She traced the rounded edge of the glass with one gloved fingertip. “It’s beautiful,” she whispered. “Like a jewel.”
He dusted the sand from his hands. “Not quite the Koh-i-Noor diamond, I’m afraid.”
“No, it isn’t,” she acknowledged, still staring at the piece of sea glass in her hand. “But it’s the loveliest thing anyone—” She broke off with a visible loss of composure.
He took an instinctive step toward her. “Helena,” he said, his voice rough with concern.
She raised her eyes to meet his. “How silly I am. I do beg your pardon.”
Justin felt a sudden rush of tenderness for her. Had she not already rebuffed him once, he would have been quite tempted to take her in his arms. As it was, he couldn’t refrain from reaching out and, very gently, brushing her cheek with his knuckles. He heard her inhale an unsteady breath.
“I’m not a pauper, Helena. I’ll be able to give you more than sea glass. But I want you to have no illusions. I’m not a wealthy man. Nor was I raised a gentleman. That I have seen something of the world and know how to go about in society, I owe to Her Majesty’s Army not to any accident of birth.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I want you to know what kind of man I am.”
“I already know what kind of man you are. Mr. Finchley told me. If I’d had any objections, I would never have written to you.”
Justin frowned. In the very near future, he intended to have a few words with Tom Finchley. “He won’t have told you everything. He’ll have left the worst to me.”
He saw the question in her eyes, the unmistakable flash of uncertainty, but she didn’t ask him to explain. She didn’t ask him anything. Her lack of curiosity puzzled him exceedingly.
“Helena,” he said, “you must understand.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does matter. The circumstances of my birth—the way in which I purchased the Abbey—even my capture in India. There’s been talk, most of it quite unpleasant. Gossips from here to Abbot’s Holcombe will be at great pains to apprise you of every sordid detail.”
She grew a little paler, but she didn’t shy away from him. Nor did she remain silent. Instead, she asked him a question. The same question he’d asked of her earlier at the King’s Arms. “Have you broken the law?”
“No.” And it was the truth, no matter what the village gossips said about how he’d acquired the Abbey.
Helena visibly swallowed. “And have you… Have you ever hurt a woman?”
His expression hardened at the very suggestion, his reply prompt and fierce. “No,” he swore to her. “Upon my honor.”
“Then I don’t care about the rest.” She began to turn away, but he cupped the side of her face with gentle force, compelling her to hold his gaze.
“And what about afterward?” he asked. “A week from now. A month from now. What happens when you realize you hate it here? What happens when you realize you hate me? Once we marry, it will be too late for you to change your mind. You will be bound to me for the rest of your life.”
“I know that. And I won’t change my mind. Only…” She clutched the piece of sea glass against the swell of her bosom. “Please, let us marry quickly.”
Justin’s heart began to pound with a dizzying strength. “How quickly?”
“As soon as possible,” she said. “I don’t want to return to London. I want to stay here. At the Abbey. I want us to marry and start our life together.”
He regarded her in silence for a moment, his large gloved hand still cradling her cheek with exquisite care. She was trembling beneath his touch, delicate little shivers that he could feel against his palm, that he could hear in her every indrawn breath.
“Please, Justin,” she whispered.
He understood then that Boothroyd was right to be concerned for his state of mind—and for the state of his bank account, too—for as he stared down at Helena Reynolds, Justin was struck with a bone-deep determination to move mountains for her. To do anything in the world to make her happy, so long as she would consent to be his and his alone.
“Very well,” he said. “If that is what you truly wish, who am I to stand in your way?”
A quick wedding was not entirely possible, as Justin explained the following morning at the inn. “You’ll have to spend another night here, I’m afraid,” he said. Helena watched as he divested himself of his hat, gloves, and rain-soaked greatcoat. His hair was wet, an errant black lock falling over his forehead. “The superintendent registrar requires we wait one full day before he’ll issue a license.”
It wasn’t the best of news. She’d already been obliged to stay one night at The King’s Arms. One long, awful night spent peering out the window of her room, waiting for someone who didn’t come. She’d hardly managed to sleep a wink.
“Though he did agree to marry us tomorrow morning any time before eleven,” Justin added. “If that will suit you.”
Helena wrapped the heavy folds of her Indian shawl more firmly about her shoulders and began to pace the length of the private parlor. No, she wanted to cry. It didn’t suit her at all. But there was no point in arguing. Justin had already made it quite clear she couldn’t stay at the Abbey before they were married. It would harm her reputation, he’d said yesterday. The villagers would talk.
“I suppose it must,” she said, “since it seems I have little choice in the matter.”
“No,” Justin acknowledged after a long silence.
She chewed the edge of her lip, lost in thought, as she walked to the end of the room and back again. When she next cast a glance at Justin, she saw he was still standing in front of the cold hearth, observing her agitated pacing with a curiously rapt expression.
He was also clad in riding dress, she realized. A dark coat, drab cloth waistcoat, and light colored breeches clinging to his long, powerful legs. Every garment bore evidence of the inclement weather, from his mud-spattered boots to his damp and slightly wilted cravat.
