Love Finds You in Annapolis, Maryland Read online

  He made a dubious hum and looked at Lark again. She rolled her eyes. “You might as well join us, Emerson. Whatever Sena has planned, she will no doubt make it entertaining.”

  “Very well.” He offered Lark his arm and was a bit surprised when she tucked her hand into it without hesitation. Perhaps they were making progress, in spite of that kiss incident on Monday, and the days in between when they’d barely spoken.

  Miss Randel bounced to the other side of Lark and led the way around the corner and down Tabernacle Street.

  Emerson used an icy patch as excuse to pull Lark closer to his side. “You are feeling better? You certainly look well this morning.”

  “I have had not so much as a twinge since Wednesday.”

  “Excellent. I wanted to check on you yesterday, but with the ice storm… I might have braved it, had I not been fairly certain you wouldn’t have sneaked down to spy on us Wednesday night if you were still ill.”

  She smiled up at him. “You acquitted yourself fairly well for being the youngest there.”

  “I was not—Monroe and Hardy are both my age, and yet entrusted with the representation of our fine state of Virginia.”

  Her laugh might be the most lovely sound he’d heard in days. “Oh, do forgive me. I did not see them.”

  Emerson grinned. “It was intriguing to be privy to the conversation. I had not realized Mr. Jefferson was so anxious about the ratification of the treaty. Or that so many of the statesmen are as incapable of carrying a tune as I.”

  She laughed again, as did Miss Randel. “I hope you wrote Wiley and bragged of your inclusion. He will be green with envy.”

  “Well, what else would I have done while iced in yesterday?”

  The girls launched into a tale of how they’d spent their day, which, to hear them tell it, involved stumbling across a pirate den in icy Annapolis and being instantly transported to the Caribbean. He smiled at their obvious delight with the game they had devised for the Randel boys, and their supposed escapades kept him entertained until they stopped before a town house on West Street.

  “Here we are,” Miss Randel said as she bounced up to the door and rang. When it opened, she beamed. “Good morning, Mrs. Haslip. We have braved the remnants of ice for some company. And we even brought a guest for Mr. Calvert.”

  The old housekeeper smiled. “Come in out of that cold, dears. I have coffee on.”

  They all did their best to remove ice and snow from their shoes and pattens, then handed off their cloaks and hats and followed the housekeeper’s wave into a parlor. No Calverts were within, but Emerson no sooner took a seat across from the chair Lark chose than he had to stand again. Miss Calvert and her brother entered together and sat.

  The girls dove headlong into chatter that sounded meaningless to him, which left him and Calvert staring rather blankly at one another. His host cleared his throat. “Did you attend Randel’s gentlemen’s evening on Wednesday, then?”

  Emerson nodded. “It was an enjoyable time. Your name was mentioned.”

  Calvert winced. “I can only imagine. Let me guess—the governor complained of my requests for my property to be returned.”

  “Very astute. Randel said the best way to quiet you would be to do as you asked.”

  With a chuckle, the man shook his head. “I have a feeling that will do naught to convince him. But I am grateful to Randel for saying so.”

  Miss Randel looked their way. “Do not dare launch into any talk of the political situation. We are going to play a game.”

  Calvert made a face. “Miss Randel, your games are always—”

  “Brilliant. I know. Here are the rules for this one. I shall begin by asking a question of someone in the room. A deep, probing question of course, otherwise what would be the fun? The person must answer in all honesty, and the reward for their answer is that they then gain the floor and can ask someone else whatever deep, probing question they most want to know.”

  Emerson and Calvert both groaned, Lark looked dubious, and Miss Calvert paled and sent her friend a beseeching glance.

  “You needn’t fear, Kate—you have no secrets to hide.” Miss Randel’s lips curled into that impish grin of hers, and she looked directly at Emerson. “My question is for Mr. Fielding.”

  He raised a hand to his forehead. “I don’t think I like this game. You swear it will not lead into ‘Lynch the Virginian’?”

