Love's Tangle (25 page)

“I have no knowledge of such an event. I can only think your servant’s imagination verges on the vivid.”

“We’ll put it to the test, shall we?” She felt herself unceremoniously pushed aside and forced to watch helplessly as Gabriel took the stairs two at a time.

“You would not conduct yourself so arrogantly if Roland
were
here,” she called after him.

Gabriel paused mid-flight, turning to face her. “He is here, of that I’m sure. But he will wish himself elsewhere when I have finished with him. You will both wish yourselves elsewhere—indeed, you may start packing now.”

Roland Frant appeared on the landing as the duke reached the top of the stairs. He might have been woken by the commotion below, Gabriel thought grimly, but he was still alert enough to be fully dressed.

“I must echo my mother’s words, Gabriel,” his cousin began, “and ask you to leave. I imagine this outrageous intrusion is a result of your drinking. I would advise…”

But Gabriel was not in the mood to take advice. He sprang towards Roland and grabbed him by the throat. The man’s complexion mottled violently until it was almost purple and a strange whimpering noise came from deep within his chest. He struggled in vain to free himself but the duke’s grip was iron, slowly squeezing the life out of him.

“Where is she, you little rat? Tell me!”

Roland’s arms waved frantically in the air. The duke allowed his grasp to loosen very slightly.

“Your Grace, please, I beg of you,” Roland panted.

“Keep begging and I may let you live. Where is she?”

“Hurstwood,” his cousin whimpered in a voice grating with pain.

“Hurstwood? Then you are a bigger villain than I took you for.” Gabriel’s hands began to tighten around the man’s throat once more.

“No,” he managed to gasp, “she was running away and I did nothing but help her reach safety.”

Gabriel drew himself upright and looked scornfully down on the speaker.

“Nothing but put her in the greatest of danger. You are a dog.” And he cast Roland down on to the floor where his cousin lay in a sobbing heap.

He was half way down the stairs when a voice barely above a whisper croaked, “You’ll pay for this! Name your seconds!”

“I would,” the duke spat the words, “if I thought for one moment a cur such as you would dare to meet me. I am more than happy to run you through any time of your choosing. You know where to find me.”

Roland said nothing.

“I thought not,” Gabriel threw over his shoulder and walked out.

****

He was almost at Hurstwood and still the mist had not cleared. The road here dwindled into little more than a track, empty at this time of the morning, for it was too early even for the carrier with his parcels to be making his daily rounds. Intent on reaching the house, Gabriel pushed the horse into a canter once more, feathered a blind bend and almost collided with a grey figure emerging specter-like from out of the morning haze. The figure gave a startled cry and leapt aside. He pulled fiercely on the reins and was out of the saddle and on the grass bank in a trice, his arm outstretched to help. The woman took his hand in a firm grip and clambered back up the bank and onto the road. They stood facing each other.

“Elinor!”

“You!”

It was not the most auspicious beginning. Her face was pink with vexation and her hands began agitatedly adjusting the skirts of her dress. But when she spoke her voice was strong and clear. “I have left Allingham, Gabriel, and wish to continue my journey. I hope you will not make it difficult.”

He was grappling with the horror of her words and could only stammer, “How could you leave without a word to me?”

“There is nothing to say,” she responded in an unnaturally composed voice. “You have made your decision and I must make mine.”

“I have made no decision.” His voice expressed bewilderment. “I know I have caused you distress and I am sorry—abjectly so. But can we not talk of this?”

“Why? We have not managed to do so before.”

And she picked up her battered portmanteau and slipped beneath his outstretched arm. She had hardly gone a step before her ankle gave way and she would have fallen but for Gabriel’s strong hold.

“See what you have done.” She hastily brushed away the tears that were threatening. “I cannot walk thanks to your recklessness.”

He forbore to point out that their collision had been an accident, that she had been walking a narrow lane shrouded in mist. Instead he tried to plead for time.

