Harlequin Historical May 2021--Box Set 2 of 2

by Elizabeth Rolls

  His weight—hard, male and so satisfying on her—stole her breath.

  ‘Wait?’ Why not right now?

  ‘Mmm.’ Another kiss, deep and hungry. ‘Because this time—’ his body, fully recovered, confirmed that this time was indeed right now ‘—this time, I am going to ride you.’

  ‘Oh.’ His wound. She should say something to—no. He was an adult.

  She trailed her fingers along his flank. ‘Do you ride well, sir?’

  His eyes darkened. ‘You’ll have to tell me.’

  He rode extremely well. So well that she had no breath left to tell him anything. Instead, she fell asleep in his arms, only waking when he rose to put more coals on the fire. She lay quietly, watching him crouch there in the firelight. He came back to the bed through the shadows and slipped in.

  Perhaps he wouldn’t want to hold her again, perhaps he would roll over and—

  He gathered her in so gently that if she’d been asleep she would not have woken. She lifted her head and placed a kiss on his jaw.

  ‘Love?’

  Yes, oh, yes. God help her, but she did. Her throat ached and she dared not speak, so simply kissed him again. He turned his head to capture her mouth and drew her deep. Long, tender kisses that promised everything. They made love again, slowly and quietly, and Psyché knew she was irretrievably lost. Nothing could ever be the same after this. After him. And she admitted in the silence of her heart as she drifted towards sleep that, if knowing her fate she could have avoided it, she would still have chosen the same path.

  * * *

  Will discovered that Psyché, a working shopkeeper, rose hours before the winter sun. By the time he dragged his clothes on in some sort of order, including his boots, she was downstairs cooking breakfast. He knew that because the aroma of eggs and coffee wafted up the stairs as he jogged down.

  She was just removing the eggs.

  ‘I did enough for you as well. And...coffee.’

  She sounded oddly uncertain. He kissed her. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Do you mind eating at the counter? I haven’t set out tables yet.’ Still that odd reticence. Was she regretting taking him as her lover?

  ‘The counter is fine.’ He sat on one of the tall stools across from her. The eggs and coffee were more than fine. Best to ask. If she’d rather step back—‘Psyché—’

  ‘I’ve never cooked breakfast for anyone before.’

  He sipped his coffee, looking at what she’d said from several angles. The view from all those vantage points was as fine as the coffee and eggs.

  ‘I’ve never stayed for breakfast before. Or had a key.’

  Her breath jerked in. ‘No?’

  ‘No. It’s nice.’ He put his coffee down and reached across the counter. She set her hand in his and their fingers twined, a perfect fit.

  Something else niggled, though. ‘There is one thing, sweetheart?’

  ‘Yes?’

  He cleared his throat, shifted on the stool. ‘You might...that is, I didn’t...er...finish inside you, but you might still, you know—’

  ‘Get pregnant?’

  He was not a green schoolboy to feel this awkward at a little plain speaking. ‘Yes. That. I could use a cundum if you—’

  She smiled at him over the rim of her coffee cup. ‘Queen Anne’s lace.’

  For a moment he thought she was talking about Queen Anne’s sartorial choices. ‘You mean the plant?’

  ‘Chewing the seeds avoids that complication.’

  He stared. ‘I didn’t know that.’

  She chuckled. ‘You’re not a woman.’

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  My dear Will

  I hope this letter finds you as it leaves me and mine—in very good health and spirits. You will doubtless be pleased to know that upon examination the Donne edition is as claimed.

  My lady and the children will accompany me as far as Isleworth, therefore the journey may not be accomplished quite as swiftly were it otherwise.

  I will divide my time between Isleworth and Grosvenor Square. Would you be so kind as to advise Bentham and the staff at Moresby House of this?

  I have received your letters regarding the business you have undertaken for me in London. I am your very grateful servant. Please set all in train as you have suggested.

  I will spend a day or two at Isleworth before coming into town and will write from there so that you may make arrangements to move back to Moresby House.

  Lady Huntercombe sends her best wishes, as do Harry and Georgie. Georgie wishes me to tell you that her backgammon is much improved and she looks forward to a game with you.

  Huntercombe

  Will read the letter again. It had been written nearly a week ago, so by now the Marquess was well on his way to London. Never before had he viewed a return to work with such impending gloom.

  For the past four weeks, despite his room at the Red Lion, he had to all intents and purposes been living with Psyché. And to his confusion and beguilement it was no longer an affair as he recognised the phenomenon.

  Will had conducted affairs before. It had been staggering to his younger self how many women were prepared to indulge in a discreet liaison with him. He’d been far too diffident even to think about it until several ranking ladies had dropped unmistakable hints. At first he’d ignored such invitations, but eventually he’d been attracted enough to one to accept her invitation. He was no prude, but he tried to be discriminating and he was careful to use precautions.

  Most of his affairs had been convenient dalliances at country house parties he had attended with Huntercombe. Widows, or matrons with complaisant husbands, wanting only a pleasurable interlude. He’d always liked his partners—he’d never understood why anyone wanted to be intimate with someone they didn’t actually like—but never before had he deliberately fixed on a particular woman he wanted above all others to be his lover.

