The Runaway Countess Read online

‘Which I did—and more, much more there in the summerhouse.’ Her cheeks suddenly turned pink, and she turned away. ‘No, it wasn’t all bad. I was just so young then, so foolish. I thought everything would always be just that way.’

  ‘We aren’t so young now, Jane. We’ve been married five years and spent barely two of those years together,’ Hayden said, suddenly feeling very urgent. Somehow they had to connect again. ‘Surely we can talk. Perhaps I could even make you see me as you once did. The real me.’

  For she was the only one who had ever truly seen him, just him, Hayden the man and not the earl. The man he was and the man he really wanted to be. And like an idiot he had thrown that rare treasure away.

  Emma came running back in just at that moment, not giving Jane time to answer. But she did smile at him and, for the moment, that would have to be enough. Until he put his plan in order.

  ‘Keep your eyes closed,’ Hayden said sternly as he helped his wife down from the carriage.

  Jane laughed and shook her head, but she didn’t move away from his guiding hands on her shoulders or try to remove the blindfold tied over her eyes. ‘This is ridiculous, Hayden! I have seen your town house before.’

  ‘It wasn’t my town house,’ he said. ‘It was my parents’. More accurately, my mother’s since my father did not care for it. But now it is our town house. I’ve had it completely refurbished, attics to kitchens, to make it ours.’

  He helped her up the marble steps just as Makepeace, the butler who had presided over this place ever since Hayden was in leading strings, opened the front door and gave a deep bow. ‘Welcome home, my lord, my lady. I trust you had a pleasant time in the country.’

  ‘Most refreshing, thank you, Makepeace,’ Hayden said.

  Jane stumbled a bit on the top step, but Hayden held her fast with his strong arms. Refreshing said the very least of it. It had been—amazing. Beautiful. Transcendent. She had never imagined being so close to another person could be so wonderful.

  He led her through the grand rooms, the beautiful drawing room decorated in the very latest à la greque fashion, the music room with its gilded pianoforte and harp, the dining room with its vast expanse of polished table and many, many perfectly aligned, brocade-cushioned chairs waiting for elegant parties.

  Parties she would have to host.

  A full-length portrait of Hayden’s beautiful black-haired mother, in full countess splendour in velvet robes and coronet, peered down at her haughtily from her carved frame. A little white dog peeked out from her fur-trimmed hem, but it didn’t make her look at all cosy. She looked rather fearsome. And now her job was Jane’s. Her world was Jane’s and it was one Jane knew hardly anything about.

  Suddenly some of her silvery glow of happiness tarnished at the edges.

  But Hayden still held her hand, and she clung to it. He led her up the stairs and into a large suite of rooms, all done in blue-and-silver satin, with a massive carved bed curtained and draped in blue velvet and piled with embroidered cushions. A dressing gown, all frothed with swathes of tulle, was spread with a dazzling array of silver and crystal pots and bottles and brushes.

  ‘And this is yours,’ Hayden announced proudly. ‘I had it completely redecorated for you in a way you would love. My room is right there through that door, so we can be together every night.’

  Together every night. Jane wished the night would start right away as she stared around the overwhelmingly elegant room. A room fit for a countess. A room fit for a woman she was not. How could she make this room, this life, her own?

  She suddenly felt very, very cold. Ramsay House had been a dream and she was waking up.

  She slowly untied the ribbons of her bonnet and looked about for somewhere to put it down. A maidservant she hadn’t even seen bustled over to take it with a curtsy.

  ‘Do you like it?’ Hayden said confidently. He was already sure she had to. It was the best of everything after all.

  But it was not the room she would choose. A comfortable, shabby, pretty pink room for reading and talking—and kissing. ‘It is beautiful.’

  ‘I’m very glad to hear it.’ Hayden kissed her cheek quickly and strode towards the closed connecting door. ‘Settle in, enjoy yourself. Ring for the servants if you need anything at all. I’m going to change my clothes and go to the club just for a while. It’s been some time since I’ve seen my friends.’

  ‘The club!’ Jane whispered. He was leaving her, right now, all alone in this new house.