“If you are intent on leaving, Elinor, I cannot stop you but at least let me drive you to wherever you wish. Or if you will not accept my escort, let me put my coachman at your disposal.”

She looked as though she wanted to argue but she was in no position to travel unaided and he gave thanks for this small blessing. “If you will return with me to the Hall, I will order the carriage to be made ready.”

“It would seem I have little choice,” she said wearily.

He tossed her up into the saddle, handed up her luggage, and then mounted behind her. “It won’t be the first time that we have ridden bodkin,” he said as cheerfully as he could. It wasn’t the first time but this was going to be a vastly different ride.

****

Elinor sat straight in the saddle, as far forward as she could manage. She must maintain whatever small space there was between them. She did not want to remember having shared a horse with Gabriel. Then she had lain back against him, felt his powerful body enfolding her and wanted the ride to go on forever. Now she was desperate for it to end. And when it ended, what could either of them say? Her unwitting deception had divided them, troubling him so badly he had abandoned her. Was it likely that two days’ absence had changed his mind?

The ride to Allingham was wearisome and they were both relieved when its huge iron gates loomed out of the distance. Once on the carriage way, the mare, sensing the closeness of the stables, picked up her heels in anticipation. But without warning Gabriel left the well-trodden drive and veered across the grass towards the woods that he and Elinor had walked all those months ago. She tried to turn her head to protest but her words were carried away on the air.

He leaned forward and spoke into her ear. “I thought to take a small detour—for an hour at most. Then we will go to the Hall and order the carriage.” She could do nothing but acquiesce.

They were in the woods now and the chill of the morning still hung in the branches above. She shivered and for a moment wished Gabriel would move closer. But she should be glad he did not; she had made the right choice in leaving and she must keep to her purpose. Along the uneven path they traveled, the horse carefully stepping between tree roots and through patches of undergrowth, on and on until the sky began to brighten and the trees gave way to open space. A perfect sphere of light appeared ahead—they had arrived at the clearing.

Gabriel slid from the saddle and came to the horse’s head.

“Why are we here?” Her nervousness was making her pettish.

“We are here because I must tell you something before you leave, and this has to be the right place.”

The hushed circle brought back memories, unbearably happy memories, and she was stung into unwise words. “But not for me, not for what I have to tell.”

She felt a deep yearning to speak of the baby she carried but she knew she must keep silent. No more foolish retorts, she chided herself. If she told, she would never be able to leave. And she had to. She could not bear to live another day in this loveless marriage.

He reached up for her and put his hands around her waist to lift her from the saddle. She felt the strong, firm clasp on her body and had an insane urge to cling to him, but schooled herself to break away. He led her to where they had sat once before on that bright June morning. The felled oak was still there and a full sun rising over the clearing made the place look much as it had months ago. Only they had changed. The surrounding trees lifted their heads to the new warmth, their autumn dress of red and gold glowing in the morning rays. A bird somewhere sang out its joy and everywhere was still. She could have stayed there forever. But she had a journey to make, she reminded herself, and peace such as this was not to be hers.

They sat quietly side by side on the fallen tree and she could almost hear their two hearts beating. Then he turned to her with a strange smile, a shy smile.

“What I have to say is simple,” he said after a long pause. “I love you. I love you, Elinor.”

It was an extraordinary declaration. An unbelievable declaration. “But—” she began.

“I know what you will say and you are right. I have behaved as stupidly as any man could. But stupidity
was
to blame, not lack of love. I was afraid, afraid of the feelings you aroused in me and I walked away.”

She could hardly credit his words. “You left because you loved me!”

“I did mention the word stupidity, didn’t I?’ He turned his head towards her, willing her to look at him. “I offered you a marriage of convenience, a business arrangement, but I don’t think I ever believed in it. I loved you from the first moment I saw you but I kept pretending to myself that I felt no such thing. When we found Charles’ papers and it seemed almost certain we were relatives, I was delighted. More than delighted. I could keep you at Allingham. Not only that, I could bring you even nearer by moving you into the Hall.”

“But you have not wished to be near me.”

