The Revenge of Lord Eberlin (26 page)

Lily seemed to hesitate before stepping forward, but she walked to the lodge without sparing him a glance. He watched her go inside with the woman, and the door close behind them.

Then he glanced around, and realized that everyone else had gone about their day, and he was utterly alone.

P
reparations for the First Winter’s Night Ball kept the staff of Tiber Park in a state of chaotic activity for the next several days. Tobin had made it clear that work must be completed on the new courtyard, and that renovations to the common areas of the house must be finished as well. Dozens of men had been put to work, and the grounds were beginning to look immaculate and the house pristine.

To prepare the ballroom, Tobin had engaged the services of a gentleman from London who dressed theater stages for a living. Mr. Kissler had brought a crew of men and materials down from London to create a winter garden, a scene that would rival any decoration Carlton House had ever seen. Tobin had never seen the ballroom of Carlton House, or even knew what sort of decorations it had had, other than what he’d read in the
Morning Times.
But he’d heard of the Prince of Wales’s penchant for scenery, and he was determined
to have a ballroom every bit as grand as that at Carlton House.

Mr. Kissler completely transformed the ballroom. Soft white down covered the ceiling to look like clouds, and from those clouds hung dozens upon dozens of crystal stars that twinkled in the light from the three candelabras. Small pine trees had been arranged in huge clay pots, their limbs decorated with snow and crystal icicles. On the balcony, where the orchestra would sit, mountains had been made of wooden frames and cloth, which would hide the musicians but not impede their music. To Tobin’s guests, it would seem as if the waltz was being played from the French Alps.

On the night of the ball, ice sculptures would grace either end of the ballroom, and a large circular fountain of libations would flow all night. A temporary dining room had been erected in the courtyard, where a full-course meal would be served at midnight. It would be one of the most splendid evenings the residents of Hadley Green had ever experienced.

Tobin was also preparing for the arrival of Charity and Catherine. Charity hadn’t wanted to come, but he had implored her. He certainly understood her misgivings; she held no fond memories of Hadley Green either and, unlike him, she had no desire for revenge. Frankly, Tobin didn’t know
what
she desired any longer. She kept her wishes to herself and said only that she wanted to be left alone with her daughter,
rambling about his Mayfair town home and avoiding society.

Normally Tobin would do whatever his sister wished, but this time he needed her. He needed a familiar face, fearing what could happen if a spell descended on him. He would need his sister to help him unknot his body and his mind if they became taut.

“But what of Catherine?” Charity had asked when Tobin had told her he wanted her at Tiber Park.

“You cannot keep the child tucked away as if she were some precious Oriental flower,” he’d said gently. “She needs society.”

“She does not need Hadley Green society,” Charity had sniffed.

Tobin had not been able to argue with her feelings, but he’d nevertheless prevailed, and Charity was due to arrive the following morning.

His sister’s arrival would leave only one thing undone, Tobin thought that afternoon as he neared the end of his hedgerow. There was one thing that weighed heavily on his mind, and bloody hell if he hadn’t been cursed with troubling thoughts—inexplicably
tender
thoughts—about Lily Boudine.

He could even point to the day he’d first had them. It was the day she’d come riding into the forest with that absurdly flintless gun, as if she were the sheriff. It was the moment she had been standing on the steps of Ashwood, gripping her riding crop as if her life had depended on it, determined to pick up the gauntlet.
He had greatly admired her pluck and cunning for doing precisely the opposite of what he’d expected.

The feeling he’d experienced that day had been nothing more than a noticeable tic—but it had rooted.

Tobin swung his ax and felt the resistance of the stubborn hedgerow reverberate through his body.

When she’d come to dine, he’d had every intention of seducing her. But he’d felt that abominable tic in him again when she’d left him standing there, reeling from the strength of her ethereal kiss and the uncomfortable knowledge that he wanted to see her again.

He’d had stronger, more tender thoughts of her when he’d seen her frolicking on the riverbank with Lucy, and he’d certainly felt something the day he’d found her at the cottage, where, in the haze of his formidable physical desire for a beautiful woman, he’d seen a glimpse of the girl Lily had once been, the incorrigible, spirited lass who had vexed him. He’d softened that day.

But when Tobin had gone to Ashwood, and had seen her in her sickbed, he’d felt the thing that frightened him the most. He’d felt concern.
Alarm.
She’d looked so small and forlorn, without anyone she loved to care for her. He’d almost felt the black mud in him begin to dry.

Such incomprehensible feelings were insupportable. He swung the ax again. Had this secret illness addled his brain? Had he not been beguiled by other beautiful women without developing such bothersome
feelings? Yes, he had . . . but with Lily, there was a familiarity he’d not accounted for.

That familiarity and the bloody tender feelings had been eating away at him the day he’d gone to London with Bolge. He’d taken his sister to Bond Street to be measured for new gowns, and as he’d waited, he’d seen the blasted gold gown in the dress shop window. Like a green young lad with his first infatuation, he’d made an impetuous purchase, all because he’d remembered her swanning about in her aunt’s gowns as a girl, acting the queen. She would tilt up her chin, and with her aunt’s priceless ruby coronet on her head, she’d walk with her hand held out, as if she’d expected a knight to rush up and take it as he dropped to his knees and swore his fealty. “
Do
bring tea, young man,” she’d say to him, and Tobin could remember rolling his eyes and turning his back to her so that he might finish the book he was reading.

Then, fifteen years later, he’d walked into a Bond Street dress shop and touched the shimmering gold brocade in the window, and he’d seen Lily, regal and beautiful, a winter queen in her own right, wearing that gown.

