Married to a Stranger (11 page)

‘I am sure it will.’ Sophia gestured to the footman to pour more coffee for both of them. Callum had been used to a bachelor existence with Daniel. No doubt their servants had improvised to cope with whatever their young masters wanted and the brothers would not stand on too much ceremony. England was quite another matter and no doubt his comments would find their way back to Mrs Datchett’s ears before long. Diplomacy would be called for.

‘Madam’s cards have arrived, sir.’ Hawksley proffered a salver and Callum picked up the rectangle of pasteboard on it, nodded his approval and passed it to Sophia.

‘There you are. We must be married, it says so there.’

Mrs Callum Chatterton

Half Moon Street and Long Welling Manor, Hertfordshire

The card was stiff, gilt edged and elegant. ‘Oh. Thank you.’ How daunting. These were for when she made calls without her husband. At home her name had been on Mama’s card, so this was the first time she had had her own. But who on earth was she to call upon? She knew no one in London.

‘Right. I’ll be off, if you will excuse me. I’ll leave you to get on with your letters.’ Callum rose and came to bend over her shoulder. Sophia turned to say goodbye and was surprised by a kiss on the cheek. Against her skin his was smooth, with just the faintest hint of bristle after his morning shave. Castile soap, a trace of sandalwood, virtually no trace of the warm smell of heated male skin. Even so there was a tug, low in her belly, as her newly awakened body responded to the closeness of his.

‘Goodbye,’ she said, with an attempt at cool composure and hoped her thoughts did not show in her voice. ‘Have a good day in the City.’

His grimace made her smile and then he was gone, leaving her alone in her own house, with her own servants. Her first day as a married woman.

Sophia finished her coffee and bread and butter as she listened to the sounds of her new home. Carriages in the street, snatches of conversation as people passed, the clatter of booted feet running down the stone steps into the narrow area at the front of the house and then more voices as someone in the kitchen opened the lower door. Callum’s voice talking to Hawksley in the hall, the bang of the front door, the slight sound of Michael shifting his stance as he stood by the buffet waiting for her next order.

All she had to do was to make this household run like clockwork. Her husband was a hard-working man with a lot on his mind; he must come home to domestic perfection, a home that ran so smoothly he never even noticed. That was not so hard, she told herself, even if she had no idea what Callum’s likes or dislikes were yet. And by the time she had managed that, then perhaps she would have made some acquaintances, begun to create a new life for herself. ‘Michael, please give my compliments to Mrs Datchett and ask her to join me in my sitting room in half an hour.’

That had sounded confident enough; she only hoped the woman was easy to deal with. She had rehearsed everything they needed to settle in her head and was waiting, a list to hand, when the cook-housekeeper entered. She seemed a pleasant, competent woman, Sophia decided after a few minutes. She suggested things that needed to be bought for the kitchen and scullery, announced that the staff quarters and service area were most satisfactory, nodded agreement to the housekeeping allowance that Sophia proposed and then asked, ‘And will you be entertaining much, ma’am?’

‘I expect so. In the meantime my husband may well bring colleagues home to dine at very short notice. He does not expect a formal dinner on those occasions. Is that likely to be a problem?’

‘No, ma’am. If we agree the menus for the week I’ll make sure we have enough food in the larder to add extra dishes as required.’

That was a relief. ‘Can you cook Indian food, Mrs Datchett?’

‘No, ma’am!’ She frowned. ‘No, but there’s a receipt for a curry in one of my cook books. That’s Indian, I think.’

Mrs Datchett bustled off back downstairs and Sophia set herself to explore her new domain. Her bedchamber and dressing room were well appointed; they just needed a fresh coat of paint and some new hangings, as did the rooms on the ground floor and the hall, stairs and landings.

Which just left Callum’s study and bedroom. The doors were unlocked and he had not said he did not want them disturbed. Even so, it was with the sensation that she was entering Bluebeard’s chamber that she turned the handle on the bedroom door.