“Of course I have. I have not dared to be near you. I couldn’t trust myself. I wanted you close but I couldn’t bear you close. Does that make any sense?”

His question floated in the still air. “In a strange way, I suppose,” she said slowly. “But if I bothered you so much, why did you choose to marry?”

“I told myself marriage would benefit us both. I could give you back your rightful home and at the same time provide Allingham with an heir. It all made perfect sense. Except the story I told wasn’t true and on our wedding night, the façade I’d built exploded in my face.”

His fingers drummed a ragged beat against the tree’s rough bark. There was a long pause before he spoke again and when he did, his voice was shaky with emotion. “The truth was I loved you with all the passion I was capable of and I wanted to go on loving you like that forever. I couldn’t pretend to myself any more.”

“But you didn’t go on loving me. It makes no sense after all, Gabriel.”

“It does if you’ve been badly hurt.”

She did not respond immediately. Instead she sat and thought. Thought of his parents who had gone away while he was still a small child and never returned, of an uncle who had offered only contempt, of a much loved brother who had died on a far-away battlefield. The scars had cut deep and she understood that. But what then of her deceit?

She stuttered the question which burned through her mind. “And my parentage?”

“What about it?”

“You were deceived. Charles Claremont is not my father.”

“We don’t know that. I have a strong suspicion Roland’s tale is yet another mischief. I’ve asked my London agent to travel to Norwich and interview this Mrs. Warrinder. I think we will find she knows nothing of you or your parents. But even if she does and your father turns out to be a trusty woodsman, do you think I really care?”

“I believed you did. I believed you cared a great deal.”

He looked bewildered. “You thought I cared that your father was not Charles?”

“I thought you were silently accusing me of deceiving you, that you would never have made even a marriage of convenience if you’d had an inkling of my true identity.”

He laughed aloud. “It was never such a marriage, my darling, at least not on my side. I know you feel differently but I loved you from the very start. If you had been a true dairymaid it would have made not the slightest difference. The problem lay with me. I have lost everyone I ever cared for and I could not bear to open my heart to the possibility of more pain.”

She tried to make sense of what he was saying. Her parentage was of no account. He loved her. And he believed that she did not love him! Her head spun as she fought through the fog of misapprehension.

“You must know I would never have hurt you,” she stammered. There was a pause as she gathered courage. “I could not have done so—I loved you.”

He shook his head as though amazed at how blind he’d been. “I didn’t know, I didn’t realize. I convinced myself otherwise. You were bound to grow tired of me, I thought, perhaps play me false, or even die. One way or another I was going to lose you.”

She looked at him in astonishment.

“I know it sounds crazy but I think I
was
half-crazed. I figured that if I didn’t get too close, I couldn’t get badly hurt again.”

“And now?”

“I have been so miserable without you that I could not be more unhappy, whatever happens in the future between us.”

There was another long silence while she thought over the tangled feelings he had revealed until, throwing caution aside, he blurted out, “You said a moment ago there was a time when you loved me. Do you still?”

The air seemed to hang breathless, waiting for an answer. He had hurt her and hurt her badly but were the long days, when he had left her solitary and loveless, too bitter to forgive? She sat motionless for minutes on end, her mind floundering, unable to see her way clearly. He had laid bare his deepest emotions so she should understand the conflicts that had driven him. Did she understand? Could she trust him sufficiently to place her life and that of their unborn child in his hands? In search of an answer she stared unseeing into the line of trees that guarded the magical space. But they were not her salvation. She took a deep breath and looked into those dark blue eyes and suddenly the question was no longer so difficult.

“I love you still.”

He moved a fraction towards her and she saw the longing writ plainly on his face. She put out her hand to him and he covered it with his.

“So where do we go from here?”

She heard the uncertainty and it was more than she could bear. She leaned towards him and gently touched his lips with hers. He had his arm around her and kissed her back. For several moments they sat thus, arms entwined, lips seeking solace. Then his hands were in her hair and pulling her plait to pieces.