Randolph stood in front of her, then leaned down, placing his hands on the wooden arms of the chair on either side of her, effectively trapping her. He brought his stern gaze on an even level with her own. “Francesca Winthrop, I want to marry you.”
“But I’m already married.”
“It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter that you’re soiled goods. I still want to marry you.”
“Soiled goods?” Her jaw dropped.
“He forced himself on you, didn’t he?” He moved his face so close she could smell the morning kippers on his breath. “Did he hurt you? I’ll kill him if he hurt you, Fran. Did he?”
She tried to straighten in the chair to put distance between them but it did no good. His gaze bored into her. Her eyes widened in panic. “I refuse to answer these questions. This is totally inappropriate.” She averted her gaze.
“Look at me, Francesca. Look at me.” He reached out and physically turned her face toward his. “Tell me the truth. Did he hurt you when he took you the first time?”
She didn’t say anything. What could she say? Then it occurred to her to simply tell the truth. “No,” she said evenly. “William didn’t hurt me.”
Randolph stared at her with the eyes of a crazy man, terrifying her. Then he smiled. “You haven’t had sexual congress with him yet, have you?” He chuckled, his eyes boring into her as if he could read her mind and bypass her lips. “This is perfect. It all makes sense. If not for her money, why else would he marry Frosty Franny? He couldn’t have had a great passion. Once he had your money, he didn’t need to prod a cold fish. He probably thought he was being respectful not claiming you as a true wife. Hah, the fool!”
He released his grip on the chair and straightened. “You can have the marriage annulled, Francesca. You can claim fraudulent intent. You can annul the marriage and avoid the taint of divorce. Annul the marriage and marry me.”
Now that he had moved, she was released from his confinement. She stood and straightened. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears. This was not the reunion she’d anticipated. “I was pleased to see you arrive here, Randolph. I would like to revisit our friendship the way it used to be. But I will not tolerate your suggestion that I annul my marriage. I have no desire to do so. Nor will I contemplate divorcing William, nor tolerate insults toward his character. If you continue on that path, then I shall be forced to ask you to leave. Do you understand me?”
It was his turn to gulp air. He hung his head and jammed his hands in the pockets of his jacket. “I . . . I apologize. I thought that you might still have feelings for me, the way I still have feelings for you.”
“Ours may have been an arranged marriage, but I’ve grown to rejoice in the consequence. My mother may have played a heavy hand in her desire to gain a title for the family, but in retrospect, I wonder . . .” She dropped her head, feeling suddenly weary after that unanticipated argument. She pressed her hand on her side. “I think I should go upstairs now and rest. I’m feeling the effect of too much activity.” She started to leave and then said, “If you should see Lord Nicholas Chambers, could you tell him I’ve reconsidered our sketching session. I don’t think I’m quite up to it at present.”
She was proud that she held her head high, that she managed to climb the steps with the help of the banister and stubborn pride, that she found her room in spite of the blur of tears that built in her eyes. A chambermaid was tidying up the room but after one look toward Fran, she curtsied and left. Fran lay down, too sore to even curl into a ball.
Why else would he marry Frosty Franny? Once he had your money, he didn’t need to prod a cold fi sh.
She could still hear Randolph’s words. They shouldn’t hurt the way they did. William had told her often enough that he didn’t believe that insulting nickname, but the fact still remained that she was a wife in name only.
A cold fish
.
A cold fish
. Randolph brought memories of home but not the memories she’d sought. Was there some truth in his words? Is that why they stabbed at her heart with the intensity of that relentless pounding? Tears saturated her pillow. She had difficulty catching her breath, and she hurt. Lord, she hurt inside and out.
She spied the laudanum bottle left behind from the breakfast tray. Take some for pain, the doctor had said, and so she did. She didn’t see a spoon available so she tipped the bottle to her lips, sipping an amount she judged to be the equivalent of what she had swallowed last night. She replaced the cap on the bottle and stretched out on her bed, waiting for the darkness to come.
