Merry Misrule - St. Clair, Ellie Page 0,24
Joanna said now, her voice strangled, “as it happens, I do recognize that watch.”
“I must have shown it to you then!”
“You did,” Joanna’s lips somehow formed a tight smile. “You don’t recall where the watch came from?”
“Mm, no, I don’t,” Cecily said with a bright smile, although a quick darkness passed over her eyes, telling Joanna that she well remembered all that had occurred. “It’s a mystery!”
Joanna opened her mouth once more, but suddenly Elijah’s hand was on her shoulder.
“I can hardly believe you still have it, Cecily,” he said, and when Joanna looked up at him, a protest on her lips, he silently shook his head. “How lovely. Your husband must be thrilled.”
Joanna nearly snorted at that, but then Elijah held out an elbow. “Should we go and rejoin the others?”
Joanna nodded, and it wasn’t until Cecily left them to fetch her cloak for the walk to the church service that she turned to him with her hands on her hips. She didn’t need to demand his explanation, however, for he already had one awaiting her.
“I have a plan,” he murmured in her ear. “We won’t be able to put it in place until later, but I will get your grandmother’s pocket watch back. I promise.”
She turned to him then, searching his deep brown eyes, wondering if what he said was true.
“Do you trust me?”
She didn’t. Not entirely. But he seemed so earnest, so committed, that she didn’t have it within her to break his spirit.
“Let’s give it a try,” she said, forcing a smile to her face.
She wasn’t sure how he thought to pull this off, but if there was any man she knew could come up with the perfect scheme, it was he.
Elijah was buoyed by hope. Joanna had, at the very least, not completely turned away from him and shut him down.
He knew she was trying to show pleasure over his gift, even though it had done nothing but cause her additional grief. He had done the best he could, but Cecily showing up with the watch that Joanna actually longed for… well, there was nothing he could have done about that.
But he could get it back for her.
He had a few tricks on how to encourage people to give up things that belonged to them, to scheme them out of the items. He had to be careful, however, for Cecily was already aware that Joanna wanted what she had, and if she were to simply lose the watch, Joanna was sure to be blamed. The fact that she was a seamstress while Cecily was the daughter of an earl and the wife of a viscount, would certainly mean that Joanna would be found in the wrong.
He donned his cloak and hat before opening the door as all who filled Briercrest began to pile into the waiting sleighs. As many of the guests had arrived in one themselves, there were more than enough to fit them all.
He hoped for the chance to sit under one of the warm fur rugs with Joanna pressed up against him, but alas, he was next to the admiral’s wife once more.
“Mrs. Cuthbert,” he greeted her, and the woman beamed up at him so hard that her eyes closed. She was near to his mother’s age, but he couldn’t help note that she wiggled in much closer to him than was necessary. He swallowed, looking for help or an escape, but he was pressed up against the side of the sleigh.
“Lord Elijah,” she gushed, so loudly that his ear started to ring. He supposed that when one lived with a near-deaf husband for so many years, one would become used to speaking in so great a volume. “Happy Christmas.”
“And to you,” he returned politely.
“It is a chilly one today, is it not? Thank goodness we have one another tucked in here under all of these layers.”
She laughed, but unfortunately there were not nearly enough layers between the two of them. If she came any closer, then he was sure he was the one who would be ruined.
He looked up toward the other sleighs which were also being loaded, and found that sitting across from him, watching him with interest, was Joanna.
She was laughing. At him.
He stared back at her, slowly shaking his head at the fact she was taking such pleasure from his obvious distress. That was when she really began to laugh in earnest, so much so that her sleigh companions looked at her with some question. Caroline, who was