Love Finds You in Annapolis, Maryland Page 3

  Isabella’s eyes lit up with competition. “Then I shall have to make mine all the finer, so I outshine her.”

  If anyone could put the blond to shame, it would be Isabella. Though that meant Lark would be eclipsed by them both—and on what should be her day of days.

  “Dinner is served.”

  Mamma and Papa stood at Ginny’s announcement and led the procession out the drawing room door amidst laughter and continued conversation.

  Emerson appeared at Lark’s side, but his gaze didn’t so much as touch her. He was far too busy studying the sway of Penelope’s skirts. Distracting, to be sure, since one could see the movement of her legs under the cloth, but must he stare even as he offered Lark his arm?

  She rested her fingers inside the crook of his elbow and drew in a long breath. “You look particularly well this evening, Emerson.”

  “Thank you, darling, so do you.” Odd how a compliment could feel like an insult when it was so obviously unconsidered. “I imagine you are enjoying your cousin’s company—she is a lovely young lady. Well spoken and pleasant.”

  From behind them, Isabella loosed an unladylike snort. Lark shot her a glance of amusement masked in reprimand. “She does have a way with words. And have you passed a pleasant week?”

  “I’m sure.”

  Something knotted up inside her chest, where her heart should beat. Her cousin was beautiful, yes, and a practiced flirt. The same could be said of countless women—would his head be so easily turned by them all? Would she be forever known as the wife of the straying Mr. Fielding, if she married him?

  She squared her shoulders. “Have you been terribly busy? I have not seen you since my birthday.”

  The reminder of their last encounter—and his promise to be the very figure of devotion—affected him not at all. “Quite.”

  Frustration brought her chin up. If he wouldn’t pay attention to her, she could at least have a bit of fun at his expense. “Well. I have passed a busy week, learning the rules of a new trade. Did you know that to desert the ship or one’s quarters in battle will be punished in death or marooning?”

  “Mm.”

  Isabella choked back a laugh behind her. Lark smiled. “And one must always keep one’s piece, pistol, and cutlass clean and fit for service.”

  “Certainly, darling.”

  “The true challenge will be in restraining my temper, however. It is strictly against the code to strike another while on board. Every man’s quarrels are to be settled on shore, with sword and pistol.”

  “Yes, I—” Emerson finally looked down at her, his brows drawn. “Did you say something about swords?”

  Surely she deserved credit for neither laughing nor rolling her eyes. “Of course not, darling, I said a woman has only her words. Hence why it is so important to have a good way with them.”

  He still frowned at her, but they had reached the dining room, so he made no reply. He led her to her usual chair, helped her sit, and then went around to his place across from her. Isabella leaned close to her ear. “How do you devise these things, Lark?”

  She only grinned—which lasted until Penelope took the seat at Emerson’s side. “What a delight it is to have you and your sisters with us this evening, Mr. Fielding. I feared my cousin had overstated the pleasures to be found in your company, but I ought to have realized guileless Lark is incapable of any exaggeration.”

  Was it unchristian to dream of plucking each and every golden strand from her head so she might strangle her with them? Undoubtedly. But perhaps if she left it at the plucking and refrained from the strangulation…

  Emerson smiled at Penelope. “’Tis proving a pleasurable evening all round.”

  He obviously had no trouble following her conversation.

  Oh, she must put aside the petty thoughts, the jealousy. They would only make her miserable without having any effect on the ones causing it. She allowed herself one look to her brother for fortification and otherwise made it a study to ignore the flirtatious banter occurring across from her. She paid no attention as Penelope laughed through the soup. She didn’t listen at all as, over the meat, Emerson detailed his plans for expanding the Fielding plantation, though he had never seen fit to share his thoughts with her. She gave no heed when they lapsed into a discourse on whether the Articles of Confederation would suffice or if a constitution ought to be drawn up.

  As if Penelope did anything but parrot the arguments Papa and Uncle Moxley had shared earlier in the day. Her cousin cared nothing for politics. Though Lark had a few opinions on the matter, if Emerson ever cared to hear them.

