Chapter Fourteen

January 24, 1818

Baselton House

St. James Place

Vivian covered a yawn with her hand. She hadn't gotten much sleep last night, for the contretemps at the rout had occurred just before midnight, and by the time she'd arrived home—thanks to Lord Twinsfield—she'd been too emotional to drop into slumber.

When she'd finally calmed enough, worry stole sleep from her. She'd either lost the sapphire and diamond necklace at the rout or it had been encouraged off her neck by a thief, and the only men she'd let close enough to do the job had been her husband and Lord Starkington.

And Evan had no reason to steal it.

Thankfully, the earbobs had remained in her ears the whole time. They were safely tucked away in her jewelry box which was hidden in a clothes press.

But the primary reason sleep had been elusive was the fact that Evan hadn't come home last night. She'd sat up half the night worrying about him, walking the floor in the event he showed up. They hadn't exactly quarreled but there had been enough damning and embarrassing accusations flying about that she dreaded showing her face in society again so soon.

What must he think of her? What did she think of herself? Yes, she'd thought him dead. At that point, he had been missing for nearly five years, and she'd been weak. Of course she had; any woman would have been! When Starkington had come around, acting solicitous and charming and attentive, she'd fallen for him. And women had needs, the same as men. Why did society never bat and eye when a man took a married lady into his bed, but the moment said lady did the same? Oh, it was scandal and gossip and rumors!

She yawned again as she sipped from her teacup and stared out the window in her morning room. At the rear of the house, it overlooked the square of St. James, which had been dusted with a thin layer of snow from the night before. Ordinarily, she would have thought the scene charming and almost fairy-like with the winter-bare tree frosted and sparkling in the anemic January sunshine, but just now, her mind was gripped with confusion and concern.

"My lady?"

She turned about at the sound of her maid's voice. "Yes, Tilly?"

"Mr. Davis told me to inform you that His Lordship returned about an hour ago."

"What?" The hand holding the teacup shook, so she gripped it with both hands. "Baselton is home? Where is he?"

"According to Mr. Davis, he went directly to his suite, asked for a dose of laudanum, and then laid down to sleep."

Oh, dear. If he'd wanted the opiate, his mind must be in a quandary. "Did he administer the drug himself?" Worry pulled knots tight in her belly. What if he'd taken far too much?

"No, my lady. Mr. Davis did that, and he told me to reassure you that he'd erred on the side of caution and went with a light hand."

"Good." Vivian nodded even as she frowned. "Where had His Lordship passed the night?" Had he chosen to go to the club, spend those hours with a courtesan as retaliation? Then she tossed out the idea, for the hurt and bewilderment in his eyes last night had been all too real, and the man he was would never have done that. In the past, perhaps, but not now.

The maid shrugged. She tucked in an errant blonde curl beneath her mobcap. "I'm not sure, but it was the Duke of Broadmoor who brought him inside and up to his rooms. Mr. Davis assisted him."

"Ah." How very interesting.

"Also, my lady, a courier delivered a note for him shortly after that."

"Was it taken up as well?"

"Yes. Mr. Davis left it on his nightstand."

"Thank you, Tilly. Did Mr. Davis say how long His Lordship might be asleep with that dose of laudanum?"

"He didn't, my lady, but I suspect he will inform you once that happens."

"I'll keep that under advisement."

The maid curtsied. "Do you still plan to attend the St. Vincent ball this evening? I'll need to make sure your gown is pressed and ready."

In all fairness, her husband truly needed his rest, and she wasn't ready to put herself back into the public eye so soon after the disaster of last night. However, there was still a criminal to catch and a thief as well—though she was slowly beginning to suspect Edward might be one and the same—and since the ball was being thrown by one of Evan's friends from the club, the risk of a threat was no doubt low.

Finally, Vivian nodded. "Go ahead and ready the gown. Once my husband awakens, I shall discuss the possibilities with him."