  She laughed. “We are a peaceable company, I assure you. Now. What really happened that night with the villainous, dastardly Penelope?”

  Lark’s uncertainty slid into discomfort. “Sena—”

  “An easy question to answer, actually.” He kept his gaze fastened on Lark. “After Wiley went up to check on you, I found myself in a bad temper. I wanted to escape our fathers for a while, so I headed to the library—Wiley had mentioned a book he thought I should borrow. But I no sooner gained the room than your cousin slipped in. She said she was looking for a book to pass the evening with—”

  “Ha!” Lark folded her arms over her chest. “She has probably never read an entire book in her life.”

  “Which I had no way of knowing at the time.” He drew in a quick breath. “I selected one for her, handed it to her, and the next thing I knew she…” He shrugged.

  Lark’s stance didn’t soften. “You did not look to be fighting her off.”

  “And that is where my guilt lies. I am sorry for it.” When Lark averted her gaze, he glanced at Miss Randel. “My turn?”

  She nodded.

  “Excellent. My question is for Lark.” Though she still didn’t look at him, he smiled. “What is your favorite book?”

  “Oh, come now!” Sena bounced in her chair. “That is neither deep nor probing. You could learn the answer in any conversation.”

  He kept his smile in place. “It is of the utmost importance I learn the answer now, so if ever she asks me for a recommendation on what to read, I can offer a learned opinion. Lark?”

  She heaved a sigh. “Don Quixote. And now ’tis my turn, so I will ask something of Mr. Calvert. What was your first reaction when you learned your house had been seized?”

  They all looked to their host, who offered a small smile. “I prayed. First of all to thank the Lord for His wisdom in urging us to our plantation for the duration of the war. Who knows what would have happened had we been there when they demanded the property? And then for direction in where to find housing.”

  Emerson could only stare. Did the man honestly expect them to believe that? That his first response to such news was prayer? But the ladies all seemed convinced of his answer. And he sounded sincere, granted.

  Which was unfair. How was he to compete with a man so blasted perfect he harbored no ill will toward anyone?

  “My question, then.” Calvert arched a brow at Emerson, which made him want to groan again. “How did you manage to maintain an engagement to Miss Benton for two years without ever getting to know her?”

  Though Emerson started to sigh, he realized midbreath the question wasn’t as hostile as it could have been. He didn’t ask why he had wanted to, or what was wrong with him to have done so. He asked how he had managed it. Emerson settled his gaze on Lark yet again. “I am not sure. I admit I made no attempt to remedy it, that at first it was even what I sought, that lack of involvement. But as I come to know her now…I have to think had I seen this Lark at any point in those two years, I could not have maintained my indifference.”

  Her eyes went wide, her arms went to her sides. “Are you saying this is my fault?”

  He grinned. “I believe the next question is mine, Miss Benton. But I will use my turn to ask you what is on your mind, which I assume is whether I am laying the fault for our failure at your feet. The answer to which is that of course I am not. I know well had I asked you a single question then, you would have been happy to provide the answer. I am merely pointing out that had you acted at all during the last years as you have since coming to Annapolis, I wouldn’t have had to ask anyth
ing to glimpse that beautiful nature of yours.”

  Miss Randel huffed. “Absurd. Not the fact that Lark has a beautiful nature, which we all know, but that she needed to do anything differently to show it. I cannot think she had a complete change in personality merely by arriving in our fair city. And I happen to know if she kept to herself, it was because she felt she must. And whose fault is that, Mr. Fielding?”

  The housekeeper entered with a coffee tray, but no one did more than glance her way. Calvert gave Miss Randel a muted grin. “For this being your game, Miss Randel, you are terrible at obeying the rules. The question belongs to Fielding now, ’tisn’t to be asked of him.”

  He nodded. “Thank you, Mr. Calvert. And since your fairness is obvious, I will put my question to you. Unarguably the fault is mostly mine—I would never claim otherwise—but I have given much thought to this over the past few days, and I would like your opinion. Can two people remain perfect strangers because of the choice of one, when they are in the same company day in and day out for years?”

