Page 12

Chapter Twelve

In the shadows…

T he interior of Gunter’s was lively. On such a cold day, one would think that ices were the last thing people wanted, but then it, much like Hyde Park, was simply a place to see and be seen. The frozen treats were not the primary attraction.

So much of their daily lives was simply for show, Marina reflected. And she detested all of it. She didn’t know enough about country living to say whether or not she’d prefer it. Her aunt and uncle were very much city dwellers, after all. But she thought she might like to at least give it a go. It certainly couldn’t be worse than being stared at as though one were a specimen to be examined in a laboratory.

“Are you fixed on remaining in town after the Season?” she asked, striving for a casual tone. She was deeply aware of Stephens hovering nearby, hanging on their every word. No doubt she would run home and report even the slightest of improprieties. Not that Willa asked her to do such things. That was simply Stephens’s way.

“I have not yet decided. I rather think that decision, and many others, will be better made at a later date with proper contribution from all parties involved,” he answered. His tone wasn’t casual at all. It was laced with meaning.

“I see.” Rather than ask further questions that would make their situation even more awkward, Marina simply took a bite of the cherry ice he’d ordered for her. “It is rather delicious. One of my favorite treats.”

“I shall commit that to memory then,” he said. “Are there other things you enjoy? Chocolates? Art? Particular authors?”

“Oh, you would be hard pressed to find any young woman who doesn’t love chocolate,” she admitted with a laugh. “As for art, I greatly appreciate the endeavors of others but have next to no skill myself. Even my aunt, who is an excellent artist herself and quite accomplished as a teacher, gave me up for a lost cause. But reading… that is my vice, I fear. I could spend entire days with my nose buried in some fantastical novel or other.”

“Do you have a favorite?” he asked.

Marina looked at him, worried that he was only asking to be polite. But when she met his gaze, it seemed that he was genuinely interested. “You’ll think me a ninny when I admit it, but I do love any book that frightens me. I recently read The Horror of Oakendale Abbey and it was simply mesmerizing.”

“I don’t think it silly at all. I’m a fan of Mary Shelley’s, personally. I think she was infinitely more gifted than her husband, and likely Byron as well. Though that opinion was hardly popular when I was at university.”

“Did you attend Oxford or Cambridge? Or did you stay in the North?”

“Oh, it was definitely the North,” he confessed with a grin. “It was the University of Edinburgh. My grandfather was quite insistent that I not attend Oxford or Cambridge. He was rather firm in his dislike of the aristocracy that he’d fled as a young man, I’m afraid.”

Marina smiled at his rueful tone. “Were you there for the Snowball Riots?”

“I’m surprised you know of them! But no. Alas, I had left university the year prior and was working in my grandfather’s coal company by then,” he explained. “In truth, I am sad to have missed it. It certainly seems as though it would have been an event worth remembering.”

“So it would. Does it snow very much in Copley?” she asked.

“It does. I believe we get more snow there than anywhere in all of England. It’s a small village. But quite pretty, especially with new fallen snow. Marina… if you are concerned that I mean to take you from London, well, naturally there will be times when I must return to Copley to see to business matters, but I do not expect you to give up your life here.”

“What if I wanted to?” She’d voiced the question softly, but the weight of it was very real. For so long, she’d been avoiding any real prospect of marriage, terrified that she would find herself once more in the sights of some well-camouflaged fortune hunter. But their current situation wasn’t one of his planning. He hadn’t strategized all of this simply to trap her for his own personal gain. And he’d been incredibly forthcoming about his reasons for marrying her. It was refreshing not to be lied to by a man.

“Is your life here in London really so terrible?” he asked softly.

Shaking her head, she replied, “I love Aunt Willa and Uncle Devil. I love my rapscallion cousins. And Charlotte is my dearest friend. But the truth of the matter is that I do not have very much of a life here at all.” She paused, drawing a deep breath as she admitted something to him that she had never said to anyone else. “I detest being an object of curiosity and ridicule, a person to be scoffed at by others because they think the gossip about me is true or that I’m somehow beneath them. So many people in the city are simply watching and waiting for me to do something so scandalous that they can pat themselves on the back for looking down their noses at me all my life long.”

