The Capture of the Earl of Glencrae by Stephanie Laurens
They glanced at each other, then Gavin asked, “Just for a few days?”
She nodded. “It’ll all be over soon.” It had to be.
“All right,” they chorused.
After another brief exchange of looks, Bryce gripped her hand and jiggled it. “Can we go for a walk all together? Outside the castle, I mean?”
She smiled and rose. “I can’t promise, but I’ll see what I can do.”
On receiving the expected summons to attend Mirabelle in her sitting room, Angelica allowed Brenda to escort her thither, her tack for the day clear in her mind. Mirabelle again instructed her to sit on the straight-backed chair facing Mirabelle’s comfy armchair; knowing the position was deliberately designed to demean her, even deep in her crushed violet role, Angelica still felt a spurt of temper. The instant she sat, clinging outwardly to her role, she launched into her prepared monologue, illustrating that the crushed violet had accepted her lot to the extent of contemplating how to make her way as a “ruined lady.”
In between wheedling, imploring, and begging Mirabelle to help her escape, tossing out vague mentions of family gratitude—none of which, perhaps unsurprisingly, garnered any response—she subtly and consistently underscored her belief in her own ruination; every request, every suggestion of making a new life was firmly predicated on the assumption that she was already irrevocably ruined, and, in polite terms, beyond the pale.
“Perhaps in Edinburgh? I have a good eye for fashion and can sew—perhaps I’ll be able to find a place with a modiste there?” She fixed weary, helpless eyes on Mirabelle. “Are there fashionable modistes in Edinburgh?”
Finally able to get a word in, Mirabelle snapped, “I have absolutely no interest in what you do with the rest of your life. What I want to hear from you is . . .”
The catalog of her questions was as well thought out and significantly more extensive than Angelica’s preparations. Stuck with the inevitable, she answered Mirabelle’s queries about the Cynsters’ connections, the other major ton families, the wider nobility presently in London, the patronesses of Almack’s . . . it finally dawned that the questions revolved about all the ton luminaries with whom the Cynsters rubbed shoulders.
Angelica found that a touch unsettling. She countered by embellishing her answers with breathless speculation of how those named would react on learning of her ruination, how shocked they’d be, how horrified . . . only to see Mirabelle’s vindictive avidity reach new heights.
Of course—that’s what she hopes will happen.
The longer they spoke, the clearer it became that Mirabelle took real pleasure, nay joy, in imagining the ramifications of Angelica’s—Celia’s daughter’s—social ruination.
Finally the gong for luncheon sounded; Angelica couldn’t wait to leave the room and the blackness that surged within it.
But over luncheon, Mirabelle continued to cast sly, expectant glances at her, continued to ply her with leading questions, no longer about individuals but about the wider ton’s likely reaction to such a sensational case of a young lady of good family being ruined.
Dominic growled and put a stop to the interrogation.
Mirabelle got huffy and declared that she’d heard enough from “the little twit” anyway.
“Does that mean you’re prepared to hand over the goblet?”
“Not yet. I have to digest what she’s told me . . . but soon.” Her gaze distant, her expression coldly pleased, Mirabelle nodded. “Soon, very soon, I’ll have gained all the revenge I want.” She glanced at Dominic. “And then you may have your precious goblet back.”
Pushing back her chair, she rose and swept from the hall.
Dominic watched her go, then murmured, “Do you have any idea what she’s thinking?”
Eyes on her plate, Angelica replied, “I haven’t a single clue.”
“Is it my imagination, or is she waiting for something specific?” Dominic paced back and forth along the crenellated wall at the top of the keep.
He’d let Brenda escort Angelica back to the store room, then had gone down the secret stair, led her up to his rooms, and from there up the main stairs to the top of his tower, to where the air was fresh and they could speak freely.
Perched on a buttress nearby, with Gwarr, who’d followed Dominic from the hall, slumped beneath her feet, Angelica shook her head. “I didn’t get that feeling, at least not while talking to her in her sitting room. As for her later comments, she seems to think she’ll come to a decision—the right decision for us—soon.”
“So she intimates, but I’m not about to believe I’ll have the goblet back until I have it in my hands.” Halting before Angelica, he looked into her upturned face. “What did you and she talk about this morning?”
She told him, ending with, “Looking back, she seems to have accepted my ruination as fact—she didn’t appear to doubt or question that. Her focus today was on the outcome of my ruination. Yesterday’s gloating had transformed to something more like glee—and yes, it’s an anticipatory glee, but it didn’t seem to be contingent on any other happening. She wanted to dwell on the result as she imagines it will be.”
Reading her expression, the distaste conveyed by the set of her lips, he guessed, “She wanted to dwell on the pain you being publicly ruined would cause your mother.”
She met his eyes, then sighed and nodded. “Yes. It was . . . more disturbing than I’d thought it would be, listening to her, knowing what she was taking such delight in.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault. If any fault could be laid, it would be at your father’s door, but even then his obsession was innocent in itself. It’s what Mirabelle has twisted it into that’s so black and awful.”
