There was a beat of a moment before he and Rosalinde turned together to face her. When they did, their expressions said everything, even before either of them spoke. Humiliation and pain flooded Celia, yet she somehow managed to keep her chin up.
"Oh, Celia," Rosalinde whispered, her voice broken with empathetic pain for her sister. "There are no words I can find to express it. I'm just so, so very sorry."
"Why?" Celia asked, shocked she could find her voice after everything that had just happened. "You didn't lie to me. You didn't create this situation at all. We are all victims of this investigation."
Gray's jaw tensed, and he hesitated slightly before he moved forward. "But none more than you." He cleared his throat and his discomfort was clear. "You and I were not always close, but I feel we have become closer recently. When I had you come to live with us, it became my responsibility to ensure that any man who courted you was worthy, and I failed in that."
Celia shook her head. "This isn't your fault, Gray. In the end we were all fooled by him."
She turned away from the sting her own words created. Fooled by him. That implied each and every thing between them had been untrue. Aiden … or whatever his name truly was … he had said as much.
Except there was a part of her that didn't believe him. When she had finally looked into his eyes and declared she would allow the false courtship to continue in order to help him, there had been something that lit up in his stare that told her some things had been real. That was why she was determined to meet with him. Alone, she could see better what his motives had been, beyond his case. Beyond his deceptions.
"What can I do?" Rosalinde asked, sliding up beside her. "How can I comfort you?"
Celia slowly faced her. "I love you and Gray so much for wanting to shelter me from these feelings. But I'm afraid I must simply feel them until they have lost their power. Right now I want to go upstairs and lie down for a while."
"Alone?" Rosalinde asked, her eyes brightening with tears.
Celia smiled sadly as Gray took a place beside Rosalinde and put his arm around her. At least her sister would have comfort and someone to remind her that this wasn't her fault.
"Yes, alone. For now," Celia said. "Perhaps later, perhaps tomorrow or the next day, I'll be more ready to talk. Right now I can hardly think of anything to say. I have to consider it more."
Rosalinde nodded. "I understand." She rushed forward and yanked Celia into a fierce hug that nearly squeezed the air out of her. "I love you."
Celia smoothed her hands over her sister's back and blinked at tears. "I know."
When she managed to escape Rosalinde's arms, she smiled weakly at the pair, then turned to go upstairs. What she had said to them was true. She did want to lie on her bed and simply digest everything that happened this afternoon.
But she also had plans to make for her escape tonight. And for how she would confront Aiden when there were no barriers and no one to protect either of them from the truth.
Clairemont swept his pocket watch from his jacket and flipped it open. It was after midnight now and yet he was still sitting in his carriage, watching out the window as he waited for Celia to join him. Had she been waylaid? Or had she changed her mind?
Worse, was she just toying with him, letting him feel a tiny fraction of the pain and embarrassment he had forced her to endure with his lies? Would she leave him sitting here, waiting for her?
If she did, he deserved no less. And he would wait here all night if necessary to pay the penance she required.
The servants' entrance to the house opened just as that thought filled his mind, and Celia stepped out. She was wearing a cloak pulled up around her face, but Clairemont recognized it was her from the way she moved with such grace.
He opened the door and moved to step out, but she motioned him back in. "I can manage," she said, her voice tight and cold.
She climbed up into the vehicle without his assistance. He frowned, but reached out to close the door behind her. In the dim quiet of the carriage he watched as she pushed the hood back from her face and caught his breath.
She was absolutely beautiful. Every time. Without fail.
"Are you certain you want to do this? To talk to me alone?" he asked.
She arched a brow. "We have things to discuss, and as much as I adore Rosalinde, she is too protective to allow us to be alone now to do so. So yes. I still feel this is our best option."
He leaned back to tap the wall. The carriage rumbled forward, maneuvering back to his townhome just a short distance away.
The few moments in the vehicle were quiet. If he had expected Celia to launch directly into a condemnation of him, she didn't do so. Instead, she leaned her head on the window, staring out into the darkened streets with an unreadable expression on her face.
She never looked at him.
When the carriage stopped at the townhouse he had been staying in since his arrival in London, she straightened up and leaned forward. "I realize I never came here before," she said.
He flinched at that characterization. She had split their relationship into two sections. Before the truth and after. Before she despised him and after.
"No, I suppose you didn't."
"His?" she asked.
He nodded without needing clarification. "Yes."
She was silent a moment before she asked, "How did you manage the servants?"
"The real Clairemont was reclusive, remember. Most of his servants never even met him. But we hired a new group just in case. The old ones got very good references."
"Seems you found a way to make sure no one suffered," she said, turning her face.
He frowned. The unspoken words hung between them. No one had suffered but her. He pushed the door open and stepped out, then turned back to help her. She hesitated before she took his hand and barely touched him as she exited.
They moved to the front door, which Clairemont opened himself. She looked at him in surprise as they entered. "Or did you hire servants?"
"When you asked me for privacy to discuss everything, I gave them the night off. No one is home but us," he explained. "I hope that doesn't make you uncomfortable."
She glared at him. "Uncomfortable is not the word I would use, no," she said. "Where should we talk?"
He motioned to the parlor where he'd had his servants lay a warm fire before they departed for the night. Once inside, he closed the door behind them. He moved toward the sideboard.
"May I make you a drink?" he asked.
She turned on him suddenly. "What is your name?"
He froze in his spot, hand outstretched to the decanter of liquor. Slowly he faced her and leaned back against the sideboard. She was watching him, hands folded before her, gaze unwavering.
"It doesn't matter what my name is, Celia," he said softly.
Her expression, which had been so unreadable until that moment, twisted in a mask of anger and grief. "I haven't earned it?" she hissed out, fingers clenching in a fist at her side.
"You have likely earned it more than anyone I've ever known," he explained. "But if you knew it, you could very well be in danger."
"Why? How? It isn't as if I'd ever use it in public," she said.
He shook his head. "You would never mean to do so. But a slip can happen to even the best and most well-trained of agents. Or if you were questioned by a skilled interrogator, he would know you were lying if my real name was in your mind. So I can't give it to you because it is the best way for both of us to be hurt. You'll notice even Stalwood only ever calls me Clairemont."
"Stalwood," Celia repeated, the name like a curse. "And he seems to be so very important in all this, your handler, so I suppose that should appease me."
"Celia." He stepped toward her, but she held up a hand to ward him off. It took everything in him to accept her rejection and stay where he was, halfway across the room from her, unable to touch her or comfort her.
"What will happen to Aiden when your investigation is over?"
He blinked. "I-I don't understand," he said. "I've already told you the real Clairemont is dead."
"Not the real Clairemont," she said, pursing her lips. "Aiden. You as Aiden. You obviously won't go on being him, so what will happen to him? To the man I thought I knew?"
"The character," he said, understanding her now. Almost wishing he didn't when he thought of the answer. "Well, he'll … he'll die, Celia. Probably not as violently as the real Clairemont did, but there will be an accident or illness that will take him. As far as Society, as the public in general, will know, he'll die. Since there are no heirs, the crown will take the title and his lands and that will be the end."
She caught her breath, tears filling her eyes. She blinked them back fiercely. "So I'll lose you."
He nodded. "Yes. But I promise you, Celia, we will resolve this as quickly as we can so as not to cause you more pain. I'm hoping to be finished in days now with Gray's help, weeks at most." She flinched, and he moved on her now, ignoring the barriers she'd put between them. "I'm sorry. You don't know how sorry. I did things I shouldn't have done, I went beyond the bounds of my role with you."