  But he didn’t. How much clearer could it be? Whatever his reasons had been for proposing, they had obviously included neither her looks nor her wit nor her disposition—he never acknowledged any of them with any insight. And Wiley, the one person who did, would be leaving come morning.

  A servant placed her sweet before her, but she felt far too empty inside for that to fill her. Around her whipped five different conversations as everyone caught up, teased, cajoled, and huffed over differing politics. She had tried to put a word in now and then, but she had difficulty following the other four conversations when she was ignoring Emerson and Penelope so thoroughly.

  Was this all life had for her? Being forever outside, removed?

  Across from her, Penelope swept her lashes down. They glimmered like gold dust upon the cream of her cheek, then lifted again so her icy-blue gaze could pierce through to Lark’s very soul. “You look pale, cousin. Are you feeling ill?”

  All eyes shifted to Lark, though few had looked her way at any other time. She forced a swallow and shook her head. “I am quite well, thank you.”

  “Are you?” Isabella, at least, sounded genuinely concerned. “You barely touched your dinner, and your eyes are shadowed. Have you another of your headaches?”

  Mamma leaned forward, worry etching her face. “Oh, Lark, you must speak up the moment one sets upon you, you know that. Activity only makes them worse. You ought to be in bed.”

  “Really, Mamma, I—”

  “You do look pale.” Papa frowned at her, that warm frown he always gave when about to insist on her better good.

  Perhaps it was her imagination, but Aunt Hester looked nearly gleeful as she pronounced, “We cannot have you falling ill, darling, with so much planning to be done over the next weeks. You ought to retire. Nothing soothes a headache like some quiet.”

  Though her spine could be no straighter, she lifted her chin a notch. “I am well.”

  “We appreciate your hesitation to complain, dearest, but when one’s health is at issue, one must relent.” Mamma gave a nod that made the tower of her hair teeter.

  “But, Mamma—”

  “You know she would never voice a complaint in front of guests.” Papa tapped a finger on the table.

  “There is no complaint to voice, I am—”

  “Do not be stubborn, darling.” Emerson’s voice rang cool, unconcerned. “You obviously are not feeling yourself. Your aunt is right, you should rest now to avoid illness later. We shall carry on without you.”

  Something inside her shrank, went cold.

  Wiley pressed his lips together. “I highly doubt she is so beset she cannot finish the meal with us. It is the last I shall be with you for nearly two months, after all, and she has not seen her betrothed since her birthday.”

  Emerson’s smile looked anything but reassuring. “I will be happy to return on the morrow.”

  Of course he would—and his glance at Penelope proved why.

  Was it possible for one’s blood to still in one’s veins? She felt as though it had, as though she watched from afar off. Her presence was obviously unneeded. Woodenly, she stood. “Very well then. I bid you all good night.”

  The men all leapt to their feet, but even as she left the room, conversation resumed.

  She clearly would not be missed.

  Chapter Three

  Wiley waited until the collection of females adjou
rned, until the three older gentlemen were engaged in a heated debate on politics, before he took the chair next to Emerson at the table and leaned in close. “Do you take some perverse pleasure in playing the part of a fool, Fielding?”

  Emerson paused with his brandy halfway to his lips. “Must we waste your last evening here with nonsense, Wiley?”

  Wiley lifted a hand and pointed discreetly at the door through which the ladies had exited. “My cousin is a viper, and you have become her prey. Are you so blind you cannot see it or so stupid you do not care?”

  Emerson brought the glass to his lips and took a sip. “Those are my only options? You will not grant that perhaps I enjoyed an evening of diverse company, but that I am in no danger of being declared blind or stupid or foolish?”

  “You spent the past three hours flirting shamelessly with a known minx.”

  “I spent three hours,” Emerson returned, leaning toward him, “engaged in conversation with a perfectly respectable young woman who will soon be my cousin. There is no harm in that.”

