A Proper Scandal (29 page)

T
here was a warm but spacious room in the rear of Elisabeth's foundation building that she had designated long ago as the reception room for new girls on the night of a rescue raid. Originally conceived as living space for a married butler and his housekeeper wife, the room connected to the kitchens and led to the garden.

It was anchored by a long table, thick and sturdy, that was lined on both sides by low benches with cheerful pink cushions. On the night of a raid, the table would be laid with warm bread and salty cheese, sweets, milk, ham, and fruit.

Along the wall was a small cot, also made up in the sweetest pink, with soft linens and fluffy pillows, and warm blankets folded at the end. Two bookshelves offered picture books and simple novels on the higher shelves; an array of bonnets, ribbons, and fans on the lower. A large crib in the corner was filled with dolls in frilly dresses and explosively curly hair. Near the fire, which illuminated the room with warm, orange light, lay three friendly dogs and a cat.

By design, the room was meant to appear irresistible to frightened, deprived, lonely girls. The dogs, the fripperies, and the dolls were the result of years of consideration. Elisabeth wanted each girl, no matter how frightened or displaced, to feel welcome and curious and open to the program that the foundation would offer her if she elected to stay.

Despite the food and the toys, the blankets and the pets, a final, crucial element was the large, arched door that led to the garden and the outside gate beyond. Both door and gate remained open—wide and gaping—while the girls were welcomed in, situated, introduced, and fed.

Open doors posed all kinds of security risks, and it meant that Stoker and his lads remained outside, patrolling, on alert and in danger for more than an hour while the girls settled in. Still, to Elisabeth, the open doors were essential. A lock on any room, she knew—even a comfortable and safe and inviting room—could be just as terrifying as any of the places from which they had come.

To that end, they kept the doors open, even on cold nights, even in the rain. There was to be no question about anyone's will in the matter of a rescue. If a girl did not wish to stay in Elisabeth's care, she need only walk through the open door.

It was, she thought, looking around this very room, exactly the manner of choice Bryson had given her. An open door. A way out. He did not mean to reject her so much as to say,
This is all my heart can allow. Manage with this much—this little—or go.

Or perhaps she was being too generous.

Perhaps he did simply reject her.

She sighed, reminding herself that the marriage he had offered was hardly the husbandly equivalent of a warm, inviting room. But for some women, it might have been enough. It simply was not enough for her.

She looked around the spacious room at chores that needed to be completed before the next group of girls came. She smiled hopefully at Jocelyn Breedlowe.

Jocelyn was shaking her head. “I cannot possibly handle this—not alone, Elisabeth.”

“You can, and you must,” Elisabeth countered softly. “The sooner I leave, the better.”

Jocelyn's head still shook. “But all the way to Yorkshire?”

“Stoker may never go if I do not personally escort him to the school. And Rainsleigh has bade me go, so . . . two birds, one stone. That said, the raids and acquisition of newly rescued girls must not stop simply because I am away. Not when you may be here to do the important work.”

“But I've never even been present on the night of a raid.”

“Oh, it's really rather exciting,” Elisabeth said, sliding a crate of food from the market down the table. “You will enjoy it, I think. The other staff will help you. You bring a calming presence that will be a boon to the rattled girls. They will need you more than ever, with Stoker gone.”

“You have too much confidence in me. I don't understand why you and Stoker cannot wait. The raid is just three days away.”

Elisabeth hefted a sack of flour aloft and looked at her. “And where else am I to go? My aunt is relocating to the other side of the moon. She mustn't even know. And I cannot go back to Henrietta Place.”

“You could live here for a time.” Jocelyn began to unpack the provisions.

Elisabeth shook her head and plunked the flour on the table. “Rainsleigh would seek me out; maybe not soon, but eventually. You saw him hound me—for weeks, he has hounded me, even when he was furious with me. He tracks me down so he may hold me at arm's length. I cannot take it anymore. I cannot.”

“Perhaps he will track you to Yorkshire?”