"Very well. If that will be all, my lady?"

"Yes." She waved the maid off. "I plan to keep to myself for the day, for I didn't have much sleep last night."

Tilly left without another word while Vivian returned to contemplating the outside world.

By teatime, Evan still hadn't made an appearance, and Vivian couldn't stand not knowing her fate any longer. Her brief affair—there was no other word to describe what had happened with Edward—aside, each day with Evan had strengthened that familiar nuptial bond, changed it into something new and possibly stronger. She desperately wished to pursue that, if he would have her.

After ordering a tea tray from the kitchen, she carried it up to his rooms personally. "Evan?" She pushed open the door and then closed it behind her with a foot. "Are you well?"

"I am not certain any longer." He stood at the windows. Clad only in a pair of buff-colored breeches, she was struck once more by how strong his body was even at his age of one and forty, of how handsome, but how scarred he was, both inside and out. A network of white scars marred his skin. What he must have seen in the military but couldn't remember to share with her? What must it be like inside his head while he was racked by nightmares but couldn't recall why?

"Oh." A wave of caring and protection came over her. Briefly, she shifted her attention to the windows. Large, fluffy snowflakes gently drifted down to the ground even as the sun was shining. It made for a romantic backdrop, yet it would no doubt be wasted on the present situation. "I, uh, I thought you might be hungry. I haven't seen you all day and was worried, especially after how we parted last night."

Did he hate her now?

"Thank you, but I'm afraid I don't have much of an appetite just now."

"All right." She laid the tea tray on a small table near the door then advanced farther into his bedchamber. "Where did you go after you left the rout?"

"To Broadmoor's townhouse." He still hadn't turned about to face her and left his hands clasped behind his back. Did that mean he'd made up his mind to ignore her? "Twinsfield wished for me to come home, but I didn't have the strength to face you, didn't wish to talk with you after everything."

"That is understandable." Pain stabbed through her chest, for she deserved it.

He nodded. "I talked with him last night because I was upset. So angry and alternately maudlin, in fact, that I thought the only way to solve all these issues was to end my life."

"What?" Shock plowed through her person as she stared at him. "Why would you do that? It would solve nothing."

Finally, her husband turned. He met her gaze, and there was sadness in those brown depths. The weak sunlight glinted off the gray at his temples and sprinkled through his blond-brown hair. When he'd been younger, those strands had been all golden. "So you can have the life you wanted before I came back and ruined it."

Emotion lodged in her throat. It was time to have this conversation. "Oh, Evan, I might have wanted that when I thought you were dead, but the second you returned, I knew I wanted you, wanted a life with you in whatever way that meant." Would he believe her, or did her betrayal run too deep?

"Pretty words and lip service?" He shook his head. "I don't know what's true, and being lied to has completely tipped over my world."

"I am so sorry." Suddenly, she realized just how damaged he was from the war and his experiences afterward. All he ever wanted was to belong and to live a peaceful life, but that wasn't what fate had handed him. "I have made mistakes, and I was wrong in my thinking; I see that now. What you and I are embroiled in is so unlike anything most people would experience, it's much like untested waters."

Many women would have abandoned men like him, figuring there was no future there, or whatever future they could have would probably end in heartbreak. None of that mattered anymore, and it hadn't since the first time she'd walked in Hyde Park with him after the rogues from the club released him. He was her husband, her Evan, and though he might not be the man she used to remember, she looked forward to coming to know who he was now, what his new dreams were, what he might enjoy doing from this point forward.

No longer would she try to force him to be something he wasn't.

"Be that as it may, this is the next obstacle in our path. It remains to be seen how we will overcome that, if at all." Then he turned back to contemplate the world outside the windows.

"Of course we can overcome it." Panic rose in a hot wave in her chest, and she took a few steps toward him. "Evan, please, might we talk through this?"

