Messalina bent her head to the catalogue again. “The library is over a thousand books and includes an illuminated Irish psalter, a bound quarto of Shakespeare’s plays, and the complete works of Euripides in custom red leather worked in gold.” She took a deep, ecstatic breath. “Oh, Gideon, I want everything in this library.”
He nodded. “Then we’ll buy the entire library.”
“But your idea.” She looked at him curiously. “I’ve never seen you read a book.”
“I don’t. Books have never been…” He shook his head. “I may not need them, but I know you do. And I like when you read to me.”
Messalina was silent as the auctioneer declared the winning bidder of the ugly table and the crowd seemed to all start gossiping together. There was a feeling of excitement and anticipation growing in the room.
He turned back to Messalina to find an expression on her face he could not interpret.
She opened her mouth, hesitated, then said, “I’m happy to read to you. I rather enjoy it, in fact.”
“As do I,” he replied, perhaps too intently. “You have a lovely voice.”
He watched a small smile curl her lips before he returned his gaze to the auctioneer.
* * *
Messalina reverently cradled the illuminated Irish psalter in her hands as their carriage started forward an hour later. Gideon had arranged to have the crates of books delivered to Whispers, but she couldn’t help but claim an illustrated atlas and the psalter at once.
The psalter was a tiny thing, barely as wide as her palm, but inside, the pages glowed in jewel colors. Tiny, meticulous illustrations, many picked out in gold, headed every book within. She’d never seen anything so beautiful.
And Gideon had bought it for her.
She looked up at him in wonder. He sat across from her, watching her with a faint smile curling his lips. Usually his smiles were cynical, but this one was entirely forthright. How had Gideon known she would want—would love—this little book? He’d tried to win her with flowers only days ago—a ridiculous misstep—and now he gave her something utterly perfect.
An entire library.
The gesture made her feel shaky somehow. As if she were uncertainly balanced between hope and despair. Because if he knew that the library was the perfect gift for her, did that mean he might actually care about what she wanted?
That he might care for her?
It frightened her—the possibility of hope—because it also brought the possibility of pain again. She’d yearned so helplessly these last few days since the ball and his betrayal of her trust. If she once again believed him, if she gave in to the tiptoeing return of desire, she would be devastated if he betrayed her again.
She wasn’t sure she could believe her own senses.
She realized that he was watching her now with a little wrinkle between his winged brows.
She cleared her throat. “Thank you.”
“I’m glad you liked my gift,” he said carefully.
She tilted her head, trying to read him and failing. “Are you?”
“Yes.” His jaw tightened, but he replied evenly enough. “I did it for you, after all.”
“Why?” she asked, and held her breath.
He tilted his head back against the seat, those clever eyes pinning her. “I want you to be happy, Messalina. Simply that.”
The words lit a small flame within her breast, flickering uncertainly.
He looked weary all of a sudden, his eyes closing as she stared at him, and she worried that the trip had been too much too soon.
The carriage jolted to a halt, nearly sending her to the floor.
“Damn,” Gideon exclaimed, reaching across the carriage to catch her arm and steady her. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” she said breathlessly. “And more importantly, the psalter is as well.”
He cocked an eyebrow pointedly. “It’s not the psalter I worry about.”
She bit back a delighted curl of her lips at his words, like a veritable ninny right out of the schoolroom. Her heart seemed unable to remain indifferent to his pull, no matter what her mind told her.
He leaned forward and wrenched open the window, muttering, “What’s the delay?”
As soon as he opened the window, Messalina could hear the shouts and the sound of tramping feet, and she felt a shiver go down her spine. “What is it?”
The voice of their driver rose above the clamor. “’Anging, guv. Can’t get around the crowd. We’ll ’ave to wait them out.”
Gideon made a small sound.
Messalina’s gaze darted to his face.
He was white.
She remembered the last time they’d come across a hanging march. “Gideon?”
He sat again heavily, his fists clenched in his lap, his eyes closed. He didn’t seem to have heard her.
