Page 85 of The Lady is Trouble
Finn clapped and peeled himself from the desk. “I see the wheels turning in the dusty equipment. My work is done.”
At the door, he paused, sending Julian a look shaded with chagrin. “But, um, send the love notes to Brook Cottage. Piper, Minnie, and half of Ashcroft’s army are heading there as we speak. I’m afraid…well, your woman has left you.”
Julian tossed the twine to the floor as the door closed behind Finn. Brook Cottage had been a gift, a very personal one if Piper looked closely. She wasn’t going to make it easy, and maybe he didn’t deserve ease.
What had he expected from the most fascinating, bothersome, stunning creature he’d ever encountered?
Women, he grumbled and set about winning his.
Chapter 22
Whoever loved that loved not at first sight.
~Christopher Marlowe
A week passedbefore Piper concluded that her rejection of Julian’s pitiable but heartfelt proposal might have been an unintentionally deceptive feminine ploy.
Minnie had located spare furniture in storage at Harbingdon and wonder of wonders established a comfortable home in short order. Brook Cottage was charming and agreeable, as Julian had known it would be. Ashcroft’s men patrolled, but unobtrusively, as the threat had lessened with Sidonie’s death. The gardens were beautiful and in need of just the right amount of attention to entice, not intimidate. Edward, Finn, and the Duke of Ashcroft visited daily, as did the new gamekeeper, a young man who delivered thoughts to her as steadily as bullets fired from a pistol without once opening his mouth. Simon had spent two nights on a pallet next to her bed, allowing them to continue readingDavid Copperfield. Henry had even begun to arrive in the afternoon, rolling about on his back among honeysuckle and a variety of wildflower Mr. Knotworth identified as enchanter’s nightshade.
She should not be lonely, yet she was. A bone-crushing, soulless ache the likes of which she’d never encountered. Not even while sequestered in Gloucestershire.
Not surprising as two crucial elements were missing.
Julian. And her bay.
Julian the most critical, of course.
She’d ridden twice in the past week, feeling like she trespassed as she tiptoed into the stable, although Murphy hadn’t blinked. Galloping along with her gaze fixed habitually over her shoulder, she’d finally deemed it unsafe to continue. Until Julian showed his face at Brook Cottage, she would walk. Or take a cart.
She admitted to being unsettled.
Because, for the first time in her life, Julian was pursuingher.
In an affectionate, persistent, patient, somewhat mysterious, oh-so-Julian way.
Every day for the past six, a gift arrived before dawn on her doorstep. Intimate selections chosen by a person who knew her better than she knew herself. The first a book on trees native to England wrapped in a sketch of the chapel in the wood and their picnic under the stars. The second a silver jewelry box decorated in tea roses, similar to the ones she had shown Julian on a clandestine, midnight walk, where she’d gushed over how well they’d blossomed under her tutelage. Inside, nestled among folds of royal blue silk, he’d left two things: the hairpin he’d been carrying with him for weeks and a brooch he’d given her on her nineteenth birthday, one left behind in the chaos surrounding her grandfather’s death. It was Julian’s mother’s, one of the few items he had from her. A treasured heirloom he’d not part with frivolously.
She scarcely drew a full breath upon opening the door each morning, her heart expanding with every present. A scandalous cobalt riding habit that would allow her to ride astride. A lavender bush planted in the corner of the yard, surrounded by river stones in the shape of a heart. A telescope placed in the center of the lawn, directed to Julian’s beloved Canis Minor. A handsome leather folio engraved with her initials and filled with suggestions for her research, one that brought to mind the partially-clothed investigative sessions they’d conducted in the lodge.
This thought sent her mind down a treacherous path littered with sensual images of stolen, breathless moments. Lying atop his body as they made love amidst the tall grass by the lake; standing in a heated press against the potter’s shed as he thrust inside her; laughing as they rolled from his desk to the floor in a tangle of arms and legs.
As if the gifts—a deliberate, chess-like advance—were not enough, nowthis.
This offering not only weakened, itslayed.
Nay, it was not a gift but a statement. So ardent a statement, she sank to the stone steps and pressed her shaking hand to her chest to steady herself. Beneath the modest portico of Brook Cottage, the air proclaiming the arrival of autumn, dew on the faded pink Hydrangea petals sparkling in the sun, she fought for composure.
Where in the world…?
He had kept it all this time.
She turned the tarnished locket—wrapped in a cravat she recognized as one Julian had used to attach her wrist to his bedpost—in her hand. Over and over in sluggish revolutions as if the movement could lessen the depth of emotion she experienced upon seeing it again.
As if she hadanycontrol over her love for the man.
Contain, ease, or rectify. She could do little.
As helpless as seaweed swept along by a strong tide.