Almost Heaven Part 30

"Because it was a new fur m.u.f.f of a rare sort, of which she was extravagantly proud."

"There is no fur on earth that mangy, Elizabeth," he replied with an impenitent grin. "She's hoaxing the lot of you," he added seriously.

Elizabeth swallowed a startled laugh and said with an imploring look, "Promise me you'll be very nice, and very patient with the committee."

"I promise, " he said gravely, but when she reached for the door handle and opened the door-when it was too late to step back and yank it closed-he leaned close to her ear and whispered, "Did you know a camel is the only animal invented by a committee, which is why it turned out the way it has?"

If the committee was surprised to see the formerly curt and irascible Marquess of Kensington stroll into their midst wearing a beatific smile worthy of a choir boy, they were doubtlessly shocked to see his wife's hands clamped over her face and her eyes tearing with mirth.

Elizabeth's concern that Ian might insult them, either intentionally or otherwise, soon gave way to admiration and then to helpless amus.e.m.e.nt as he sat for the next half-hour, charming them all with an occasional lazy smile or interjecting a gallant compliment, while they spent the entire time debating whether to sell the chocolates being donated by Gunther's for 5 or 6 per box. Despite Ian's outwardly bland demeanor, Elizabeth waited uneasily for him to say he'd buy the d.a.m.ned cartload of chocolates for 10 apiece, if it would get them on to the next problem, which she knew was what he was dying to say.

But she needn't have worried, for he continued to positively exude pleasant interest. Four times, the committee paused to solicit his advice; four times, he smilingly made excellent suggestions; four times, they ignored what he suggested. And four times, he seemed not to mind in the least or even to notice.

Making a mental note to thank him profusely for his incredible forbearance, Elizabeth kept her attention on her guests and the discussion, until she inadvertently glanced in his direction, and her breath caught. Seated on the opposite side of the gathering from her, he was now leaning back in his chair, his left ankle propped atop his right knee, and despite his apparent absorption in the topic being discussed, his heavy-lidded gaze was roving meaningfully over her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. One look at the smile tugging at his lips and Elizabeth realized that he wanted her to know it.

Obviously he'd decided that both she and he were wasting their time with the committee, and he was playing an amusing game designed to either divert her or discomfit her entirely, she wasn't certain which. Elizabeth drew a deep breath, ready to blast a warning look at him, and his gaze lifted slowly from her gently heaving bosom, traveled lazily up her throat, paused at her lips, and then lifted to her narrowed eyes. '

Her quelling glance earned her nothing but a slight, challenging lift of his brows and a decidedly sensual smile, before his gaze reversed and began a lazy trip downward again.

Lady Wilts.h.i.+re's voice rose, and she said for the second time, "Lady Thornton, what do you think?"

Elizabeth snapped her gaze from her provoking husband to Lady Wilts.h.i.+re. "I-I agree," she said without the slightest idea of what she was agreeing with. For the next five minutes, she resisted the tug of Ian's caressing gaze, firmly refusing to even glance his way, but when the committee re-embarked on the chocolate issue again, she stole a look at him. The moment she did, he captured her gaze, holding it, while he, with an outward appearance of a man in thoughtful contemplation of some weighty problem, absently rubbed his forefinger against his mouth, his elbow propped on the arm of his chair. Elizabeth's body responded to the caress he was offering her as if his lips were actually on hers, and she drew a tong, steadying breath as he deliberately let his eyes slide to her b.r.e.a.s.t.s again. He knew exactly what his gaze was doing to her, and Elizabeth was thoroughly irate at her inability to ignore its effect.

The committee departed on schedule a half-hour later amid reminders that the next meeting would be held at Lady Wilts.h.i.+re's house. Before the door closed behind them, Elizabeth rounded on her grinning, impenitent husband in the drawing room. "You wretch!" she exclaimed. "How could your' she demanded, but in the midst of her indignant protest, Ian shoved his hands into her hair, turned her face up, and smothered her words with a ravenous kiss.

"I haven't forgiven you," she warned him in bed an hour later, her cheek against his chest. Laughter, rich and deep, rumbled beneath her ear.

"No?" "Absolutely not. I'll repay you if it's the last thing I do." "I think you already have," he said huskily, deliberately misunderstanding her meaning. Shortly afterward, they returned to Montmayne to spend September in the country, where it was cooler. For Ian, life with Elizabeth was everything he ever hoped it could be, and more. It was so perfect that he had to fight down the nagging fear that things could not go on like this-a fear which he tried to convince himself was mere superst.i.tion brought on by the fact that two years ago fate had s.n.a.t.c.hed her from him. But in his heart, he knew it was more than that. His investigators had not yet been able to find a trace of Elizabeth's brother, and he lived in daily dread that hers would succeed where his had not. And so he waited to discover the extent of his offense against her and her brother, knowing he was going to have to beg her forgiveness for it, and that-in marrying her without telling her what he did know-he was as guilty of duplicity as he was of her brother's abduction.

