To Claim the Long-Lost Lover

by Jude Knight

  “I agree,” Uncle James said. “You have lost seven years together, and your families owe you their support to live your lives in the way you choose.”

  Lechton subsided at that, and Uncle James moved smoothly to discussing what activities the Benthams, as he called Sarah and Nate, might engage in during the next few days.

  By the time they left the dining table, Sarah and Nate had agreed that they would talk to Elias together the next day, and introduce him to Lord and Lady Lechton afterwards. They would attend the Opera in the Duke of Winshire’s box tomorrow night, and ride in Hyde Park each day for the rest of the week.

  Further, at Sarah’s suggestion, she and Nate would visit the Tremaways to explain their history before the announcement at the ball. That should help to make peace between Tremaway and Lechton.

  The ball at the end of the week would be a glittering finale to the year. Uncle James was certain they would get excellent attendance, and Sarah didn’t doubt it. Her mother and aunt, and her godmother, the Duchess of Haverford, would see to that.

  Once they were settled in the drawing room with the tea tray, the conversation turned to proving the validity of the marriage. Nate described his conversation with Wakefield. “We may have results from Oxfordshire in time for the ball,” he said, “but I don’t know how long it will take to get news of my cousin.”

  Lechton’s brows shot up. “But I can tell you that. Winshire put pressure on our mutual cousin who was earl before me to get rid of the man. He was only a curate, you know. I lost track of him for a while, but the solicitors found him again when the previous earl died. He is my heir after you, you know. After Elias, now.”

  “You said you know where he is?” Nate asked.

  “Why, not more than an hour’s drive from here, in the village of Hounswood. He is curate to the vicar of St Chad’s. I... um... we do not talk. But he would talk to you, Nate. He always felt that you were in the right back then, and were badly treated.”

  Sarah could see Nate swallowing a sharp answer before he asked, politely, for his cousin’s direction, and Lechton went off to his study to find it.

  “What an astounding coincidence, Nate. St Chad’s in Hounswood sponsors the training centre I told you about: The Theodora Foundation. I might have met him myself if I had taken the women Charlotte rescued to deliver them to the village. But apparently Aldridge is going to Kent, and has promised to detour past Hounswood, so their travel is all organised.”

  Sarah and Nate left the Lechton townhouse not long after. “Shall we drop you off, Bentham?” Uncle James asked.

  Sarah took a deep breath and said, “Can we go past Nate’s rooms so he can get a change for the morning, Uncle James? I would like him to come home with me.” By the time she had finished the sentence, her face was burning, and the heat had spread even to her ears and her throat.

  But Nate’s broad smile and the warmth in his eyes made it all worthwhile, and Uncle James didn’t turn a hair. “Certainly.” And he turned to give the instruction to his coachman.

  * * *

  The servants would not talk. Their enemies had ensured that. In the last two and a half years, Sarah’s cousin Sutton and Yousef, her uncle's aide, had tested and confirmed the loyalty of everyone who worked in one of their households. Not everyone in England approved of a mixed-race ducal family, and they had suffered everything from gossip to assassination attempts.

  Here, in Sarah's own home, she and Nate could begin their marriage again without word leaking before they were ready.

  Even so, she led him, her hand in his, up a secondary staircase to the suite she shared with her sister. As soon as she opened the door, she knew Charlotte was home early. The wrap Charlotte had worn was thrown over the back of a sofa, and the door to Charlotte's chamber was open. She could not see the bed from this angle, but Charlotte’s maid Clarke moved around the room, snuffing the candles.

  Sarah drew Nate into the room and shut the door behind them. "I will just check on my sister. Would you care for a brandy?" She gestured to the decanters. "Help yourself. I won't be moment."

  "Do you wish me to go?" he asked.

  She had already taken two paces across the room but at that she turned back. She reached up to his face with her palm, kissing his other cheek. "I want you to stay. Will you stay, Nate?"

  His eyes devoured her as he nodded, and the heat rose in her again. Charlotte. I am going to check on Charlotte. She stiffened her shaking knees, and crossed the room to Charlotte's chamber.

  "Her ladyship is right poorly tonight," Clarke whispered. "The usual trouble."

  The heap of blankets on the bed shifted. "Is that you, Sarah?" Her voice was barely louder than the maid's. When Charlotte's indisposition approached, it began with a headache that only worsened as the other cramps and aches descended upon her. "You are home early."

  "And I have a guest, my dear. Nate is with me. Clarke, Lord Bentham is in the sitting room. He will be staying the night." The maid's training held good; her reaction confined to widened eyes and a dropped jaw that she closed immediately. "Congratulate me. You are the first outside of immediate family to know that I am married.”