"What do you want me to say?" The controlled roar in his voice reverberated through the room as he thrust the fingers of one hand through his hair. He turned about to face her so quickly, she stopped short with a small gasp. "That I expected my wife to remain faithful while I was away at war and then after I had my accident? That I'd hoped the transition from my old life as a woodworker back to an earl would have been easier?" Pain and discouragement clouded his eyes. "That I am devastated that the one woman who makes me feel a modicum of calm, of peace when I'm with her secretly wishes for a life that I cannot give?"

The despair in his tone had the power to completely break her. Tears sprang into her eyes, and the knot of emotion in her throat grew more prominent. "I was faithful, Evan, for so long. While you were away at war was difficult. We wrote letters to each other, and you took leave as often as you could. During those times, I fully believe we fell in love through those missives." In fact, she'd kept those letters, and when she'd wished to torture herself while he'd been missing—or perhaps preserve hope—she'd taken them out and read them.

"I didn't know that."

She nodded. "Many of the letters I wrote to you were included in your military trunks that you had shipped here once your commission expired."

"Before I left for my hunting trip."

"Yes." When she offered him a small grin, he merely stared at her. "You may read them if you like. I would imagine Davis has put them in storage somewhere. No doubt in the attics where all your outdated clothing is as well as all the things from your military life."

"You never threw them out as rubbish?"

"Of course not. They belonged to you, and I didn't have the heart to toss any of your belongings." She forced down a hard swallow. "I kept all the letters you sent to me as well." Then an idea occurred to her. "If you put all the letters together, it would create an accurate timeline of our relationship up until the last one where you told me you were going on a hunting trip but expected to return to Town in a month."

For long moments, Evan watched her while he curled on hand into a fist and relaxed it in a never-ending cycle. "I would like to read every letter we exchanged. Perhaps it would help, and I could come to a greater understanding of our marriage." He paused, as emotions flitted over his face. "You must have been completely upended when I went missing."

"It was the most horrible time I have ever gone through." A waver went through her voice. "As the years passed with no word from you, with no one coming forward to say they knew what happened to you or that they were worried you were missing, I slowly lost my own hold on reality. Some of my humanity chipped away as I wondered and postulated and hoped. I became a shell of myself, no longer recognized myself in the mirror." She wrapped her arms around herself. "Every time the door opened my heart leapt thinking it was you. I fully expected a letter to arrive explaining your absence or what had happened, even if it was bad news."

"But there was nothing to alleviate your thoughts," he added in a soft voice. "Your questions went unanswered; your thoughts ran away with you. There was never any sort of closure so you could heal and move forward. Truly, you existed in a state of frozen waiting, neither a wife nor a widow."

"By the time that fifth year came around, I was exhausted. Every hope I'd had of you coming back had expired." Tears fell to her cheeks as she spoke. Perhaps it was just as well that the truth came out. They should have done this from the very first when he'd come home, but she'd been so adamant that he remember who he was, hoped he would still be the man she'd first fallen in love with. "Edward began paying his addresses, and since I was at a weak point in my life, I didn't offer protest. It was nice to have a man with me again, paying attention to me, holding me in comfort and giving support. I needed all that so much by then."

"It is so easy to see now what happened." Though he struggled with containing his emotions, they played over his face regardless, and when his Adam's apple bobbed with a hard swallow, there was moisture in his eyes as he looked at her once more. "You are not at fault, Vivy." Lines of fatigue were evident in the delicate skin at the outside corners of his eyes and framing his mouth. "You were simply a woman hurting, under duress, needing to make decisions but didn't have enough evidence to do… anything."

"Yes." So many feelings swamped her—hurt, anger, grief, shame. They all worked together to steal her breath. "Five years is a long time to think someone would return from wherever they'd gone. And without a word, I didn't know what to do or how long to wait. My life didn't feel real any longer. I was constantly battling my memories of you, of our life together with the need to resume living. Edward was there. He was sweet and kind and solicitous. I felt less alone and once more like a vital woman."

