by Anna Bradley
These two young people were his children and were far older than the age of two and ten.
Unease swirled around in her brain as the magnitude of these circumstances hit her with more force than the wind and snow would have had she gone dashing outside.
He had children who were almost grown, around the age of fifteen and older, she’d guess. Which meant he was married.
Which meant he had been married twelve years ago.
And that meant that not only had she fornicated outside the bonds of matrimony with him, but she had committed adultery.
She’d lain with a married man!
***
Henry Fairchild, Baron Crestwood, had remembered her the moment she’d spoken her name. He’d truly looked at her then, and her eyes had jolted him into the past. As a girl, she’d insisted they were plain, as brown could often be, but he’d found them sultry and inviting, like chocolate or coffee. They stood out to him even from behind the metal-rimmed spectacles. Thick lashes framed them, contrasting starkly with her alabaster skin.
To the undiscerning eye, she was quite forgettable.
Years ago, he’d found Eliza Cline to be a beauty in hiding. Dragging his eyes up and down her drab clothing and unimaginative hairstyle, he suspected this was still the case.
“Papa,” Charlotte, his daughter of ten and six, wailed softly. “I don’t—”
“Charlotte, I’d like to present Miss Eliza Cline. Miss Cline, my daughter, Miss Charlotte Fairchild. Bartholomew, Miss Cline. Miss Cline, my son, Bartholomew Fairchild.”
The woman he’d never expected to see again blinked a few times and then greeted his less than mannerly offspring and Charlotte’s maid, Mrs. Blake, with some reserve.
“Miss Fairchild, ma’am.” The woman from his past turned toward his daughter. “If you are ready now, I’ll show you to my chamber.”
Charlotte gave him one last pleading look but then dropped her lashes at his unrelenting stare.
Her surname had not changed. From what he recalled, she had been engaged to be married.
Henry clenched his jaw. The fiancé had broken it off then.
He’d wondered.
Miss Cline turned to lead his daughter and her maid upstairs, and he stopped her with his question. “You will join us for dinner? Of course?” It was the least he could do as she was giving up her privacy.
She glanced over her shoulder with narrowed eyes. If she harbored ill will, why had she offered to share her chamber?
But then her chin dipped in acquiescence.
Henry rubbed his jaw. He’d bedded her twelve years ago and when she’d come to him with expectations, he’d had nothing to offer her. Less than nothing. He remembered that the guilt had already begun to set in.
They’d been caught in a most inappropriate situation, by her fiancé, and Henry had had the gall to become annoyed.
His actions had been unforgivable.
What a bastard he’d been.
And yet, he’d not been himself. Even now, he remembered feeling as though he’d been watching somebody else in his place…
“The key, My Lord.” The innkeeper’s voice jolted him from the unsettling memory.
Henry turned, signed the register, and indicated for Bartholomew to follow him up the narrow staircase. He’d share a room with his son this night. Hopefully, the weather would clear, and they could make the remainder of their journey tomorrow morning.
He wasn’t sure quite what he would say to Miss Cline if he found himself alone with her. Likely, she’d have some angry words to hurl at his deserving head.
He’d ruined her.
CHAPTER TWO
More than Regret
Miss Charlotte Fairchild had yet to acknowledge or thank Eliza in any way. Shortly after they arrived upstairs, manservants appeared with the young woman’s trunk and smaller valise. The girl threw herself across the bed, facedown, while Mrs. Blake went to work unpacking a few lovely gowns and draping them over the only chair in the room.
This had been a mistake. Eliza berated herself for allowing her charitable inclinations to put her in this situation.
Edging to the bed, she lowered herself onto the corner of the mattress. “If it hadn’t made travel impossible, I’d be more than happy with all this snow over the holidays. Are you on your way to celebrate Christmas with family?” Eliza faced the back of the girl’s head.
“Arousrarty,” Miss Fairchild mumbled into the pillow.
“A house party?” Eliza hated sullenness. “That sounds quite festive.” But she could not contain herself from asking, “Are you meeting your mother there?”
The girl rolled over and stared at her blankly, escaped strands of dark hair covering parts of her face. “My mother is dead.”
Oh, dear! Why hadn’t she thought of this? One ought never to make such assumptions. “I’m sorry.” Eliza’s own parents were still alive. As far as she knew. She presumed she and Thomas would have been notified had they passed on.
“Don’t be. I’ve been motherless since I was five.”
Mrs. Blake made a few disapproving sounds.
“Well, it’s true.” Miss Fairchild’s gaze flicked toward the maid.
“I would imagine one would miss what a mother provides, even if one doesn’t recognize it.” Eliza reached over to the small table by the bed to retrieve a book she’d been reading earlier and opened it to the page she’d marked.
Lord Crestwood’s wife had been alive at the time she’d known him then. For a moment, she’d hoped that perhaps the woman had died in childbirth—not that she’d wished the woman such a horrible and tragic death, nor that she’d wished his children never to have known their mother, but that she’d wished she’d not committed adultery twelve years ago.
How dare he!