“Gideon?” she asked again tentatively.
He shook his head. “I can’t…”
She was alarmed now and rose to cross the carriage and sit beside him, her psalter forgotten. “Are you well?”
He made a noise that was not at all a laugh. “No.”
“It’s the hanging, isn’t it?” she said softly. “Can I help?”
He shook his head and opened his eyes, his expression bleak. “You must think me mad.”
“Not at all,” she murmured, laying her hand on his shoulder. “Will you tell me why it hurts you so much?”
He stared at his fists. “Eddie.”
Who—? For a moment her mind was blank as she tried to remember where she’d heard the name before.
And then she recalled. Eddie had been Gideon’s younger brother. “What about him?”
Gideon said stonily, as if he didn’t feel at all, “They hanged him.”
“What?” She simply couldn’t comprehend. “Who hanged him? Why?”
He finally looked at her, and she was shocked to see his black eyes dulled. “Eddie was hanged for theft. He was eleven.”
“But…” That couldn’t be, surely? She’d never heard of a child so young being hanged, let alone for theft. “I don’t understand.”
He sighed. “Eddie picked pockets. I didn’t like it—far too dangerous—but when we were hungry I looked the other way. And we were very hungry that winter when Eddie was eleven and I thirteen.”
She didn’t like this story—she already knew the ending, and it was horrific. But she couldn’t let him suffer alone. “What happened?”
Gideon’s face twisted and he bared his teeth. “It was an aristocrat, an old doddering man in St Giles looking for a whore most like. Why else would he be walking the streets there? Eddie took his watch—his gold watch, silly fool. The lord’s footman caught my brother. Eddie was hauled before the court, tried, and hanged.”
Messalina gasped, appalled. That a boy should be executed for a man’s crime was disgusting. She only vaguely knew the law, but this didn’t seem at all right.
She whispered, “I thought that the magistrates would commute the sentence if the condemned was so young?”
“Oh, they would in the normal way of things.” Gideon’s voice was low and hateful. Had she once thought he had no feelings? “I found that out later. But the lord—a man named Cross—insisted on the sentence. He said that it was an affront to his dignity as a peer for his watch to be stolen. That Eddie must pay the price of his crime. It was only proper.”
He snarled the last word, his expression transfigured into a sneering mask.
What could she say in the face of such injustice? Of Gideon’s rage and grief? “I’m—I’m sorry.” The words felt like a dainty handkerchief pressed to the bloody stump of a severed limb. Inadequate. Trite.
Useless.
Gideon didn’t seem to hear her anyway. “I never saw him while he was imprisoned. I hadn’t the coin to bribe the guards. He was in there alone and afraid, without food or blanket, and I could do nothing. Nothing.”
His hands clenched and then opened, empty.
The horror
washed over her. She couldn’t comprehend. For a little boy…To be completely helpless…She shook her head, grasping for some light. Anything. “Your mother?”
The look he gave her was bleak. “Mam was soused much of the time by then. She was dead drunk, unable to form words even, when he was hanged.” He glanced at the window and murmured, almost as if to himself, “When he was hanged…”
She couldn’t ask. Didn’t want to know or imagine. But she couldn’t help running her hand from his shoulder down to his fingers. Taking his warm palm in hers and squeezing.
He inhaled, his hand tightening around hers. “I went, of course. I couldn’t do else. I didn’t want him to die—” He choked on the word and she knew he meant alone.
A child dying alone.
He closed his eyes. “I followed the procession. By the time we came to Tyburn there were too many for me to make my way to the front. I stood on a barrel to see my brother hanged.”
He stopped again and swallowed.
Messalina felt tears pricking her eyes. She couldn’t imagine. A boy watching his only brother hanged.
“I think he saw me. Maybe.” He shook his head. “I might’ve been wrong, he was so far away. But I could see him. His face was pale. So very white…”
Gideon looked at her, and she saw that his eyes were damp, though no tears had fallen. His face was harsh, his features drawn, the silver scar standing out on his cheek, and she realized that anyone who didn’t know him would mistake his grief for something else. Would think him remote and ruthless and awful when he wasn’t.
