Drawing her away from those thoughts, Aunt Myrtle asked to hear all about their adventure. Winn recounted most of it from the very beginning, leaving out the more salacious parts, of course. And her aunt cleverly avoided any question of how they’d slept during their nights together, or what they did when their clothes were wet from rain.
Winn decided not to mention the stream at all, or the loft in the boiling house. There were certain memories too precious to share.
In the warm glow of the flickering chandelier overhead, her aunt eased into the straight-backed armchair at the head of the table and turned her attention to Asher. “You must be in dire straits to have been desperate enough to resort to kidnapping. And yet, here you have an heiress so conveniently at your disposal.”
Winnifred rolled her eyes. “Lord Holt would not use me in such a manner. All he ever wanted was the money he lost in order to embark on a grand opportunity, which is perfectly understandable.” Especially considering what she knew about his father.
Asher stared into the wineglass in his grasp, then cleared his throat. For most of dinner and before, he’d remained pensive and withdrawn, and Winnifred worried that his journey was weighing on his mind.
Aunt Myrtle slid a glance to Asher. “And will this grand opportunity take you far away?”
“It will, indeed, madam,” he said, looking from her to Winnifred. “And for how long, I cannot be certain.”
“The passage of time is a burden we all must endure,” Aunt Myrtle added with a flit of her fingers. “However, the pain that comes from absence can always be lessened if there is a plan in place for your return. Some men, so I’m told, would list taking a wife as a priority. Would you, Lord Holt?”
Winnifred might have chided her aunt for delving too deeply into personal matters. Instead, she found herself holding her tongue and her breath.
He set his glass down and pushed away from the table. Then, standing, he bowed. “Madam, I wonder if you would permit me to escort your niece for a walk about the grounds.”
Aunt Myrtle’s lips curved in a small, knowing smile. “Of course you may. I imagine you have a great deal to discuss. And since the two of you are far beyond my chaperonage at this point, I would not intrude by offering my escort. However, I should warn you that my limbs feel the approach of rain not far off and, should you venture into the singing garden where all my songbirds like to visit, mind the latch on the gate. It tends to stick.”
“I should not think we’ll stray far from the house,” he said, then looked to Winnifred. “Miss Humphries, will you take the air with me?”
She frowned, utterly perplexed by this sudden stiff decorum.
But then a little voice in the back of her mind whispered that, perhaps, some conversations required a degree of formality. Speaking to the members of the royal family, for example. Or a servant about missing silver. A steward regarding the accounts. Or even . . . a gentleman who planned to ask for a woman’s hand in marriage?
Her heart gave an excited leap.
Her mind warned her that the thought was far too outlandish.
Hmm . . . Whatever the reason, she was never going to discover it while sitting here at the table.
Holding his gaze, she said, “Yes, of course, my lord.”
Chapter 21
Madam Humphries did not adhere to many formalities, and yet being in her company reminded Asher of society’s expectations.
It was one thing to pretend to be Mr. and Mrs. Strewsbury among strangers. Yet with a member of Winn’s family, it was quite a different matter.
He’d been traveling alone with Winn for three days. Her Aunt Myrtle doubtless expected a proposal of marriage to save Winn’s reputation. And he found himself wishing that his life was that simple—find a girl, fall in love, obey the obligation to one’s heart and marry her, then spend eternity in utter bliss raising a dozen freckled children.
He expelled a tense breath as they walked side by side past the orangery. The white stone walls gleamed in the slivers of moonlight that strained through the slender celestial paths between gathering clusters of clouds.
“I do not know how long I’ll be away,” he said after a lengthy silence. “It could be months, or longer.”
“How much longer, do you think?”
“If the weather is optimal, the voyage there will take a month.” He didn’t elaborate further. In her bleak expression, he could see that she understood what might happen if the weather wasn’t optimal, or if they encountered other dangers along the way.
She breathed in the cool night air, then let it slip out slowly. “This is something you must do. It has been your plan all along. And if I were to tell you that I wish you had sailed away to gain your fortune years ago instead of now, it would be terribly selfish of me.”
“Then I’m glad you did not tell me,” he said with a wry chuckle. “And I will not tell you that I have the same wish.”
She tilted her head back to gaze heavenward and whispered, “Then why didn’t you?”
He nearly smiled at the soft, petulant demand for an answer. “Aside from the fact that this opportunity had yet to present itself?”
“Yes, aside from that. After all, there must have been others.”
“Likely so,” he mused, thinking over the core reason he’d stayed for so long. “It may sound strange, but I never pursued any other prospect with such fervor because I was trying to honor my mother. You see, when she was still alive, she told me how men prove themselves through their loyalty and that I was on my way to becoming a fine man in that regard. I was nine and this conversation happened to coincide with the advent of a packed satchel hidden beneath my bed. You see, I’d planned to escape my father that very night after he’d wagered on, then lost, my horse in a card game.”
“Do you think she knew?”
“I do,” he said, remembering her fondly. “I’ve tried to stay loyal to her memory for all these years. I’ve tolerated Father’s madness. Cleaned up one catastrophe after another. And whenever I believe I’ve reached my breaking point and refuse to comply, he will threaten to sell something of hers, something that I’d thought was safe from his greed. Then I always find myself sinking to a new low.”
