Practical Widow to Passionate Mistress

by Louise Allen

  He watched her with unusual amber eyes that seemed startlingly youthful in his wrinkled face. She should get up and walk away, she knew, but something about him fascinated her. ‘You be as pretty as he told I.’

  ‘Who? Ross? I mean, Lord Brandon?’

  ‘Aah,’ he said, a complicated noise with more vowels in it than she could count. He sat down on a rock facing her. ‘You looking after that boy properly?’ A black-and-white dog, long haired with a plumy tail, crept up, belly to the sand, and curled round at his feet.

  ‘Boy? He is hardly that. You are Billy, are you not? I’m afraid I don’t know your last name.’ Dreadful old reprobate he might be, but this was the man Ross seemed to regard almost as a grandfather. If she wanted to understand Ross, perhaps he could help her.

  ‘Billy’ll do. He talk about me, then?’

  ‘Lord Brandon spoke fondly of you. He told me that you taught him how to shoot and how to treat girls.’

  The old man gave a crack of laughter that had the dog looking up. ‘Well, he shoots damn fine, I just hope he listened about girls.’ He got at least one u into the word, but Meg was beginning to understand the accent now.

  ‘I really would not know.’

  ‘Aah.’

  ‘I am his housekeeper,’ Meg said repressively. ‘Lord Brandon—’

  ‘Don’t be calling him that, that’s his father, God rot him. Ross ain’t his father.’

  ‘Well, it is his title now, and he has to manage this estate and find himself a wife and settle down. And be happy.’

  ‘Why not marry him yourself then, maid?’ Infuriating old man. Meg glared at him. He had hardly any teeth and the few she could see were brown with tobacco. She suspected he hadn’t washed in a year and probably, if the sea breezes were not blowing from her to him, smelt like a ferret, and he had no business whatsoever talking to her like this. But Ross loved him. And he obviously loved Ross. Ross needed love. She couldn’t bring herself to snub Billy.

  ‘That would be impossible. He is a baron. I—’ I am forbidden from marrying any decent man because of what I have done.

  ‘You’re a widow, and an officer’s widow too, he says. A lady. Respectable.’

  ‘Not respectable enough.’ Impossible that she ever could be. She should be sinking with shame at such a frank conversation, but talking to this old man was more like confiding in a wild animal or an ancient tree than confessing to a person.

  ‘Boy’s a fool,’ the poacher said. At least, that was what Meg guessed he said. ‘I’ll sort him out for you.’

  ‘No!’

  The dog sat up and barked. Old Billy blinked at her, slowly, like a very thoughtful lizard. ‘Don’t you want him then, maid?’

  ‘I…Certainly not.’

  ‘Hah! Never thought Ross’d be such a gommuck. Good day to you, maid.’

  ‘G-good day,’ Meg stammered. The old man picked up his stick and walked away up the beach to where the scrubby woodland ended. He whistled, sharply. The dog sprang up, swiped a hot tongue over Meg’s bare feet and when she looked back to the wood both man and dog had vanished as mysteriously as they had appeared.

  She brushed the sand off her feet, put on her stockings, laced her shoes and made her way back up the lane, uncertain whether she was amused or alarmed by that encounter. Would he take Ross to task and lecture him on marriage? What if Ross thought she had put the idea into Billy’s head and not the other way around?

  The thought of marrying Ross had never entered her mind—her conscience was quite clear about that. She had married once, thinking herself in love, and that had not been what her romantic soul had thought it might be. She was older and wiser now, knew that no man was all hero, all saint, however handsome his face and sunny his smiles. And Ross was not handsome and he rationed his smiles like a miser. Was she—could she be?—in love with him?

  ‘Have you been out a-gypsying?’

  Meg stopped short. Without realising it she had reached the edge of the terrace and there was Ross, his shoulder propped against one of the lichen-encrusted urns that edged it, towering over her as she stood on the grass below him. Her insides did the complicated flip-flop that the unexpected sight of him always produced.

  ‘I have been down to the beach.’

  ‘And returned without your bonnet, with flowers in your hair and, I will bet a guinea, you have sand between your toes.’

