Page 36 of Lady Frederica and the Scot Who Would Not
“Tried to tell me what exactly?” she asked, her pulse now at a full gallop.
He glanced over his shoulder to his awaiting coachman, and she thought he might dismiss the man since he stood within hearing distance, but he didn’t. Instead, Gabriel cleared his throat and faced her once more, a determined look now upon his face. “I purchased a home in Mayfair the day before yesterday.”
Freddy’s brows drew together. “Whatever for?” she asked like a fool, but there could be only one answer. He was never planning to let her into his world. He thought to force her to live in a world where she didn’t belong. A spasmodic trembling began in her that she could not control. She could not be right. She could not be.
“For you to live here.”
“Alone?” She blanched at how wounded she sounded, and she had to blink to stop the tears that suddenly wanted to come. She bit down on her lip until the sharp pain overtook the ache in her throat that was urging her tears to unleash.
“Yes, I’ll live in Covent Garden.”
He could have struck her, his words hurt her that much. He was rejecting her. Her nickname whispered through her head.Frightful Frederica. She shoved down the self-pity that tried to rise. How dare he reject her before he even truly gave her a chance!
“You said we’d not remain strangers.”
A long silence stretched, and with it, her nerves, but then he finally said, “We won’t. We have a lifetime to become acquainted.”
Acquainted.As if they were business partners and not husband and wife. She wanted to scream and slap him. Instead, she bunched her skirts in her hands. “I gave you the opportunity to back out of this,” she accused.
He had the good grace to flinch at her words. “I told you I could not do that.”
“Oh yes,” she said, her words as bitter on her tongue as lemons. “Your honor would not let you. But that honor does not require you to live with me.”
He shifted, looking wholly uncomfortable, no doubt, with her not meekly agreeing to this preposterous arrangement, and a man in livery appeared by the coachman. She snapped her attention from him back to Gabriel. “Let’s speak of this later,” he said. “I’ve urgent business at the club.”
“More urgent than this?” she asked, unable to temper her incredulity.
“Yes, Frederica. More urgent than this. I’ll see you tomorrow at the latest.”
“How very honorable of you!” She shoved past him to exit the carriage and nearly fell out of it in her haste. His strong arm slid around her waist in a flash, and he pulled her back into the safety of his embrace. Her body’s instantaneous reaction to him irritated her to no end. She wanted to hate him, but she desired him. She did not want to care that he didn’t want her around him, yet she cared so much she ached with it.
What was happening to her?
“I’ve got you,” he whispered, his warm breath washing over her neck and ear to make heat pool low in her belly.
“Got me,” she muttered, squirming out of his grip, needing time to think, to sort the confusion rioting in her head. “If this is how you will ‘have me,’ I think perhaps I’d rather be lost.” With that, she pulled away from him and lumbered down the stairs of the carriage, taking the extended hand of the man she assumed was the footman.
Once she was on solid ground, the footman released her hand. “My lady, I’m Morgan. If you’ll allow me to show you to your bedchamber, I’m sure your exhausted.”
She was too furious and confused to be exhausted, so she simply nodded and followed Morgan toward the front door, not bothering to truly look at the home. She had no intention of remaining here in Mayfair.
Stationed on either side of the door were two men who stared straight ahead until she was nearly upon them. She frowned and turned to Morgan, whose understanding look said he’d anticipated her questions. “Mr. Beckford placed these men here to guard the house.”
The house or her? She recalled Gabriel mentioning an enemy. She glanced over her shoulder to ask him about it and felt her mouth slip open. The carriage door had been closed and was pulling away. Well, she was certainly not going to chase after Gabriel. She had her pride, even if she did not have a husband who wanted to live with her. She sniffed at that and followed Morgan into the home, noting the grandeur without much interest. She had not picked these things and had no sentimental ties to them, nor had Gabriel chosen them because he knew her. He did not.
With every step toward her bedchamber, her despondence grew, but when the footman opened the door to her appointed chamber, she gasped. It was decorated in colors of peacock blue and gold, with an elaborate raised platform bed and miniatures from her bedchamber at her home, of her family, were sitting on the table beside her bed.
She swept her gaze over the room, but it stalled at the dressing table where her favorite hair combs and brush were arranged just so. “Did my… Did my sister Guinevere come here and do this?” she asked, befuddled.
“No, my lady.” The footman grinned. “Mr. Beckford oversaw this himself. He had the room decorated yesterday. He told the decorator that peacock blue was your favorite color, and he had all the staff in a frenzy to collect your personal things after the wedding ceremony today so you would not know until you arrived here and felt at home.”
A maelstrom of emotions overwhelmed her. He’d remembered her favorite color, and he wanted her to feel at home here. Hedidcare. A man who didn’t wouldn’t remember such a thing or go to such trouble. And yet, she didn’t want to live in Mayfair, and he knew that. He had done all of this, bought this home here in Mayfair, decorated it to make her feel welcome, to keep her out of Covent Garden and to ensure they had separate lives.
Her thoughts spun as she thanked the footman, closed the door behind him, and sat on the bed. She had long ago told herself that she didn’t want or need love, and yet here and now, when faced with the prospect of a loveless marriage, her heart ached. Why? If she truly didn’t care, then why?
She was a fool, that was why. A fool who had lied to herself.
But why?