She would’ve thought that a week ago.
“Eddie was younger than me,” he said softly, his voice so low she could hardly make out the words. “It was my fault he was hanged. I should’ve protected my brother. I should’ve taught him not to steal.”
The carriage lurched into motion. The procession must’ve moved on.
But Messalina hardly noticed, she was so stunned. It was as if a blinding light had shone into her mind. She remembered Gideon shouting at a weeping Sam that first day of their marriage. What had seemed like barbaric savagery was now flipped over, the other side entirely different. Gideon had been making sure Sam—a young boy like his brother—would never steal again. Because it was a hanging offense.
He hadn’t been cruel for cruelty’s sake.
He’d been protecting the boy as he hadn’t been able to protect Eddie.
“Oh, Gideon,” she said, feeling sad. “It was never your fault that they hanged Eddie.”
“Wasn’t it?” He looked at her fiercely. “I was the only one to watch over him. I was the only one he turned to.” He fumbled suddenly with his neckcloth, jerking it so hard she thought he would strangle himself. “Do you know what he did, the last time I saw him? Before he went out pickpocketing and was caught?”
He yanked open his shirt, wrenching a couple of buttons off, sending them pinging to the floor.
He ignored the buttons to hold up the worn farthing he wore always around his neck. “He gave me this—to buy a bit of bread for our supper. I had a half dozen pennies but I took his farthing anyway—and when he went to prison he had nothing.”
The helpless rage, the overwhelming grief she saw in his eyes staggered her. Made her wonder how she’d ever thought him without emotion.
Messalina wrapped her arms around him. “You did your best. You watched over Eddie as well as you could.” He shook his head violently, but she insisted because she knew now. “You loved your brother, and that farthing is the proof.”
Chapter Eighteen
The days passed one after another with very little difference until one evening the fox returned home with a limp and a pair of red shoes in his paws.
“For you,” he said to Bet.
She took the shoes and tried them on, finding that they fit perfectly. “Why have you given me these?”
“To remember me by,” he replied mockingly.…
—From Bet and the Fox
Messalina lounged in the sitting room late that night after dinner, clad in a comfortable wrap in preparation for bed. Lucretia was beside her, nibbling on a lemon tart. Her sister appeared to have Hicks entirely in her thrall. Gideon had disappeared as soon as dinner was done.
Messalina had meant to examine the new psalter on her lap, but she kept remembering that afternoon instead. How Gideon had been so hesitant when he’d taken her to the auction. His satisfaction when he realized she loved his gift.
And the rage and grief he’d let spill afterward when he told her about Eddie. He’d never have spoken so frankly, without scheme or guile, when they’d first married. She knew that.
She felt honored that he’d revealed his hurt to her.
Tiny, sharp teeth nibbled at her fingers, dangling from the side of the settee. Messalina glanced down and saw that Daisy had decided that her fingers were a late-night snack.
“Ow,” she said in a scolding tone of voice. “No biting, please.”
“I’m sorry, ma’am.” Sam had been lying on his stomach by the fireplace, carefully turning the pages of the illustrated atlas she’d brought back. He jumped up and ran to the settee.
“You needn’t worry, Sam,” Messalina said. “Even the most well-behaved puppies like to nibble.” She set the psalter down on the settee beside her and lifted Daisy onto her lap. She glanced at Sam. “That is, I hope Daisy has been well-behaved?”
The boy suddenly looked guilty. “’E may’ve found one of Mr. ’Icks’s shoes.”
Lucretia glanced up. “Did Daisy eat the shoe?”
“Oh no, not eat.” Sam stared down at his toes. “Although he did chew them up a bit.”
Lucretia widened her eyes with what seemed like alarm. “We must get Mr. Hicks new shoes at once. He’s been coming along so nicely with his roasts.”
The boy looked worried.
