Page 61 of A Hint of Scandal

Chapter Thirty

With the departure of the prisoners with the somewhat self-satisfied constable, and the downing of the brandy, an unexpected quiet momentarily fell over the interior of The Royal Oak. Max also heaved a heart-felt sigh of relief to match the one Serafina had just made.

Turning to their hostess, who was already pouring herself a second and even more generous measure of brandy, he reached a hand into the interior pocket of his coat for his wallet. “Madam, I won’t see you out of pocket for the loss of the custom of those two reprobates.” He jangled a few coins together, but didn’t yet hand them over.

The woman’s avaricious eyes fixed on them, her brandy glass arrested in its progress to her lips. She did have about her the appearance of someone fond of her tipple.

Max rubbed the coins together as though considering his offer. “I trust that if I compensate you well for their absence from your establishment, I can rely upon your discretion both now and in the future? My brother is not at all well, and I wouldn’t like it to come to his ears that our private business was the talk of the town.”

He held out a handful of coins, that glinted even in the subdued light of the taproom. Guineas, by the look of them, and far more than the landlady would have garnered from the letting of two rooms for a night or two. Enough, it was to be hoped, to keep her silent.

The woman held out her hand and Max dropped the coins into her palm. In an instant she had them secreted about her person. “You may rely upon me, Captain Aubrey, and so may his lordship your brother. He’s always been good to us here in Marlborough. I can keep my mouth as tightly closed as a knot in a bootlace. You mark my words. If anything of this gets out it won’t be from me. It’ll be that constable. I’ve always thought him a tattle-tale.”

Max nodded. “Thank you, Mrs.…?”

“Browne,” she said. “Margaret Browne, Captain.”

He nodded. “Thank you, Mrs. Browne. Much appreciated. I feel I will now sleep easy with the knowledge that this matter is sealed and will never be spoken of again.”

The incident seemed to have loosened Mrs. Browne’s previously frozen face muscles and she even managed a smile. Or it might have been the brandy, of course. Whatever the cause, having the local gentry in her establishment no doubt pleased her no end.

Max glanced across at Serafina, who was looking very pleased with herself and her detective work, and a little pink cheeked from the glass of brandy. Thank the lord she’d been with him. If it had been left to him, he probably would never have recalled that the woman they were looking for should have had blue eyes, and even if he had, he might not have noticed the discrepancy. Eye color wasn’t something he noticed very often, although not in Serafina’s case. How could he not notice those wide gray orbs?

A smile that was a peculiar mixture of relief and love spread across his face. “And I’ll never forget that I’ve you to thank for working out that woman was a base imposter. I’d never have done it alone.”

She broke into a wide smile, her eyes shining with the excitement of having succeeded. “It was an elementary conclusion, my dear Max. Mr. Paynter had given us such an excellent description, as soon as I laid my eyes on the woman, I knew her for a fraud. Besides which, did you not take a look at her face? Her dead sister might have been able to capture your brother’s heart, but not that woman, even if she’d shared her sister’s eye color.” She paused. “And right from the start, I’ve been certain there was something decidedly fishy about her making this claim now, with your brother so ill. I was straightaway looking for reasons not to believe her, and there one was, staring me in the face. Literally.”

Max couldn’t resist her infectious enthusiasm. On an impulse, he reached out and pulled her into his arms. “And now that’s done and my family is safe, we’d best do as you say and repair to the Misses Sedgewick’s shop and let them measure you for your wedding gown.” And he bent and kissed her on the lips. Her soft mouth yielded and her body seemed to melt into his. But they had to part. This was not the place for declarations of love.

Mrs. Browne’s eyes must have lit up at the mention of the wedding dress. There was even a proprietary look about her as though she thought herself partly responsible for their coming matrimony. “May I be the first to offer my congratulations to you both.” She bobbed a little curtsey. “And wish you many years of happiness together.”

Serafina’s face, so close to Max’s now, broke into an even wider smile, as she turned in his arms to regard their hostess, who now had a much more mellow air to her, as the second brandy had vanished. “Thank you, Mrs. Browne. And yes, if we don’t visit the dressmakers, I think my maid is going to think us a poor couple to work for who don’t ever do as we say.” And with that, she took Max’s arm, tucking her hand into its crook, the smile now all for him.

An enormous longing to be able to cover that small hand with his own useless right one swept over Max, to have as much contact as he could. Impossible. Resigning himself to that frustrating fact, with a final nod of thanks to Mrs. Browne, he escorted Serafina out of the inn, and headed her towards the Sedgewicks’ shop.

As it had stopped raining some time ago, after Serafina had now been measured and exclaimed over by the two Misses Sedgewick, she and Max returned to The Angel where Badger was patiently waiting beside the coach with Elsie.

With no intention of sharing the interior of the landau with her maid again, Serafina suggested Elsie should travel on the driving seat with Badger, a fact that seemed to please the girl. So, alone at last and deprived of further worry about claims on Julian’s estate, Serafina and Max mounted into their carriage, and Badger set it rumbling on its way towards Bratton once more.

As the buildings of the town vanished behind them, Serafina turned towards Max where he sat close beside her to find him staring at her with an intensity that made water of her bones. Oh, how often she’d longed to have him look at her in just this way, never expecting it to come true. Within the confines of her stays, her heart gathered pace, and warmth climbed from her breasts, up her neck to her cheeks.

She couldn’t miss the matching flush in his cheeks, nor the smoldering heat in his dark eyes. Yes, this must be what love was. This mysterious and uncontrollable longing to be with the one you loved, to give yourself to him freely, to melt into his arms. How awful it would have been to have lived her life without ever having known this. Or worse, to have had to control it forever because it wasn’t reciprocated. How lucky they both were to have met one another. The thought that if she hadn’t come to London with Letty, he would have met and married someone else in order to secure his inheritance, chilled her blood for a moment. How awful would it have been if they’d met next year, and still fallen in love, when it would have been too late then for this. She found her breathing coming fast and furious as though she’d been running and her mouth uncommonly dry. She licked her lips.

Max lifted his good left arm and cupped her chin in his hand. His skin felt warm against hers, as his thumb gently massaged her cheek. “You are so beautiful, my Serafina.”

Yes, she was his, and he was hers. The realization of this drenched her in heat and the urge to deny his words melted away. If he was saying she was beautiful, then she must be in his eyes, even if not in the eyes of anyone else. Nor even her own. “No one’s ever said that to me.” Her voice was hoarse.

“Then they’re fools.”

She managed a smile. If her heart beat any faster it was going to come leaping out of her mouth and land in his lap.

“I love you, my Serafina; my fiery angel.”

She blinked. He’d said the words. Words she’d never thought to hear anyone say to her. The only other person who’d loved her unconditionally until now had been her father. For the last eighteen years she’d lived without the love of any other person, starved of it, deprived. Letty and her brothers and sisters didn’t count. No one but her papa had ever loved her for who she was, rather than what she could do for them.

She swallowed. “I love you too, Max.” The words tumbled out, and every one of them seared into her heart. She was in love. She was loved in return. What more could she ever want?

He leaned closer, his face only inches from hers. “I’m very glad chance caused us to meet in that summerhouse, and I was forced to find myself a bride I thought I could tolerate living with. If neither of those things had happened, I’d never have met you.” His eyes bored into hers. “I liked you from the moment I met you, and if I hadn’t been such a fool, I’d have known it was love I was feeling much sooner than I did. I was an idiot. I didn’t think myself capable of love, nor of being loved. How wrong I was. Such a fool.”