What a Lady Needs for Christmas (35 page)

The return to Balfour was undertaken in a first-class compartment, which Dante and his wife had to themselves.

More’s the pity.

“You’re quiet,” he observed. He wanted to ask her what she’d sketched for Valmonte in that same tea shop, but he already knew: Joan sketched dresses. Occasionally, she’d sketch a dress worn by her mother or her sisters, but the occupant of the dress was often an afterthought, chosen to better exhibit the garment itself.

Joan put down the book she’d been reading, some old novel. “I’ve been thinking. Have you ever been to Paris?”

Why, yes, of course. Every crofter’s son who came of age toiling in the mines went larking off to Paris at the first opportunity.

“I don’t speak French.” He read it well enough, because he needed to understand contracts written in French.

“That’s no matter, they all speak English.”

No, they did not. Many of the French understood English, but just as Dante was loath to exhibit his poor pronunciation before the French, they hoarded up their English abilities for their own purposes—and for their own entertainment.

“You’ve been, I take it?”

“Many times. I would love to show you Paris.” Her enthusiasm for the journey did not show in her gaze, which was fixed on a bound edition of one of Dickens’s dolorous epics.

“We’ll go someday, then.” Someday when the mills were adequately financed, Margaret’s situation was settled, Hector wasn’t vibrating with a restlessness that boded ill, and Joan wasn’t having assignations with skinny viscounts.

“Might we go soon?”

Her simple question held controlled desperation, the ladylike version of panic, and abruptly, Dante could not abide the deception that had joined them in their private compartment.

He put an arm around his wife, closed his eyes, and spoke as gently as he could. “Why did you meet Valmonte in Aberdeen, Joan? He’s engaged, you’re married. To me.”

The shock of his question rendered her smaller against his side.

“Edward is an old friend. We shared a cup of tea.”

Joan had not shared anything with Valmonte, except her time and her sketch. Perhaps she’d been anxious that news of her meeting might get back to her husband, but then, why meet in a public tea shop and sit in the very window?

Dante honestly did not want to accuse his wife of infidelity, not even in his thoughts.

“I don’t care for him,” Dante said. “He doesn’t mind his tongue in the gentlemen’s retiring room, and he lets his mother run roughshod over him. The family business seems to fall entirely to the uncle, while Valmonte minces about town, having tea with other people’s wives.”

She picked up her book. “I can hardly avoid his company. He and Lady Dorcas will be at Mama’s New Year’s ball. They’ll show up at all the best entertainments, and you and I will be invited to his wedding.” She came to a pair of pages that hadn’t been cut. “Were you spying on me, Dante?”

They were to exchange prevarications, which was usually the way of it when a marriage faltered.

“I’m interested in opening offices in Aberdeen. Any time a port city acquires rail access, trade there booms, and Edinburgh has become quite expensive. I was acquainting myself with the commercial real estate available in Aberdeen, and happened to see you.”

He fished out his penknife, appropriated her book, and slit the pages cleanly free of each other.

She accepted the book back, but didn’t open it. “So you’ll be spending time in Aberdeen, while the children and I remain where?”

He’d been thinking of establishing Hector in Aberdeen, though Joan didn’t seem upset to relocate her husband there.

“The Glasgow property is home to the children and Margaret. I prefer it for its proximity to the mills.”

For what fine lady didn’t aspire to live within walking distance of a trio of wool mills?

Joan stared at her book for the next thirty miles of their journey, while Dante kept his arm around her and pondered what he might have said, should have said, and didn’t say.

“Maybe this spring,” Joan said as the train lost momentum on the approach to some way station, “I’ll pop over to Paris and do some shopping.”

The hell she would.

“Long journeys at this point are probably not well-advised. Do you know yet if you’re expecting a child?”

A child would bind them together, and as the train hurtled toward the cold, dark mountains, Dante accepted that he wanted to be bound to Joan. Not only legally, but morally, emotionally, intellectually, financially, all the ways a true couple became entangled.

“I’m not certain. My digestion has been tentative, but that’s to be expected amid so much upheaval.”

Upheaval, indeed.

“In the interests of giving you some peace amid this upheaval, we might consider separate quarters upon our return to Balfour House.”