She felt a flicker of guilt. “Did you ride to Abbot’s Holcombe? In this weather?”
He ran a self-conscious hand over his hair. “It wasn’t raining when I left.”
“And then you rode all the way here?”
“I promised I’d call on you this morning, didn’t I?”
Helena wondered if he always kept his promises, no matter how uncomfortable or inconvenient. “You did,” she said, moving toward the antiquated bell pull that hung beside the fireplace. She gave it a decisive tug. “And my manners have been appalling.”
His brows lifted. “Have they? I hadn’t noticed.”
“I’ve left you to stand here shivering while I—” She broke off at the sound of a soft scratch at the door. It heralded the appearance of Bess, who’d grudgingly resumed her duties at the inn earlier that morning after having spent the night on a cot in Helena’s room.
“Will you be wanting your tea now, miss?” she asked.
“If you please, Bess. And do send someone in to build up the fire.”
“Yes, miss.” Bess dropped a curtsy and then withdrew, shutting the door behind her.
Helena turned her attention back to Justin. “Won’t you sit down?”
“If you will.”
“Of course.” She gestured toward two armchairs near the hearth. He nodded and, after she’d seated herself, he did the same. “Oh!” She moved to stand once more. “I should’ve had Bess take your boots. Shall I summon her back?”
“Don’t trouble yourself. I’ll only muddy them again on the journey back to the Abbey.”
She wanted to tell him it wasn’t the mud that concerned her, but the damp. She’d certainly have done so if it had been her brother who’d just tramped in with sodden boots. But Justin Thornhill wasn’t her brother. To raise such an indelicate subject as his feet—wet or otherwise—see
med positively indecent.
“I wouldn’t like you to catch a chill,” she said instead.
A smile tugged briefly at the edge of Justin’s mouth. She had a sinking feeling he knew exactly what she’d been thinking. “I’m not so fragile as all that,” he said. “If I were, I wouldn’t last long here.”
“No. I suppose not.” She managed a weak smile in return, though smiling was the last thing in the world she felt like doing at the moment.
Tomorrow, if everything went according to plan, this man—this stranger—would be her husband. For better or worse, he’d be endowed by law with all of the rights that were a man’s privilege over his wife. And he could exercise those rights in any manner he chose. He could beat her if he wished or he could confine her. He could do almost anything short of killing her and no one would say him nay.
This was marriage, as she knew it. And this was what she’d be freely consenting to at the registrar’s office in Abbot’s Holcombe.
It was impossible to think of it without an accompanying wave of panic.
She swallowed. “I do hope it will have stopped raining by the time you return to the Abbey.”
“I expect it will.”
Further conversation was interrupted by another scratch at the door. It preceded the entry of a grizzled manservant who informed them he’d come to lay the fire. While he busied himself at the hearth, coaxing a flame from the kindling, Bess arrived with a tea tray.
“Mrs. Blevins says to tell you she made the little cakes fresh this morning,” she said, placing the tray on a low table near Helena’s chair. “Will you be wanting anything else, miss?”
“No, thank you, Bess. This will do quite nicely. Please convey our appreciation to Mrs. Blevins.”
“Yes, miss.” Bess offered another stilted curtsy before taking her leave, the manservant not far behind her. The door to the private parlor shut after them with a decisive click.
Helena arranged the teacups and began to pour. As the lone female in a family of men, she’d long been accustomed to presiding over the tea tray. However, in Justin’s presence, the familiar ritual felt clumsy and new. She could sense him watching her every movement.
If he noticed her discomfiture, he gave no sign of it. But when she was handing him his teacup, her bare fingers brushed his. He looked at her then and the oddest expression crossed his face.
She stilled in her chair. “What is it?”
“Nothing.”
“I’ve amused you.”
“No, you’ve surprised me.” He lowered his teacup to his lap. “Your attentions feel…very wifely.”
Her cheeks warmed. “Surely not. I only want you to be comfortable. It’s the least I can do after you’ve ridden out in this weather on my account.”
“Not only yours. I’m to be married tomorrow, too, if you’ll remember.”
“Yes.” She prepared her own cup of tea, adding in a liberal amount of sugar. Jenny had always sworn by heavily sugared tea in times of crisis. It was all Helena could remember drinking in the weeks following the news of her brother’s disappearance. “But I’m the one who insisted on a hasty wedding. I daresay you would’ve preferred to wait for the banns to be called.”
“Three weeks? You credit me with a great deal of patience.”
“Not patience, no, but… Don’t you wish to marry in a church?”
He helped himself to a cake from the tray. “Do I strike you as a particularly pious man?”
“One needn’t be pious to marry in a church. Merely traditional.”
“I’m neither. Which is why a registrar’s office will suit me very well.”
She took a small sip of her tea. The scalding, sugary liquid burned a path down her throat. It warmed her all over, helping to soothe her frazzled nerves as reliably as it always did. “Even if it’s in Abbott’s Holcombe?”
