“I took pains,” he explained, “to make sure no one would guess.”
“Oh, Lord Cheverley, my dear boy,why?”
The crease between her eyes said she didn’t understand—could never understand. And, in truth, he hadn’t any answer that could satisfy.
“When did you return?” she asked. “How long have you been home?”
In a way, but a few, short minutes. Also something beyond his ability to explain.
But even though he couldn’t find words, he couldn’t lie to her—not to the woman who had practically raised him.
“After the wreck, I was imprisoned for six years,” he said. “Several months ago I escaped.” Or, rather, a woman—not the pirate—whose form had been sheathed in darkness had loosened his binds enough for him to finally break free.
“Months?” she said with a heartbreaking sob.
“But please, Mrs. Renton. There is more than you can possibly understand.” He pushed wet hair over his shoulders. “Promise me that you will not tell anyone. Not yet.”
“As you wish, of course.” She sniffed. “But her ladyship deserves to know.”
“Yes,” Penelope spoke from the doorway. “Yes, she does.”
The full weight of Pen’s dark eyes, so large, so full of conflicting emotion, landed like a punch to his gut. This was what he had hoped for and feared—the storm in her gaze, windy, and rainswept, and unnavigable.
But better a storm than no feeling at all.
“Would you leave us, Mrs. Renton?” Cheverley asked.
~~~
Pen didn’t hear Mrs. Renton’s reply.
She leaned against the doorway for support, clutching her basket against her chest.
She’d known the captain was her husband. She’d even accepted Cheverley had his reasons for coming home in disguise. But she hadneverimagined he’d been back on England’s shores for months.
Months.
And nothing prepared her for the raw reality of gazing on Cheverley’s agonized features free of his filter of lies.
Blood rushed in her ears. Anger met grief, met pain, creating a storm she did not know how to survive.
Then, they were alone.
“Pen—”
“Don’t speak.” She pushed back the swelling internal chaos. “I promised you a bath in exchange for speaking with His Grace. And now, I intend to give you the shave you requested.”
His wary eyes dropped to the towel, soap, brush, and razor in her basket and then returned to her.
“Don’t speak,” she repeated, preemptive warning replaced her command.
She wouldn’t believe anything Cheverley said in this moment.
Months.
What the devil had he been doing?
Her current anger placed at risk all the future moments she’d embraced last night in giddy glee. How had she—even for a moment—been able to overlook the unanswered questions, the inevitable accusations and recriminations?
