The vicar appeared preoccupied, but that expression cleared when he caught sight of her. “Ah, Emma, my dear, you are in fine looks again tonight.”
“Good evening, Reuben.” Her eyes slipped to the door, hoping it would open and Spence would walk in.
Reuben offered his arm to escort her into the drawing room. “I hope you do not mind that I stopped by for dinner. When I saw my cousin and Larkin earlier, Spence extended the invitation.”
Her hopes rose. Reuben had seen him! Perhaps he had not run to London, after all.
“You are always welcome, Reuben,” she said, but her suddenly cheerful voice was not meant for him.
He squeezed her arm as if it had been, but she quickly stepped away, regretting having given him that impression. She poured him some wine. “Spence has not yet returned.”
“That is so like him.” Reuben looked up at her. “Do not tell me you are worried?”
Reuben was a friend, but she had never truly confided in him. “Well, he is not completely recovered, you know.”
Reuben gave her a sympathetic look. “Fear not. Leave it in God’s hands.”
Everything that happened was in God’s hands, Emma felt like saying. But she always believed God preferred a man to be responsible for his own behavior.
Instead she said, “I always do.”
She sat on one of the chairs near the fireplace, and Reuben seated himself in the other, sipping his wine.
After a brief silence he spoke in a knowing way. “Mr. Hale seems to believe you and Spence are getting along splendidly.”
“We have been managing.”
He suddenly leaned toward her. “Forgive my impertinence, but has he . . . has he done his duty by you?”
Her cheeks burned, but she forced herself to give an ingenuous smile. “Spence has worked tirelessly. He has managed to remedy all of Kellworth’s neglect.”
Reuben shifted his chair closer to her. “I meant, has Spence performed his husbandly duty to you?”
She gave him a level stare. “You are crossing the bounds of propriety, Reuben. I beg you will cease doing so this instant.”
He tapped his fingers on the arm of the chair and looked around the room, finally directing his gaze at her again. “You do not know him as I do, Emma. He will hurt you again. Do not put your trust in him, I beg you.”
Emma’s immediate impulse was to spring to Spence’s defense, although Reuben only voiced her own fears. She opened her mouth to speak, but at that same moment the door opened.
Spence crossed the threshold, still dressed in his riding clothes.
Emma jumped to her feet, her heart beating wildly at the mere sight of him. “You have returned! I was beginning to fear something had happened.”
His eyes were warm and seemed to savor her face. “Something did happen. I lost my stirrup and fell off the horse, which I daresay my friends would endlessly tease me about.” He smiled at her. “I beg you will not tell them.”
She reached out to touch his arm. “Are you hurt?”
He covered her hand with his own, but moved stiffly. “Not a scratch. But it was a long walk home.”
“Where was Larkin?” Reuben piped up.
Only then did Spence seem to notice his cousin’s presence. “We’d finished our task and he’d ridden on ahead, so I was alone.” He turned back to Emma. “I will take but a moment to dress for dinner, but you may begin without me.”
“We will wait for you,” she said.
After he left and she walked back to her chair, Reuben gave her a pained look. “Be wary, Emma. Guard your heart.”
Throughout dinner Reuben was unusually quiet. Emma suspected Spence did not notice, but she thought she understood how Reuben felt. He had discovered he was not as important as he hoped. She well knew that feeling.
Emma felt guilty for her dependence on him, which certainly fostered his tendre for her. Still, it was past time for him to abandon his attachment to her and search for a wife of his own.
After dinner they all retired again to the drawing room for more stilted conversation. At his usual time Reuben stood and said, “Best I get back while I still have the light.”
Emma walked him to the door as usual. Before he took his hat and gloves from Mr. Hale, he leaned close to her ear. “Remember my caution, my dear.”
“Do not concern yourself about me,” she replied, as direct as politeness would allow.
She was eager to return to the drawing room and did not wait for Reuben to go out the door.