  Calvert frowned as he considered. “I confess my initial reaction is that they cannot.”

  “Edwinn!” Miss Randel squeaked.

  Calvert grinned. “Can you not wait your turn, Sena?”

  She glared. “No, and I thank you for asking and thereby making the question irrelevant. And now I will demand you tell us, Mr. Calvert, whose side you are on!”

  “Theirs.” He spread his hands, palms up. “It is obvious they care for one another, but how will they ever mend things if they do not examine the issue from all sides?”

  Emerson’s eyes bulged. Calvert was not against him?

  Miss Randel held her glare while the housekeeper passed out the coffee. “Certainly ’tisn’t by blaming anything on Lark. Lark—tell these idiot men why you remained aloof, if in fact you did.”

  Calvert sipped his coffee. “You at least had the floor this time, but was that supposed to be a question?”

  “Yes,” she snapped. “Lark?”

  Lark looked caught between a smile and panic. “I…only did what I had been taught a lady must, and what I thought he wanted. After all, that was how I had always acted before he proposed, and I assumed he had a reason for asking me to marry him to begin with.” Her gaze went sharp and pierced him. “What else was I to do, Emerson?”

  “Perhaps exactly what you have been doing since—reprimand me for my idiocy and refuse to hide that bright spirit of yours, as the Lord Himself cautioned us about.”

  Calvert buried a chuckle in his coffee, which earned him the glares of all three young ladies.

  Lark all but growled. “Sometimes the idiocy is so great it precludes reprimanding a man for it, until some other event has first knocked the stubbornness out of him.”

  “I will be gracious enough to take that observation into consideration before forming my next question.” He paused for a sip, then set his cup upon its saucer. “If indeed I was such a prodigious idiot—which, again, I will not deny—then I must ask again the question I put to you the other night, Miss Benton. Why did you ever love me to begin with?”

  Lark turned a lovely shade of pink. “Do you really think that an appropriate question to ask in company?”

  “No, but neither have any of these others been. And it begs to be asked.”

  Her jaw clenched, her fingers dug into the arm of her chair “We are not talking of this here. I have a question for Miss Calvert.”

  “Ah, but the floor is mine.” He sent her an innocent smile, then said, “I have a question for Miss Calvert.” He looked at the lady in question, then at Lark again. “What is my question?”

  For a moment she continued to glare at him, then the amusement crept in. All at once, the group burst into laughter. Through it, he caught the encouraging nod of Calvert, who in a single glance managed to say he’d done well.

  Emerson wasn’t certain of that, nor of what to make of the other man’s support. But perhaps Lark would consider the question. And perhaps she would come to see that foolishness was not his only characteristic. Unless she were as superficial as her cousin, he must have some virtue to have won her regard.

  He picked up his coffee again as the girls declared the game finished, and tried not to wonder what he would do if his question turned on him. Tried not to fear that Lark, like Elizabeth and Penelope, had been interested only in his looks, his wealth, his charm.

  Because if that were the case, his chances of winning her back were minuscule. If she’d never truly loved him, she wouldn’t care enough to forgive him.

  He sighed into his coffee. It would serve him right, to be falling in love with a woman who would as soon toss him back into the bay as give him another chance.

  Emerson might not be as devout as Calvert seemed to be, but that was enough to spur him to desperate prayer.

  * * * * *

  The moment the door to Kate’s room was shut, Lark spun on Sena with wide eyes. “What in the world were you thinking with that game, Sena Randel?”

  Her friend laughed and took a seat on Kate’s bed. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. Though I confess, I did not expect Mr. Calvert to take Mr. Fielding’s part so much.”

  Kate chose a seat on the plush couch and smiled. “It was good to see him and another young man being companionable.”

  “And shocking, given that these two particular young men are both interested in the same young woman.” Sena arched a glance at Lark.

  She rolled her eyes. “Mr. Calvert is not interested in me, Sena.”

  “Of course he is. Tell her, Kate.”

