Always a Maiden (The Belles of Beak Street #5)(53)

Susanah stared at her nemesis, the woman who had stolen a perfectly acceptable husband from her. Her throat clogged, as her hopes crashed down to her embroidered slippers. If they wouldn’t help her, she had nowhere to turn.





Chapter 14





“You’re not about to faint, are you?” asked Lord Ashton with a skeptical tilt of his head. At the same time, he put an arm around Annabelle’s back.

For all the good that would do her. Susanah had to convince them to help her and not have them go running to fetch her mother to her.

“You’re very pale,” he added.

Annabelle rolled her eyes.

Susanah stood up very straight. She should be angry, she thought distantly, but she was too scared to be. Or rather panic and exhilaration were running through her veins in equal measure. “You should help me because I helped you. But, please, I’m begging you. I can’t marry Lord Farringate.”

“He’s an earl,” pointed out Lord Ashton. “Or have you found a duke that suits you better?”

“A plain mister,” she choked out knowing she deserved his scorn.

“I say, do you have a pistol in your reticule?” He moved Annabelle behind his shoulder.

Susanah pulled out the tin. Candied almonds popped out and a small square of paper fluttered down—probably a liner she hadn’t noticed before. Her squeezing it must have released the catch.

She stared at the dropped almonds. A servant should be summoned to sweep them away. But she didn’t want the last thing Evan had given her to be tossed in a rubbish bin so unceremoniously. To say nothing of the fact that if this didn’t work, she’d be on bread and water until she married Lord Farringate or perhaps longer. She’d need the almonds to nibble.

“Really, a plain mister?” Lord Ashton echoed more to himself than with any volume as if he’d just realized what she’d said, and he couldn’t quite believe it.

Not caring about her dignity, Susanah dropped to her knees and began plucking up the candied almonds and placing them back in the tin. The plink, plink sounded loud to her ears.

“Lady Susanah, you haven’t spoken to me in a month,” Annabelle said. “And now you want my help?”

“I’m sorry. My mother said you weren’t appropriate company for me. Or your sisters. I couldn’t talk with you.”

“We went to school together,” protested Annabelle, but she squatted down and helped pick up candied almonds.

“I know, but I have to be obedient or I am punished. Now, my parents are forcing me to accept Lord Farringate. If I don’t get away, I will never be free of them. Unless I die in some strange accident—drowning perhaps.” Or being dragged by a horse. She couldn’t suppress the shiver that ran down her spine.

Her dark eyes rounding, Annabelle stopped with an almond in her hand poised above the tin. “I think you had better explain.”

“If my mother thinks I have left with Lord Farringate on whatever his urgent business is, I’ll have about a week before they realize I have decamped. I could write a letter suggesting one of his children is deathly ill.” She put her hand to her forehead. But then what would she do? Her only hope was that Evan’s offer was still open. “If I am properly chaperoned and they think I am with the man they expect me to marry, they won’t run me down. I can escape.”

Annabelle stared at her blankly.

Susanah sighed. She knew she would have to explain better. All the visible almonds were in the tin, so she scooped it up and extended it. “He gave me this before he asked me to marry him.”

“Lord Farringate?” asked Annabelle.

“No. The man I hope is still willing to marry me. If you’ll take me to him…” She should just give them Evan’s name, but she feared they truly wouldn’t believe her. She hardly believed that he’d offered to marry her. But she’d been so shocked that he would be a steward that she hadn’t been able to hear what he was saying about his position as a member of the family, not just an employee. “I don’t know what else to do.”

Heavens above, she didn’t know where he was. “We might have to ask Lord Hull if he knows his direction.”

Lord Ashton bent and scooped up the paper. He tilted his head to the side. “Who is EC?”

The tin and almonds went flying and she ran over and snatched the small paper from his hand.

The scrap of paper was stained from the nuts, but she read the words that made her heart soar.

If you ever need me, send word. The direction of his uncle’s estate followed.

“You have to take me to him,” she said.

“Upon my honor, do you mean Mr. Cooper? Evan Cooper asked you to marry him?” Lord Ashton’s voice crested high.

“Yes.” She knew they would be too astounded to believe such a thing.

“And do you love him?” asked Annabelle.

Susanah went stiff at the question. Yet, she’d asked it of Evan not so long ago. And she would say anything to get them to agree to help her. “I don’t know, but I am alive when I am with him.”

They both watched her silently.

Heat rose in her face. “So quite possibly. How does one know?”

Lord and Lady Ashton exchanged a look that spoke of a shared understanding and a kind of affection she longed for.