When she reentered the room, Spence rose to his feet. The mere fact of being alone with him roused her desire, leaving her trembling. She walked over to him as if drawn by a rope.
He searched her face. “I am sorry to have caused you worry, Emma.”
She tried to compose herself, to rise above the flood of emotion roiling inside her. Her voice cracked. “I . . . I thought perhaps you had gone back to London.”
Frown lines creased his brow. “I promised you I would stay to give you a child.”
She wanted to be strong, to act as if she believed his promise and as if conceiving a child were still her only desire. It was impossible.
“Well . . . I . . . I thought perhaps . . . after last night . . . you . . . decided once was enough.”
He put his fingers under her chin, raising her face to him. “Once was most definitely not enough.”
“A baby might be inside me now.” She touched her belly.
He placed a hand over hers. “It might not happen so easily, Emma.”
She began to feel light as air, as if floating two inches above the ground. She took several deep breaths. “Then we must try again.”
His eyes darkened. “Yes, we must.” He lifted her hand and pressed his lips against her palm. “I think we must try again this very night.”
Chapter THIRTEEN
Their second night together surpassed the first, but could not compare with succeeding nights as they learned more and more what pleased the other. As Spence’s physical strength grew, his lovemaking became more inventive and more passionate. Emma responded more boldly than she ever thought she could. She delighted in exploring his body, willing herself to remember every inch of him with sight and smell and touch.
If her nights were the milk that nourished her, then her days were the cream. Kellworth’s demands on Spence’s time decreased and they spent a great portion of the day in each other’s company. They rode in the morning, Spence helping her gain confidence on horseback. They romped with the kittens. Read books to each other. In the evening she played the newly repaired pianoforte for him.
His strength and stamina restored, he took her on walks and picnics and excursions to the village, where everyone smiled in greeting at them. Spence insisted upon buying her whatever treats the shops sold. He insisted she visit the dressmaker again, ordering more dresses, giving her the delight of having to decide what to wear each day. They explored the estate and took inventories of each room of the house. Sometimes a black mood would suddenly come over him as they came across a familiar object or a place he said he’d played as a child, making the pleasant memories seem painful. She’d wrap her arms around him to soothe whatever caused his pain, and often her attempts led to a poignant, urgent sort of lovemaking in places other than the bed. But he never spoke of what had upset him.
Four weeks passed, the happiest time Emma could ever imagine. She pretended this idyll would last forever.
The illusion succeeded most of the time.
This night they lay in each other’s arms, satiated and languorous. She loved moments like this when they talked of little things, ordinary things that contrasted so sharply with the extraordinary pleasures of their coupling.
She shivered and he reached over her to search for her nightdress, helping her don it; then he snuggled her close to him again.
He planted a kiss on her forehead. “You’ve no wish to be naked?”
She cuddled closer to him. “What if a servant comes in?”
He laughed softly. “The devil with them.” Tightening his arms around her, he asked, “What is your pleasure tomorrow? I beg to please you.”
She turned her head and kissed where her lips reached at the edge of his chest. “I am content.”
“Nonsense. We need a new adventure.”
He said this lightheartedly, but any hint of his restlessness merely reminded her that he would leave her.
Her hand slid to her belly. Her monthly courses were more than a week late, and usually she was as regular as the moon’s cycles. She might be carrying a child. His child.
She wanted it to be true. It thrilled her to think that a new life could be born from the passion they shared, from the joining of their bodies. She longed to hold his child in her arms, longed to feel his child suckling at her breast.
And yet, if a child were inside her, their new bargain would be fulfilled, and Spence was free to depart. So she did not tell him her courses were late. She would delay for as long as possible.
“I have it!” he said after a piece. “I will drive you to Maidstone and we will buy out the shops for you.”
“I have never been there.” Emma had no desire to go to Maidstone. Going farther than the village gave her a flutter of nerves.
“Then it is high time I took you. If tomorrow promises to be a fine day, I will drive you in the curricle.”
