Chapter Twenty-Five

“Shopping can uplift a lady’s spirits like nothing else,” Olivia said.

“I hardly think a new bonnet will help.” At the expectant look on her sister’s face, Ellie lightened her tone. “But I do believe spending an afternoon with my sister shopping for bonnets is a splendid idea.”

Olivia’s brow eased, and she smiled. “I didn’t have the milliners in mind.” She hooked her arm through Ellie’s and urged her down Bond Street.

Ellie was not in the mood for shopping, but she did not want to disappoint her sister. She was also aware that her days in town were limited, and she wanted to spend as much time with Olivia as she could.

Her heart sank. She’d no longer see Olivia on a daily basis but would have to wait until her family traveled to the country to see her sister. How awful.

They came to a shop, and Ellie glanced at the sign above the door. “Phillips Jewelers?”

“I’d like to purchase something special,” Olivia said.

A departing patron opened the shop door, and the two sisters swept inside. The jeweler was busy helping a gentleman with a selection of snuffboxes. Displays on counters and tables captivated Ellie, and she wasn’t sure where to look first. Necklaces, earrings, and bracelets of precious and semiprecious jewels of diamonds, pearls, emeralds, rubies, sapphires, amethysts, and topaz were nestled on black velvet trays. Snuffboxes with lids that could incorporate a tiny portrait of one’s spouse were displayed on tables throughout the shop. Ellie wondered if Ian would like another snuffbox with Grace’s image. A table was laden with a full dinner service of silver plates. Another held cameo brooches and lockets.

Olivia waved for Ellie to join her in the corner of the shop where a selection of letter openers was displayed. Some were plain with simple silver handles; others were inscribed and their handles encrusted with jewels.

“I thought to get you a letter opener so that you can open all the letters I plan to write you.”

Ellie’s eyes welled. “That’s so thoughtful.”

Olivia touched her arm. “Oh, Ellie. I didn’t mean for you to cry.”

Ellie shook her head. “I’m crying with happiness now.”

“I promise to write every day. And I shall visit often. Ian will tire of me asking to see you and will no doubt relent at my persistence.”

A tear slipped down Ellie’s cheek. “I will look forward to each treasured letter and every visit.” Her fingers grazed the displayed letter openers. “You pick one.”

Olivia selected one with a jeweled handle made of opal. As they waited for the shopkeeper to finish with his customer, the shop’s bell chimed, and a man clad in a coat and beaver hat with the brim pulled down low entered and went to the back. Ellie paid him little heed as the shopkeeper raised his head to smile at the sisters and motion them to the counter to pay. He covered the sharp tip of the letter opener with a piece of cloth. Rather than carry a wrapped package, Ellie slipped her small purchase into her reticule.

“Now it’s my turn,” Ellie said. “I want to buy you a keepsake as well. It must be a surprise. You stay in the front of the shop while I search for the perfect gift.”

Ellie wound her way past tables displaying fancy silver wine goblets, elegant candelabras, and more gleaming silver plates. From the outside, the shop appeared small, and indeed it was narrow, but it had considerable depth. She stopped at a table of amber brooches and necklaces and admired each one to decide which her sister would like.

A strong hand landed on her arm and another around her mouth. Shocked, Ellie tried to struggle, but she was dragged out of the shop’s back door and into the alley.

…

Hugh took the earl’s carriage and directed the driver to Bond Street. He looked up and down the street. Gentlemen and ladies strolled arm-in-arm, others entered and departed from stores, while others stopped to look at displays behind large bay windows. Where on earth could two unmarried women shop? The dressmaker’s? The milliner’s? The shoemaker’s?

“Lord Deveril!”

He spun at the sound of his name to see a golden-haired lady rushing toward him.

“Lady Olivia,” he said, closing the distance between them in two strides. “Where’s your sister?”

Her cheeks were flushed, her green eyes wide. “I don’t know.”

“What do you mean?”

She was breathing heavily, her voice strained. “We were in the jeweler’s shop. She told me to wait in the front of the shop while she selected something for me…a surprise. She just…just disappeared. She would never just do that. Never. I’m afraid something has happened.”

“Wait in the carriage.” Hugh ran down the street, scanning the area for Ellie and pushing past alarmed passersby on his way. His thoughts bordered on chaotic as his legs pumped to reach the shop. Baron Willoughby was raving mad, and he most likely knew Ellie had something to do with his wife’s disappearance. How long had she been missing? The thought of the baron hurting her or worse—killing her—caused panic to riot in his chest.

Don’t think of how he mercilessly beat his own wife.

Urgency made him quicken his pace, and his heart thumped an irregular beat with each step. With stunning clarity, he realized that he loved Ellie. Had always loved her. His desperation for her to marry him had nothing to do with the club, their fierce attraction for each other, or for his need to protect her, but because he could not envision a future without her. Without her laugh, her wit, her keen intelligence that rivaled his own.

Ever since his parents’ damning words regarding Ellie’s family, he’d thought to do right by her. And after surviving his parents’ cold upbringing, he’d left his childhood home and had learned never to rely on another. Love, he’d believed, was a foolish emotion.

Then Ellie had returned to his life, and his youthful feelings had resurfaced stronger than before. He’d fallen even more in love with her, not only with her beauty, but with her intelligence, her determination, and her unwavering loyalty to those in need. She’d turned his world inside out, and he could never return, never imagine a life without her by his side. He needed her to challenge him, to make him laugh, to make him feel alive, to complete him.

And how had he shown her his love? Because of him, she was being banished to the country and sent away from those she loved. Her dreams of financial independence and helping others were now shattered.

He was responsible. For everything. He’d broken her heart when she’d been a young debutante. He justified his need to protect her by thinking it was the only way, but he’d been wrong. Terribly wrong. By not telling her the truth about his parents’ disapproval and by hurting her in a cruel fashion by kissing another, he’d effectively taken away Ellie’s right to make her own choice. She should have had a say.

And he’d repeated his mistake when he’d privately spoken with Castleton about her activities with Violet Lasher. Ellie was right. He hadn’t trusted her enough to come to him and instead had acted on his own. His stubborn pride, his need for control, had ruined their chance to be together, just as it had years ago.

She had every right to despise him.

His heart sank as he realized what he had done. Could she ever forgive him? More importantly, would he reach her in time to beg her forgiveness and profess his love?

The alternative was unthinkable.

He could lose it all.

His breath caught as he spotted the jeweler’s. Pushing past a startled group of dandies, he reached for the door and burst into the shop. The shopkeeper looked up in alarm. “Is something amiss?”

“Is there a back door?”

The man pointed and Hugh took off. Goblets and bowls toppled off tables on his mad dash to the back door.

Praying he was on time, he sprinted into the alley.