  At country houses a gentleman visited the lady’s room under cover of night and discreetly slipped away before the servants were about. The name of the game was discretion. Never before had he engaged in a relationship where he was all but living with his lover. And day by day he felt that relationship, and his feelings, deepen.

  He had always made certain to protect the reputation of any woman he was involved with. But with Psyché? It was not so much the social demand for discretion, as a fierce determination to protect her. And that warred with a growing joy that made it so much harder to hide his feelings. Feelings that shocked him. In the past he had accepted without a qualm that his lover would enjoy other affairs after they parted. He hadn’t minded in the least. He had never been possessive about a woman.

  Now he could no longer imagine wanting any other woman and the idea of Psyché taking another lover lodged in his gut like a lump of frozen lead.

  The morning after their first night together he had taken a cab to Grosvenor Square, packed up enough of his belongings and the papers he needed for the work Huntercombe had left him, and ridden back to Soho. He’d booked a room at the Red Lion for the sake of appearances, but he hadn’t spent a single night there.

  He breakfasted there occasionally, or took supper there before slipping back to The Phoenix to spend the evening and night with Psyché. During the day he went about his work, calling on Huntercombe’s London tenants, and making lists of properties requiring repair or modification, leases needing to be updated and properties needing to be re-let.

  If he got back before The Phoenix closed he might work in his room at the Lion. More often he slipped into The Phoenix through the back to work upstairs. Every so often he worked quietly at a table in the shop itself, enjoying the rush and bustle. Oddly enough, for a man who had always treasured the peace of his employer’s various libraries or his own office, the noise did not bother him in the slightest.

  The noise was outweighed by the joy o
f being near Psyché, of simply watching her, admiring her efficiency as she worked, the cheerful way she managed her staff, the calm dignity of her interactions with the gentlemen who frequented the shop.

  But it was the evenings he liked best. Not merely the taking each other to bed, but the quiet companionship as he wrote up his notes and she updated her account books. Or if they had no work they might simply read. He was happy, he realised. Happy in a way he had never known before.

  Not that he had been unhappy. He had always been happy, content with his life. He found his position challenging and fulfilling. But this, this relationship, was more. More than he had expected, or even thought possible. Because without ever suspecting the danger he courted, he had fallen head over heels in love.

  Always he had thought of love as something sweet and tender, moderated by reason. Sweetness and tenderness were certainly involved. But it was also a fierce burning in his soul that scoffed at reason and refused to acknowledge its claims.

  Now the clock ticked loudly. Huntercombe’s return to London would end this time out of time. In returning to Mayfair in preparation for the Parliamentary sitting, Will would not only be busy during the day, but there would be evening engagements he was expected to attend. He often went out of town to deliver particularly private or sensitive messages.

  Where would that leave this relationship? There would be odd evenings here and there. Perhaps one a week. That would have been more than sufficient for an ordinary affair. But this was Psyché. He didn’t want to be sneaking into her bed once a week and leaving before dawn. Everything in him revolted at the thought of treating her like a whore. As if all they had between them was sex.

  The obvious thing to do, dictated by reason, would be to bring the relationship to a close. Perfectly natural when it was no longer convenient for either of them...only his heart lurched at the word convenient. Psyché was not convenient. She was a very great deal more than that. In fact, she was damnably inconvenient. It would have been convenient if he only wanted sex or if he had possessed the sense to fall in love with a woman he could—

  And there it was. The word he had been circling around. The word he had scarcely dared to acknowledge.

  Marriage.

  He wanted to marry her.

  And he had the distinct impression that marriage had not as much as approached the outer boundaries of Psyché’s mind, let alone crossed it. Not only that—if he married Psyché his own world would turn upside down.

  * * *

  The firelight touched Will’s face with flickering shadows, playing across every familiar angle and plane. Something was bothering him. In the past weeks she had come to know not only his face and body, but his every mood. The slight frown of concentration as he worked at his writing slope on the dining table, the slow smile that lit his eyes when he looked up at her. A smile that could turn her heart upside down and inside out.

  Not that he had brooded like this before. That was the thing. He’d come home—and that she thought of his arrival each evening as coming home terrified her—frustrated on occasion if his day had not been entirely successful, but never moody. Always before he’d talked about whatever was bothering him: a hitch in negotiations, a stubborn tenant or a problem for which he couldn’t see an immediate solution. Sometimes, by talking about it, the solution had come to him. But tonight he kept reading and re-reading that letter from Huntercombe as if it contained bad news. News he didn’t wish to share with her.

  Huntercombe’s seal was as well-known to her as her Uncle Theo’s. Surely a letter from him couldn’t contain bad news? Unless...she swallowed...the Marquess knew about this. Since Will had stayed that first night, obviously Huntercombe knew about their affair. But what if he knew his secretary was practically living with her and disapproved? She doubted he would disapprove on Will’s behalf, but he considered her, in a way, under his protection. Could he be angry with Will for—as he might see it—taking advantage of her? If that was so, she would have to put it right somehow. But how, if she wasn’t sure what was troubling Will?

