The Captain's Christmas Bride (18 page)

Only then did Alec round on her, his face a mask of fury.

‘You trollop.’

She flinched. And was about to protest that Eduardo had forced the kiss upon her. That she was only covering for Lizzie. But Lizzie clearly didn’t want even Alec to know what she’d been up to, or she would have come straight out of her hiding place the moment she’d realised the newcomer was her own brother, who could be trusted not to spread malicious gossip.

Her hesitation was all it took to fuel Alec’s fury to new heights.

‘I thought what happened in here at Christmas was a terrible accident,’ he ground out. ‘The culmination of a series of blunders. I was prepared to overlook your behaviour because I thought you were just a naïve, foolish girl with a head stuffed full of nonsense. But now I see that this is a regular trysting spot for you. Good God! You must be insatiable. You kept me in bed all morning, and then arranged to meet another man out here!’

How could he think that? Didn’t he know her at all?

No. Come to think of it, he was
always
jumping to the worst conclusion whenever she made the slightest blunder. And she was sick of having to...to
crawl
to earn every scrap of affection. It was the story of her life. She only had to put one foot out of place and all affection was instantly withdrawn.

She lifted her chin and glared at him. If he could come to such a horrid conclusion, simply because she’d been reluctant to instantly provide a plausible excuse, then he didn’t deserve
any
kind of explanation!

‘You’re nothing but a spoiled, wanton trollop!’

He had clearly only just managed to prevent himself from plunging to even deeper depths, but the hurt remained the same. She wasn’t any of those things! But he’d taken one look at the situation and decided she must be guilty of the worst sort of conduct. He hadn’t even asked her for an explanation. Not that she would have given him one.

‘You pick up men like pretty toys and toss them aside when you’re bored.’

She sucked in a sharp, shocked breath. She’d never treated anyone like a toy. She’d had her own feelings trampled often enough to ever contemplate treating anyone else so shabbily.

‘I thought you were struggling to control your hurt,’ he bellowed. ‘I thought you were brave. God, I actually admired you for your fortitude. But it was no such thing, was it? You just didn’t care. You swapped me for David the way most women change their shoes!’

He might as well have slapped her, that last comment hurt so much.

She lifted her chin another notch. Fine then! If this was what he really thought of her it was as well to know now, before she...before she began to really care what he thought. Because she didn’t. She didn’t.

In fact she hated him. In that moment she really hated him for speaking to her that way.

‘Nothing to say?’

‘No.’ She gave him a hard smile. ‘You’ve clearly seen through me, so what is the point? I won’t beg for your forgiveness, if that is what you’re hoping for. Nor offer you an explanation. You don’t deserve one.’

She made as if to get past him. His hand shot out and gripped her arm.

‘Where do you think you’re going?’

‘Back to my room.’ She pulled her arm out of his grasp with all the disdain she could muster. ‘There is a ball tonight, in case you have forgotten. For which I need to prepare.’

‘You mean to dance, and smile for your father’s guests as if nothing has happened?’

She looked over her shoulder as she stepped over the shattered window frame. ‘Nothing has happened,’ she said. But it might at any moment. For the fronds of the potted palms at the end of the orangery were quivering, as though someone was trying to get out from behind the pots.

Now that she’d been treated to a dose of Alec’s temper she wasn’t surprised Lizzie had chosen to hide from him when he’d first come in. And now there was no point in Lizzie confessing to the truth. If Alec really thought so poorly of her, then what was the point of trying to salvage anything? She should have known their marriage was never going to work. Should have realised that it was too good to be true. No man could possibly be as decent, and kind as she’d begun to think Alec was.

‘Apart from you behaving like a brute, and breaking the window, that is. Gatley is going to be furious. As am I. Honestly...’ she sent him a withering look ‘...anyone would think you expected me to behave like a nun. A little kissing is nothing.’ She tossed her head airily as she set off towards the house. Just as she hoped after making such an inflammatory remark, Alec surged through the shattered window frame to give her a piece of his mind.

