With an oil lamp in hand, Piper eschewed the servants’ stairs in favor of a concealed staircase hidden behind a faux panel at the far end of the service hall near the courtyard entrance. The stairs had been built by the fourth marquis to hide his affair with his housekeeper and climbed a single story to his bedchamber on the first floor. Piper had used them when she was in hiding here, making it her habit to avoid any use of the main staircases to best maintain the secrecy of her presence.
Her bedchamber was a short distance down the hall from the lord’s chamber, far from Connor’s in the bachelor’s quarters in the opposite wing. As with her mother, he would never know they slept under the same roof. Slipping into the room, she closed and locked the door behind her.
The room was clean and aired, much to her surprise. She hadn’t slept here in a year. There was no reason it shouldn’t be shrouded in dust cloth. Had Mrs. Davies kept it at the ready for her? Piper wouldn’t have thought the housekeeper so sentimental.
Decorated in shades of green and cream, the bedchamber was soft and homey. Bed hangings of sage and cream toile with scenes of lords and ladies from centuries past dancing hung from the four tall walnut posts of the bed. A canopy of the same arched above it with showers of green fringe dripping from the edges. Solid green silk coverings draped the bed and cream, watered taffeta covered the walls.
With her mother off in London most of the time, Mrs. Davies had helped Piper decorate the room with her favorite color. Once the green had represented the outdoors, her favorite place and playground. Now it summoned images of Connor.
As most things did of late.
With a soft smile, Piper ran her fingers down the fringed edge of the matching toile curtains, letting the silken strands sift through her fingers. Fringe or lace dripped from the edges of almost everything in the room. A walnut vanity sat along one wall. Brushes and combs on top. The towering wardrobe next to it would be bursting with clothes, if she were to inspect the contents. She’d taken nothing from the room with her when she’d moved to her cottage except a few simple pieces of clothing. The illusion had needed to be maintained, in case anyone examined the room, that she had never returned to Dinton Grange.
Several oil landscapes in soft pastels hung on the walls. Piper didn’t heed them now but instead peered at the handful of photographs in heavy pewter frames atop of the chest of drawers at the foot of the bed. Leaving them behind had been difficult. There was one of her father, another of them together when she was a little girl. The rest were of her and Harry, a painful reminder of the closeness they’d once shared.
Turning her back on them, she climbed on top of the bed and hugged a downy pillow to her heart. When she lay nestled in the cozy bed, she stared up at the canopy with a frown.
She’d hardly left the nursery behind before her father died. When Celeste had remarried before another year passed, they’d continued to spend the summers here. Sedmouth would join them at her mother’s insistence that the Grange was bigger than his estate. That had gone on for a few years until Harry had had enough of Celeste’s machinations and banned her from the property. After that, it was either the townhouse in Victoria Square for her or rare visits to her stepfather’s estate in Basingstoke.
This room had never gotten much use. It had been decorated for a young girl with a head full of dreams and a heart full of hope. There was an innocence and frivolity in the delicate lace and shining satins that she didn’t possess any longer. Lovely as it was, it was a child’s room and she was no longer a child.
She continued to act like one from time to time, she acknowledged. Didn’t everyone from time to time? Her temper had a short fuse. Occasionally, she fell into a juvenile pout when she didn’t get her way.
Her head was still full of dreams even if there was meager hope left in her heart.
Was it immature of her to continue to hold a grudge against her brother? Was she wrong to cling to her distrust, doling out faith in small doses like a petulant toddler being forced to share her sweets? She didn’t think so.
She didn’tliketo think so.
She’d vehemently adhered to her belief that he’d betrayed her over the years. Maintained it for reasons that no longer signified in the greater scheme of things. Now in the space of weeks, that resolve was crumbling.
Because of Connor. Because of tonight, really.
While her feelings for him were far from sisterly, he recalled to mind many of her favorite parts of Harry. Their animated conversation—granted, far more mature than any she’d shared with her brother—had brought to mind a multitude of similar moments with Harry. The teasing, poking fun at one another, the test of her mental acuity to keep him on his toes.
That aura of camaraderie had suffused her with each hour’s passing. As much as it stirred remorse for the past, it also renewed a fraction of the anticipation she’d once known for the future. She didn’t want to give that up.
She didn’t want to give Connor up.
How could she spend so long aspiring for nothing greater than a safe and pleasant tomorrow and suddenly be overcome by the lofty ambition to have everything she longed for?
If fate were to fail her anew, at the very least she wanted a taste of what life might have been like if hers had gone differently.
Chapter 12
I tried to tell Mother what Rutledge has said to me. What he’s tried to do. She will hear nothing against him and has redoubled her campaign to force this marriage.
~from the correspondence of Piper Brudenall, January 1893
“I need to have a word wi’ the lady, nae more. I simply need ye to tell me how to contact her.” Connor kept his voice low and soft, hoping to finally coax an answer from someone with kindness. “Dinnae act as if ye dinnae ken how to do that. I ken ye’re all part of the ruse.”
Bram’s face flooded with enough color to make his many freckles disappear. Feet shuffling, ears afire. With his wordless gaping, he’d proven himself the worst liar in history. Shame Connor hadn’t pressed the groom harder in his initial questioning. He might have saved himself months of fruitless searching.
And another hour given to the effort this very day.
Bloody hell, he didn’t want to accost the lass! He would have liked to think after months here, they’d all ascertained that much of his character.
“R-ruse, m’lord?” the lad stammered. “I’m not certain what you mean.”
