“We need to be caught together. If it appears like your compromised me, then there will be no choice but for us to marry.” Lydia leaned back far enough to look up at Keith. “There’s an assembly tomorrow night. People must find us together. And it can’t be something simply explained away as though we happened to be in the same place or that we were merely talking.”
“If you mean I need to ravage you, then I’ll happily oblige.” Keith grinned for the first time in what felt like a lifetime. He waggled his brow and winked.
“Perhaps you could save ravaging me to the privacy of our chamber, but—” Lydia’s face flushed as she snapped her mouth shut. “That was presumptuous of me. I’m sorry.”
“What was? That we would share a chamber? Lydia, from the day we wed until the day one of us dies, I will have no chamber but the one I share with you. I do not want you sleeping apart from me. I will not visit you as though we’re practically strangers. You will not be a guest in a chamber within your own home.”
“I suppose the lord’s bed is large enough for two.”
“It is, but I intend to find the smallest one I can. Then you shall have no choice but to lie next to me. There won’t be room for you to get away.” Keith’s hands slipped down to her backside as she went up on her toes. Their kisses grew wild as their hands roamed. Keith unfastened the first three buttons on Lydia’s tunic and pushed it over her shoulders. But a log shifted and caught their attention. It was clear it moved because most of it had burned away. However, it was a reminder they’d encountered Kelsey’s spirit not even a quarter of an hour ago. It dampened their ardor as they looked around, searching for anyone who might spy them.
“You should return before anyone realizes you’re gone.”
Lydia nodded but couldn’t meet his eye. When he squeezed her waist, prompting her, she admitted, “I think Oliver followed me to the crypt. He couldn’t find where I went, so he gave up.”
“He’s likely waiting for you then, expecting you to return home before daylight.”
“You could truly compromise me, and I could stay here. Let the servants find us together inourbed.”
“Your father would put a bullet between my eyes before we made it to the altar.” Keith didn’t exaggerate, and Lydia knew it. “Tomorrow night will be soon enough. I’ll walk you back. We take the tunnel to the trees and sneak you back from there.”
Lydia agreed, and soon she led the way with a torch raised to illuminate their path. Keith saw her to the kitchen’s door and waited. She’d agreed to wave from her window before he would leave. He breathed easier, seeing her smile from above. He was almost to his own door when Oliver appeared. Keith sighed, knowing nothing good would come of this conversation. He wanted it over with so he could retire. The events in the library exhausted him, and he wanted to sort through how he felt about the idea that Kelsey’s ghost inhabited the abbey. He wondered what other spirits might lurk there.
“What do you want?”
“Leave her alone, Cousin.” Oliver cocked a pistol and raised his arm.
“What will you do, Ollie?” Keith knew he despised the diminutive. He’d used it as a child to goad Oliver when he was fed up with his cousin and wished for him to get in enough trouble with his own father it would force him to leave Keith alone. “Will you shoot a duke on his own land? You aren’t high enough in line to inherit. Do you think anyone will believe I’ve just gone missing when my ship is in the bay and my horse is in the stables? Hell, even if you stole my horse, he’s too recognizable to pass for yours. Go back to bed.”
Keith stood in the shadows, so he had darkness on his side. He withdrew his gun from the small of his back and the knife he kept at his hip. When he had both weapons at the ready, he stepped into the moonlight, cocking, and raising the pistol. He raised his other hand, and the moon reflected off the blade.
“Only one of us has experience killing and disposing of bodies, Ollie. And we know it isn’t you, so go back to bed.” Keith took another step forward, his longer arm practically pushing the barrel into Oliver’s chest.
“You always had to have everything,” Oliver whined.
“A bastard father, a haunted old heap of bricks, being up to my ears in hock. Oh yes, do tell me how I have everything. She isn’t a toy we’re squabbling over. You are the one who will stay away.” Keith pulled the pistol back, giving Oliver space to turn around. The man glared at Keith for a protracted moment before he huffed and left. Keith watched him walk away. When his cousin was nearly out of sight, he followed. He wasn’t at ease leaving Lydia in the house with Oliver.
He crept into the kitchen behind Oliver, waiting until he was certain his cousin would have crossed the enormous expanse. He hurried inside and climbed the servants’ stairs while Oliver took the main ones. Keith watched him pause at Lydia’s door before going to his own. Keith slid to the floor and spent the night tucked into the corner, watching the corridor. He sneaked out when he heard the first servants mustering at dawn.
CHAPTER5
The next fortnight continued much as the last had. Oliver continued to demand Lydia’s time, insisting that they walk the gardens, that she play the piano for him, and that he haltingly read poetry to her. She didn’t care for overly flowery poetry, so enduring his poor yet excessively effusive reading frequently gave her headaches. More than once, she requested a tray for the evening meal at just the right moment, pleading ongoing exhaustion from their daily promenades. While no one believed she was anything but the picture of good health, no one refused her to avoid a scene. Her parents knew she was often on the cusp of saying something she couldn’t retract.
It was early mornings when she found solace from Oliver’s unrelenting attention. She slipped down to the beach with her guards, and Keith was often already there. Her men kept an appropriate distance, but she knew they approved of Keith far more than Oliver. They never interrupted the couple when they stole a few moments behind a bend in the cliffs.
They both were far earlier risers than Oliver, so they spent two or three hours together. Her parents knew where she went, and she was certain her guards reported to her father. But she suspected they were selective in what they shared and that they didn’t mention Keith was there every day. She couldn’t see how her father would permit it otherwise.
“Lyddie, did you enjoy your latest book?”
“I did. It seems to have magically appeared sinceEmmawas only recently published, and the spine on the copy I found hadn’t been broken. However did it wind up in your library?”
“Fairies.”
Lydia stared at Keith for a moment before she laughed hard enough to snort. She covered her mouth, but mirth danced in her eyes. Eventually, she stopped trying to conceal her smile.
“A fairy? One who’s about yay tall.” She stretched onto her toes and lifted her arm above her head. “I didn’t know water nymphs came so big.”
Keith captured her around the waist and hauled her against him as he walked backwards until they were out of the guards’ sight. His lips pressed to hers, but it was her tongue that flicked against his lips. She’d been a quick study and caught onto kissing with little tutelage. She was always as amorous as Keith, both starved for the brief moments of lust and affection they could share. With anyone possibly seeing them, they knew they risked much just by kissing. By tacit agreement, they kept their hands on the outside of one another’s clothes, resting on each other’s waists.
