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“And was she alone?” Hugh couldn’t say what prompted him to ask that question, except he recalled that man from a couple weeks ago, the very one his wife had said to be insignificant. Worse, the letter of George wanting her to come back to him.
“Will you speak!” Caroline cried, her hands pressed against her chest.
“She was in the arms of a gentleman, your lordship,” he said stiffly. “She was being held intimately, and…her ladyship’s head rested on his shoulder. I…I was uncertain at the moment what I witnessed and turned away to offer her ladyship privacy. However, the carriage left, and it is now close to dinner time, and her ladyship has not returned. It has been hours, my lord. I, then, thought it prudent to inform you, though it is not my place to comment on her ladyship going and coming. I…I thought you would want to know.”
Caroline gasped and whirled to face him.
He lifted his hands. “Dismissed.”
The butler shuffled out, leaving an awful silence behind.
“He must have mistaken the matter,” Caroline said softly, tears springing to her eyes. “Perhaps she had to leave.”
“Without a farewell?” And in the arms of a man, with her head resting on his shoulder. Hugh was aware of the slow drumming of his heart.
“Did she…did she know our mother left in a comparable manner?” Caroline whispered, looking ashen. “That her lover came for mother in a carriage and she left without looking back?”
The awareness pressed like heavy stones against his chest, crushing and powerful. The anomaly of the sensations had Hugh freezing. Except his damn heart raced a furious pace, and he distantly became aware of Caroline moving closer to him, her lips moving. He did not like the sensations coursing through him one bit; they felt foreign, not a part of him or something he could control.
“It is not prudent to consider every situation through the eyes of what our mother did.”
Yet it would be foolish to dismiss all the lessons the old earl had taught him, and his own experience. His throat ached, and his hands, held so stiffly at his side, trembled as he rose them to sign, “I will be going to London.”
Caroline’s face creased in surprise. “London! Are you certain that is where Phoebe went?”
“I am certain.”
“How can you be so sure?”
He quickly relayed the information to his sister. “That is where her brother lives.”
Her eyes went wide. “But why would she ever go to him? Without thinking of Franny or you. That does not sound like Phoebe, Hugh!”
“Perhaps she was not willing.”
Caroline sent him a pitying look before shuttering her expression. “She…she was in the man’s arms, and he took her into the carriage. Based on Mr. Gervase’s account, that was from this morning. Over five hours have passed.”
“Franny will feel adrift without both our presence for a while.”
“You…you are bringing her home then?” Caroline asked with such hope it jolted him.
“I wasn’t aware there was another option.”
She bit into her lip. “Mother…she tried to come home a few years ago. Father…the old earl would not let her. I know if he was here now, he would tell you not to chase Phoebe and to let her go. I…I simply wasn’t sure what you were going to do.”
“Franny needs her mother. Of course I will bring my wife home.” Hugh also added, “She has not yet fulfilled her obligation in helping you to launch into society. She is not yet free to repay her debt of honor in this marriage of convenience.”
His heart still raced, and a weak-kneed feeling assailed him that had still yet to abate. Hugh was painfully aware that as he signed, his fingers had trembled, and he could not control his reactions. Or the sense of disquiet deepening in his gut. Or the doubt pressing against his heart.
“And do you need her, too? Are those really the only reasons you would go for her?”
“Of course I do not need her. If not for Franny’s sake and yours and William’s, would it matter?”
A wounded look appeared in Caroline’s eyes, but Hugh did not stay to ponder the matter. With rapid strides, he exited the drawing room, heading to his library. Once there, he drafted several notes to his solicitors in London and to his man of affairs. The Winthrop townhouse in Grosvenor Square, which had been closed for more than a decade, needed to be opened and fully staffed by the time he should arrive in London. They had only a few days to get everything tip top, and no expenses should be spared in making the townhouse presentable.
Once there, he would retrieve his wife and deal with the matter of her unexpected leaving.
Never chase after a woman. The old earl’s warning slid under his defenses like a well-aimed arrow. That is the surest way to give them too much power, my boy, and then before you know it, you are in a trap that you can never recover from.
