Terri Brisbin (23 page)

“So was it Achilles and Hector who kept you from your work today?” she asked. “Will they be the scapegoats when your paper isn’t ready to be delivered?”

“No, when it comes to interruptions, those old warriors can’t hold a candle—or a sword—to you.” His smile faded, and he gently settled his hands on her shoulders. “I wished to see you, Cordelia, and I didn’t want to wait until this evening. We must talk, you and I, before too much more—”

“Beg pardon, m’lord, but I must pass,” Ralph said, trying to squeeze around them to the door. He was pale, his face gleaming with sweat, and his eyes had a strange, unfocused desperation. “I’m not feeling m’self, and I need—I need—”

But before Ralph could finish, his legs folded beneath him, and he slumped forward. Ross grabbed him around the waist, half dragging Ralph to one of the ballroom’s benches.

“What is wrong, Cordelia?” Alfred demanded, leaning over the other actor with concern. “What has happened to him?”

Swiftly she loosened Ralph’s collar. “I don’t know, Father. He said he wasn’t feeling himself and then he seemed to fold up like this. Last night you didn’t go—”

“He’s not had a drop, not in my company.” Frowning, Alfred laid his hand on Ralph’s forehead. “He’s on fire with fever, the poor fellow.”

“There’s a good physician in the next town,” Ross said. “I’ll send a footman for Dr. Graham, so that Mr. Carter here can have the best care.”

“Thank you, no, my lord.” Alfred rose, folding his arms
over his chest. “No physicians. Your generosity is well intended, but we’ll see to Ralph ourselves.”

Holding Ralph’s hand, Cordelia quickly looked up. “But Father, surely a surgeon would better know—”

“We always look after our own, daughter,” he said. “Just because we’re actors doesn’t mean we take charity from fine folk like His Lordship.”

Ralph groaned, turning his head from side and side, as Gwen hurried up with a cup of water.

“See now, he’s better already,” Alfred said. “We’ll take him back to the gatehouse to rest and mend, my lord, and I promise you he’ll be right as rain in time for the wedding play.”

Ross frowned and Cordelia rose swiftly to stand beside him. “I do care more for the man’s well-being than the play, Lyon, as difficult as that may be for you to accept,” Ross said.

At first Alfred didn’t answer, holding the silence, before he bowed with a rolling flourish of his hand.

“I am a man of great resiliency, my lord,” he said, pointedly including Cordelia. “I can accept anything that needs accepting. But unlike others who court misfortune and sorrow, my lord, I have the sense to keep to my station in life, and I thank the Maker I can tell the difference.”

C
ordelia pulled her chair a little closer to Ralph’s bed, striving to make out his whisper of a voice. “Your throat is no better?”

“Worse,” he croaked, pushing himself higher on the pillow to slice his finger across his throat. “Like hell.”

“I am most sorry to hear it.” She sighed, sitting back in her chair with her hands in her lap. Alfred had insisted that Ralph would be recovered in time for the performance, continuing with rehearsals for the supporting cast and the fiddler, making the final placements of the scenery and properties, even arranging the audience’s chairs in neat rows in the ballroom.

But he’d also chosen to ignore Ralph’s condition, blithely leaving Cordelia behind at the gatehouse to watch over the ailing actor, and she’d sent for the village apothecary, who had diagnosed a putrid quinsy, serious but not fatal. Cordelia had watched with growing concern as the apothecary had bled Ralph, and for another shilling, he’d left a foul-smelling concoction of mallows as a purge that had left poor Ralph even weaker than before.

Now the play was scheduled to begin in less than twenty hours, the bridegroom hero was still too ill to stand or speak,
and once again Alfred had gone off with Gwen and Tom and a few of the others to “feed their muse” at the Tawny Buck.

“Sorry,” Ralph whispered, his face twisted with misery. “Sorry.”

“It’s not your fault, Ralph,” she said, forcing a smile as she patted his hand. “Besides, the Lyon Company has never before canceled a performance for any reason, and I’ve no intention of changing that now.”

He arched his brows in exaggerated surprise. “How?”

“We’ll manage somehow, Ralph,” she said, determined to be cheerful, if not realistic, for his sake. “We always do.”

But it was past time for someone to make a responsible decision about the fate of
The Triumph of Love,
and whether Cordelia wanted to or not, that someone was going to have to be her.

“What have you heard about my wedding play, Ross?” Emma demanded, twisting her pearl bracelet around and around her wrist with growing anxiety. “I know you’ve heard something. Am I to have my
Triumph of Love
or not?”

Ross leaned closer to the looking glass, wincing as he ran his forefinger along the inside of his shirt collar. He knew he wasn’t supposed to meddle with the black silk neck cloth once his manservant had tied it in the precise knot for the evening, but the blasted thing was near choking him.

“As far as I know the play will be shown as planned, Emma,” he said. “I’ve no reason to believe otherwise.”

“But you saw what happened yesterday to the actor playing my Weldon!” Emma was pacing now, back and forth across the carpet in Ross’s bedchamber. “He was horribly ill. By now he might even have died, for all anyone is telling me!”