Chapter Eleven

H
is valet had unpacked and tidied the room, but Callum had somehow managed to imprint his personality on the space far more than Sophia felt she had in her own chamber. Wilkins had gone out on an errand to the bootmaker so she could explore without fear of interruption.

There were silver-backed brushes on the dresser, a silver dish with tie pins in it, a few small boxes, everything with the cat’s mask from the family crest. He must have taken things from the Hall, she guessed, to replace those lost at sea.

In her room was the trunk filled with the trousseau she had embroidered with this very crest. Fortunately she had not followed her mother’s suggestion of adding an entwined
D
and
S
to the cat’s mask, so everything was usable and if she did not draw attention to it perhaps Callum would not think about who they had originally been intended for.

She moved around the room, touching the books heaped on the dresser, on the floor beside the bed, uneasy about picking them up. There was a pencil and a pile of paper on the nightstand as though thoughts might come to him in the middle of the night and have to be recorded immediately. An oil painting of the Hall hung on one wall, on the other a smaller version of the triple portrait of the brothers that hung over the fireplace in William’s study.

Daniel’s charming, boyish smile was vivid, even in this copy, contrasting with Callum’s steady, thoughtful gaze. That was the Daniel she remembered, but was it the man he had grown into? The adult Callum she could see clearly in the youth, but he had a harder edge now that this serious boy had been lacking. Sophia reached up and touched Daniel’s painted cheek. ‘I’m sorry, Daniel. Sorry I fell out of love with you, sorry you are gone.’

There were Indian objects too, she found as she wandered around the room. Callum must have sent them home over the years. She picked up a small soapstone carving of a god with the head of an elephant, an ivory panel carved deeply with swirling vines, fruit, birds and a tiny lizard, then a set of boxes, vivid with enamelled colours, so light that they must be
papier maché.

The slippers by the bed were backless embroidered leather with curling toes, the robe at the foot of the bed was not the plain red one she had seen last night, but a gorgeous weave of blues and black in heavy cotton. Callum would look like an exotic Eastern prince wearing those, she thought with a sensual shiver.

On impulse she turned back the covers and ran her hand into the bed. No folded nightshirt: he must sleep naked. Feeling as though she had been caught watching through a spy hole, Sophia jerked back her hand and straightened the bed.

Still, she couldn’t drag herself away. It was as though this exploration would reveal the man she had married, answer questions she dare not ask. The bottles on the dresser were coloured glass and each, when she removed the stopper and sniffed, held a different perfumed oil. Sandalwood in one, a musky, disturbing fragrance in another, a third filled with something that teased her nostrils with the warm scent of spice.

The clothes press held the sombre coats and waistcoats of a gentleman who had been in mourning. The woollen cloth was of the highest quality, the dark waistcoats were silk. What was his normal taste? Would he buy more flamboyant waistcoats now, more dashing coats?

Drawers revealed piles of white shirts in fine linen, muslin neckcloths, handkerchiefs. All new and good quality. She touched things, ran her fingers over them, inhaling the scent of starched linen and masculine leather. There was a pile of hat boxes from Lock’s and more boxes revealed gleaming boots and evening slippers. Callum had not been averse to shopping for himself, she realised.

Sophia scanned the room. Had she left everything as it had been? Yes, she was sure of it, he would never know she had been in here.

Next door the study was quite incredibly untidy in contrast to the bedchamber. Obviously Wilkins had no control here. Books had been unpacked from chests and were stacked all around and in piles on the shelves. A drawing slope had been set up and boxes on it revealed pens and rulers, inks, chalks, a box of watercolours, the squares of paint dry and brittle.

Sophia stood for a while looking at the pristine white sheet pinned to the board, her fingers itching for a pencil, a stick of pastel, anything to draw with. She turned away before the urge to mark the clean surface overcame discretion.

A pile of papers was on one end of the desk under a piece of marble with a carving of a tiger on it. Folders were heaped at the other end, bristling with markers. There were letters, too, stacked on the leather desktop, already annotated on their wrappers.

