plans and the revival of a proper life. Ruby and Miriam and St Clair. Home. The word filled her with longing, even as the amber-fired eyes of Asher Wellingham danced before her. Beguiling. Intriguing. Forbidden.
Shaking her head, she sat down in the chair by the fire and watched the shadows of flame fill the room.
Asher Wellingham came to Haversham House early the next morning and hard on the heels of a note he had sent. And he came alone.
The drawing room where Miriam and Emerald sat to receive him had been hastily tidied and what little furniture they had in the house had been brought down to fill out the spaces left from an auction they had held almost two months prior in York. Quietly. Secretly. The recompense they had gathered from the exercise had reflected the clandestine nature of the adventure. Still, money could be translated into food and beggars could not be choosers. At least they still had the silver tea service, placed now on a side table.
This morning Emerald wore her second-best gown of light blue velvet with lace trimming around the neckline and an extra petticoat sewn into the base of the wide double skirt for length. On her head she wore a matching mobcap, the scratchy lace making a red rash on the soft underside of her throat. If she had had her potions from home, she might have been able to ease the itchiness. The names on the bottles in the London apothecaries were indecipherable.
Indecipherable!
Everything here seemed that way. Medicines. Places. The weather. People. The Duke of Carisbrook.
‘Ladies.’ This morning his voice was underlaid with both tiredness and purpose. ‘I have come to you this morning on a rather delicate manner.’ He cleared his throat and Emerald caught a hint in his eyes of what she could only determine as uncertainty, though the impression was fleeting before the more familiar and implacable urbanity returned. ‘I was wondering whether it would be possible to speak with the young man who resides here with you.’
‘Young man?’ Miriam’s response wavered slightly.
‘The young man who helped my sister yesterday evening. My servant followed him when he did not stay to be thanked, and it was to this house that he returned. This morning at around the hour of five after sending his carriage on.’
Miriam looked so flabbergasted that Emerald felt bound to break across her silence. ‘Perhaps he means Liam, Aunt Miriam?’ she prompted and hoped that her aunt might take the hint, though as blankness and silence lengthened she realised she would have to brazen this out by herself. ‘Yes, it must be Liam that you speak of. My cousin. He was here for two days only and left this morning for the country, but I shall tell him that you came to relay your thanks. Now,’ she added as if the whole subject was decidedly passé and she wanted no more discussion, ‘would you like tea?’
The Duke’s returning glance was so cold that Emerald felt her heart tremble, and his voice when he spoke was fine edged with anger.
‘My sister said Mr Kingston had an unusual accent, Lady Emma. Would this accent be the same one as your own?’
‘It is, your Grace.’ She did not elaborate, but as he swiped his hair back off his face she saw that the two last fingers on his right hand were missing and the stumps where they once had been were criss-crossed in scar tissue.
He has become a ruthless warrior because of the actions of my family.
She made herself stop. She could not feel sorry for a man who had stalked her father and run him through with the sharp edge of his sword. More than once, it was said. And more than what was warranted.
Warranted?
Therein lay the rub. She had heard the story of Asher Wellingham’s hatred for her father from every camp except his own. And if life had taught her anything it was the fact that things were seldom black and white. Aye, grey came in many shades. Her father’s dreams. Her mother’s disappearance. Her own childhood lost between the scramble for easy gold and the rum-soaked taverns of Kingston Town.
Lord, she had to be careful. She had to appear exactly who it was she purported to be or else he would know her. Expose her. Consign Ruby to the care of the nuns in the Hill Street Convent for ever. Ruby. Her heart twisted as she remembered the last sight of her little half-sister being bundled away by the dour and formidable Sister Margaret. How long had it been now? Over a hundred days. The time of passage to England and the weeks waiting for Carisbrook to appear. Without the map she could provide neither home nor sustenance, the squalor of the Kingston Town port streets no place for a fey and frightened child of eight.
Accordingly she schooled impatience and, catching the rough gist of her aunt’s conversation, observed the man opposite carefully.
This morning he was dressed in fawn trousers and a brown jacket, the cravat matching his white shirt loosely tied in a casual style she had not seen before. With one long leg crossed over the other, he gave the impression of a man well used to power and unquestioned authority and his confidence was contagious after years of living with a father who had little of either.
Damn it, but she must not think like this either. Beau’s choices had been foisted on him by his own self-doubt and excessive introspection. If at times he had made decisions that were suspect, he had still tried through it all to provide a home for her and Ruby. A home Asher Wellingham had shattered when he returned to the Caribbean bent on revenge.
Revenge.
His revenge and now her revenge? And what difference lay between them as the thin veneer of right and wrong tumbled under the greater pressure of need? She shook her head and poured the tea. When he stood to take the cup from her, their fingers accidentally met, and everything slowed.
Time.
Breath.
Fear.
The beat of her heart narrowed as she felt the warmth of his skin. Reaching out, she grabbed the arm of the sofa. To stop herself falling. Into him. For ever.
Whatever was wrong with her? She was acting like the simpering misses so prevalent in London and she did not even recognise these constant, damning blushes that seemed to consume her from head to toe. Her resolve firmed.
‘Excuse me,’ she said when she saw his pupils widen. ‘The accident at the ball yesterday has left me rather poorly…’ Leaving the explanation in mid-air she noticed that he had placed his cup on the side table as if making ready to catch her again.
Poorly?
When in her life had she ever used such a word? In the fading light of day she suddenly saw herself as he would see her. Vulnerable. Delicate. Feminine. She almost had to repress a smile. So easy to make men believe exactly what you would want them to. So simple to become a person of such little account. Lifting a fan from the table next to her, she was pleased for the cooling breeze it engendered and used the moment to take stock.
Asher Wellingham was older and harder now and the icy brittleness that coated his eyes was disconcerting. Here, in the blandness of a London drawing room, she could feel a barely concealed danger, a thread of the warrior only lightly clothed beneath his well-pressed jacket and pantaloons. Untamed. Ready to pounce should she put a foot wrong. Oh, God, she blanched, she had already put a foot wrong,
