“Yes, it is. You want me to accept what you think is best. Listening to all of you, I’ve accepted everything, even giving in to the notion that my life was lies. Four years is long enough to be tragic, long-suffering Ruth. I want the baron to come, to tell the truth. In exchange, he can stare at me all he wants.”
“Your friend, Barrister Marks who you’ve corresponding with, who asked you to marry him, will be here Thursday.”
“Marks is just a friend. We have no formal agreements. Maybe he’ll meet my new cousin.” I flung my hand like a whip. I might’ve even chuckled, but I looked forward to seeing Wycliff. He was my proof until I found the other half of the registry.
The front door opened, and Mr. Bexeley, Ester’s husband came in. Tall with dark hair and deep-blue eyes and a tan from healthy outdoor exercise, he put his papers on the table and swept my sister up in an embrace. “Good evening, Mrs. Wilky, my dear…Ester.”
He released his wife. “Is everything well? Have you two had a disagreement?”
I slipped my broken spectacles into my palm. “Not at all, Mr. Bexeley. Give your wife a big kiss. Thank you for going with me today, Ester.”
“Mrs. Wilky, you left the house today? Good for you.”
Bexeley was a gentle soul who loved my sister dearly. Ester was his greatest encourager. They were a perfect pair, the Shakespeare lovers. They’d overcome so much to be together.
“Good night.” I held my breath and headed into the darkness of the upper level. A breath and a step. A breath and a step. All the way up, but I heard their whispers.
“Bex, we went to Blaren House and met a crazed Lord Wycliff.”
“Blaren House. Wait. Mrs. Wilky, Ester, are you two all right? I heard there was a great upset that happened there. It’s quite the talk of some of my colleagues.”
“Good night, Ester, Bexeley.” I gave up breathing and just marched up the steps. By the third floor, I exhaled. I was happy my sister had found love. I was. Every girl needed that feeling just once. May Bexeley and Ester always have that joy.
I tiptoed into the nursery. Josiah was asleep in his crib. My Chris snored in his.
With my free hand, I tucked covers onto his feet. He’d kicked the blanket loose. That was something Adam had done.
I put on my spectacles and looked again at my son.
My son. Chris was getting big. Soon he’d need a big-boy bed. “I love you so. I’m going to be smart for you. I’ll secure your future.”
I wasn’t that young girl with a head filled with promises any longer. I was a woman, a mother. No sweet talk would fill my empty chest. A flamboyant, staring man was the means to restore my name, nothing more.
I kissed my fingertips and touched his sleep-warmed brow. I eased out of the nursery and walked the fifteen paces to my room.
Tossing my broken lenses to the bed table, I shed my coat on the footboard. Then I found matches and lit my lamp. Snuggled in Wycliff’s cape, I fell on my bed and wanted to drift to sleep with Bay Rum cologne in my nostrils.
The door to my bedchamber opened. No knock. No asking.
Ester rushed in. “We need to talk about him.”
Shrugging my shoulders, I reached into my box on my table where I kept all my old pairs of spectacles. “I’m rather tired and your husband is home. Shouldn’t you be with him?”
Ester shut the door with athud. “He has to read something and make notes for his speech tomorrow.”
“Please be quiet. Mama’s a light sleeper. The last thing I need is for her to be up here, too.”
“That baron was all over you. He looked hungry, like, like—”
“Your friend Lady Hartwell and her lust for chocolate biscuits?” I sat up and laughed a little. “He’s Adam’s cousin. What do you know? Adam was a real person. Oh, look at that, a living, breathing person. Shouldn’t you focus on the truth you heard, not a man looking at me?”
“I’m sorry I didn’t believe you. I am so sorry. And I will make it up to you. But Ruth, you didn’t see how this Wycliff was looking at you. If I hadn’t been there, who knows what he would have done?”
I had been alone with men, the worst kind of men. Wycliff didn’t frighten me.
I pulled at the shawl that still wrapped my shoulders and held it out for Ester. “You’re exaggerating.” I waved my hands like the preacher whose message of damnation became too lively. “You think he will look at me the same when he hears his cousin’s deception has labeled me a liar, a harlot, a long-suffering knitter?”
“I will apologize forever, but sister, he’s dangerous…and that whip thingy.”
