Captive Bride (8 page)

“Hose, I believe they called them,” Bea offered.

“And awful, tall boots that do not make any sound when he walks.”

Bea’s blood
hummed,
her mind awhirl. A tingle of fear still wriggled through her, but it only added to her exhilaration. “Why does he use the door to leave, do you imagine?”

“To be odious,” the girl repeated with an eloquent shudder.

Clearly Lady Bronwyn was too close to the matter to be of critical use.

“Beatrice, you cannot believe this chit,” Lady
Marstowe
said.

Bea nodded. “I do, Aunt Grace. I saw him, and I spoke with him before you all arrived. He passed his hand through a candle flame without flinching. He also told me I have a Welsh ancestor, which is perfectly true. Thomas, had you mentioned that to anyone here?”

“I didn’t even know it.”

“You see, Aunt Grace, Lord
Iversly
is a ghost.”

“Well of course he is!” Thomas exclaimed. “The question is not whether he is a ghost, but how we will prevent him from forcing Lady Bronwyn into marriage.”

“It seems so, Tom.” Tip’s voice was especially deep, but even. Bea met his gaze. It seemed dark, and there was a crease in his brow
.

Her stomach tightened. She had dragged him into this. Well, not precisely. He had insisted on coming along. But he had not expected this, certainly.

“You needn’t remain,” she said quickly. “Neither of us believed Thomas’s letter, of course. You did not bargain for this when you offered your escort, and you have business elsewhere. We will not take it amiss if you leave.”

“Of course we will,
Cheriot
,” Thomas stated. “I can’t defeat this fellow with a bunch of women.”

“Thomas, your gallantry does you justice,” Tip replied, then turned to Bea again. “My business can wait.”

She had rarely seen him appear so somber or speak with such lack of animation. She could only recall one occasion when he had looked so emotionless, the time he visited Yorkshire while he was still in mourning from his mother’s death. He had been so grave then, so unlike himself.

“I would not wish you to—”

“I am remaining.” His tone was unflinching, his jaw very hard. A thrill of pleasure skittered through her. Before, he’d thought the whole thing nonsense, and he hadn’t actually seen Lord
Iversly
. But now he believed her and intended to help. It was small wonder she had loved him forever.

“The last sane mind in this party has fled, I see,” Lady
Marstowe
said, then barked at Lady Bronwyn, “When do you serve dinner here, girl?”

“Oh, I beg your pardon, my lady.” Lady Bronwyn’s eyes glittered. “I am only enormously relieved you are all here. You cannot imagine what a terror this has been for me. Then Mr.
Sinclaire
arrived and promised help.” She laid a grateful look upon Thomas,
then
turned. “Thank you, Lord
Cheriot
and dear Beatrice. You are infinitely kind.”

Tip inclined his head in acknowledgment, but he did not smile. Bea bit the inside of her cheek.

“Dinner?”
Aunt Julia chirped.

Strain hinted about Tip’s mouth throughout the meal. He did not once look at Bea, and he continued unusually sober. Everyone else was wrapped up in the ghost. Bronwyn and Bea were obliged to repeat the details of his appearance several times, and Thomas recounted each occasion on which he had heard Lord
Iversly
speak. Tip remained largely silent, not offering his own testimonial although Bea was certain he had been speaking with the ghost when she entered the parlor.

The party returned to the parlor after dinner to take tea, but the great-aunts did not remain long before rising to retire.

“Lady Bronwyn,” the dowager said, “does
Iversly
wander the corridors at night, dragging chains and that sort of nonsense?”

“Oh, no.
He sleeps in the master suite, I believe. At least,” her voice quivered, “that is what he told me.”

“The blackguard.”
Thomas took her arm. “I will take you to see your grandmother before you retire, if you wish,” he said gently and led her from the chamber.

“The poor dear,” Aunt Julia said, although Bea could not say whether she meant Lady Bronwyn or the sickly grandmother they had yet to meet. Bronwyn’s grandmother was of a delicate nature and apparently frightened of Lord
Iversly
. Thomas insisted this was the reason he had stayed on after his friend fled, although Bea wished he had thought to engage a more effective chaperone for the girl.

She glanced at Tip across the parlor. His gaze rested on her, peculiarly enigmatic.

“Beatrice, come along,” Lady
Marstowe
ordered. “Julia.”

Bea obeyed, but Aunt Julia paused.

“Peter dear, aren’t you going to bed too? It has been an awfully fagging day.”

“Of course, ma’am.”
He offered his arm to Julia, turning a warm smile on her. Bea’s throat tightened and she started up the winding stair beside Aunt Grace to the great-aunts’ apartments. Their bedchambers were all clustered about a central keep, with Bea’s around a corner along the dark, stone corridor, and Bronwyn’s, Thomas’s, and Tip’s just beyond.

“Don’t let Lord
Iversly’s
jingling chains keep you awake all night,” Aunt Julia said with a seraphic smile and closed the door.

The intimacy of the narrow corridor, lit only by a guttering torch stump, with Tip just behind her, closed in on Bea swiftly. She went the few yards to her bedchamber door and paused.
He was close enough to touch, tall and dark in the cold, shadowed passageway. She crossed her arms, hugging them to her for warmth.

“You really should leave here,” she said.

“I will not. I have already told you so.”

“This trouble has nothing to do with you.”

“You are involved. It does now.”

Bea tried to discern his expression in the dimness. “But you do not like this. I can see that.”

