Secret Valentine (11 page)

Her maid, obviously impatient with Cecelia's
sluggishness, pulled the evening gown from the box and held it out.
"Oh, try it on, do. Stand up so I might unfasten your dress."

In a state of near shock, Cecelia stood up.
How could Mr. Hartley have had a dress made up in what looked like
her size? Could he know the dressmaker Devin had arranged to come
to the house? The idea was too preposterous for even her to
believe.

Her maid had pulled the new dress over her
head before Cecelia realized what the girl was doing. "No, my
nightgown."

"You have to try this on. It is so
lovely."

Cecelia resigned herself to learning if the
gown fit. It explained the dressmaker taking, what Cecelia had
thought at the time, too many measurements for the simple walking
dress she was having done.

Had Devin ordered this gown made?

As the maid fastened the tapes and pinned the
closures, Cecelia realized the dress fit her perfectly.

"We should have a hairdresser come and do
your hair, miss. I'm not very good with it, myself."

She stared at her looking glass, seeing the
elegant drape of the simply styled gown. There was none of the fuss
and furbelows of current marriage-mart-miss fashions, but the dress
was beautiful in its simplicity, with only a small demitrain and a
gathered bodice that dipped lower than Cecelia was used to
wearing.

In a haze, Cecelia reached for the door and
flew down the stairs to the morning room.

Only Mrs. Marsh was inside.

"Where's Devin?"

"I believe he's gone home to his quarters,"
said Mrs. Marsh. "What a lovely gown, Cecelia. Are you going out
this evening?"

Cecelia shook her head.

"That color is quite good on you, brings out
the blossoms in your cheeks."

Cecelia shook her head again and backed out
the door. She pressed her hands against her burning cheeks. It just
couldn't be Devin. Could it?

* * *

For the second day in a row, Cecelia didn't
show up at the breakfast table. Devin pressed his palm against his
forehead. Was she avoiding him? Or was she in her attic
hideaway?

He finally summoned Barnes to check on
her.

"Miss Clemmons's maid informs me that her
mistress is still abed," said Barnes upon his return.

Devin pushed back from the table, unable to
linger any longer over his cold coffee. "Have her sent a tray when
she wakes." He folded
The
Morning Post
. "Put this on
it."

There was a small piece on the unknown girl
found in the Thames. Apparently a few people, including him, had
stepped forward with funds to give the girl a decent burial.
Cecelia would want to read about it.

He paced the morning room like a caged animal
until it was time for him to head for Parliament. He had no choice,
but to continue with his plan of valentines and gifts. He was
almost totally convinced he was doomed to fail.

Except for that kiss in the library. In which
case there was always plan two. If a woman could participate in a
kiss like that, her affections must be engaged, and he could make
short work of any resistance. But he didn't want her forced into a
marriage with him. He wanted her to
choose
him.

And he wanted to kill that visitor of the
night before last so there was no choice left but him. Which made
absolutely no sense.

* * *

Cecelia woke late in the day and wondered if
she had dreamed about the dress. She was so groggy from three
sleepless nights of churning out her valentines and from fretting
about the identity of her secret admirer, she didn't feel she could
think straight.

A breakfast tray was brought to her even
though she hadn't requested it. She had barely eaten a bite of
buttered eggs when her maid began hustling her into a day dress,
because there was a visitor downstairs.

She entered the drawing room and her
gentleman friend of last year greeted her. Cecelia felt a wave of
panic thread through her. Was it him, after all? Had he somehow
learned the dressmaker was to visit and coerced the woman to
measure for a dress he wanted to give Cecelia?

No, there was no way he could know her so
well.

A few minutes later, she was more confused
than ever. Her once spotty friend had come to tell her he was
leaving England to take the Grand Tour, and he wished her well. She
bid him a safe journey and happiness.

It couldn't be him. He hadn't even asked to
write.

Could Devin have really gone to so much
trouble to persuade her to marry him? Could he have stood silently
as she received gift after gift without a word to him?

