Chapter 13

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Colin took his clothing into the adjoining room and laid it on the bed, pushing aside a plank of wood that hadn’t yet gone into the floor. Once he had decided to give Mercy the larger guest room, he’d put the renovation of the bride’s chamber on hold to tend to more important matters, like the left-hand side of the grand split staircase.

Now he realized this room needed to be completed before a new unsuspecting maid injured themselves on the broken floor. Another thing to add to his ever-growing list.

But there were more important things to worry about at the moment—like the guest awaiting them in the library.

He closed the adjoining door, giving Mercy and her new maid privacy to change out of her traveling clothes. Mercy’s frustration was valid. He had been mostly honest with her from the start, but how did one tell a woman with whom he was making a marital arrangement that he believed she was someone he had the potential to fall in love with one day? The sheer depth of pressure that would have applied to their relationship could have been insurmountable .

No, he had been correct in keeping that bit to himself.

He changed quickly, giving special attention to the knot of his cravat until he felt presentable.

Flint had accepted a new gardener that morning while they were gone, so the staff at Winterbourne was steadily growing. By the end of the year, he hoped to have every position filled and the funds to pay them, too. Things were improving, little by little.

Mercy opened the door to his room and stood there, her hair having been combed and put up high on the crown of her head, a gown he hadn’t seen of deep green muslin falling over her gentle curves. The sleeves were long, reaching her wrists, and he wondered if she was warm enough.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

“I am not certain I will ever be. Your aunt seems a formidable creature.”

“She gives that perception, certainly, but her heart is soft. Do not fear her.”

“I do not fear her,” Mercy corrected, looking up at him. “I fear ruining your inheritance.”

He should not have told her the depth of his concerns.

She chewed on her lip. “What will we do if she ascertains the truth about us?”

“What truth is that?” he asked, his pulse rising to a steady thrum.

“That we are not in love,” Mercy said simply. Her words sliced through him like a sharp knife, the cut so clean the pain did not arrive straight away. Her straightforward speech made him question his own feelings. He’d imagined he was beginning to care for her on a deeper level. He had certainly felt desire for her, appreciation for how she had managed his mother and sister and faced their disagreements with level-headed grace.

Colin hid those feelings. He did not want to force Mercy into anything else she was uncomfortable with, and this situation was already bad enough. “I think we can show Lady Edith that we care for one another and the truth will speak for itself. I care for you, Mercy. Is that feeling not mutual?”

“Of course it is,” she breathed.

“Then we do not have to worry,” he said, though he felt very much the opposite. “Come. We should not keep her waiting. She has undoubtedly been informed that we have arrived home by now.”

Mercy took his arm and followed him from the room. He glanced back at his bed, the four posters holding up heavy drapes that would undoubtedly keep her warm at night. Winterbourne did not boast any other finished chambers than his own and the guest room Lady Edith had taken from Mercy, but there were other beds. Colin could give his bedroom to Mercy and find somewhere else to sleep tonight.

His idea to wait to start a family had begun with good intent. He had come upon Mercy like a sudden storm, pulling her into a marriage arrangement with little notice. Waiting to start a family until they knew one another better had seemed the right thing to do. He had quickly regretted stating it the way he had, however. Now that he’d set the precedent and given her control, he could not so much as kiss her. There had been multiple opportunities for such a kiss. Nothing terribly intimate, mind, but he was her husband, after all.

More than that, he wanted to kiss her. Something about her lips had become unreasonably interesting these last few days .

Her hand tightened imperceptibly on his arm, reminding him of her nearness. He inhaled, smelling the soap she had used to wash up.

Mercy paused outside the library door. “Is there anything else I need to know about the arrangement?”

“Aunt Edith is my great aunt—my grandmother’s sister.”

“On your mother’s or father’s side?”

“My mother’s. Lady Edith’s father was an earl, so she comes by her pride naturally. But she married a merchant for love and has never wanted for a thing in her life. She is cantankerous, opinionated, and possessed of a wild sense of humor.”

“You are beginning to frighten me a little.”

“I shall be at your side,” Colin said. He looked at her worried eyes, a lock of hair falling over her brow, and brushed it back. Her copper hair was so striking, her pale skin littered with freckles. She was so beautiful. Why had he not noticed it before? Of course, he had always thought she was pretty, but in the last few weeks, the longer they’d spent together, the more beautiful she had become.

A shiver wracked her shoulders.

“Are you cold?” he asked. Blast, this woman was like an icehouse. “I can fetch you a shawl.”

“The fire must be lit in the library. We can sit near it.” She raised her eyebrows, an unspoken way of asking if he would like to go into the library now.