  She could ask him what was wrong, but hesitated to cross the invisible boundary set by his silence.

  Affairs were not meant to include asking your lover what bothered him. Only this arrangement did not feel like an affair any longer, if indeed it ever had. Affairs did not usually include your lover living with you. And, despite that room at the Red Lion, that was exactly what Will was doing. His linens were in one of her drawers, his shaving kit in another. A pair of boots stood in the closet. He had a hairbrush and toothbrush here.

  Even that might not have mattered if his things did not look as if they had always been here. As if they belonged. And if she had not wanted so very much for them to stay here.

  That had not been part of their agreement. Except she had given him a key...

  ‘What’s worrying you, sweetheart?’

  The gentle concern in his voice tore at her self-control. She blinked and found his worried gaze on her. He had folded the letter, set it aside.

  Honesty. She’d never liked playing games. ‘I was worrying about whatever is worrying you in Huntercombe’s letter.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘I recognised his seal.’

  He nodded slowly. ‘He’s on his way to London.’

  So that was it. He was worrying about telling her that their affair would have to end. The least she could do was make it easy for him. But despite having known that this couldn’t last, that he would have to return to his world, the pain of knowing it was over was shocking.

  ‘I see.’ She managed a smile. ‘You’ll be returning to Grosvenor Square—’

  ‘Yes. But—’

  ‘We knew you would have to go back.’ She galloped into speech, desperate to make it easier for him. Easier for her. Because if she didn’t say something, she would say what must not be said. ‘You can still visit. Stay here if Huntercombe is out of London for a few days and doesn’t—’

  ‘Psyché. That’s not—’

  ‘No.’ Her resolve shook. ‘Don’t—’

  ‘I’m in love with you, Psyché.’

  Shock reared up at the simple, steady declaration. Joy and terror warred. And she knew, deeply, just how much she loved him. How could she not? From the very first he had seen her, truly seen her, as she was. He saw her humanity and the colour of her skin. Many of Uncle Theo’s circle had seen her humanity, but failed to see that it was not despite her skin colour.

  ‘Such a clever child! You would hardly credit that she’s Black.’ Or even: ‘What a shame she is Black!’

  How often had she heard that as a child? As a young girl? People who, rather than seeing and accepting her colour, simply pretended that it wasn’t there? But Will had never done that. He found her beautiful and clever as she was. He didn’t need to pretend that she was a miscoloured white person—to him, she simply was.

  But even if he did love her... ‘You don’t have to say that.’

  ‘Don’t I?’ Those raised eyebrows and the wry smile turned her heart inside out. ‘Psyché, love, I’m thirty-two, not twenty. Nor am I entirely inexperienced. I’ve known lust, infatuation, before.’ He reached out, took her hand. ‘And while I’d have to admit that lust is definitely an element here, it’s not only that. It’s love. And love needs to be spoken.’ His mouth twisted. ‘Unless you cannot return my affection?’

  It would be wiser to say she wasn’t in love. So much safer to lie and to let him go.

  She drew breath, searched for the words, reached for the lie.

  The words refused to be spoken. They refused even to form in her mind. Not for the man who saw all of her.

  ‘I...you don’t understand.’

  For an instant his fingers tightened, then, very deliberately he released her hand. ‘Then will you explain?’

  That smile, the one that had stolen her heart, crept into his eyes, e
dged with sadness. ‘I might not like it if you don’t love me, but it’s scarcely incomprehensible.’

  Oh, yes, it would be. She couldn’t understand why she hadn’t realised from the very beginning the danger Will posed to her peace of mind, to the safe, contented course she had charted. And he was not demanding an explanation as if he were owed one, as if he had offered something priceless and couldn’t accept that she might not want what he wanted. He was simply trying to understand her. That made it even harder to deny him.

  ‘I do love you, Will.’ She could give him that. ‘We can continue our affair. Nothing has to change.’

  ‘Is that what you wish? That nothing should change?’

  She had to be honest with him. ‘That is all it can be. I fancied myself in love once. When I was young.’ She had wanted everything. Marriage, children. She had longed for it with all her heart and soul, believing herself loved in return.

  She had been shatteringly, heartbreakingly wrong.

  ‘And you are so dreadfully aged now.’

  The dry tone made her laugh despite the ache of memory. ‘I was seventeen.’ And now she knew beyond all doubt that what she had felt for Charles had not been love. It had been calf love. Immature and fleeting.

  He nodded. ‘You were very young.’

  ‘Not so young that I didn’t understand why he decided in the end against marrying me.’

  Will’s gaze hardened. ‘“Decided in the end”?’

  Beyond Charles, only Huntercombe had any inkling of what had happened that night out at Hampstead. She had never spoken of it, not even to Uncle Theo or Aunt Grace. Certainly not to Hetty. She had persuaded herself that to do so would be a betrayal driven by spite and jealousy.

  Nor had she dwelt on that evening in years, yet the fragrance of roses, hothouse lilies and candlewax came back so clearly...and the young girl in a dusky rose-pink gown floating down the stairs of Highwood House to her very first formal dinner and party... If she made Will see that girl, would he understand?

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN