That drove Wordsworth to actually grab her shoulders in alarm. “Listen to me!” he barked. “If you do that, you may well get your own brother killed!” Embarrassed by his own vehemence, he dropped his hands, but his voice was still insistent to the point of pleading. “Consider the facts, if you won’t consider conjecture: Your husband has just been named heir to one of the most important titles in Europe. He is going to marry you—a beautiful woman, a countess, who would have been above his touch until a few weeks ago. Do you think for a moment he’ll risk all that by letting your brother be found and brought here to give evidence against him? If your brother wasn’t killed, if Thornton only had him put to work in one of his mines, or impressed on one of his ships, and you start questioning him, Thornton will have little choice but to decide to dispose of the evidence. Are you listening to me. Lady Cameron? Do you understand?”
Elizabeth nodded.
“Then I’ll bid you good day and resume the search for your brother.” He paused at the door and looked back at the girl in the middle of the room who was standing with her head bent, her face ghostly pale. “For your own sake, don’t wed the man, at least until we know for sure.”
“When will that be?” she asked in a shattered voice.
“Who knows? In a month, perhaps, or in a year. Or never.” He paused and drew a long, frustrated breath. “If you do act in defiance of all sense and wed him, then for your brother’s sake, if not for your own, keep your silence. You, too, would be in danger if he’s guilty and he thinks you’re going to discover it and perhaps expose him.”
When he left, Elizabeth sank back down on the sofa and closed her eyes, trying to keep her tears at bay. In her mind she heard Wordsworth’s voice. In her heart she saw Ian smiling down at her, his voice husky and filled with need: “Love me, Elizabeth.” And then she saw him as he’d confronted her uncle, a muscle jerking in his cheek, his body emanating rage. She remembered him in the greenhouse, too, when Robert barged in on them and said Elizabeth was already betrothed; Ian had looked at her with murder in his eyes.
But he hadn’t harmed Robert in that duel. Despite his justifiable wrath, he’d acted with cold control. Swallowing convulsively, Elizabeth brushed a tear from the corner of her eye, feeling as if she was being torn to pieces.
She saw his face, that hard face that could be transformed to almost boyishness by one of his lazy smiles. She saw his eyes—icy in Scotland, blazing at her uncle . . . and smiling down at her the day he came to Havenhurst.
But it was his voice that revolved in her mind, overcoming the doubt, that rich, compelling, husky voice—“Love me, Elizabeth.”
Slowly Elizabeth stood up, and though she was still deathly pale, she had made her decision. If he was innocent and she stopped this wedding, Ian would be made to look a fool; she couldn’t even give him a reason for doing it, and he would never forgive her. She would lose him forever. If she married him, if she followed her instincts, she might never know what became of Robert. Or Ian would be vindicated. Or else she would find out that she was married to a monster, a murderer.
Alexandra took one look at Elizabeth’s white face and hurtled off the bed, wrapping her arms around her friend. “What is it, Elizabeth? Is it bad news? Tell me—please, you look ready to drop.”
Elizabeth wanted to tell her, would have told her, but she very much feared Alex would try to talk her out of proceeding with the wedding. The decision had been hard enough to make; now that she had decided, she didn’t think she could bear to listen to arguments or she’d start to waver. She was determined to believe in Ian; and since she was, she wanted Alex’s liking for him to continue to grow.
“It’s nothing,” she said lamely. “At least not yet. Mr. Wordsworth simply needed more information about Robert, and it’s a difficult thing to talk about with him.”
* * *
While Alexandra and a maid fussed with Elizabeth’s train the bride waited at the back of the church, cold with nerves, torn with misgivings, telling herself this was nothing but wedding jitters.
She looked past the doors, knowing that in the entire packed cathedral there was not one relative of her own—not even a single male relative to give her away. At the front of the church she saw Jordan Townsende step out and take his place, followed by Ian, tall and dark and overwhelming in stature and will. There was no one who could make him abide by their bargain if he chose to ignore it. Not even the courts would force him to do that.
