She opened her eyes for that. He sounded quite sure of himself. “How?”
“Look at you. So happy and content. If you weren’t going to marry me, you’d be running about like a chicken—no, sorry, a turkey—yipping on about what have I done and what have you done and what have we done?”
“I’m thinking all those things,” she told him.
He snorted. “Right.”
“You don’t believe me.”
He kissed her. “Not for a second. But it hasn’t been a full day yet, and I’m a man of my word, so I won’t badger you.” He stood and then held out his hand to her.
Annabel took it and rose to her feet, smiling with disbelief. “That wasn’t badgering?”
“My dear Miss Winslow, I have not even begun to badger.” And then his eyes took on a most devilish light. “Hmmm.”
“What?”
He chuckled to himself as he led her up the hill to the path. “Has there ever been a Winslow Most Likely to Outrun a Badger competition?”
She laughed all the way back to Stonecross.
Chapter Twenty-one
Later that night
Did you see him this afternoon?”
Annabel would have looked up at Louisa, who had just entered the room, except that Nettie had a viselike grip on her hair.
“Which him?” Annabel asked. “Ow! Nettie!”
Nettie yanked even harder, twisting a piece and pinning it into place. “Sit still and it won’t take so long.”
“You know which him,” Louisa said, pulling up a chair.
“You wore blue,” Annabel said, smiling at her. “It’s my favorite color on you.”
“Don’t try to change the subject.”
“She hasn’t seen him,” Nettie said.
“Nettie!”
“Well, you haven’t,” the maid declared.
“I haven’t,” Annabel confirmed. “Not since luncheon.”
The midday meal had been served al fresco, and as there was no set seating, Annabel had ended up at a table for four with Sebastian, his cousin Edward, and Louisa. They had had a marvelous time, but halfway through, Lady Vickers had requested a private word with Annabel.
“What do you think you are doing?” she demanded, once they were off to the side.
“Nothing,” Annabel had insisted. “Louisa and I—”
“This is not about your cousin,” Lady Vickers bit off. She grabbed Annabel’s arm, hard. “I am talking about Mr. Grey, who is not, may I point out, the Earl of Newbury.”
Annabel could see that her grandmother’s rising voice was attracting attention, so she lowered her own, hoping that her grandmother would follow suit. “Lord Newbury isn’t even here yet,” she said. “If he were, I would—”
“Sit with him?” Lady Vickers raised an extremely skeptical brow. “Hang on his every word and behave for all the world like a harlot?”
Annabel gasped and drew back.
“Everyone is staring at you,” Lady Vickers hissed. “You can do whatever you want once you’re married. I’ll even tell you how to go about doing it. But for now, you will remain—and your reputation will remain—pure as the bloody driven snow.”
“What do you imagine I have been doing?” Annabel said in a low voice. Surely her grandmother did not know what had happened by the pond. No one did.
“Have I taught you nothing?” Lady Vickers’ eyes, as clear and sober as Annabel had ever seen them, settled hard on hers. “It doesn’t matter what you do, it matters what people think you do. And you’re staring at that man like you’re in love with him.”
But she was.
“I’ll try to do better,” was all Annabel said.
She finished her meal, because there was no way she would be seen running off to her room right after her grandmother publicly scolded her. But as soon as she’d finished eating, she excused herself and retired for the afternoon. She told Sebastian she needed to rest. Which was true. And that she did not want to be present when his uncle finally arrived.
Which was also true.
So she’d settled on her bed with Miss Sainsbury. And her mysterious colonel. And told herself that she deserved an afternoon to herself. She had a great deal to think about.
She knew what she wanted to do, and she knew what she should do, and she knew that these were not the same things at all.
She also knew that if she kept her head in a book for the entire afternoon, she might be able to ignore the whole awful mess for a few hours.
Which was remarkably appealing.
Maybe if she just waited long enough, something would happen, and all of her problems would disappear.
