The Star-Crossed Bride (16 page)

This was patently untrue, as Aunt Emmaline had probably been packed for the last month. Emily knew her mother would hate to think of having to cancel her daughter's wedding and, worse, having to hear about it in every tedious letter from Aunt Emmaline — who had not only two daughters, but a son and heir for her husband, even though he was only a viscount.

"Francis," her mother said, having taken a remarkably short time to break down, "perhaps it would be best if we keep to the original date, now that Emily has seen the error of her ways and understands the benefits of marriage to you."

The marquess did not look pleased. Emily wondered if he would tell her mother then and there what had transpired last night. It was probably the only thing that could convince the countess to notify all her guests and relatives of the change in wedding plans. He frowned at Emily, as if he understood that she was maneuvering her mother. "I was looking forward to my wedding trip." His look did not make her feel the same anticipation.

Suppressing a shudder, she said, "We will still make the trip, my lord. And we will not have our friends and family piqued by our thoughtlessness." Thank goodness that she and Valentine had put a stop to any possibility of marriage to this man with their own hasty elopement.

"Of course," her mother prepared to wheedle and Emily crossed her fingers. To her joy, it took only twenty minutes before the marquess, tight-lipped with displeasure, agreed. At every moment she expected him to expose what had happened last night in order to win a hasty ceremony. He did not. For some reason, he did not want to tell her mother that she had hit him over the head and abandoned him in the library with a bottle of brandy.

Her relief did not last very long, however, as he turned toward her and smiled, saying, "Our walk yesterday was interrupted, Emily. Why don't we walk again today? It is a lovely day."

"Yes, do," the countess echoed.

Emily was trapped. She could see that Granbury did not have a quiet, pleasant walk in mind, but she could not refuse without giving her mother a reason to think that she was still harboring hopes of breaking off the engagement. To buoy her courage, she reminded herself of what her successful charade would accomplish: the downfall of the marquess and his murderous ways. What she need do was simple enough.

The consequences if she did not convince him she had had a change of heart were obvious. Her mother's willingness to keep the wedding plans on course would evaporate, Aunt Emmaline's gloating or no. She did not know whether to laugh or cry when Valentine was assigned as the footman to accompany them into the garden. She did her best not to show by expression or sound that he was anything more than a footman to her. It was torture to keep from glancing at him. Torture to smile at Granbury. She had never done anything so difficult in her life as all this pretense. She would be glad when she could be done with pretending and take up her new life as viscountess and mistress of Anderlin.

As they began to walk, with Valentine close upon their heels, Emily said loudly, "I am grateful to you, my lord, for allowing the wedding plans to proceed as originally scheduled. I promise you I do not intend to try to break the engagement any longer." Not now that she was married.

"Then why did you insist that we wait for the scheduled date if you are so eager to be my bride?"

She had the perfect answer for that, though, thanks to watching her mother plan and scheme through three different wedding preparations. "I am a woman. I wish for everything to be perfect on the day I wed."

"And what is more perfection than having the two people there who are marrying? What need is there of cakes and gifts and guests?"

"Friends and family to bless the union, of course. A wedding is a milestone of great importance. Should it truly pass without heralding or celebration?" Emily knew that her words held conviction.

The marquess heard the certainty in her voice, and his eyebrows rose as she continued, "Perhaps I want no gossip. You have convinced me that there are unexpected dangers in skirting scandal." It was dangerous to remind him of last night, even obliquely. But he was not a stupid man. He must intend to use the incident to gain some hold over her. Perhaps her bold statement would draw him out.

"There are advantages to avoiding scandal, I must admit." Slowly he brought his hand up to rub absently at the place where Valentine must have hit him with the candlestick. "I do not object to your wish to have our wedding without a hint of gossip for hastily altered plans."

"My thoughts exactly, my lord." She thought sadly of how she and Valentine had wed — secretly, quietly, in the dark of night with only Nancy and an unknown man to bind them. How much better to have done so openly, with their friends and family to wish them well.