“It’s all right,” Messalina reassured him. “I’m sure it wasn’t your fault Daisy found the shoes.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Sam didn’t seem nearly as convinced of his own innocence.
Messalina suppressed a smile and petted Daisy, who had curled up on her lap. She watched as Sam returned to the atlas, and a sudden thought struck. “Sam?”
The boy lifted his head from the book. “Ma’am?”
“If you could do any work in the world when you grow up, what would you like to be?”
Lucretia raised her eyebrows. “What—?”
“Shh,” Messalina murmured.
Sam gave the question serious thought, a heavy frown wrinkling his forehead, and then his brow cleared and he said, “A schoolmaster.”
Messalina blinked, surprised. “Really? Why is that?”
“Well,” the boy replied. “Schoolmasters don’t live in St Giles. An’ they’re clever-like. Real clever. They read books.”
It seemed a little unlikely that there were no schoolmasters living in St Giles, but Messalina could concede the other points. “I see.”
Sam nodded and returned to the atlas.
Daisy stood at that point and yawned, and Messalina was reminded of how tiny a puppy’s bladder truly was. “Can you take Daisy to the garden, Sam?”
“Yes, ma’am.” The boy scurried over with an important air and scooped the dog up.
After the boy and dog left the room, Messalina turned back to Lucretia and saw that she was bent over the psalter.
“What is this, do you suppose?” Lucretia murmured, pointing to a drawing on the vellum page.
Messalina peered down at the tiny purple monster. “It’s a whale, I think.”
Lucretia seemed doubtful. “Is that what a whale looks like? I didn’t know they had whiskers.”
“I’m not entirely sure,” Messalina said, taking the book to study the creature. Could it be a cat with a fish tail?
“Hmm,” Lucretia murmured, and reached for another tart. “I never would have guessed that Gideon would be so generous. Your library must’ve cost a pretty penny.”
“There’s much abo
ut Gideon I certainly would never have guessed,” Messalina said slowly. She remembered her husband’s face as he’d talked about his dead brother. When she’d arrived in London she’d thought him a wicked man without feelings.
She’d been wrong.
“Certainly he doesn’t seem the literary type,” Lucretia mused.
“He’s not. But he knows I am.” Messalina turned to her with enthusiasm. “You should’ve seen the auction house, Lucretia! Filled with all sorts of things, many quite, quite ugly, but so fascinating. And the bidding—I had no idea how ruthless it could be. It was rather exciting toward the end. I was on the edge of my seat, hoping if Gideon could outbid…” She trailed away as she noticed Lucretia’s thoughtful face. “What?”
“Oh, nothing,” her sister replied, clearly lying. “It’s just that you seem so happy.”
“I am,” Messalina said, feeling a tad defensive.
“Yet I thought we still plan to leave?” Lucretia questioned softly.
Messalina bit her lip, looking down at the psalter, remembering Gideon’s face as he’d watched her open it for the first time.
Did she really want to leave anymore?
Because if Gideon was capable of love—even brotherly love—wasn’t there a chance for happiness?
“I don’t know,” Messalina whispered.
Lucretia nodded, dusting crumbs from the tarts off her hands. “That’s what I thought. I’ll have to find someplace to hide, I think. Somewhere Uncle Augustus can’t find me. Perhaps at Kester’s northern manor? No”—she held up a hand to halt Messalina speaking—“I’m not berating you. I want your happiness. I just believe you ought to really think on it. Do you truly wish to leave Gideon?” Lucretia gave her a lopsided smile as she stood. “Good night, Sister dear.”
Messalina watched her go and then slumped back on the settee. She knew what she wanted to do—she wanted to stay here with Gideon. She just wasn’t sure if it was the morally correct move. After all, she was thinking only of her happiness. What if Julian continued to hate Gideon? What if her brother hurt him? And what if Lucretia had to be sent away to be hidden? It wasn’t fair to Lucretia, for her to sacrifice her own happiness for Messalina’s.
When a Rogue Meets His Match Page 28