Unraveled (41 page)

Jeremy shook his head.

“He’s right.” There was a bitterness to her voice. “Only one of us will survive this night. And if I try to make it me…”

Jeremy choked. “There has to be a better answer.”

“There cannot be. There is no escape for me. If this is the way I get what I’ve built to survive in some manner… I haven’t long to live, in any event. Promise me that you won’t make a fuss. Whatever he has to do—promise you won’t interfere. Don’t help me if I fall. Don’t—”

He felt a curious kinship with the woman. She didn’t deal justice—not truly. But like him, she’d tinkered with the machineries of death. She saw the people she helped as human and real. Maybe, without the benefit of the law behind her, she had gone just a little mad.

“Mrs. Blasseur,” Smite said. “I had not thought to drive you to the station like cattle.”

She stopped and frowned at him. “No? Well, I suppose it might turn ugly if I couldn’t make it.”

Smite didn’t push aside that moment of sympathy now. He embraced it, let himself feel the sorrow that Jeremy did. And then—because it had to be done, because there truly was no other choice…he let that moment of wistful regret dissipate and he met Mrs. Blasseur’s eyes. “Under the circumstances,” he said, “I had rather thought I would carry you.”

“Carry me?”

“It turns out,” he said, “that my duty dictates only
what
I must do. There is no mercy in the what. But there is room for it in the how.”

T
HEY MADE A SOLEMN,
silent procession as they made their way to the city center in a column. The men Mrs. Blasseur had brought with her had vanished into the night. Ghost trailed the remaining folk almost somberly. Mrs. Blasseur weighed almost nothing in Smite’s arms. She didn’t tremble. She didn’t fight. She scarcely even breathed.

Halfway through the walk, the snow turned back to slush, and from there to a hard, cold rain that drummed against him relentlessly. The streets were deserted.

But when they arrived at the station, it was lit brightly. Smite pushed open the door to see a throng of blue-uniformed police officers standing near the front. A corporal was giving out orders; to his side stood Ash, watching the proceedings with a grim determination.

“We have reason to believe,” the corporal was saying, “there is a large group of armed men there. Do not hesitate to use force if it should prove warranted. Assume that nobody means you well—not women, not even children.”

Smite gently let Mrs. Blasseur down on her feet. Ash hadn’t seen them enter yet; he was watching the corporal with a hard, fierce look in his eyes.

“This is an insult to the city of Bristol that must be answered with force,” the corporal said.

“On the contrary,” Smite called out. “Force will not be necessary.”

As he spoke, Ash turned to him. A spectrum of emotions played across his brother’s face—fear changed to surprise, followed by a heart-stopping emotion that Smite could put no words to.

It took a few minutes to calm the crowd and to allay their worries. It took another few moments for Mrs. Blasseur to vanish into the holding cells. Ash slowly drifted across the room to him.

“Smite.” Ash reached out and clasped his hand. His brother’s fingers were warm against Smite’s chilled flesh.

“Yes?”

“I had this notion for years that I would need to be the Duke of Parford to make things right for you. I thought—” he choked, then stopped. “Damn you, Smite. I must have aged ten years tonight.”

He grabbed Smite’s shoulder with his free arm and then pulled him into a fierce hug. Smite only stiffened for a second before he hugged him back.

“You know, Ash,” he said, before he could lose his nerve, “I love you.”

Ash pulled back and looked at him quizzically.

“And you will need to be the duke for me,” he said. “I made some rather egregious promises tonight. We’re going to need more constables—and you’re just the man to fund their salaries. Not to mention that we’ll need more magistrates; I’m weary of being the only one here who listens.” Smite gave his brother a tired smile. “Parliament will have to handle that. I’m hoping you’ll help me out.”

Someone else might have blinked an eye at that. But Ash simply shrugged his shoulders. “There,” he said. “You see? I was just saying that I needed to consider more charity.”

I
T WAS ALMOST DAWN
by the time Smite brought Miranda home—
home
to the house he’d bought for her. The rooms seemed too quiet to her; the servants, not expecting her to return, were in bed for the evening.

He brought her up to her bedchamber, helped her strip off clothing made sodden and cold. They rubbed each other dry with towels, then slipped into wrappers that should have been warm.

They weren’t.

A fire in the bedchamber upstairs didn’t help. Huddling under the covers brought no warmth. The rain beat against the roof, hard at first, and then more softly. It was only when he drew her to him that Miranda stopped shaking. He pressed his body full-length against hers, and Miranda began to warm.

But even though he stroked her skin, he did not attempt anything so tame as a kiss. It was just warmth they shared: nothing more. He’d not tried anything
more
since…since that night in the inn. It seemed so long in the past. It was the only time he’d actually spent the night with her.

Through her window, the gray sky tinted first pink, then orange. The rain stopped and the clouds drifted apart, letting through ragged strains of early morning sunlight.

Smite sat up beside her. His gaze focused on some far vista. Just beyond the flotilla of masts on the Floating Harbour she saw a rainbow. It glimmered ephemerally, and then disappeared.

