“Yes.”
Mercy slanted him a frown, folding her arms over her chest. “That’s hardly edifying.”
“That is all theedificationto which I am disposed. It’s poor form to discuss one’s former lovers.” He braced one palm against the wall of the carriage as the driver took a turn a bit too quickly.
“I would discuss mine, had I any to discuss.”
“But you haven’t any, so it is immaterial.” The right corner of his mouth had hitched up in a smile, and his voice was warm with amusement. At last he heaved a sigh, touching the back of his head to the seat. Capitulation, she thought—like he knew already that since she had found the thread, she would find it impossible to let go of it until she had unraveled it in its entirety. “There have been a few women with whom I enjoyed the occasional liaison,” he said. “No one you’d be likely to meet, and there were never expectations of anything more than that. I’ve never kept a mistress, nor offered marriage to any woman.”
“Why didn’t you?” she asked, her fingers knitting in her lap. “You could have married years ago.” Probably he should have done.
“There were few women who would have met Father’s impossible standards, and I could sustain an interest in none of them. And then, after he died, I poured all of my energy into the barony, into Marina and Juliet. I supposed there would be time enough to find a wife after I’d seen them properly settled.”
“Don’t…don’t tell Marina that, if you please,” she said softly.
His head tilted to the right, inquisitive. “Why?”
“It’s her fourth Season,” Mercy said, her shoulders lifting in a tiny shrug. “She’s rather sensitive about it. All of her friends are married already—”
“Except you.”
“I don’t count. I was never going to marry.”What would I do with a husband? she had asked more than once at Marina’sgentle prodding. A deflection, even if it had been offered with incredulous laughter. She had ceased to entertain the notion so long ago, that the question itself had become purely rhetorical, unanswerable.
Only now, so very suddenly, that unanswerable question had acquired an answer at last.
Love him.
∞∞∞
Mercy knew Thomas’ sisters better than he did. He supposed it should not have surprised him—probably it was not half so easy to discuss one’s insecurities with one’s brother as it was with one’s friend. And they had always been that, no matter how he had once resented it. It seemed so small and petty of him now, in retrospect.
He’d never known Marina had struggled so. He would never have pressed her to bring a gentleman up to scratch with all haste, and it had never mattered to him whether or not she had found a suitor in any particular Season. Before Fordham had run off with the family funds, he could have afforded any number of Seasons for the girls. There was no reason for them to marry in haste, when they might repent at leisure for an ill-made match.
But it had mattered to Father. He’d left his marks upon each of them in turn. Possibly Juliet had been spared the worst of it, since Father had had little interest in children and less interest in female children especially. But Marina—Marina had been old enough, before Father had died, to catch the sharp and cutting slice of his tongue. Old enough to bear at least a fraction of the scars that Father had inflicted upon him.
And he’d never asked. Never told her it was perfectly acceptable for her to find a suitor in her own time. Never once considered that a woman now three and twenty years of age might struggle with the feeling of having been left behind by the peers who had gone to the next stages of their lives before her.
But Mercy had. Even though she’d been old enough to reject the idolization of two little girls who had followed her around, as Mother had said, like little chicks, she had instead taken them both beneath her wing. Become the surrogate older sibling they had needed, when he had failed them.
No wonder Mother had always loved her. No wonder the girls had adored her. She’d saved them, after a fashion.
She’d savedhim. From the cold, spiteful man he’d been well on his way to becoming. He had needed her every bit as much as they had, and he’d fought so fiercely against it, when he might have embraced the chaos of her years ago.
Mercy was going to make an utter wreck of his carefully-regimented life, and only a few weeks ago, the thought would have appalled him, horrified him. But he’d brought a little order to hers, he thought, and that—that was good. There was a balance they had found between them, halfway between his order and her chaos, and it was the best of both of them.
She had not yet come to this conclusion herself, however. It was written in the lines of her face, curiosity and trepidation both. It was in the fidgeting of her fingers, which had fallen once more to her lap.
She took a breath and pursed her lips, her gaze flickering nervously over him. “Regarding that lecture—”
“It’s coming.” But not now. They’d probably no more than a few minutes before they reached the tavern, and what he wanted to say—to do—would be imprudent before they had concluded their business.
“I’d really rather—”
“Mercy. Later.” He let his feet fall to the floor of the carriage once more, sat up from his indolent slouch. “We’ve precious little time. You did well to dress as you have. Now you must act the part.”
“The—the part?”
“Ladies do not go to taverns to socialize,” he said. “The women that frequent taverns for purposes other than to keep to their rooms are notladies. It is unlikely that we will encounter anyone who would recognize either of us—I have not, on the occasions I have been—but it would be deleterious to your reputation were your name to be bandied about. So for the evening, you will be Mrs. Armitage. My wife.”