In the rational part of his mind, he knew that by having Robert tossed aboard the Arianna, he had spared the hotheaded young fool a far worse fate at the hands of the authorities. But now, without knowing what fate had actually befallen him, he couldn't be certain that Elizabeth would see his actions in that light. He couldn't see them in that light himself anymore, because now he knew something he hadn't known at the time. He knew that her parents had been long dead by then and that Robert had been her only buffer against her uncle.

Fear, the one emotion he despised above all others, grew apace with his love for Elizabeth until he actually began to wish someone would find out something, so that he could confess to her whatever sins he was guilty of, and either be forgiven or cast out of her life. In that, he knew his thinking was irrational, but he couldn't help himself. He had found something he treasured beyond all bounds; he had found Elizabeth, and loving her made him more vulnerable than he'd been since his family's death. The threat of losing her haunted him until he began to wonder how long he could bear the torment of uncertainty.

Blissfully unaware of all that. Elizabeth continued to love him without reservation or guile, and as she grew more certain of his love, she became more confident and more enchanting to Ian. On those occasions when she saw his expression become inexplicably grim, she teased him or kissed him, and, if those ploys failed, she presented him with little gifts-a flower arrangement from Havenhurst's gardens, a single rose that she stuck behind his ear, or left upon his pillow. "Shall I have to resort to buying you a jewel to make you smile, my lord?" she joked one day three months after they were married. "I understand that is bow it is done when a lover begins to act distracted."

To Elizabeth's surprise, her remark made him s.n.a.t.c.h her into his arms in a suffocating embrace. "I am not losing interest in you, if that's what you're suggesting," be told her.

Elizabeth leaned back in his arms, surprised by the unwarranted force of his declaration, and continued to tease. "You're quite certain?"

"Positive."

"You wouldn't lie to me, would you?" she asked in a tone of mock severity.

"I would never lie to you," Ian said gravely, but then he realized that by withholding the truth from her, he was, in effect, deceiving her, which in turn, amounted to little less than lying outright.

Elizabeth knew something was bothering him, and that as time pa.s.sed, it was bothering him with increasing frequency, but she never dreamed she was even remotely the cause of his silences or preoccupation. She thought of Robert often, but not since the day of her marriage had she permitted herself to think of Mr. Wordsworth's accusations, not even for an instant. In the first place, she couldn't bear it; in the second, she no longer believed there was the slightest possibility he was right"

"I have to go to Havenhurst tomorrow," she said reluctantly when Ian finally let her go. "The masons have started on the house and bridge, and the irrigation work has begun. If I spend the night, though, I shouldn't have to go back for at least a fortnight."

"I'll miss you," he said quietly, but there was no trace of resentment in his voice, nor did he attempt to persuade her to postpone the trip. He was keeping to his bargain with the integrity that Elizabeth particularly admired in him.

"Not," she whispered, kissing the side of his mouth, ''as much as I'll miss you."

Chapter 32.

Her mind on the list of provisions she was reading, Elizabeth walked slowly along the path from Havenhurst's storage buildings toward the main house. A tall hedge on her right s.h.i.+elded the utilitarian buildings from view of the main house where the masons were working. A footstep sounded behind her, and before she could turn or react, she was grabbed round the waist and dragged backward, a male hand clamped over her mouth, stifling her scream of frightened protest".

"Hush, Elizabeth, it's me," an achingly familiar voice said urgently. "Don't scream, all right?"

Elizabeth nodded, the hand loosened, and she whirled around into Robert's waiting arms. "Where have you been?" she demanded, laughing and crying and hugging him fiercely. "Why did you leave without telling me where you were going? I could kill you for worrying me so-"

His hands gripped her shoulders, moving her away, and there was urgency on his gaunt face. "There isn't time for explanations. Meet me in the arbor at dusk, and for G.o.d's sake don't tell anyone you've seen me."

"Not even Bentner-" "No one! I have to get out of here before one of the servants sees me. I'll be in the arbor near your favorite cherry tree at dusk."

He left her there, moving stealthily down the path, then vanis.h.i.+ng into the arbor beside it after quickly glancing in both directions to ensure he hadn't been seen.