“Elizabeth?” the Duke of Stanhope said gently, and he held out his arm to her. “Don’t be afraid, child,” he said softly, smiling at her huge, stricken eyes. “It’ll be over before you know it.”
The organ gave forth with a blast of melody, then paused expectantly, and suddenly Elizabeth was walking down the aisle. Of the thousands of people watching her, she wondered how many were still recalling her publicized “liaison” with Ian and speculating on how much too soon a babe was likely to arrive.
Many of the faces were kind, though, she noticed distractedly. The duke’s sister smiled as she passed; the other sister dabbed at her eyes. Roddy Carstairs gave her an audacious wink, and a hysterical chuckle bubbled inside her, then collided with a lump of terror and confusion. Ian was watching her, too, his expression unreadable. Only the vicar looked comforting as he waited, the marriage book open in his hands.
29
The Duke of Stanhope had insisted that a grand wedding banquet and reception, with everyone of social prominence in attendance, was just the thing to put a final end to the gossip about Ian and Elizabeth’s past. As a result, the festivities were being held here, at Montmayne, rather than Havenhurst which lacked not only the size needed to accommodate one thousand guests but furnishings as well. Standing on the sidelines of the ballroom, which Ian’s army of florists had transformed into a gigantic bower of flowers, complete with a miniature arbor at the far end, Elizabeth tried with every fiber of her being to ignore the haunting memory of Wordsworth’s visit this morning. No matter how hard she tried, his words still hung over her like a wispy pall, not thick enough to prevent her from carrying on as if all were normal, but there, nonetheless.
Now she was dealing with it the only way she could: Whenever the gloom and dread closed around her, she looked for Ian. The sight of him, she had discovered in the long hours since their wedding, could banish her doubts and make Wordsworth’s accusations seem as absurd as they undoubtedly were. If Ian weren’t nearby, she did the only other thing she could do—she pinned a bright smile on her face and pretended to herself, and to everyone else, that she was the radiantly happy, carefree bride she was supposed to be. The more she practiced, the more she felt like one.
Since Ian had gone to get her a glass of champagne and been waylaid by friends, Elizabeth devoted herself to smiling at the wedding guests who passed by her in an endless stream to wish her happiness, or compliment the lavish decorations or the sumptuous supper they’d been served. The coldness Elizabeth had thought she felt in church this morning now seemed to be a figment of her nervous imagination, and she realized she had misjudged many of these people. True, they had not approved of her conduct two years ago—and how could they?—yet now, most of them seemed genuinely anxious to let the past be laid to rest.
The fact that they were eager to pretend the past hadn’t happened made Elizabeth smile inwardly as she looked again at the glorious decorations: No one but she had realized that the ballroom bore a rather startling resemblance to the gardens at Charise Dumont’s country house, and that the arbor at the side, with its trellised entrance, was a virtual replica of the place where she and Ian had first waltzed that long-ago night.
Across the room, the vicar was standing with Jake Wiley, Lucinda, and the Duke of Stanhope, and he raised his glass to her. Elizabeth smiled and nodded back. Jake Wiley watched the silent communication and beamed upon his little group of companions. “Exquisite bride, isn’t she?” he pronounced, not for the first time. For the past half-hour, the three men had been merrily cong
ratulating themselves on their individual roles in bringing this marriage about, and the consumption of spirits was beginning to show in Duncan and Jake’s increasingly gregarious behavior.
“Absolutely exquisite,” Duncan agreed.
“She’ll make Ian an excellent wife,” said the duke. “We’ve done well, gentlemen,” he added, lifting his glass in yet another congratulatory toast to his companions. “To you, Duncan,” he said with a bow, “for making Ian see the light”
“To you, Edward,” said the vicar to the duke, “for forcing society to accept them.” Turning to Jake, he added, “And to you, old friend, for insisting on going to the village for the servingwomen and bringing old Attila and Miss Throckmorton-Jones with you.”
That toast belatedly called to mind the silent duenna who was standing stiffly beside them, her face completely devoid of expression. “And to you, Miss Throckmorton-Jones,” said Duncan with a deep, gallant bow, “for taking that laudanum and spilling the truth to me about what Ian did two years ago. ’Twas that, and that alone, which caused everything else to be put into motion, so to speak. But here,” said Duncan, nonplussed as he waved to a servant bearing a tray of champagne, “you do not have a glass, my dear woman, to share in our toasts.”
“I do not take strong spirits,” Lucinda informed Duncan. “Furthermore, my good man,” she added with a superior expression that might have been a smile or a smirk, “I do not take laudanum, either.” And on that staggering announcement, she swept up her unbecoming gray skirts and walked off to dampen the spirits of another group. She left behind her three dumbstruck, staring men who gaped at each other and then suddenly erupted into shouts of laughter.
Elizabeth glanced up as Ian handed her a glass of champagne. “Thank you,” she said, smiling up at him and gesturing to Duncan, the duke, and Jake, who were now convulsed with loud hilarity. “They certainly seem to be enjoying themselves,” she remarked. Ian absently glanced at the group of laughing men, then back at her. “You’re breathtaking when you smile.”
Elizabeth heard the huskiness in his voice and saw the almost slumberous look in his eyes, and she was wondering about its cause when he said softly, “Shall we retire?”
That suggestion caused Elizabeth to assume his expression must be due to weariness. She, herself, was more than ready to seek the peace of her own chamber, but since she’d never been to a wedding reception before, she assumed that the protocol must be the same as at any other gala affair— which meant the host and hostess could not withdraw until the last of the guests had either left or retired. Tonight, every one of the guest chambers would be in use, and tomorrow a large wedding breakfast was planned, followed by a hunt. “I’m not sleepy—just a little fatigued from so much smiling,” she told him, pausing to bestow another smile on a guest who caught her eye and waved. Turning her face up to Ian, she offered graciously, “It’s been a long day. If you wish to retire, I’m sure everyone will understand.”
“I’m sure they will,” he said dryly, and Elizabeth noted with puzzlement that his eyes were suddenly gleaming.
“I’ll stay down here and stand in for you,” she volunteered.
The gleam in his eyes brightened yet more. “You don’t think that my retiring alone will look a little odd?”
Elizabeth knew it might seem impolite, if not precisely odd, but then inspiration struck, and she said reassuringly, “Leave everything to me. I’ll make your excuses if anyone asks.”
His lips twitched. “Just out of curiosity—what excuse will you make for me?”
“I’ll say you’re not feeling well. It can’t be anything too dire though, or we’ll be caught out in the fib when you appear looking fit for breakfast and the hunt in the morning.” She hesitated, thinking, and then said decisively, “I’ll say you have the headache.”
His eyes widened with laughter. “It’s kind of you to volunteer to dissemble for me, my lady, but that particular untruth would have me on the dueling field for the next month, trying to defend against the aspersions it would cause to be cast upon my . . . ah . . . manly character.”
“Why? Don’t gentlemen get headaches?”
“Not,” he said with a roguish grin, “on their wedding night.”
“I can’t see why.”
“Can you not?”
“No. And,” she added with an irate whisper, “I don’t see why everyone is staying down here this late. I’ve never been to a wedding reception, but it does seem as if they ought to be beginning to seek their beds.”
“Elizabeth,” he said, trying not to laugh. “At a wedding reception, the guests cannot leave until the bride and groom retire. If you look over there, you’ll notice my great-aunts are already nodding in their chairs.”
“Oh!” she exclaimed, instantly contrite. “I didn’t know. Why didn’t you tell me earlier?”
“Because,” he said, taking her elbow and beginning to guide her from the ballroom, “I wanted you to enjoy every minute of our ball, even if we had to prop the guests up on the shrubbery.”
“Speaking of shrubbery,” she teased, pausing on the balcony to cast a last fond look at the “arbor” of potted trees with silk blossoms that occupied one-fourth the length of the entire ballroom, “everyone is talking about having gardens and arbors as themes for future balls. I think you’ve started a new ‘rage.’ ”
“You should have seen your face,” he teased, drawing her away, “when you recognized what I had done.”
“We are probably the only couple,” she returned, her face turned up to his in laughing conspiracy, “ever to lead off a ball by dancing a waltz on the sidelines.” When the orchestra had struck up the opening waltz, Ian had led her into the mock “arbor,” and they had started the ball from there.
