A Stolen Season: Bath: A Stolen Season Book 2 Page 2

  Cait popped a bean into her mouth, a forced smile on her lips as she took in her husband, who now was running a hand down his lover's arm. "Because I'm a marchioness here and forced to eat dinner with a whore. I do not think there is much to celebrate, do you?" she stated matter-of-fact, long having given up the pretense of liking either person with whom she shared her meal or what they ordered her to endure.

  "How dare you?" Fanny spat, turning to the marquess. "de Vere, tell her to watch her tongue. She cannot speak to me in that way."

  Cait met her husband's eyes, daring him to tell his wife not to speak to a Covent Garden doxy in that way when she was the marchioness. Her family's wealth enabled her bastard husband to have a roof over his head. He would not dare insult her more than he already did with the ludicrous marriage situation.

  "Now, now, Fanny. As I have stated before, you must ignore Catriona. She is jealous of what you have, and she never shall, that is all."

  Cait scoffed and then chuckled, unable to hide the mirth of such an absurd declaration. "You must be joking, my lord. I never cared for our marriage," she stated, finishing off her wine and pushing her chair back to leave. "Nor do I care what you do or how many whores you bring to your bed so long as you leave me alone." Which was true. The thought of his Lordship darkening her bedroom door sent a shiver of repulsion down her spine.

  "My dearest de Vere would never break the bond he shares with me, not even for his wife," Fanny stated, smirking.

  Cait no longer cared what either of them said or did. She had sat idle in Bath for three years, walking the grounds two miles out of the city and rarely socializing as she once had. But no more. She was determined to reenter society and had already taken steps in gaining accommodation and reintroducing herself to her lost friends. She would enjoy Bath society this year and travel to London next.

  She walked from the room, damming the marquess and his whore to the devil.

  Chapter 3

  Nigel, the Marquess de Vere, narrowed his eyes on his wife as she left the dining room, knowing that her growing argumentative and recalcitrant nature of late would never do, nor would he stand for it.

  How he loathed the woman he married, a rich heiress who was only good for one thing—her blunt. He couldn’t care less what she did with her life or if she lived at all, and that was the crux of his problem.

  He needed her gone. With her death, he would come into what remained of her inheritance. The hundreds of thousands of pounds her brother had safely stowed away in trust to keep her safe from men such as himself.

  It was implied he had married the chit for her money and nothing else. She was rich beyond his dreams. What sane man did not want such a union? Thankfully her parents required a title and were willing to sell their daughter for one. The marriage had saved his estates from ruin and kept him and his mistress in the life of luxury they were accustomed to, but even her funds only went so far, and of late, he was starting to run low.

  She, therefore, had to be dispensed, and by any means available to him, including eliminating her from the earth permanently. But how?

  "Darling, you are not going to let Catriona go into Bath and socialize. People will expect you to attend with her, and I will not be left alone here at the hall on my own like some sullied secret you are ashamed of."

  "Never, my love," he cooed, reaching out to take Fanny's hand. "Let her have her time in Bath, you know her participation in society is limited, and it would be cruel of us not to let her have her experience while she can."

  A knowing smile lifted his lover's lips. Fanny was well aware of what he wished to do, and under the understanding that she would be the next Marchioness of de Vere, agreed to speak of it to no one and was more than happy to help him gain what he wanted.

  To obtain all the money they would ever require in their life, he merely had to remove his wife. And he would. There was nothing standing in his way.

  * * *

  Richard strolled into the pump rooms and held back his awe at all its nineteenth-century glory. Polished wood floors, windows that spanned the length of the room and rose from floor to ceiling. People strolled about in a long, circular motion while others stood in the middle of the room, talking and catching up on scandals and gossip.

  Sarah and Eric joined a couple standing in the center of the room, and it took Richard only a few seconds to recognize the lady as Lady Anita. She gasped and smiled when she remembered him, and he kissed her cheeks in welcome, having missed their banter the past few years.

  "Richard, how lovely to see you again. You remember my husband, Lord Drake?"

  Richard bowed. "It is good to see you again, my lord. Congratulations on your nuptials, although I'm a few years late in giving them to you."

  "Oh, never mind that, we're so thankful you have returned." Lady Anita turned to Sarah. "You did not tell me your brother was traveling to England. You have surprised us all."

  Sarah laughed, and Eric threw him a knowing smile. "It was short notice for Sarah too, but I'm thankful to be here and seeing you all again. I feel like it has been two hundred years since I saw you last."

  Sarah chuckled, holding tight to her husband's arm and showing Richard without words how happy and settled she was in this time. It made him glad to see her so contented. She had been so heartbroken when she returned to the future. Upon seeing her there, Richard knew she could not have stayed in the twenty-first century, no matter how many people she loved and left behind. The heart wanted what it wanted, and she needed to return to the man she adored.

  "He sent a missive, telling us to meet him in Bath and here we are, all together again. I'm so happy you're here," Sarah said, meeting his eye.

  Richard winked at her before a disturbance at the door caught his attention, and he glanced toward that part of the room.