Her mother could find a long-lost diamond necklace.
Lord Newbury could find a girl with even bigger hips.
There could be a flood. A plague. Really, the world was full of calamities. Just look at poor Miss Sainsbury. In chapters three through eight she’d fallen off the side of a ship, was captured by a privateer, and nearly trampled by a goat.
Who was to say the same things might not happen to her?
Although, all things considered, the diamond necklace was a bit more appealing.
But a girl could hide for only so long, and so now she was sitting in front of the mirror, getting her hair yanked this way and that while Louisa filled her in on what she had missed.
“I saw Lord Newbury,” Louisa said.
Annabel let out a groany sort of sigh.
“He was talking with Lord Challis. He…ah …” Louisa swallowed nervously and plucked at the lace adornment on her dress. “He said something about a special license.”
“What? Ow!”
“Don’t move so suddenly,” Nettie scolded.
“What did he say about a special license?” Annabel whispered urgently. Not that there was any real reason to whisper. Nettie knew everything that was going on. Annabel had already promised two bonnets and a pair of shoes to keep quiet.
“Just that he had one. That was why he was so late. He came straight from Canterbury.”
“Did you speak with him?”
Louisa shook her head. “I don’t even think he saw me. I was reading in the library, and the door was open. They were in the corridor.”
“A special license,” Annabel repeated in a dull voice. A special license. It meant a couple could marry quickly, without posting banns. Three entire weeks could be saved, and the ceremony could take place anywhere, in any parish. At any time, even, although most couples still stuck to the traditional Saturday morning.
Annabel caught her own gaze in the looking glass. It was Thursday night.
Louisa reached out and took her hand. “I can help you,” she said.
Annabel turned to her cousin. Something about her voice made her uneasy. “What do you mean?”
“I have—” Louisa stopped, looking up at Nettie, who was spearing Annabel with another pin. “I need to speak with my cousin privately.”
“I only have this one last piece,” Nettie said, giving it what Annabel deemed a more vigorous twist than necessary. She fixed it into place with a pin and left the room.
“I have money,” Louisa said, just as soon as the door closed. “Not very much, but enough to help.”
“Louisa, no.”
“I never spend all of my pin money. My father gives me far more than I need.” She gave a sad little shrug. “It’s to make up for his absence in every other corner of my life, I’m sure. But that doesn’t matter. The point is, I can send some to your family. It will be enough to keep your brothers in school for another term, at least.”
“And the term after that?” Annabel said. Because there would be a term after that. And then another. And as generous as Louisa’s offer was, it would not last forever.
“We’ll deal with that when it comes. At the very least, we’ll have bought you a bit of time. You can meet someone else. Or maybe Mr. Grey—”
“Louisa!”
“No, listen to me,” Louisa interrupted. “Maybe he has money
no one knows about.”
“Don’t you think he’d have said something if he did?”
“He hasn’t—”
“No, he hasn’t,” Annabel cut in, hating the way her voice was cracking. But it was hard. It was hard to think about Sebastian and all of the reasons why she shouldn’t marry him. “He said he’s not a pauper and he said we wouldn’t starve, but when I reminded him that there are eight of us, he made a joke about our growing thin!”
Louisa winced, then tried to dismiss it. “Well, we knew he wasn’t as wealthy as the earl. But really, who is? And you don’t need jewels and palaces, do you?”
“Of course not! If it weren’t for my family, I’d—”
“You’d what? What, Annabel?”
I’d marry Sebastian.
But she dare not say it aloud.
“You must think of your own happiness,” Louisa said.
Annabel let out a snort. “What do you think I’ve been thinking about? If I hadn’t been thinking about my own happiness I’d have probably asked the earl to marry me.”
“Annabel, you cannot marry Lord Newbury.”
Annabel stared at her cousin in shock. It was the first time she had ever heard Louisa raise her voice.
“I won’t let you do it,” Louisa said urgently.