As if he could read her thoughts, he said softly, "As I recall, you were not so eager for a proper wedding with Valentine Fenster."

Emily pressed her lips together to keep in her exclamation of annoyance. Why had her mother confirmed the rumor for the marquess? Surely it did not make her more marriageable, but less . . . didn't it? "I was a girl then, swept away by a romantic notion. I am older now. I have seen my chance to go to the altar come to nothing twice now."

"I see. So you understand your options are to marry me or be a spinster for the rest of your life."

Emily slowly and deliberately rubbed her neck, imagining the weight of a hangman's rope around it. "I understand that marriage to you means a chance for children, a return to society life, and a break with my mother. As you might guess, I am eager to be my own mistress." She added with heat, "And to have my bedroom door unlocked — " She looked directly at him as she said, " — unless I choose to lock it myself."

"But you would never lock it against me." He sounded quite sure of himself.

"Not after we are properly married." She held her breath. Would he accept her condition? It would be so much easier if she did not have to worry that she would find him at her door in the middle of the night. Valentine would kill him, then. But the consequences of that action might see him hanged. That was what she was fighting to prevent.

"I agree. As long as you do not give me cause to change my mind."

"Of course I will not, my lord." There was no need to argue; the point was settled, even if he was not yet aware of it. Knowing that her words had a meaning the marquess could not guess at, she smiled sincerely and said, "I shall do my best to please my husband in all ways at all times."

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Valentine startle. Fortunately Granbury was turned away from him and did not see the movement. It was only with the utmost self-control that she managed not to turn her gaze to the footman.

Granbury took her hand and said, "I will hold you to that promise, my dear." His thumb pressed into the soft flesh of her wrist until she wanted to cry out in pain. Acutely aware of Valentine standing close by she merely winced and shook her hand free. "I always keep my promises, you can be assured of that."

"Then we should rub along quite well together, after we are married." There was a gleam in his eye that she did not like to see. Briefly, she regretted not fleeing to London. But then she remembered the poor women he had murdered and knew that she had made the right decision.

He came to her that night, as he had promised. Nancy let him in and then locked them in together alone. But not before she whispered saucily, "I don't expect to be 'earing from you two until morning."

For a moment Emily was shocked, and then she realized that, as far as Nancy was concerned, they were married and there was nothing wrong with a man and his wife spending the night together without a chaperon. It was a heady realization.

But Valentine's expression contained concern, not desire. Before she could say anything, he asked curtly, "How badly did he hurt you?"

She blinked and hesitated, not understanding his question at first. And then she remembered he had been in the garden when Granbury grabbed her wrist. She waved her hand in dismissal, and shook her head to reassure him. "Not too — "

Impatiently, he cut her off. "I saw you wince, Emily."

"He startled me, that's all."

He sighed as he put out his palm. "Let me see."

She put her fingers against the warmth of his palm reluctantly.

He grasped her hand gently and brought her wrist to the light. Her sleeve slipped away revealing the purple thumbprint, dark against the pale skin. His tone was grim. "I should have killed him last night."

All the consequences of such an importunate action rushed through her thoughts — ending at last with the image of Valentine, a noose around his neck. "Don't say that. He is the murderer, not you."

"He marked you." Valentine pulled her into his arms, resting his cheek atop her head. It felt so right to be held by him this way, she wished they could stand so forever. "He deliberately put his mark on you. And I, yet again, could not protect you."

Emily had been so relieved in the garden, when the "footman" had not intervened, that she had not realized how hard it must have been for him to see her hurt and not come to her rescue. To reassure him, she repeated the truth, "You have given me the best protection I could ever have against Granbury."

His arms tightened around her. "The best protection I could offer you would be to see him hanged."

She said solemnly, as she stretched up to kiss him lightly on the chin, "And we will do that. But until then, you offered me the protection of your name." Carried away by a wave of daring, she kissed his chin again and then looked into his eyes, pleased to see that she had sparked an ember of desire to life. "You married me so that he cannot."