She sat up on her elbow. “Are you able to handle the ribbons for so long a time?” He had taken her for short drives, but a trip of two hours or more over questionable roads was another matter entirely.
He pulled her down next to him again. “I am certain of it. I am good as new.”
She was not so certain, but she allowed him to lull her to sleep, talking of the sights they would see on the way and all the treasures he would buy for her in the Maidstone stores.
By the time Spence joined Emma in the breakfast room the next morning, he was no longer convinced of the wisdom of this trip to Maidstone. The idea had grown out of a wish to escape Kellworth even for a brief time. He had not considered that it meant riding on the section of road where Stephen was killed.
Where he killed Stephen, he meant.
The bleak misery of regret he usually held at bay pressed in on him as it had done so often during this time with Emma. Memories were in every corner of Kellworth, over every hill, and into each thicket. Most were of Stephen, alive, vibrant, happy. Stephen laughing at their childhood games, crowing in triumph when they climbed to the top of a tree, slapping him on the back after they leapt over the stream and did not fall in. If that were not disturbing enough, there were also flashes of his parents, a wisp of his mother’s laugh, the whiff of his father’s snuff. They were like ghosts haunting him, popping up anywhere, when he least expected it.
He could never explain to Emma when the memories assaulted him, but she’d noticed his distress. Sometimes he just wanted to run, to escape Kellworth for any place else.
His best escape was Emma. When he made love to her, he felt transported. At the same time it was like coming home. Sometimes, when she lay in his arms, he decided that life with her would be adventure enough for him. Then the next day he would turn a corner and the ghosts would be waiting, and the urge to be on the road, in a carriage, on horseback, in a ship, returned.
With his arms wrapped around her in his bed, he’d thought a trip to Maidstone would content him. He wanted to spoil her, to lavish gifts upon her. Spending the day with her seemed irresistible.
“What concerns you, Spence?” Emma broke into his reverie and peered at him over her cup of chocolate.
“Why, nothing,” he lied, attempting a reassuring smile.
She gave him a worried frown. “Are you not feeling up to this trip to Maidstone? I do not mind if we stay home.”
She already wore a new carriage dress and looked so fetching he could only imagine how she would be admired in the town. He wanted to show her off.
If only he would not have to travel that haunted piece of road.
He reached over to clasp her hand. “I am perfectly well. We will not miss our little adventure.”
She lowered her lashes. “I am not much made for adventure.”
“We shall have a splendid time. You will see.” Spence knew she felt most comfortable in the safe bosom of Kellworth, the same place that to him felt like being trapped in the coffin. She did not desire this trip, but he needed it.
If only he would not have to travel on that haunted piece of road.
Within the hour a groom brought the curricle to the front door. The horses harnessed to it were the same animals that seven years ago had been harnessed to the high-perched phaeton he’d badgered his brother to buy. Had no one rid Kellworth of them? He’d been too grief-stricken to think of it at the time, too much in a hurry to run off to war.
This day, cloudless and crisp, was as perfect as the day he’d held the phaeton’s ribbons and uttered to his brother those fateful words, “Let me show you how fast it can go.”
Spence helped her into her seat and climbed up beside her, taking the ribbons in his gloved hands. They started down the long lane on Kellworth land and soon enough reached the road, taking the fork with a sign pointing to Maidstone.
Neither of them spoke. Emma seemed lost in her own thoughts and Spence would just as soon heave up his breakfast than turn onto this road. Only the horses seemed cheerful. They were frisky and eager to run, just as they had been seven years ago. Spence set a brisk but sensible pace, feeling the horses strain against it in disappointment.
The haunted stretch of road came into view. Each twist and turn made Spence’s head pound and his hands shake as he came closer to the spot. The memory of his excitement returned, of laughing as the phaeton rounded each bend, challenging his driving skill, and giving him the sensation of flying.
