| |
As Amelia embroidered one last stitch onto the handkerchief, completing the letter J, she glanced over at the bed in the corner for the hundredth time that hour. The counterpane-covered figure propped up by pillows lay as still as ever.
She sighed and returned to her sewing, but she was soon interrupted when Tessa peeked her head into the room.
“May I come in?”
Amelia set aside the handkerchief and nodded. It was late afternoon now and she’d been keeping vigil over James for almost nine hours now. Once Kensworth had returned her to Applewood, both of them still dazed by the events at the hunting box, Peyton and Tessa had agreed to set out for London at first light to discover what had transpired at the Theatre Royal. They’d arrived to find James injured and unconscious. Nothing had changed over the course of the day, except that Amelia had insisted on watching over him so the servants had moved a bed and mattress into the silver salon for propriety’s sake.
Tessa hesitantly crossed the carpet and sat beside Amelia. “Do you need anything, my dear?”
Though she knew it wasn’t what her sister intended, Amelia replied, “I need your support.”
Tessa blinked. “I already said you would have it.”
“Your wholehearted support.” When Tessa opened her mouth, Amelia continued on, needing her sister to hear her words. “I know you like Kensworth. I know you think he is perfect for me. I know you dislike James.” Tessa tried to speak again, but Amelia shook her head sharply. “Kensworth is a fine man. I have fiercely defended him countless times over the last few days. No one cares for him more than I do.”
“But...” Tessa managed to slip in.
Amelia turned to look at James, his immobility wrenching her heart open again. “But he is the man I love. He’s the one I want to spend the rest of my life with.” She swallowed a sob. “If I get the chance. We’ve both bungled things quite badly but that doesn’t change the fact we are perfect for each other. I... He must wake up. I can’t... I could not bear...”
Tessa gathered her up, stroking her back, murmuring comforting nonsense words until Amelia’s tears subsided. Then she produced a handkerchief, mopped up those tears, smoothed Amelia’s straggling locks back, and looked her in the eye.
“I don’t dislike James. I hate how badly he hurt you. I’ve had a hard time forgiving him, having seen the misery you endured.”
Somehow Amelia was able to dredge up a reluctant smile. “I am not exactly the forgiving type myself.” She heaved a sigh and sneaked another look at James, who hadn’t moved at all, except for the slight lift of the counterpane as he breathed. She had to keep faith, for at least he was breathing.
“Amelia?” Tessa squeezed her hand. “Is James your True Love?”
Three years ago, Amelia would have replied with a resounding yes. She’d matured since then. She’d realized she could love and respect one man, Kensworth, while loving, respecting, and desiring another. Did that mean James was her True Love? The practicality she’d cultivated over the last few years scoffed at the idea. Alas, she was a romantic at heart and she couldn’t stamp out the little spark that kindled inside her when she thought of James, heard his name, saw the teasing sparkle behind his spectacles.
She shrugged at Tessa. “I know you don’t believe in maudlin sentimentalities but... James is the one for me. Even if he won’t have me.”
Tessa reached out and stroked Amelia’s cheek. “Don’t be ridiculous. That man is completely incapable of keeping his passion for you hidden. If you say he’s the one, sister dear, I will make certain he declares himself to you.”
“That sentiment is exactly what I need from you, Tessa.” Amelia held up a finger. “However, I don’t want you to act on it. James and I need to work things out for themselves. If he would only wake up.”
“He will.” Tessa pulled her in for another embrace and Amelia found comfort in the familiar sweet smell of her sister.
Then she heard it. A whisper of movement from the bed, a short intake of a pained breath.
Tessa released her and slipped out of the room, undoubtedly to tell the others the good news.
Amelia rushed to the bed. “How do you feel?”
James grimaced. “As if Marden is playing his drum inside my head.”
Amelia hummed sympathetically, her eyes devouring him. He was awake and alive and talking. “I imagine so. You have a large gash on your temple and a good-sized knot behind your ear.”
He reached up and fingered the white bandage wrapped around his head. His gaze slid back to her. “Why am I in the silver salon?”
“When you first arrived last night, they installed you in your bedchamber. However, when I arrived early this morning, I informed the family I would be keeping watch over you. They decided to bring you to a more public room.” She smiled, finally feeling alive again herself. “Apparently I have a reputation as one who ravishes unconscious men.”
The corners of his mouth lifted, but he didn’t fully smile.
Just then the maid Mary returned with a tea tray. She set it on the table in front of the sofa, dropped a curtsy and left again. James watched her depart, seemingly uneasy.
Amelia knew she had only a limited amount of time before their tête-à-tête was interrupted. “Would you like a cup? There is toast as well.”
“Please.” He sat up gingerly, tossing off the counterpane. Swinging his stockinged feet to the floor, he rested his unshaven face in his hands. His filthy breeches had numerous rips in them, but his linen shirt was pristine; Taviston’s valet had changed it while cleaning his wounds.
