When the Duchess Said Yes (15 page)

She kissed him again, clearly no longer caring who
watched. He was glad of that, and he threaded his fingers through her hair, cradling her face before him as he kissed her, and—

“Forgive me, Your Grace.”

Hawke could not believe he’d heard so intemperate an interruption; he ignored it and continued to kiss Lizzie. But when the interruption was followed by an impressive throat-clearing, he knew he’d no choice but to look up. Giacomo was standing before him, holding a silver salver that carried a single letter.

“Giacomo, you fiendish rascal,” he said, falling into the Italian the two always used together. “I trust that this is a message from His Majesty himself, to disturb me at this time?”

Giacomo bowed, the sort of graceful, noncommittal bow at which he excelled, and presented the salver to Hawke.

“I regret, sir, that this is not from His Majesty,” he replied, also in Italian. “But it is from His Grace the Duke of Breconridge, whose servant impressed upon me the need for great urgency.”

It didn’t take a genius to guess what and why Brecon would have sent him word, and with a muttered oath Hawke took the letter and cracked the seal.

“What is it, Hawke?” Lizzie asked with concern. “What is wrong?”

“We are, by my cousin’s reckoning,” he said, and handed her the note, written in Brecon’s impeccable hand:

Marchbourne House
Four of the clock

My dear Hawkesworth:
I regret to bear the most Unfortunate News that Lady Elizabeth Wylder has been borne away by some Criminal of the lowest order, & at present remains Missing & torn from her Family. The Hearts of those who Love her Most are distraught, & I urge You to come directly to us here to decide what Course must next be taken for the Lady’s safe deliverance. Not a minute is to be lost
.

N.B. However, as I do grievously suspect that this is No News to you, & that the Lady is in your Safekeeping, I beg that you return her At Once, to end the Suffering of her Family, & before the Magistrates are consulted & admitted to our Confidences
.

Yr. s’v’t.
,
B
.          

She read it once, then slipped from his lap to read it again with more care. Hawke sighed and reached for his glass for more sherry.

“I wanted to show you my pictures next,” he said ruefully. “They would have amused you, I think. But now—now I suppose I must return you, as Brecon says.”

“We must go at once, Hawke.” She refolded the page and handed it back to him. “If you please, have your people prepare your carriage.”

“I shall see that it is done, my lady,” Giacomo said in English, bowing, and leaving to obey—obeying her, really, as if she were already his mistress.

“I told you that you’d have no trouble with the servants,” Hawke said, emptying the glass. “But then, Giacomo has always had a weakness for the fair sex.”

But Lizzie wasn’t laughing. Her expression was solemn, far more solemn than he’d expected, and she stood with her hands clasped tightly before her waist. In gaudy contrast to that somber pose, the rubies and diamonds at her wrist sparkled in the late afternoon sun, a reminder of what they’d shared earlier.

“I have made my family suffer, worrying over me, and for no reason,” she said softly. “I should have sent word that I was unharmed, and with you.”

“You were gone for only a few hours,” he protested.
“And I was the one who carried you off, as a lark. It wasn’t your idea. Surely they’ll forgive you for that.”

She shook her head, looking down. “Likely they will. They only wish the best for me, you know. But how can I forgive myself?”

He frowned, at a loss for what to say. He could not fathom why she should worry so much over her family’s reaction. It was her life, not theirs. He’d turned his back on his own family for a good ten years with no harm to any of them. What difference could a few hours make to hers?

Yet clearly to her it did. He watched her braid her hair, scraping it back from her face into a sensible plait that doubtless she’d coil into an even more sensible bun.

What had become of the carefree girl he’d chased through the garden at a breakneck pace? Where was the merry, willing nymph he’d kissed in the arbor? What had her family done to her to make her feel so damned guilty over a few hours of pleasure with him? Damnation, he was the one who was going to marry her. Didn’t his wishes count for anything? He sighed and rose.

“Come,” he said, reaching for Lizzie’s hand. “By the time we reach the stable yard, the carriage will be ready.”

She offered a tremulous smile of gratitude and squeezed his fingers, for which he in turn was grateful as well.