She squeezed his hand and he looked down, almost startled by the contact.
Since the moment they’d stepped out into the garden, Asher and Winn had been walking at a respectable distance apart—his hands clasped behind, hers in front.
Yet without thinking at all, they’d merged closer. Their hands were now twined tightly, fingers laced, neither of them wearing gloves. And if it weren’t for the manicured setting, her aunt only a length of grass and a window away, he might allow himself to imagine they were alone again, wandering the countryside and thinking of nothing more than where they would sleep curled up beside each other.
“Perhaps,” Winn began, “your mother was stating that you’d already proven your loyalty. I imagine she would have wanted you to be loyal to yourself as well.”
He said nothing, but let the comment drift down into his heart. She seemed to always have the words that were like a balm over a raw wound, letting him know that his course was the right one. And yet, every moment spent with her made him long for things beyond his reach.
He wished he could take her with him. Wished the obstacles between them weren’t as insurmountable as they felt.
At the end of the promenade, they turned down a narrow footpath, and Asher knew it was now or never. “Winn, there’s something I have to tell you.”
But his statement was drowned out by the chirrup of birdsong rising over the ivy-enshrouded wall beside them.
“The singing garden,” Winn said with a pleased gasp and tugged on his hand. “Come inside for a minute? There are so many lovely trees that the birds have always come here to roost, larks and nightingales and dozens of others. I could even list their Latin names if you like, and this time it won’t be because I’m out of breath.” She grinned as if they were sharing a secret, and
drew him farther down the path. “You’ll love it in here. It sounds like a cathedral with all their calls ringing out at once. In fact, when I was just a girl visiting my aunt, I used to steal out of my bedchamber in the middle of the night and pretend this was a church, with a little altar bench situated beneath an arch of night-blooming jasmine.”
“And did you leave offerings at this altar?” he asked, imagining little Winn with her wild hair and taste for adventure.
She nodded. “Ribbons and strings for the birds to weave into their nests.”
“Then perhaps we should leave something before we go.”
“I have part of your silk cravat tied in my hair. I think that’s the only reason the combs have managed to keep my coiffure tidy for this long.” She lifted her shoulders in a delicate shrug that drew his appreciation—and not for the first time—to the creamy skin and supple swells on display, taunting him.
How was a man supposed to focus on what he needed to say when his thoughts kept careening off course?
He knew the softness of her skin beneath his touch. The texture of her flesh on his tongue. The sounds she made when he drew her into his mouth.
And all at once he wasn’t thinking about what he intended to say. Instead he was thinking about how good it felt to have her close to him.
The gate creaked when they crossed the threshold into the singing garden. Then, for a moment after that, there was no sound at all, just a palpable alertness from the unseen avian occupants in the trees that flanked the perimeter.
Winn held a finger to her lips, her eyes dancing as she drew him deeper inside. The air was sweetly perfumed with the array of dew-speckled flowers along the path. Most of them were slumbering with drowsy stalks, heavy-budded in clusters of dark green shadows. At the far end on a small hillock of grass sat a bench—her little altar—beneath an untamed and unmanicured arch of moon-white blossoms.
She stopped walking and slid her arms around his neck, tilting her face up for a kiss. It felt perfectly natural to pull her into his embrace, to breathe in the scent of her hair. And when he gazed down at her, standing in her girlhood chapel, he saw a clear vision of what he wanted for the rest of his life.
And yet, along with this certainty came a sense of panic, thudding in his chest, reminding him of what he stood to lose.
His hands flexed, gripping muslin, holding fast to her while the strain of the restless quiet suddenly closed in on him. Then he reached up and withdrew her hands from around his neck.
Her brow knitted in confusion and, perhaps, even hurt. “Do you not want to kiss me?”
For all the days of my life, he thought. But it would have been unfair to speak those words. They sounded too much like a promise.
“Winn, you need to understand that my father’s compulsions destroyed my mother. He didn’t just take her fortune when he married her. He took her soul, too. He is like a leech that senses one last drop of blood in his victim. Once he catches the scent of money, nothing is safe or too precious. Ultimately, he would destroy your life through me.”
She chafed her hands over her arms. “Why are you telling me this?”
“You know why.”
“If we both know, then say the words.”
Frustrated, he raked a hand through his hair and turned away from the altar. “I have nothing to offer you.”
“If that’s true, then I want all of it. Every single ounce. Because I’m fairly certain there’s love hiding inside this . . . nothing,” she said stubbornly. “Do you deny it?”
How could he deny something that covered him like a suit of clothes, visible to everyone? Only with this, every stitch penetrated his skin, the needle digging through to the marrow of his bones. This ill-fated love was already a permanent part of him.
He faced her again, his words sharp with futility. “If I had all the bloody money in the world, I’d steal you away to Gretna Green this instant. But I don’t. And I won’t marry you until I do. So it’s useless to imagine anything between us. You have to understand that!”
Her eyes flooded. Pale green pools stared at him in mute agony before she rushed past him and to the gate.
