The Light in the Darkness (22 page)

“What the hell do you want?” he demanded.

The door opened, and Catherine, clad in an unfashionably high-necked dark gray gown, came in. “I’ll take that as an invitation to enter,” she said calmly, smiling at him. Grey did not return the smile. Whenever Catherine smiled at him there was trouble in the offing.

“What is so important,” he said tightly, “that you must disturb me?”

Catherine sat down in one of the leather-upholstered chairs and faced him. “I have had a brilliant idea,” she began. “More than brilliant. Astonishing, extraordinary—”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake, get on with it,” Grey growled.

Catherine looked slightly wounded. “Very well. It seems to me that I should consider finding another place to reside. I do not want to become your spinster sister who depends upon you for support for the rest of my years, especially now that you are married. I should really consider looking for a husband so that I can marry and get out of your way.”

Grey turned to face her, lifting his eyebrows in surprise.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Catherine. You’ve never been in the way. In fact, you’ve been invaluable in teaching Jennifer how to be a lady.”

“I’m glad you feel that way,” Catherine went on smoothly, never missing a beat. “Because my idea has to do with Jennifer as well.”

Grey’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. “Just exactly what is your idea?”

“A rout!”

Astounded, Grey stared at her for a long moment. “You must be joking,” he said at last. “A rout? Are you suggesting that we give a rout here? In
my
house?”

“Yes!” Catherine said happily. “For Twelfth Night. It would be the ideal setting both to introduce Jennifer to society and to begin my search for a husband. After all, we have that lovely ballroom in the east wing that has hardly ever been used. It would be the event of the season!”

Twelfth Night, Grey knew, was the most celebrated holiday in the colony, even more so than Christmas. The planter class frequently threw lavish celebrations. A rout at Greyhaven would certainly be a popular event. And Twelfth Night was little more than a month away. If he agreed to this mad scheme, people would invade his house in a month, laughing and talking and in general making bloody nuisances of themselves. His peace would be shattered entirely. It would be perfectly appalling.

And yet … Catherine did need a husband.

Before he could mount any sort of coherent defense, Catherine got to her feet. “Good!” she said brightly. “I’m so glad you agree. Jennifer and I will start work on the guest list right away. And of course we’ll have to sew new ball gowns.”

Grey’s head snapped up. The thought of Jennifer in a ball gown made his body tighten. The attraction he felt for her ordinarily was bad enough. Gowned and coiffed like a princess, she would be gorgeous. He would probably go mad.

But Catherine did need a husband.

“Fine, Catherine. You do that.”

Catherine smiled at him like a queen granting favors to her subject. “There’s just one other thing.”

Grey lifted a dark brow. He knew Catherine well enough to know that she would casually try to pass off her most unpalatable suggestion as if it were of no significance whatsoever. What could be worse than the notion of holding a rout at Greyhaven, he had no idea. Nevertheless, he mentally braced himself as he waited. “Yes?”

“Jennifer needs to learn to dance, since we will of course have dancing. I cannot dance, due to my infirmity, so you—”

Grey jumped to his feet and scowled down on her from his imposing height. “No,” he said sharply. “Absolutely, positively, definitely not. I will not teach her to dance. It is utterly, totally, and completely out of the question.”

“Why not?” Catherine inquired in her most innocent and reasonable tone. Grey knew that tone all too well. She wielded it like a weapon whenever she was trying to make him feel like a loutish, unmannered boor.

“I hate dancing,” he snarled.

“Oh, really, Grey. Would you prefer that all of Virginia laugh at your wife because she has no idea how to dance the minuet?”

Yes, I would,
he thought, but he did not dare to say it aloud. Because then Catherine would see his weakness and strike. He could not admit that he was afraid of holding his own wife in his arms, afraid of what he felt every time he touched her. He had promised Jennifer he would not kiss her again. He had told himself over and over that he did not want her. But none of it was true. He did want her, and if he was forced to touch her he would surely kiss her. And then he would make love to her.…

“I will not waste my time teaching her to dance,” he said firmly, trying to suppress the images he had conjured up of holding Jennifer, clad in a low-cut ball gown, against his body. “I care nothing for what society thinks. If it matters so much to you, I suggest you hire a tutor.”