But the ride to Marchbourne House in the coming dusk was made in silence, and in silence he handed her down from the carriage when they arrived. He saw eager shadows silhouetted by candlelight at the drawing room windows, doubtless her family of keepers eager to swallow her back into their lair. His footman trotted before them, and one of March’s was already waiting to open the door.

Yet at the last possible moment, Lizzie stopped and turned toward him.

“I wish to thank you for this afternoon, Hawke,” she
said, her words tumbling out in a rush. “For the cherry tarts, and the French fiddler, and the bracelet and—and everything else. I will never forget it, not so long as I live, and I cannot wait until we are wed.”

He hadn’t expected that, nor the odd little tug in his chest that her words seemed to cause.

“I cannot wait, either,” he said, raising her hand to his lips. “Not at all.”

“Lizzie!” Charlotte hurried down the steps, her skirts flying, and flung her arms around her sister. “Oh, my dear little sister, you cannot know how happy I am to see you safe!”

Over Lizzie’s shoulder Charlotte stared at Hawke, her gaze flinty and full of reproach. Then she swept her sister toward the light and into the house, and away from him.

He stood there, unsure what to do next. He could have climbed back into his carriage and left, ridden away as if he’d planned to do so from the beginning. He was hardly dressed for the customary splendor of Marchbourne House, still in his common dark linen breeches and shirt, and those none too fresh, either. Like a rascal meant for the gallows at Tyburn, he thought, imagining already what they’d say when they saw him. Joining that anxious company inside would earn him nothing but scolding and faultfinding for what he’d done, and he’d a distinct feeling that his explanation—that he’d only wished to be alone with Lizzie—would likely fall on the deafest of ears. Lady Sophronia and his mother would come after him like the harpies they were, while Brecon and March would be harsher and again call him a scoundrel, a rogue, and much more besides.

He could ride away now and spare himself. But the painful truth was that he wished to stay in Lizzie’s company, if only for as long as they’d let him. He didn’t care
what they said of him. All he wanted was to have her to himself, which in a few days he would.

The Marchbourne footmen were still holding the door, expecting him to enter. At least the servants welcomed him, he thought dryly. So would Lizzie, and she was the only one of the lot who really mattered.

He squared his shoulders and followed her.

“How cross is Aunt Sophronia with me?” Lizzie asked her sister, clutching at her arm. “You must tell me before we go inside. And Lady Allred? I’ll wager she’s absolutely furious.”

But Charlotte shook her head. “The older ladies aren’t angry at all, leastways not with you,” she said. “They blame everything on Hawke. March and Brecon, too. I do believe they were ready to come after you themselves with pitchforks and muskets if he hadn’t brought you back soon.”

“It’s not Hawke’s fault,” Lizzie said. “That is, not entirely. He did carry me off from the mantua-maker’s shop in the hackney, and he did refuse to take me back when I demanded that he do so. But after that, once we arrived at Hawkesworth Chase and he explained everything to me, I didn’t protest at all. He’s a very fine gentleman, Charlotte, and very amusing. I was indeed rather willing.”

Charlotte rolled her eyes. “You look more willing than those tawdry creatures we see trailing after the men in Covent Garden. I can’t begin to think what manner of explanation he could offer that would reduce you to—to this.”

“Hawke can be very persuasive,” Lizzie insisted. She
wasn’t entirely sure herself how he’d changed her mind so completely. She’d begun by being furious with him, and then they’d kissed, and she’d climbed the wall and run away from him to prove she could, and after that, everything had been most splendid between them.

“He’s persuaded you right into the scandal sheets again,” Charlotte said. “I know there’s only a few days until the wedding, Lizzie, but even you might have kept your virtue intact until then.”

“I did, Charlotte, I swear by all that’s holy!”

“The sorry state of your clothes tells another tale, Lizzie,” Charlotte said skeptically. “That is, the clothes you’re still wearing. What’s become of your hat and your cap, and your kerchief as well? If I could, I’d take you upstairs directly for repairs before you join the company, just to salvage what we can, but Mama insists on seeing you at once.”