‘To think I was trying my damnedest to make a go of this accursed marriage,’ he shouted at her back as she strode across the terrace. ‘Now I see that I was the one who did all the trying. I put in all the effort. You did nothing!’

That remark was so unjust that it was all she could do not to turn round and slap his self-righteous face. But she refused to lower herself to his level.

Instead, she held her head high and remained mute, hoping it would look as though the torrent of abuse and foul accusations was washing right over her. Because while she stalked away from the orangery, he followed. Which was, at least, giving Lizzie and Nellie the chance to escape undetected.

‘All you have done is moan about your bloody so-called friend, and complain I’m nothing like that saintly David!’

Which was completely untrue. She’d never complained of
that
. On the contrary, she’d been glad he was so different from David.

Well, all that was at an end.

He made sure of it by continuing to say unfair things, all the way up the stairs. And every insulting thing he’d thought about her, and was now actually saying to her, felt as if it was flaying a little more flesh from her bones.

She marched into her room, and right through to the dressing room. Because there was only so much she would tolerate.

‘Well, since you are so obviously finished with any pretence you can stand me,’ she said, seizing his valise, ‘there is no further need to play at being husband and wife, is there?’

‘What are you doing with that?’ He pulled the valise out of her hands.

‘What do you think I’m doing?’ She tried to take it back. The clasp snapped open as they tussled over the case. ‘I’m throwing you out of my room.’

‘Fine,’ he said. Which made her let go of the case. ‘Do you think I want any more to do with you?’ He went to the washstand and began shoving toiletries haphazardly into the valise which hung open over his arm.

He was just going to walk out on her, after only a handful of days, because he’d seen another man kissing her, was he? And thought he could get away with shouting abuse at her all the way through the house? So that everyone—from the footman who’d been lighting the hall candles, to the mayor’s wife who’d opened the door of her bedroom to see what was going on—knew exactly what he suspected her of doing?

Well, she’d see about that!

She grabbed everything she could see that belonged to him—which comprised his evening shirt, which a maid had laid out over the back of a chair, a pile of freshly starched cravats, and his telescope—marched over to the main door to her suite, and threw them all out into the hall.

A couple of his neckcloths sailed over the banister and fluttered down to the hall several floors below. His telescope rolled to the top of the stair and went rattling down to the next landing.

‘Bloody hell!’ He pushed past her, running down the stairs to recover his telescope. ‘You’ve broken it!’

‘Good!’ She was glad she’d managed to break something of his. The way he’d broken her...

No. He hadn’t broken her heart. That was just an expression. She did feel shattered, but having such a violent argument with anyone would have made her feel this bad.

The feeling would pass.

It would.

But, since he was one flight down, kneeling on the carpet, cradling the dented brass instrument to his chest, she took the opportunity to slam the door shut on him. Shutting him out. Ooh, how she hated him. Almost as much as she hated that telescope. If he hadn’t been carrying it around on the night of the masquerade she’d never have mistaken him for David. She was glad she’d broken it. Glad!

She whirled from the door, her hand to her mouth as just one sob tore free. She couldn’t break down and weep. She didn’t have time. Besides, going about her normal duties, as though nothing mattered, would help her keep herself together. She would smile, and pretend nothing was amiss. The way so many society brides had to do.

The way Ellen always did. Oh, Lord, now she was feeling just the way her poor sister-in-law must have felt every time Nick had been unfaithful, and then abused her for daring to complain. No wonder she just drifted about the place, looking as though her mind was somewhere else. No wonder she took no interest in the running of a household and estate that would one day belong to her husband. She must wish she was anyone else’s wife. That she could live anywhere else.

Well, Julia wasn’t going to behave like Ellen and have everyone feel sorry for her. She was going to behave with dignity. So, she’d ended up in exactly the kind of marriage she’d never wanted. Did that mean she had to let everyone see she was miserable? No. All her married aunts managed to pretend they were fine with the boors whose children they were obliged to produce. She could do no less. In fact she’d had good training for the position. She’d been pretending she was fine, when inside she’d been cold and lonely, ever since her mother had died.