“Do you think I want to marry him?”
“Then don’t.”
Annabel clenched her teeth together in frustration. Not at Louisa. Just at life. “I don’t have your choices,” she finally said, trying to keep her voice even and calm. “I am not the daughter of the Duke of Fenniwick, and I don’t have a dowry large enough to purchase a small kingdom in the Alps, and I wasn’t raised in a castle, and—”
She stopped. The stricken look on Louisa’s face was enough. “I didn’t mean it that way,” she mumbled.
Louisa was silent for a moment before saying, “I know. But do you know, I don’t have your choices, either. Men have never fought over me at White’s. No one has ever flirted with me at the opera, and I certainly have never been compared to a fertility goddess.”
Annabel let out a little groan. “You heard that, too, eh?”
Louisa nodded. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” Annabel shook her head. “It’s funny, I suppose.”
“No, it’s not,” Louisa said, but she looked as if she was trying not to smile. She stole a glance at Annabel, saw that she was also trying not to smile, and gave up. “Yes, it is.”
And they laughed.
“Oh, Louisa,” Annabel said, once her laughter had melted into a wistful smile, “I do love you.”
Louisa reached over and patted her hand. “I love you, too, cousin.” Then she pushed back her chair and stood. “It’s time to go down.”
Annabel stood and followed her to the door.
Louisa walked out into the hall. “Lady Challis says there are to be charades after supper.”
“Charades,” Annabel repeated. Somehow that seemed ridiculously appropriate.
Lady Challis had instructed her guests to gather in the drawing room before supper. Annabel had waited until the last possible minute to head downstairs. Lord Newbury was not stupid; she had been avoiding him for several days, and she suspected he knew it. Sure enough, when she entered the drawing room, he was waiting near the door.
So, she noticed, was Sebastian.
“Miss Winslow,” the earl said, intercepting her immediately, “we must talk.”
“Supper,” Annabel replied, managing a curtsy at the same time. “Er, I think it’s almost time to go in.”
“We have time,” Newbury said curtly.
Out of the corner of her eye, Annabel could see Sebastian moving slowly toward her.
“I spoke to your grandfather,” Newbury said. “It is all arranged.”
It was all arranged? It was on the tip of Annabel’s tongue to ask him if he even thought to ask her. But she held back. The second-to-last thing she wanted was to cause a scene in Lady Challis’s drawing room. Not to mention that Lord Newbury would probably take that as an invitation to propose to her then and there.
Which was the last thing she wanted.
“Surely this is not the time, my lord,” she hedged.
But Newbury’s face tightened. And Sebastian was edging ever closer.
“I am making an announcement after supper,” Lord Newbury told her.
Annabel gasped. “You can’t do that!”
This seemed to amuse him. “Really?”
“You haven’t even asked me,” she protested. She nearly bit her tongue out of frustration. So much for not giving him the opening.
Newbury chuckled. “Is that the problem, then? Your pretty little pride has been pricked. Very well, I shall give you your hearts and flowers after supper.” He smiled lasciviously, his lower lip jiggling with the exertion. “And perhaps you shall give something to me in return.”
He put his hand on her arm, then let it slide down to her bottom.
“Lord Newbury!”
He pinched her.
Annabel jumped away, but the earl was already chuckling to himself and heading off to the dining room. And as she watched him go, she began to feel the strangest sensation.
Freedom.
Because finally, after avoiding and procrastinating and hoping that something would happen so that she would not have to say yes—or no—to the man whose offer of marriage would solve all her family’s problems, she realized that she simply could not do it.
Maybe last week, maybe before Sebastian…
No, she thought, as lovely and magnificent as he was, as much as she adored him and hoped he adored her, he wasn’t the only reason she couldn’t marry Lord Newbury. He did, however, provide a splendid alternative.
“What the hell just happened?” Sebastian demanded, at her side in an instant.
“Nothing,” Annabel replied, and she almost smiled.
