When he was finally alone in the yard, Evan turned back to Commodore. He examined the rough reddish-brown coat. Somewhere along the way, the horse had suffered a terrible injury. Was it in those terrifying moments at Salamanca as he had saved Evan’s life? Or had it happened later in another battle? Evan had been shot, hanging over Commodore’s neck, gripping his mane, telling himself over and over that he mustn’t fall off, that he had to get to the British line. Once he’d reached relative safety, he’d crashed to the ground, and that was all he could remember before waking up aboard a ship, being transported back to England to recover.
The horse’s wound had been stitched badly, and the scar was jagged and rough. Amazing he’d survived, that someone hadn’t put him out of his misery rather than treat him.
“Easy, boy. Easy.” He slowly shortened the lead rope. With a few snorts and stamps, the gelding let Evan touch his neck, his hide twitching and his tail swishing.
What a strange twist, that the very animal who had saved Evan’s life should arrive at White Haven. The Lord moved in mysterious ways.
“Sir?” Shand came under the archway into the stable yard. The horse skittered. “They’ve arrived then?”
“Yes, eight new ones today. Look at this, Sergeant. Remember this animal?” Evan turned, full of enthusiasm, but he froze when he saw Diana behind his steward. Lines of strain marred her beautiful face.
He felt a cad for his treatment of her, even as his righteous indignation rose up to justify his behavior.
“Why, sir, it’s old Commodore himself.” Shand kept his hands and his voice low, coming up on the horse’s off side. “I sure do remember you, old son. Look, my lady. It’s one of the horses from our old unit.”
Diana hung back, twisting her fingers at her waist, her teeth worrying her lower lip. Sunlight glinted off his military ring, the ring she still wore because he hadn’t gotten around to getting her something more suitable.
She looked as ready to flee as Commodore.
Shand stopped admiring the horse to look from Evan to Diana. The silence lengthened to the point of awkwardness, and Evan’s former sergeant turned steward rolled his eyes.
“Sir, my lady has news for you. I’ll take Commodore so you two can speak in private.” His tone bore a hint of censure, which only made Evan feel guiltier, and as a result, angrier. He wasn’t the one who’d lied, and yet he felt everyone was waiting for him to apologize.
Leading the big horse across the yard to one of the open boxes, Shand looked back once over his shoulder. His expression plainly said he thought Evan and Diana were both being foolish.
Evan’s neck felt stiff and his face warm as he walked toward his wife. With the easing of cold weather, she’d taken to wearing lighter gowns, and this one today, in pale lavender, picked out the golden flecks in her eyes and showed off her delicate neck and shoulders. As he approached, she looked everywhere but at his face. She was as tense as a fawn caught out in the open.
He stopped before her, studying the way the sunlight raced along her brown curls, at how the whiteness of the part down the center of her head made her look vulnerable. Several curls brushed her brow and cheeks, and he remembered how silky her hair was, entwined around his fingers. “Shand said you have news?” His voice was rough.
“Yes.”
Her tongue darted out to moisten her lips, and his eyes were drawn to the movement. Those sweet lips, so kissable … And yet they had lied to him, he reminded himself.
“Well?” he asked when she didn’t continue.
She swallowed. “Messengers have come from London. The prince and his retinue will be here in two days.”
Two days. He didn’t know whether to be glad or anxious. For weeks now, the visit had been the focus of nearly every decision, every purchase, every effort. And now it was upon them.
“There’s more.” She wrung her hands. “The messengers are my brother and Viscount Fitzroy. They’re at the house, and they claim they are staying through the prince’s visit.”
“In my house?” His voice rose, and his fists clenched. Diana flinched, and he realized what he’d said. “My house” instead of “our house.”
Percival and Fitzroy. He’d made it abundantly clear that he had no desire to see either of them again, and they were taking up residence in his—their—home?
Diana spread her hands. “What was I supposed to do? I’m not strong enough to throw them out. And they were sent by the prince.”
“I am strong enough to throw them out, the lot of them.” And angry enough to do it.
“Wait. Please.”
Her hand touched his arm, and he looked down at it, disconcerted that even that mild contact was enough to stir him.
“I need to know what you’re planning to do about Cian. Because I don’t know how much Percival and Fitzroy know. I mean, Percival knows about Cian of course, but I don’t know if he knows the baby is here with me. And Fitzroy doesn’t know about the baby, but he does know that Catherine fled London, and I don’t want him putting the pieces together. He’ll spread the news like a plague, and all of London will know. Even sparing that, both of them would tell my father, or else try to return the baby to him, expecting to be rewarded, I’m sure.”
Bleakness crossed her face and her tone. She looked up at him with those big brown eyes. She wasn’t begging, but she wasn’t far from it. What kind of man did she think he was? He might be upset with her for not telling the truth, but he wasn’t a monster. He wouldn’t give a dog he didn’t like to the Duke of Seaton, much less an innocent child.
Diana blinked hard. “Percival is sure to want money if he finds Cian is here. Money from you to keep it quiet or money from my father for bringing the baby back. Or possibly both, if he tries to play both ends against the middle.”
Money.
The word left a bad taste in Evan’s mouth. Before he had any money beyond his officer’s pay, his problems had been simple. Try not to get shot or blown up or bayoneted. Survive until tomorrow. Now that he was rich, his life was so complex he didn’t even know who he was anymore.
His troubles seemed to begin and end with the Seaton family. And Lord help him, he was married to one of them. And yet he didn’t really see her as a Seaton, not anymore. She was a Whitelock. He had thought she was beginning to feel like an Eldridge, but that had been a fantasy. He was an Eldridge, his parents were Eldrigdes, but Diana was an aristocrat, something he wasn’t and would never be. She could be Diana, Countess of Whitelock, but she’d never be just plain old Diana Eldridge.
“Let’s go greet our ‘guests,’ shall we?” He offered her his elbow, a temporary cease-fire of sorts. It wasn’t a capitulation, an admission of wrong, or a return to their previous accord, but he could pretend. He’d been doing it for so long now, pretending to be a gentleman, an estate owner, a member of the peerage, what was one more pretense thrown on the pile?
When they entered the house, Fitzroy strolled out of the drawing room, a glass in his hand.
It wasn’t Christian of Evan to feel such antagonism, and yet he couldn’t help it. He truly disliked the man. Diana must’ve felt the same, because her hand tightened on his arm and she sucked in a breath. At least they were reading from the same map in this, if nothing else.