Meet Me at Midnight (29 page)

Shaking herself, Victoria stood. “I would like to leave now,” she stated.

He gave a small, abrupt nod. “The coach is waiting.”

At his signal several footmen hurried into the room to collect her luggage. Sinclair remained by the door, looking at her, though she didn’t know what he expected to see. Defiant anger swirled through her veins. She certainly wasn’t going to weep again—not in front of him, anyway.

She followed her things out the door. At the top of the stairs Sinclair offered her his arm. “I would sooner break my neck,” she murmured, and descended on her own. It wasn’t true, of course, but if he touched her she was entirely likely to do something stupid and
humiliating like clinging to him and begging to be allowed to stay.

“This is for your own good.”

“This is for
your
convenience. Don’t pretend otherwise.”

Ignoring his hand again, she allowed Milo to help her into the coach. Jenny joined her luggage in the second vehicle. She knew she should tell him about their child, but now was certainly not the time. It would just sound as though she was asking to stay, or even worse, trying to gain his sympathy.

“Augusta and Kit are waiting for you at Drewsbury House. From London it’s an easy two days to Althorpe.” Sinclair reached out his hand as though to touch her cheek, then lowered it again. “This will be over soon, Victoria.”

“Yes, I imagine so. Now you won’t have anything to distract you from what’s important.”

With another stiff nod he softly closed the door. A moment later, the coach rocked into motion. Belatedly Victoria realized that with the way he seemed determined to ignore her advice and suspicions, she very well might never see him again. She sat back and wept.

Sinclair Grafton, you are going to Hades for this
. He watched the coach out of sight, part of him wishing Victoria would come out of her doldrums enough to stop the coach, stalk back up to him, and punch him. He would have let her do it. Obviously, though, he’d done such a fine job of angering and humiliating her that he’d be damned lucky if he could convince her to return at all.

“Damnation,” he muttered and turned back to the
house. Milo and the footmen stood glaring at him, more balefully than they had when he’d first returned to London to claim the title.

Going to Parliament drunk would have been easy, because he wanted a stiff whiskey almost as much as he wanted Victoria back in his arms. The best, swiftest way to achieve that, though, was to finish this and arrest—or preferably shoot—the Earl of Kingsfeld.

“Will there be anything else this morning, my lord?” Milo asked stiffly.

“Yes. I’m going to the House of Lords this morning, but I expect to return here for luncheon.” In case Kingsfeld came looking for him, he wanted to be easy to find.

“Very good, my lord.”

With a last look down the street in the direction his Victoria had vanished, Sinclair went back inside the house. It was time for the final act to begin.

He arrived at the House of Lords precisely twenty-seven minutes late. As he staggered through the tall old doors into the main chamber, he noted that both Kilcairn and Kingsfeld were present. As he’d expected, after he’d purposely excluded Marley from their party last night, the viscount hadn’t made an appearance.

“Good morning, gentlemen,” he drawled, and with liberal handholds on shoulders and coats, made it to the vacant seat beside Kingsfeld. The annoyed looks from his peers were knowing rather than surprised, so Kilcairn had been tending to his task.

“Did I miss anything?” he asked Kingsfeld, and was immediately shushed by his nearest seatmates.

“Only a taxation speech,” Kingsfeld murmured. “What happened to you, Sin?”

“Well, thanks to you, Vixen thinks I only married her because of Marley,” he whispered back, real anger touching his voice. The story helped his ruse, but his fingers still curled with the desire to hit Astin. The earl had already destroyed his past with Thomas, and now was ruining any chance he had at a happy future—because that future had to include Victoria. He didn’t want a future without her.

“Oh, dear. We were only jesting. I didn’t think she would take me seriously.”

“Well, she did, and now she’s gone.”

“Shh!”

“Gone? Gone where?”

Sinclair blew out his lips. “Who knows? I told her I was going to finish this today, but she just glared at me and said she was leaving.” He leaned closer. “You haven’t seen Marley, have you?”

“No. You have no idea where your wife ran off to?”

Sweet Lucifer, Kingsfeld really
did
intend her harm. Sinclair clenched his jaw and fixed a perturbed look on his face. “She didn’t say, and I didn’t ask. I really don’t wish to discuss it.”