Elizabeth felt as if she'd imagined the whole brief encounter. The sense of unreality stayed with her as she paced across the drawing room, watching the sun set with nerve wracking slowness, while she tried to imagine why Robert would fear being seen by their loyal old butler. Obviously he was in some sort of trouble, perhaps with the authorities. If so, she would ask Ian for advice and help. Robert was her brother, and she loved him despite his faults; Ian would understand that. In time, perhaps both men would come to treat one another as relatives, for her sake. She stole out of her own house, feeling like a thief.

Robert was sitting with his back against the old cherry tree, moodily contemplating his scuffed boots when Elizabeth first saw him, and he stood up quickly. "You didn't happen to bring food, did you?"

She'd been right, she realized; he was half-starved. "Yes, but only some bread and cheese," she explained, taking it out from behind her skirts. '"I couldn't think of a way to carry more out here without causing someone to wonder whom I was feeding in the arbor. Robert," she burst out, no longer diverted by such commonplace needs as food, "where have you been, why did you leave me like that, and what-"

"I didn't leave you," he bit out furiously. "Your husband had me kidnapped the week after our duel and tossed onto one of his s.h.i.+ps. I was supposed to die-"

Pain and disbelief streaked through Elizabeth. "Don't say that to me," she cried, wildly shaking her head. "Don't-he wouldn't-"

Robert's jaw clamped down, and he yanked his s.h.i.+rt out of his waistband, jerked it up, and turned around. "This is a souvenir of one of his attempts."

A scream rose up in Elizabeth's throat, and she pressed her knuckles against her mouth, trying to stop it. Even then she felt as if she was going to vomit. "Oh, my G.o.d," she panted, looking at the vicious scan that crisscrossed almost every inch of Robert's thin back. "Oh, my G.o.d. Oh, my G.o.d."

"Don't faint," Robert said, clutching her arm to steady her. "You have to be strong. or he'll finish the deed."

Elizabeth sank to the ground and put her head against her knees, her arms clutched around her stomach. rocking helplessly to and fro. "Oh, my G.o.d." she kept saying over and over at the thought of his tom, battered flesh. "Oh, my G.o.d."

Forcing herself to take long. steadying breaths, she finally brought herself under control. All the doubts, the warnings. the hints, crystallized in her mind. focusing on the proof of Robert's battered back and an icy cold stole through her, numbing her to everything. even the pain. Ian had been her love and her lover; she had lain in the arms of a man who knew what he had done to her brother.

Leaning a hand against the tree, she stood up unsteadily. "Tell me," she said hoa.r.s.ely.

"Tell you why he did this? Or tell you about the months I've spent rotting in a mine, dragging coal out of it? Or tell you about the beating I got the last time I tried to escape and come back to you?"

Elizabeth rubbed her arms; they felt cold and numb. "Tell me why," she said.

"How in h.e.l.l do you expect me to explain the motives of a madman?" Robert hissed, and then with a sublime effort he got himself under control. "I've had two years to think about it, to try to understand, and when I heard he'd married you, it all came clear as gla.s.s. He tried to kill me on Marblemarle Road the week of our duel, did you know that?"

"I've hired investigators to try to find you," she said. nodding that she knew part of it, unaware that Robert had gone more pale than before. "But they thought you tried to kill him."

"That's garbage!"

"It was-conjecture," she admitted. "But why would Ian want to kill you?"

"Why?" he sneered, tearing into the bread and cheese like a starving man while Elizabeth watched him. her heart wrenching. "For one thing. because I shot him in our duel.

But that's not really it. I foiled his plans when I barged in on him in the greenhouse. He knew he was reaching above himself when he reached for you, but I put the onus on him. Do you know," he continued with a harsh laugh, "there were people who turned their backs on him over that episode? Plenty, I heard before I was thrown in the hold of one of his s.h.i.+ps."

Elizabeth drew a shaky breath. "What do you mean to do?"

Robert leaned his head back and closed his eyes, looking tormented. "He'll have me killed if he learns I'm still alive," he said with absolute conviction. "I couldn't take another whipping like the last one, Elizabeth. I was on the brink of death for a week."

A sob of pity and horror rose in her throat. "Legal charges, then?" she asked, and her voice dropped to an agonized whisper. "Do you mean to go to the authorities?"

"I've thought of it. I want it so badly I can hardly sleep at night, but they'd never take my word now. Your husband has become a rich and powerful man." When he said "your husband" he looked at her so accusingly that Elizabeth could scarcely meet his haunted eyes.

