Edith Layton (24 page)

Of course, Annabelle realized, the vicious, shameless creature wanted her triumph complete. Why else wear a gown that all but shouted,
Slattern
!? To boast about her conquest and show how she’d done it. Why else send her brother to beguile the hostess while she queened it at
her
ball? To make her victory complete.

Annabelle had planned to show Rafe what he’d missed tonight, by showing him the contrast between what he’d got and what he might have had. It would have been a slow, delicious revenge. Now she saw mists of red before her eyes. She’d been careful, secret and sly, spreading rumors, causing gossip. It hadn’t hurt them a bit. In fact, they flourished. Vengeance had to be achieved. Instantly. She could think of nothing else. Rafe wanted her; she’d seen it in his eyes. Now she’d make sure Brenna and all the others saw it too.

“Dance? I think not,” Annabelle said with a glittering smile. “I find I don’t care to. Oh! Look there, your sister’s abandoned her husband and is dancing with another. Why am I not surprised? I think I must offer him some consolation. Good evening, Lieutenant Ford.” She spun on her heel.

“Rafe!”
Annabelle cried as she hurried toward him.

The waltz was playing, but the musicians kept
their eyes on their hostess. This was her soiree; her every move was noted. She’d raised her voice loud enough to attract attention. The music slowed and wound to a halt, the musicians waiting for their next cue. Was it to be another set of country dances? Or time for dinner? Annabelle’s mama stopped gossiping with the other matrons and looked at her daughter. Everyone did.

Rafe heard his name called, and looked away from the dance.

“Rafe!” Annabelle said again as she came up to him. “Where have you been all evening?”

“Here,” he said abruptly. He’d been at the sidelines all night watching his wife when he wasn’t dancing with her. “How are you, Annabelle?” he added belatedly. “It’s a very good party. Beautiful gown.”

“You like it?” she asked in a smaller voice, casting her glance down, holding out her skirt as if inspecting it. Her voice grew sad. “I don’t know. It’s so subtle. It isn’t red as fire, or clinging. You don’t think it’s too girlish? I mean to say, is it attractive enough?”

Her smile was tentative. She was a tiny woman and a very lovely one, the petal pink of her gown making her look exquisitely fragile. In that moment she looked lost, vulnerable again, as she had when he’d first seen her. Rafe felt his conscience stab him. He was accountable for that. He, who’d only tried to ease her sorrow, had now added to it again.

His face showed his regret.

Brenna had left the dance to rejoin Rafe. When she saw him watching Annabelle with a lost, sad expres
sion, she hesitated and hung back. He put out a hand and drew her to his side. He frowned as he felt her hand tremble in his.

“Lady Dalton,” Annabelle said, “how good to see you again. And in such a fine gown. I was just telling Rafe how it quite puts mine to shame. And he couldn’t deny it.”

Rafe saw tears in Annabelle’s eyes. “No,” he told her, “it’s just that I’m no man for words. I said your gown’s beautiful. It suits you, it does.”

She raised her petal-soft gaze to his. “Does it, Rafe? You think so? Then why haven’t you asked me to dance?”

He laughed, but not happily. “I’m a married man now.”

She laughed too, not merrily. “So you are a married man, Rafe. But that doesn’t mean you’re a dead one.”

He showed no expression. But there was something in the back of his eyes she couldn’t name.

“I promised my wife this dance, lady,” he said.

She put out her hand to him. The room went absolutely still. She raised her chin to let him see the dare, as well as the need, in her eyes. “It’s my party,” she said, her eyes entreating him. “Dance with me, Rafe. You have the rest of your life to dance with your wife.”

Brenna went very still.

“You’re right, I do,” Rafe said.

Annabelle’s lips began to curve in a tiny, tilted smile.

But Rafe didn’t take her proffered hand. He held Brenna’s as he sketched a bow to Annabelle. “I’m
sorry,” he said with real sadness in his voice. “I have the rest of my life to dance with her, true. But it won’t be long enough, not even if I lived two lifetimes, my lady.”

Annabelle stood looking at him, her hand still extended.

“In fact,” Rafe said abruptly, “if you’ll excuse us? We came here to show how we appreciate your friendship. We enjoyed ourselves, and thank you for it. But we are newly wedded, after all, and have other things to do tonight. It’s time for us to move on now. It really is.”

He bowed again, and holding Brenna’s hand tightly, turned and walked away from Annabelle, leaving her standing alone, her hand still reached out to him, in the midst of all the silent, watching company.

