Authors: Kate Rothwell

Somebody To Love (21 page)

BOOK: Somebody To Love

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She tiptoed into the hall. From far off, at the other side of the suites, came the low sound of men’s voices.

She groaned under her breath. They’d all know. The stiff-backed Williams, Hobnail, all of the Calverson company men would know what she and Griffin had done that afternoon.

When she made the safety of her room, she looked in the mirror. With nosh, she could only finger-comb her wild curls and twist them into a knot at the back of her head.

Perhaps they’d think Griffin was too injured to frolic in bed. She turned sideways to peer at her image. There was no disguising her swollen lips and cheeks reddened with kisses and rubbed by the stubble of shaved male skin.

The memory of his mustache brushing her breast made her shiver. Even after the hours together, she would not have minded a few more kisses. Ha. A few kisses were what got her into trouble.

She smoothed her rose calico dress over her hips and adjusted her bustle, and after making herself as neat as possible, she decided to go talk to Elizabeth. Perhaps she could coax her to return to her father. The sooner Elizabeth went back to her real life, the sooner Araminta could leave this place and the endlessly harmful temptation of Griffin.

Elizabeth sat in the parlor alone, drinking tea. She smiled brightly when Araminta entered the room. The smile did not leave her face, but perhaps she lost a touch of the eagerness, as if she’d been expecting someone else.

Had she already succumbed to Griffin’s attraction?

“The maid said you were sleeping. I trust you had a good nap?” Elizabeth asked.

“I needed the rest.” That was no lie. Her body vibrated with exhaustion.

“Mr. Williams kept me company for a short while. He is a very agreeable gentleman.”

Uh-oh. Poor Griffin had competition. Elizabeth must have seen Araminta’s smile, for she blushed. “I mean, he put me at ease.”

“Unlike Mr. Calverson.”

“Yes, very different from him. Mr. Williams is a gentleman. Mr. Calverson is like—like Mr. Kane.”

Araminta crossed to the chair near Elizabeth and arranged herself on it hoping her dress didn’t show signs of having been rumpled in Griffin’s bed. She resisted a sudden urge to check the buttons on her gown to be certain she had closed them properly. “I don’t think you can compare Mr. Calverson to Kane.”

“But how can you say that? They are so similar! Such ruthless men! They care nothing for anything but their power.”

Araminta was opening her mouth to argue, but realized she’d said much the same thing to Griffin, and probably also to Elizabeth.

How could anyone prefer Williams to the potent Griffin, or think Griffin resembled the smarmy serpent Kane? At last she settled on, “You must admit that Mr. Calverson has acted as your friend.”

Elizabeth pressed her lips tight. “I do not know. Perhaps it would have been better to leave me at Mr. Kane’s. At least there I had a home.”

“What could you mean?”

“I can’t go back to my parents. I can’t be the reason for their disgrace.... Is something the matter?”

Araminta realized her face had twisted into a thundering frown that reflected the growing dismay inside her.

“Your parents love you.” She was surprised at how calm she sounded. “Don’t you think they deserve to make that decision?”

Elizabeth shook her head so hard that two carefully pinned ringlets escaped from her hair. “I will not be the cause of their shame. I could never survive that.”

Araminta studied her friend for a long minute. Her stomach churned, but she managed to find some dispassionate words.

“Never. You could never be the cau of their shame. People can never . . .” She tried to think of what she meant. “A mother’s shame should never reflect on her daughter. And a daughter’s actions should never be blamed on her mother.”

“I don’t understand.”

Araminta shook her head. “I’m not sure I understand what I mean either. But please never hide because of mistakes other people have made or even that you’ve made. Don’t waste your life because you brought shame on something as ephemeral as a family’s reputation.”

“Araminta, it is not something an outsider can understand. You don’t know what I mean.”

For the first time, Araminta lost her patience with her friend. She rose to her feet, and in a voice shaking with anger exclaimed, “Oh, you are so very wrong. I do know it. No one will ever know better. My very birth was a source of shame. And everything that happened—all of that
stupidity
—happened because I decided to exist.”

Elizabeth’s mouth fell open.

Araminta’s breath slowed. The red-hot glaze of temper had already receded. “Shall I tell you, I wonder?”

Elizabeth nodded, mute. Araminta wondered if she’d scared the timid girl, but she supposed she’d needed the burst of anger to get the story past her lips.

She paced a small area in front of Elizabeth as she talked. “My grandfather was named Hiram Woodhall. He was a very wealthy banker in London. But he began to fall apart when his unmarried daughter discovered she was pregnant.”

“Oh.” Elizabeth turned red and tried to interrupt. “I didn’t—”

But Araminta wouldn’t let anything stop her, now that she’d managed to start. “He grew insane the night I was born. He dashed a vase against the wall above the bed where my mother lay with me.”

Elizabeth’s rosebud mouth opened as if she would say something more, but she didn’t speak.

Araminta plowed on. “And then my grandfather ran downstairs to the servants’ quarters and found the butler. He stabbed him to death with an ice pick. In the heart.”

“Why?” Elizabeth’s whisper was almost silent.

Araminta found the rest came far more easily than she would have ever guessed. “The butler was my father. He could not marry my mother because he was still married to a woman he had not seen in ten years.”

“Gracious Lord.”

“Yes, it is quite the story, isn’t it?” Araminta wondered why she’d been so unwilling to ever tell it before. She felt no worse for having confessed the worst of her history aloud.

“You were only a baby.”

Araminta sat down again, and ran her damp palms over her skirts. “I was the cause of my father’s death and my mother’s banishment from society and her estrangement from her family—and subsequent poverty. And I was the reason that her father became a murderer. In other words, I was a source of enormous shame, young lady. So do not tell me that I don’t know about ruining a family’s name.”