  ‘Just for a short time. You must be tired from the journey, you won’t want me hanging about while you rest. Mary will bring you supper here on a tray, won’t you, Mary?’

  ‘Of course, my lord,’ the maid said quickly. ‘I am here to help her ladyship with anything at all.’

  ‘There you go, my dear,’ Hayden said with a smile. He was obviously happy to be back in town. With or without her. ‘Look around the house, let me know if you want to change anything.’

  And then he was gone, the door swinging closed between them. Jane slowly sat down on a chaise by the marble fireplace and shivered, wishing a fire was laid. But it wasn’t the chilly house making her cold. It was the sudden realisation, as quick and unwelcome as a dunking in a snowbank, that this was her life now, her life as a countess. And she had no idea how to begin it.

  Chapter Seven

  ‘Lord Ramsay sent this to you, my lady,’ Hannah announced, in a grand voice Jane had never heard from the maid before. ‘Grand’ was never required at Barton.

  She looked up in surprise from the trunk she was sorting through with Emma. Hannah stood in the bedchamber doorway, holding out a neatly folded note on a silver tray she had unearthed from somewhere.

  ‘Isn’t Lord Ramsay downstairs, Hannah?’ Jane asked, dusting off her hands on her apron.

  ‘Yes, my lady. In the old library.’

  ‘Then why would he…?’ Jane stared at the note. Yesterday in the maze, and then later at dinner with Emma, had been—different. Laughing with Hayden, talking with him rather than quarrelling, she was sure she caught a glimpse of the man she once thought she had married. He seemed serious, interested in life at Barton. There was even a strange, swift flash of sadness she couldn’t quite work out, lost quickly in the laughter of a game of Pope Joan with Emma.

  But then today the rain started again and Hayden retreated to her father’s dusty old library. Now he was sending her notes instead of coming to talk to her. She was completely baffled by him.

  ‘Aren’t you going to read it?’ Emma asked.

  Jane suddenly realised Emma and Hannah were staring at her, their eyes wide with curiosity. ‘Yes, of course,’ she said briskly and reached for the letter.

  It wasn’t sealed, and when she unfolded it she saw Hayden’s familiar bold, untidy scrawl. She remembered the last time she saw that handwriting, on the notes he would secretly send her behind her aunt’s back when they were courting. She still had them, carefully tied up in ribbon at the bottom of her jewel case, unread since those heady days.

  Would you do me the honour of having supper with me in the dining room at seven this evening? Sincerely, Hayden.

  Jane almost laughed aloud at the absurdly formal words.

  ‘What is it, Jane?’ Emma asked.

  ‘He invites me to dine,’ Jane answered, folding the note and tucking it in her apron pocket. ‘In my own house?’

  ‘Indeed?’ Emma said. Her voice sounded far too innocent. Jane turned to study her sister’s face, which was written with a comical expression of false surprise.

  ‘What do you know about this?’ Jane demanded.

  ‘Why, nothing at all! It sounds as if he would just like to spend time with you,’ Emma said. ‘Maybe he’s just not sure you want to spend time with him.’

  Spend time with Hayden? Once that had been all Jane wanted in the world, but it had never come to pass. He was always rushing away somewhere.

  But now he was here in her house, trapped by the weather and his injury, and he wanted to din
e with her. What would they even have to say to each other, after all this time?

  Yet she had to admit—she was curious. And just the tiniest bit excited.

  ‘Will you go?’ Emma asked.

  ‘Of course. I have to eat some time,’ Jane said. She turned back to Hannah. ‘You may tell his lordship I will meet him in the dining room at seven.’

  Emma clapped her hands as Hannah left with the message. She whirled back to the trunk they had been sorting through and tossed out a pile of gowns. They spread over the faded carpet like a vivid rainbow of shimmering silks and delicate muslins.

  ‘What will you wear?’ Emma said. She caught up a pale blue silk trimmed with dark blue velvet ribbons and pearl beading. ‘This one? It’s very pretty and the colour would look splendid with your eyes.’

