The Countess Conspiracy

He came down the path to stand in front of her. “Violet,” he whispered, “in what world do you think I would tell you that you were nothing to me?”

She looked up at him. Her eyes stung; she could scarcely breathe. “I just—I thought—” She couldn’t say it. “I thought that perhaps you didn’t want…”

“You think I don’t want to kiss you?” He raised an eyebrow. “Violet. You know better than that.”

She swallowed.

“I don’t want to make you feel worthless. I don’t want you to think that the only thing that matters is my lust.” He reached out and very slowly, laid his hand against her cheek. “When I told you that I loved you, Violet, what on earth did you think that I meant?”

She couldn’t answer. Her throat was too tight, and besides, she wasn’t even sure that she could make herself believe the truth. She’d been running from it too long to accept it.

“I meant,” he said softly, “that you are precious to me.”

She pulled her arms around herself. She wanted him to want her with abandon. She wanted to believe that she could make him lose his head and lose control. If he ever did, she’d hate him for it.

“I’m not a fair woman,” she choked out. “I want impossible, contradictory things. I’m all hard edges, Sebastian. Hard edges and crumpled pieces and broken bits of glass. There is no way for you to win in this.”

He didn’t contradict her. He just brushed her jawbone with his thumb, back and forth, a mesmerizing caress that made her want to shut her eyes and fall into his embrace.

“There is only one thing I know,” she finally said. “One thing that I am sure of.” She looked up into his eyes. “You are precious to me, too.”

He shut his eyes and exhaled.

“You should be furious with me,” Violet said. “I’m…impossible. Utterly impossible.”

But he smiled instead. “No,” he said. “You’re difficult. But then, Violet, if there is anyone who can work out an impossible problem, it is you. I trust you.”

Stupid, stupid Sebastian. Believing there was a way out of this? Her throat closed. He was an idiot. She wanted to scream at him to run away, to save himself. To fall in love with some other woman, someone who didn’t experience love as a series of sharp splinters embedded in her heart. She wanted to do all of that—and still she didn’t want him to leave.

“Don’t,” she told him. “I haven’t any trust in me at all.”

But he didn’t flinch away from her. “I know,” he said. “That’s why I’m trusting for both of us.”

She couldn’t say anything. Instead she stretched out her hand. He took it, folding his fingers around hers, and they stood, palm to palm, her heart beating in nervous, befuddled arousal.

He folded his hand around hers.

“This was never the way I imagined that this would go,” he finally said. “When we finally talked about this. I thought…”

“What did you think?”

“Honestly?” he gave her a little bit of a smile. “A few years ago, I started doing some scientific research of my own. I had an idea that when it was done, when I’d figured everything out and mapped it to precision, I could show you. Somehow, I always believed that when I gave that presentation, you’d finally understand how I felt.”

She tilted her head up and looked at him quizzically. “What kind of scientific research says…?” She couldn’t bring herself to say the word love. “…Says that you care for a woman?”

“Oh. Just a few crosses with some flowers,” he said with a wave of his hand. “It never really went anywhere. It’s…rather embarrassing. Maybe someday, I’ll figure it out. This way… It’s better for us all.”

She was still holding his hand. “Maybe,” she said softly. “But I’m curious.”

“What, you want the scientific talk?” He smiled. “Come, Violet. I know better than to woo you with confusing data sets.”

“Clearly, you don’t know me as well as you think. Confusing data sets are my specialty.” She inhaled. And it would be easier to try and accept what he’d told her if it were a data set: something laid out like a problem to be solved.

“It’s nothing like your work—not nearly as good—but…” He shook his head. He seemed nervous, of all things. After all they’d done together, all they’d said to one another.

“Oh, come on, Sebastian,” she said. “You can just give a little interim report at one of the weekly seminars. Everyone would love it. And I know you said you wouldn’t present my work anymore, but this is yours.”

He didn’t say anything.

“It’s been a week since I took a trip back to Cambridge,” she continued. “The gardeners make sure my plants don’t die, but I’m still responsible for all the crosses. Don’t you think you could…?”

She wanted him to make this clear. She wanted this to be a puzzle of the intellect, one she could think all the way through, rather than one of the heart.

“Oh, very well,” he said. “But… Violet, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

She looked up at him. “Is it very, very explicit then?”

He shook his head. “No.” He gave her a sad smile. “The only one who might find it objectionable at all would be you.”

Chapter Fourteen

“DO YOU KNOW WHAT’S GOING ON?”

Violet shifted in her chair at the front of the room, sliding an inch closer to her friend.

Jane Marshall was dressed almost demurely—for her—in a dark blue gown, one that had only a mild excess of ruffles. Two seats down from her sat Jane’s sister-in-law, Frederica Marshall. Miss Marshall—known to the family as Free—had begged to come, to see a real Cambridge lecture. It was hardly that, Violet thought, but still, the young woman looked about the room in avid interest. She seemed to drink in every ordinary detail: the wood panels on the walls, the chairs, worn and scratched from years of use, all lined up to face the front.

“Oliver tells me,” Jane continued in a whisper, “that Sebastian has been rather odd about this lecture. Nervous and secretive. As you and he are friends of such long standing, I thought…” She spread gloved hands. Her gloves, at least, were outrageous—spangled with little glass beads that had been sewn on the soft leather in the shape of peacock feathers.