The train bumped over some junction in the tracks, jostling everybody aboard, the way that question to Joan jostled all of Dante’s dreams for a shared future off their marital rails.

He could not lie down night after night beside a woman who was dishonest with him.

“Separate quarters might be for the best,” Joan said. “I appreciate your gentlemanly consideration.”

She cuddled closer, her book apparently forgotten, while Dante stroked her arm and nearly choked on his consideration.

***

Tell
him, tell him, tell him.

That Dante would suggest separate sleeping quarters not ten days into the marriage was a sign of consideration, and yet, like pretty clothes that only drew attention to a woman’s plainness, to Joan, the effect wasn’t considerate at all.

“Thank God,” Dante muttered as the train slowed on the approach to Ballater. He tucked his lap desk into a satchel apparently made for it and reached for Joan’s book. “I can carry that if you don’t want to put it in your reticule.”

A mundane bit of thoughtfulness. Their marriage would be full of thoughtfulness and devoid of trust.

“I’ll carry it.” They decamped for the platform when the train pulled into the Ballater station. Dante fussed with the lone porter over their baggage, and soon, they were in the frigid darkness, awaiting the arrival of a sleigh to take them back to Balfour house.

“Come along,” Dante said, tossing the porter a coin to mind their trunks. “We can get something to eat over at the inn.”

“An inn?” Joan had never taken a meal at a country inn, and the prospect sounded dubious from a gustatory standpoint. “Are you hungry?”

“And cold,” Dante said, his breath puffing white in the night air.

Down the street, laughter burst from a two-story granite structure festooned with lanterns and wreaths.

“Very well.” How difficult could it be, to sit beside her husband while he downed an ale and a meat pie? Joan dutifully tucked her gloved hand over his arm and prepared to march off, when a ripping sound stopped her.

“I’m caught,” she said, freeing herself from Dante’s escort and stifling a curse. “My hem is caught, and I can’t—”

She couldn’t turn to inspect the damage because she was
caught
. Her favorite aubergine dress, the one with the lavender lace and flounces about the hem, the one she considered her prettiest for everyday and travel, was doomed to catch, snag, and be injured by circumstances. One curse wouldn’t be enough; one language worth of curses wouldn’t be enough to express her sheer frustration.

“Hold still,” Dante said, kneeling. “I’ll have you free.”

“That’s not the point.” He was bareheaded, kneeling at her hems, and Joan was desperate to make him understand. “I’ve torn the hem, ruined the lace. Now the lace will drag in the snow, and I’ll step on it, and it will tear further, and the entire petticoat is at risk, and I
love
this dress. I sewed every stitch of it, tatted every inch of the lace. I chose the fabric and made the patterns, I love—”

He rose holding a scrap of lavender lace, and used it to dab at Joan’s cheek. The sensation of hot tears on her cold cheek, of the rough-soft lace against her skin, put the moment into higher relief than a simple torn hem merited.

“It’s only a dress, Joan. You can make another.”

Dante spoke gently, he touched her gently, and he might just as gently give up on their marriage.

He hadn’t believed her lies about that tête-à-tête in the tea shop. The next time Edward commandeered Joan’s presence or her sketches or her time, Dante wouldn’t be fooled by those lies either.

Joan wrapped her hand around his, around the frivolous bit of little lace he’d used to dry her tears. The lace was worth nothing, while her husband meant so much to her.

“I don’t want to sleep apart,” she said, tugging him closer by virtue of their joined hands. “I don’t want anything to come between us.”

He rested his forehead against hers, so their breath joined, and a startling patch of warmth touched Joan’s brow, like a kind thought might touch her mind. The laughter came again, and somebody took up a song about the wise men, long journeys, and hope.

“I followed you, Joan, the second time you met with him. The first time was by chance, but then I saw Valmonte’s note, his
summons
, and followed you. I should not have dissembled, but he’s of your ilk, a handsome young lord, a gentleman by birth. Nonetheless, I suspected his motives. I did not trust—”

She kissed him, quickly, because the cold was threatening to make her teeth chatter. “I did not deserve your trust. Edward certainly did not deserve mine, and he’s about to make such trouble.”

“Valmonte was the one who used you ill?”

