Chapter 13

13

N icholas had the audacity to feel hopeful when the knock came upon his bedchamber door. In a moment of unthinkable idiocy, he envisioned changeable eyes, plump pink lips, and a measured voice assuring him that all was well again and everything would turn out just as it should.

Which made it all the more galling when he opened the door to his mother’s frowning face and an irritated tap of her cane.

“ What are you doing?” She eyed him up and down, his lack of coat and cravat causing the crease in her brow to deepen. “ Barrington is going to announce dinner any minute, yet here you are, hiding away in a state of undress. I left you alone after you so discourteously abandoned the luncheon, but enough is enough.”

He pressed his hand against the doorframe, barring the way before the dowager took it in her head to charge into his bedchamber and continue with the chastisement. One would think that reaching the age of six-and-thirty, not to mention inheriting a bloody marquessate, would exempt him from that sort of treatment, but no such luck, and frankly, he wasn’t in the mood.

“ I’m not going down to dinner tonight.” He kept his tone deliberately mild, although tightness was beginning to set into his jaw. “ Carry on without me. I’ll get something sent up later.”

His mother’s eyes narrowed into slits. “ If you tell me you’ve been taken ill, I won’t believe you.”

No , he wasn’t ill. Unsettled , more like. After absconding from the damn disaster of a lakeside luncheon, he’d spent the afternoon riding about the estate, seeing to trivial tenant matters, to clear his head. He’d then received word from Mrs . Connelly upon returning that Emily and Miss Windham had passed some time picking wildflowers, had come in for tea and reading, and both seemed in good spirits. His solitary hours outdoors, combined with the housekeeper’s favorable news, should have restored his equilibrium. Instead , he was more aware than ever that things at Beaumont Manor were not as he wanted them. That some things, quite desperately, needed to change.

“ You look a fright, but you’re not ill,” the dowager so graciously informed him, giving her cane another impatient thump at his silence. “ Now , get on your dinner attire and come down. Need I remind you that you have a guest?”

“ No .” He spit the word between clenched teeth, although as soon as it left him, a tiny chunk of the weight he shouldered melted away. “ No ,” he repeated, the assertion equally as lightening, and suddenly, the decision he’d come to seemed more right than ever. “ I’m done with entertaining. Should you wish Lady Burville to stay on, she will be your guest only, and I strongly suggest you see that the dower house is made ready without delay. In fact, I’ll give both the chambermaids and footmen permission to make it their priority.”

“ Really , Rockliffe ,” she huffed. “ You scarcely gave her a chance. I hope you’re not basing your decision on the theatrics of an incensed child, because?—”

“ Stop .” He pushed a finger into the bridge of his nose, his forehead knotting with tension. “ I’ll not pursue Lady Burville . I’ll not wed anyone . The sooner you can accept that, the better off we’ll all be.”

He narrowed his eyes as well, doing his own version of the Prescott glower. It had been stupid of him to consider any plan of his mother’s—especially one pertaining to marriage—for even an instant. No , he hadn’t given Lady Burville much of a chance. And no, he shouldn’t make decisions because his temperamental daughter had had an outburst. Regardless , that didn’t change what he intrinsically knew: were he to wed Letitia Burville , neither of them would make the other happy. More importantly, Emily wouldn’t be happy.

The dowager could argue all she liked that he’d been too hasty, that these things could take time. Yet in his mind’s eye, all he could see was the image of his runaway daughter sitting in the field with the blasted cat in her lap and Miss Windham at her side. Like old friends. Like they belonged.

If only the dowager were the type to be put off by adamant words and a caustic look. Instead , she seemed to take them as a challenge, staring right back at him. Not venomously, though. Instead , she looked … thoughtful . Like she was looking through him and not at him. Contemplating . And that was damn dangerous.

“ I mean it.” Had he a walking stick handy, he would have pounded it against the floor, too. “ Whatever you’re thinking, whatever scheme you’re drumming up because you believe you know better than the rest of us, stop. It won’t work this time. You cannot orchestrate a compromising position when there’s no one around to witness it, and even if you did, you do realize it would hardly have the same effect when both parties are widowed and over the age of five-and-thirty?”

She sniffed, having the nerve to appear affronted. “ Why must you always assume the worst?”

“ Because my assumptions are warranted.” He folded his arms, his fingers digging into his sleeve.

She let out an audible sigh, readjusting herself against her cane as if, formidable force though she was, she began to grow weary. “ Believe it or not, Rockliffe , I only want what’s best for you.”

“ What’s best for me,” he snapped, “is for you to go down to dinner, leave me in peace, and forget all thoughts of matchmaking.” God , he was weary as well, ready to sink into his armchair and not get up for a very long time.

“ As you wish.” Her words were complacent. Unusually so. “ If you change your mind, you know where we’ll be.”

She stepped away from his door with far too little a fight. Doing just as he’d demanded but causing his stomach to roil, nonetheless. To the best of his knowledge, the dowager had never acquiesced easily in her life. He’d be a fool to think she felt inclined to start now.

He remained in the doorway until she disappeared from his sight and the thump of her cane faded, half-expecting to see the whole corridor go up in flames in her wake. But when it didn’t, and he slammed the door on the scene, he found no resulting wave of relief.

He stalked across the room, not to his chair but to the window, tugging at the sash. He’d stake a large sum of money that this wouldn’t be the last he’d hear on the subject of Lady Burville . Or if not her, then some other equally appropriate society lady whose presence stirred nothing within him but numbness.

But he couldn’t fixate on that now. Didn’t have the energy. He shoved the window up, sticking his head out for a blast of the cooling twilight breeze. However , the sinking sun brought no respite from the day’s heat; indeed, the air had only grown hotter, thick enough to be cloying.

He inhaled it anyway, taking in the view of the sprawling park. Of the clusters of ancient trees, the more recently planted flowers and shrubs, the motionless water of the lake that sparkled like crystal. All grand and stately, worthy of envy. All his . Yet what good did it do when so much else had fallen apart and gone wrong? Could never be repaired.

He dropped his elbows to the sill, letting his weight rest against them. Whatever made the encroaching clouds feel heavy enough to burst seemed to exist within him, too. He was on edge, unsure of which way to turn, of how to make things right again before old misery crushed him and Emily both.

He was the Marquess of Rockliffe , supposed to be all-powerful and all-knowing. In this matter, though, he found himself at a loss. For as he stared at the darkening sky, trying to conjure a solution, only a single name—a single thing he could never keep—tumbled through his head.

Phoebe .