He should open the door. It was his aunt after all. His hesitancy wasn’t born from a need to stay away from his aunt, but rather from the desire to stretch this time with Mercy. When he was with her, he never wanted to leave her side. She was becoming the one person he always wanted to be near .

Maybe he’d been starved for company the last few years and now that he had a steady companion, he was growing to rely on her. Or maybe it was just her .

He rather thought it was the latter.

Reaching for the door, Colin turned the handle and pushed it open. Lady Edith sat on a high-backed settee near the fireplace, her gray hair piled beneath a white lace cap, her walking stick leaning against the armrest. Heat emanated from the crackling fire, making the small room feel intimate and warm.

“There you are,” she said, her beady eyes tracking their entrance. “Kept me waiting all day, you did. Why did you feel now was a good time to gallivant across the countryside? Christmas is only days away.”

“There was no gallivanting, Aunt,” he said, leaning forward to kiss her wrinkled cheek. For a woman on the brink of death, she was still possessed of a lively spirit. But he could see a pallor to her skin she hadn’t had before, the rosiness absent from her cheeks. “We merely went to Bath, which you know isn’t above eight miles from here. May I introduce my wife? Mercy Caldwell, our local vicar’s daughter.”

Mercy stepped forward, coming to his side, and curtsied. “Pleased to meet you, Lady Edith.”

“Aunt Edith,” she snapped. “Won’t be having Colin’s wife practicing formalities. Come sit by me, Mercy. I want to hear about you.”

Mercy shot him a glance, but he couldn’t read her eyes. He should have warned her better, prepared her more. If she found the matrons of Millcombe to be a trial, Lady Edith would be far worse. She had all their same attributes, of course, but with the cantankerous pride that accompanied a life of money and title.

He waited for Mercy to take a seat on the sofa opposite Lady Edith, then sat beside her. He was closer than was strictly necessary, but they were trying to prove their love, were they not?

“You’ve known one another long, then, I assume?”

“Nearly our whole lives,” Mercy said. “Colin and I used to play together as children near the local stream—most of the children in Millcombe did, so we were not particularly close.”

“Yet you did not marry until now. Colin needed proper encouragement, I assume.”

“You provided it in spades,” he muttered. “Can I fetch you a blanket? Add a log to the fire?”

Lady Edith’s eyes twinkled. “Stop your fussing and get this old woman a drink.”

“Of course, madam.” Colin rose and rang the bell. “Tea?”

“Only if it has brandy in it.”

“In your health?” he asked dubiously. “Has the doctor approved your drinking?”

This set her back up. “Add a nip of brandy or I shall haunt you once I’m dead, Colin Birchall.”

Flint opened the door and Colin crossed the room and requested a tray of tea. “Better add brandy to the tray, too.”

“Brandy, sir?”

“If I do not add it to Lady Edith’s tea, she’s liable to do it herself. You can imagine which among the two of us are likely to be more liberal in our pouring.”

Flint nodded in understanding. “Very good, sir.”

When Colin returned to Mercy’s side, she was telling Lady Edith about her sisters and their children. “And my youngest sister, Grace, is recently engaged.”

“The younger sisters married before the eldest. Your mother could not have liked that.”

Mercy’s mouth flattened. “Not an ideal situation, no, but it could not be helped.”

The light of interest flashed in Lady Edith’s eye. “I hope to meet these sisters while I am here.”

“My parents would be happy for the introduction, and my youngest sister, of course. The other two are not in Millcombe any longer.”

“Hmm,” Lady Edith said, eyeing her.

Colin settled on the sofa again, close to Mercy’s side. He liked being near his wife.

“How many brats does Honora have now?” Lady Edith asked.

“Only William and little Sarah,” he said. “She did not bring the children to Bath. Honora and my mother came alone.”

“They met with you in Bath, you say?” Lady Edith narrowed her gaze like a cat studying its prey. “That was why you made the wretched journey? It is not the time to travel, my boy. Far too much snow on the roads.”

“Does that mean we have the pleasure of your company until the roads clear?” he asked.

She gave him a narrowed-eyed glare. “I’m off to see your cousin Richard in Derbyshire, so I cannot stay long, but you shall have me for a few days, Colin.” Her gaze slid predatorily to Mercy. “My solicitor informed me of your wedding, and I decided I must see this paragon for myself. I told you so in my letter, did I not?”

“You might have mentioned it.” Colin regretted sending the letter to her solicitor once he and Mercy had married. He imagined it would put the money in his pocket faster, the quicker he’d acted. Now he wondered if extra time would have been a benefit to them now that they were forced to prove their affection.