  Had it not happened to him, he would tell himself to stop being a romantic idiot, but even he had to admit that he felt his mouth drop and his eyes widen at the sight of the woman in the pump room doorway.

  "Who is that?" he heard himself gasp, his group of friends all turning to look at the woman who had entered the room. Alone.

  "Oh, that is Lady Catriona de Vere, she married the Marquess de Vere, and they live not far from Bath at present, although due to her immense fortune, they have other properties too," he heard Anita state, matter-of-fact.

  Holy shit! Was she Lady de Vere? The very one who lived in the house he was investigating back in the twenty-first century? And the very woman who disappeared from all accounts of historical record after the great fire that burned down the Bath estate?

  Did she pass in the fire as believed? Richard frowned, not liking the idea of such a young, vibrant woman being killed before her time. She walked into the room, joining a group of women clearly pleased to see her, if their bussing of one another's cheeks was any indication.

  He had to meet her.

  Sarah sidled up to him, wrapping her arm in his and leading him away from his ogling of the woman. "Come, walk with me, Richard and tell me what you're thinking," she said, excusing themselves.

  Richard took one last look at Lady de Vere, imprinting on his mind the long, coffee-colored locks of her hair sitting high on her head and accentuating her long neck and perfect features.

  "She's so beautiful. Why did you not tell me she was stunning?" he demanded of Sarah.

  She shushed him, nodding in pleasantries to those they passed. "Because I did not think that signified to your investigation. You're to research the location of the house, that is all, is it not?"

  He stopped himself from rolling his eyes, but only just. They turned to stroll up the other side of the pump room, people everywhere, but his height gave him an advantage, and he could once again look upon Lady de Vere and admire her as much as he wanted.

  "Yes, of course, but by God, Sarah. She's beyond anything I expected."

  Sarah raised her brow, throwing him a disapproving glance. She was such the countess these days, he mused, smiling to himself.

  "Well, now that you've seen her beauty and have been starstruck a little by it, you need to get over it and do your job. What is it that you need to know exactly? We're alone now, and you can tell me."

  He had not said when he had first seen Sarah and Eric, for if he did say too much, it could twist the ropes of time and change the future, which he did not want to be responsible for. The fewer people who knew of his work, the better.

  But Sarah, he could tell. She knew how to control information. Richard could trust her with his secrets. "It is rumored she disappears after a great house fire sometime this Season, but her body was never found at the estate. Her husband, the Marquess de Vere, became a very rich man after her death, inherited what would be hundreds of millions in our time."

  "He survived the fire?"

  Richard nodded. "Yes, he did and married his mistress within months of the marchioness's death. I found it strange, and even more so found it odd that there is no scarring of the estate in our time. It cannot just disappear. The foundations at least had to have remained. I think we're digging in the wrong location."

  Sarah met his eyes a moment, a frown between her brow, and he knew she was thinking on his words. "So all reminders of the estate have been abolished. While I can understand why you want to know the exact location of the estate, and that should be fairly easy to map out now that you're here, it's not really why you came, is it? Does my father know you're here to solve a two-hundred-year-old death instead?"

  Richard threw her a mischievous grin. He had never been able to lie to Sarah, and she was as quick and intelligent as she always had been. How he loved having her by his side once more. He had missed her dearly. "You are right. I'm here to find out what happened to her too. Did she run away? Some say there were sig
htings of her in New York, several years after the fire. Others say they saw her body, and she was buried in the family mausoleum on the estate."

  "Were you able to authenticate that?" Sarah asked him.

  He shook his head. "No, there is nothing in the coffin. We checked. So where is she? Was the fire so destructive that nothing remained? I find it doubtful, for there are articles that state that parts of the house remained intact after the fire, so not so intense to remove all evidence."

  "You believe the husband had something to do with her disappearance, don't you?"

  He hoped he was wrong, but so many things did not add up. "I think she went somewhere, but where? I'm going to find out what is between the marchioness and her husband. I'm going to find out if he loves his wife or his mistress more and if that gives him the motive to remove her from his life."

  "You cannot change history, Richard. That I came back and stayed with Eric was bad enough. We still do not know what my actions may have changed and rippled through time to make difficulty. If you change her fate, if you stop her death, that is too much. You cannot do that."

  "I will not do anything of the kind, but I will find out everything that I can before I return home."

  Richard looked across the sea of heads, and the breath in his lungs seized as their gazes clashed. It was but a moment, but he knew in that instant of looking into her dark-green orbs, as vibrant as the Derbyshire Forest, that he had to know. Had to solve the mystery of her life at least. "If she was murdered, I'll make sure whoever did it is punished for the crime. That is one point in history I may change."

  Chapter 4

  Like a bolt of lightning through her body, so too was the feeling that darted through her the moment she saw him. But who was the man walking about the pump room with the Countess of Earnston? Cait had never seen the man before, but he must be someone in society if he was walking around the room in such proximity with the countess.

  She had to meet him, if only to annoy her husband when he received word, and she was certain he would. That she had spoken to another man who was not of his choosing would certainly be relayed.