“I’m sure we would know if he’d died, Emma,” Ross said, still trying to gain an extra half inch in his collar. “No doubt he is perfectly fine.”

“But he didn’t come to rehearse his parts in the ballroom today with the others!” she cried, her voice rising to a plaintive wail. “I went, and I saw with my own eyes. Neither he nor Cordelia were there, and they play us!”

“Hysterics won’t help anything, Emma.” Of course he’d noticed, too, that Cordelia hadn’t come to the hall today, just as she hadn’t come to his library last night. Here his house was full to bursting with family and guests, his only sister was going to be married, and yet all he could think of was why in blazes Cordelia Lyon had vanished just as he’d been ready to ask her to stay. “Perhaps they are simply resting their voices to make a good showing tomorrow.”

“Oh, Ross, I feel so sure I’m to be disappointed!” She came to stand beside him, clutching at his sleeve as she made an especially tragic face at their joint reflection in the glass. “A wedding should be the most perfect, most glorious moment in a lady’s life, and now mine is to be spoiled because I won’t have my wedding play!”

“Hush, Emma, please,” he said, trying to sound stern but comforting at the same time. “You’re only going to make your eyes red and your nose look like a turnip, and when you go down to dinner, our guests will wonder if you’re having second thoughts about marrying poor Weldon.”

“My nose does not look like a turnip, Ross, and of course I wouldn’t have second thoughts about my dearest Weldon!” She snuffled, rolling her eyes for extra emphasis. “It’s you who promised me
The Triumph of Love,
as my special wedding present, and now everything is going to be spoiled!”

He took her by the arms, turning her away from the looking glass to make her concentrate on him instead.

“Listen to me, Emma. Everything is not going to be spoiled. Everything is going to be
fine
.”

She gave a slurpy sob, dabbing at the corners of her eyes with her lace-trimmed handkerchief. “Then you won’t break
your promise to me, Ross, will you? You’ll make sure I’ll have my
Triumph?
”

He nodded, thinking of how relieved he’d be when this wedding was done. “I’ve never broken a promise to you yet, have I?”

She shook her head, the tiny white flowers looped into her hair bobbing. “So you will find Cordelia and ask her what is happening?”

That was harder; that he couldn’t guarantee, even to Emma.

“I’ll do my best, lamb,” he said, his voice gruff. “That’s all any man can do. I promise I’ll do my best.”

And prayed that his best would be enough for Cordelia, as well.

Cordelia walked on the grass along the side of the drive as yet another coach full of well-dressed people passed by, the coaches’ wheels kicking little white stones around her feet. She had not seen the hall like this before, with so many candles lit inside that it seemed to glow before her like a giant lantern. The windows had been thrown open to the warm spring evening, and through them came scattered laughter and conversation and the sounds of a small orchestra. She remembered Lady Emma speaking of a great dinner to be given as part of the wedding celebrations, but Cordelia hadn’t imagined it to be quite as great as this.

Coming closer to the front door, she hung back in shadows, painfully aware of her plain yellow linen gown. She had to speak to Ross, but she’d no place among these grand folk walking up the polished steps with jewels glittering around their throats and wrists. Likely the footman would turn her away if she tried, anyway. But the door to Ross’s library—that was
her
way, the one she’d shared each night with him.

She hurried around the back of the house, along the paths that led to the garden outside the library. But tonight those
windows were dark, with Ross playing host to his guests elsewhere in the house instead of working.

She climbed up the steps anyway, pressing against the glass to peek inside. There was his desk, as disheveled as ever, the narwhal’s horn, the tank for making waves and the cushioned bench where they’d sat and talked and kissed by the hour: it all looked like a waxwork setting now, uninhabited and frozen in time the way her memories of it were destined to be. Leaving Ross in two days would have been painful enough, but after she told him tonight that the company must cancel the play—why, likely he’d be so angry at her for disappointing his sister that he wouldn’t even say goodbye.

She forced herself to turn away, twisting her hands forlornly in the ends of her shawl. If she went to the kitchen door, she might be able to coax one of the maids or footmen to take a note to Ross, asking him to meet her. Even so, he might not be willing to—

“Cordelia?” The glass door squeaked open behind her, and before she’d even turned all the way around Ross had gathered her into his arms, holding her so tightly she wondered if he’d ever let her go. “Ah, lass, I came here only to fetch a book to give to another gentleman at breakfast, but I never dreamed I’d find you here, too!”

“Oh, Ross, Ross,” she whispered against his shoulder, her happiness tempered by what she must do now. “Ross, we must speak. I—I—oh, I have such bad news to tell you!”

“You do?” He set her down, his face turning somber as he went to light the candles on his desk. He was impossibly handsome in his dark evening clothes, his waistcoat embroidered with silver and gold vines. “Then come, sit, and tell me your worst.”

