Through the Smoke(51)
Author: Brenda Novak

“Meaning… ?”

“I have worked to create a union among the miners, something that is in the best interest of who I am and who I know and love. You will marry strategically, for the same reasons. We were born into separate worlds, you and I.”

“But do we have to remain in those worlds?” He put down the lamp and the letter and gripped her shoulders as if he’d shake the answer he wanted out of her. But she wasn’t even sure what that answer would be. What if she were to tell him she’d fallen in love with him? That she thought of him constantly?

“Is there no place to meet in the middle?” he asked. “The colliery doesn’t mean everything to me. Must that stand between us?”

When his gaze dipped to her mouth, Rachel’s pulse spiked. Would he kiss her? She wanted him to. But there was too much at stake. If she really cared about him, she would insist he do what was best and safest. “Not without a great deal of sacrifice, my lord. And I fear it would be your sacrifice far more than it would be mine.”

His jaw hardened. “Only because you have already paid the price.”

“We have nothing to mourn. A person in your position and a person in mine… we wouldn’t have a chance, regardless.” Forcing herself to step away, Rachel took another look at Peasant Wedding Feast. “I hope you can find what’s missing.”

When she glanced back at him, a sad smile curved his lips. “I fear, if I lose you, I never will.”

Chapter 15

Once he saw Rachel to her room, Truman went to his study, where he sat at his desk and attempted to pen a letter. The account books she’d given him sat at his elbow. He planned to go through them and see what he could find. But he’d had a meeting earlier in the evening, at a tavern outside of Newcastle, where the duke’s solicitor had given him an ultimatum. He needed to respond to that first.

But what would he say? He’d been mulling that over almost the whole ride back to Blackmoor Hall and still he had no answer.

“M’lord?”

Startled by the intrusion, he glanced up. With his head in his hands, he’d been so deep in thought he hadn’t heard the door. “Linley. I thought you’d gone to bed. What are you doing?”

“I couldn’t rest until I’d had the chance to speak to you.”

Truman rubbed his face. “Of course. I should’ve realized you’d be worried.”

Once the workday was through, Linley had taken to using a cane. An old wound, from when he’d been thrown from a horse as a child, kept acting up. Leaning more heavily on it than usual, he came farther inside and closed the door. “Did you meet him?”

“I did.”

“What did he say?”

The terseness of the letter that’d arrived two days ago, requesting the meeting, had prepared Truman. His time with the duke’s man of business hadn’t lasted long, but it had been every bit as tense as Truman had anticipated. “It was as we thought.”

“His Grace has heard about Rachel.”

“Yes. The gossips wasted no time.”

“We knew they wouldn’t. They never do.” Linley’s cane hit the hardwood floor until the rug swallowed the sound.

“He finds it an embarrassment, of course.”

“That comes as no surprise, but”—Linley’s expression grew pained—“is it enough of an embarrassment that he has rescinded his offer?”

“Not yet. He has given me a choice.”

“Find another situation for Rachel or forget about marrying Lady Penelope.”

“Yes.” Truman pushed away from his desk so he could stretch his legs.

The pitch of his butler’s voice shifted to one of entreaty. “My lord, I realize you have endured a great deal—”

Truman lifted a hand to silence him. “Don’t patronize me, Linley. I can’t bear it, least of all from you.”

“Then I shall speak bluntly.”

“Why not? You usually do.”

They both chuckled.

“Your welfare means a great deal to me,” Linley admitted. “In my old age, it is almost all I care about.”

“Then say what’s on your mind, old friend.”

“Don’t do anything to risk the wedding. Think of all you stand to lose if the duke withdraws his patronage.”

It wasn’t what he stood to lose that bothered Truman. It was the thought of disappointing his parents, as well as all the other Stanhopes who’d come before him. It was failing. Somehow, that was worse than death. “I will take your advice into consideration.”

“You can’t hope to arrange a more favorable match, my lord. No one else—at least no one who holds such power—would even consider…”

When his words fell off, Truman finished for him. “Marrying his daughter off to a man suspected of murdering his first wife?”

“That’s stating it even more bluntly than I would have, but… yes.”

Truman trimmed the lamp on his desk. “The duke’s man of business stated it similarly.”

“Did he? And what did you say in response?”

“I held my temper, in case you’re wondering.” Even though it galled him to have anyone, even a duke, attempt to tell him what to do. He had more land and other holdings than the Duke of Pembroke, had never had to worry about anyone’s “patronage” before. Were it not for Katherine, he could take his pick of brides.

“A wise decision.”

“His man is awaiting my response at the tavern right now.”

“He will carry it back?”

“Yes.”

Linley indicated the blank sheet of paper on his blotter. “What will you tell the duke, then?”

Truman knew what he had to say but couldn’t seem to make the commitment, couldn’t bring himself to send Rachel elsewhere. “It’s not that I find Lady Penelope too objectionable.”

Linley propped his hands on his cane. “She’s nothing like Lady Katherine. A small consolation, perhaps, but there is that.”

“Yes, there is that.” Penelope didn’t come off as spoiled and vindictive. But she didn’t possess Rachel’s keen mind, strong values, or fighting spirit, either. “She almost has the opposite problem,” Truman grumbled, stretching the muscles in his back. “She’s so blasé I wonder if she isn’t a bit daft.”

Linley didn’t like that statement, probably because he didn’t want to acknowledge the truth of it. “I wouldn’t go quite so far, my lord.”