*

Caleb was quiet. For most of the outing, he had been answering her questions but not initiating any of his own. It wasn’t as if he were lacking in conversational skills, but rather that he was too distracted watching the delicate slide of the small silver spoon between her berry-pink lips. In that moment, he pulled his gaze away long enough to actually formulate a response to what she had said. It felt significant—important to their future.

He would admit, at least to himself, that the shine had worn off London for him as well. Initially, it had been exciting. And there had been some notion for him that with a title, that was where he belonged. But the title did not ultimately change who and what he was… and that was a collier from the North Country. But the city was far dirtier to his mind than any coalfield ever would be. That was at least honest work. The city, in contrast, had streets running with refuse from humans and animals alike. Dark alleyways, where the worst sorts of horrors took place by the minute, abounded. The starvation and misery he’d seen since his arrival was simply astonishing. He was not so naive as to think one man could change it all, nor was he so naive that he didn’t recognize that the group of people who had the power to effect such change were disinclined to do so. At least in County Durham, he had the ability to do something about the misery he saw, even if it was simply offering employment or supporting the church’s funds for widows and orphans with a substantial contribution.

“I don’t care for London,” he said simply. “I thought perhaps I would, and it was certainly exciting enough when I first arrived. But the longer I am here… well, it’s like anything else when one looks under the shiny surface, isn’t it?”

“Indeed it is,” she replied. “I’ve never been out of London for very long at a time. We’d spend time at my uncle’s country estate in the summer, but he’s a city dweller. He enjoys the excitement of it all. I think he even enjoys society to some degree, but more at its expense than as a participant.”

He looked thoughtful for a moment. “I don’t care for this kind of forced gaiety amidst the misery of others. It saddens me to hear that you have faced such censure when you have done nothing—when you could have done nothing—to deserve such treatment.”

She looked as though she wasn’t entirely so certain. “You are a kind man.”

“Not especially,” he said, not wanting to foster any idealized notion she might have of him. He had his share of faults, more than most according to some. “I’m a fair man, or I strive to be… If you have finished your ice, I think perhaps we should make our way back to Park Lane. No doubt your uncle will have questions for me by now.”

“I’m sure you’re correct.”

Caleb watched as she placed her spoon in the small bowl and delicately wiped her lips. He was jealous of that piece of fabric, he thought, envying its proximity to a mouth he now desperately wanted to kiss. He understood that such desires were primarily one-sided—at least for the time being—he hoped that the attraction he had for her was not. And he hoped desperately to have an opportunity to nurture that attraction until his desires were reciprocated. But she hardly knew him. If he couldn’t stop salivating over her long enough for her to get to know him, it might never change.

Rising from his chair, Caleb offered her his arm, bracing himself for the jolt her touch would create. Like before, it was electric. Perhaps it was that which had him so distracted as they began the short walk back to her home. Or perhaps it was his curiosity at why he was responding to her in such a manner when no other woman had ever had such an effect on him. Was it his own frame of mind as he knew that he wished to find a bride? Was it some sort of primal masculine possessiveness because she had now been promised to him? Regardless, he felt compelled to tell her that what was happening between them may have been brought about by the events at the Crowdens’ ball, but that it was certainly not the entirety of it. He wanted her to know that he wanted her for her and that he’d been attempting to seek an introduction to her from before their encounter in the library.

“Marina…?”

She turned back to him. “Yes, Caleb?”

He was so focused on her, on her bright-blue eyes and delicately beautiful features, that his distraction was such that he didn’t see the carriage. He didn’t take note of it coming toward them at a truly reckless speed. It wasn’t until he heard the frightened scream of an onlooker that it penetrated the haze he was under. It was instinct alone that saved them. He simply grabbed Marina about the waist and hauled her backward, both of them falling to the pavement with a heavy thud as the carriage sped past, only narrowly missing them. So narrowly that tracks from its wheels had marked her skirts.

Bruised and winded, he was still acutely aware of the weight of her pressed against him. Even through countless layers of clothing, it was a feast for his senses. But despite taking that moment to savor the pleasure of her closeness, his mind whirled with one thought. Someone had tried to kill them. But which of them was truly the target?