“Mama’s here now?” Lizzie exclaimed. “And Diana?”

She hadn’t seen her mother or her younger sister for many months, not since they had returned to Ransom Manor after Twelfth Night, and in that time Lizzie had missed them both sorely. “They weren’t supposed to arrive until tomorrow!”

“For once the roads from Dorset were dry, and their journey was easier than expected,” Charlotte was saying, but Lizzie had already rushed ahead, into the drawing room where everyone was gathered.

Like the rest of Marchbourne House, the drawing room was very large and grand, with marble columns trimmed with gold, blue silk brocade on the walls, and gold-framed looking glasses that ran clear to the ceiling. Even now it easily contained the large crowd of people gathered in it, including Aunt Sophronia, Lady Allred, and a tall, severe gentleman in a medal-covered uniform who must be her second husband, General Lord Allred. Also present were Brecon and two of his sons; March
and Charlotte and their twins, plus the nursemaids to keep them in line; March’s secretary and Brecon’s man of business; and several assorted clergymen, determined to offer comfort, who had accompanied someone or another. It was indeed a crowd, but for Lizzie, the only faces she saw belonged to her mother and sister, sitting to one side.

They were lovely faces, too, with Mama’s golden-haired beauty duplicated in sixteen-year-old Diana. In Diana’s lap was curled her treasured cat, Fig, sensibly and soundly asleep. Both women still wore their traveling clothes, with the dust of the road on their skirts, and in addition Mama’s face bore the obvious strain of her middle daughter’s disappearance and deliverance. That alone was enough to sharpen the edge on Lizzie’s guilt as she fell into her mother’s arms.

“I’m sorry, Mama, so sorry,” she said contritely, holding her mother tight. “I can only beg your forgiveness for the trouble I have caused this day.”

“Dear Lizzie, what a curious sort of greeting is that!” Mama exclaimed. “Here now, let me have a proper look at you before you begin wailing over sorrow and forgiveness.”

Dutifully Lizzie stepped back, bowing her head modestly and clasping her hands at her waist as a lady should, or at least as Aunt Sophronia had been trying to teach her. Mama, however, wasn’t fooled.

“I must say you’re looking a bit bedraggled for a bride,” she said, her blue eyes shrewdly observing Lizzie’s rumpled skirts, haphazardly dressed hair, and missing hat and kerchief. “Even for you, Lizzie.”

“Yes, Mama,” she said, wincing even at that gentle criticism. “But when I left this house, I promise I was most properly dressed. Charlotte has seen to that. Even when I left the mantua maker’s shop, I was turned out well enough. But that was before I, ah, met Hawke.”

“She didn’t ‘meet’ His Grace, Celia,” Aunt Sophronia declared indignantly, unable to keep quiet any longer. “Not unless being bundled up in a horse blanket from the street and thrown into a common hackney cab before a score of horrified witnesses is how a gentleman chooses to meet a lady in this present, wicked age. It was entirely disgraceful.”

“Hawke did it because you wouldn’t permit him to call on me, Aunt,” Lizzie protested. “He said he tried and tried but was always turned away. He vows that this was the only way he could contrive to be with me, and how could I object to that? Isn’t that so, Hawke?”

She turned around, expecting him to be there. She’d assumed that he’d followed her and Charlotte into the house, and for one long, hideous moment she feared he hadn’t, but had abandoned her to face her displeased family alone.

Then suddenly he
was
in the doorway of the drawing room, and she couldn’t help but grin and hold out her hands to him. Still in his shirtsleeves—for his coat must have gone the same way as her kerchief and hat, and he’d never had a neckcloth that she could recall—and with a decided devil-may-care look to him, he looked the perfect romantic hero, making every other gentleman in the room seem stuffy and overdone by comparison. It was the perfect hero’s entrance, too, with him striding confidently across the room to join her. Before everyone he took her hand and lifted it to his lips, his dark eyes fairly
smoldering
with desire and regard for her. If Lizzie were prone to swooning, she would definitely have done so then. Surely she must be the most fortunate lady in London, to have such a bridegroom!