Down the snowy street, the revelers at the inn had fallen silent, while a lyrical duet lifted into the night, like the single star sending a beacon of hope long ago.

To withhold details from Dante now would be to protect Edward, and a cheering, simple thought made Joan’s decision effortless.

Her marriage mattered to her more than anything. More than pretty clothes, pretty society, pride, familial associations, titles, appearances,
anything
. She would become Mrs. Dante Hartwell in truth, and the rest of the world—and their little dogs—could all have a Happy Christmas without her.

“Edward is the scoundrel, and I suspect he duped me with an invitation to tea, purportedly from his mother. I’ll tell you all of it, but let’s find some ale and a meat pie.” She kissed him again, more lingeringly.

“Aye,” Dante said. “We shall. Before our lips freeze together.”

***

Scandal was not
necessarily
bad for business.

Dante rubbed his eyes, and for the thousandth time, resisted climbing into bed beside his sleeping wife. After the Christmas Eve tree lighting, he’d remained awake, rearranging figures and wrestling emotions.

Joan was embroiled in a situation that could bring ruin not only to her, but also to Dante’s businesses, and to Joan’s family. For Quinworth’s brood, the scandal would be temporary, particularly if they distanced themselves from Joan’s folly, though Joan’s guilt over the inconvenience to her family would be eternal.

A drink to settle the nerves was in order, or to take the edge off the worries keeping Dante awake.

He could not foil Valmonte’s scheme.

He could not protect Joan from the ridicule and judgment of her peers.

He most certainly could not attract investors from among Joan’s family, which meant going hat in hand to the banks or continuing on the present course, reaping profit, but with a sense of disaster looming when a roof gave, a loom broke, or a strike threatened.

Fire, thank God, could be insured against.

He rose, kissed his wife’s forehead, and took himself into the darkened corridor, a frigid place even in Balfour’s commodious dwelling. Despite the challenges facing him, Dante enjoyed fierce satisfaction that Joan had entrusted him with her problems, surrendering a burden she should never have been made to carry.

“What are you doing out of bed?” The question came from Spathfoy’s father, who managed to look dignified even at this late hour.

“Fetching a nightcap. Join me?” The Marquess of Quinworth was Dante’s father-in-law, and yet, they’d hardly exchanged two words since the wedding.

“If I tarry with you over a drink, my marchioness will fall asleep in my absence, for which I will be scolded in the morning.”

This scold didn’t bother his lordship much, based on the affection in his tone.

“A wee dram, then,” Dante said. “We can toast the health of our ladies.”

“And the Queen, of course,” Quinworth said, a small English nudge to his son-in-law’s cultural ribs.

“Two wee drams, then, for—”

In the darkness at the end of the corridor, a pale, shadowy blur disappeared around the corner, a blur about the size of a cat, but closer to the ground.

“What was that?” Quinworth asked. “Has Frederick got loose again?”

Dante hurried down the corridor, the older man keeping pace. “Frederick?”

“My granddaughter Fiona’s damned rabbit. He’s a complacent enough chap, though lately, Fiona says he’s looking peaked and wan.”

They were nearly running, but quietly, in deference to the sleeping household. “That rabbit weighs a good stone at least,” Dante said, for he’d made Frederick’s acquaintance on many trips to the nursery. “He’s no more peaked and wan than Spathfoy’s gelding.”

“Or Spathfoy himself,” Quinworth said as they rounded the next corner.

Just in time to see a bunny tail disappearing toward the stairs.

“That’s not Fiona’s bunny,” Dante said, anxiety tearing at him. “That’s the rabbit I bought Joan for Christmas. If it gets outside in this weather—”

“It will hop out to the stables and dine on oats and hay until spring,” Quinworth said, sounding more stern than optimistic.

“It can’t hop to the stables through more than two feet of snow,” Dante countered.

They next spotted the beast at the top of the main stairs, which it descended with enough speed to suggest the rabbit knew it had pursuers and wasn’t in any mood to be caught.

“We should fetch the hounds,” Quinworth said. “This time of year they get mopey, and a bit of a run—”

“They’ll tear my Joan’s Christmas present to pieces, all over Lady Balfour’s carpets.”