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She was walking around the small drawing room as he sorted through the books the artist had left. From the bookshelf, he pluckedWalpole, Moliere, Madame de la Fayette,which seemed to entertain her endlessly. He stacked them up and moved over to the windows, prying them open to brush away some of the dust. The flat was on the fourth story, and it would have looked over most of London if not for the matching set of buildings on the other side of the road.
“All things considered, there are much worse places to hang one’s hat,” Charlotte mused from where she was poring over a dusted tome. She took a sip of her tea, looking at Benjamin with an easy smile.
Gentleness had become commonplace between them, shocking no one more than Benjamin himself. He felt grounded since his desperate proposal, since his argument with Gamston, too. The Duke had not said a word when their betrothal had been revealed, and Benjamin could not have been happier for it. He had spent little to no time revisiting Gamston’s concession, having no use for it. He would make his own way, with Charlotte or long after she had tired of him, and that way did not pass through the Duke’s duchy.
Benjamin turned from the window. “Decent reading?” he asked, rolling back down his sleeves.
Charlotte simpered. “As decent as one could hope for with a library like that. The Prince would surely hang us if he caught us reading such French diatribe.” Setting her teacup back down, she closed the book and got to her feet.
“Leaving so soon?” Benjamin picked up the stack of books, moving them to where she had been at the small table by the kitchen.
She paused before him, running a finger over the dusted cover ofLa Princesse de Cleves.He would have givenanythingto feel that same finger trailing down his spine. Since their engagement—a thing of artifice or not, it had still not been decided—they had barely shared a room, let alone anotherset of stairs.
“Father is still coming to terms with this whole ordeal. One wrong move and he will surely dissolve our union prematurely.” She hummed to herself, walking over to where she had left her coat. “I’d hate to pester Josie overlong, besides.” As always, the maid was out shopping while Charlotte tended to errands of a more personal nature.
He nodded, leaning over the chair she had been occupying. He could smell her on the wood. “I won’t keep you, then.” He looked toward the door, hoping it might jam and keep her trapped with him for all time. “I have a thing to collect in a bit—a new jacket or something of Pollock’s design for our engagement party.”
The affair was to be held in two days. It was the night they had resolved to tell Charlotte’s family his real name, not wanting to complicate matters even more and catch themselves in a lie. They would find his service history if they pried, and that was all. Having led a life of crime was not all without benefit, for Benjamin knew how to cover his tracks.
Charlotte swept her coat over her shoulders, its fur trim dancing at her jaw. “Before you do, there is a thing I must say.” Benjamin gestured for her to continue. “I am still debating how long to keep up our ruse, though you are aware we will not stall my father forever. He will expect a wedding before the end of summer, perhaps next winter if we are fortunate.” She paused to regard him. “This means that we will be seeing a lot more of each other in coming times.”
“You pronounce it like a death sentence, Char, but this is where I yearn to be.”
“Be that as it may, I have this to say—“ She let her arms fall to her sides, looking as though she was about to deliver a sermon of some sort. Whatever she had planned, it had been rehearsed. “I still do not believe I can trust you, not for all the luncheons we have spent together. It will take years for me to believe in you again, which is time we do not have.”
An odd thing to say, Benjamin thought, since she had made clear her distrust from day one. Still, he suffered the words like a pinch to the back of the neck. “I understand all of that, Charlotte. What I wonder is why you have felt the need to remind me.”
“Because I find myself not disliking the time we have shared, as ridiculous as that sounds.” She brushed a stray dark ringlet from where it had caught in her eyelashes. “So, I propose we end what has been a trial period and keep up this ruse until such a time as I am convinced of my… unmarriageable nature.” She paused and smirked. “On one condition.”
Steeling himself, Benjamin straightened and stepped toward her, his hip knocking against the corner of the table. “Anything.”
Charlotte allowed him to take her hand in his own, looking down at them as she said, “No more secrets, Benjamin.” Her brow ticced. “There can be no more secrets between us.”
The word,secrets, washed over him like a vat of ice water. For her to imply that there could be no more surely meant that she was unaware of all he had hidden from her. Namely, that she had not been told of his blood ties to the Duke of Gamston. He stared into her rich, brown eyes for a moment too long, debating whether or not to end all charade between them.
He could not. If Charlotte knew he was the Duke’s son, she might loathe him. Worse, she could encourage him to patch things up with his father and take up the mantle of the duchy when the time came. That might have been a fate worse than losing her.
Instead of saying all that, he merely nodded. Like a glove from a hand, she slipped away from him, drifting towards the door with a smile. She closed it behind her, and he was powerless to reveal his truth as she sweetly said, “Until next we see each other, Mr. Fletcher,” and let herself out.
Benjamin sagged against the wall and took a moment to berate himself. It seemed it was in his nature to pretend. Only, for as long as he had knowing what it meant, he had acted the gentleman, striving always to play a better man. No more.
He returned to the bookshelves, trying to busy himself before meeting Pollock at the tailor. Sorting through more tomes and placing them in a trunk to have them shipped off, his curiosity got the better of him and he began to read. He flicked through a book of poetry that he knew Charlotte would enjoy, resolving to set it aside for her. Atop it, he stacked another five novels, and soon, he had a shelf dedicated to her leisure. Perhaps, in the life they would build with one another, for however long, he could take up literature.
When he heard the door to his home creak open again, his heart leaped in his chest. She had come back for him. “Forgotten something, have you?” he purred, dusting off the clear middle shelf. She said not a thing, so he hung the damp dusting cloth from the doorknob to the sleeping room and turned the corner.
However, it was not Charlotte that had entered his home.
Dressed top to bottom in charcoal grey, his cropped brown hair having greyed at the edges, pinning back his coat in a way to reveal the glinting flintlock at his waist, a man stood in his small kitchen. A man he recognized all too well.
Captain Harper.
“You will leave this place at once,” he ground out without thought, suddenly consumed by burning anger. The sight of his captain was enough to make him feel sick and scare him into violence. The last time he had seen Harper, before the Richmond affair, he had promised to leave Benjamin well on his own.
“Come now, Benny. That’s no way to greet an old friend!” The stout man cast a glance over the flat, and he whistled his appreciation. “What a fine abode. You’ve certainly made a thing of yourself since last we met. One might wonder how—“
“Leave—or I shall cast you out.” Benjamin shook his head slowly, making sure this was not some living nightmare. “You and I are finished.”
His former captain clucked, and each turn of his tongue made Benjamin shiver. “You and I are finished when Isaywe are. Unless you fail to understand how debt works between us.”