HE WANTED—NEEDED—TO HIT SOMETHING. WILLIAM stomped his way out of the abbey and into the busy courtyard. Preferably something tall with an American twang and a bushy fungus growing on both sides of his face. Men stood waiting by long, thick ropes that would be used to hoist a giant triangle of stone to sit on the two new pillars beside the carriage entrance to the courtyard. William strode to the end of one line and placed the rope on his shoulder and turned his back to the stone. As if that action had been a long-awaited signal, the other workers picked up the rope as well. They didn’t wait long for the shout that caused them all to strain their backs to the task at hand.
Nicholas had told him that he’d caught his wife ogling her husband through a window to the courtyard. He had liked the sound of that, his lusty wife ogling him. He had been pleased as well to hear that she was up and about and not consigning herself to her bed like a delicate English rose. He decided to find her himself on the pretense of inquiring after her injuries.
Find her, he did—in the library with her American friend. One of the consequences of living in an abbey was the amazing transference of sound. It seemed a whisper could be heard a hallway away, and raised voices probably further. As the door to the library was open, he could remain a respectable distance away and still hear every gasp and sigh and bleat of laughter.
Randolph had said he loved Franny, and that she loved him too, and he had proof! William bent his legs and back, straining against the heavy weight that threatened to pull him back. He could have tolerated that if that was all there was. By Franny’s own admission she was younger and didn’t know what love meant.
But then the cheeky bugger suggested she have the marriage annulled. Just pretend that it had never happened. And the grounds? Lack of consummation! Well, William could pretend too. He could pretend the other end of this rope was wrapped around that American bastard’s neck. He grunted and pulled harder, buoyed as well by shouts of encouragement around him.
He felt betrayed that Franny would admit such intimate details to a stranger. He felt betrayed that he didn’t hear a resounding slap in answer to Stockwell’s questions, but instead heard laughter. Laughter at him, the foolish Duke. The Duke who couldn’t handle the responsibility that came with the title and married a woman whom he couldn’t even mount. Then to add further insult, he felt betrayed that Franny invited him to stay on so that they could talk further. That’s when he left the hallway in disgust. He couldn’t stand to hear more.
The words he’d hoped to hear, the words that would have silenced Randolph, did not float on the currents that carried the full conversation to his ears. He waited to hear “I love my husband,” but those words, those critical words, never passed her lips.
The weight on the other end of the rope seemed insurmountable. It pulled him back, made him lose ground. He dug in his heels and pressed his full weight forward.
“Your Grace,” someone yelled beside him. “You can stop now. They need the slack. Let the rope go.”
He looked to his side and noted the other lines had dropped the ropes so he did the same. Turning to admire the result of his labor, he noticed Randolph standing off to the side, pointing to the set stone. Damnation! Must that man ruin everything?
“You’ve got a strong back, Your Grace.” The foremen of the crew handed him a towel to wipe the sweat from his face. “A strong back indeed. You can pull with me boys, anytime.” He smacked the Duke on the back in a universal sign of acceptance. “We’re going to drink some of your fine ale and toast the setting of this last piece. Will you join us, man?”
William smiled tightly, noting that the deletion of his title was meant as a compliment, a sign of acceptance.
I never wanted your title
, Franny had said yesterday. Right now, he wasn’t sure he wanted it either. “Perhaps later,” he replied to the invitation. “I think I need to celebrate the moment with something stronger.”
SHE’D SLEPT THE MORNING, AFTERNOON, AND PERHAPS part of the early evening if she judged the light from the window correctly. She stretched out on her side, surprised to note that a blanket now covered her.
“You’re awake now, are you?” Mary sat nearby, some mending on her lap. “You were sleeping like the dead. Did you take some of the laudanum, then?”
Fran groaned, noting her dress had been removed, and boots. She never felt a thing. “Mary, put that bottle away. It’s too strong and too easy to take. I don’t want to spend hours in this bed. I have guests.”
“Are you saying you plan to join the others for dinner, then? If so, we should get you dressed. No time for a full bath, but I have water in the jug for a quick wash.”
“A damp cloth sounds heavenly,” Fran said, pulling herself to a sitting position. “Maybe it’ll chase the fog from my head.”