“You know,” Smite said softly beside her, “even in the Bible, there was just that one flood.”

“One seems more than enough.”

He stood. “Mine comes back. It’s a recurrent promise, one that I’ve held to all these years. It wasn’t the flood that drove away every living thing. It was me, afterward.”

She sat very still, but her heart thundered inside her. He turned to her. He seemed so solemn. “I don’t know how to do anything by halves, Miranda.”

He was going to send her away after all. She could scarcely breathe.

“So,” he concluded, “you’re going to have to marry me.”

She choked. “What?”

“Marry me,” he repeated.

She stared at him. He sounded perfectly rational. His hair was disordered, true, and he needed to shave. But there was no outward indication that he’d gone mad.

“You can’t marry me,” she said finally. “I’m your mistress. Nobody in polite society will ever see you again.”

He blinked at her for a few moments, and then drew a deep breath. “That possibility had never occurred to me,” he said stiffly. “In that case, I retract my offer. My overcrowded social calendar must be protected at all costs.”

She stifled a grin.

“Give over, Miranda,” he said. “That’s not a serious objection.”

“You still can’t marry me,” she told him. “There’s no need. We can continue on—”

He set his hand over her lips, stopping her words. “I sent you away once.” His fingers trailed down her cheek. “There are some things that cannot be made right by simple apology. It’s not simply marriage I intend. It’s a promise. I will never be without you again.”

Her heart thudded wildly in her chest.

“I was hoping I could avoid the bit in the proposal where I lay out all the advantages of the match to you. There aren’t nearly enough of them. The truth is simply this: you can find a better man than I. God knows you wouldn’t have to look very hard. But I don’t believe you can find one who loves you more.”

She sucked in her breath.

“Love will never magically make me whole. It won’t heal old wounds. But when I’m around you, I do not feel as if I must be alone. I smile when you’re in the room and I laugh when you’re happy. I feel as if I’ve come home to you.” He slid his fingers up her arm, around her back. “There isn’t one part of me that you’ve flinched from. I don’t know why you’d marry me, but I know why I’m desperate for you. Nobody else on earth would bring me to myself as you have.”

“Oh, don’t you know why I love you?”

He turned to her. His hands closed roughly about her wrists. “Say it again.”

“You anchor me without holding me down. You frighten me without threatening my future. You’re unflinchingly devoted. I love you.”

It had been
days
since he’d so much as kissed her. He made up for that now, with a hard, demanding possession. But his kiss was belied by the soft touch of his hands on her, stroking her arms, then her ribs. His fingers trailed up her sides as he kissed her, sliding up until he cupped her face.

“How will we live? What will we tell people?” she asked.

“I don’t know. As long as it’s with you…” He kissed her again. “If it matters, I can—”

“We,” she corrected. “When it matters,
we
will find a way.” She gave him a long, slow smile.

He echoed it back at her.

“And we’ll start right here. With this.” She leaned in and slowly, tenderly, kissed his shoulder, and then down his neck.

After a moment, his arms came around her. “Yes,” he murmured, pulling her close and slowly peeling back her wrapper. “This is an excellent place to start.”

Epilogue

A
LMOST EVERYONE IN
M
IRANDA’S
new family had gathered at Parford Manor on the day before Christmas—two weeks after their marriage. The thought of these people as
family
was still foreign to her. Like the ring Smite had put on her finger, she was still too aware of them—not uncomfortable, nor unwelcome, but still all too conscious of their newness.

Lady Turner’s sisters had arrived in the early morning. They sat before the fireplace with Margaret, and played with Lady Rosa, the duke’s daughter. Rosa had just learned to pull herself up on the furniture. She stood on chubby, wobbly legs and grinned at the adulation this garnered.

The room was hung with holly, and the scent of pine boughs was heavy in the air, mixing with the hint of smoke from the crackling fire. Snow was thick on the ground outside, but the sun was out, and light glinted off the surface, brightening everything.

On the long divan, Smite, Ash, and Richard Dalrymple were arguing companionably about some item in the newspaper. Every so often, Smite would glance up and meet her eyes.

The low, private smile he gave her curled her toes. He’d been hers for every night of their honeymoon.

They’d settled into her house in Bristol, with Mrs. Tiggard staying on as housekeeper. They’d hired a manservant—but only the one, and he didn’t live in. They’d started a quiet, private life. When the New Year came, Robbie would join them. Smite would return to his duties. And Miranda would announce that she was home to visitors. Everything would change, and they’d have to make everything work once more. But for this short space of time, he was all hers.

Through the window, she caught a flash of brown.

Smite stood, dropping the paper, and cutting off the friendly back-and-forth with two words. “Mark’s here,” he announced.

Before anyone could say anything else, he darted away, opening the front door in a flurry of bells. Miranda followed with the rest of the family—everyone came except Margaret, who stayed back, bundling Rosa into warmer things.