  “No harm?” Was the man mad? Wiley shook his head. He would have liked to pound a hand to the table but didn’t relish the attention it would draw. “Did you not see my sister’s face?”

  “Of course I did. She was obviously pained—hence why everyone insisted she rest.”

  “It was not a headache, Emerson, it was you. You and your ghastly behavior. How can you not realize what you do to her? She wants only your affection, your attention once in a while, and you—you are too busy salivating over my cousin to even notice what it is you do!”

  Emerson blinked, as if Wiley had lapsed into Dutch midway through his rant. “You are overreacting.”

  “I am not. Penelope…she has always been this way. A bat of her lashes, a sweet little smile, and she snatches whatever she wants. Whenever we have been in company, what she wants is inevitably what my sister has. Imagine the coup if she were to steal you.”

  “I am not a doll or a slate, Wiley. I cannot be stolen unless I wish to be—which I do not. I will marry your sister.”

  “Will you?” Wiley pushed away from the table and stood. “That will take more than an emerald and an agreement, Emerson. Something you are yet unwilling to give.” He took a step toward the end of the table where his father sat with Mr. Fielding and Moxley. When Father looked his way, Wiley nodded. “Excuse me, sirs, I will go check on my sister.”

  He strode from the room, but it wasn’t until he had climbed the stairs and traveled the hall of bedchambers that he convinced his teeth to unclench. Blast it, he despised being in a foul humor. It didn’t suit him. But now he would spend his entire trip to Annapolis worrying over this mess between Lark and Emerson—and now Penelope. Perhaps he ought to send his regrets to Randel and remain at home to be sure all fell into line.

  He passed his own chamber and knocked on the next door. “Lark?”

  “Come in, Wiley.”

  Well, she sounded herself, no tears clogging her voice. That was encouraging. Wiley opened the door and stepped inside, his gaze finding Lark at her writing desk. She had changed into everyday clothing and sat in a position familiar to her—paper and quill before her, a book open at the side.

  He closed the door again and moved over to her secretaire. She looked up at him as he approached, giving him a view of her face. It was calm, though he wouldn’t have called it serene. Resigned, perhaps. “How are you feeling?”

  Her smile was small. “As well as I did before.”

  “So without a headache but emotionally ravaged?”

  She set down her quill. “He knows her not like we do. I am sure he sees only the picture she is so careful to show.”

  “’Tis no excuse, Lark. He has seen through many another carefully crafted facade, I know not why hers should be any different.”

  “I am not making his excuses. Only trying to understand.” She sighed and tapped the feather of her quill against the side of her paper. “Part of me wants to confront him. The last time I dared to, he set a date for the wedding. Perhaps if I were to be firm on this, he would decide to be a proper bridegroom. But is that what I want? Can I trust him, or should I end this farce and accept the consequences?”

  “I wish I had an answer for you.” Wiley glanced down at the page. “You have written him?”

  “Nothing I intend him to read. I was working through my thoughts. My fears, my hopes. It would all be so much easier if I had been born beautiful, so that he fell in love with me as quickly as Hendricks did Violet. Why could I not have inherited Mother’s fair complexion like the two of you?”

  He smiled at the tease gleaming in her eye but then fell sober. Certainly, her coloring was different from his or Violet’s, her hair having darkened over the years to be closer to their father’s deepest brown. But to his eyes both of his sisters were lovely. Violet in a more exuberant way, but Lark…Lark had a quiet depth he had always loved. In her blue eyes dwelt the longing for things he well understood—knowledge, wisdom, a desire to be accepted for who she was. In her soul pulsed a spirit that grew tired of docility, one waiting to leap up, flag waving, and charge into battle.

  He had been the same way and had been given the chance to fight for a cause in the Revolution. No longer was he the same man-child who had first gone to battle, and the changes, he felt, were all good…aside from those images that haunted him.

  Lark needed the chance to spread her wings, to explore the world outside Endover and Williamsburg. She needed a cause to fight for—and he suspected that cause might need be her own liberty, her own freedom. The question, to his mind, was whether she could emerge from such a war without the nightmares he had brought home with him. Or whether one would even recognize the gift of victory without them.