She took the chair across from him instead of at his side, needing the desk between them. “It
is
the worst. Ralph Carter has a putrid quinsy of the throat, and though the apothecary bled him, he is too sick to speak and too weak to stand, and—and—” She gulped. She’d put so much into this fool
ish play, and she hated to have it end like this. “Because of that, I—that is, the Lyon Company—regrets that I—we must cancel our performance of
The Triumph of Love
.”

She held her breath, waiting for him to respond as Alfred would have in the same situation: the shouting of oaths, slamming of fists and hurling of crockery.

But Ross wasn’t Alfred, and all he did was draw his brows together, more to show he was considering rather than being angry. “You have no understudy for the hero’s part?”

“Father doesn’t believe in them,” she said. “He says we’re too small a company to carry any idle players. Everyone pulls their own weight. It’s always worked before.”

He tapped his fingertips on the edge of the desk, the shadows from the single candle dancing over his face. “You all could simply have packed everything into your wagon and vanished in the night. Isn’t that the way with some acting companies?”

“But not ours!” She gasped with indignation. “You know me better than that, Ross! I would never treat anyone so shamefully, and especially not you!”

“Instead, you have been honest with me.” His smile was sudden, as brilliant as the candle’s flame. “Even when I neither expected nor deserved it.”

She raised her chin, still on her guard. “You should know that I cannot help it. It is how I am. But oh, Ross, I will be so sorry to disappoint Lady Emma!”

“Perhaps you won’t.” His smile twisted wryly to one side. “Can I be honest with you, too, sweetheart? I know all of Mr. Carter’s lines from watching you rehearse. Do you trust me to say them in his place, and save my sister’s wedding play?”

She stared at him, stunned. “You are an earl, a gentleman of learning and reputation. Why would you venture onto a stage with a pack of common actors to risk your good name before your guests? Why, Ross?
Why?
”

“Because I can.” His shrug was sheepish, disarming. “Be
cause I don’t wish my sister to be distraught, indulged little creature that she is. But if I am being most honest, Cordelia Lyon, I am willing to make a complete ass of myself because I want to impress you.”

She lifted her hand to her mouth in disbelief. “You would do that for my sake?” she asked, her voice squeaking upward. “For
me?
”

“For God’s sake, sweetheart, don’t cry.” He hurried around the desk to take her into his arms “Save the tears for when you hear my lines.”

She took the handkerchief he offered with a snuffle of emotion. “That you would do this for me—oh, Ross, I cannot believe it!”

He chuckled, pulling her closer against his chest. “‘My heart only such endless devotion knows, / Such passion! Such yearning! Such fervency that glows! / Oh, dearest lady, the queen of my heart / That rules my every passion even when we’re apart.’”

“Now you
will
make me cry,” she said, not bothering to wipe away her tears as she turned her face up to his. It didn’t matter that his delivery was as unemotional and dry as a mathematical equation. He’d done this for her, and, oh, how empty her life was going to be without him in it! “Using my own words to win me, and without any mistakes, either, like poor Ralph makes—that isn’t fair, Ross, not at all.”

“You told me Shakespeare wasn’t supposed to be fair,” he said, his voice low and gruff. “I suppose that must hold for your verses, too.”

“A pox on my verses, Ross,” she whispered fiercely, curling her hands around the back of his neck. “Kiss me instead.”

At once his mouth found hers, as hungry as her own. His kiss was hard and demanding, as if he, too, sensed how little time was left for them together, and she gave herself freely to him, arching her body up against his. She wanted to feel him, she wanted more, and with shaking fingers, she shoved his
coat from his shoulders and down his arms, and as soon as she could work the buttons on his waistcoat free, that, too, followed to the floor.

Still without breaking their kiss, she tugged his shirt free of his trousers, sliding her hands up inside the billowing white linen to find the warm skin inside. She’d already learned he’d more of a sailor’s body than a scholar’s, and she loved exploring the muscles of his back, the taut planes and valleys that showed the strength beneath the skin. She slid her hands lower along his spine, into the back waistband of his breeches, and he groaned, then jerked his shirt over his head.

“Who’s not playing fair now?” he whispered hoarsely as he feathered kisses along her throat. With one arm he swept the top of his desk clear, papers drifting to the floor, and lifted her to perch on the edge.

He kissed her again, his lips teasing along her throat as he eased the small sleeves of her gown from her shoulders, sliding them down her arms until the soft muslin slipped from her breasts. She gasped with surprise, then gasped again with pleasure as he kissed her nipples, teasing the soft flesh into hard peaks with his tongue.

“That is so—so
wicked,
Ross,” she breathed. She closed her eyes and let her head drop back, the better to feel the sensation. “What you do—what you do.”

“I thought you’d left me, Cordelia,” he said, his voice a rough, urgent growl as he eased her knees apart to press closer between them. “I thought you’d gone forever.”

“Oh, no, Ross,” she whispered, running her hands through the curling dark hair on his chest. “I would never leave you like that, with no word of farewell!”

“Then don’t.” His hands were warm on the bare skin of her thighs as he pushed her skirts high, higher, far above her garters and stockings, far above where they’d ever gone before. “Stay here, Cordelia, with me in this house. Stay.”