Alice waited, wishing she could disappear into the corner of the carriage, feeling small and insignificant. It was an unpleasant sensation, and one she had not experienced since she was a child. It seemed horribly familiar, though.
“You shouldn’t have made me promise,” she said, feeling wretched. “I could still go, Aubrey. I don’t want you to be cut off from your family, your father. I don’t want them to hate you and turn their back on you because of me.”
Aubrey frowned, looking bewildered. “Cut me off? Whatever do you mean?”
She sat up again, impatient now. “You said your father would cut you off, and Hawkney is furious with you!”
His expression clearing, Aubrey laughed, shaking his head. “Oh that! That was just for show, so people were more interested in the scandal than the fact that you are wearing a small fortune in stolen jewels. Hawkney didn’t know precisely what was happening, but he knew we needed to get out. He improvised, which was dashed decent of him, and I followed along.”
Alice blinked, staring at him in consternation. “But you said yourself, you have a good deal to say to each other.”
Aubrey’s expression softened, and he smiled at her, an expression of such fondness that her stupid heart gave an uneven beat, and she wished more than anything that he would embrace her again.
“Well, of course we do, he’s livid, and rightly so. The scandal is going to be rather dreadful, and Hawk cannot abide a scandal. His father was an appalling man and forever the subject of vile stories, all of them true, sadly. Hawk feels responsible for polishing the name up and this sort of thing reflects badly on the whole family. He’s protective of all of us, but he has Della and Vinnie to think of, remember.”
“Will he cast you out?” Alice asked, feeling horribly guilty. She refused to be the cause of a family rift.
“Cast me out?” Aubrey gave a bark of laughter. “Lord, do you and Lill read a lot of ghastly melodramas? Cast me out, indeed! No, he won’t, you foolish creature. He’ll give me a frightful lecture about the importance of the family name and a worse one about marrying outside of my class and all the dreadful implications, and he’ll likely punish me with withering comments for a few weeks, but that’s all.”
Alice stared at him, refusing to believe it, but too startled by the words ‘marrying outside of my class’ to articulate a word.
“Come, love.” His voice was gentle as he held out his hand to her. “It’s been a long day and a longer night, and I’m shattered. You must be worn to a thread.”
“Tired, yes,” she said with a huff of laughter. “Jittery though. I won’t sleep.” He squeezed her fingers, regarding her with concern.
“Is there anything you’d like? What would help?”
Alice though about Lill at home and wished they were there, her and Aubrey and Lill, sitting by the fire. But it was late and Hawkney wanted to speak to her in the morning.
“Cake.”
Aubrey smiled. “Cake it is then.”
So Aubrey showed her to her room where she was attended by a kindly housemaid, who found her a nightgown that belonged to Della and helped her to bed, where she was given a cup of hot chocolate and a large slice of cake. The diamonds rested carefully on the bedside table, where she could see them, and her gaze kept drifting there as she sipped her chocolate. When the cup was empty and the cake consumed, the housemaid bade her goodnight and crept quietly out.
Thus fortified, Alice fell into a dreamless sleep, waking a few hours later with a start of anxiety as she wondered where the devil she was. Reaching out a hand, she felt the cold, sharp edges of the diamonds and gave a sigh of relief. She may have plunged Aubrey into a family crisis, despite his assurances that all would be well, but she could now return the diamonds to their rightful owner, and she had thwarted Silas Mourney’s plans to get her hanged. All in all, it hadn’t been such a terrible day, and with that she had to be satisfied.
Sleep eluded her now, though. The desire to reach for the footman’s outfit the maid had silently hung up in the wardrobe nagged at her, the urge to slip out of the house and disappear into the night tantalising. Not that she would disappear. She had given Aubrey her word, and she did not do so lightly. A promise was a promise. But the longing to go home, to tell Lill everything and cry on her shoulder was hard to resist. But Alice was no coward. The Duke of Hawkney wanted to discuss things with her and no doubt rail at her for leading his cousin astray. She couldhardly deny him that much. That did not mean, however, that she was looking forward to it.
Chapter 13
Colder than Diamonds.
Hawkney House, Mayfair, London, 20thJanuary 1816
Aubrey woke early the next morning. Despite his reassuring words to Alice, he knew Hawkney was damned furious, and with good reason. It had taken decades for the name The Duke of Hawkney to conjure anything other than thoughts of wickedness and vice. Hawk might be a stickler and a bit of a dull dog, but Aubrey understood his motivation. He knew, too, precisely what it had cost his cousin to fling those ideals aside to ensure Alice and Aubrey got out of the house with no suspicion attached to them.
As he expected, he found the duke in his study, sitting behind a massive carved oak desk, a pot of coffee and a plate of biscuits at his elbow and an expression of resignation upon his face. A fire burned in the grate, crackling merrily, and the room was warm, but not the least bit inviting.
Hawkney had completely changed the room when he’d taken up residence here, and whilst it had all the elements that ought to make it a masculine sanctuary, leather chairs and books and dark green painted walls hung with gilt framed landscapes, somehow it still did not feel like it belonged to him, or to anyone.
“I am relieved you did not keep me waiting,” he said upon Aubrey’s arrival, his expression stern as he sat back in his chair.
“I’m not entirely stupid.” Smiling at his cousin, Aubrey crossed to the desk, poured himself a cup of coffee and helped himself to a biscuit.
Hawkney said nothing for a moment, allowing Aubrey a moment to settle himself in the chair opposite and devour the biscuit in one large bite. A heavy silence enveloped them, and Aubrey realised it would be worse than he’d feared. He felt his cousin’s green gaze fix upon him and met it squarely. He might be sorry for the trouble he’d caused Hawk, but he wasn’t sorry about Alice, and he wasn’t about to bend to the duke’s will.
“I thought you had outgrown unsuitable women.”