S
he wept. Brenna sat in the carriage as they drove home, and cried as though her heart were breaking.

Rafe raked a hand through his hair. “What did I say? What did I do now?” he asked her in frustration. “You didn’t want to leave? I’m sorry. I thought you’d want to. I complimented her gown? How could I not? Damme it, Bren, could you answer me? You’re weeping like a leaky bucket, and I don’t know why!”

“I don’t cry,” she sobbed, “not like this. And I don’t know why I am now.” She dabbed at her eyes; her voice hitched. She waved him off when he drew near, knowing that if he took her in his arms to comfort her, she’d only bawl the more.

“I didn’t cry when they told me my fiancé was gone, never to return,” she cried, shaking her head.
“No, not even when I heard about my
second
fiancé’s betrayal. Nor even when I heard Eric was wounded, and alone in a far-off land.” She caught her breath and choked back another sob. “I went into my room each time, and when I was alone,
den
I wept,” she said, her voice becoming nasal with her tears.

He didn’t know whether to smile or weep for her himself. He offered her his handkerchief instead. “Blow your nose,” he said.

She did. Then she drew a long, shuddering breath. “I
don’t
weep like a bucket. At least, never in front of anyone. I grieve when I’m alone. But this! It’s just that what you said—you made me so happy. Did you mean it?”

He stared at her.

“You didn’t dance with her,” Brenna said, turning a shining face to his. “You didn’t act as though you loved her. Oh, Rafe, I was so sure you did. I was so sorry you had to marry me. You can’t know—I even considered emigrating to rid you of me. If I saw you still longed for her, that is.”

“Emigrating?’ he asked, shocked.

She nodded. “Yes, if I had to. I’ve traveled far from home and braved the unknown before. I despaired at the thought of losing you, but it would be worse to lose you where I could see it every day. What kind of love is it that deprives someone of what they want the most? I couldn’t. I
wouldn’t.
Then, when I saw Annabelle tonight—when she enticed you—I knew I’d finally know what I should do. She meant to humiliate me, but she couldn’t. You refused her. And
I could see it didn’t bother you to do it. Or did it? Oh, Rafe, you do love me?”

“Of course I do,” he said, putting out his arms for her.

But she didn’t throw herself into his embrace. He knew he had to say more.

“Look,” he said, “you know I’m not a man for words. Damme.” He rubbed his forehead as though he could generate some by doing that. “But you need them now, don’t you? Prettier ones than I can usually muster. Don’t blame yourself. I should have said something sooner. Listen, Bren,” he said, taking her hand in his, “I’ll try to explain, though it’s like asking a fish to sing, or something like that.”

He thought he saw her lips quirk, and taking heart, went on. “I did love her. That’s true. Or thought I did. But I never really loved a woman before you came along, so how was I to know?”

“She’s very beautiful,” Brenna said solemnly. “Who could blame you?”

“Yes. Yes, she is,” he said eagerly. “There it is. Her looks. I think I saw in her an omen. Aye, that’s it. Go on with that, you’re on the track,” he muttered aloud to himself. “I saw in her sort of a pale reflection, beforehand, of what I’d find in you. Does that make sense?”

Brenna’s face was a study in puzzlement.

“She was a foreshadowing, that’s all,” Rafe said. “I always liked dark ladies. I never knew why. Now I do. It’s because I was in some strange way looking for you. Do you see? Annabelle’s dark—that attracted
me. But so are you, and you’re so much more. I can talk to you as well as to any man…Damme, there’s no compliment,” he groaned.

He sat forward. “What I mean to say is that what I found with you is what I was really looking for. Which is more than I ever expected or knew I needed. And I do need you. You bring me more than that beautiful face of yours, or that amazing body. It doesn’t need a red gown, by the way, though I admit it nearly kills me to see you in it, and let you stay in it, that is. It’s you, entirely. You suit me. You entice me just by sitting there. You fit me in every other way too. I like to talk to you as much as make love to you, and that’s saying a lot.”

He took in a breath. “That being the case, once I married you, why would I want her anymore? I feel sorry for her, that’s all. I swear it. And I’m glad we went tonight so I could see it…as well as having you see it,” he added hastily, grimacing at his clumsiness.

He didn’t want her to realize that he himself hadn’t known how much she meant to him until tonight, when Annabelle had tried to get him to hurt her. As if he ever would. He’d sooner cut off his arm, the way he hadn’t let the surgeons do. He’d kept his arm through sheer will. Sheer luck had brought him his lady. He was lucky beyond his imaginings, literally. Annabelle had been a desire. Bren was everything he’d desired and more he hadn’t even known he had. He saw it now, but that was a devil of a thing to say to her, wasn’t it?