  Jane knelt down to study the tangle of dresses. Much like Hayden, they seemed like visitors from another world, this rich array from the finest London modistes. She had brought out the trunk only a few weeks ago when Emma needed a dress for the assembly. Once upon a time, shopping for these gowns had been a consolation to her, a refuge of sorts. She hadn’t wanted to see them, remember the places she once wore them. The grand parties where she hadn’t been able to measure up to society beauties.

  The blue gown had gone to a reception at Carlton House, where she had dined amid the most luxurious of furnishings and watched tiny fish swim down a channel along the middle of the dining table. Where there was music and champagne and buffet tables piled with delicacies, all for the most illustrious people in the land. But what she remembered from that night was watching Hayden laughing and whispering with the statuesque, red-headed Lady Marlbury.

  A woman who was rumoured to have been Hayden’s mistress before he married. And that night it looked very much as if they were renewing the connection.

  Jane carefully laid aside the blue gown and took up a pink muslin trimmed with cherry satin and froths of cream-coloured lace. It had gone to a garden party, which she had attended alone with some so-called friends. Hayden wasn’t even there.

  ‘This one, I think,’ Jane said.

  ‘It’s very pretty. You should let me dress your hair,’ Emma said. ‘We could use some of the red rosebuds from the garden to make a wreath.’

  Her sister sounded far too enthusiastic about hair and gowns. ‘Emma, did you have a hand in this strange dinner invitation?’

  Emma started to shake her head, but then she nodded sheepishly. ‘Not very much, though. When I showed Hayden the library this morning, he asked me to help him inspect the dining room, too. That’s all. Really, Jane, I think he just wants to talk to you alone, in a civilised setting.’

  ‘But why go to the trouble? He only needs to come up here and ask to talk to me.’ Though Jane was sure they had said everything they needed to say to each other. Talking now would only rip open old wounds. Make her want things she knew were lost, just as she had when Hayden laughed with her last night.

  Emma shrugged. ‘I don’t know. But I do think he wants to try to fit in here. Just be nice to him, Jane, please.’

  ‘I’m always nice!’ Jane protested. And she had tried with Hayden. Tried until she couldn’t bear to try again.

  She slipped her hand into her apron pocket and felt the crackle of the note there. Maybe, just maybe, she could dig deep and find it in herself to try one more time? Just for dinner?

  ‘Help me find the pink slippers that go with the gown, Emma,’ she said. ‘They should be in here somewhere…’

  Emma hummed a little tune as she skipped down the stairs, Murray’s claws skittering on the wooden floor behind her. From behind the closed dining-room door she could hear the sound of furniture being moved, the clink of fine porcelain and silver being unpacked, and upstairs Jane was dressing in some of her pretty London clothes.

  It was more activity than Barton had seen in a very long time and it felt as if the house was waking up around them. As if a whole new day was dawning.

  Emma turned towards the library and gave a little spinning turn on the newly polished floor. Everything was going so very well. Jane looked happier, smiling more, even laughing, and no one deserved to be happy more than her sweet sister did. And Hayden wasn’t the ogre Emma had come to imagine when she had seen how distant Jane was in their first weeks back at Barton last year.

  Emma didn’t know the whole tale of her sister’s marriage. Jane had never been one to confide her troubles in anyone else, just as Emma never told Jane about Mr Milne. But Emma’s imagination had filled in tales based on novels she read about city lives and gossip from the girls at her old school. Hayden became almost a monster of unkindness and rakedom in her mind.

  But when she found him injured on the road and brought him home, she’d seen he wasn’t what she imagined. He seemed almost like Jane. Sad—seeking.

  Of course, that didn’t mean Emma wouldn’t kill him if he dared hurt Jane again.

  She closed the library door behind her and hurried to the shelf where she spent so much time, the section that held volumes and documents on the history of Barton and the neighbourhood. That was where she had found the original journal and where she had come to think the maze held the secrets to the treasure. She had to keep on with the hunt; she was so close now.

  Jane slowly made her way down the stairs, hugging her wool shawl closer around her shoulders. Somehow the house, her house, felt strange, as if she walked through halls and rooms she had never seen before. Lamps were lit along the way, the flickering amber light blending with the waning daylight streaming through the windows. It made everything look magical.

