Cloudy with a Chance of Marriage

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Stephen’s heart pounded in his chest. Something was wrong. Something was terribly wrong. Jilly was shaking like a leaf. She walked swiftly behind her counter and stood there, her nostrils flared, her cheeks pale, her mouth half open, as if she were struggling for breath.

She didn’t even seem aware of his presence anymore.

That magical moment between them—when they’d spoken at the same time and reached toward each other …

It was as if it had never happened.

Threat hung in the air, dissolving that special memory to mist and propelling Stephen into full-blown defensive mode. His training at sea during wartime saw to that. And he was prepared to go on the offensive if the situation should require it.

He assessed the man standing at the door. The danger came from him, obviously, but Stephen had yet to know why, and he wanted to know—very much.

He wanted to know who was scaring Miss Jones.

His Miss Jones.

The fellow was impeccably dressed, in a fine coat and waistcoat and a diamond stickpin in his intricately folded cravat, yet somehow the clothes sat poorly on him. He was perhaps two or three years older than Stephen, about the same height but slightly thicker at the waist. His brown curls were glossy but hung lank at his temples in a style that suggested he wasn’t sure if he were a farmer, a Corinthian, or a man of business. His lips were thin and mean, and his chin jutted like a bull’s. Without blinking, his small, brown eyes focused with a terrible intensity on Jilly.

She stared back, almost blankly.

It was as if the Jilly Stephen knew weren’t there any longer.

This is the man, Stephen thought, the man she fears—

The one that Otis had been prepared to clock with a shoe.

He had the incongruous thought that he wished Otis were here now, pulling off one of his outlandish shoes. Jilly would have rebuked him—or not—but at least there would have been movement, words spoken, instead of this awful silence.

“Get your things.” The man’s voice was low, almost a growl.

Jilly flinched.

Stephen stepped forward. “Who are you?” he asked sharply, prepared at any moment to fight. He cast a discreet glance at the man’s waist. His coat gaped, but Stephen couldn’t tell if he was armed or not.

Every ounce of his being clamored to protect the woman behind him.

Out of the corner of his eye, he looked for a weapon of some kind. But all he saw were books. Book bindings could hurt if they landed on a temple correctly, but they weren’t nearly as useful a weapon as a pistol.

At least he had his fists.

The man looked at him with contempt, yet he didn’t appear interested in a fight. “I’m Hector Broadmoor,” he said flatly, “and I’m here to retrieve my wife.”

His wife?

Stephen’s mind couldn’t register what the man was saying. “She’s not here, obviously.” He looked about the room, and when his gaze passed over Jilly, she raised a shaky hand to her eye and wiped away a tear.

“Go away, Captain Arrow,” she said in a voice he didn’t recognize.

It was low. Ugly.

Despairing.

He shook his head. “What’s going on?”

He had the same feeling he had on a ship when he heard a low, mournful whistling through the rigging, the sound that signified a storm was brewing, the kind that required the men to be at their most alert—to murmur prayers when the darkness fell and the swells grew large and cavernous, slapping against the hull, taunting the sailors with their tentacle fingers.

Jilly stared at him. “Please,” she said. “Leave.”

Stephen spread his feet and put his hands on his hips. “Explain to me what’s happening, Miss Jones.” His heart was going faster than it ever had, yet he felt as if he were moving in slow motion.

“There needs no explaining,” the man at the door said, almost complacently. “She’s my wife. And her name’s not Miss Jones. It’s Mrs. Broadmoor.”

A wave of sickness washed over Stephen. He stared at Miss Jones—at Jilly—and she looked back with a mournful expression in her eyes.

It couldn’t be.

It simply couldn’t be.

“Is it true?” he managed to say. His mouth was drier than the bottom of a barrel of grog let loose among his sailors.

She hesitated but a moment, then nodded.

It all went rushing out of him then, like a waterfall, the bundle of emotions he’d felt about her—all of it, from the very beginning: the annoyance, the desire, the concern, the anticipation, the tenderness.

He was emptied in a moment, back to his old self, the one who hadn’t really known who he was until after his mother had died and a village neighbor had told him his core family had never existed.

“All right, then.” He looked back at Mr. Broadmoor, then one more time at Jilly.

Her brows, those exquisite black wings, were flung far out above her violet-blue eyes, which were wide with grief.

And perhaps shock.

Although …

Although she’d known he was coming, hadn’t she?

It was why she’d steered clear of Stephen, or at least tried for a while to steer clear of him—

She’d known.

He turned away from her and walked slowly past the man at the door. He felt small. Invisible.

And profoundly stupid.