He hesitated, then asked, “Do you want to call a halt?”
“No.” She looked up at him, determination and stubbornness infusing her features. “I’m not such a weak creature that confronting a little nastiness will make me cut and run. There’s far too much at stake, and never doubt that in this, I’m now as committed as you.”
He looked into her eyes, now flashing gold more than green, and smiled. Reaching for her face, he tipped it up and kissed her.
She kissed him back, one hand rising to cradle the back of one of his. He straightened and, wrapping one arm around her, drew her off the buttress and into his arms.
She sank against him; he angled his head and deepened the kiss, accepting the invitation that she, with her lips and tongue and the caress of her small hands, laid before him.
Beside them, Gwarr stirred.
Then the big dog barked.
They broke off the kiss. Both stared at Gwarr. He was on his feet facing the door they’d used to reach the battlements—the one at the top of the main east tower stairwell that gave access to Dominic’s rooms.
A low growl reverberated in the dog’s chest.
“Quick—behind the buttress.” Dominic urged Angelica into the lee of the stone abutment.
She crouched down, out of sight of the stairwell door.
Gwarr barked again. She heard Dominic stride toward the door. Then he asked, “What is it?”
“I wanted to speak with you,” Mirabelle said. “I looked in your study, then felt the breeze from up here.”
“Let’s go back to the study—we can talk there.” A second passed. “Gwarr. Come!”
The dog had stayed as he’d been, on guard between Angelica and the door. He whined, but then went.
Angelica waited a few seconds, then peeked out from behind the buttress—just in time to see Dominic send Gwarr down the stairs and pull the door closed.
Exhaling, she rose. She couldn’t risk going down the stairs, not until she knew Mirabelle had left the east tower; Dominic would come and fetch her when it was safe.
Strolling to the wall, she decided she might as well enjoy the enforced interl
“Is that all you wanted?” Standing before the desk in his study, Dominic laid aside his mother’s latest dressmaker’s bill. Although her allowance was generous by anyone’s standards, she invariably outran the constable and had to apply to him to bail her out.
Despite the fact she never attended balls, never went anywhere, every year she ordered the most expensive of the latest fashions and threw out the previous year’s acquisitions unused. He’d long ago stopped caring; the women of the clan enjoyed the lovely blouses and skirts the castle’s sempstresses fashioned from Mirabelle’s castoffs.
“Yes, that’s all.” Mirabelle turned to leave.
He couldn’t help himself. “When are you planning to hand over the goblet?”
Halting, she arched her brows, but didn’t meet his eyes. “Soon.” She paused as if calculating, then said, “It shouldn’t take much longer—a day or two at most.” Her eyes found his. “I know you still have time.”
“We don’t have that many days left—I still have to get it down to London.” Even as he said the words, he knew he was playing into her hands—playing her game rather than his. Angelica had seen the truth very clearly; Mirabelle’s scheme was at least equally driven by her wish to be avenged on him.
“Nevertheless, you’ll have to wait.” Her expression grew coy, almost girlish. “Tomorrow, or perhaps the day after. We’ll see.”
With a swish of her skirts, she turned to the door. This time, he didn’t stop her.
She stopped of her own accord. Poised in the open doorway, she looked back at him. “Meanwhile, you might dwell on the fact that if you’d done as I urged you all those years ago, you wouldn’t be facing ruin now.”
If he’d done as she’d asked and acquiesced to his father’s murder.
His expression locked, his face like stone, he made no reply, just waited until she’d left, then he slowly crossed the room and quietly shut the door.
“I’m increasingly wondering if she intends to hand back the goblet at all. Once she does, she’ll have no Damocles’s sword to hold over me, no lever or power to make me do her bidding—and she’s so enjoying that. Admittedly there’s no benefit to her in holding onto the goblet, but . . .”
“But you fear she’s vindictive enough to do it just for spite.” Lying cushioned amid the pillows on Dominic’s bed, Angelica watched him, heart-stoppingly naked, cross the room toward her. Moonlight shone through the window overlooking the forests, limning his long limbs and the upper edge of his broad shoulders.
“Exactly.” He climbed into the bed beside her. “I can see her happily letting the clan collapse.” He slumped on his back; crossing his arms behind his head, he stared upward.
She wished she could dismiss his fears. Unfortunately, she shared them. Their plan was straightforward, but what if it didn’t work?
Two seconds of thought convinced her that that was an outcome she didn’t want to think about, or even entertain regardless of how matters at the moment looked. “We can’t let her throw us off. We will succeed. Come hell or high water, we will get that goblet back and get it to the bankers in time.”
He glanced at her, but, like her, seemed to draw ineluctable comfort from the belligerently stubborn statement.
Rustling about, she turned to him. “And in the spirit of focusing on the better times to come, I have something to confess.”
He studied her face, then arched his brows. “Confess away.”
She smiled. “I had to tell the boys about us—that we’re going to shortly marry, and that I’m helping you with something, and until that’s finished with, it would be best if they could avoid us both while we’re inside the keep, except for their rooms.”
