Wicked Intentions (Maiden Lane #1)(64)
Author: Elizabeth Hoyt

He approached the settee on the balls of his feet, oddly hesitant to wake her. When was the last time he’d examined her unobserved? Years, perhaps, or more likely decades. She was beautiful; she always had been and she always would be. The bones of her face were fine and aristocratic, but he noticed now a slight softening of her jawline, a tiny drooping of her upper eyelids. He bent closer to look for other changes and inhaled the scent of oranges. Her scent. She’d always worn it, and it brought back memories of the nursery. Of her coming to visit when he ate his tea when he was seven or eight. Of her kissing his cheek before she left.

She stirred and he hurriedly stepped back.

“Lazarus.” She opened those sharp blue eyes. “I’d ask you where you’ve been if I did not fear to hear the answer.”

“Madam.” He propped a shoulder on the mantel. “To what do I owe this visit?”

She smiled, arch and flirtatious, but he thought he saw her lips tremble. “Can’t a mother drop in on her son?”

“I’m tired. If you’ve only come to play, you’ll excuse me if I seek my bed instead.” He turned toward the door, but her voice stopped him.

“Lazarus. Please.”

He looked at her. The smile was gone now, and her lips did definitely tremble.

She inhaled as if bracing herself. “Have you any wine?”

He stared at her another moment and then sighed. Perhaps it was the lateness of the hour or his own weariness, but he could use a drink as well, though not of wine. He crossed to the decanter and poured them each a glass of brandy.

“I seem to remember you preferring this instead.” He handed her a glass.

“Do you?” She took the glass with both hands, looking startled. “How did you know?”

He shrugged, taking a seat across from her. “I think I saw you one night in Father’s study.”

She raised her eyebrows but did not comment. For a moment, they both sipped their brandy in silence.

Finally she cleared her throat. “You took that woman to Lady Stanwicke’s ball.”

He gazed at her over his glass. Her tone had been very neutral. “Her name is Temperance Dews. She runs a foundling home in St. Giles.”

“A foundling home?” She glanced up quickly. “For children?”

“Yes.”

“I see.” She was gazing at her glass now with pursed lips.

“What did you come for, Mother?” he asked softly.

He expected her usual dramatic outrage. Perhaps some cutting sarcasm. Instead she was silent for a time.

Then she said, “I loved her, you know.”

And he knew that she was talking about Annelise, dead a quarter of a century.

“I miscarried three times,” his mother said low. “Once before you were born and twice before Annelise was born.”

He eyed her sharply. “I didn’t know.”

She nodded. “Of course not. You were a child, and we were not a particularly close family.”

He didn’t bother replying to that.

She continued. “So when Annelise was born, she was very dear to my heart. Your father, of course, had no need of a girl child, but that was just as well.” She glanced up quickly at him and then down again at her glass. “He’d taken you away from me when you were but a baby, made you his own, as it were. His heir. So I made Annelise my own. Her wet nurse lived in the house, and I visited her every day. Several times a day if I could.”

She took a long sip of brandy, closing her eyes.

Lazarus didn’t say anything. He didn’t remember this, but then he’d been a child and only interested in matters that impacted his own small world.

“When she became ill…” She stopped and cleared her throat. “When Annelise became ill that last time, I begged your father to send for a doctor. When he refused, I should’ve sent for one myself. I know that. But he was adamant… and he was your father. You remember how he was.”

Oh, yes, he remembered well how Father was. Hard. Mean. Completely assured of both his own invincibility and his own correctness. And cold, so very cold.

“Anyway,” she said softly, “I thought you should know.”

She looked at him as if waiting for something, and he stared back, mute, because he wasn’t sure if he was ready—if he’d ever be ready—to give it to her.

“Well.” His mother drained her glass and set it on a table before rising. She smiled brilliantly at him. “It’s very late and I must be getting home. Tomorrow I have a fitting for a new gown and then an afternoon tea to attend, and I must get some sleep if I’m to look my best.”

“Naturally,” he drawled.

“Good night, Lazarus.” She turned to the door, but then hesitated before looking at him over her shoulder. “Please remember that just because love isn’t expressed doesn’t mean it isn’t felt.”

She swept from the room before he could reply.

Lazarus reseated himself and watched as he swirled the last of the brandy in his glass, remembering a little girl’s brown eyes and the scent of oranges.

SHE COULDN’T GO on like this.

Silence pretended sleep as she watched her husband rise. They’d slept in the same bed last night, but it might as well have been separate houses. William had lain as still as a corpse on the far side of the bed, so near the edge she’d thought he might fall off in the night. When she’d carefully inched over to lie against him in the dark, his entire body had stiffened, and fearing he really would fall, she’d rolled back to her own side, hurt.

But it had taken her many hours to finally sleep.

Now she watched as he shaved and dressed without ever looking her way. Something shriveled and died inside her. His ship’s cargo had reappeared just as suddenly as it had disappeared. The ship’s owner was overjoyed, William was no longer in peril of being sent to prison for theft, and he’d finally received his pay.

They should have been happy.

Instead, despair hovered over their little home like an insidious mist.

William buckled his shoes and left the bedroom, closing the door softly behind him. Silence waited a moment and then rose herself, hurriedly tiptoeing about the room to dress. Yesterday he’d left without saying good-bye. And, indeed, when she came out of the bedroom, he already had his hat on.

“Oh,” she said.

He walked to the door.

“I… I’d hoped to make you breakfast,” she said in a rush.

He shook his head without looking at her. “No need. I have business this morning anyway.”