Amelia prepared the tea while he steadied himself. Then she walked beside him the few feet from the bed to the sofa, ready to reach out if necessary. He sank down and she sat next to him, holding out his cup. She couldn’t help staring at the scratches on his hands and chafing on his wrists as he accepted it. He always seemed to be injured, but he never let those injuries hinder him.
“You’re a hero,” she said, despite knowing how much he would hate the appellation. He was the hero of her heart, too, but that declaration would have to wait a few minutes longer.
He looked askance at her.
“The newspapers aren’t naming you, though.” She pulled the Times off a side table. “They are, however, vilifying a man named Harry Watson. It seems he shot at Liverpool. Was he involved with David?”
“No. He was my liaison with Sidmouth.” James sipped his tea, which seemed to restore a small measure of color to his face. “He was supposed to make certain Liverpool and Sidmouth didn’t show up at the theatre, but they did anyway. I don’t believe Watson was shooting at the prime minister. That’s not in his character.”
Amelia glanced at the newspaper again. “Well, it says he lured Liverpool and Sidmouth out of the theatre by telling them they were needed at an urgent meeting.”
James took a bite of the buttered toast she handed him. “Probably true. I think he altered one of my earlier reports too. I would guess he wanted to play the hero. I told him when and where the assassination was to take place. I was getting Stickney and Bates away from their wagon when Watson fired and hit Stickney. His second shot set off the gunpowder.”
Amelia hesitated before recounting the rest of the newspaper article, knowing the information would upset him. But what was the point in denying it? He had been there and would suspect as much as she was going to tell him. “Bates and Stickney are dead. Two others are injured. David is in custody And,” she sighed, “Kensworth is wretched. I don’t know how he will go on.”
“I feared for him just as much as you did.” James rubbed his eyes. “Do you know where my spectacles are?”
Retrieving his spare pair from the side table, she unfolded them and slid them onto his face herself. That way he had to look at her. She stared into those blue eyes and whispered, “You must be wretched too.”
He shrugged and stared at his teacup. “I botched the mission.”
She reached for his hand. “Don’t be ridiculous! Liverpool and Sidmouth are safe. As for David, this Watson fellow and the others, they brought their troubles on themselves.” Gently, she swiped her thumb back and forth across his knuckles. “Not that I don’t pity them, but...you and Kensworth are the innocent ones, and yet you are injured, and he is inconsolable.”
Pushing his teacup away with one hand, he snatched the other away from her. “I don’t understand why you are here. Why I am here.”
Willfully she grasped his hand again and slid to the floor, on her knees, unmindful of her skirts. His round-eyed expression almost made her giggle, but this was serious. “Because I wanted to ask you a question. James, will you m—”
“Stop! Amelia, get up,” he beseeched her. “You cannot propose to me.”
“Sometimes, James” —she leaned in— “you are an astonishing prude! I most certainly can ask you, and I think it is time I did. Things have not worked out well the previous two times when you did it.” She waggled a finger at him, eyes teasing. “You, however, are full of common sense and will not be so foolish as to say no.”
Or, she hoped he wouldn’t say no. If there was anything she’d taken from their argument, from the night they’d shared, from all the time they’d spent together, it was that he loved her. She was risking everything, as he had done.
In silence he lifted her hand, urging her to sit back on the sofa. She complied only because she could see the pain he was suffering etched on his features. She tucked her knees up under her and leaned sideways against the velvet-cushioned back, no longer feeling quite so blithe. “Let me put the question off for a moment and tell you something. You broke my heart all those years ago, James.”
His blue eyes searched hers. “I know.” Then he let his bandaged-covered forehead come to rest against hers and whispered, “Because I broke mine too.”
Warm tears slipped down her cheeks and she was unable to speak for a moment. Finally, she kissed him on the forehead and said, “No, I think I broke your heart. With my unthinking words and my romantic expectations. I thought I had grown up in the last three years, that I had put all those fanciful ideas aside. But I hadn’t. I still wanted you to be my hero and sweep me off my feet.”
“I want to be your hero.”
“Hush.” She leaned closer, taking his hand again. “You are my hero, and no further action is required on your part. I love you, James. You are the only man I’ve ever wanted, and I will love you no matter what you do, no matter how many times I have to tend your injuries, no matter where we’ll live, or how many times you’ll have to run off—”
He squeezed her hand. “You say I talk too much?”
Very well. “Honest answer. Will you marry me?”
His eyes shone brilliantly, and his smile threatened to turn into a grin. “Yes.”
He was so beautiful. And he was hers. Gently grasping his shirt, she drew herself against him and kissed him. Ever so gently, so as not to cause him further pain. His arms snaked around her and, as he carefully lay back against the pillows, she came too, stretched out against the length of him.