Mary busied herself with pouring water into the basin and setting the soap and washcloths to the side of the basin. “They set the capstone on the courtyard entrance today. There was quite a cheer.”
“Oh, dear, I should have been there,” Fran lamented. “William must be so proud.” She should have been by his side to see the culmination of his plans. “Pick something out especially pretty for dinner tonight, Mary. We should toast the Duke’s accomplishments.”
“They say your duke was the lead man in the rope line to hoist the stone in place. It must have been quite a sight.”
“William was in the line?” That would have been a sight to see; a tremor teased her core. How she wished she could have seen it, but she was sleeping away in her room. “You must put that laudanum away. I don’t want to lose another day like today.”
She washed her face and extremities. There’d be time for a full bath later, for now she wished to see William, hear his voice, congratulate him on witnessing the fulfillment of his plans.
She took the pins out of hair and vigorously applied a brush. Mary returned with an ice blue gown decorated with lace trim. The overskirt was covered with golden honeybees embroidered with a shiny gold thread. It had been one of her favorite gowns and perfect for this evening.
“I’ll need to wear my honeymoon pin,” she said, excited to see William’s expression when he saw her in the gown. Would he remember that it was her trip to the hives that had inspired their interrupted tryst in the woods yesterday?
Urging Mary to hurry, she was dressed in record time. The occasional stabbing pain in her chest kept her from rushing down the steps, but she maintained her progress.
She entered the parlor and all eyes turned toward her—but not the eyes she sought. William wasn’t there.
The lips below those many pairs of eyes did not lift in greeting, or even smile at her arrival; they all turned away. Except Randolph. His smile was wide and his eyes very appreciative.
“What has happened?” she asked, an uneasy panic building in her rib cage.
Randolph’s eyes grew wide. “Nothing, nothing has happened.”
She advanced into the room and tugged on Nicholas’s arm. “Where’s William?”
He looked away. “Does it matter?” He sipped at a glass of spirits.
“Of course, it matters,” Fran replied. “I thought we would be celebrating.”
Emma stepped before her, her gaze narrowed and hard. “You wish to celebrate? I am so disappointed in you, Francesca. I thought William had finally found a woman worthy of him.”
“I thought you weren’t fond of William,” Fran said, confused by the many contradictions. Family she had thought cared for her were now cold and distant. The cold and distant acquaintances now acted as friends. Was she still experiencing the effects of the laudanum? Was this some awful opium-i nduced nightmare?
“I love William as a brother,” Emma said, her back straightened. “I love my husband. What William did to me was out of love for my husband as well. I can forgive him for that, but I don’t think I shall ever forgive you.” She started to walk away, but Fran grabbed her elbow and pulled her out into the hallway.
“Emma, please, I don’t understand. What has happened while I slept?” Fran captured Emma’s gaze and held firm, all the while offering a silent prayer that William was not hurt or otherwise incapacitated.
Emma sighed. “William told Nicholas that you planned to seek an annulment and cancel your marriage. I told him that I did not believe it of you, but Nicholas suggested you might have grounds.”
A cold, ugly stillness slipped through her. There is only one person who could have suggested that to William. She started to return to the parlor, but Emma caught her arm.
“William’s a good man, Francesca. I don’t know why you feel you should do this thing, but I urge you to reconsider. You’ve hurt him deeply.”
Fran glanced back at Emma, letting her feel the full force of Frosty Franny’s famed demeanor. Emma drew back instantly.
“I have not now, nor have I ever, had any intention of dissolving my union with my husband,” she said, low and emphatically.
She walked directly to Randolph and smiled in the hope that it would assist cooperation.
“You look every inch a duchess in that dress, Your Grace,” Randolph said.
“Thank you,” she replied. “What exactly did you say to the Duke?”
He laughed as if she were speaking out of two heads. “I haven’t said anything to your husband.”
The crack of her slap reverberated like a gunshot. His hand reached for the reddening spot on his cheek. “Honest, Francesca,” he pleaded. “I haven’t seen him except when he stood on line for the capstone. I haven’t spoken to him at all. I thought he would arrive at any moment.”