An Affair in Winter (Seasons Book 1) (15 page)

Rosalinde blinked. She could have done just that, but she’d never thought of it. Perhaps because she had wanted that night with Gray as much as he had, so she couldn’t pretend she had been used when she was an equal party to the passion.

“No, I-I thought if I could get closer to him—”

Celia skittered back, her hand flying up to her face, but not before Rosalinde saw the horror of her expression. It cut her to the bone.

“You’re
still
bedding down with him?” Celia asked, her voice muffled by her fingers.

Rosalinde flinched at the stark description of her actions. Stark, but not inaccurate. She pushed to stand and straightened her shoulders.

“I have, yes.”

Celia let out a strangled sound and spun away, racing across the room as if getting away from Rosalinde would make this right, make it better.

“I thought you would flirt with him,” she gasped. “Not this!”

“But—”

“No! No! You know what he wants to do,” Celia all but sobbed. “How he is driven to hurt me and my chances of a future.”

“Yes,” Rosalinde admitted, and hated herself for the betrayal her beloved sister now felt. “Oh God, Celia, it wasn’t my intention to—”

“Your intention?” Celia cried out, spinning on her. “You want to speak to me about
intention
now?”

“Gray sees you as a potential harm to his brother,” she explained. “But he is not entirely unreasonable. I thought if I could grow closer to him, I could make him see—”

“That we Fitzgilberts have no morals? No control?” Celia interrupted.

Rosalinde recoiled at the accusation. “I—you don’t mean that.”

Celia shrugged, her voice calm even though tears were now streaming down her face. “How could I not? Thanks to Grandfather’s coldness, you and I have always been more than sisters. You were my best friend. I watched you dance around Martin Wilde and what did I tell you?”

Rosalinde swallowed hard. “I—you—” She dipped her head. “You told me it was a bad idea.”

Celia nodded. “I told you Grandfather would retaliate, I told you we might
both
suffer. But you declared you were in love, and so I closed my eyes and prayed I would be wrong.”

“You weren’t, though. He cut me off,” Rosalinde whispered. “And when he did, Martin realized there would be no great sum settled upon me, upon him, as he hoped.”

“Yes, we both know how your husband turned against you.” Celia stepped toward her. “But do you know what Grandfather did to
me
?”

Rosalinde drew back. “Did to you?”

“I always kept it from you, so you wouldn’t feel guiltier than you already did.” Celia lifted her chin. “He locked me in my chamber for a
week
. When he brought me out, it was only to read Bible verses which described punishments for disobeying the Lord, disobeying
him
. If I didn’t seem impressed enough by his readings, he made up punishments of his own. He let you escape, but he made it clear
I
never would.”

Rosalinde reached for her. “Oh, Celia. I didn’t know, I didn’t—”

“Of course you didn’t know. You were busy running off to marry, to thwart Grandfather, and only deal with the easiest of consequences.” Celia dodged her hand. “And when he told me that our father hadn’t actually died, as we’d always been told, and that if I did as he wanted, he would tell me about him…I was shattered, Rosalinde. And you were
gone
. I was left to deal with it alone.”

Rosalinde could hardly breathe as the full weight of her selfishness hit her. She had always only seen her own pain, but now Celia’s burned bright and accusatory.

“You suffered because of me. I cannot tell you how sorry I am.”

“When Martin died and you were going to be on the street, I had to
beg
to have you return,” Celia continued. “Grandfather was horrible, Rosalinde. It was almost unbearable to hear him disparage you, compare you to our mother and make you both sound so terrible.”

Rosalinde tried a weak smile for her. “But it worked. He allowed me back, not with open arms, but back nonetheless.”

“And it is
me
he rails to about you,” Celia said. “When he forced you to remain in London when we came here to begin final wedding preparations, do you know what the topic of conversation was the entire time in the carriage?”

“No,” Rosalinde whispered.

“How when you came, I had best control you so you wouldn’t ruin this engagement. That and how I better not let any romantic notions of a happy and loving marriage keep me from doing as I’d promised. He holds
me
responsible for both our behavior and now you do
this
. Do you know what he’ll do if he finds out?”

“He won’t find out.”

“Why? Because you fully trust this man who would destroy all my hopes with a wave of his hand if he could?” Celia asked, her tone flat and sarcastic.

Rosalinde flinched. She deserved her sister’s censure, but it cut her nonetheless.

“What can I do to earn your forgiveness?”

Celia stared at her, her face filled with disappointment and betrayal, but also love. Her sister still loved her, and Rosalinde clung to that.

“You said this man can be reasonable,” Celia whispered. “I’ve seen no evidence of that.”

Rosalinde thought of him. There were times when he could be so tender. Times when she could believe…

Well, she didn’t know what to believe.

“I think he could be.”

Celia didn’t look convinced, but she said, “Then perhaps that can be used to help us. I don’t want my future husband’s brother to despise me, to poison his family against me. See if you can talk to him, see if you can convince him that I am not so bad as he wants to believe. Perhaps you can even convince him to discuss his problems with me directly.”

Rosalinde nodded. “I can try, but…but that might mean I have to trust the man a little more. Give a little more.”

Celia stiffened, her aversion to that plan clear on her face. But she finally jerked her head up and down. “All right. If you believe that is best, I’ll agree to it.”

Rosalinde reached for her again, and this time Celia allowed her touch. She squeezed her sister’s fingers as she said, “I let you down. I know I did. But I vow to you, Celia, I will be sure never to do it again.”

Celia held her stare, but it was clear she didn’t fully believe Rosalinde. And that hurt the most. Her sister thought she was willing to sacrifice her for her own pleasure.

And Rosalinde was going to have to be certain she never did that again.