“There’s not much choice. Not if we want to wed quickly.” He looked down into his teacup for a moment, a scowl briefly darkening his brow. “And it’s not all bad, really. There’s a fine hotel there and several very decent shops. You might want to visit a few of them while we’re in town.”
“Oh no. That won’t be necessary. I meant it yesterday when I said I wouldn’t be expensive.”
“And I meant it when I said you’d have whatever you require.”
She fingered the soft edge of her Indian shawl. It pooled around her in her chair, still half-draped over her arms. “I really don’t need anything. I brought enough with me for now. After we’re married, I can send for the rest of my things.”
“The rest of your things?” Justin looked at her over the edge of his teacup. “How much more is there?”
“A great deal more, stored away in London. It was far too much to bring with me on the train. There was scarcely any room in my carpetbag as it was. And I haven’t a maid to sponge and press my dresses. Everything is in a dreadful state.” Her words tumbled out in an anxious rush. She couldn’t seem to stop them. “I wanted to look my best, but I traveled by myself and I didn’t like to draw attention—”
“Helena,” he interrupted. “Helena, it’s all right.”
“I’m babbling, aren’t I?” She looked at him, feeling suddenly helpless. “I fear I’m overwhelmed.”
“I know. I’ll sort it.”
“You can’t.”
He gave her a quick, wry smile. “Try me.”
Helena ached to confide in him. To tell him everything. To rest all of her troubles squarely on his broad shoulders. He was willing to bear them, she could tell. He was gruff and forbidding, but he was kind and gentle, too. She saw that now quite clearly. It pricked her conscience that she must deceive him, but she’d fallen victim to seemingly sympathetic gentlemen too many times this past year to trust her instincts now. For all that Justin Thornhill appeared genuinely concerned, she knew in her heart she couldn’t fully trust him until they were married.
Which was perfectly fine, she told herself. In less than a day, they’d be man and wife. There would be plenty of time to confide in him then. A lifetime, in fact. Why, she might even grow to like him.
Though whether or not he would like her when this was all over was another question entirely.
She took another sip of her tea. “It isn’t any one thing. It’s feelings. Nerves.”
“All quite natural, I believe.”
Her brows lifted. “Are you nervous?”
Justin regarded her in silence for a moment. The sensitivity that had shone in his eyes only moments before slowly gave way to something hard and almost predatory. “I’m anxious. I don’t think I’ll be completely easy until you’re mine.”
Helena’s stomach performed a disconcerting somersault. She took another hasty swallow of her tea, her eyes still locked with his. “Nor I. Until you’re mine, that is.”
To her astonishment, a dull red flush appeared on Justin’s neck, visible just above the line of his cravat. He cleared his throat. “Have I told you— That is, I know I haven’t, but I had meant to— Your gown and your…” He motioned to her shawl. “Is that from India?”
“It is. It was a gift from my brother.”
“Yes, well, it looks very pretty,” he said. “You look very pretty.”
She lowered her teacup back to its saucer and returned them both to the tea tray. Her heart was thumping with uncommon force. “Thank you. But you needn’t feel compelled to say such things.”
“I don’t.”
“We’ve already agreed romance isn’t necessary in an arrangement such as ours.”
“What has romance to do with anything?”
Helena could think of no acceptable answer, so instead addressed herself to the tea tray. She refilled each of their cups and then offered Justin another cake. She chose one for herself, too, and then spent some little time cutting it—quite unnecessarily—into even quarters.<
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In the back of her mind, Jenny’s stern voice admonished her for being so shy and awkward. It wasn’t enough just to feed a guest, the voice said. One must engage them in polite conversation as well. Helena knew this. She’d spent years playing hostess, first for her father and then for her brother and uncle. All that was needed was an innocuous remark about the weather. Anything would do at this point.
“I thought it was rather cold last night,” she said finally.
Justin’s dark brows knit with immediate concern. “You weren’t warm enough?”
“Not at first, no. But later Mrs. Blevins brought up an extra blanket for me.” She paused to stir more sugar into her tea. “She said that nights at Greyfriar’s Abbey will be even colder.”
“You won’t need extra blankets to keep you warm at the Abbey.”
“Oh no,” she agreed, remembering Mr. Boothroyd’s concern about excess expenses. “Not at all. I’m perfectly capable of making do.”
Justin’s mouth tilted up in a bemused half smile. She worried he would say something more about economy and was relieved when he turned the subject. “I trust Bess stayed with you last night.”
“She did.” Helena spread a teaspoonful of Mrs. Blevins’s strawberry preserves onto a slice of cake. “Will you engage her as my companion for tonight as well?”
He nodded. “Do you mind it very much?”
“Not particularly,” she said, adding, “Bess has been telling me all about the history of the Abbey.”
Justin grimaced. “Which version of history would that be? The one with the evil monk? Or the one with the ghost and the buried treasure?”
“The one with the mad monk and the papists’ gold.”
“Good God. Is he mad now?”
“Bess says so.”
“And papists too? It grows more gothic by the second.”
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