Victoria quickly averted her gaze and shoved another bite of pastry between her lips, realizing immediately what a poor decision that was because her mouth had gone bone-dry all over again. She nearly choked, silently struggling to chew and swallow the morsel as Rafe broke the seal on the letter. Frantically, she poured herself a cup of tea and sipped it, not bothering to add any of the sugar set in the nearby silver bowl for that purpose. She nearly sighed in relief when the offending bit of food was finally dislodged but cringed when she wondered how much of that blunder Rafe had seen.
Hesitantly glancing up, she realized he wasn’t paying attention to her in the slightest. His attractively bronzed complexion had weakened to a sickly pallor, so bloodless as to be quite alarming.
“Rafe?” she croaked, her throat still slightly scratchy from the pastry incident. He gave her no indication that he’d heard her. “What is the matter? What did the letter say?”
He stood up from the table so quickly that the chair he’d been occupying fell back to the floor with a startling crack. “We are no longer leaving for the Continent; we must return to London.” The frantic roughness to his tone was more than a little alarming to her, especially when she’d only ever seen him as amiable and charming. “Home. We must return home.”
“Why?” she asked, her tone rising with her unease. “What has happened?” What could have caused such an abrupt and dramatic change in him? One minute, they’d been wading into the waters of their first morning of marriage, and the next had made her normally composed, flippant husband so suddenlyserious and, daresay, nearly panicked. Though she tried, she could not make out the address on the letter he still held in his hand. From what little he’d uttered, Victoria suspected its contents had something to do with the Blackwood estate or responsibilities—something dire.
Rafe had already removed his dressing gown and, now bared from the waist-up, was striding to the wardrobe to retrieve the clothing that had been prepared for that day’s travels. He was too preoccupied to do anything other than command Victoria to ring for a maid so she might prepare herself. “We leave within the hour.”
Heart thrumming, Victoria stood and did as he instructed. She attributed her silent acquiescence more to her confusion than subservience, hoping that all would be revealed to her as soon as they were in the carriage and on their way back to Town.
After retracing thejourney they’d completed only the day before, their hired carriage slowed to a stop before a pretty Townhouse. Victoria had not amassed a substantial knowledge of London addresses yet, but the neighborhood appeared to be tidy and safe. Though the homes were not the size of the ones she’d visited in Mayfair, the streets were relatively clean by city standards, and the small front gardens were well-kept. She suspected this was an area where politicians, second sons of lords, and other respectable men might reside alongside people like Rafe and his family—those who, according to what she’d gleaned from her brother and father, had a respectable title, but not the capital to afford the same lifestyle as other peers. Regardless, Victoria found the area charming.
Every hope she’d had of prying answers out of her husband during the journey had been very quickly dashed upon her ascension into the carriage. Rafe had remained anxious and pensively silent for the duration of their journey, which hadonly served to stretch Victoria’s nerves so close to snapping that they trembled. She’d made several overtures at questioning him from various angles, but to no avail. He’d merely held up a few fingers in dismissal or ignored her words entirely in favor of staring unseeingly out the window while alternating between tapping his boot on the carriage floor, rapping his thumb on his thigh, and raking his hands through his thick, dark hair. It was a wonder Victoria’s sanity hadn’t been lost in a ditch somewhere along the way.
It was almost a relief when the bustle outside the window grew in intensity. The change in scenery gave her somewhere to focus other than her maddeningly tight-lipped husband. His steadfast silence had only allowed her mind to wander into unwelcome territory and explode her sense of foreboding. What had been in that note that was serious enough to cause him to cancel their honeymoon trip? A death in the family? She knew Rafe’s parents had passed years prior, and she’d never heard him speak of any siblings. Perhaps it was something with his house or property? Englishmen could be quite odd when it came to discussing their business and wealth in the presence of a lady; Rafe had never displayed such an inclination before, but perhaps their new status as husband and wife had changed this in his mind. These and other possibilities had spun through her mind hour after hour, mile after mile, until they’d finally reached that London residence.
A tall, lean footman dressed in dove grey descended the stairs and swiftly unlatched the door before helping Victoria step down to the swept walkway. She didn’t care to admit that it was a relief to be out of the close and heavy air of the carriage—even if it was for the mixed bag that was the atmosphere in London. Rafe followed so closely behind that his boot nearly caught in the hem of her raspberry traveling skirt. She’d had the garment specifically made for their honeymoon trip, but now she feltfoolish for being so excited about the gold thread and whimsical buttons along the panel of her bodice, each crafted with nautical symbols to carry a bit of Rockford along with her. How quickly the tide of their future had changed.
“Have the luggage unloaded and brought in,” Rafe barked without slowing. Immediately (and much to Victoria’s dumbstruck astonishment), his long legs launched him up the handful of steps and through the front door, both confirming to Victoria that this was his home and leaving Victoria to enter alone. Her cheeks burned with embarrassment and confusion as she murmured her thanks to the footman who had helped her to the walk, shook the wrinkles from her heavy skirts, and finally climbed the front stairs.
