Chapter 18

CHAPTER 18

A s Archibald watched Izzie stride through the tower room door where his grandfather lay resting, his heart flew and his throat constricted. Was this it, the moment that his fragile dream of having Izzie as his wife came crashing down around him?

Thanks to his parents’ influence, Archibald could perform a somewhat convincing pantomime of being a gentleman. But there was no such hope for John Nettlethorpe. He had an East London accent and the colorful vocabulary that went with it. Archibald’s grandfather drank gin, not brandy, and his favorite sport was cockfighting, not horseracing. The second he opened his mouth, Izzie would understand precisely what kind of family she, the daughter of an earl, was marrying into.

Heart in his throat, Archibald peered around the door. His body sagged with relief when he saw that his grandfather was asleep.

Shame immediately coursed through him. He loved his grandfather. His grandfather understood him a thousand times better than his parents ever would. He was the one who had provided him with the means to escape the stultifying life his parents had planned for him.

But he couldn’t take the chance that Izzie would be put off by his common roots, not until their marriage was signed, sealed, and consummated. He wanted Izzie for his wife with a clawing sort of desperation. He was pathetically in love with this woman, had been from the moment he clapped eyes on her. He knew their marriage was going to go to pot eventually. It wasn’t as if he could prevent her from meeting his grandfather now that they would be living in the same house.

But it was imperative that he hide the awful truth for as long as he could.

Izzie stood framed in the doorway, looking not inside the tower room but up at Archibald with wide eyes.

He came up to stand beside her. “We need to be quiet,” he whispered, gesturing toward the bed. “See?”

Izzie squinted as she turned her gaze toward the darkened room. Her gasp marked the moment she noted his grandfather lying still on the bed.

Archibald gently took her elbow and led her out into the corridor, shutting the door behind them.

“I’m so sorry,” she said softly. “I didn’t realize—”

He immediately felt bad. “It’s all right. You didn’t know.”

She bit her lip. “Who is that? If you don’t mind my asking.”

He swallowed. She was going to be living here. There was no sense trying to keep it from her. “That is my grandfather, John Nettlethorpe. He had a tumor.” Archibald rubbed a spot on his chest, just to the side of his heart. “They were able to cut it out, but he’s not improving. The doctors think he has a few weeks.”

Her eyes were full of distress as she clasped his hand in both of hers. “Oh, Archibald, I’m so sorry.”

He nodded sadly. “As am I. He’s been sleeping more and more. I don’t know if he’ll be able to attend the ceremony tomorrow.”

“I hope he will,” she said, staring forlornly at the door. “I would very much like to meet him.”

Archibald’s feelings about Izzie meeting his grandfather were more fraught, but he nodded. “Hopefully soon.” He placed his hand on the small of her back, shepherding her toward the adjoining room. “Come, let me show you the room I had in mind for your library.”

Izzie cringed as Archibald led her down the corridor. Of course, the room had turned out to be his dying grandfather’s bedchamber. And there she’d gone, barging in!

Leap before you look—that should be her motto. If she ever decided to make an effort at her needlework, she would embroider it on a cushion.

She couldn’t believe she had been so thoughtless. Well… she could believe it. This was what came of drifting through life, not paying attention to the world that surrounded her. But her horrible mistake had certainly alerted her to the perils of behaving in such a heedless fashion. Thank God that through some miracle, Mr. Nettlethorpe had managed to sleep through her disruption.

She peered up at Archibald, wondering if his good opinion of her had just been destroyed. His expression was carefully blank. Unreadable.

What if he didn’t want to marry her anymore? She bit her lip. Just when she finally found a man she really, truly liked, a man she thought she might even be able to love, she managed to go and ruin everything. Typical, Isabella. So typical!

Archibald cleared his throat as he twisted the knob of the room next door. “See what you think.”

Izzie gasped. The room had high ceilings and a trio of tall, arched windows that let in a good amount of light. Its design was similar to the dining room, more of a medieval Gothic, with a vaulted ceiling and flagstones on the floor.

She peered at Archibald, disbelieving. Surely he couldn’t intend this magnificent room for her .

He didn’t look angry with her. He had wandered over to stand before the central window, which, upon closer inspection, proved to be a bay window. “I was thinking this would make a nice spot to install a window seat.”

Izzie’s eyes went wide. “A window seat?” She had always wanted a window seat!

He turned to face the room, eyes shining. “Your desk could go here. That way you’ll get a good amount of natural light.” He gestured to the walls. “Then I thought we could add a gallery halfway up the wall, with a spiral staircase in each corner. That way you could have bookcases running all the way from floor to ceiling.”

Floor-to-ceiling bookcases! She had dreamed about having a library with floor-to-ceiling bookcases for as long as she could remember.

She couldn’t believe he was talking about building her floor-to-ceiling bookcases when she had just gone and behaved so atrociously.

Maybe… maybe he didn’t hate her after all. Her impression of him was that he was exceptionally patient. Forgiving.

Just what you need, Isabella…

Tears pricked in the corners of her eyes. But he didn’t seem to notice that she was overcome, because he continued talking, as if everything was normal and he was not making one of her fondest, most impossible dreams come true. “We’ll have the bookcases custom-made so they fit perfectly. And I’ll build you a rail running around each level, and we can attach some ladders on wheels. That way, when you need to get a book down, you’ll have a ladder readily at hand.”

She managed to form the words, “Could you really build something like that?”

He laughed. “Of course. Something like that would be easy. You should see the things I usually…ahem.” He broke off suddenly, rubbing the back of his head.

She gazed about the room, picturing it. This would truly be her dream library.

But the thing that had her turning as mushy as a blancmange wasn’t how magnificent the room would look when it was finished. It was the fact that Archibald had thought of it at all. That he cared so much about her being happy in this, her new home.

He also thought that her writing was important enough to have its own space. He didn’t expect her to squeeze a tiny desk into her dressing room, or work on it in the morning room with a parade of visitors streaming in and out around her.

She felt a tear slip down her cheek and wiped it away with her thumb. She couldn’t believe her good fortune. Not only was Archibald not furious with her, but he was also building her this wonderful library.

How had she been so ridiculously lucky, that she got to marry this man?

Archibald frowned. “I should say that these are only suggestions. This is to be your room, and if you would prefer something else—”

“No,” Izzie sniffed. “I would not prefer something else. I would prefer exactly what you just described.”

She threw her arms around his neck.