  Jane pressed her hand against her stomach to still the nervous flutters. It was ridiculous to be anxious. She was merely going to have a meal in her own house, with Hayden.

  Alone with Hayden. That was the uncertain point. For such a long time, when they were alone they either fought or fell into each other’s arms. Neither had ever done them much good. She’d spent all those months at Barton trying to forget and find a way to move forwards.

  She’d even thought she had moved forwards, until he suddenly appeared on her doorstep. Until yesterday, when she saw that swing and remembered all the good things that once were. Until he laughed with her and Emma, as if the past was truly past.

  She hurried through the drawing room, towards the closed double doors that led into the dining room. They seldom used those rooms any longer and the furniture was shrouded with canvas covers. It made everything feel even stranger, more unreal, as did the echoing quiet of the house. Usually Emma and her dog were running around, the cook was banging pots and pans as loudly as she could in the kitchen and Hannah was singing as she dusted.

  For such a small household, they made a lot of noise. Far more than the fully-staffed, impeccably run London house. But tonight even Emma was being quiet.

  Jane paused as she reached for the door handle. She couldn’t hear anything in the dining room. What if Hayden wasn’t really there? What if he had changed his mind and run off back to London, despite the muddy roads?

  Half-sure she would find the room empty, she pushed open the door.

  The long table, which had been covered and empty for so long, was polished to a high gleam, set off by dozens of candles lit along its length and set on the sideboard. Two places were set at the far end with her mother’s china and silver that had been packed away for safekeeping, and wonderful, enticing scents of cinnamon and stewed fruit emanated from the covered dishes on the sideboard. Her mother’s portrait had even been taken from the attic and hung back in its old place on the faded wallpaper.

  Jane took it all in, amazed at the transformation, until her gaze landed on Hayden. He stood behind the chair at the head of the table, dressed in a fine velvet-trimmed blue coat and faultlessly tied cravat, his glossy black hair smoothed back from his face.

  ‘Have I suddenly been transported to a different house?’ she said with a laugh. ‘This can’t possibly be Barton Park.’

  A smile cracked his
cautious façade and he hurried over to take her hand. He raised it to his lips for a soft, lingering kiss, and Jane shivered at the sensation of his mouth on her skin. It had been so very long since she had felt that. She’d forgotten the immediate, visceral reaction she always had to his touch.

  ‘It’s amazing what a bit of polish can do,’ Hayden said as he led her to the chairs. ‘Emma found the china and most of the candle holders in the attic, along with the portrait.’

  ‘I knew she was up to something!’ Jane cried. ‘She is becoming much too good at subterfuge.’ She sat down in the chair Hayden held out and arranged her skirts as she watched him sit down next to her. The candlelight shimmered over him, turning his skin to purest pale gold.

  ‘She seemed very excited to help me set up a small surprise for you,’ Hayden said. He reached for a ewer of wine and filled their glasses. ‘She agrees with me—you work far too hard here.’

  Jane sipped at the sweet, rich red liquid and wondered where he’d unearthed it. ‘I told you, I like the work. It keeps me occupied.’

  ‘And there was nothing to keep you occupied in London?’

  Jane set the glass down with a thump. ‘Did you bring me here to quarrel again, Hayden?’

  He shook his head. ‘The very last thing I want to do is quarrel with you, Jane. I’m so weary of that and you deserve better.’

  ‘Do I?’ She swallowed hard past a sudden lump in her throat. She did deserve better; they both deserved better than the half-life they had lived together. She’d always wanted him to see that, to tell him that things could be different, but she had never found the right words. Until she didn’t believe it herself.

  Hannah hurried in with a tureen of soup and Jane couldn’t say anything at all. As they sampled the first courses of what looked like the most elaborate meal Barton had seen in a long time, she asked him about his friends in London, how Ramsay House was faring, anything but the two of them. Anything but what happened between them before.

  Anything but the lost babies.

  And slowly, as the candles sputtered lower and the darkness gathered outside, as Hannah served the elaborate meal and more wine was poured, something very strange happened. Jane started to enjoy herself.