Gray entered the parlor, intent on grabbing a few cakes leftover from tea and then heading to his chamber to prepare for the night. But as he moved to the sideboard, someone cleared their throat from the corner of the room.

He turned to find Rosalinde and Celia’s grandfather, Mr. Fitzgilbert, sitting in a chair, the paper he’d been reading now draped over his lap.

Gray stiffened. He liked this man even less than he liked Celia. And yet his conversation earlier with Rosalinde in the stable, when she’d said she and her sister were women under the rule of men…well, it rang in his ears.

This was an opportunity to find out more not only about Celia, but also about Rosalinde. To understand what she meant when she whispered those bitter, painful words.

“Good afternoon,” he said, bringing his plate to the chair opposite Fitzgilbert. “I seem to have missed tea with the others, but would you mind if I joined you?”

Fitzgilbert shrugged one shoulder as he folded his paper and set it aside. “Of course not. I admit I have been very interested in speaking to you, Mr. Danford.”

Gray met the older man’s stare evenly. “Have you now?”

“Indeed, I hear so many interesting stories about you from both gossip and your own family. I wonder if they can all be true.” Fitzgilbert smiled, but there was little realness to it. He was pandering.

“I am eager to hear what tales are being told,” Gray drawled.

Fitzgilbert crossed his legs. “They say that though you were raised a gentleman, you have become a man of business.”

“I have.”

He waited for the other man’s reaction. There were only two responses most in their sphere displayed when hearing Gray had decided not to sit on his ass and watch his inheritance dwindle to nothing, all while he pretended to still be rich.

Disgust…or interest.

Fitzgilbert was hard to read as he steepled his fingers and examined Gray. “An interesting thing, though I suppose you had little choice what with your family’s…
issues
.”

Gray stiffened. “Issues?” he repeated.

Fitzgilbert shrugged. “Come, we can be honest, can’t we? Discuss things plainly.”

“I’m not sure what it is you wish to discuss.”

“It’s no secret that your brother needs my granddaughter’s dowry.” Fitzgilbert reached out to grab his teacup from the table beside him. He took a slow sip before he said, “Some of the best marriages start that way.”

Gray nodded slowly. His dislike for this man was growing by the moment and yet he didn’t pull away. Fitzgilbert had opened a door that led to the answers Gray wanted.

“Some men wouldn’t see it that way. It seems to be in vogue at present to encourage love matches.”

Fitzgilbert wrinkled his nose in disgust. “What use is it to have children or grandchildren if one cannot increase one’s value through them? Encourage a love match? That is pure poppycock.”

“How did you further yourself through Rosalinde’s first marriage?” Gray prodded, trying to remain nonchalant.

Fitzgilbert’s eyes narrowed, his face twisting with cruelty. “That nothing she married? Laughable. Rosalinde has never brought me anything but heartache. She is an out of control, impertinent she-devil who lives to torment me when I was kind enough to take her in. I should have taken her to a foundling hospital. I’ve told her so a dozen times since I took her in.”

Gray flinched at the icy tone of his companion’s voice. At the cruelty in his eyes.
This
was what Rosalinde had endured her entire life. It was no wonder she was so protective of her sister.

“I can’t imagine you would say something like that to a child,” Gray said, now through clenched teeth.

“If it keeps a child in line, why wouldn’t I?” Fitzgilbert sputtered. “If I’d done the same with that mother of hers, we never—”

Gray straightened up as the other man cut himself off. He could see from the expression on his face that he’d gone too far, revealed too much.

“Your daughter?” he pushed.

Fitzgilbert sniffed. “Such as she was.”

Gray was stunned by the coldness. This man’s daughter had died, leaving him with two young children to raise, and he couldn’t even bother to look sad at that fact. He was truly a bastard.

But a bastard who had given Gray an insight. Rosalinde had run off with a man of no title or money and it had angered Fitzgilbert. More importantly, it also reminded him of his own daughter.

Gray had looked into the history of Celia’s parents in the past. It was vague, at best. Their mother had at some point gone to live with relatives, where she had married a gentleman who no one seemed to be able to identify. When she and her husband died, Fitzgilbert had come to collect his grandchildren. But it had always been curious to Gray that their grandfather had insisted they go by his last name rather than that of their father.

Who had that man been? And why did Rosalinde and Celia’s mother inspire such hatred in her own father?

More to the point, could the answers to those questions be Celia’s undoing? If the scandal was big enough, it was possible straight-laced Stenfax would shy away from it.

Gray’s investigator was already working on the answers to those exact questions, but now more than ever he felt this might be the path. He’d have the results of their investigations in a couple of days, when he expected his reports to be brought in by friends who were attending the wedding.

“It’s interesting you have so many questions about my family’s past,” Fitzgilbert said, drawing Gray’s attention back to him. “After all, you have not exactly made it a secret that you don’t approve of Celia and Stenfax’s match.”

Gray arched a brow. So now they were to the heart of it. “Celia told you this?”

“She was blubbering about it to her sister and I overheard. Though it wasn’t so hard to believe. Anyone with eyes in their heads can see how you glare at her.”

“And you think I’ve judged her too harshly?” Gray asked, preparing for a defense of Celia from this man, just as he’d received defenses of her character from Rosalinde.

Instead Fitzgilbert stared at him blankly. “I don’t give a damn how you judge her. She’s hardly worth considering, in truth. But what
is
worth considering is that your brother has already agreed to this union, sir. We have signed papers and arranged for monies to be exchanged. Monies that your family so desperately needs.”

Gray drew back. “This is beginning to sound like a threat, Mr. Fitzgilbert.”

“You may take it however you would like to take it.” Fitzgilbert said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “It matters little to me. What may matter on a larger scale is how your family will survive if this money was taken away.”