“I understand, lad. Of course. So you’re going ahead with Marley’s arrest?”

“I’m certainly not going to leave that bastard on the loose when I don’t know where my wife is.” Despite his barely checked fury, the conversation was going well; better than he’d anticipated. With a quick breath he decided to continue: they couldn’t count on Kingsfeld following him home for luncheon. “I meant to ask you last night,” he continued, making certain the earl got a good whiff of the whiskey liberally soaked into his cravat, “you don’t have the rest of that letter somewhere, do you? With just a few words here and there,
I don’t want any damned solicitor saying it’s really a letter to Marley’s dear sick aunt.”

“I don’t know where it would be, if I did,” Kingsfeld whispered back. “But I did find the first piece. Perhaps I used the rest of it in the library, as well.”

“It would be very helpful.”

“Lord Althorpe!”

With a start, Sinclair looked down at the floor of the House. The Earl of Liverpool stood glaring at him, hands on his hips and his lips pressed thinly together in obvious annoyance. “My lord?”

The prime minister took a step closer. “We are discussing matters of taxation. Do you have anything of importance to add to the debate?”

No one had spoken to him like that since he was a schoolboy. As Crispin pointed out on numerous occasions, though, he would do anything for the sake of the mission. He gave a lopsided grin. “That depends. What are we taxing? Oh, let me guess. Whatever it is, it’s meant to pay off more of Prinny’s debts.”

A low, rumbling roar began at the more conservative end of the House, and by the time it reached those around Sinclair, it had become a full-blown shouting match. Liverpool was yelling at him, but in the din it took a moment for him to decipher what the prime minister was saying.

“We will not tolerate your drunken interruptions here! This is a serious place of law, not a brothel!”

Sinclair stood. “You could have fooled me,” he said and stumbled back down the risers. “Good day, gentlemen,” he said, grinning, and strolled for the door. As he left, he glanced back to see Kingsfeld looking at his pocket watch, and, farther down the row, Lord
Kilcairn apparently taking a nap, despite the glinting slit of a gaze aimed in his direction.

That was one step taken care of. And now for Marley.

“All right. For the sake of argument, let’s say Sin is sending you away because you quarreled.” Kit sat on the backward-facing side of the coach, his scowl growing deeper with each passing mile. “If that’s true, though, why did the big oaf insist that Grandmama and I go with you? We didn’t argue with him.”

Victoria leaned her cheek against the windowsill, trying to catch some air on her face. She hadn’t meant to discuss her departure at all, but Christopher had his brother’s persistence. Neither of her companions knew precisely what was going on, and she didn’t want to be the one to enlighten them. On the other hand, her limited tolerance for lying had several hours ago reached its fill.

“He’s just trying to protect you,” she said, shutting her eyes and then quickly opening them again when the rocking of the coach threatened to make her ill.

“Protect us from what?” Kit retorted. “The London Season? I was supposed to go on a picnic with Miss Porter tomorrow.”

“My, Hampshire is such lovely country,” Augusta broke in. “I have always been very fond of it.”

Hampshire
. Victoria straightened. “Where in Hampshire are we?”

“The road passes through the southeast section on its way toward Althorpe.” Christopher’s scowl darkened further. “I really would like to know what Sin thinks we need protecting for. This is ridiculous. I haven’t—we haven’t—seen him for five years, and
now he decides he’s had enough of us?”

She heard and understood the hurt in his voice; she felt it herself. It would be so much easier if Sinclair didn’t blame himself for what had happened to Thomas; he felt so responsible that it seemed he would rather risk losing the love and understanding of his family than even consider them being hurt.

Victoria blinked. He was willing to risk everything. Did that include her?

She sat up very straight. Things had fallen rather conveniently into place yesterday. Circumstances in Sinclair’s vicinity seemed to have a way of doing that. And she’d fallen right in with his plans. Sending Kingsfeld to insult her seemed far-fetched, but Sin wasn’t likely to explain things, or to let an opportunity go by unused. She was not some timid miss to be banished to the country at her husband’s convenience, however. Not without getting some answers first.

“Stop the coach,” she said, grabbing onto the windowsill.

“We’re just a mile or two from the next inn,” Augusta said. “We can rest there.”

“No. Stop it now, or I’m going to be ill.”

