LITMIR.BIZ

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       Chapter Four

      The old man was, however, capable of a great deal of other things. Cam made his bow at four in the afternoon to his grandfather in the Earl of Aylsbury’s elegant pale blue Louis XV drawing room with its elaborate cornice work and gold leafing. By eight o’clock that evening, a family dinner, ostensibly in his honour, had been instigated with the best china laid out—his grandmother’s favourite Colandine pattern by Primavesi and Son in Cardiff blue, along with the very best wines—his grandfather’s favourite, the Chateau Margaux Bordeaux—and the best guests which included, not surprisingly, the Beauforts and their daughter, Caroline. By the end of the evening, Cam had an appointment to take Caroline out driving the next day and to escort her to a musicale the next. Everything was playing out just as he’d imagined it would. There were no surprises here. Just expectations. And he was meeting them all.

      ‘We’ll have a grand time, now that you’re home.’ Caroline smiled over her shoulder as he helped her with her wrap in the hall. The long evening was finally coming to a close. ‘There are so many entertainments this year. Mademoiselle Rachel will be performing at the St James’s Theatre in June...’

      Cam did not hear the rest. Out there in the world, men were dying defending British interests abroad, dying to help their country build an empire and influence the world. In his estimation it was a noble legacy. Those lives had purpose. They were fighting for something, but was that something nothing more than the preservation of a life filled with the minutiae of looking forward to the talent of Mademoiselle Rachel treading the boards? It seemed an unfair trade. Surely there was more to life than the one depicted and acted out by Caroline Beaufort? He’d been in London less than a day and he was already itching to leave. The months of his leave stretched before him like an eternity. Today, he’d taken his first steps into the wasteland he’d imagined last night.

      The thought of last night prompted a smile. What was his nameless lover doing right now? Then the smile faded. Was she dancing for another? No, he wouldn’t think of her like that—dancing with her veils, enticing another man. He would remember her as distinctly his. He would remember the way she looked, arching into him, her eyes wide as pleasure took her, the little sounds she made. She’d been as honest and open in her expression of pleasure as she had been in her nudity.

      Caroline thought the smile was for her. ‘I am glad you’re home, Cam.’ Cam. That was new, as was the possessive way she held on to his arm and both set off alarms. Before, such a confession from her would have been accompanied by maidenly blushes. Tonight it was not, a reminder that she was not a shy maiden any more, no longer a debutante of eighteen, but a woman of twenty-one who was in her third Season.

      ‘I will go back to the Crimea in a few months. I am not home for good,’ Cam reminded her with a polite smile. He was already counting the days. His men needed him and he would continue to look for Fortis. He would do it discreetly this time. If Fortis was dead, he would find him—a body, a grave, anything to bring closure to that tragic day in Balaclava. Despite his counsel to Cowden, Cam wasn’t willing to give up until he had proof. Here in England, he was too far away to be effectual. He’d written letters and made enquiries, but it wasn’t the same as being on the ground. He didn’t want to be at parties, wasting his days with nothing when there was even the smallest chance Fortis might be out there, struggling to survive while he drank champagne. Cam pushed back the memories. Not now. He didn’t want to think about them here in front of everyone, people who didn’t understand what it meant to go to war.

      Caroline trailed a well-manicured finger down his sleeve, oblivious to his pain. ‘Perhaps going back is not a foregone conclusion,’ she purred. ‘Maybe we will find you a reason to stay this time.’ The message was clear. There was a new enemy that demanded his attention right in front of him. Caroline had grown bold indeed. And why shouldn’t she be bold? She was not panicked she’d been out for three Seasons. Her family and the Lithgows, through his grandfather, had an understanding. She was to marry him. It was an understanding she’d been raised on and never had reason to doubt. The entrance hall of his grandfather’s home was no place to raise those doubts. So, Cam bent over her hand with a gallant smile and wished her goodnight.

      Would he do it? Would he, like Fortis, marry a woman of his family’s choosing and simply leave her behind, going back to his old life as if nothing had happened? Or would his family demand he resign his commission? Would he do that, too—give up his career and his choice in order to marry and live the life the family wanted for him? Or would he refuse to marry at all? To refuse his family and the Earl was no small thing. As far as he knew, no one had refused his grandfather in Cam’s lifetime. Not his uncle, the heir, or his father. To what benefit would such a refusal be? What would be worth refusing the family and all the financial and social support that went with it?

      * * *

      That night, Cam dreamt quite pleasantly of his Indian girl, his secret life, his last adventure before falling into the abyss of the London Season. In the days that followed, filled with routs and parties, and Caroline clinging to his arm as if he were already hers, it was comforting to think of his dancer out there in the world somewhere. He thought of conversations he would have with her. He talked to her in his head the way he’d talked to her that night, confessing what he had confessed to no other. Perhaps if she were by his side instead of Caroline Beaufort, the magic of the Season would be restored.

      The two women could not be more different: Caroline with her blonde paleness and penchant for tradition and correctness; his dancer with her toast-coloured skin and dark eyes and sensual boldness. Cam imagined her dressed in a fine ballgown, with jewels glittering at her neck, and he wondered what she’d think of the Season. Would she think it silly like he did? Or would she see the enchantment? In short, she became a fantasy of the ideal, the perfection of beauty and companionship—giving all to him while demanding nothing in return. It was a harmless fantasy. He could imagine all he liked. There was no chance of the fantasy being realised.

      * * *

      ‘I cannot marry Wenderly.’ Pavia stood before her father’s desk of polished Indian rosewood, her shoulders straight, defiance coursing through her veins. She had made this argument before, only this time the outcome would be different. This time she had leverage.

      ‘Wenderly is an earl.’ Her father glanced at her mother, his eyes pleading with her to intercede, but her mother had launched a subtle rebellion of her own and refused to come to his rescue. He was on his own. One arranged marriage in the family was enough, her mother’s posture seemed to say. ‘He is highly placed in society.’ Pavia knew this argument of her father’s well. ‘You would be a countess. Your son would be an earl when Wenderly dies, which can’t be more than seven to ten years in the waiting.’ Leave it to her father to look at all angles, distasteful as they were. ‘You will be a rich, young widow, able to pick her next husband.’

      How like her father to assume there would be a next husband. For all his innovation in business, he lacked a certain creativity when it came to imagining a woman’s life without a man beside her. She supposed to his balance-sheet-driven mind the deal looked acceptable, sustainable.

      Pavia looked down at the fawn medallion woven in the Kashan carpet to hide her disgust. Minimum input, seven years, maybe less, and then maximum output to her benefit in her father’s eyes. She would be twenty-five, maybe twenty-eight. Not even thirty. But those seven years between now and then stretched before her interminably. Her father was assuming she’d survive them intact, mentally, emotionally. Her father was also assuming his numbers were right and Wenderly wasn’t endowed with supernaturally long life. Her father was just as confident in Wenderly’s demise as he was in the outcome of this conversation. He was going to win. It was the thing he did best: winning at all costs. And it had cost him plenty over the years, even if he couldn’t see it.

      Pavia knew her father was not concerned about the cost of her rebellion. He viewed these arguments as a temporary unpleasantness between them that would end with her capitulation and the complete return of his wife’s loyalty, something he’d always taken for granted.

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