You, and Only You (35 page)

He merely grunted in reply, his now lopsided features
reflecting little emotion as he coolly assessed her.

Tiffany turned to Mr. Broward then, her eyebrows raised
inquiringly.
 

“We’re working on strengthening his leg muscles today,” he
informed her.

She nodded.
 
“Will you
be using the chair today?” she asked, referring to the wheeled chair that had
arrived a few weeks earlier, and now sat empty in the corner of the room.

Mr. Broward cast a sidelong glance at the marquess, his
expression dubious.

Tiffany sighed aloud, for her father was being inordinately
stubborn, refusing to even try the specially designed chair.
 
In fact, he had obstinately refused to leave
his room since returning to Melborne Hall.
 
She knew that he was ashamed of his condition and his inability to
function as he once had, but hiding away in his bedchamber for the remainder of
his life wasn’t going to change anything.
 
He needed to accept his newfound limitations and prepare to face the
world again, for better or worse.

“Father, you really should give it a try,” she said,
motioning to the vacant chair.
 
“As I’ve
told you, we can easily construct a ramp and use it to get you up and down the
stairs.”

In answer, the marquess simply turned his head away, staring
fixedly at the wall on the opposite side of the room.
 

“Fine,” she muttered.
 
“But one of these days you
are
going to have to leave this room.”

Arriving back downstairs a short while later, Tiffany donned
her heavy outer garments and then made her way to the waiting coach, noticing
as she did a few delicate flakes of snow floating down from the sky.
 
Timothy, their driver, and George, one of
their footmen, were seated atop the drivers box; both of them bundled up
against the winter chill.
 
As another of
their footmen assisted her up the iron steps and into the vehicle, she was
pleased to see that a stack of blankets had been piled high onto the seat and
several heated bricks had been placed along the floorboards.
 
Settling them around her as the door swung
shut, she felt the pull of the horses and the turning of the wheels a moment
later.

As the coach rolled along the frozen winter ground, Tiffany
tried to keep her nervousness at bay by focusing her attention on the small
book of poetry she held in her lap.
 
Though it wasn’t entirely successful, she made the effort all the same.

However, once the coach turned onto the private road leading
to Chesterfield Park, approximately thirty minutes later, Tiffany’s anxiety
quickly began to escalate.
 
Was she
making a mistake, she wondered suddenly?
 
Last night, and even this morning, she’d felt confident in her decision
to journey to Alex’s home and ask the questions that were now plaguing her, but
suddenly she was beset with doubts.
  
What if Nicholas had somehow been mistaken?
 
What if Alex hadn’t really lost at all?
 
What if she’d been right all along?
 
What if he
had
only said those things out of guilt?
 
Was she merely setting herself up for
additional heartbreak?

Regardless of the sudden doubts now skirting along the edge
of her thoughts, she supposed that it was too late to turn back.
 
Besides, she reasoned, whatever it might be,
she needed to know the truth.

Stepping from the coach a few minutes later, Tiffany was
surprised to see the ground covered in a fresh layer of white.
 
Lost to her tumultuous thoughts, she’d
scarcely noticed that the gently falling snowflakes had increased in both size
and number, or that the wind had started to blow with increasing force.
 
Summoning her resolve, she clutched the
collar of her coat tightly about her throat as she made her way slowly up to
the front steps of the magnificent house that stood before her, careful not to
slip upon the snow-covered path.
 
A
moment later, she rang the bell.

As the door swung open, the Chesterfield’s regal-looking
butler regarded her curiously for a moment, glanced over her shoulder to the
waiting coach, and then back to her.
 
“May I help you?”
 

“Hello, I’m Lady Tiffany Marlowe,” she began, handing him
her card.
 
“I’m here to see Lord
Chesterfield.”

The butler glanced briefly down at the card, and then
returned his inquiring gaze to Tiffany.
 
“Is the earl expecting you?”

“No, he isn’t,” she admitted.
 
“But it is rather important that I speak with
him.”

The stoic butler hesitated for a moment, and then ultimately
stepped aside so that she could enter.
 
“If you would care to wait in the front parlor, I shall ascertain
whether or not his lordship is home to visitors.”

Tiffany nodded.
 
After
being divested of her coat, hat and gloves, and once she’d been assured that
her driver and footman would be attended to; she proceeded to follow the
uniformed butler as he directed her to the parlor.

“If you will wait here, my lady,” he instructed as he
motioned her forward.

“Yes, of course,” she replied, stepping into the
richly-appointed space.
 
As the butler
left the room, leaving the wide set of doors standing open, Tiffany could hear
the diminishing sound of his footsteps moving across the marble floor.
 
Looking about the elegant parlor, she glanced
briefly toward the settee, but she was far too nervous to sit.
 
Instead, she walked over to the tall row of
windows that overlooked the front of the estate, watching as the snow continued
to fall and swirl in the now blustering wind.

“Come in,” Alex responded to the knock upon the door of the
library.

“Excuse me, my lord, but a young lady has just arrived and
is requesting to speak with you.”

Alex looked up in surprise, setting the book he was reading
aside.
 
“A young lady?”

“Yes, my lord.
 
Lady
Tiffany Marlowe,” he replied.
 
“She is
unaccompanied,” he added with a slight, disapproving frown, “and wasn’t
expected.”

Alex was stunned.
 
Tiffany had come to Chesterfield, alone?
 
“Where is she?” he demanded, rising swiftly
to his feet.

“I put her in the front parlor, my lord,” the butler
replied, clearly taken aback as Alex brushed past him, hastening from the room
a second later.