She’d thought him to be a bounder for a myriad of other reasons, but this!
“You must be coming out soon, Miss Fairchild. Are you yet six and ten?” The girl was older than twelve, but Eliza had to be certain.
“Nearly. I will be in a few weeks, but my father is making me wait two years. He treats me like a child!”
Oh, and, of course, the son was even older. That meant the woman had been quite alive until two years after Eliza had known him.
It was worse than she ever could have imagined. She would have liked to bury her own face upon that pillow alongside Miss Fairchild.
His grown daughter.
Not only had he had a wife, but he’d also had a family!
Eliza blinked away tears of anger, raging inside all the while she sat placidly upon the bed with her back straight and her lips pinched together tightly.
Suddenly, the room seemed to be closing in from all sides. She could not sit here a second longer.
She burst from the bed and, without further comment, located her coat and gloves.
“Surely, you aren’t going outside, miss?” Mrs. Blake looked at her in astonishment.
“I… I…“ How could she explain herself? “I have need of some air.”
“But…?” The maid glanced out the window. If anything, the storm had strengthened. She could barely make out the brown of the stable across the yard.
Eliza half stumbled toward the door. “I’ll only be a moment.”
And then she was rushing through the tight corridor outside the various chambers. Head down, she descended the stairs, crossed through the taproom, and slipped outside, grateful for once for her invisibility.
The wind bit into her cheeks and tugged at her coat and hair the instant she stepped away from the building. But she didn’t care. She deserved it.
A copse of trees beckoned behind the Inn. Her feet, somewhat protected by well-worn but practical half-boots, did not feel the cold. Only a few inches of snow had as of yet accumulated.
With her eyes focused on a perfectly shaped evergreen, she only thought that she needed to be alone. Away from any eyes that might have seen her leave.
She increased her pace, practically running until
she was safely out of sight of the windows overlooking the yard. She picked her way through the trees until she found a thick, solid trunk with little brush at its base that would support her.
Where she proceeded to bend over and lose what was surely the entire contents of her stomach. The retching sounds roared in her ears. Eyes closed, she half-sobbed with each convulsion.
She hated him. Oh, how she hated him. He was evil.
Clutching her abdomen with one hand, supporting herself against the tree with her other, she spit onto the ground in an attempt to remove the taste of bile from her mouth.
She must face the fact that she’d had relations with a married man outside of wedlock.
Twelve years ago!
She’d known her behavior had been bad enough but to learn he’d been married…
Her stomach convulsed again but nothing was left to expel. And tears streamed down her face now. Tears she’d not even realized she’d shed.
Leaning forward, she allowed the sharp edges of the bark to press into the top of her head. Cold seeped through her shoes and a gust of wind blew right through her wool coat, shawl, dress, and underclothes.
He’d asked… no, he’d essentially demanded she join him and his children for the evening meal. And she’d not refused.
Oh, how she hated that she’d grown so utterly accustomed to putting the wishes of others before her own.
“Miss Cline?”
Eliza drew in a deep breath. Of course, now, he would come upon her in such humiliating circumstances.
“Leave me, please.”
A crisp white linen handkerchief appeared before her, clasped in those long, elegant fingers of his.
“You cannot remain outside. You’ll catch your death.” He opened his hand, encouraging her to take the slip of material. On a sigh, she took it from him and dabbed it against her lips, still bending over and quite unwilling to look him in the face.
“I imagine you hate me about now.” That same languid voice she remembered from so long ago dripped from his mouth.
“You had a wife.” The words burned her throat, and she forced herself to stifle the sob that threatened to escape. “A wife!” At last, she turned her head and met his gaze.
She hadn’t realized he was crouching beside her, nor that his face would be so close to hers. Those hawkish features of his, not to mention his stunning green eyes, were mere inches from her own.
He held her stare steadily and nodded.
“I hate you. I will hate you forever.” She’d never said those words to another living person. And yet they were also directed inward. She hated everything about herself at that moment. Why did he have to show up here, of all places, with his beautiful but spoiled children?
She noticed a movement in his throat, as though he were swallowing her hatred.
His hand touched her back, and she flinched out of his reach.
But then it settled there again, and she had nowhere to go.
She moaned, and he pulled his hand away.
“Please come back inside,” he begged, sounding resigned. “I cannot leave you out here in the cold like this.”
No wonder he’d scoffed when she’d expressed her expectations all those years ago. She’d given him her body. Although she’d been working at the inn, she had been a gently bred young lady. “You had no difficulty leaving me before. Now, I understand why. You had a wife to return to. A wife and two children! I’m no responsibility of yours.”
If only she could remain outside forever. Allow the cold to penetrate her body as much as her guilt had taken over her soul. Disappear completely.
But such a thought was evil.
She couldn’t wallow in self-pity forever. Others depended upon her. Or did they?
“I cannot walk through a room full of strangers looking like this,” she said when he did not respond to her accusation. She must look a fright, with tree bark in her hair and splotches of red streaking her face.
A heavy coat dropped onto her shoulders.