She hesitated, but her next question wasn’t about that. “Still, the truth of it is, and there’s no getting
round it, though I wish there were…that you thought you had to marry me, and that’s the only reason why you did.”

It was quiet in the coach. He thought very hard. It was, he knew, his final throw of the dice.

“Aye, that’s true,” he admitted, “but I didn’t know I had to love you. God knows I do. She was like some bright star seen from afar. There’s a clever lad,” he muttered, “praising another to show your lady why you love her…But I can,” he said on sudden inspiration, “because that’s just what she was, a star seen from afar—dazzling and distant. But stars are there to navigate by, and she led me to you! There it is,” he said with relief.

She looked at him curiously.

He took her hand. “Bren, when I’m with you I feel like I’ve come home after a long and dangerous journey. And to a better home than I ever knew, at that. So when all’s said, I needed her to find you. I’m grateful to her and glad of the unhappiness she caused me. I didn’t know what joy she’d bring me, all unknowingly. And you’re the greatest joy I’ve ever known. Never doubt it.”

She smiled now, a real smile, if a watery one. He could see it in the shifting carriage lantern light. “That’s the prettiest thing anyone ever said to me, I think.”

He let out his breath. “Believe me, it’s the prettiest thing
I
ever said. But I don’t lie. You know that. Now. Once and for all, and then put it from your mind, because I can’t promise I’ll say it again. Not that I don’t mean it, but it’s hard for me. Thinking of the
words as well as saying them. But know that I love you, and none other, and that’s the way of it for me, now and forevermore. My word on it. So what do you say?”

She didn’t. She threw herself into his arms. He kissed her. He thought, though he’d never say it, that he’d had better kisses of her. She tasted wet and salty, and since she was between laughter and tears, he kissed teeth as well as lips. But he relished the feel of her in his arms.

She put her head on his shoulder. They’d made a shambles of her hair, so he stroked strands of it back from her face.

“We probably caused such gossip,” she said sadly.

“Yes. See what you’ve done? Now we’ll be invited everywhere!”

She chuckled.

He turned his head, kissed her, and found this kiss much more satisfactory. Then much more than that. She was eager to show him how she loved him. He was anxious to show her how glad he was of that. Her skin was as silken as her gown, and he reveled in trying to discover where the margins between them actually were. But with that warm, willing body under his hands and her generous mouth under his, he almost forgot where they were. A jolt as the coach went over a broken paving stone almost rattled them off the seat, reminding him.

“Not here,” he said with effort, drawing back. “We’re almost home. We’re almost somewhere else too. Peck is on the box. I’d like to see his face if we did that here…or even that. Stop it, Bren. Please.
No, much as I want to, we can’t, not now. I’d never hear the end of it.”

They sat in silence, holding hands.

When the coach arrived at their house, Bren entered the house, clutching her cape around her, a bemused, distant look on her face. Her hair was hastily pinned; her cheeks were very pink. Rafe was just as distracted. He said good night to Peck while watching Brenna mounting the stair. Never taking his eyes from his wife, he told her maid to go back to sleep, left word that they’d see Eric and the Fords in the morning, and without waiting for an answer, went straight up the stair after his wife.

They went into their bedchamber and locked the door.

They made love quickly, then slowly, and then lost track of time or the need for pacing it.

“Lord,” Rafe finally said, as they lay back on their pillows again. “What a wife I have!”

He raised himself on an elbow and looked down into her face, his own very serious. He touched her cheek. “Bren?” he said. “Listen. Something else. Something I’ve been thinking. You’ve given me so much. This, of course,” he said, stretching one warm hand over her belly. “Your trust, your patience. Your devotion and your loyalty too. And your family. I couldn’t ask for a better. As to that, I’m grateful to you and your mama for making some peace for me with my own family. I’ll have a measure of that from now on, I think. If only because they’ll never again be sure that they aren’t that, after all.”

He looked troubled. “And all you’ve got is a
broken-down old soldier with few words, fewer social graces, and no looks to speak of. A poor bargain, I must say. How can I repay you? What can I give you in turn?”

“The most valuable thing you have,” she said so promptly he wondered if there was a thing she’d been afraid to ask of him.

“Name it,” he said as promptly, “and it’s yours.”

“Yourself,” she said.

He was very generous.