  ‘I am afraid I have.’ He straightened up and kept pace with her as she walked along to the shallow flight of steps in the centre of the terrace. ‘But I have never been beside the sea before, so I could not resist paddling.’ She put up a hand to remove the cherry blossom before she utterly undermined what authority she had with the staff by walking in with it in her wind-blown hair.

  Ross leaned down and plucked it out before she could reach it, his fingertips ruffling into the fine hairs at her temple and sending a shiver down her spine. ‘Did you meet any smugglers?’ He stuck the stem into his buttonhole and waited for her to climb the three steps to his side.

  ‘Why, are there any? I saw a fishing boat, that was all.’

  ‘My head keeper tells me we have smugglers in the bay. There are caves if you know where to look and the tide is right—not big ones, but enough to stow a few barrels of brandy in.’

  ‘Oh.’ Smugglers had a romantic reputation, but no doubt in reality they were just as unglamorous and unpleasant as highwaymen. ‘Did your father turn a blind eye to it?’

  ‘He must have done.’ Ross set his shoulder against another urn and looked out towards the sea. ‘The brandy I’ve been drinking is the good French stuff, and the barrels it is coming out of have no marks on them.’

  ‘And do you condone it too?’

  ‘They did a lot of damage when we were at war. It was a prime route for intelligence to reach the French. That danger has gone now, but I must take a stand before they start intimidating people on the estate. And when I’m sworn as a magistrate I will have to take an active interest, and not just on my own land.’

  My own land. An admission at last that it was his. The relief at hearing the unconscious note of possession in his voice made her suddenly light-hearted. ‘Ross, what is a gommuck?’

  ‘A fool, a clumsy fellow. A clodpole. Why, where did you hear that?’

  ‘Oh, just a country person I passed.’ Would Billy tell Ross he had spoken to her? Was it best to admit she had seen him, or not? Then the moment to mention it was passed. Ross laid a hand on her forearm as she turned to go in and her breath caught.

  ‘I have heard from Kimber, my solicitor. He has a young man he recommends as a confidential enquiry agent and he is sending him up to speak with you on Monday. His name is Patrick Jago, the second son of the squire of a parish a few miles north of here. He has carried out some commissions for Kimber and he speaks well of him.’

  ‘Thank you, it was thoughtful of you to arrange it. It is such a relief to be taking action at last.’ His hand was warm on her arm and she did not want to move. Or think. But she must. ‘You will make an accounting of Mr Kimber’s time and deduct it from my wages, of course.’

  ‘Why? In case I should extract payment for it in some other way later?’ His brow lifted in that devilish way he had when he was on his dignity.

  ‘No.’ Meg moved away so his hand fell from her arm. ‘In case you should suppose that I presume upon my position.’

  ‘That, Meg, is nonsense. But I am sorry, I touched you, forgive me.’

  ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake,’ Meg snapped, suddenly losing her temper with the slow dance they were performing around each other. ‘This is ridiculous. I do not suppose for a moment that because you put a hand on my arm to detain me that it is some kind of demand. I am perfectly capable of telling you if you do something that upsets or offends me.’

  ‘So, you give me back my promise not to touch you?’

  His mouth, that sensual, sinful mouth that so shook her will-power when it curved into a smile, was not curving now. ‘Yes, I do.’

&nbs
p; Then she lifted her gaze and met his eyes and caught her breath, for they were smiling, and something hot and wicked and mischievous was dancing in the black depths. Without speaking he put his hands on her shoulders and drew her to him as he stepped back under the shelter of the first-floor balcony and she went, without a murmur, her feet stumbling a little on the uneven flags. Ross leaned back against the wall and gathered her into his arms and she found herself held against his chest with no strength in her, either of will or body, to push him away.

  His mouth found hers, hot and demanding, yet without force. Her lips moulded to his, opened to the pressure of his tongue, softened as he licked inside, finding the intimate, sensitive places, the places that made her melt into longing. Her hands slid up his chest, coming to rest over the beat of his heart, reading his arousal and his gentleness with her fingertips, sensing the tightly reined passion beneath.