Another head shake. “This circumstance with Mr. Eads will keep him quite busy, I'm afraid.” She thought about this, thought about the two men embracing when she'd left. “I could have helped him sort it out. It would have been the perfect opportunity for us to function as a little team, working toward a common goal. To turn to each other for support and counsel. But Rainsleigh does not want a wife in this way. He doesn't want a wife at all. He wants a figurehead.”

The crate was empty and she carried it to the door. “No, I will not stay, I cannot. He has offered me the opportunity to bow out, and I will take it.”

“But he would not wish you injury nor harm. It is dangerous for a lady to travel alone in a public coach for so many days.”

“I won't be alone. I shall have Stoker with me. It's not the Orient, Jocelyn, I'm only going to Yorkshire.”

“You are
not
,” said a male voice from behind her, “going to Yorkshire.”

Elisabeth froze.

Slowly, she turned around.

Rainsleigh filled the doorway, hovering on the garden stoop.

The bottom fell from Elisabeth's stomach, and she stared, taking in his handsome face, red with exertion. Had he run here? His chest rose and fell as he took in great gulps of air.

“Please tell me you have not chased me here,” she managed to say. He looked resigned and ruffled and sad, and she reminded herself of her own determination and sadness. She was determined not to be affected. With great force of will, she turned her back on him and walked to the basin. There were potatoes, fresh from the market, and a pail of water. She took up the scrub brush, wet it, and selected a potato.

“Chased you is exactly what I have done,” he said, ducking through the door. “And I will chase you all the way to Yorkshire if I must.”

“You mustn't.”

“
No
,” countered Rainsleigh, crossing his arms over his chest, “
you
must not. You won't. Not now.”

“I'm going,” said Elisabeth, stressing the words, “and you cannot tell me what to do.”

“I am your husband, and I very well may tell you what to do, if it pleases me.”

Her head shot up.

“But it does not please me,” he finished, raising an eyebrow. “However, I will
ask
you not to go.”

“And why?” It was out before she could stop herself. She scrubbed the potato as if her life depended on it and then dropped it into a bowl before taking up the next, angry at herself for engaging him.

“If you'll excuse me,” mumbled Jocelyn, “I'll just check on the girls' sewing . . . ” Before Elisabeth could stop her, she slipped discreetly through the kitchen door.

“You cannot go to Yorkshire because I need you. Here. With me. Because I am lost without you.”

“Lost?” She dropped the potato. “
Lost?
” She reeled around, pointing at him with the dripping scrub brush. “Spare me the hyperbole, please. I know of no other man more capable than you. Only you could lose your entire birthright and have a self-made, independent fortune waiting to sustain you in exactly the same style.”

“I don't require you to
navigate my life
, Elisabeth. I need you because my life is worthless without you in it. The money? The boats? Even the birthright—it means nothing to me if you are not at my side.”

“Bryson . . . ” she began, shaking her head. She turned back to the sink and picked up another potato. “This week has been the sort that would drive any man to edge of sanity. First the wedding and now Mr. Eads? Even you can be expected to flounder a bit. It is precipitous, I think, to judge your needs based on all that has happened since Wednesday.”

“I needed you before Wednesday,” he countered, taking a step toward her. “I needed you on Tuesday”—another step—“and Monday, and every day before that. I have needed you since I first saw you disappear into your aunt's stairwell.”

She dropped the brush again and threw the potato into the pail with a
plunk
. “Two nights ago, I told you that I loved you, and you . . . you said nothing. A day later you began to talk about sending me away. I am stubborn, but I am not stupid. It's too late.” She lifted a section of her skirt and dried her hands.

“It is never too late,” he said. He was close enough to touch her now. She turned again to the sink.

“I know this, only because of you. I have the figure of a real father now, because of you. I have an entirely new future with no title and certain scandal—”

“Because of me,” she said to the potatoes.