“But none of it was your fault. Your mother was to blame.”

Araminta shook her head. She had tried that argument with herself before. But she found she had to respect her mother’s unswerving love for the two men who’d destroyed her life. “If she had not fallen in love, I would not exist. So I can’t find it in my heart to condemn her.”

Olivia crumpled the handkerchief she held. “ou know what I mean. It is different for me. I—I went to that house.”

“Is it your fault that the drug seized you?” Araminta shrugged. “I don’t think you chose your fate. You did not look for Kane. He found you.”

“Did you ever see your grandfather? Talk to him?”

“Twice. The first time was when I was seventeen.”

Funny how long it had been since she’d replayed the scene in her mind. Once she had thought of little else than that private meeting, at a distant inn, soon after the death of her mother.

She’d been hungry and alone, yet Araminta’s strongest sensation at the time had been relief that she did not resemble the wraith of a nasty white ghost with boiled, pasty blue eyes.

Her grandfather had looked at the candle burning on the writing desk of the lounge or at the barmaid scrubbing a table. He had never so much as glanced at her.

In a timid voice, Elizabeth asked, “What did he say to you?”

“Very little. And I was angry then. So I threatened him.”

“How?”

Araminta gave a rueful smile at the memory. “He asked me what I planned to do with my life. And I said, ‘Grandfather, perhaps you would give me an introduction to society.’ Oh, when I saw the horror on his face, I knew I would never go hungry again.”

“But that was blackmail,” Elizabeth said, and she sounded almost as horrified as Araminta’s grandfather had all those years ago.

“Yes, I suppose it was. But I had to live and could not find work, not at first. I discovered he’d pay for anything I wanted, as long as I kept myself away from London and pretended I was no relation of his.”

Elizabeth frowned. “How horrible it all is.”

“Beastly.”

“How can you speak of it so lightly?”

Araminta saw her friend’s glowering eyes contained fierce condemnation.

Araminta did not feel offended. She only felt far older than the girl. She also was aware of a curious sensation of freedom, as if she’d been released from a kind of prison.

She reached over and patted Elizabeth’s hand. “What would you have me do? Starve? Grandfather had paid for our upkeep. As long as we stayed in that country village, he made sure we would not starve. After my mother’s death, I wanted the same arrangement, but with my freedom. No, actually, I didn’t want his horrible money, but I took it until I could make my own way. Thanks to my mother, I had a proper education, yet no one would hire me as a governess or teacher.”

“To be reduced to blackmail.”

“I never asked him for money once I got a job. In fact, I despised his money. He used it to keep my mother prisoner.”

Elizabeth drew in a shuddering breath. “I am tired, Araminta. I think perhaps . . .”

Still reveling in a giddy sensation of liberation that she supposed she’d gained by telling her own story at last, Araminta relaxed in the armchair and waited for Elizabeth’s excuse. The girl would run and hide.

But then Elizabeth showed another of her flashes of strength. “Blackmail is horrible. I think you’re right. I should contact my father. Perhaps the real reason I stayed with—with Mr. Kane had more to do with protecting myself. I will bear my degradation and not try to hide from the consequences.”

Araminta wonered what in her story had caused the girl to change her mind. Perhaps Kane had threatened her or her family with blackmail.

She squeezed Elizabeth’s fingers. “You’ll have love to support you. Real love from people who care about you.”

Elizabeth pursed her lips, hesitant.

“If you don’t, and your parents make your life unbearable, I can come fetch you. We could travel to Europe together. You would like France.”

The girl’s dainty mouth grew thinner, but she smiled. And Araminta knew that her dear Olivia—or rather Elizabeth—would no longer lean on her for comfort or advice. Just as well. Perhaps the girl had discovered her backbone at last. A rather grim backbone, she reflected. How soon would they lose all the closeness they’d shared at Kane’s? Araminta was glad Elizabeth would soon return to a better life, but still, she was vaguely bereft.

Elizabeth sipped her tea. They sat in silence until the maid came in and announced that Mr. Williams wished to see Mr. Calverson.

Mr. Williams came into the room after the maid.

Araminta folded her arms and hoped Williams didn’t notice her blush. “I believe he is still resting.”

“No, I’m not.” Griffin strolled into the room, his gait stiff. He settled on the divan. “Good afternoon, Williams.”

“Good to see you’re feeling better, sir.” Thank goodness there was no trace of a smirk in the man’s demeanor.

Mr. Williams, his brown hair slick with pomade, and wearing a remarkably high collar, bowed to Araminta, but took Elizabeth’s hand in his. “You are well?” he asked her in a low voice. He fingered a pince-nez before placing it on the bridge of his nose.

Araminta glanced at Griffin, who watched Wiliams with a quizzical frown. Then he met Araminta’s eyes and for several heartbeats she stared back, held by the warmth she saw in his gaze. A warmth meant only for her.

Williams and Elizabeth sat on chairs near each other and carried the conversation. They blathered about the beauty of Long Island and walks on beaches until Araminta wondered if anyone would notice or mind if she slipped from the room. They were superbly suited, she reflected.

Griffin must have grown impatient. “Miss Burritt, are you ready for us to summon your father?” As usual, Araminta thought him too blunt for Elizabeth, but reflected it was certainly one way to liven up the conversation.

Elizabeth raised her small, determined chin. “Yes, I am ready. Thank you, sir.”

Before Araminta’s eyes, the girl evolved from fragile victim to elegant young lady. More than ever, she was grateful Elizabeth had been pulled from that place. Even if, during the process, Araminta had lost her heart to a man who didn’t want it.

Griffin turned to his assistant. “Williams?”

“At once, sir.” With a low apologetic bow to Elizabeth, Mr. Williams hurried from the room.

BOOK: Somebody To Love

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