Why could she not simply appreciate that he had chosen a kind, charitable, humorous woman and leave it at that?

“I did.” Lady Edith settled back in her chair, her hand gripping the top of her walking stick. “I cannot very well hand over an entire fortune without being assured you’ve followed my specifications exactly.”

He bit back the urge to take Mercy’s hand, instead fisting his on his lap. “Do I ever do anything without precision?”

“Not usually, but one never can predict matters having to do with the heart.” She looked at the fire, then the door. “Where is my brandy?”

“Your tea is on the way.”

“I would like to rest before dinner.”

Given her pale skin and wrinkled brow, she very much needed to rest. A dying woman should not be kept from her bed All this travel couldn’t be wise. But no one had ever been able to tell Lady Edith what to do. She did as she pleased, regardless of what others expected.

It was a bit of a sting to realize she had orchestrated Colin’s life to the point of forcing him to choose a wife, as well. But Mercy was a joy to see around the house. His prime companion prior to their wedding had been Flint, so Mercy was a marked improvement. She was both remarkably prettier and a much better conversationalist.

No, he supposed he could not fault the old biddy for that particular machination after all, could he?

A knock sounded on the door, preceding Flint carrying the tea tray, his staid mouth pressed into a grim line. Again, Colin marked how the general atmosphere in Winterbourne had improved with Mercy’s smiling addition.

It would be a good thing for all of them when enough servants were contracted to work at Winterbourne, though. Flint’s pride had not been so great a barrier that he wouldn’t do menial tasks, but Colin was well aware it was below his status to bring them their tea. He ought to have sent one of the new footmen up with the tray, though, or pulled Molly from whatever task she was doing and used her for the job.

Flint set the tray down and pulled a folded sheet from his pocket. “This just arrived for Mrs. Birchall.” He set the note on the platter.

“It’s from my mother,” Mercy said, reaching for it. She glanced at Colin, ostensibly for permission to leave and read it in privacy.

He nodded.

Mercy rose, surprising him by crossing to the window and unfolding the letter there in the library. He wanted to tear his eyes from her, but it was nearly impossible. She was so beautiful. Not in an overt way, her gown plain and hair simply coiffed, but the subtle curve of her lips and the concentration on her brow were arresting. He wondered, not for the hundredth time, how he had overlooked her for so many years. Would he have continued to overlook her had his great-aunt not pressed him to make a matrimonial decision?

Without marriage forced into his mind that day, would he have merely apologized for splashing her on the road and gone on his merry way? He might not have noted her subtle humor or the way she made him laugh, had it not been pressed upon his mind to watch for it .

Had Mercy always been able to draw a chuckle from him? He thought back on their years of general friendship and drew a blank—the odd dinner party they both attended or the abbreviated conversation following church came to mind, but not how he’d felt. He very well could have gone on forever without noting exactly the type of woman Mercy was.

That was moot now that she was his wife. He returned his attention to Lady Edith to find her watching him with interest. She had, apparently, poured her own tea and was sipping it now. “I would not mind seeing the list you made that led to choosing Mercy for your wife.”

Stubbornness built the slightest wall around him. “There was no list.”

Her gray eyebrows shot up. “You expect me to believe that? From you , Colin, who could not attend the local midsummer’s fair without checking over your list and comparing it to the contents packed in your parents’ carriage?”

Very well. There had been many lists, but none of them ended with Mercy Caldwell’s name circled or underlined. None had contained her name at all, and Colin did not wish to say that now.

Instead, he sighed, feigning long suffering. “I was hardly above ten at the time.”

“My point precisely. When have you ever done anything without extensive planning?”

“I haven’t. A prepared man is a confident one.”

“He is also a dull man,” she muttered, draining the rest of her cup. She set it on the saucer with a thunk and stood with the help of her cane. “I will see you at dinner tonight.”

“May I help you upstairs? ”

She grunted. “No. Make use of this time and romance your wife, Colin. I need to see love if I’m to leave you that fortune.” Her eyes raked the room with added judgment. “Perhaps this place is not worth saving.”

Colin’s gut squirmed with unease as he watched her leave. He could not think about the amount of money he had already spent in anticipation of Lady Edith’s twenty thousand pounds. If she revoked the inheritance, he would be ruined.

No, not only him. He glanced across the room where Mercy stood at the window, reading her mother’s letter. They would both be ruined.

He could not do that to his wife. Whatever happened, he would spend the next few days proving to Lady Edith that he could see himself falling in love with Mercy.

Because the truth was, he could . He was on his way there already.