Devin returned home for supper, and Cecelia
watched him covertly. Mrs. Marsh chatted up a storm about
absolutely nothing at all. By the time Mrs. Marsh and Cecelia had
withdrawn to the morning room, Devin had exchanged no more than
polite pleasantries with her. Was he waiting for her to acknowledge
the gifts?

Was he waiting for Saint Valentine's Day
tomorrow?

When Devin didn't join them in the morning
room, Barnes informed her that he had left for his rooms across
town.

Cecelia sat with Mrs. Marsh long into the
evening. She felt almost useless as she had no more valentines to
make. Her gift last night had been quite late, but when the clock
struck eleven she stopped waiting. No gift would be delivered this
late at night. She trudged up the stairs to her bedroom, knowing
nothing had arrived for her.

Disappointment weighed her down as she
entered her bedroom...until she saw the box on the bed. Her heart
galloped, and she tried to slow her frantic breathing.

Unable to contain herself, she ripped open
the box. One of her newer cards with a poem she composed about
yearning for a touch of her lover's lips lay inside. Cecelia
blushed as she reread it.

She turned it over.

What can I say?

I yearn for more than your kisses,

so this one is for me.

Yours,

Devin

She peeled back the tissue paper and
discovered a quilted dressing gown with petal pink watered silk on
the outside, and matching fur-lined, leather-soled house slippers.
She folded back the edge of the dressing gown and discovered a
filmy, nearly sheer, silk nightgown lay inside.

She shuddered as memories of the encounter in
the library spilled out of the locked corner in her mind.

She pulled her feet up and hugged her knees
to her chest. The dressing gown and scuffs were pretty and
practical, but the nightgown was another story. And if he wanted
that
, why had he returned to his rooms so early? Besides,
did his wanting
that
mean anything? She had seen him, well
not actually seen, but known him to do
that
with women he
didn't care a fig about. So his wanting to bed her didn't mean he
loved her, did it?

Hell, did he even really want to bed her? The
other night she'd all but offered herself to him, and he had been
furious with her. He had sent her away.

Her chest began to hurt. She should have told
him sooner he didn't need to marry her.

* * *

Cecelia looked wan and pale when she joined
him in the drawing room following his summons. She perched on the
edge of the sofa and twisted her hands in her lap.

As soon as Barnes shut the door, Devin
stepped forward and said, "Happy Saint Valentine's Day,
Cecelia."

He took the lack of a book and spectacles as
a good sign, except she seemed disinclined to look in his
direction. Which might be a good thing, for she might see how very
uneasy he was. It wasn't every day that a man asked a woman to
become his wife, especially not one as unpredictable as
Cecelia.

He moved to stand in front of her and pulled
the card from behind his back. He held it in front of her. She
stared at it as if it might bite her. He placed it on her knees as
he dropped to one of his.

"Cecelia, will you do me the honor of—"

"You don't have to marry me, Devin." Her
forehead puckered, and her expression grew pinched.

"I don't think it's good form to interrupt in
the middle of the proposal."

She turned the card around. But the message
was inside this one, along with the ring tied with the ribbons
threaded through the lace. "I made this."

He was surprised, but not surprised. It made
perfect sense: the ribbons, the lace, the foolscap, the pasteboard,
the inks and the paints. "Yes, and it's quite exquisite."

She pierced him with her dark brown eyes.
"Did you know?"

"No, not entirely. May I continue?"

She dropped the card to the sofa. "I've built
a successful business. I know that must shock you, but since my
father left me penniless, I felt I must support myself somehow."
She sprang up and paced across the room. "You see, I have earned
well over five hundred pounds."

"A monkey, that much?" he murmured. Feeling
rather stupid on bended knee in front of an empty sofa, he settled
into the place she had just vacated. Actually, it was quite rude of
him to sit while she stood, but under the circumstances, he felt
vindicated.