“Damnation.” Kit lurched to his feet. “Driver, stop the coach!” he bellowed, knocking on the roof with his fist.

Slowly they rolled to a halt. Kit flung open the door and vaulted to the ground so he could hand Victoria down. As soon as her feet touched the rutted track her stomach settled, but her mind continued careening in every direction.

For several minutes she strode up and down the road while Christopher kept pace beside her and Augusta leaned out the coach’s doorway to watch them. Soon
the second carriage with their servants and luggage came up behind them and stopped.

“Better?” Kit asked.

“I think so.” For appearance sake she continued to clutch her stomach and make occasional groaning sounds. How much of what Sinclair had said to her had been lies, and how much had been the truth? Was he trying to protect her, or did he really, truly wish to be rid of her?

“Are you ready to continue?” Kit asked.

She couldn’t keep tramping along the roadside forever. With a nod, Victoria turned back to the coach again—and stopped so quickly that Christopher ran into her from behind.

“Damn,” he mumbled, grabbing her elbow. “My apologies. You’re not going to faint, are you?”

“I might.”

The coach’s driver sat facing away from her, a big, crooked hand blocking his countenance from her view. The hand, though, was as recognizable as the face, as was the driver’s short stature. For a brief moment Victoria wanted to burst into song. Just as quickly, though, she stifled the urge. Simply because Sinclair had sent Roman to drive them all to Althorpe didn’t mean he’d had motives other than the one he’d stated for sending her away.

“Driver,” she called, “I require a word with you.”

Roman jumped, glancing at her, and then faced away again.

“Driver!”

“Yes, my lady,” he muttered, climbing slowly and reluctantly to the ground.

“Vixen, do you—”

“Excuse me, Kit,” she interrupted. “I’ll just be a
moment.” She stalked up to Roman. “What are you doing here?” she demanded.

“I’m driving the coach, my lady. And if you would be so kind as to return to your seat, we’ll continue on to the Red Lion Inn, just up the road.”

The Red Lion
. A plan began forming in her mind. First, though, she had a few more questions. “If Sinclair was tired of my presence, why didn’t he send me to my parents’ house?”

The valet cleared his throat. “I wouldn’t know, my lady.”

“And why did he banish his family along with me, and place us under your protection?”

“I wouldn’t—”

“I’m going back. Turn the coach around.”

It was a bold move, but it paid off. Roman blanched—which comforted her more than all of his stumbling denials. Something was going on; and the most important realization was that perhaps Sinclair
hadn’t
tired of her after all.

“I’m not taking you back to London,” he said firmly. “I have my orders.”

Victoria rubbed her chin, surveying the pretty countryside. Augusta and Christopher complicated the plot; if she returned to London, they would go with her. She couldn’t place them in danger, not just because she had a hunch, and not when Sinclair had gone to such efforts to remove them all from harm.

Taking a deep breath, Victoria made her decision. She couldn’t allow Sinclair to decide her life, or her place in his. A night of sleepless tension and stress made bursting into tears easy. Sobbing, she returned to the carriage.

“Whatever is wrong, my dear?” Augusta exclaimed, helping her up into the vehicle.

“Nothing, really. I’m just…I’m just so tired.”

“Of course you are.”

“You know, we’re very close to my old finishing school.”

“Miss Grenville’s Academy?” A slight furrow appeared between Augusta’s eyebrows.

“Yes. My…my good friend Emma is headmistress there.” She clutched Augusta’s hand, not having to pretend the worry and tension running through her. “I would really like to visit her for a few days, if you…don’t mind. I’ll follow you to Althorpe at the end of the week.”

“Absolutely not, child! If you wish to visit your friend, we’ll all go.”

Leaning into the coach from his position on the bottom step, Kit nodded his agreement. “We’re not going to abandon you—especially after Sin was such a cad.”

Real tears coursed down Victoria’s cheeks. Nothing was going to happen to these people.
Nothing
. “Thank you, but it’s not like that. Really. I just need a day or two…alone.” At Kit’s hurt look, she smiled. “Besides, it’s a girls’ school. No men allowed.”

Augusta looked at her for a long moment. “I hope this isn’t because of Sinclair’s behavior,” she finally said in a low voice. “I think he cares very much for you.”