Kate stared at him intently, watching his dark eyes in the flickering candlelight, and catching her breath at the flash of pain she saw in the brief second before he looked away. And she knew—with every fiber of her being—that he wasn’t speaking of intangibles. He was talking about his own fears, something very specific that haunted him every minute of every day.
Something she knew she did not have the right to ask him about. But she wished—oh, how she wished—that when he was ready to face his fears, she could be the one to help him.
But that wasn’t to be. He would marry someone else, maybe even Edwina, and only his wife would have the right to talk to him about such personal matters.
“I think I might be ready to go upstairs,” she said. Suddenly it was too hard to be in his presence, too painful to know that he would belong to someone else.
His lips quirked into a boyish smile. “Are you saying I might finally crawl out from under this table?”
“Oh, goodness!” She clapped one of her hands to her cheek in a sheepish expression. “I’m so sorry. I stopped noticing where we were sitting ages ago, I’m afraid. What a ninny you must think me.”
He shook his head, still smiling. “Never a ninny, Kate. Even when I thought you the most insufferable female creature on the planet, I had no doubts about your intelligence.”
Kate, who had been in the process of scooting out from under the table, paused. “I just don’t know if I should feel complimented or insulted by that statement.”
“Probably both,” he admitted, “but for friendship’s sake, let’s decide upon complimented.”
She turned to look at him, aware that she presented an awkward picture on her hands and knees, but the moment seemed too important to delay. “Then we are friends?” she whispered.
He nodded as he stood. “Hard to believe, but I think we are.”
Kate smiled as she took his helping hand and rose to her feet. “I’m glad. You’re—you’re really not the devil I’d originally thought you.”
One of his brows lifted, and his face suddenly took on a very wicked expression.
“Well, maybe you are,” she amended, thinking he probably was every bit the rake and rogue that society had painted him. “But maybe you’re also a rather nice person as well.”
“Nice seems so bland,” he mused.
“Nice,” she said emphatically, “is nice. And given what I used to think of you, you ought to be delighted by the compliment.”
He laughed. “One thing about you, Kate Sheffield, is that you are never boring.”
“Boring is so bland,” she quipped.
He smiled—a true grin, not that ironic curve he used at society functions, but the real thing. Kate’s throat suddenly felt very tight.
“I’m afraid I cannot walk you back to your room,” he said. “If someone should come across us at this hour…”
Kate nodded. They’d forged an unlikely friendship, but she didn’t want to get trapped into marriage with him, right? And it went without saying that he didn’t want to marry her.
He motioned to her. “And especially with you dressed like that….”
Kate looked down and gasped, yanking her robe more tightly around her. She’d completely forgotten that she wasn’t properly dressed. Her nightclothes certainly weren’t risqué or revealing, especially with her thick robe, but they were nightclothes.
“Will you be all right?” he asked softly. “It’s still raining.”
Kate stopped and listened to the rain, which had softened to a gentle patter against the windows. “I think the storm is over.”
He nodded and peered out into the hall. “It’s empty,” he said.
“I should go.”
He stepped aside to let her pass.
She moved forward, but when she reached the doorway she stopped and turned around. “Lord Bridgerton?”
“Anthony,” he said. “You should call me Anthony. I believe I’ve already called you Kate.”
“You did?”
“When I found you.” He waved a hand. “I don’t think you heard anything I said.”
“You’re probably right.” She smiled hesitantly. “Anthony.” His name sounded strange on her tongue.
He leaned forward slightly, an odd, almost devilish light in his eyes. “Kate,” he said in return.
“I just wanted to say thank you,” she said. “For helping me tonight. I—” She cleared her throat. “It would have been a great deal more difficult without you.”
“I didn’t do anything,” he said gruffly.
“No, you did everything.” And then, before she’d be tempted to stay, she hurried down the hall and up the stairs.
Chapter 13
There is little to report in London with so many people away in Kent at the Bridgerton house party. This Author can only imagine all the gossip that will soon reach town. There will be a scandal, yes? There is always a scandal at a house party.
LADY WHISTLEDOWN’S SOCIETY PAPERS, 4 MAY 1814
The following morning was the sort that usually follows a violent storm—bright and clear, but with a fine, damp mist that settled cold and refreshing on the skin.
Anthony was oblivious to the weather, having spent most of the night staring into the darkness and seeing nothing but Kate’s face. He’d finally fallen asleep as the first streaks of dawn fingered across the sky. By the time he woke, it was well past noon, but he did not feel rested. His body was suffused with a strange combination of exhaustion and nervous energy. His eyes felt heavy and dull in their sockets, and yet his fingers kept drumming the bed, inching toward the edge as if they alone could pull him out and to his feet.
Finally, when his stomach growled so loudly that he could swear he saw the plaster on the ceiling shake, he staggered upright and pulled on his robe. With a wide, loud yawn, he moved to the window, not because he was looking for anyone or anything in particular, but simply because the view was better than anything else in his room.
And yet in the quarter second before he looked down and gazed upon the grounds, he somehow knew what he would see.
Kate. Walking slowly across the lawn, far more slowly than he’d ever seen her walk before. Usually, she walked as if in a race.
She was much too far away for him to see her face—just a sliver of her profile, the curve of her cheek. And yet he could not take his eyes off of her. There was so much magic in her form—a strange grace in the way her arm swung as she walked, an artistry in the posture of her shoulders.
She was walking toward the garden, he realized.
And he knew he had to join her.
The weather remained in its contradictory state for most of the day, dividing the house party neatly in half, between those who insisted the bright sunshine beckoned outdoor play, and those who eschewed the wet grass and damp air for the warmer, drier clime of the drawing room.
Kate was firmly in the former group, although she was not in the mood for company. Her mind was in far too reflective a mood to make polite conversation with people she barely knew, and so she stole away once again to Lady Bridgerton’s spectacular gardens and found herself a quiet spot on a bench near the rose arbor. The stone was cold and just a little bit damp beneath her bottom, but she hadn’t slept particularly well the night before, and she was tired, and it was better than standing.
And it was, she realized with a sigh, just about the only place where she might be left to her own company. If she remained in the house, she’d surely be roped into joining the group of ladies chatting in the drawing room while they wrote correspondence to friends and family, or worse, she’d be stuck with the coterie who’d retired to the orangery to pursue their embroidery.
As for the outdoor enthusiasts, they’d also broken into two groups. One had hied off to the village to shop and see whatever sights there were to be found, and the other was taking a constitutional walk to the lake. As Kate had no interest in shopping (and she was already quite familiar with the lake) she’d eschewed their company as w
ell.
Hence, her solitude in the garden.
She sat for several minutes, just staring off into space, her eyes focusing somewhat blindly on the tightly furled bud of a nearby rose. It was nice to be alone, where she didn’t have to cover her mouth or stifle the loud sleepy noises she made when she yawned. Nice to be alone, where no one was going to comment on the dark circles beneath her eyes or her uncommon quietude and lack of conversation.
Nice to be alone, where she could sit and attempt to sort through her muddle of thoughts about the viscount. It was a daunting task, and one she’d rather put off, but it had to be done.
But there really wasn’t all that much to sort out. Because everything she had learned in the past few days pointed her conscience in one, singular direction. And she knew that she could no longer oppose Bridgerton’s courtship of Edwina.
In the past few days he’d proven himself sensitive, caring, and principled. Even, she thought with a glimmer of a smile as she recalled the light in Penelope Featherington’s eyes when he’d saved her from the verbal talons of Cressida Cowper, heroic.
He was devoted to family.