She stood by the desk and looked around. Here she did not dare touch anything. The desk needed a blotter. She must add checking the inkwells and the blotting paper to the footmen’s routine.

Callum knew people, many people, here in London, she realised, looking at the amount of correspondence. His work would bring him into contact with them, every day. He would not be lonely and he would doubtless soon make friends, and so would she.

Now she would have luncheon and go out shopping with a dress allowance beyond her wildest fantasies, and in shops that she had dreamed of visiting. It would be feeble of her indeed to feel sorry for herself with that prospect in view.

* * *

Cal sat back in the hackney carriage and willed himself to relax for however long it took to negotiate the evening traffic between the City and Mayfair. Strange that a musty, battered carriage represented the peaceful neutral ground between two battlefields—the East India Company headquarters and his own household.

The Company he could deal with, given hard work and careful tactics. Already he could see his path clearly there. They had sized him up in the first weeks, considered the reports he had worked on, the way he had reconstructed what he could of the information lost in the wreck, both his work and Daniel’s. They would have listened to the senior company officials who had survived and, eventually they made him the offer of a post that was all he had hoped and more.

It had been a strain, focusing on the work, the discussions, while he was still physically and mentally wounded from the wreck. Perhaps his sombre demeanour and total focus had been what had convinced them. He would probably never know.

But now he had a shared office, a clerk and a challenge to reform an area of the business that was very much to his taste and he knew he would find it, quite legitimately, highly profitable. It would be pleasant to be rich. He smiled, amused at himself. He was not badly off now—it would take a foolish or unlucky servant of the Company not to make money—but to be in the position to develop the two estates into something fine, buy all the bloodstock he fancied … Perhaps exert enough influence that a title came his way. Yes, tempting.

The other campaign was his marriage and that promised to hold far more damaging skirmishes. Sophia’s confession coming so soon after the culmination of their lovemaking had left him almost dizzy. She had not loved Daniel. Part of him resented that on his twin’s behalf, but he knew it was unjust. He had healed enough to be able to see Dan again just as clearly as he ever had. His brother had fallen out of love with Sophia—it would be hypocritical to blame her for doing exactly the same thing.

Except for one small detail—of the two of them, she was the one who could have broken the engagement with honour. And she had not. If she had, he would never have thought to offer for her, let alone press the matter. He should be angry with her, but he was not and a small glow of satisfaction that he could not analyse kept disturbing him. Surely he was not glad that she had fallen out of love with Daniel? That would be absurd, it was not as though he was in love with her himself.

This morning she had been poised and pleasant, apparently happy to be with him. But she had not seemed in the slightest bit concerned that he was leaving her alone all day, and when he had kissed her cheek she had stiffened. For a mad moment he had been tempted to pull her from the chair, kiss her hard and possessively on the mouth, there and then in front of the watching servants.

It occurred to him that perhaps he had been too demonstrative in his lovemaking last night. She was very innocent and shy. Now the memory of that little shiver when he had touched her was lodged in his mind as well. Last night had been the first time for her and he knew he must have hurt her. It would be his duty, and his pleasure, to make certain that every time from now on was better.

Never had the contemplation of duty been so arousing. The images his brain was conjuring up stirred his body to the point of discomfort. Grimly Callum began to calculate compound interest in his head. By the time he was delivered to his own front door his unruly body was under control, but he was still achingly aware of it. It did not help that he recognised it was entirely his own fault.
She is almost a virgin,
he reminded himself.

‘Madam is in the drawing room, sir.’ Hawksley took hat, gloves and cane. ‘Dinner is at eight, if that is satisfactory.’

‘Whatever Mrs Chatterton says. Please send up hot water and Wilkins. I will bathe and shave.’

Callum paused on the threshold of his room. It looked just as it had when he’d left it that morning and yet he had the feeling that someone had been there. One of the maids, no doubt, dusting. And Wilkins would have tidied up, too. Yet he could not quite shake off the sensation of a presence that lingered on the edge of his perception.