He broke off the kiss. “You might not want to hear this, but I think it’s a good thing we’ll have a nice long engagement. We need time, Amelia. Time to court, however secretly, to get to know each other more deeply, to enjoy each other’s company.”
“This might be the only time I say this, James, but you are absolutely right. I love you, but... I’m still a little afraid.”
“I know.” He swept a loose strand of hair behind her ear and kissed her tenderly. “Our future is still uncertain. But whatever it holds, we’ll be together. I’ll find hundreds of ways to smother that little doubt in the back of your mind.”
“Hundreds?”
“Yes. For instance, I was serious about intending to stand for Parliament on my own.” He nipped at her earlobe.
“Oh, please don’t do that for me. I am mature enough to cope during your absences.” She was certain of as much, and she held his gaze. “James, you are an excellent spy, and I don’t want you to give it up. I want you to be who you want to be.”
“Ah, but I want to give it up. That is my choice entirely, and the only thing you have to do with the whole business is having to suffer my presence day in and day out.”
“I can do that.” She grinned like a fool and kissed him again, letting herself melt against his hard body, the body that had endured so much. Contentedly, they snuggled together.
The click of the door opening only registered in her mind afterwards. The dowager duchess’s gasp first brought her back to the present. Then the others—Taviston, Victoria, Tessa, and Peyton—all began speaking at once.
Amelia buried her face in James’s neck and felt him smile against her ear. “They were right. You are a ravisher of bedridden men.” Louder, he said, “No need to worry; I’ve agreed to make her the happiest of women.”
“You’ve made a good start,” Peyton muttered.
“Would it be so difficult for the two of you to wed without an attendant scandal?” Taviston complained.
With James’s help Amelia righted herself and sat primly on the edge of the sofa, her cheeks heated to near boiling.
“Children!” the dowager duchess reprimanded them in her best maternal voice. “It appears your brother is sufficiently recovered and in need of our felicitations.”
***
JAMES STOOD LONG ENOUGH to embrace his mother and receive hearty handshakes from his brothers before subsiding to the sofa once again. He wasn’t certain his head would ever be ache-free again. As Amelia was taken into an all-encompassing hug from Peyton, he patted the seat next to him. “Will you sit a moment, Taviston?”
“Of course.” He flipped his tailcoat up and sank heavily next to James. “I cannot believe you didn’t tell me you were trying to stop the prime minister’s assassination.”
“I appreciate, Taviston, more than you can imagine, your taking on the role of father for me all those years. It must have been trying for you since you had lost Father as well. However, I’m grown now and I have my own life. I’ve made my way in the world, and I will continue to do so, as I see fit.” He turned to look at Taviston. “What I need now is a brother. Someone to confide in. Someone with whom to discuss the issues of Parliament. Someone to mock my choice of waistcoat. I—”
“You want me to stop telling you what to do?” Taviston asked, black eyebrows rising.
“Well, yes.” James grinned. “You can always start in on Marden, you know. He is your son.”
Taviston looped an arm around his shoulder. “I’ll do my best, brother.”
“Even if I’m a Whig?”
“Yes,” his brother answered on sigh. “You may even try to bring me round to your side before you take your arguments to the House of Commons, though you shan’t succeed.”
“Everyone, I think we’d best let James rest.” James’s mother fussed over him, settling the pillows behind his back and adjusting his bandage. “There. Now, Amelia, do be mindful of his injuries.”
“Yes, Your Grace.” Amelia’s responded politely enough but James noticed a heated blush climbing her cheeks.
Everyone began to file out, but Tessa grasped Amelia’s hand and gently pulled her over to the sofa. Holding fast to her sister’s hand, Tessa reached down and took James’s hand in her other.
“I wish to apologize.” Tessa gazed down at Amelia. “To you, my dear sister, for thinking I knew best how you should live your life.” Then she squeezed James’s hand and turned to face him. “And to you, my dear brother, for not giving you a chance and for not seeing how much you loved her. I wasn’t being fair to either of you.”
James looked to Amelia and at the same time, they clutched Tessa’s hands tighter. Tessa let out the breath she’d been holding and grinned.
Leaning down, she kissed James on the cheek. “I only ask that you love her as I do.”
“I promise to, every day, every hour, every minute.”
Tessa straightened and embraced Amelia. “Don’t ever let him go.”
Amelia sniffled, tears threatening again. “I won’t. I can’t. I fear if I don’t watch him every minute, he’ll just keep getting injured.”
After one final smile, Tessa sailed out of the room.
“Lady Amelia,” James said when they were alone. “I don’t believe I’ve told you I love you. At least not today.”
She rushed back to the sofa and sat on the edge. “I know it anyway.”
He took her hand. “May I ask you a question?”
“By all means, but I’m afraid I’m already betrothed,” she joked.
“Honest answer,” he made her promise. He tugged on her hand, and she fell softly against his chest. “May I kiss you?”
“Anywhere you wish, sir.”