drive up and call on her one day.”

  The brief visit passed in small talk, but even through her renewed happiness, Dawn found the atmosphere uneasy. She was glad to escape and stroll back to their own box on the earl’s arm.

  But the strange, cold dizziness that had almost overcome her in the Gardyns’ box hung around her until it was time to leave. She looked forward to the fresh air, with but it seemed there was another ordeal to overcome, for as they spilled out of their own box, they merely added to the squeeze of people already in the corridor. The countess, on Tamar’s arm, was guaranteed freedom from jostling, but everyone else took their chances, including the earl and the delicate Miss Farnborough clinging to his arm.

  Beside Dawn, Serena smiled ruefully. “Horrible crush, isn’t it?”

  “We could just step in here and wait for them all to pass,” Dawn suggested, stepping smartly into an open, vacant box.

  But Serena seized her arm and dragged her on. “Bad idea. Mama particularly dislikes being kept waiting.”

  “But won’t we have to wait for the carriages in any case?”

  “No, you can wager your life ours will be first, holding up everyone else’s!”

  Dawn gave in and tried to breathe normally as she flowed with the crowd, like a seething river, along the passage to the stairs and downward. She felt a weird sense of floating. Mrs. Gardyn’s words repeated inside her head, But you’re dead! You’re dead…

  She could no longer see the countess in front of her, though Gervaise and Miss Farnborough were suddenly much closer than she remembered. He looked over his shoulder at her, frowning. She glanced over hers, searching for the countess, but she found only Julius Gardyn, his arm protectively around his frail mother. But you’re dead!

  She faced forward again, trying to control the dizziness with deep breaths, and then a sudden blow in the small of her back pitched her forward into the floating sea of people.

  Voices exclaimed and screamed, but they seemed to be very away and muffled. There was an instant of resignation, when she recognized the inevitability of this moment. She had always known that tonight, in this building, she would be suffocated under the press of people.

  And then, her instinct to fight back slammed back into her. Gasping for air, she flung out her arms to grasp onto anyt
hing, anyone she could use to drag herself back up. But arms already held her, sweeping her up against a hard chest that was blessedly familiar. She clung to Gervaise.

  “I have you,” he whispered. “I have you.” His voice changed abruptly. “Make way there, make way! The lady has fallen and needs help. Stand aside, if you please.”

  Miraculously, there was suddenly space for him to sail down the rest of the stairs with her in his arms, and they brushed against no one.

  At the foot of the stairs, she glimpsed the countess and Miss Farnborough, looking furious. Gervaise strode past them and deposited her on a sofa in the foyer. Only then, in safety, did she properly realize what had happened. Although she had felt very strange and dizzy, she had not fallen. She had been pushed.

  She clutched at the earl’s hands. “Gervaise,” she whispered.

  “I know,” he breathed. “We’ll talk later.” He took the smelling salts thrust at him by his mother and waved them under her nose.

  She turned her head away. “Thank you. I’m fine now. I’m fine.”

  “You poor thing,” Miss Farnborough cooed. “Did you miss your footing?”

  “I’m not sure what happened,” she replied vaguely. “It was so quick and I’ve been feeling dizzy all evening. I’m so sorry, but I’m better now, and quite able to leave with you.”

  “Good,” Lady Braithwaite pronounced. “Then let us go. The carriages are waiting.”

  She couldn’t have known that. She just assumed it. For some reason, that made Dawn want to laugh, but since it was probably hysteria, she swallowed it down and rose somewhat shakily to her feet.

  “Braithwaite,” the countess demanded.

  He hesitated for an instant, as if about to insist on staying with Dawn. She already knew he was not afraid of his formidable parent. But he did recognize the sort of talk such an insistence would cause. People were already staring at them from all directions.

  He rose and offered his arm to his mother. “Take care of her,” he said curtly to Serena and Tamar, and walked forward with Miss Farnborough on his other arm.