"I know it must not sound like much to you,
but it is more than enough for me to repay you for any expenses I
may have generated in the last year, and enough for me to live on
my own...modestly."

"Yes, extremely modestly," he agreed. He
crossed one ankle over his knee and spread his arms across the back
of the sofa. Cecelia wrung her hands. He had never seen her quite
so panicked.

"Well, I have modest tastes."

"I know that."

She stopped pacing. "So you see, you may
consider yourself relieved of all responsibility for me. I shall do
quite well on my own. I will began looking for a cottage to rent,
and you shall be able to move back home."

"Would there be room for me in your
cottage?"

"Devin!" She turned three different shades of
red, one right after another, and then turned her back to him.

He moved off the sofa to stand behind her. "I
should find it a come down to live in a cottage, but I should like
to live with my wife."

"I'm telling you, you don't have to marry
me."

"I never did
have
to marry you." He
leaned over and brushed his lips against her nape. "The question
has always been, would you marry me?"

Cecelia shivered. He put his hands on her
shoulders and guided her back to the sofa. She allowed herself to
be lead.

This time when he went down on bended knee,
he laid his arm across her legs so she wouldn't get up. "I should
quite like making it so I
have
to marry you, though."

She bit her lip.

He grinned at her. He didn't quite understand
her objections, but he had hope he was getting to the bottom of
them. "Was there some problem with the gifts? I wasn't quite sure
about the music box, but..."

"I treasure that," she blurted out.

"I thought since you didn't like to waltz..."
His words trailed off as an awful truth came to him. "You don't
know how to dance, do you?"

She slowly shook her head.

"Bloody hell, Cecelia, I can't believe how
dense I was."

"It's all right. I should have told you."

"I'll teach you."

She looked away at the wall and then the
other wall, and then she blinked rapidly. He took her hand in his.
"Come, Cecelia, what objection do you have to marrying me?"

A tear dripped down her cheek. "I can't
believe you've worked so hard to convince me I should."

He wiped the tear away with his thumb. There
was still some barrier he hadn't breached, but he waited
patiently.

"You can't possibly love me," she said in a
tiny voice.

Was that all she feared? "Have you ever known
me to put so much effort into a seduction?"

She shook her head. "You've never had
to."

Well, that was certainly true, but he had
never wanted to before either. "Perhaps, you should read the
card."

Cecelia shook as she picked up the card from
the sofa. Her fingers nearly refused to cooperate as she opened the
folded pasteboard to the slips of foolscap in between. A gold ring
was threaded through one of the ribbons. She turned it over
noticing the loveknot had been retied in a slipknot.

"Read it."

She turned it back over and flipped to the
last inside page.

I love you, Cecelia.

Devin

Her heart threatened to leap out of her
chest. She risked meeting his intense blue gaze. His lazy grin was
for once absent.

"You've changed me, and I don't think I could
live without you, so say you'll be my wi—"

She pressed her lips against his, and he
eagerly followed suit. Before she knew what he was about he had
scooped her up and plunked down on the sofa with her in his
lap.

"If you don't say yes soon, I shall go
mad."

"I don't think you've finished the
question."

He clapped his hand over her mouth and laid
her down on the sofa twisting until his body covered hers. "Will
you do me the honor of becoming my wife?"

He lifted his hand.

"Devin, not that I have much experience, but
isn't this an odd position for a proposal?"

"Let's try this again. I love you. Will you
marry me?"

"So in other words—"

He pressed his hand over her mouth again.
"You have to say yes or no, Cecelia. Those are the rules."

Her heart pounded madly. Surely he could feel
it with their bodies pressed so closely together. She knew she
should believe in his love, but did he really love
her? Her,
Cecelia, the valentine card-making, bluestocking, dressed
unfashionably in black? Or did he plan to change her into some
fashionable tonnish creature she wasn't?

He lifted his hand slightly and cocked his
head sideways.

She tried to turn away from his penetrating
blue eyes, but couldn't bring herself to say no, to say yes, to say
anything at all.