“Annabel—”
“No, really. It was nothing. Finally, it was nothing.”
“What do you mean?”
She shook her head. Everyone was heading in to supper. “I’ll tell you later.”
She was having far too much fun with her own thoughts to share them, even with him. Who would have thought that a pinch on the bottom would be what finally made it all come clear? It hadn’t even been the pinch, actually, but the look in his eyes.
Like he owned her.
In that moment she realized there were at least ten reasons why she could never, ever commit herself to that man in marriage.
Ten, but probably more like a hundred.
Chapter Twenty-two
One, Annabel thought happily as she took her seat at the table, Lord Newbury was simply too old. Not to mention that Two: he was so desperate for an heir that he’d probably injure her in the attempt, and certainly no woman with a broken hip could carry a baby for nine months. And of course there was—
“Why are you smiling?” Sebastian whispered.
He was standing behind her, supposedly on his way to his own seat, which was diagonal to hers, two seats closer to the head of the table. How anyone might think that her seat was on the way to his was beyond her, which brought her to a revision of Three: she seemed to have attracted the attention of the most charming and lovable man in England, and who was she to turn such a treasure away?
“I’m just happy to be down at the far end of the table with the rest of the peons,” she whispered back. Lady Challis was nothing if not a stickler for propriety, and there would be no deviations from the order of rank when it came to her seating arrangements. Which meant that with nearly forty guests between Annabel and the head of the table, Lord Newbury seemed miles away.
Even more delightful, she had been seated directly next to Sebastian’s cousin Edward, whose company she had so enjoyed at lunch. As it would be rude to remain lost in her own thoughts, she quickly decided to rename her brothers and sisters Four through Ten. Surely they loved her well enough not to want her to enter into such a hi
deous union on their behalf.
She turned to Mr. Valentine, beaming. Smiling so widely, in fact, that he actually seemed taken aback.
“Isn’t it a marvelous evening?” she asked, because it was.
“Er, yes.” He blinked a few times, then shot a quick look over to Sebastian, almost as if checking for approval. Or maybe just to see if he was watching.
“I am so glad that you are attending,” she continued, gazing happily at the soup. She was hungry. Happiness always made her hungry. She looked back up at Mr. Valentine, lest he think she was pleased by the soup’s attendance (although she was; she really was), and added, “I had not realized that you would be here.” Her grandmother had obtained a guest list from Lady Challis, and Annabel was certain there had been no Valentines on it.
“I was a very recent addition.”
“I am sure Lady Challis was most pleased to have you.” She smiled again; she couldn’t seem to help herself. “Now then, Mr. Valentine, we must speak of far more important matters. I am sure you must know many terribly embarrassing stories about your cousin, Mr. Grey.”
She leaned forward a bit, eyes gleaming. “I want to hear them all.”
Sebastian could not decide if he was intrigued or enraged.
No, not true. He pondered rage for about two moments, then remembered he never got angry and decided he preferred intrigue.
He had almost interceded when Newbury had cornered Annabel in the drawing room, and in fact he’d had quite the most delicious urge to pinch his uncle on the eyelid after he’d pinched Annabel on the bum. But just as he stepped forward, Annabel had undergone the most remarkable transformation. For a few moments, it was almost as if she wasn’t there, as if her mind had lifted off and gone to some faraway, blissful spot.
She’d looked lifted. Weightless.
Sebastian could not fathom what his uncle might have said to make her so happy, but he recognized the futility of trying to question her while everyone was filing in to supper.
So he decided that if Annabel wasn’t going to be furious about Newbury’s pinch, then neither would he.
At supper she was positively incandescent, which, given the two-seats-down-and-across-the-tableness of their positions, was somewhat irksome. He could not enjoy her radiance, nor could he take credit for it. She did seem to be enjoying her conversation with Edward immensely, and Sebastian found that if he leaned just a bit to his left he could hear almost half of what they were saying.