Mistress by Marriage Page 17

  “Here, let me try.” He stood, fastening his trousers, walking barefoot across the little lawn. The knob wouldn’t budge.

  “I’m sure we can rouse the servants.”

  Caroline tossed her head. “No we can’t. Cameron’s room is in the front. Both the Hazletts sleep like the dead and snore to prove it. I told Cameron to do as Ben and Lizzie do—stuff cotton in his ears at night, else he’d never get any sleep. What are we going to do?”

  Edward thought a minute. “What about the garden doors?”

  Caroline folded her arms across her chest in a vain attempt to press her torn nightgown together. “Cameron nailed them shut just this afternoon. I heard him before Deborah Bannister came. He doesn’t trust me.”

  “As well he shouldn’t. If you hadn’t done this mad thing, we’d be inside, sound asleep in our beds ourselves. You’d be snoring to rival Hazlett.”

  “I don’t snore!”

  “I’m afraid you do. Like one of the piglets at Christie Park’s home farm. I’ve had to listen to you all week.”

  “I never asked you to listen! I don’t know why you had to sleep in my room anyway. You never did when we were married.”

  “Of course I didn’t. A gentleman never sleeps in the same chamber as his wife. It isn’t done.”

  Caroline shoved him into some shrubbery. “Isn’t done? Is that a Christie tradition? I know many couples who share the same bedchamber.”

  So did Edward, but he was not about to agree with her. He liked his privacy. Needed it. Who wanted to tussle with Caroline all night long as she stole the covers and laughed in her sleep? Rubbed up against him like her damn cat, her cold feet on his calves? It was bad enough having to take breakfast with her in the morning, when she would prattle on about her plans for the day, never giving him a moment’s peace as he sipped his coffee, peppering him with questions he had no intention of answering. Treating the staff like long-lost friends, and the children as equals. Caroline knew no barriers, had no filters, was like a child herself. A spoilt one. He brushed the pollen from his shoulder. “There’s no need to manhandle me.”

  She smacked his chest again. “There is every need,” she whispered furiously. “Thanks to you we’ll be trapped out here all night.”

  “Wait just a minute! Whose bright idea was it to climb out a window?”

  “I didn’t plan for the sheet to come undone. I would have been back in bed by the time you came home and you never would have known the difference.” She stomped away to sit back on the bench.

  He followed. “You little fool. What if there had been intruders in the garden?”

  “The garden doors are nailed shut. I just told you. I was perfectly safe.”

  “A determined man could scale the wall, Caroline.” As soon as the words left his mouth, he knew he’d have cause to regret them.

  Her smile was quite feral. “Fine. Prove to me how determined you are.”

  Edward straightened. “I have no need to prove anything to you. I’ve always kept my word. Done the right thing.”

  “Oh? Coming to my bed after all these years was right? When you plan to get rid of me anyway? You are nothing but the basest villain, Edward. Being a wolfpack’s dinner is too good for you!”

  “So now you want me to plunge to my death over a Mayfair garden wall.”

  “I don’t want you dead, Edward, although who could even tell you’re alive? I just want you gone.”

  “Your wish is my command,” he ground out. He’d show the little baggage. He headed for the spike-topped brick wall.

  “Not that one. There’s no one home, remember? Bayard has bunked it. Serena on the other side might still be awake. Her gentleman keeps very odd hours. She has extra keys to my front door.”

  “Even the new locks?” he thundered.

  “She’d never hand them out to anyone but me or my staff. I trust her. We look out for each other on Jane Street.”

  Good Lord. He looked down at his bare chest and bare feet. Would the Janes look after him? If word got out, he’d be a laughingstock. It had only been because of his Christie-ness he was able to survive the scandalous denouement of his marriage. He had behaved with impeccable decorum, as if he’d not spent a year fighting like cats and dogs with his wife. No one save Will ever brought up the fact that he’d tucked Caroline away somewhere. Very few knew that the somewhere was Jane Street. How Neddie had figured it out was a mystery. If only his son had kept away, he’d not be standing there half naked.