He held up a hand. "I don't wish to hear more, for I can piece together the rest."

"I'm so sorry, Evan." Not knowing what else to do, Vivian took another few steps toward him. The silk skirts of her pale pink gown whispered in the silence. "When Edward asked if I would be amenable to marrying again if the courts would agree to declare you dead, I agreed. I was so afraid that I'd wasted so many years… waiting—"

"And you didn't want to waste any more." With his lips set in a tight line, he held her gaze as if she were a mathematical problem he needed to solve but had currently baffled him. "I can almost feel your pain, your despair, your indecision in your words, so there is no need for you to continue explaining your decisions to me."

"I must, though, because I don't want you to believe that I broke our marriage vows out of spite or boredom or a want of revenge." She sniffled and then scrubbed at the tears on her cheeks. "I honestly thought you were gone, for you'd simply vanished."

"Yet you didn't send out Bow Street to investigate." One of his eyebrows rose in challenge. "Why?"

"It didn't occur to me, for I honestly thought you had either extended your hunting excursion or that you needed time away after your commission expired." She shrugged. Perhaps she was at fault after all. "Then time went on with no word. I figured if you had wanted to write and inform me of your plans, you would have."

"And that was when the anger and grief took hold."

"Yes, but there was also the waiting and hope. Months passed, then years. Absence and the unknown changes people."

"Agreed." Finally, he bowed his head. "We've circled back to the reason for my discontent. You moved on and had made plans with Starkington. The only thing preventing you from having a happy life is me. I'm the complication."

"No! That's not it at all!" Why couldn't he see it from her point of view? "Was I taken by surprise when you returned? Of course I was! Who wouldn't be? Was I ecstatic? Yes, I was, for my husband had come back when I'd given up most of the hope I'd carried for so long." A sob wrenched from her throat as she looked at him. "You were essentially back from the dead. Are you the man I remember? No, you are not, but I'm learning that you don't need to be, for the man you are right now, the man you will become is enough."

Desperate to garner a response from him as well as reassure herself there was something between them she could cling to in order to keep him with her, Vivian closed the distance. One hand cupped his cheek while the other slid up his naked chest to curl about his nape, and with a search of his dark gaze, she rose onto her toes and pressed her lips to his.

Would he return the overture, or would he demand to be left alone?

Seconds ticked by, marked by the wild beating of her heart while he stood stock still and peered into her eyes. Then, everything shifted in infinitesimal ways.

"Oh, God. I need you so much," he whispered against her lips right before he took her into a more comfortable embrace and firmly took command of the kiss.

With a sob mixed with a moan, she looped her arms about his shoulders, layered herself against his mostly naked form, and then spent copious minutes kissing him back as if she were a wanton. Perhaps she was, for talking about the issues they faced had cleared the air a bit, and she could once more think clearly. She hadn't been wrong; there was truly hope for them, she could feel it.

Her highly strung emotional state collided into his which produced a blazing inferno of need, fear, and desire; she couldn't have enough. This was her husband, and nothing else mattered except making it clear to him that she wanted no other man except him.

"In the event you wondered," she said against the strong column of his neck as she edged her lips along his skin. "I surrender into your care and want nothing more than for you to pleasure me without constraint while I do the same to you until we both fall into the throes of passion, and I scream out your name."

"Ah." For the space of a few heartbeats, he nipped and nibbled the skin beneath her jaw, and when he found the spot near her earlobe that set her world on fire, he made full use of it. "I think we can work with that, one fantastic tribute as it were so I'll never be forgotten?" Before she could question his words, he fisted his hands in the back of her gown and tugged.

The sound of fabric rending filled the silence, and the primal rawness of those actions worked to further fan the flames building in her blood. "Evan, I…"

Then she wasn't able to speak, for he'd returned to her mouth and proceeded to devour her as if this was the last time he would ever see her…