Page 147 of The Earl She Once Saved

“I told Win so. She knows it, too.” Ezra glanced at him. “But Roland has returned. Last night her mistress disappeared, and Win did not know whether she would see her again. I asked her to leave on the very evening she was most frightened for her.”

“You did not know Verity would ride out.”

“No. Win says she cannot go now, not with things as they are. She will stay beside her as long as she is needed.”

Ezra rested both hands on the top of his cane. He did not complain of Win’s answer. That troubled Rafe more than anger would have done.

“I cannot fault her for it,” Ezra sighed quietly. “It is the steadiness in her that I love. I cannot ask her to put it aside because I have grown tired of waiting.”

Rafe looked past him to the daylight in the stable yard. He had been thinking since dawn of the promise he had made Verity on the moor: that she would not face Roland alone. Ezra had made no such promise to Win, yet he understood why she could not leave.

“Will you speak to her again?” Rafe asked.

“I have said what I can.” Ezra picked up the bridle and hung it where the groom would find it. “Perhaps I had better go to London alone after all.”

“You need not decide today.”

“I know.”

It did not sound like comfort. Rafe had no better words to offer him. He had faced Ezra across campfires when pain kept him awake and through the long journey home, when neither man knew what peace would ask of him. He could not mend this by insisting that Win change her mind.

Footsteps sounded on the cobbles. Roland entered the stable without a coat, his boots clean despite the mud in the yard. He glanced at the horses, then at Ezra’s cane.

“Here you are. I had supposed you might be halfway to London already, Bellamy.”

Ezra inclined his head. “My lord.”

“I have business with my brother.”

Ezra reached for the stall door. Rafe did not ask him to stay. He stayed, nonetheless.

Roland noticed. “It may be useful for you to hear it as well. After all, you will be leaving with him.”

Rafe turned to face him. “What business?”

Roland came a few steps farther into the aisle. “You made your feelings plain before half the county this morning. I shall now make mine plain to you. You are to offer for Celestine Marchmont, and soon.”

For a moment Rafe could only look at him. He thought of Celestine’s smile failing beneath the portico.

“No.”

Roland’s brows rose. “You heard me.”

“I heard you. I will not marry her.”

“The Marchmonts have encouraged the match for years. I have every reason to think she would accept you.”

“That does not give me a reason to ask.”

Roland lowered his voice. “You embarrassed her before Mrs. Fenwick and Lacey. An offer would put an end to the talk you have started.”

“I should have spoken to Celestine in private long before this morning,” Rafe declared. He allowed her to believe too much when he called upon her, and let Thursday’s dinner stand when he knew she expected more of him than a visit. “I owe her an apology for that. I owe her an honest answer. But in all honesty, I have already given the answer.”

“A gentleman repairs the harm he has done.”

“An offer I do not mean would harm her further. Celestine deserves a man who wants to marry her. I do not.”

He would speak to her when he could do so without another audience. Roland could not make a marriage out of her disappointment.