He turned and opened the door to his study. Again, just as he had left it. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. England smelt strange after years of the dust and strong scents of India. Ah, yes, just the faint hint of the rose perfume that Sophia wore. How strange that he had sensed her presence so quickly. That teasing hint of perfume must have been what had alerted him—he had no idea his sense of smell was that acute. And there, in the rug about three feet from the desk, were the prints of two small heels. She had stood, and looked, for several minutes to leave those deep little dents.

Unaccountably disturbed, Callum began to prowl around. Nothing was touched. The heel marks were indented beside his drawing slope, too; she had studied that also. What had she said last night about her art? That it was the most important thing to her? He had forgotten all about the way she had been smudged with charcoal and chalks as a girl.

He went to his room and bathed and changed with his mind only half on what he was doing. ‘I must speak to the maids,’ Wilkins said, tight-lipped as Cal considered the neckcloths he was proffering, draped over his arm. ‘They have been rummaging.’

‘Rummaging? Where?’ Cal selected a length of muslin and began the intricate business of tying a knot of his own invention.

‘Amongst your shirts and other things, sir. I know to a fraction just how I leave them. And every drawer is always left completely closed. Someone has been touching them and replacing them with care, if not total precision.’

‘Nothing is missing, I hope.’ The valet shook his head. ‘Then I would not mention it. Mrs Chatterton may well have been checking over my linen.’

Wilkins appeared to be restraining himself with an effort. His thoughts on wives interfering in his domain were quite obvious, but training held and he said nothing.

How very intriguing. Cal inserted a diamond tiepin and gave his cuffs a final twitch. Sophia was curious about him, it seemed. It made him realise that he had hardly given her, as a person, a thought except insofar as her thoughts and actions affected him and his plans. There was the woman he had made love to and the well-behaved young lady whom he had married and the woman who had fallen in and out of love and lost his twin—but what was going on in her head? What was important to her now in this marriage?

What, he wondered with a frown, did she think of him?

It was an hour since she had heard Callum come in. Sophia unpicked the last dozen stitches that she had set in her embroidery, pricked her finger, said ‘Rats!’ in a most unladylike fashion and stuck it in her mouth before the blood got on to the linen.

‘What on earth is the matter?’

And now her careful pose of sweet domesticity for her returning husband was shattered. She took her finger out of her mouth and held it away from her gown while she fumbled in her reticule for a handkerchief. ‘I was sewing and I pricked my finger and I do not want to get blood on the cloth or my new gown—oh, thank you.’ Callum shook out a large clean linen square and handed it to her. ‘Have you had a good day?’ He did not look as though he had spent a tiring day bent over paperwork or in stuffy meetings or whatever it was that he did. She realised that she had no idea.

‘Interesting and quite positive, I think. That is a very handsome gown.’

Was that warmth in his eyes as he studied the amber silk with its coffee-brown ribbons? She felt a definite warming herself as she studied the lean figure in the dark elegance of evening dress. There were muscles under that smooth tailoring; she had felt them shift under her hands as he drove into her body.

‘You do not think it is too bright in colour? I was a trifle unsure, but it had been returned to the
modiste
and it happened to fit and I thought that while I waited for the other gowns I had ordered to be finished …’ She was prattling with nerves. Sophia stopped and reminded herself to breathe.

‘I think it is very suitable. The ribbons are a trifle sombre, perhaps. Could they be replaced with ruffles or something?’ Callum grinned, transforming his expression. ‘Or am I completely adrift—will it quite ruin the style if you do that?’

That smile.
Oh, my goodness.
That was all she needed on top of her overheated thoughts. Sophia smiled back, her heart lifting. She had not realised just how tense she was. ‘Of course it will! Have you no experience of ladies’ fashions, sir?’ It was meant as a joke, but then she remembered that he had no sisters, had not been in England for years, so the only ladies’ fashions he would have encountered would have been in India and the ones he would have taken an interest in were probably on the backs of his mistresses.