He leaned in, speaking in a low voice, “I was going to say,
but I am at peace with it—because of you.
”

She shook her head, refusing this logic, refusing, even, to look at him. “You are
at peace
with all of this
at the moment
, Bryson.
At the moment
, all things seem possible, because you are swimming in bad luck and poor timing, and I am a proficient source of support who does not judge. But what if all was well with your world, and it was
my
life falling apart? What if I was wretched? What if
I
needed to rely on
you
? Because this, too, will happen. It's only a matter of time. Life, as you must know, is not exactly as you direct it.”

“Yes, and thank God,” he said on a breath. “Because I never would have directed my life to know you.”

“That's a lie; you have hounded me. You hound me still. But not for what I want or what I need. Not for forever.”

“Hear what I have to say, please,” he said softly, reaching out. He caught her wrist and held it gently. “I have more than hounded you, Elisabeth, I have pursued you with a single-minded vigor. Not only is out of character for me, but it has been exhausting. In my right mind, I should never have endured. In my right mind, I should never have set my sights for a woman who runs a charity for prostitutes, who was in possession of a deep, dark secret that she revealed in her own time, rather than mine. Who—and I am speculating here—blackmailed me for her charity and the extradition of her aunt—before she would agree to marry me.”

“Don't forget, who was not even a pure, virginal bride,” Elisabeth interjected flatly.

“Oh, you were a virgin, but that is beside the point. What I was going to say, was—”

“Wait.” She pulled her wrist from his hand and reared back. “Stop. What did you say?”

“You were a virgin; I thought you knew—”

“How was I to know? Why, why . . . didn't you tell me?”

“Oh, well,” he hedged, “I was distracted, I suppose. It didn't seem important at the time. It's not important.”

“But my almost-certain ‘impurity' was the primary reason I didn't tell you about the brothel,” she whispered. “You wanted a virgin.” She came to the bench beside the table and dropped onto it.

“No, I wanted you, Elisabeth,” he began carefully. “I didn't care that you were a virgin; I only cared that you were mine. That is all I have ever cared about.”

“But how can I be yours if you will not allow yourself . . . to belong to me in return?”

“Oh, my darling,” he said, crouching before her, taking up her hands, “I want nothing more than to belong to you. Forever. Please, can you overlook my stupidity, and reticence, and fear, and every other bloody barrier I have erected between us? Can you help me show you that I”—he looked away, squeezing his eyes shut, and then looked back at her—“that I
love you
, Elisabeth. And that my greatest wish is to remain in our marriage—our
real
marriage—starting now, until death, like the bishop said?”

She blinked down at him, fighting for control. Her mind was a tangle of desire, and fear, and fledgling hope.

“Whatever life brings,” he continued, his voice breaking, “if you will have me. I want only you, and I want all of you, just as you are. I give the whole of my heart into your safekeeping.”

“And I'm expected to believe that your fear of . . . of . . . intimacies has just disappeared?”

“Oh, Elisabeth,” he said, burying his face in her lap, “that was the first thing to go. Please.” He looked up. His eyes glistened, but there was a slight smile on his face. “We shall sleep in the same bed, always—beginning tonight. My bed, your bed, on the rug before the fire—whatever strikes us. I said that you could not go to Yorkshire, but I only meant that you could not go without me. If you wish to make the journey with Stoker, then I shall go too. Wherever you go, I shall go.”

“But Bryson—why? Why the change of heart? Is it merely because you turned around and I was not there? How can I trust this?”

He nodded. His blue eyes darted right, as if searching for . . . for . . . It occurred to her that she had no idea what he would say. She had expected some of his speech when she saw him walk in the door—well, she had
hoped.
But the answer to this? This was essential.

She could not threaten to flee to Yorkshire every time he detached from her. She had to trust that he would not force distance between them ever again.

“The strangest thing occurred to me when I grabbed hold of Mr. Eads and embraced him,” he finally said, looking at her. “Did you see it before you went? When he shook my hand? We actually stood in the center of the room and embraced. I wept on his neck like a child.”