After she’d refused it and sent it back to him, he’d tossed it into the guest room, annoyed with himself for having succumbed to the creaky feelings of tenderness.

But then . . . then he’d felt a troublesome surge of tenderness again when he’d watched Lily say a tearful farewell to Lucy Taft. He hadn’t wanted to empathize
with her—God no, not after the way she and Donnelly had treated him at Ashwood. But he’d not been able to help himself. The expression on her face had been his undoing, and when she’d touched her fingers to his, he’d lost himself.

He wanted to see her in the gown. He wanted to touch her fingers once more, to feel her lips beneath his, taste her skin, smell her hair—

God, what was wrong with him?

Tobin chopped the last of the hedgerow and threw down his ax. He glanced at Mr. Greenhaven and said, “All done. Now find me another.” And with that he stalked up to the house, wishing he could turn his flesh inside out and scratch the prickly sensation.

He took the stairs two at a time up to the first floor. He did not glance at the footman and the maid who stood to one side as he passed. He did not pause to ask someone to draw him a bath. He walked to the newly furnished suite of rooms he had designated for Charity and Catherine, and opened the wardrobe.

There was the gown, hanging alone.

Tobin looked down at his hand and remembered the feel of Lily’s fingers touching his. When, exactly, had he lost sight of his reason for being here? When had his rage dissipated into the desire to be part of something more . . . uplifting? He still felt the rage, but its sharp edges had been dulled.

So it was not a great surprise to Tobin when he found himself on the road to Ashwood later that afternoon,
the gown folded and attached to the rump of his horse. He rapped loudly at the door and stood with one foot on the threshold when Linford informed him that Lady Ashwood was behind closed doors with her estate agent.

“I’ll wait,” Tobin said and strode into the foyer before Linford could turn him away. He sat on one of two chairs, the bundle of the gown on his lap.

Linford looked pained by Tobin’s obstinacy. “I cannot say how long she might be, my lord.”

“That is quite all right.” A moment passed before Linford, either too tired or too old to argue, lumbered away, leaving Tobin to sit in the foyer as if he were some youthful suitor who did not know these sorts of battles were won in the darkened stairwells at balls or behind the decorative greenery at supper parties. But he continued to sit, for he knew that if he stood, he likely would walk out the door and not come back. He would sink back into the blackness and allow it to cover his head.

He had no idea how much time had passed when he heard a door close and the sound of a man’s footfall. He stood slowly, his bundle under one arm.

Mr. Fish appeared in the foyer with one of the footmen. He looked startled when he saw Tobin there and exchanged a look with the footman. He then glanced down the corridor from whence he’d just come before turning back to Tobin. “Is the countess expecting you?” he asked crisply.

Tobin resisted the urge to fidget with his neckcloth. “No.”

Mr. Fish looked him up and down, obviously debating what his response should be. It was plain how determined the man was to despise him, so Tobin was not surprised when Mr. Fish strode across the foyer and glared up at Tobin. “You are a vile man,” he said low. “You prey on an innocent and unprotected woman.”

At any other time, in any other place, Tobin would have merely shrugged. But he’d now been accused twice in one week of distressing or otherwise preying on Lily, and he did not like the way the accusation made him feel. There it was again, that loathsome business of feelings!

“Step aside,” he growled at Mr. Fish.

For a moment, it seemed as if the smaller man would not, but Mr. Fish was an intelligent man who probably weighed all the possible outcomes if he didn’t, for he stepped back and pivoted about, striding to the door.

When he’d gone out, Tobin noticed Linford and the footman lurking near the corridor. “Well?”

“If you please, my lord,” Linford said, gesturing to the corridor.

Tobin glanced at the footman, who likewise bore an accusatory expression, and followed Linford.

Lily rose from her desk when he entered the study. She was dressed in crimson, which had the effect of giving her a very healthy glow. “Tobin,” she said flatly.

“Madam.”

Her eyes flicked to the bundle he held. “What brings you to Ashwood today? There is no grain in our granary.”

“Grain?” he uttered, momentarily confused. Then he remembered, and he could not help his smile.

Lily frowned and folded her arms across her. “You may find it amusing, but I assure you, we do not. A
free
granary!” Her gaze flicked to Linford. “That will be all, thank you.” She glared at Tobin as the old butler went out, then swept around her desk, advancing on him, her eyes blazing with anger. “I don’t understand you, in truth,” she said. “On the one hand, you seem to want some sort of friendship. You were kind to Lucy, you loan people money who need it. You came to see after me when I was ill. But then you turn around and do things that are so cruel and ill-spirited.”

His smile widened. “I grant you that I have done many cruel and ill-spirited things, but this was not one of them.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she said and twirled away from him. “I may be easy prey, Tobin, but I am no fool.”

“No,” he agreed. “You are certainly no fool. However, I have not opened a free granary, nor do I have plans to do so. Even I cannot justify such expense.”

Lily cast a suspicious gaze over her shoulder. “Don’t lie to me—there is nothing I will not discover.”

“I have not,” he said. “But I said that I had. I’ve said any number of things in the last week, in the company
of various servants, all so that I might discover the identity of your spy in my house. What is his name? Ah, yes. Ranulf. His sister Agatha is in your service.”

Lily’s lips parted with surprise.

Tobin moved closer still. “Tell me—how much do you pay Ranulf?”

Lily’s hand fluttered to her throat. “I bade him do it. You must not punish him,” she said quickly.

“Admirable of you to take the blame,” he murmured, admiring her mouth. “Then I should exact my punishment from you?”