  When Ross lifted his head she went up on her toes and kissed the corner of his mouth before sinking down to rest her head where her hands had been, strangely soothed and at peace. This was so right, this was where she should be. She sighed, content, willing the moment to last.

  ‘Why do you give me what you will not let me buy?’ His voice was husky against her hair.

  ‘Because I can give you a gift freely and remain myself,’ she said into the soft, warm linen of his shirt, explaining it to herself as much as to him. Because that kiss was two people attracted to each other, not a man with money buying a woman.

  ‘I see. And you gift me one kiss?’

  ‘Just one, and no promises.’ Meg managed to step back. It seemed she could smile quite successfully. ‘I will see you after dinner; we should finish Gulliver’s Travels tonight.’

  Ross’s mouth twisted. ‘No. No tonight. Not again, in fact. I do not think I can sit in the library alone with you, even if the door is open, and concentrate on Lemuel Gulliver’s troubles. I must think on my own.’

  ‘Then I am sorry.’ Her spirits plunged at the realisation that this was going so very wrong. ‘I should not be here, in this house. I do not want to tease you, to seem to flirt, to make you suffer. I was right when I said I must go—it is selfish to stay when we feel…’ Meg turned, knowing only that she must walk away from him, now, this minute. Down towards the lane she saw a flash of black and white, the wave of a plumy tail, then the dog was gone. And with it its master? Had Billy been standing there watching that foolish, impulsive kiss?

  ‘No, Meg, don’t go. Don’t leave, not yet. Between us we will learn to control this—whatever it is. And if you must—I confess, the last thing I want is to stop kissing you.’

  She turned back from the view, to find him just where she had left him. ‘I don’t want…I do not want to make you more unhappy.’

  ‘Unhappy?’ The shadow swept over his face as though the sun had gone behind a cloud. ‘Is that how I seem to you?’ He shook his head in an abrupt rejection when she nodded. ‘No. I do not think I am unhappy. For a while I was in despair, deep enough in to make death not something to be courted, but a fate that I would not avoid if it found me.

  ‘Now? I am frustrated by wanting you, but you make me see this place differently. I am…challenged by all the things I must learn and the things your questions make me confront. I am terrified of Lady Pennare, her daughters and all the matchmaking mamas for twenty miles around and I wake at three in the morning wondering when I will come round from the nightmare and discover I am not here at all, but somewhere I understand and can control. Is that unhappiness? I do not think so. It is certainly no longer despair, even if it is not contentment.’

  He frowned, but the old, deep darkness was not there. This was thought, a man deep in a puzzle. ‘But perhaps challenge is a way of knowing you are alive. You have brought me something, a way of looking at this house, this estate. The reminder that I owe it more than duty.’

  ‘I am glad of that at least. I was frightened for you.’

  ‘And that is why you kissed me just now?’

  ‘Oh, no.’ She shook her head, unable to explain to him without revealing the fear that she was falling in love with him. He had rejected the notion of love, had sneered at it—she could not bear the thought that he might guess how her heart was betraying her. ‘Do you have any mischievous spirits in Cornwall? Elves, perhaps?’

  ‘We have piskeys. Why, have you met one?’

  ‘I think perhaps I did just now. Down on the beach. Yes, a piskey up to mischief. That would account for it.’

  Chapter Twelve

  Ross might confess to waking in the small hours to brood on his new life, but Meg was having trouble even getting to sleep in the first place. That kiss, the tenderness she had felt in both of them as his lips brushed over hers, haunted her. He was recovering, becoming again the man she suspected he had always been. He had never lost his courage, his endurance, his basic decency, but the young man’s sense of humour, his capacity for joy, that had been knocked out of him by guilt and hardship, the loss of the life he loved and the pain of his wound.

  It was fragile still. Meg gave up on sleep and sat up in bed. That darkness needed little excuse to swoop and fill up his soul. Had she ever felt that bleak? She had been miserable at home at the Vicarage, but there had always been her dreams to give her hope. It had been hard when she had realised that James had feet of clay and that she would always be the stronger of the two of them, but she had learned to make the best of things. His death had been a grief and the time after his will had been opened still had her shivering at the memory of his betrayal and what it had made her.