  He shook himself and motioned to the book on her desk.“Don Quixote again?”

  “It was the only thing I had up here, and I daren’t venture downstairs.”

  “Why ever not? You know well our darling cousin would never darken the door of the library, if she be the one you wish to avoid. Besides, the ladies are all gathered in the parlor with their stitching, and the men will be at their brandy and pipes for a while yet. You could sneak down and back up unseen. Come.” He held out a hand to help her up. “Let us fetch you something newer. Have you read the ones I brought home last week?”

  She stood, life entering her eyes. “Not all of them. And you know, ’tisn’t such a bad turn. A book is far better company than Penelope.”

  He laughed and led her toward her door. “I readily concur.”

  They fell into silence for the trip down the stairs. What could he do to ensure his sister’s happiness? To help her grow into the songbird that lurked under the quiet demeanor, that only peeked out now and then? A hard question, as he knew only what had worked for him. But he could hardly send her to school in Annapolis or place her under the tutelage of Mr. Randel. He couldn’t convince her to come with him even for a visit, much less long enough to effect any changes.

  She was right that she couldn’t be carted off to the capital with a wedding looming, but Emerson was unlikely to take her there afterward. As much as Wiley had loved the “Athens of America,” as they called the city, as much as he had taken to John Randel both in school and later in war, Emerson had never seen eye to eye with him.

  He let out a sigh, silent lest his sister wonder about his thoughts. The library door was before them, cracked open. Flickering light spilled out, which was no great surprise. Their father always ended his days in there, so the servants would be sure to have the fire blazing in the hearth, a lamp lit.

  Wiley opened the door and stood aside for Lark to precede him.

  He regretted it when a shriek of horror spilled from her lips. He jumped into the room to see what had caused her distress and could not stifle the curse that sprang to his tongue.

  Emerson stood before the hearth, even now disentangling himself from Penelope’s arms. His eyes were wide, either from being caught or at the realization of
what he was doing. Wiley was not certain which and frankly didn’t give a whit. “Lark, go back to your room.”

  She made no move to obey. On the contrary, the hands that had flown to her mouth dropped, fisted, and fury lit in her eyes. She had found her battle. But he couldn’t let her fight this one, not when the death toll was certain to include her heart. He stayed her with a hand on her shoulder when she would have charged forward, pulled her behind him. “Lark, go.Now. I will take care of this.”

  She turned on him, those blue eyes sparking like the hottest flame. “I will not. I will not suffer this.”

  For perhaps the first time since he returned home from Yorktown two years prior, he felt his face settle into the hard mask of Lieutenant Benton, rather than the carefree countenance of Wiley. “Trust me.”

  Her chin lifted, but not in stubbornness this time. Rather, in recognition of a fellow warrior. With one last withering glance over her shoulder, she fled the room.

  Wiley settled his attention on the two parties beside the hearth. His gaze bore first into Emerson’s guilt-stricken face. Emerson tugged at his waistcoat, his eyes shifting from floor to wallpaper to chair. Wiley transferred his glare to Penelope, who hadn’t the sense to look contrite. Or perhaps she tried, but the smugness was far too pronounced to pull it off.

  Blood roared through his veins. He was helpless to disobey when it ordered him forward, when it pulled back his arm. He relished the pain in his knuckles when they connected with Emerson’s jaw.

  “Wiley, no!” Penelope grabbed at his arm and made to put herself between them.

  Wiley shook her off. “I ought to challenge you here and now, you swine.”

  His cousin put on a pout. “I appreciate the concern for my honor, but—”

  “Your honor?” That nearly made him laugh. “I give not a fig for your honor, Penelope, assuming you have any. A woman who would deliberately try to steal another’s betrothed is hardly worth the fight. But for my sister…”

  “Wiley.” Emerson stepped forward, palms out. At least he didn’t move to Penelope’s side. Wiley would have pummeled him if he had. “You would have every right, but please. ’Tis not what it appeared.”