Ah, the irony. He would protect her from a blizzard now, when he’d…
But the worst of it all was that she’d been equally to blame. She had known it was wrong. Everything she’d ever learned in life had promised her she’d suffer for such poor judgment.
Earlier today, she’d been wishing for something more in her life. She had to learn to be careful of what she wished for.
She inhaled and the scent of man, the scent of such an elegant masculine gentleman, engulfed her senses, reminding her partly of why she’d given herself to him in the first place.
She shivered in the warmth left over from his body.
Eliza could not change the past any more than she could change her current circumstances.
She wiped her mouth again with his handkerchief. “I do not require your coat.” She rose to her full height. He pushed himself from his haunches and managed to somehow appear as equally formal and handsome as before he’d come out into the storm.
Except for the lock of hair that now swept along his cheek and jaw, seeming to emphasize his austere features all the more.
A gust of wind ripped between the trees, and she swayed, her knees nearly buckling.
“Steady there.” This time, when he took hold of her arm, she hadn’t the strength to push him away. Her moment of revulsion had apparently left her weakened.
She hated feeling weak. She was Miss Eliza Cline—dependable, strong, able to step in whenever parishioners were in need.
Eliza Cline was not this pathetic woman who’d run recklessly into a blizzard.
“I am fine.” She forced her shoulders back.
It wasn’t that anyone else would ever know or suspect what she’d done. But… knowing herself was bad enough.
And God knew.
She shuddered but made herself take one step, and then another.
“Eliza! Miss Cline!” His voice halted her. If he deigned to apologize or make some excuse or reason for omitting such pertinent information when they’d been acquainted before, she was going to scream.
This was not something she could forget.
“What?” she answered impatiently, freezing in place.
“The inn is this way.”
She lifted her chin and made an attempt to find her bearings. The snow was falling so thick now that she could barely make out the shadow of the building she’d fled from. If he hadn’t followed her, she might have simply wandered off to nowhere, never to be heard from again.
And no one would have been the wiser.
She blinked at her maudlin thoughts but turned and walked in the direction he indicated. Her feet were freezing but other than that, she only felt emptiness.
He did not attempt to touch her as they trekked through accumulating snow. Upon reaching the covered porch at the entrance, Eliza shrugged out of his coat and numbly handed it over. White flakes covered his hair and shoulders. His face was grim.
Apparently, he, too, realized that any sort of apology could never be accepted. What he’d done was unforgivable. She was relieved he realized this.
She would not thank him for coming after her, nor for the use of his coat. Looking at him only managed to rebuke her for what she’d done.
“I’ll see you at supper,” he reminded her.
She nodded. And sometime in the future, she’d meet him in hell.
***
Henry waited outside long after Miss Cline left him standing there. He’d been the one to walk away twelve years ago.
He’d been traveling through Misty Brookes and stopped at… what had she called it, oh, yes—The Dog and Pudding Inn—when he’d first met her. She’d been open and friendly as she’d served him ale. She’d also been engaged to marry the innkeeper’s son. Henry could not remember the man’s name; he barely remembered how he got there, he’d been so mired in despair from what he’d learned of his wife’s condition.
That the young girl who made him laugh belonged to another man had been of no consequence. Neither ha
d he considered that he had nothing to offer her. He’d pretended to be a bachelor, a younger brother to himself. He’d pretended his troubles never existed and that he was merely a young man returning from his travels overseas.
He’d filled her head with lies.
He’d flirted with her, dazzled her with his fine speech and aristocratic airs. Ah, yes, what an ass he’d been. And when he’d sensed that she was falling in love with him, he’d done nothing to dissuade her. In fact, he’d encouraged her.
And then he’d seduced her.
Henry would shoot any man who even glanced sideways at his own daughter, let alone acted in the manner that he had.
It wasn’t that he hadn’t cared for Eliza… Miss Cline… in his own selfish way. She’d been like a balm to his soul at the time. He’d imagined he could have her while it suited him. Since God had smitten him with Francine’s injury, he’d believed he had every right to bring himself some satisfaction and comfort in whatever manner he pleased.
Remorse had come later, when he’d gone home and sat with Francine that first night.
A combination of self-disgust and bitter regret had moved into his soul.
It had yet to depart.
He’d hurt Miss Cline in the worst way and betrayed his wife at the same time. Francine had been lost within herself, lost to reality, and even though he’d confessed, she’d only nodded with that empty look in her eyes.
But he’d abandoned Miss Cline to suffer the consequences.
Henry had been the cause of her broken engagement, and in turn, she had never married. He guessed that her fiancé had not kept Miss Cline’s transgression to himself.
A strong gust of wind reminded him he was standing outside in freezing weather. He brushed the snow off his head. Nothing he could do about it now. It was obvious she hated him and had no wish for him to attempt to apologize.
She’d recoiled from his touch.
Stepping inside, he determined he would make certain she had all that was needed for her stay at this infernal inn. And then they’d go their separate ways.
He could not change the past. But she could rely on him to be the utmost gentleman in the present.