Laurel Ames - Playing To Win

He knew how she felt about horses, how she became attached to them, yet he sold the very one she liked the most. Did he do it on purpose, to put her in her place, or did he not even think about her wishes? This was a much more depressing thought than believing he had done it to spite her.

She did not have the heart to face Marie. If she had to tell her why she was not riding, she might very well cry, and she had too much pride for that. She went to the downstairs room she had chosen as her library, where by now some of her books had been unpacked and ranged along the available shelves like old friends. She leaned against them, and had a sudden black vision of Tony pulling them down and tearing their pages. She really was being silly. He never did anything violent. She almost thought it would be better if he did break something. Always he pushed down his anger, as though there were something keeping him from saying what he really thought.

She heard Tony running up the stairs, three at a time. It had to be him. She knew a cowardly impulse to lock the door. Instead, she took down a volume she knew by heart, carried it to the desk and sat down to read. It was ten minutes before he ran her to ground, and she had regained much of her composure by then. When he threw open the door, he was seething.

“I should drag you out there and make you ride that horse.”

“I suppose you could. But you don’t like to ride with me, anyway. It was a stupid idea to try at all. You don’t like to do anything with me. Why would you like to ride with me?”

“You are still my wife. I won’t have you throwing a fit over something as stupid as a horse.”

“If anyone made a scene, it was you. And horses are not stupid. At least Tansy was not. Now I shall never know what has become of her. She might be beaten or misused. You really don’t care.” Sera was very nearly in tears, in spite of her viselike grip on the old book.

“If you cared about her, you should have said something.”

“So it’s my fault she was sold, then?” Sera asked, in shock.

“I’m only saying it wouldn’t have happened—”

“I’m not a child, Tony. I wish you would stop playing these stupid games. If you don’t like me, there’s nothing I can do about that. But don’t pretend. It’s much more cruel than hating me outright.”

Tony looked as though she had dashed cold water over him. Sera walked past him, out of the room, and he stood a moment wondering what had given her the idea he hated her. Women took such stupid notions. All over a damn horse. He supposed he would have to buy the thing back now. He had only been trying to protect her. But hate her? Never!

A man with a little more experience with women would have gone after her, would have stopped making excuses and tried to explain himself. That would have meant apologizing, and Tony truly did not think he had done anything wrong, at least not on purpose. He went instead back to the stable. He found Chadwick alone and was thankful for that at least.

“Find out from Tattersall’s where that mare went, and buy her back.”

“How much should I pay?” Chadwick asked impassively.

“Whatever you have to,” Tony said, giving him the roll of money he had just received for the sale of four horses at Tatt’s. “Don’t come back without her.”

“Yes, sir.”

As with many of their arguments, there was no real reconciliation. They simply did not speak of it again. By now there were dozens of things Sera was afraid to speak of again. Lady Amanda feared that she was in the way, and went to Sera after breakfast to offer to return to Oak Park.

“Oh, please don’t leave us now. I shall have no one to talk to when Tony is angry.”

“I don’t know what is wrong with him. He used to be so gay—never irritable like this.”

“He has so much on his mind now. I expect he will get over it. But it is nothing to do with you. It is a relief for me to have you here.”

Eventually Lady Amanda believed her, and to cheer them both up, Sera took her shopping. She ordered a hackney for the expedition, since she did not like to leave Tony’s coach horses standing in the street, nor to tie up one of the grooms for hours on end.

There were only Jeffers, Chadwick and an undergroom to look after the stables. Their household staff was similarly reduced. They were fortunate in being able to leave the kitchen staff and most of the underservants at the town house, for the lessors to pay.

Rayburn, the butler, when queried by Sera on his preferences, said he would like a change of scene. It was he who had supervised their move to Marsham Street, with so much dignity that it could not be thought to be a financial rout, but rather a planned temporary retreat into a quieter neighborhood. Rayburn achieved all with no loss of face for himself or the family, and had been instrumental in engaging the new kitchen staff.

Tony frankly admired the man’s loyalty. But Rayburn was also inspired by a lively sympathy for his new mistress. From some few things Marie had let fall, and Rayburn’s own observations, he could see that things were not as they should be between the new Lord and Lady Cairnbrooke. He resolved to do all in his power to smooth any difficulties between them.

Marie thought Rayburn had been an easy ally for Sera to enlist, almost no challenge compared to the reserved Stewart, whose first loyalty should have been to Tony. With his whole staff conspiring against him, Lord Cairnbrooke should not be too difficult to bring into line. Sera had been vaguely aware of these subtle shifts in loyalty, but thought it only natural, since she was responsible for the household staff.

On the way to the shops, Marie’s droll comments on the state of dress or undress of the ladies they passed had both Sera and Lady Amanda giggling until they went by a fashionable phaeton halted before a hat shop in Oxford Street. They were just getting down from the hackney to enter the shop when an irritating trill of laughter caused them to look at the occupant. It was Madeleine Vonne, which would not have been so upsetting, except that it was Tony who was gazing up at her and causing her laughter.

Sera stood frozen on the pavement for a moment. How could he look at her so, as though she still had him bewitched, when she had come so close to getting him killed? Lady Amanda gaped, and had just opened her mouth to say something, when Sera grabbed her arm and pulled her into the shop. Marie paid off the driver.

Sera composed herself for her mother-in-law’s sake and refused to speak of the incident, even when the shop girls were not bustling about them. She secretly prayed Madeleine and Tony would have gone when they left.

Up until she saw Tony with Madeleine, Sera had thought him so beaten down with grief over his brother and father that he could never be happy. That was why she did not push him for a more normal marriage. Yet there he was, laughing and chatting in public to the jade who had nearly ruined him. Sera could not recall ever feeling so hurt in her life. Tony was not, to her way of thinking, a very wise man, but she had never before had reason to doubt his sanity. What if Lord Vonne should see them? What if he should hear of the incident? It was just the sort of nasty gossip that got carried right where it would do the most harm.

When they returned home, she came to regret not letting Lady Amanda vent her wrath in the shop in Oxford Street, for she attacked Tony about it at dinner. There was a blazing argument between those two, in which Tony accused his mother of meddling and Sera of spying on him. “I cannot very well ignore Lady Vonne, can I?” he demanded of Sera’s downcast face. “Can I?” he persisted.

“No,” she said, wondering what he wanted of her. So often what he shouted about had nothing to do with why he was angry, and there was no point in arguing with him. It only made them both ridiculous. He slammed out of the house with no dinner, which stole Sera’s appetite, as well.