  “Very well.” He tripped across a flower bed. Edward was tall, but the wall was taller. “I think if we can drag the bench over, I can boost myself up.”

  Caroline was not much help. Her end of the iron bench kept slanting down until she complained she’d bruised her toes and had to sit down for a while. The dark gray sky had brightened sufficiently for him to watch as she rubbed her plump white feet. She was barefoot, too. She seemed unaware that her right breast was completely unrestrained by the torn negligee.

  “Maybe we should just wait until dawn. It won’t be that much longer.”

  “Coward.”

  Edward bit back his retort. She was right. He was one. He couldn’t cut Caroline out of his life, yet couldn’t live with her. What was the expression? You can’t have your cake and eat it, too. With a mere legal separation, he’d never be free of her, never be able to find a peaceful, normal woman to marry and help guide Allie to womanhood.

  “Stand up. I’ll get it the rest of the way by myself.” With a grunt, he pushed the bench through some flowers, crushing the petals and causing their aroma to waft up in the night air. But nothing smelled as perfect as Caroline.

  “You’re ruining my garden.”

  “You’re ruining my life!” Edward snapped.

  “Good, because you’ve ruined mine, you odious, impossible, horrible”—she paused—“man!”

  “Is that the best you can do? Why not blackguard or scoundrel? Rogue or miscreant?”

  “It doesn’t matter what you men call yourselves—you are fiends, every one of you.”

  Edward hopped up on the bench, running his fingers on the jagged iron spikes. He pictured one puncturing his lung, the life draining out of him as Caroline stood below, tapping a bruised foot impatiently. “I’m not going to do this, Caro. We’re just going to have to wait for Mrs. Hazlett to light the stove in a few hours. She can let us in the kitchen door.”

  “I’ll climb over then.”

  “You certainly will not. Even if I could toss you over, you’d probably land and break your neck. This place is like a fortress. It’s a wonder there are not alligators in a moat.”

  “I told you I was safe! But, no—you had to exert your Christie control and make my life a living hell.” She sunk down among the ruined flowers. “I rue the day my cousins ever took me to town. I would have been better off acting as an unpaid nursemaid for their brats than marrying you.”

  “My understanding was that your cousin James had other plans for you.”

  She looked up at him, her face stark. “Being his whore would have been preferable to being yours.”

  Edward felt something unravel within. “Take that back.”

  “Why should I? I’m nothing to you. Oh, you’ve strutted about all week acting Sir Galahad. It suits you to see yourself as a hero. But you’re cold, Edward. So cold you make my blood freeze. I don’t know how I could ever have thought I lov—” Her words stopped.

  And his heart stopped, too, then started up with dizzying speed. He needed to get down off the bench before he fell but couldn’t seem to move his feet. “What did you say?”

  She pulled up her bodice. “Nothing of any consequence.”

  He stood rooted to the iron bench, its fancy curlicues cutting into his soles. Something swooped through the air—a bat, most likely. The silence in the garden made its own kind of noise, but he knew he’d have to interrupt soon—if he could find any words to say.

  He clambered down from the bench and sat beside her. “If I’m s
o cold, why do you love me, Caroline?” he asked quietly.

  “I don’t know!” she cried. “It’s terribly inconvenient. I shall stop at once.”

  He wanted to tell her he loved her too, but the words wouldn’t come. They had never tumbled out with ease. He hadn’t said them in years to anyone. But even unspoken, they were true, and she was right. It was terribly inconvenient, but he didn’t think he could stop loving her. Ever.

  So this was love. It was nothing like the ballads and sonnets and psalms, or the comforting closeness he’d shared with Alice. It was sharp, as sharp as the iron spikes on the wall, as ruining as the crushed flowers beneath his arse. Caroline made his blood boil and his mind turn to mush. It was more than inconvenient—it was inconceivable that Edward Allerton Christie could love Caroline Louise Parker.