Rafe’s booming voice echoed through the foyer as she entered, but she could not quite make out individual words; his tone, however, rang with every speck of anxiety he’d kept bottled up on their journey.
Left alone and greeted by no one, Victoria took her chance to examine her surroundings. A slow turn in place revealed a space that, clearly, had once been grand but had suffered from years of neglect and lack of updating. More than years—perhaps decades. A pattern of black and white marble tiles ran along the floor. Yellow papering covered the walls from floor to ceiling and while it had likely been quite lovely when it had been hung, it was now faded so badly that she could hardly make out the design of exotic birds and tropical trees. The brass sconces were worn in places from age. The window to the left of the door was clear and polished, but the draperies adorning it were slightly sun-bleached and expertly patched near the hem. The not-unpleasant aroma of beeswax and lemon almost masked the slight scent of old wood, a hint of dust, and aged parchment. A subtle swipe of her finger along the polished banister leading to the next floor confirmed that the home was kept relatively cleandespite its shabbiness. In all, it was a marked difference from the exterior of the residence, and not a condition that would have taken a single generation to achieve.
Victoria was so preoccupied with her surroundings that it took her several moments to realize she was no longer alone; a maid cradling a small girl had entered from a cleverly disguised doorway—a servants’ passage. The woman was garbed in the serviceable grey wool of the working class, unadorned except for a white cap upon her head. She was rosy-cheeked and plump of form and perhaps at least two decades older than Victoria. The child she held in her arms was barely more than a toddler. Her wild black curls moved with a life of their own when she buried her pale face into the older woman’s neck, and she wore a frilly white nightrail that made her seem like a Renaissance cherub painted in the bosom of a cloud.
The sight was baffling.
Victoria’s confused frown deepened even more when Rafe appeared at the top of the stairs, at once harried and relieved to spot the maid and the child standing below. He practically flew down the stairs, his eyes only for the girl. Victoria hadn’t realized she’d clenched her fists until her nails bit so deeply into her palms that she feared she might draw blood. It was a task to unleash the tension in her body—even more so when Rafe scooped the little girl into his arms and cuddled her close.
“How are you feeling, darling?” he crooned, heedless of the child’s wayward curls as they clung to his lips and caught in the slight stubble of the beard he hadn’t paused to shave away that morning in his haste to return to London.
“It is only a little cough,” answered the maid reassuringly. “Mrs. West insisted on sending that letter, but I told her ’twould only worry you. Dr. McCullom has already come and gone. ’E left a salve to clear her lungs and recommended rest and warmsteam. Cook is making soup for supper, so we were sitting in the warm kitchen air for a spell.”
Victoria couldn’t stop staring at the girl who clung to Rafe so trustingly, so sure he would provide her with comfort as she released a cough so deep that it made Victoria cringe. Rafe did not so much as flinch as he patted the child’s back and held her close.
Initially, the sight warmed Victoria greatly…but that quickly melted into terror. What were the implications of this familiarity and concern between them? Who was this child to Rafe?
Just as her mind began to spiral into an abyss, her thoughts were shattered as a young lad careened down the banister and ended in a leap, sliding across the marble-tiled foyer and forcing Victoria to lurch out of the way lest she be knocked into a heap on the ground.
“Dominic!” Rafe snapped, his eyes narrowing at the boy. “Haven’t I told you time and time again not to do that?”
A sudden thud behind Victoria made her jump for the second time that minute. The footman lowered his eyes and apologized for dropping her trunk before ducking back from the house to bring in the rest of the luggage. The incident seemed to remind Rafe that he was not alone, that he had, in fact, a (very confused) wife. She’d followed him into the foyer, and was gaping at him like a landed fish.
“Apologies,” he said, finally fully looking at her for the first time in what was quite literally hours. “The boy is as much of a hellraiser as I was at his age.”
Victoria’s panic began in earnest at that point. She stuttered, “A—Are these children…they are…are these your children?” She should have been more tactful in her inquiry, but it wasn’t something her mind and her tongue could accomplish when faced with the very real possibility that her marriage wastumbling down around her before it had ever been given a real chance to begin.
From her conversations with him, she knew Rafe had never been married before; however, she was not naive enough to believe marriage was required for a man to father children. A signed document was not a magical talisman of fertility. Could this boy and girl be his children? He was certainly familiar enough with them. And could he expect her to reside with all of them beneath the same roof as a patched-together farce of a family?
Rafe shocked her with a great bark of laughter. “Good God, no!” His voice boomed. Her relief was still hesitant and would likely remain so until she finally received the explanation she’d been craving for the better part of that day. “May I introduce you to my niece and nephew, May and Dominic. A third child—another girl—is up in the nursery as well, but she’s rather a poor conversationalist since she does not speak just yet.”
“And…all of them live here?”
He patted the girl on the back, his hand moving in soothing circles. “Yes, they do. They are my wards.”