She jerked on the iron bars, the latch frozen just as her aunt had warned. Yet that didn’t stop her. She shook them until they rattled.
He came up behind her, gripping the gate above her hands, sheltering her. She stilled, but the stuttered sounds of her anguish wrenched his heart and he rested his forehead on her shoulder. “Winn . . . please don’t cry. I hate this as much as you do.”
“I highly doubt your level of loathing surpasses mine,” she cried, sniffing wetly. “After all, I’m trapped in the garden with a man who gives me glimpses of a wondrous future, only to strip it all away in the same breath.”
“Believe me, it isn’t all biscuits and cakes to be the man who cannot marry the woman he loves.”
She sucked in a startled hiccup and a tremor tumbled from her body into his. “But you’ve been thinking about it—a life with me?”
“There are so many parts of my plan that can go awry, it wouldn’t be fair to ask—”
She turned suddenly and pressed her finger to his lips, her lashes clustered into spiky thorns from her tears. “If nothing goes to plan . . . if everything turns to chaos . . . if we both end up poor as church mice . . . I’ll wait for you, Asher. I’ll wait for you until the end of my days.”
He held her tightly and they sagged like the stems on the path, bowing toward each other in the shadows. They belonged together. No one had ever burrowed so deeply, so completely, into his soul. He didn’t even care that she was turning all his plans inside out.
Yet there was still one thing he regretted, and he had to confess it before it was too late to undo the wrong. “Winn, there’s something else I need to tell you.”
“Whatever it might be, it doesn’t matter,” she said, smiling up at him. “I love you and nothing will ever change that fact.”
He kissed her lashes, tasting her salt on his tongue. Her steadfast certainty tunneled through him, filling him with hope and he eased his mouth over hers, sinking headlong into the promise of a future with her. She would be his someday. And, knowing that, he cinched his arms around her.
She clung to him, a sense of urgency in the press of their lips, the nips of their teeth, and the hungry sinuous slide of their tongues. Frantic seconds, minutes, eons passed without concern that they were leaving no air in the garden or in themselves. Even with their lungs burning and empty, they still couldn’t stop. Both of them knew he would be gone tomorrow.
He drew her body flush with his, length to length, wishing that he could take her with him. He couldn’t imagine being separated from her for a single day. And he didn’t know if it was because he was light-headed and not thinking clearly, or if everything suddenly became clear, but a new plan started to form in his mind. Perhaps there was a way . . .
But before he could finish the thought, it began to rain. Again.
Chapter 22
Winnifred tipped back her head and squinted wryly at the dark sky overhead. “You were right. We will never spend a dry day together.”
Asher laughed and took her hand, escaping to the shelter of the arch. Shrugging out of his coat, he settled it over her shoulders, the residual warmth inside the wool chasing out an involuntary shiver.
“Come here,” he said, tugging her closer by his lapels and back into his embrace.
Even in the shadows, his body was achingly familiar, every sculpted line imprinted on her brain. His scent permeated the space around her, his skin, his shaving soap, his heat. It all made her knees quiver like a pair of isinglass jellies carried on a platter.
He shored her securely against him, his lips brushing away the tiny droplets of rain that clung to her lashes and skin, trailing down until her waiting lips were under the searing pressure of his.
She loved the way he kissed. He told her a story in those deep, tender pulls, the almost frantic growls that revealed how much he was holding b
ack. It was the story of how they met and how they’d fallen in love with a certainty that was frightening. And how this unexpected love would link them forever, no matter if they were worlds apart.
With the rain falling around them, hitting wet leaves with the rhythm of a clock wound too tightly, too fast, she whimpered into his mouth. Time was speeding out of their control. Her aunt could send a footman to check the gate at any minute. Morning would come. He would leave.
She clung to him like the last petal on a flower. “I don’t want this day to end.”
He held her closer still, his hands gripping, roving down her back and over her hips in a near-desperate caress. He pulled her against him, aligning their bodies. And through the thin layers of her clothes, she could feel his hard length and her reflexive tilt to cradle him. Hear his breath hitch.
A sense of expectation filled her at the sound. She knew what it was like to be held by him, to have his body poised above hers. She wanted that again, his weight, his warmth, those deep, otherworldly kisses. She wanted his hands on her.
Reading her thoughts, his caress shifted course, moving up along the curve of her hip, the cage of her ribs, and then—ah—he cupped her breasts. Her nipples hardened instantly, her flesh drawing tight beneath the coaxing heat of his hand, her hips cambering with welcome, with need. He flexed, surrounding her, then grazed his thumb over the tip, drawing out a needy mewl from her throat that lifted off into the vines above them.
He did it again, a tender pinch through the damp muslin. She closed her eyes on the sweet ache that roused a heavy pulse, low in her body. And she pressed her legs together to keep it right there, nestled to his insistent thickness. But Asher had other ideas.
He lifted her in his arms and took her to the narrow bench, draping her legs over one side of his lap. She twisted to find his mouth as his hands teased down her body—waist, hips, knees and lower. Then he encircled her ankle and she squirmed, restless, searching for something to ease that throbbing ache.
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