"I-" She lifted her hand in helpless apology, but she didn't know what to apologize for, and tears were starting to blur her eyes and impede her speech. "Please," she cried helplessly. "I don't know what to do or say. Not yet. I can't think."

He dropped the bread and wrapped his arms around her. "Poor beautiful baby," he said. "I've lain awake nights scared out of my mind for you, trying not to think of his filthy hands on you. He owns mines-deep, endless pits in the ground where men live like animals and are beaten like oxen. That's where he gets the money for everything he buys."

Including all the jewels and furs he'd given her, Elizabeth realized, and the need to vomit was almost overwhelming. She shuddered repeatedly in Robert's embrace. "If you don't bring him up before the magistrates, what will you do?"

"What will I do?" he asked. "This isn't a question for me alone, Elizabeth. If he learns you know what he's done, your beautiful back won't take the punishment mine has. You won't survive what he has his people do to you."

At the moment, survival was unimportant to Elizabeth. Inside she was already battered. and she was already dying.

"We have to get away. Use new names. Find a new life." It was the first time Elizabeth hadn't paused to consider Havenhurst before making a decision. "Where?" she asked in a shattered whisper.

"Leave that to me. How much money can you get your hands on in a few days' time?"

Tears dripped from her clenched eyes because she had no choice. No options. No Ian. "A great deal, I suppose," she said dully, "if I can find a way to sell some jewels."

His arms tightened, and he pressed a brotherly kiss on her temple. "You must follow my instructions exactly. Promise me you will?"

She nodded against his shoulder and swallowed painfully. "No one must know you're leaving. He'll stop you if he knows what you mean to do."

Elizabeth nodded again; Ian would not let her go easily, and never without weeks of probing questions. After their torrid lovemaking. he certainly wouldn't believe she wished for a separation because she didn't want to live with him.

"Sell everything you possibly can without raising suspicion. Go to London; it's a big city, and if you use another name and try to make yourself look as different as you can, you aren't likely to be recognized. On Friday take a hack from London to Thurston Crossing on the Bernam Road. There's a posting house there, and I'll be waiting for you. Your husband will launch a search for you once your disappearance is noted. They'll be watching for a blond woman, and if they find me, I'm as good as dead. If you're with me, so are you, if he finds you first. We'll travel as man and wife; I think that will be the best way."

Elizabeth heard it all, she understood it all, but she could not seem to move or feel. "Where are we going?" she asked numbly. "I haven't decided yet. To Brussels, maybe, but that's too close. Maybe to America. We'll travel north and stay in Helmshead It's a little village on the seacoast, very secluded and provincial. They only get the newspapers irregularly, so they won't know of your disappearance. We'll wait for a s.h.i.+p going to the colonies up there."

His hands tightened, moving her away. "I have to leave. Do you understand what you need to do?"

She nodded.

"There's one thing more. I want you to quarrel with him-in front of someone, if possible. It doesn't need to be anything serious-just enough to make him think you're angry, so that when you leave he won't set investigators on your path so quickly. If you disappear for no apparent reason, he'll start searching for you at once. The other way will buy us time. Can you do that?"

"Yes," she said hoa.r.s.ely. "I imagine so. But I wanted to be able to leave him a note, to tell him"-tears clogged her throat at the idea of writing Ian a note; he might be a monster, but her heart was refusing to let go of her love at the same speed her mind was accepting Ian's treachery to tell him why I'm leaving." Her voice broke, and her shoulders began to shake with wrenching sobs.

Robert gathered her into his arms again. Despite the comforting gesture, his voice was icy and implacable. "No note! Do you understand me? No note. Later," he promised, his voice softened and silky, "later, when we've made good our escape, you can write to him and tell him everything. You can write volumes to that b.a.s.t.a.r.d. Do you understand why it's imperative that you make it look like you're leaving over an ordinary quarrel?" "Yes," she said hoa.r.s.ely. "I'll see you Friday," he promised, moving away from her and kissing her cheek. "Don't fail us."

"I won't."

Mechanically going through the motions of living and survival, Elizabeth sent a note to Ian that night announcing her intention to stay overnight at Havenhurst so that she could go over the books. The next day, Wednesday, she left for London, her jewels in a velvet sack concealed beneath her cloak. Everything was there, including her betrothal ring. Scrupulously adhering to the need for stealth, she had Aaron drop her in Bond Street, then she took a rented hack to the first jeweler she saw in a neighborhood where she wasn't likely to be recognized.

The jeweler was impressed with what she had to offer. Speechless, in fact. "They're all exceptionally fine stones, Mrs..."