She yanked at the bell pull viciously. She was going to wash off the feel of Eduardo’s mouth on hers, instruct Mabel to burn the dress he’d had the cheek to put his hands on, and deck herself out in her finest clothes and jewellery. And tonight she would dance with anyone who asked her. And laugh at their witticisms. And show the world she didn’t care
what
Alec thought.

And then she’d come back up here and sleep alone.

‘Mabel,’ she said, the moment her maid arrived. ‘When you’ve finished here I want you to take a message to Mrs Dawson. I would have her make sure there is a fire up in Captain Dunbar’s room.’

‘Captain Dunbar’s...?’

‘The one he had when he first arrived.’ It was still vacant, since it was only large enough to contain one person, and the other guests who’d been invited for tonight’s ball were all couples or families. ‘I want you to make sure that not one item belonging to him remains in my room, too. And just one more thing. Have Stephens keep an eye on him.’ She’d been amazed—though perhaps she shouldn’t have been, given she’d seen the muscularity of her husband’s body—at the ease with which he’d dealt with Eduardo. There was only one footman on the staff who was likely to be able to match him. Stephens. Well over six feet tall and as broad as a barn door.

‘On no account is Captain Dunbar to be permitted access to my room. If he attempts to come in here...well,’ she said with a toss of her head, ‘Stephens will know what to do.’

* * *

‘Alec?’

‘Yes, Lizzie?’ He looked up and pulled his mouth into a smile for his sister. She’d been creeping about him for the last couple of days as though she was half-afraid of him. He sighed. He supposed it wasn’t so surprising. Rumours of how he’d broken the actor’s nose, his arm, and the greenhouse window were running rife. And Lizzie had been rather fond of the actor. Well, all the girls had. He’d watched them at rehearsals. Fluttering and blushing whenever he singled one of them out for any reason whatever. He rather thought a couple of them deliberately fluffed their lines in an attempt to get him to give them individual tuition. Not that he’d succumbed to their machinations. No— Eduardo was clever enough to keep them all dancing to his tune, while he kept his eye on the bigger prize. A married woman. A woman he could dally with in safety.

Or so he’d thought.

Well, hadn’t he fallen into the same trap? Alec had managed to fend off all the eligible young girls, only to succumb to the advances of a woman who was more experienced.

Or so he’d thought.

The hell of it was, they’d both fallen prey to the same woman. The same deceitful, conniving...

‘Alec, I was just wondering...’

‘Hmm?’ He set aside the block and tackle he was mending. Since he’d had the fight with Julia, he’d actually found some solace in spending his days with Lizzie. His marriage might be over before it had properly begun, but Lizzie would always be his sister.

During the first night he’d spent curled up in the freezing attic to which his wife had banished him, he’d reminded himself that she was only a detour anyway. Lizzie was the reason he’d come to Ness Hall. And he was damned well going to stay here as long as Lizzie did. For her sake. And take part in the activities that amused her. And since she was so heavily involved in the theatrical production, that meant lending his skills to the carpentry, and other backstage work that required a man who was handy.

Besides which, the amateur dramatics were now one man down. Eduardo had been sent back to London, his future with the company in question.

‘That is...when are you going to make it up with Julia?’

He scowled at her. ‘I don’t think that’s any of your business.’

‘Oh, but it is. I want you to be happy. And you aren’t happy, are you?’

He bent his head to the task in hand. No, he wasn’t happy. He was damned miserable. But he’d have to make more of an effort to appear content, if even his sister could see through his attempt at nonchalance. It was just that whenever he saw Julia, striding about the place with that little smile on her lips, busily tending to all her father’s guests, he wanted to...shake her till her bones rattled. Kiss that treacherous mouth until she melted in a puddle at his feet.

And then step over her as though she was nothing. Nothing!

‘Alec,’ Lizzie said again, clasping her hands together at her breast. ‘It...it wasn’t fair, what you said to her.’

He lifted his head and stared at her in disbelief. This chit had no right to correct him. No right at all. Besides which, how the hell could she know what he’d said to his own wife? Such things were private.