  But Kate inclined her head. “He may have entertained a few notions, but I think his true heart rests closer to home.”

  Sena looked none too amused. “Don’t fill my head with nonsense. Your brother has never shown the slightest preference for me…and even if he had feelings, he would never act on them without my father’s approval. Otherwise I might have been tempted to throw caution and family opinion to the wind like Alice did.”

  “Did your father not tell you?” Kate leaned forward, eyes twinkling as she began to relax. “When he came to speak with Edwinn while your mother was in her child-bed, he said he wouldn’t be opposed to Edwinn’s courting you, if ever he inclined that way.”

  “What?” Sena jerked upright, but then her face went sober. “Then back to my original point—he must not be inclined.”

  Lark took a seat beside Kate and enjoyed the respite from her own romantic woes. “Come now, Sena. I barely know Kate’s brother, yet even I can be sure he is only taking some time to divine your feelings, and perhaps be sure your father meant his words. His inclination is certain, otherwise he never would have argued with you as he did during that game of yours.”

  “By that logic, then, your Emerson is completely smitten with you.”

  Lark winced, though she’d brought that on herself. “We have plenty to argue about. You and your Edwinn, however, do not. I think you must give him some encouragement. Right, Kate?”

  With some relief, Lark saw Kate’s reticence had disappeared. Looking perfectly at ease, she nodded. “He will need it, to be sure. And even then, he may hesitate until he succeeds in reclaiming our property. It is difficult for him, feeling he has no place. And I imagine any man who feels displaced will not be confident in asking a woman he loves to share his exile with him.”

  “Well.” Sena rolled over onto her stomach and propped her head on her hands. “I shall bat my lashes and flirt as needed, and we shall soon see if he responds. In the meantime…”

  “No.” Lark groaned and fell into the back of the sofa. “Let us focus no more on me, Sena.”

  “It must be done,” she replied with feigned sobriety. “You are the most interesting thing to happen to us for ages. Kate, what say you of the menfolk’s claims? Does Lark share in the blame for the distance between herself and Mr. Fielding?”

  Lark’s eyes slid shut. “You questioned me on that before. You asked if I had truly shown him my heart.”<
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  “And I was satisfied with your answer, but they obviously saw it differently. You behaved exactly as a young woman is taught to behave. I, however, have little experience doing such, so I figure Kate can give us a better perspective. She is dutiful and obedient too. Kate?”

  At Kate’s thoughtful hum, Lark opened her eyes again to study this other new friend of hers. Surely if anyone would take her side, it would be gentle, bashful Kate, who didn’t seem to have a contentious bone in her body.

  But Kate’s eyes didn’t look particularly indulgent. “I suppose I must wonder what kept you silent all that time. As Sena pointed out, you can’t have changed overmuch within. You obviously had such spirit during your engagement. Why did you not show it?”

  Lark smoothed back a loose hair. Part of her wanted to ignore the question, but this was the longest speech she had ever heard from Kate, and she hadn’t the heart. “I think I have changed more than you may realize, having been exposed to more in this past month than all my life beforehand. Still, I had opinions I never shared. I…I suppose I was afraid I would scare him off. I had been in awe of him all my life, so I had always been meek and silent in his company, and when he proposed—well, I assumed he wanted a quiet, unobtrusive wife.”

  “And so you would have resigned yourself to that for life?” Sena looked at her as though she were a simpleton. “Could you have? Did it never occur to you he would find you out eventually?”

  Lark could only bury her face in her hands and mumble, “I don’t know.”

  Kate put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. Strange how the touch could be so encouraging simply because it was so out of character. “Let us, for a moment, examine the fear. He is your brother’s closest friend, right? Then what is your brother like?”

  She sighed and lowered her hands again. “Wiley is…Wiley. Clever, lighthearted, a bit of a joker. Optimistic, but with a fierce streak if you back him into a corner or injure one he loves.”

  Kate nodded. “As I thought—not so unlike you. So then, if this is the sort of personality Mr. Fielding is drawn to…”