Page 51 of Now Comes the Mist

“I’m sure your mind is occupied by wedding plans. Your mamma tells me you have been busy sending invitations.” Arthur pulls back to look at me fondly, and his gaze falls upon the left side of my neck. “What is this? Did you hurt yourself?”

I press a hand over the skin where Vlad’s scratches have healed but are still visible as red lines. And now I am thinking of Vlad again, damn him, while Arthur is looking at me in that innocent way. “I was petting a neighbor’s cat and it did not like my attentions,” I say, and because the lie sounds thin even to me, I add, to distract him, “Well, darling, how about a stroll into town? I would love to show you around Whitby.”

“Could we go to the cliffs?” he asks eagerly. “The breeze might be cooler there.”

I hesitate. I have not been there with anyone but Vlad all summer, and it almost feels like betraying him to bring Arthur there. But then again, I owe him nothing. And he need not know, for he would likely not be out in all this sunshine. “Let me get my hat,” I say.

Within minutes, Arthur and I are walking arm in arm toward the sea. He prattles on about everything under the sun—our acquaintances in London, his mother’s desire to go abroad again, and rearranging the gardens on his estate. I try to listen and show interest in these everyday subjects that he considers so absorbing, even as I find myself searching the faces of men passing by.

All week, I have only encountered Vlad in the conversation of others.

“The count was at Mrs. Whitaker’s card party last night! What a fine figure of a man.”

“That foreign chap, Count what’s-his-name? From Russia, or some such place. He’s really rather a decent fellow—insisted on paying far too much for my old curricle.”

“At the Parkers’ supper, I asked if he was married, and he spoke most pleasingly for half an hour and quite turned my head around. Never did answer, though.”

“The count seemed upset about poor Diana Edgerton’s disappearance and the fact that she simply up and left without telling anyone or even shutting up her house. The two of them had been friendly, you know. She was the first person in Whitby to whom he spoke.”

When Mamma’s friend had said that, I had pressed my lips tightly together. No one knowsIwas Vlad’s first friend, long before any other swooning girl. It has been frightfully irritating, wondering if he has not called to me this week because he is with some other woman who caught his eye, perhaps calling her hiskindred soul… or considering giving her his gift.

“Lucy, did you hear what I said?” Arthur asks, a bit impatiently.

I bring myself back with a powerful effort. “No. Could you say it again, my love?”

“I only wondered if you would dance with me tonight. That’s all.”

I laugh and kiss the shoulder of his jacket as we walk. “I would dance with you anywhere and at any time you wished,” I say cheerfully. “I would dance with you right now on this path, if you asked me to. But why tonight especially?”

“You reallyhaven’theard a word of what I said,” he tells me, his brow furrowing. “It’s the Wilcoxes’ ball tonight, of course. I’ve been talking about it for the last five minutes.”

I had forgotten about the damn ball. “I am delighted that you’re escorting me. The Wilcoxes are quite wild to meet you after how much I’ve talked about you! I was only distracted because I was pondering which dress you would think me prettiest in.” I have been flirting for far too long not to know what men like to hear, and I feel Arthur’s unease fade at once.

He looks around to see if anyone is watching, then ducks his head under my hat to kiss me. “You look pretty in everything,” he says softly, and I feel the old quiet tug of longing for him. I hug his arm tight, wishing I could be the simple, uncomplicated girl he deserves. “And I am certain you will look like an angel at our wedding. Only one more month until you are all mine, Lucy, and I am going to make you so happy.”

“You already do,” I say, kissing his shoulder again.

We ascend a steep section of the path and Arthur holds on to my waist to steady me, unaware that I know this climb like the back of my own hand. “Speaking of the ball, I heard there might be some distinguishedpeople attending tonight,” he says. “Did you know you have foreign nobility visiting? Someone mentioned a count from Bulgaria. Or was it Germany?”

My heart seizes. “Yes, Mina and I met him briefly in town one day,” I say offhandedly to hide my confusion. For some reason, I had never imagined Arthur and Vlad crossing paths. And why shouldn’t they? No one would blink an eye at the man I am engaged to marry making the acquaintance of the man I have recently met, and only Vlad and I would know the truth. I wonder if I will be able to hide, on my own face, the memory of his hips framing mine and his eager mouth on my neck. Mamma and Mina can never know.Arthurcan never know.

“Would you like to sit down for a while?” Arthur asks.

To my horror, he is pointing directly to the stone bench where Vlad and I meet. “Let’s sit elsewhere,” I say, my cheeks hot with guilt and embarrassment at the prospect of sitting with him where I had kissed and embraced another, thinking it was only a dream. “I don’t like that one.”

“Why not?” he asks, surprised. “It has a wonderful view.”

“Many of the other benches do, too,” I point out.

“And it looks so romantic with the willow branches hanging down, doesn’t it?”

I tug at his arm, nearing desperation now. “Come, let’s go farther down the path.”

“But it looks so nice and cool in the shade of that tree—”

“Arthur, please,” I say, more sharply than I had intended. “I don’t want to sit there. I’m afraid of falling. It makes me nervous to be that close to the cliff’s edge.”

His face is a mixture of hurt and bewilderment. “Would you rather not sit at all?”

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