Now as he drove the curricle sedately around that same sharp turn, he could not help but remember how the phaeton started to tip, how he’d tried to pull the horses to compensate, how the speed was too fast. He could still hear Stephen’s shout as the phaeton flipped over. Spence jumped up, laughing, without a scratch. But Stephen . . .
Stephen lay in a heap under the tree he’d been thrown against. He died in Spence’s arms.
The curricle passed that tree while Spence felt the wrench of agony, the taste of bile in his throat. But as soon as it had been reached, they were past the spot, unscathed, merely scraped by a painful memory. The horses were as sprightly as when they had started, and Emma had relaxed her grip on the seat. Spence felt as if he had scaled the rocky face of an Alpine mountain. He exhaled a long, pent-up breath and glanced at Emma. She smiled back at him and a knot loosened inside him.
Everything would work out, he suddenly felt. The future was as bright as the sun shining down on them. First they would enjoy the shops at Maidstone and who knew what other adventures they could share. They had the rest of their lives to discover.
Spence took in the familiar countryside as if seeing it for the first time. He savored the glimpse of verdant hills, of lush foliage. He lifted his face to the sun.
As the horses turned down the next bend in the road, he heard a loud crack from the wheel on his side. The curricle tipped as the wheel shattered. He was in the air, hearing Emma scream as the sky turned upside down and back again. He landed hard on his wounded shoulder, through stars of pain glimpsing the horses dragging away the now one-wheeled vehicle.
“Emma!” he called, painfully struggling to his feet. He twisted around to search for her. “Emma!”
She did not answer.
He finally saw her at the bottom of the slope at the side of the road, looking like a rag doll tossed away. She didn’t move.
“Emma!” he cried again as he slid down the embankment and limped to her side.
He untied the ribbons of her bonnet, searching her neck for her pulse, his shaking fingers frantic until finally he could feel its tiny beat.
She moaned, and he was grateful for another s
ign of life. He felt for her spine and checked her arms and legs. Nothing seemed broken. There was a tiny scrape near her hairline, but no other evidence of harm.
“Wake up, Emma,” he demanded. “Talk to me.”
But she made only unintelligible sounds.
He needed to get her back to Kellworth, to send for the surgeon. Reluctant to leave her, even for a second, he climbed back to the road. Through the trees he could see where the road doubled back. He caught sight of the horses galloping out of sight.
They were at least six miles from Kellworth. He could not carry her such a distance. No one would come looking for them until day’s end, and even then they might assume they had stayed the night at Maidstone. This road was too untraveled to trust another carriage to happen by.
He hurried back to Emma’s side and pulled her into a sitting position. “Wake up, Emma,” he pleaded again.
“Mmmmm,” she murmured, falling against him.
He did not have the strength to carry her up the embankment and was forced to drag her up the steep incline, her new dress tangling in a prickly vine and ripping. Once on the road, he lifted her over his good shoulder, as he had done many a time to carry wounded men off the battlefield.
His shoulder throbbed with pain and his legs felt weak, but he ignored the discomfort and headed toward Maidstone, toward the main road some two to three miles distant. Carriages and wagons and riders would use the road heading to the town. Someone would find them.
With luck one of Kellworth’s tenant farmers came upon them, returning from Maidstone. He made room for them in the back of his wagon, and drove them all the way back to Kellworth, Spence holding Emma in his arms the whole way. She woke several times while he held her, but always slipped back into unconsciousness again.
It was well past noon when the farmer brought them directly to Kellworth’s door and later still when Mr. Price attended her. Spence paced her room while the surgeon performed his examination. Mrs. Cobbett and the new lady’s maid stood by her bedside.
All Spence could think was that she would not wake up, that he had killed her, as he had killed Stephen. She would draw one long, deep breath and release it slowly and life would leave her as it had left Stephen. Spence had seldom prayed since that day, except to ask God why his life had been spared and his brother’s taken, why he walked off a battlefield when thousands of good men did not. He prayed now, for Emma. He prayed to God, who took from him his parents and his brother, not to take Emma as well.
The Marriage Bargain Page 16