Emily's lips moved to his mouth, and Valentine forced himself to step away so that her gesture was just a light brush of warmth. He fought the urge to kiss her properly, so that she would not know how much he wanted her. He had not meant to hold her, to — She was his wife, but when the danger from Granbury was gone would she regret it?

"Why do you pull away?" Her breath was soft on his cheek. "I can see that you want to kiss me. And we are married, now, after all." He opened his mouth, but in the end made no sound, for he had no answer for her. Yes, they were married. He had put his ring on her finger in the darkness of the ramshackle inn. He had said his vows in a voice kept low and discreet. But there was still a doubt in him.

He had decided that the right thing to do, the noble thing, would be to give her the choice once Granbury was no longer a threat: marriage and a straitened lifestyle, or a return to her family and her familiar luxuries. Without a looming threat, she could make such a decision wisely. And he could be sure that her choice was made with both head and heart, rather than heart alone.

However, he knew himself too well to imagine that he could act as her husband here and then give her such a choice. Once he had taken her to bed he would not ever be able to let her go. Still, she could sense he wanted her, though she had no idea exactly what it was that he wanted from her but kisses. And he wanted to kiss her very badly indeed. That was the crux of the problem. He wanted more than a kiss. He wanted to make her his in every way. But a secret, dark‚ shrouded sham of a ceremony did not give him the right to take what he had essentially stolen from her.

There was hurt in her eyes as she filled the silence with a simple question. "Do you wish you had not been forced to marry me?" He could see quite clearly that she wanted reassurances from him — reassurances to quell her own doubts. And he could not bring himself to hurt her with the truth. So he could only offer cautious hope. "In the end, I hope we are both not sorry for having had to go so far."

It would not be a life worth living if Emily were unhappy at Anderlin. He watched as disappointment turned her mouth downward, but she did not cry, and in a moment her lips tightened into a firm line and she said bravely, "I will not be."

He wanted so much to believe her, but he dared not. "You are not in a position to know how you will feel after your mother stops trying to push you at Granbury. At the moment, I must seem the answer to your prayers, trapped here as you were, about to be forced into a marriage you did not want."

She smiled as she said, "Don't you think it was fateful that I literally dropped into your arms just as I was about to run away?"

The image made him want to return her smile, but he forced himself to be stern. "I am not one of Miranda's fairytale princes come to sweep you off to happily ever after."

She sniffed in annoyance. "I don't need your sister's fairytales to tell me what you are, Valentine." She smiled at him, a question in her eyes. "Do you think I don't know I love you?"

The question was simple enough, but for a moment he felt as if he couldn't breathe. She loved him. The truth was there in her eyes. "Love can wither away easily enough."

"Mine has not." Her annoyance was all too obvious in the set of her jaw "I have loved you since you told Edmund Burke that my feet were too delicate for his dance step and swept me away from him. No fairytale prince could have been so bold, but my toes and I will be forever grateful to you for that."

He sighed. Had he ever been so young and feckless? "Be sensible. We haven't seen each other in three years. I tried to elope with you — a young impressionable girl . . . an heiress."

She laughed, as if the scenario he painted were preposterous. "You asked my father first. We tried all honorable persuasions before we eloped, didn't we?"

He had to fight his own impulses to simply give in to her arguments. "If you want to be completely honest about our situation, we are no better than strangers."

At that, she looked as if he had struck her squarely in the gut with his fist. For a moment she seemed unable to breathe. And then she said steadily, "Never. You will never be a stranger to me."

"Perhaps." There was such conviction in her voice, he could not but believe what she said. Only the thought of ultimately hurting her kept him from taking her into his arms then and there. So she thought she knew him, and perhaps he would find she did. But what if she did not? Worse, would he one day find her indifferent to him? Angry that he had not truly prepared her for what it would be like to be the wife of an impoverished viscount.