Slowing his steps as he neared the double-doors leading into
the parlor, Alex then hesitated for a moment upon the threshold.
 
She was there, standing at the window, her
gaze fixed upon something outside.
 
But
why had she come?
 
Stepping into the
room, he turned and pushed the doors closed.

Hearing the sound, Tiffany turned from the window.
 
Alex stood just inside the doors, his
expression indecipherable.
 
“Hello,
Alex,” she said softly.

“Tiffany, I… wasn’t expecting you,” he finished lamely.
 

“I know,” she replied, smiling hesitantly.
 
“I was hoping that we might talk,” she
explained.

“Of course.”
 
Moving
forward, he motioned to the nearby settee.
 
“Would you like to sit?”

Tiffany nodded, walking toward the stylish piece of
furniture.
 
Sitting down, she nervously
smoothed the skirt of her blue and green striped, muslin day dress as Alex
settled into one of the two opposite-facing chairs.

Biting down nervously upon her lower lip, she was suddenly
unsure how to begin.
 
“Are your mother
and sisters at home?” she finally asked, for lack of a better way to start off
the conversation.

“No.
 
They are
presently in Bristol, visiting my mother’s sister.”

“Oh, I see.”
 
Good
heavens, this was so much more difficult than she’d anticipated.
 
Clasping her hands together in her lap, she
glanced fretfully about the room.
 
Go on, ask him
, her inner voice
commanded.

“Tiffany-”

“Alex-” They both spoke at once.
 

“Please,” Alex said, motioning for her to go first.
 
“What were you going to say?”

“Alright,” she said quietly, meeting his steady gaze.
 
“Alex, did you…lose the wager to my father on
purpose?”

He blinked in surprise.
 
His first thought was to ask her how she could have possibly known that,
but after a moment’s hesitation, he simply answered her truthfully.
 
“Yes, I did.”

“Why?” Tiffany’s voice was little more than a whisper as she
gazed at him searchingly.

He regarded her thoughtfully, pondering just how to put his
feelings into words, as he held her intense gaze.
 
After a moment, he spoke.
 
“Do you remember that night at the theater?
 
You were there with Ashleigh and your father.”

“Yes.”

“When I saw you there, sitting in your box, I was… utterly
captivated,” he began.
 
“And then, after
that night, I couldn’t seem to stop thinking about you,” he continued
earnestly.
 
“I told myself that as time went
on I would somehow be able to get you out of my mind, but then, when I saw you
again, I knew that I’d been fooling myself.”

Tiffany listened to what Alex was telling her in utter
fascination, for what he was saying was so similar to the initial effect he’d
had upon her.

“I did my best to avoid you after that,” he admitted with a
slight shake of his head.
 
“I confess
that I was both baffled and unnerved by my reaction to you, and I was afraid
that it would only get worse, the more time we spent in each other’s company,
the more I got to know you.
 
And of
course, it did.”

Tiffany sat spellbound as Alex continued.

“But even so, I told myself that I could stay away from you,
that I had to stay away from you.
 
But
then, on the night of your birthday, when I saw you with Fitzpatrick, I nearly
lost my mind.
 
In fact, I wanted to
strangle the boy,” he acknowledged with a wry smile.
 
“Then, when I kissed you, I knew that
everything had changed.
 
Though I tried
stubbornly to deny it, in my heart I knew that my feelings for you were so much
stronger than I was willing to admit.
 
I
was just too dammed pigheaded to acknowledge, even to myself, that I was
falling in love with you.”

Feeling her eyes grow moist, Tiffany fought to hold back her
tears as Alex continued.

“As crazy as this may sound, when your father presented me
with that damnable wager I was furious, but surprisingly, there was a part of
me that felt an odd sense of relief as well.”

“Relief?” Tiffany questioned softly.

Alex smiled tenderly.
 
“Although he didn’t know it at the time, and though I foolishly
continued to fight my feelings, your father was offering me not only one, but
two
things I desperately wanted.”

“So you agreed to the wager, and then lost on purpose
because you
wanted
to marry me?”

“I knew that I had your father beat, but in the back of my
mind I realized that if turned my cards over, I might lose
you
.
 
I couldn’t do it.
 
I couldn’t take that risk.”

She wanted to say something, but she was suddenly too choked
up to speak.

“I’m sorry for being such a damned fool.
 
And I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you about
the wager when I had the chance,” Alex said earnestly, his expression filled
with remorse.
 
“It was a terrible mistake,
but I swear that I was only trying to protect you.”

Tiffany nodded in understanding.

“And then, when I got your note, to know that you had found
out like that, to know what you must have been thinking, I felt sick
inside.
 
I wanted to see you, to talk to
you, to try and explain if I could, even though I feared you wouldn’t believe
anything I had to say, but you had already left,” he continued.
 
“Knowing that I might have lost you forever
was like having my heart suddenly ripped from my chest.”

“Oh, Alex,” she whispered, for she could well understand the
pain he must have felt, so much like her own.
 

“I wanted to go after you right away.
 
But I waited, hoping that if I gave you
enough time you might eventually find it in your heart to forgive me.”

She couldn’t fight them any longer.
 
Gazing at Alex in absolute wonder, she finally
gave in and allowed the tears to slide slowly down her cheeks.

Rising from his chair, Alex moved across the short space
that separated them, dropping onto his knees before her.
 
Lifting his hands to her face, he gently
wiped the tears from her cheeks with the pads of his thumbs.
 
“I love you Tiffany,” he said, feeling the
sudden sting of tears at the back of his own eyes.

Gazing into the depths of his beautiful grey eyes, Tiffany
felt as if she had just received the most precious gift in the world.