“They didn’t say anything about speaking with you when I saw them a few hours ago.”
“Possibly because it was here that we spoke.”
“Here. This room?”
She nodded. “Which was why it was necessary to promise them that they could attend our wedding.”
“You promised them that?” When she nodded, his lips slowly curved, then he gave in and grinned. “I know they look sweet and innocent to you, but do you have any notion of just how inventive those two can be when it comes to getting into scrapes?”
“Of course. I have nephews, and Gavin and Bryce can’t be worse than they are. Regardless, I assure you, we—the females of the family—have tried-and-true ways of ensuring weddings go off without a hitch, even with the involvement of multiple page boys.”
“Page boys. Have you told them that?”
“Not yet. I’m saving it for later.” She smiled into his eyes, felt her own happiness well from knowing she’d eased his cares for just a little while. “I have a proposition for you.”
He arched his brows, inviting her to state it.
Spreading her hand on his chest, she held his gaze, softly said, “I suggest we concentrate on the here and now, on the pleasures and the joys of this night, these next hours, the coming moments. And that we leave tomorrow’s cares for tomorrow.”
He studied her eyes, then he unlocked his arms and reached for her. “All right.”
His hands closed about her waist. Before she could think, he rolled, and then she lay on her back beneath him, the dimness of the four-poster closing around them as he settled over her.
The warmth of their bodies merged; her nerves stretched with awareness and anticipation.
He looked down at her and smiled, his eyes slowly tracking up to her eyes. He looked into them, then murmured, “As you wish. Tonight is for tonight, and these hours are for you and me.”
He bent his head and she tipped hers up, let him kiss her while she kissed him back. Then let him whirl her into the primal dance, banishing all thoughts but those that led them ever onward, down the road to paradise.
Chapter Nineteen
They were late down for breakfast; other than Brenda, still in her role of guard, there were only a few stragglers at the lower tables.
As Mirabelle rarely emerged from her rooms until much later, Angelica was happily addressing a bowl of porridge liberally laced with honey when Dominic, similarly engaged in his chair alongside hers, suddenly raised his head, then looked at her. “She’s coming.”
Angelica met his eyes, blinked, then drew breath, closed her eyes, and reached for her wilting, crushed violet persona, drawing it around her like a veil, shrinking down, her head lowering, her shoulders hunching as if to ward off a blow.
A second later, Mirabelle walked into the room. She didn’t immediately glance their way, but peered toward the main doors. Frowning, she turned to the high table. Spotting the news sheets Dominic had been leafing through, her expression eased and she crossed to the dais to take her usual seat.
One of the maids came hurrying up, but Mirabelle waved her off and reached for the news sheets. Wordlessly, Dominic surrendered them—the Edinburgh papers from three days before, and the London papers from a week previously; he had both delivered by rider from Inverness every day.
His heart sank as he realized what his mother was searching for.
Discarding the Edinburgh sheets, she pored over those from London, turning each over, flicking back and forth. Abruptly, she sat up and flung the papers back at him. “There’s nothing there!”
He had to be sure. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that there’s no mention of her”—viciously Mirabelle jabbed a finger in Angelica’s direction—“disappearing. No mention of the scandal! How can she be socially ruined if no one knows?”
Turning his head, Dominic exchanged a brief glance with Angelica.
&n
Dominic faced Mirabelle. “Obviously her family has hidden her disappearance. They will for as long as they can. You must have read enough of them to know that they could, and most likely would.” He frowned at her. “Surely you didn’t expect to read about Angelica Cynster being kidnapped in a news sheet?”
The look Mirabelle bent on him stated very loudly that she had.
She glared, then, her face hardening, shot a dark glance at Angelica’s bowed head. “I wanted a scandal.”
“No—you wanted her ruined. That was our bargain, and ruined she is, whether that’s puffed off in the news sheets or not.”
Mirabelle’s jaw firmed. Lips compressed, she glared even more furiously—first at the papers, then at him. “I don’t care!” She drew breath, reached for a modicum of calm, then stated, “I’m going to wait until the scandal breaks.” Rising, she pointed at the news sheets. “Until I see it in black and white.”
Dominic held onto his temper. “That wasn’t our bargain.”
Leaning closer, Mirabelle grated out, “Too bad!” She stepped back. “She has to be socially ruined. I’m going to wait.” Swinging around, she stormed out of the hall.
Angelica watched her go, then, straightening, closed a hand on Dominic’s arm. “Not here.” To her senses, his spiraling temper registered as a volcano about to erupt; her temper was not far behind. She eased out a breath. “Let’s go for a walk.”
They were going to need something to anchor and, later, refocus them. Angelica sent Brenda to fetch the boys and the dogs, then to her surprise found herself in company with Gavin, Bryce, and the three gamboling water spaniels being ushered by a silent Dominic down into the bowels of the north tower below Mirabelle’s rooms. They crept down the stone stairs, then Dominic opened a door and waved them past, into a store room. After shutting the door, he took her hand and drew her in the wake of the boys and the dogs—to another door set in the outer wall.