"Mrs Roberts," Elizabeth provided with a kind of dumb inspiration. Now that nothing mattered anymore, it was easy to lie and dissemble.

The amount he offered her for the emeralds sent the first stab of feeling through her, but it was only a sense of mild dismay. "They must be worth twenty times that much."

"Thirty, more like, but I don't have the clientele that can pay those lofty prices. I have to sell them for what my clients are willing to pay." Elizabeth nodded numbly, her soul too dead to bargain, to point out to him that he could sell them to a Bond Street jeweler for ten times more than he was paying her. "I don't keep this kind of money around. You'll have to go to my bank."

Two hours later Elizabeth emerged from the designated bank with a fortune in notes filling the large sack and her reticule.

Before leaving for London she'd sent word to Ian that she intended to spend the night at the house on Promenade Street. using as an excuse a desire to do some shopping and look in on the servants. It was a lame excuse, but Elizabeth had pa.s.sed the point of rational thought. She followed Robert's instructions automatically; she did not deviate or improvise; she did not feel. She felt like a person who had already died but whose body was still ghoulishly propelling itself around Sitting alone in her bed chamber on Promenade Street, she stared blankly out the window into the impenetrable night. her fingers idly twisting in her lap. She ought to send Alex a note to tell her good-bye, she thought. It was her first thought of the future in almost two days. Once the thinking began, however, she wished it hadn't. No sooner had she decided she couldn't risk writing to Alexandra than her mind began tormenting her with the single remaining ordeal before her. She still had to see Ian; she could not avoid him for two more days without awakening his suspicion. Or could she? she wondered helplessly. He had agreed to let her live her own life, and she'd stayed at Havenhurst occasionally since they'd been married. Of course; the reason had owed to foul weather, not whim.

Dawn was already lightening the sky when she fell asleep in her chair.

When Elizabeth's carriage drew up at Havenhurst the next day she half expected to see Ian's in the drive, but everything looked normal and peaceful. With Ian's money available, Havenhurst was filled with new servants; the grooms were walking a horse by the stable; the gardeners were laying mulch on the dormant flower beds. Normal and peaceful, she thought a little hysterically as Bentner opened the door. "Where have you been, missy?" he asked, anxiously searching her pale face. "The marquess sent word he wants you to come home."

Elizabeth should have expected that, but she actually hadn't. "I can't see why I must, Bentner," she said in a strained voice that was supposed to pa.s.s for annoyance. "My husband seems to forget we had a bargain when we wed. "

Bentner, who still resented Ian for his past treatment of his mistress-not to mention for the a.s.sault on Bentner's person the day he forced his way into the house on Promenade Street-could not find any reason to defend the marquess now. Instead he trotted down the hall on Elizabeth's heels, stealing anxious glances at her face. "You don't look well, Miss Elizabeth," he said. "Shall I have Winston make you a nice hot pot of tea with some of his delicious scones?"

Elizabeth shook her head and went into the library, where she sat down at her writing desk and composed what she hoped was a politely evasive note to her husband stating her intention to remain at Havenhurst tonight to finish working on the account books. A footman left with the note shortly afterward, with instructions to make the carriage trip in no more than seven hours. Under no circ.u.mstances did Elizabeth want Ian leaving their house-his house-and barging in here in the morning-or worse, tonight.

After the footman left, the nerves that had seemed numb in Elizabeth came to vibrant life with a vengeance. The pendulum on the old grandfather clock in the hall began to swing ominously faster, and she began to imagine all sorts of vague, disastrous things happening. Sleep, she told herself; she needed sleep. Her imagination was running rampant because she'd had so little sleep.

Tomorrow she would have to face him, but only for a few hours. . . .

Elizabeth snapped awake in a terrified instant as the door to her bed chamber was flung open near dawn, and Ian stalked into the darkened room. "Do you want to go first, or shall I?" he said tightly, coming to stand at the side of her bed.

"What do you mean?" she asked in a trembling voice.

"I mean," he said, "that either you go first and tell me why in h.e.l.l you suddenly find my company repugnant, or I'll go first and tell you how I feel when I don't know where you are or why you want to be there!"

"I've sent word to you both nights."

"You sent a d.a.m.ned note that arrived long after nightfall both times, informing me that you intended to sleep somewhere else. I want to know why?"

He has men beaten like animals. she reminded herself. "Stop shouting at me," Elizabeth said shakily, getting out of bed and dragging the covers with her to hide herself from him.

His brows snapped together in an ominous frown. "Elizabeth?" he asked, reaching for her.