Tempt Me at Twilight (The Hathaways #3)(25)

Poppy saw the impatience on her sister’s face, and she knew that Amelia was prepared to fight him on every point, for her sake. But she held Amelia’s gaze and shook her head, sending the silent message, It’s no use. Michael had already decided on his course. He would never defy his father. Arguing would only make him more miserable than he already was.

Amelia closed her mouth and turned to stare out the window again.

“I’m sorry,” Michael said after a long silence, still gripping Poppy’s hands. “I never meant to deceive you. Everything I told you about my feelings—every word was true. My only regret is that I wasted your time. Valuable time for a girl in your position.”

Although he hadn’t meant that as a slight, Poppy winced.

A girl in her position.

Twenty-three. Unmarried. On the shelf after her third season.

Carefully she drew her hands from Michael’s. “Not a moment was wasted,” she managed to say. “I am the better for having known you, Mr. Bayning. Please don’t have any regrets. I don’t.”

“Poppy,” he said in an aching voice that nearly undid her.

She was terrified that she might burst into tears. “Please go.”

“If I could make you understand—”

“I understand. I do. And I will be perfectly—” She broke off and swallowed hard. “Please go. Please.”

She was aware of Amelia coming forward, murmuring something to Michael, efficiently shepherding him out of the suite before Poppy lost her composure. Dear Amelia, who did not hesitate to take charge of a man much larger than herself.

A hen chasing a cow, Poppy thought, and she let out a watery giggle even as hot tears began to slide from her eyes.

After closing the door firmly, Amelia sat beside Poppy and reached out to grasp her shoulders. She stared into Poppy’s blurred eyes. “You are,” she said, her voice ragged with emotion, “such a lady, Poppy. And much kinder than he deserved. I am so proud of you. I wonder if he understands how much he has lost.”

“The situation wasn’t his fault.”

Amelia tugged a handkerchief from her sleeve and gave it to her. “Debatable. But I won’t criticize him, since it won’t help matters. However, I must say . . . the phrase ‘I can’t’ comes rather too easily to his lips.”

“He is an obedient son,” Poppy said, mopping at her tears, then giving up and simply wadding the handkerchief against her flooding eyes.

“Yes, well . . . from now on, I advise you to look for a man with his own means of support.”

Poppy shook her head, her face still buried in the handkerchief. “There’s no one for me.”

She felt her sister’s arms go around her. “There is. There is, I promise you. He’s waiting. He’ll find you. And someday Michael Bayning will be nothing but a distant memory.”

Poppy began to cry in earnest, wracking sobs that caused her ribs to ache. “God,” she managed to gasp. “This hurts, Amelia. And it feels as if it will never end.”

Carefully Amelia guided Poppy’s head to her shoulder and kissed her wet cheek. “I know,” she said. “I lived through it once. I remember what it was like. You’ll cry, and then you’ll be angry, and then despairing, and then angry again. But I know of a cure for heartbreak.”

“What is it?” Poppy asked, letting out a shuddery sigh.

“Time . . . prayer . . . and most of all a family that loves you. You will always be loved, Poppy.”

Poppy managed a wavering smile. “Thank God for sisters,” she said, and wept against Amelia’s shoulder.

Much later that night, there came a determined knock at the door of Harry Rutledge’s private apartment. Jake Valentine paused in the act of laying out fresh clothes and polished black shoes for the morning. He went to answer the door and was confronted by a vaguely familiar–looking woman. She was small and slight, with light brown hair and blue gray eyes, and a pair of round spectacles perched on her nose. He considered her for a moment, trying to place her.

“May I help you?”

“I wish to see Mr. Rutledge.”

“I’m afraid he’s not at home.”

Her mouth twisted at the well-worn phrase, used by servants when the master didn’t wish to be disturbed. She spoke to him with scalding contempt. “Do you mean ‘not at home’ in the sense that he doesn’t want to see me, or ‘not at home’ in the sense that he’s actually gone?”

“Either way,” Jake said implacably, “you won’t see him tonight. But the truth is, he really isn’t here. Is there a message I may convey to him?”

“Yes. Tell him that I hope he rots in hell for what he did to Poppy Hathaway. And then tell him that if he goes near her, I’ll murder him.”

Jake responded with a complete lack of alarm due to the fact that death threats against Harry were a more or less common occurrence. “And you are?”

“Just give him the message,” she said curtly. “He’ll know who it’s from.”

Two days after Michael Bayning had visited the hotel, the Hathaways’ brother Leo, Lord Ramsay, came to call. Like other men-about-town, Leo leased a small Mayfair terrace during the season, and at the end of June retreated to his estate in the country. Although Leo could easily have chosen to live with the family at the Rutledge, he preferred privacy.