  But he supposed he did. How else could he explain the past weeks of insanity? It was more than the craving of her warm body atop and beneath him, more than his appreciation of her still-dazzling beauty. More than his desire for dominance.

  “Holy God,” he whispered.

  “It’s too late to pray, Edward. It’s too late, period. You are right. We are completely incompatible. I want you to divorce me.” She wrapped her arms around her knees and sniffed.

  “I cannot, Caro. I decided that weeks ago. I don’t even believe I can go through with a legal separation.”

  “Edward, what are you saying?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t think. I never can when you’re near.”

  “Well, someone has to! You can’t keep reeling me in like a fish, then tossing me back. It’s unconscionable.”

  “I’m sorry, Caro. I’m a cur.”

  She nodded. “Yes, you are. A dirty dog. With bloodthirsty fleas and other assorted vermin.” She seemed satisfied with the analogy. He put his arm around her and she didn’t resist, putting her head on his bare shoulder. The warmth of her russet hair pricked his skin and stirred his cock.

  “What are we to do?” For once in his life, his Christie confidence had completely deserted him.

  “I’m sure I don’t know. Wait for Mrs. Hazlett to wake up.”

  “Not about now. About our future.”

  “We haven’t got one, Edward. You of all people should know that.”

  “I thought I did, but I’m not so sure. What if we try again?” He must be mad to suggest such a thing, but the words had tumbled out without a moment of Christie forethought.

  Caroline made a choking sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob. “I’m too old to change, Edward. And I don’t want to. I’m not cut out to be a Christie, all proper and dull.”

  He put a hand to his heart. It was there, beating erratically, breaking just a little. “A direct hit.”

  “You know I’m right. You’d be ready to throttle me within twenty-four hours. Think of the children. Allie. It wouldn’t do to upset her routine with me waltzing back into her life only to have it all fall apart again.”

  Edward brushed a tear from her cheek. “No. I suppose not.”

  “So it’s settled then.”

  “If you say so.” His throat constricted. Well, she had wanted him to feel, and now he did. It was appalling for a man his age to want to cry.

  “It’s for the best.” She slipped out of his hold. “I’ve been thinking I’d like to make a fresh start. Go somewhere where no one knows me. A little cottage in the country, where I can write. Maybe I’ll even stop penning such naughty books and try something edifying for a change.”

  “You’ll stop killing me off?”

  “There’s no need to. I’m not angry anymore. With you or myself. We can’t help being who we are, can we?”

  For the first time in his life, Edward wished his last name was different. Wished he was different. Wished most of all that he didn’t love Caroline when the discovering of it came too late.

  “I’ll look for a suitable property for you.”

  “Thank you, Edward. I have some money of my own, you know.”

  “Nonsense. You are still my wife, and I’m responsible for you.” He would place her far out of reach, away from temptation, even if it killed him as thoroughly as Caroline’s villains.

  Unless . . .

  He was a Christie. Christies might be proper and dull, but they did not give up. They knew their duty. They were dogged in the fulfilling of it.

  He’d made his vows six years ago and meant them. He wanted Caro even more now, though it made no sense. They would probably wish each other to the devil within the first hour of mending their marriage.

  But he had to try. How to convince her? Edward would approach the difficulties with his usual logic once he was alone and free of the confusion he always felt in Caro’s presence. He needed to think, but first he needed to kiss her. She might think it was a good-bye kiss, but he knew better. Christies always did.

  Chapter 15

  A new life. It was everything she desired yet didn’t dare to dream of or deserve.

  —Flowers for Flora

  Despite the late hours the residents of Jane Street kept, morning rose all around them. Windows opened, doors shut, servants stepped into kitchens, and so did Mrs. Hazlett. Caroline had been stationed on the steps to the kitchen door for some time while Edward appeared to be lost in thought on the hard bench, his eyes closed. They’d not said much to each other once they discussed Caroline’s real estate needs, which were not particularly demanding. She would take Lizzie with her if she’d go, but Caroline assumed Garrett Marburn would have something to say about that. It had surprised her when Edward said he’d sell the Jane Street property. So there was to be no mistress in his future, as there was to be no master in hers.

