Never Land the First Fish

Chapter Twenty-Two, Part 2

It wasn't until their third night at Longford Court that Maddox realised his family was keeping him from Emily. As they're rested in one another's arms after celebrating the first private moments they'd had since Maddox had left her before dawn, Emily commented, "You have been very busy. I've scarcely seen you today."

Maddox began listing all the errands and tasks he'd been set to in the course of the day. Sitting with his father while his mother rested. Helping Longford and Stocke sort through the mail and write answers to letters sent to the earl or the countess. Consulting with his sister Daisy about arrangements to convey the visiting children to the nearby estate of Aunt Susan (actually his father's cousin, who was married to an old friend of his father).

The list went on, and—apart from sitting with his father, which was a privilege—none of them needed him in particular. Or, if he was needed—and he had no objection to playing his part in lightening his mother's burdens—Emily could have helped, too.

He had been silent for too long. "I understand that your family needs you," Emily assured him.

"Are they treating you well?" Maddox asked her.

The brief pause before she answered told him that the Redepenning family had closed ranks against the outsider. "They have been very civil," Emily said. "I am perfectly content, Maddox. You do what you need, and I will be here when you have time for me."

Civil. Maddox had seen the English upper classes' version of civil before. "Are they giving you frostbite, my love?"

He must have sounded as grim as he felt, because Emily hastened to reassure him. "No one has been rude, Maddox." She fluttered her hand across his chest, and—despite the topic and their recent work out—his breeding organs stirred to attention. "I am an outsider here, and they are concerned about your father. Yes, and your mother, too."

An outsider? The woman who held his heart? He opened his mouth to object, but she placed her fingers on his lips.

"You cannot expect them to welcome me with open arms, Maddox. I am older than you, a stage performer, part Indian, of scandalous birth. I have told you that a match between us is impossible." She ran her hand down his body to squeeze the part of him that was not interested in the conversation. "We are good friends. We have this. Let that be enough."

Maddox shook his head. "I love you, Emily. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I want the honour of being your husband."

"We have this," Emily repeated, with another squeeze. He allowed himself to be distracted, but tomorrow, he'd be having a word with those who made his chosen mate feel that she was not good enough.

***

As usual, when the first rays of dawn lit the eastern sky, Maddox left Emily's room to return to the one he shared with Stocke. He went back to bed, but lay waiting for the household to awake, fretting over his family's attitude and what he might do about it.

He breakfasted with Emily, and turned away any suggestions from his brothers and sisters that he might sit elsewhere, or join another conversation, or fetch something from another room.

"I need to practice before the steward needs his office," Emily told him, when they were finished. Every corner of the house was in use, but Emily had been given access to the steward's office for her twice-daily violin practice: first straight after breakfast, before the steward arrived, and later immediately before dinner, after he had left. Maddox escorted her across the house, then went looking for his mother. She was easy to find, for she seldom left the room that had been converted into a bed chamber for his father. He let himself into the room without knocking.