  How she loathed her life and her marriage to the old crone.

  How was it that her parents had forced such a union upon her? Just because the marquess asked her first did not mean she had to say yes immediately. She had the pick of anyone she wanted in society.

  Her parents could have waited. She had heard herself that the Duke of Melbury was quite surprised to hear she had become betrothed.

  She had been too.

  And now, look where she was. In Bath, not that there was anything overly wrong with the city, but it was not London. She wondered what everyone here would think if she told them she was forced to live with her husband's lover.

  She longed to leave. To live and be happy. To fall in love with a man of her choosing, not her parents’. If her husband were so willing to do whatever he wanted in life, then so would she.

  Or at least she would very soon. No longer would she allow him to hide her away from her friends and family. She would rebel and have a marvelous time while doing so. The Season was about to commence in earnest, and she would not miss a moment of it.

  Cait grabbed hold of the arm of her good friend Lucy, Lady Marabel, who was much more happily situated than herself with her marriage after marrying her childhood friend.

  "Oh, are we mingling?" Lucy said, smiling at several acquaintances as they started to promenade.

  "I need to meet that man over there." Cait gestured with her chin.

  Lucy glanced his way, frowning when it seemed she, too, did not recognize him. "I have not seen him before. Is he related to the countess, do you think?"

  "I would think so. Why else would they be so familiar?" Cait stopped when they came up to the countess and her enigmatic guest. "Good afternoon, Lady Earnston. How very lovely to see you in Bath this Season. We are not often graced with your presence in our little city."

  The countess smiled, always pleasant and utterly charming. Cait had always liked her and was happy the earl had found happiness at last. Rumor had it his first marriage had not been a happy one, but no one could say that about the union he now enjoyed.

  "Lady de Vere, it is splendid to see you too. And Lady Marabel, good afternoon to you both." The countess turned to the man holding her arm and smiled up at him. "Let me introduce you to my brother, Richard, Lord Stanley. He's recently returned from abroad and is joining us here in Bath for a few weeks."

  Brother? Fortunate indeed.

  Cait turned to his Lordship, dipping into a quick curtsy. "We are always glad to have new guests to join our little parties here in Bath. Where abroad did you travel from?" she asked him, wanting to know if it were so very far away and if he had a permanent residence there.

  "Ah, yes, my house abroad. I live in a small town called Abondance. It is near the French alps."

  "So far away, my lord. How sad for us all," Lucy stated, pouting.

  Cait frowned down at her for a moment, wondering why she was pouting at all when she was happily married. She turned back to Lord Stanley and found him watching her, an intense light in his eyes that made her shiver with awareness.

  Her heart pounded in her chest, and she had the oddest feeling he had marked her as someone he wanted to know above anyone else in the room.

  Not that it would be so very terrible to be about such a gentleman. He was utterly handsome, tall, and broad-shouldered. Lovely brown locks that looked soft to the touch. His strong jaw and wicked mouth looked made for kissing. Cait could not help but wonder what he looked like under his superfine coat and perfectly pressed shirt.

  The word delicious swirled about in her mind, and she schooled her features before she gave herself away as some swooning debutante. She would never recover if he thought her desperate for affection, even though a little part of her knew she was.

  She had suffered years of marriage and a lack of human touch and affection. Not that she wanted her husband to kiss or caress her at all. But had she married for love, the thought of afternoons abed together or long strolls around beautiful gardens, lying in a man's strong arms was a dream she only enjoyed in her imagination.

  "A lovely part of the world, I'm sure," Cait said, meaning every word. She had hoped to travel when married, but her husband had soon put paid to such ideas. If they were not secluded away at their estate in Kent, they were here at the property near Bath. For all the houses that they owned, she preferred the London town house where company was at least a possibility, not out at the country estates where Nigel kept her from those she enjoyed visiting with.

  "Is your wife traveling with you, my lord?" her friend asked the countess's brother.

  Lord Stanley's eyes met hers before he shook his head. "I'm not married."

  Cait bit her lip, having the distinct impression he was answering for her and not Lucy. Why she had that impression, she could not say, but oh la la, he was so very distracting and just what she needed this Season. A delightful diversion that would take away the pain of the horrendous mistake her life had bestowed upon her.

  You cannot have a love affair, Catriona. What would people think?

  She no longer cared, if she were brutally honest. She could no longer endure years of endless pain and lack of affection. She would die if she continued in that way.

  She grinned, unable to school her features into one of indifference because something about this man intrigued her. What that was exactly she could not say at present, but what did that matter right at this moment? She was enjoying herself, with pleasant company and her husband two miles out of Bath and not at her side. The day was promising.

  "Are you attending the Snowdon ball this evening at the assembly rooms?" Lady Earnston asked Cait and Lucy.

  "We are. We hope to see you there this evening," Cait stated, her gaze slipping over Lord Stanley, taking one last glimpse of him in his afternoon jacket and tan breeches. How muscular he appeared, like he rode horses every day and danced every night.