Page 62 of Unmasked by the Marquess
He tried to breathe but it felt like his lungs were in a vise. Every shallow breath sent pain through his chest.
There was one obvious reason why Gilbert would have gotten married in Scotland, and it was that Robin wasn’t with them. In which case, where had she gone? Had she decided to stop being Robert Selby and simply vanish? He felt his heart lurch at the notion. He wanted her here with him, not alone and nameless.
He forced some tea down his throat and hoped he didn’t look like a man whose mind was reeling. There could be another possibility, he realized. Perhaps she had determined that exposure was imminent, had feared that she would be revealed as an impostor, and hadn’t wanted Louisa’s marriage invalidated when her signature was revealed to be forged. That was even more alarming, because if she truly feared exposure, she would do anything in her power to prevent Louisa from being implicated. That would mean she would have to disappear, to hide. And he knew his Robin well enough to fear that she would hide too well for him to find her.
He rose to take his leave, blindly going through the motions of wishing them all a good day. When he reached the door, he felt a hand on his elbow. It was Amelia, looking grave and concerned.
“If you hear from Mr. Selby,” she said, “will you send me word? It is very strange that he left town without saying goodbye to my mother or to me. We were friends, you see. Or I thought we were.”
Some of his pitying comprehension must have shown on his face, because she hurriedly added, “No, not in the way you’re thinking. Mr. Selby isn’t interested in... marriage.”
Incredulously, he realized she thought Robin a gentleman who preferred men. Which wasn’t far from the truth, in fact. “Quite right.”
And now she was givinghima pityingly understanding look. “I saw you at your ball,” she whispered. “In the garden.”
A month ago he would have assumed that she meant to blackmail him, that she was after his money or his honor. But now he understood that she was saying this out of concern for her friend, and she thought her friend’s lover would know his whereabouts.
He chose his words carefully. “I saw Mr. Selby a week ago in Bedfordshire, but not since. When I saw him, he was quite well. I give you my word that if I hear of him I will tell you myself.”
But even as he spoke, he feared he would hear nothing from Robin.
Charity had taken this road more times than she could count. She ought to know it by heart, she ought to have memorized every sheep-dotted hill and every crumbling wall. But on her previous returns to Fenshawe she was too preoccupied by thoughts of seeing Robbie and Louisa, too busy thinking of the stories she would tell them about what she had seen at the market, at the fair, at Cambridge. She hadn’t had any attention to spare for the landscape.
But there would be nobody at Fenshawe today. So now, on her last trip down this road, Charity could properly appreciate every tree and gate and cottage that she would never see again.
She had granted herself leave to be quite disgustingly maudlin, and didn’t even care that she was making a right mess of her cravat by letting tears fall all over it. She would bid goodbye to the only real home she had ever known, and since there was nobody around to see, she could cry as much as she liked.
The lane bent, and now she could see Fenshawe itself, nestled between two hills. She tried to commit the sight to memory: gray stone, gabled roofs, windows and chimneys arranged at a time when symmetry must not have been much in fashion.
Her eyes caught on a detail that was out of place—she could quite plainly see smoke curling dark gray against the clear blue sky. They had closed the place up entirely when they left for London. The couple who looked after the house lived in the old gamekeeper’s cottage. Perhaps they had ventured into the house for some reason and lit a fire. Still, she spurred the horse a bit faster.
Once she had Mab fed and watered in the stables, she made her way across the courtyard. This would be the last time she crossed the courtyard, the last time she pushed the kitchen door open. It ought to feel monumentally significant, but instead she felt like she was watching herself from a great distance of space and time.
“I thought it would be you,” said a familiar voice.
She gasped and turned to where Keating stood, leaning against the scullery door. “I thought you’d be long gone. How could you possibly guess that I’d come here?”
“You’d never bugger off without throwing some flowers on your fellow’s grave. Figured you’d turn up sooner or later.”
Of course he was right. She started to cry—really, she hadn’t quite stopped since the last round—and found herself pushed by the shoulders into a chair by the fire.
“Like a dog hanging about its dead master’s body. Embarrassing, it is. There’s nothing for you here, but you keep coming back. Like a ghost, haunting the place.”
“Your metaphors are a mess,” she managed through her tears.
“Your priorities are a mess.” He pulled a flask from his coat and handed it to her.
She sniffed it. Gin. She drank a few swigs anyway. “Louisa’s married by now.” She heard the scrape of a chair across the stone floor, then the creak of wood as Keating sat.
“That’s not why you’re crying.”
“No, I’m crying because I’ll miss her. I’ll miss...” She tried to make a gesture that would encompass her whole life, without actually saying it.
“Then don’t give it up. Stay Robert Selby. Who the hell cares that you aren’t? You’re as good a Robert Selby as he ever was, and probably better.”
She had long suspected Keating of harboring revolutionary tendencies, and now she was sure of it. “I can’t. It’s stealing.”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing. It’s always been stealing, right from the start, and you never let that stop you.”