“A tutor?” Catherine echoed in dismay. “But Grey, tutors teach children the social graces, not adults.”

“I daresay they can teach adults as well as children,” Grey said. The corners of his mouth quirked upward in amusement as he watched Catherine try to mount another offense. Clearly she had not expected him to suggest a tutor, and she seemed to be floundering. “I believe the Madisons have an excellent dancing master,” he suggested politely, sitting back down in his easy chair. “Perhaps you could hire him to give Jennifer lessons.”

“But—”

Grey waved a careless hand. “If another tutor would suit you better, that is perfectly acceptable,” he said magnanimously. “I’ll leave the details to you. Hire whomever you please. Now, Catherine, I do have some work to do. If you would excuse me …”

Outmaneuvered, but not beaten, Catherine frowned as she left him in his study. She had managed to get Grey to agree to a rout, and for that she was profoundly grateful. She was not blind to the growing attraction between Grey and Jennifer, but her foolish brother was so stubborn that he needed some sort of added impetus. Her original goal in making Jennifer into a lady had been simply to show Grey that he had not succeeded in out-maneuvering her. But due to her growing friendship with Jennifer, her intentions had changed. Over the past year, she had grown nearly as fond of Jennifer as she was of her own brother, and she wanted to see them both happy. Her purpose was not to snare a husband at all. Rather her purpose was to bring Grey and Jennifer closer together. And this time, she decided with determination, it was going to work.

It was unfortunate that Grey had rebelled at the notion of teaching Jennifer to dance. She had hoped to force them into each other’s arms, literally as well as figuratively. But if Grey would not teach Jennifer to dance, he would surely dance with her at the rout. She smiled to herself.

We’ll just see,
she mused,
how he reacts when he sees Jennifer in the ball gown I have planned.
Grey didn’t have a chance.

Caught up as they were in preparations for the rout, Catherine and Jennifer spent a great deal of time together planning the menu and the festivities and sewing their ball gowns. They giggled together like little girls as they decorated the house inside and out with fruits, green garlands, and kissing balls studded with sprigs of mistletoe. Neither of them could remember such a happy Christmas.

Grey, on the other hand, was miserable. Grey detested the twelve days of Christmas. He detested the gaiety and the social whirl, the smiling faces and the giving of gifts. He detested the good cheer that seemed to emanate from everyone like a particularly loathsome disease. Most especially, he detested this particular Christmas, when he was being forced not simply to attend a rout but actually host one. Consequently he was in an exceptionally vile mood when his wife actually dared to tap softly on the partially open door of his study.

Berating himself for not shutting and locking the damned door, Grey glowered at her in annoyance. “What do you want?” he drawled in a tone that implied whatever she had to say could not possibly be of interest to him.

Jennifer faltered a bit at his angry gray eyes, which seemed darker than usual, but she persevered. “It—it’s Christmas day,” she began.

Grey greeted this absurdly obvious statement with incredulity. “Indeed it is,” he agreed at last, in a gentle tone that one might use to an imbecile. “I do thank you for informing me of that fact. Why, in spite of the garlands and holly you and Catherine have strung all over the house, I do believe I was on the verge of forgetting. Christmas, you say? How singular!”

“I am well aware you know that it is Christmas, Grey.”

“Then why remind me of that regrettably unalterable fact?”

Jennifer paused under the onslaught of his gray eyes, wishing she had not intruded on her husband today. Clearly Christmas affected him badly, for he was obviously in an even more dreadful mood than usual. And yet this matter could not wait. Screwing up her courage, she finally managed to explain hesitantly, “I—have a present for you.”

Grey’s eyebrows shot up as he gaped at her, dumbstruck. All the anger and impatience drained from him as he stared at her. Of all the things he had expected her to say, that had not been one. A present? The child had gotten him a present after his churlish behavior over the past few weeks?

It was impossible. And yet there was no doubting the sincerity on her lovely face. Jennifer had, for some obscure reason known only to herself, gotten him a present.

“A present?” he repeated, as though the idea were completely foreign to him. It had been so long since anyone had given him anything. Or, for that matter, since he had admitted to himself that he wanted anything.