“Why don’t you allow me to decide what I do or do not like,
hm
?” He leaned one broad shoulder against her bedchamber door, as though perfectly at ease. “It’s a bit like one of those novels you like so much, isn’t it?
The stories featuring horrid villains and helpless maidens.”

Bea’s eyes snapped wide. “I do not like those sorts of novels.”

“Of course you do.”

Her cheeks got positively scalding. “How would you know that?”

Tip’s gaze shifted, as though studying her blush. “I have accompanied you to the lending library in York at least half a dozen times, my girl. I am not blind.”

Bea begged to differ. He had not been able to see how much she loved him for years.

“Of course you have. I just never thought you would—” She halted and bit her lower lip.

The light in Tip’s eyes seemed to flicker in the torch-glow. “You never thought I would what, practical, sensible Miss
Sinclaire
? Notice your shameful secret?”

She swallowed hard.
Then frowned.
Why must he always tease her? He had never teased
Georgie
. He always treated her with complete respect.

“I never thought you would care enough to notice,” she said shortly.

He pushed away from the door, coming within inches of her.

“I care enough. Always have.” A slight tilt of his mouth cut a crease in his cheek. Warmth trickled into Bea’s veins. She didn’t care for his teasing, but his smile made her want to laugh and cry at once, filling her with sweet longing and fear that it would all disappear, that he would finally find another lady he could love, cease visiting York, and she would never see that smile again.

Her pulse raced, but she smiled back. She could never resist his good humor, especially now, seeing it for the first time since Thomas told them about
Iversly
.

Tip’s eyes took on a peculiar glint, the same she’d spied earlier in the parlor and again at dinner.

“You like this,” he said.

Bea’s heart turned over. She liked standing in the corridor with him alone in the middle of the night?
Most assuredly.
Like a foolish, dream-starved girl.

“This?” she managed to breathe.

“The ghost story.”

Oh
.

“It is not a story. It is real.”

“I still cannot believe it, yet I feel deuced foolish not to have realized it sooner.” He ran his hand through his dark locks around to the back of his neck. The gesture was so unconscious, so boyish and manly at
once,
it sent a delicious ripple through Bea. The corridor seemed very warm and close.

“It’s not your fault. Who would have believed this sort of thing could truly happen?”

“You did.” His tone did not accuse. It sounded oddly bewildered, and his eyes looked bright.

“Well, Thomas wrote—”

“You wanted to believe it, didn’t you? You wanted the ghost to be real, and you’re happy that he is. Aren’t you?” He looked at her so fixedly, as though he hoped she would deny it.

She could not deny it, not even for him. She’d had so few adventures in her life.
None
, in truth.
She simply could not regret this one, however horrifying it might seem to a rational person. She may as well admit it to him. She was fairly certain he wouldn’t tell anyone, especially not Mama; he already knew her nasty little predilection for darkly dramatic prose.

Cheeks hotter than ever, she tightened her arms and met his regard directly.

“I did hope he would be real, and I wanted to be able to help. I cannot imagine a more exciting activity to be engaged in just now.”

“I can.” Tip’s voice sounded rough.

Her eyes shot wide. “What?”

He looked even odder than before, his eyes intense, like emeralds glinting from within a shadow. He put his palm on the stone behind her head and leaned in.

Her heart slammed against her ribs. They had never stood this close, not even while dancing, and that was years ago. He seemed so large from only a few inches away, so masculine and broad, his chest a wall of heady possibility right before her. If she unwound her arms she could touch him, place her palm on his coat and feel his body that looked so firm and powerful, as she had wanted to do for years.
Longed
to do.

Her breaths shortened. She fumbled behind her for the door latch. “I—I think I will turn in now.”

Tip’s eyes seemed to shimmer. “Not.” His breath feathered across her brow. “Just.” He bent his head.
“Yet.”

His lips brushed hers.

CHAPTER
FIVE

Bea melted. His lips barely lingered, a brief caress of warm, wonderful heat that stole into her, twined between her lips and across her breasts to explode in unruly sizzles all through her middle and, wickedly, between her legs where she always seemed to grow hot when she fantasized about him kissing her.

But this was not a fantasy. It was spectacularly, miraculously real. A sigh escaped her, so light she possibly imagined it.

He stepped back abruptly, blinking several times and staring at her in obvious bemusement.

“I should—” he said haltingly, “—should go.”

She nodded. Her lips tingled. Her entire
body
tingled. She tilted forward into the corridor, attracted like a magnet to his pole. They could write it on her gravestone like that:
Beatrice
Sinclaire
, spinster, unappreciated companion to her wretched mother, human magnet,
b.1799
–d.1822.

For now she truly could die. Peter
Cheriot
had kissed her. She was a whole woman. Or at least she felt like one at the present. The sensation might not last. But for the time being, heaven seemed entirely hers.

“I will—” he began again. He took a sharp breath. “Good night, Bea.” He turned and disappeared down the corridor.

In the abrupt vacuum of his presence, Bea nearly fell over. Clutching the door latch, she gulped in breaths of air acrid with torch smoke. It smelled like summer flowers.

He had kissed her.

She didn’t know why he had, but for the moment, at least, she wouldn’t even think about that. She would simply allow herself to feel, remembering the sensation of his lips passing across hers so intimately, reliving the swirling delight in her body, and reveling in it all.

He had kissed her.
Finally.

It had only taken seven years.

What in the devil had he been thinking?