  She rapped on the glass, causing Mrs. Hazlett to jump quite spryly for a woman her age.

  “Whatever are you doing out here, Lady Christie? Lord Christie will have our hides!”

  Caroline inclined her head toward the back of the garden, then turned to the subject of Mrs. Hazlett’s startled look. Edward wasn’t thinking after all—he was asleep sitting up, his long limbs loose and relaxed. “I had a bit of a misadventure last night, but don’t worry. All is well.”

  Mrs. Hazlett stared at the obvious disarray of Caroline’s nightgown. “I suppose your clothing tore itself.”

  “It had a little help.” She would never make love to Edward again. The last time under the stars was a worthy memory, however. There would be empty years ahead to think on it. Too many, if Caroline lived as long as Mr. and Mrs. Hazlett. Edward had offered to send them from London with her, but a butler and a housekeeper would be superfluous for the kind of simple life she envisioned. Caroline could cook and clean for herself. But she would take Ben. Growing up in the country would be good for him, and her lessons with him would be good for them both, as long as Ben did not catch her out on her spelling.

  “Come in, come in. Good thing it’s so warm or you’d catch your death. The night air is dangerous.”

  Dangerous to Caroline’s heart, at least.

  She couldn’t credit that Edward said he wanted to reconcile. If there had been a moon, she’d attribute the whole incident to moon madness. Thank goodness she had the presence of mind to remind him how it really was between them. It had been the hardest thing she’d ever done.

  “I’m going upstairs, Mrs. Hazlett. Please tell Lizzie not to bother bringing breakfast. I’m exhausted. And Cameron should wake Lord Christie soon. I’m sure he has a full calendar.” She paused on the stairs. “They will be leaving today. For good.”

  Mrs. Hazlett glanced up sharply. “Then you’re safe?”

  “Safe as a mouse in cheese.”

  “I thought—” Mrs. Hazlett tugged at her apron nervously. “I wondered if he might not take you back.”

  “Oh, no, Mrs. Hazlett. Whyever would he do that?”

  “I see the way he looks at you, my lady. Like a hungry man and you’re a meat pie.”

  Caroline laughed. “Well, I’ve been called many things, but never that.”
>
  “You know what I mean. I’ve not much way with words like you, an authoress. But it’s my opinion, and Mr. Hazlett’s too, that Lord Christie has warm feelings for you.”

  “We are to get a legal separation at long last, and I am moving away from the city. Whatever he feels at the moment, he’ll come to his senses. I don’t want you to worry about your positions. Lord Christie will find you places, or you may retire with a generous pension. You’ve been more than kind to me.”

  Mrs. Hazlett pinked. “It’s been easy doing for you, my lady. A true pleasure.”

  Caroline swallowed the lump in her throat. But she was going to put the past behind her, once and for all.

  She fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow, oblivious to the tiptoeing removal of Edward’s things from her room, unconscious of his absence in her life. If she felt the brush of his lips on hers as he bade her good-bye, it might have been a dream.

  When she awoke in the early afternoon, it was to the sound of Cameron’s soft cursing below, as he plied the long nails out of the garden doors. The balcony door stood open to the bright summer sun, and someone had untied the sheets from the railing. Caroline stretched and peered down as Cameron removed the final nail and put it in his pocket. As he turned toward the house, she gave a little wave. He inclined his head but kept walking. No doubt his pride was wounded after she outsmarted him, thinking he’d been so thorough. But soon there was to be no more visiting between the garden gates anyway. Caroline would have her cottage in the country. Her cat. Good heavens. She was taking a page from Charlotte Fallon’s book.

  Caroline was starving. And rather dirty. The soles of her feet were black from pacing in the garden, and her nightgown was a total loss. She wouldn’t need anything so provocative again, not where she was going and who she would try to be. Before she had a chance to ring for a bath or breakfast—or would it be luncheon?—Lizzie knocked and popped into the room.