“Did you mind?”
“You know I didn’t,” she returned, walking beside him up the curving staircase.
He stopped outside her bed chamber, opened the door for her, and started to pull her into his arms, then checked himself as a pair of servants came marching down the hall bearing armloads of linens. “There’s time for this later,” he whispered. “All the time we want.”
30
Oblivious to Berta’s pinched face as the maid brushed her heavy hair, Elizabeth sat at her dressing table clad in a lacy cream silk nightdress that Madame LaSalle had insisted would be extremely pleasing to the marquess on his wedding night.
At the moment, however, Elizabeth wasn’t worried about the way her breasts were revealed by the deep V of the bodice or the way her left leg was exposed to the knee by the seductive slash in the gown. For one thing, she knew the bedclothes would hide her; for another, now that she had solitude for the first time since this morning, she was finding it much harder to ignore the tormenting things Mr. Wordsworth had said.
Trying desperately to think of other things, Elizabeth shifted impatiently in her chair and concentrated on her wedding night instead. Staring at her hands folded in her lap, she bent her head to give Berta better access to her long tresses, her mind going over Lucinda’s explanation about how babies were conceived. Since Ian had been very emphatic about wanting children, there was every chance he might wish to start tonight; if so, according to Lucinda, they would evidently share a bed.
She frowned as she reconsidered Lucinda’s explanation; it did not, in Elizabeth’s opinion, make a great deal of sense. She was not ignorant of the way other species on earth created their young; on the other hand, she realized that people could not possibly behave in such an appalling fashion. But still, a kiss in bed from a spouse? If that were so, why had she heard occasional scandalous gossip about a certain married lady in the ton whose baby was purportedly not her husband’s? Obviously there was more than one way to make a baby, or else Lucinda’s information was incorrect.
That brought her to the matter of sleeping accommodations. Her suite adjoined his, and she had no idea whether, if he did wish to share a bed with her, it would be this one or his. As if in answer to her unspoken questions, the d
oor that connected this chamber with Ian’s opened, and Berta jumped in fright; then she glowered at Ian, whom she, like several of Elizabeth’s servants, continued to fear and blame, and went scurrying out, closing the door behind her.
Elizabeth, however, felt only a swift surge of admiration, and she smiled a little as he walked toward her with those long, easy strides that always looked both certain and relaxed. Still clad in the formal black trousers he’d worn, he’d removed his coat, waistcoat, and neckcloth, and his white frilled shirt was open at the neck, revealing the strong, tanned column of his throat. He looked, she thought, as ruggedly virile and elegant in shirtsleeves as in formal attire. In the midst of that, Wordsworth’s accusations slid insidiously through her mind, and Elizabeth thrust them away.
She stood up, self-conscious in her revealing gown, and took a step forward, then stopped, arrested by the spark flaring in those golden eyes as they moved over her body in the revealing gown. Unaccountably wary and shaky, she hastily turned back to the mirror and absently ran a hand over her hair. Ian came up behind her, and his hands settled on her shoulders. In the mirror she watched him bend his dark head, felt his warm lips against the curve of her neck, sending tingling sensations down her neck and arm. “You’re trembling,” he said in the gentlest voice she’d ever heard.
“I know,” she admitted with a nervous tremor in her voice. “I don’t know why.”
His lips curved in a smile. “Don’t you?” he asked softly.
Elizabeth shook her head, longing to turn to him and plead with him to tell her what had happened to Robert; afraid to hear his answer, afraid to ruin this night with her suspicions—suspicions she knew had to be unfounded. Afraid of what was in store for her in that bed . . .
Unable to tear her gaze from his, Elizabeth watched his hand slide around her waist from behind, pulling her against him until she felt his hard chest against her back, the imprint of his legs against her own. He bent his head again, his arm tightening as he lazily kissed her ear, and his other hand swept up her arm, sliding beneath the satin ribbon at her shoulder, his hand seeking the side of her breast, fingers splaying wide in a bold, possessive caress.