  But she had never despaired. She locked her arms around her bent legs and rested her chin on her knees. If Death had come looking for her, she would have kicked and screamed and punched him on the nose rather than give in.

  And Ross had not given in either, although he might think he had. Meg bit her lip. He thought he had given up and he felt diminished by that? But he had fought to live after he had been wounded or he would never have had the will to stop them cutting off his leg. He had been at the end of his strength in the river and yet somehow he had clung to that ladder and to life.

  He was finding his way out of the darkness. Was she really being any help to him, or was her refusal to be his mistress making it worse? There were ways he could deal with physical frustration, Meg told herself firmly. She must not talk herself into going to him by pretending it would be an act of charity. If she did, then it would be because she loved him and she could share that, know him fully for the little time they could have together before the realities of their respective positions, his duty, his need for a wife, her search for her sisters, took them apart for ever.

  But that did not stop the yearning to be held, the need for tenderness, for the thrill of another’s body in tune with yours, that rare, soaring ecstasy that she believed, deep in her romantic soul, she would find one day when everything was right, and the man was the right one, and both of you were utterly transported.

  That had been what that kiss was about, for both of them: a yearning, a reaching out for joy. ‘Go to sleep,’ Meg said out loud, turning to punch her hot pillow before she lay down again. ‘Go to sleep and dream about Bella and Lina.’

  Sunday. How long was it since she had been in a proper church, sat through a service, listened to a sermon? It must have been the day before she ran away from home and the sermon had been Papa at his dourest. Following the army there had been drum-head services every Sunday, prayers by graves scratched in the dusty earth, baptisms with water dipped in a bucket from the nearest stream, weddings in the sight of God, but not a clergyman.

  Now she had to dress in her best, braid her hair tightly under her bonnet, process with the other servants behind Ross down to the church in the next valley. They said it was very beautiful. She had been avoiding it as though it had been a plague pit.

  It was beautiful, almost exotic, once you removed your gaze from the back of Ross’s neatly barbered head under the tall hat Perrott had magicke
d up from somewhere. The church was down in the bottom of a steep combe, its toes almost in the water, Heneage said. It was like plunging into a jungle; she almost expected parrots instead of the jackdaws who wheeled and chattered overhead, squabbling with the gulls.

  Trees dripped with moss, ferns grew waist high, grey headstones stood and leaned on every flat place as the path wound down to the grey granite tower. Beside the steps a brook chuckled and tumbled its way to the sea.

  The beauty seduced, calmed, but even so, her hand was rigid on the butler’s arm as they went into the little church, the servants from the Court after them, filling the back pews.

  The choir shuffled into place, small boys uncannily well behaved under the eye of the older choristers. A plump woman bustled up to the organ, which had been wheezing for the past ten minutes while another small boy pumped at the bellows. She played a chord and the congregation winced, but with the air of long familiarity and acceptance. The vicar emerged from the vestry, tripped on the edge of his cassock and took his place.

  ‘Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today…What?’ The tallest chorister was hissing from the stalls. ‘Oh. Yes, not a wedding, of course. Dearly beloved brethren, the Scripture moveth us, in sundry places…’

  ‘He’s a good man, but given to muddles, is Mr Hawkins,’ Heneage murmured in her ear. ‘Much loved, hereabouts. And Miss Hawkins, his sister, for all that she murders that organ.’

  The sermon, once Mr Hawkins had found his papers in the vestry and then dropped them as he climbed into the pulpit, was all about lost sheep and the joy of their finding. It was to give thanks for the safe return of one of the fishing boats, thought lost a week since, that had limped into harbour the day before. But it was also about Ross, Meg sensed, as the vicar’s mild blue gaze swept over his congregation, pausing for a moment on the front pew.

  Meg swallowed the lump in her throat. This was what a vicar should be, she thought, looking at the happily weeping fishermen’s wives in one pew, Ross’s bowed head, the earnest, scrubbed faces of the choir.