Her thoughtfulness touched him deeply. For an instant, it seemed as though she cared something for his happiness, and he was profoundly grateful. Unfortunately, her next words shattered his gratitude like glass.

“Of course,” Jennifer said, and, lest he realize just how much he meant to her, added hastily, with an attempt at airiness, “It is the expected thing. It
is
Christmas, and you
are
my husband.”

Grey’s mouth snapped shut quickly. For a moment he had believed that she was making a peace offering, or better yet, a gesture of friendship despite their differences. And he had been astonished by the warm pleasure that had suddenly washed over him a minute ago, only to be abruptly cut off by her final cool words.

So the chit had gotten him a present because it was the “expected thing,” had she? Of course, she had never been to Williamsburg, or anywhere else for that matter, so what
could she possibly have gotten him that would be worth having? She could have bought nothing that he would want on the limited allowance he’d given her, anyway. A moment ago he would have accepted the gift with all the tact he could muster, but now, angered anew by her chilly words, he decided not to humor her. His old bitterness and hatred of Christmastime and its related festivities were back, more strongly than ever.

“A generous thought, I’m sure,” he said in a tone that was distinctly bored, “but I’m afraid you have wasted your effort. I have everything I could possibly desire, except for that which is beyond my grasp. There is nothing you can give me that I would want. So, you see, your gift would be entirely superfluous.”

Jennifer blinked hard, feeling tears stinging her eyelids, but she was unwilling to let him see them. Only Grey could reduce her to tears. And he did it so often! But she had worked so hard on his gift that she could not simply give up and walk out of the study. She blinked back the tears.

Struggling to hold her voice steady, she said levelly, “Perhaps you do have everything you need, Grey. But there are certain things that are not necessary but that are pleasant to possess.”

Her husband gave her an insolent grin that did not touch his cold eyes. “Perhaps. But obtaining
pleasure
has rarely been difficult for me.”

The intentionally cruel reference to his mistress hit her almost like a physical blow.
Why is he acting this way?
she wondered in mounting anguish. Perhaps she had only imagined the flash of hope and delight she thought she’d seen on his features when she had first mentioned a gift. “At any rate,” Grey went on coldly, “anything that you could afford would be of no interest to me.”

“You cannot be certain of that until you have seen my gift,” Jennifer countered, struggling valiantly to maintain a bantering tone so as to conceal her hurt. She could not bear to let him see how much his callous indifference wounded her.

Grey raised his eyes to the ceiling in silent supplication, then evidently tired of the game and scowled at his wife. “Very well. What is it?”

Relieved that curiosity had gotten the better of him, Jennifer almost smiled. “You will have to come into the parlor,” she told him airily.

Grey frowned even more at being forced to leave the refuge of his study, but he reluctantly rose and followed her into the parlor. Glancing about with a fine show of disinterest, he said coldly, “I don’t see it. Where is it?”

“Such impatience,” Jennifer teased gently, trying desperately to conceal her terror that he would turn on his heel and stalk back to the solitude of his study. “Why don’t you sit down?”

Grey went to the settee, stretched out on his back with his legs dangling over the edge, and threw his arms over his face. “I’m ready,” he said in a muffled voice. “Hurry, or I’ll be tempted to take a nap.”

Hardly encouraging words, but Jennifer realized that her infuriatingly contrary husband was as enthusiastic now as he would ever be. Her footsteps were muffled by the heavy Oriental carpet as she crossed the room.

Grey lay sprawled on the settee, wondering impatiently when he could get back to his study and have a drink. And then he heard his gift.

It was like nothing he had ever heard. A melody, simple yet strangely plaintive, rang out from the harpischord. In a moment the melody was joined by another, and then another, all interweaving like threads in a vivid tapestry to create a startlingly lovely whole.

Grey sat up slowly and stared in stunned surprise at his wife. Her back was to him, presenting him with a view of little except the long, dark gold hair falling free to her waist. But in her posture he saw passion, animation, violent emotions as her hands flashed lightly across the boxwood keys. And he realized for the first time that Jennifer did express her emotions, but always privately.