  Clarke curtsied in her confusion, and stammered, “I am about done here, my lady." Her head came up at a knock on the outside door. "That will be Lady Charlotte's brick." She curtsied again. "Please excuse me, my lady."

  Sarah moved to where she could see Charlotte's face. "Is there anything I can do, beloved? I can send Nate away if you need me.” Usually, Charlotte wanted nothing more than to be left alone with a hot brick, a few drops of laudanum, and a darkened room.

  Yes, there she was, shaking her head and wincing at the pain. “Go have your reunion, dearest. Love you.”

  Clarke was at her elbow again. “I’ll look after her, my lady.” She cast a glance back towards the sitting room door. “You go to your husband.”

  With a last glance at her poor sister, she did as she was told. Charlotte was a martyr to the woman’s trouble; had been ever since that terrible infection after the incident they never spoke about. Fortunately, her courses were not frequent or regular, and the symptoms became bearable again after a day or two.

  Furthermore, Sarah usually left her to the tender ministrations of Clarke, who was, after all, with her all the time. It was foolish to feel guilty about welcoming Nate to her bed when Charlotte was in pain and miserable, and would never know the joy and pleasure of being one flesh with a husband.

  Well, and are you going to spoil your life—and that of your son and husband—because you cannot improve mine? That’s what Charlotte would say if Sarah expressed such thoughts to her. She never complained. Indeed, she compared herself to those whom Sarah rescued, and insisted she had a wonderful and privileged life: wealthy, independent, and surrounded by family who loved her.

  “Is she very ill?” Nate asked. She had drifted to where he stood by the sideboard, his bag of clothes still slung over one shoulder. He put down his glass of brandy to brush his fingers across the furrows between her brows. “Does she need you? Do not feel you have to—"

  Sarah slipped her arms around his waist and rested her face against his waistcoat. “She has taken something to help her sleep, and her maid is with her. Hold me for a moment, Nate.”

  He had wrapped her in his embrace even before she had asked. “Gladly.”

  Sarah felt the tension drain from her as they hugged. She was where she belonged. She pulled back and he released her instantly, watching her as if for a cue. She gave it to him. “Pour me a small brandy, too, Nate, then bring the glasses through to my room.”

  Her own maid waited, her mouth firmly shut but her eyes full of questions.

  “Wilson,” Sarah said, “my husband Lord Bentham will be joining me tonight. Please fetch my hot water now, and then that will be all for the night. Oh! And you had better knock before you bring the water in. I am sure, Wilson, I do not need to tell you and Clarke: not a word to the other servants.”

  Wilson nodded, her
eyes wider than ever. “Shall I undo your buttons, Lady Sarah—Lady Bentham, I mean?”

  Nate reached Sarah’s side, and handed her a glass. “Thank you, Wilson, but I shall be maid for my wife tonight.” He kissed Sarah’s forehead, and Wilson blinked several times before bobbing a curtsey and stammering, “Yes, my lord. My lady. Um.” She bobbed again. “Every happiness. Hot water. Yes.” And still bobbing, she hurried from the room, closing the door behind her.

  “Poor Wilson. I am afraid she might burst of curiosity.”

  Nate ran his finger down her cheek and then slid a hand down her arm and across onto her breast, driving what she had been about to say completely out of her head.

  His voice was husky as he commented, “She should knock before she comes in, should she?”

  Sarah sipped her brandy, trying to pretend she was not going up in flames. “I hoped that was a good idea,” she told him.

  He sipped his own before answering, his hand continuing its explorations, shaping her breast and then moving to the other. “An excellent idea. But I think I should not strip you naked quite yet?”

  She could feel the heat rising in her cheeks. He was bold, this older, more confident Nate. “Nor I, you.” She managed the retort, and her voice barely shook.

  “Perhaps a kiss, then?” he asked. His hand slid around her back to hold her firm against him, and his lips descended on hers.

  For seven years, memories of their kisses and embraces had fuelled her dreams. Tender at first, almost tentative, this kiss set those memories in the shade from the first, and as the heat rose and his free hand pressed her closer; as she spiralled into a space out of time and place where nothing existed but him, the memories slipped away to be replaced by new ones.

  Somehow, the glasses were gone, and both of his hands were on her, and hers on him, untying and stripping off his cravat, fumbling undone the buttons of his waistcoat, pulling his shirt from his pantaloons so she could slide her hands up under it, to stroke and caress his warm firm skin, silk over steel, much more of it than back when he had been a skinny youth just shooting up from boyhood and still inches short of his adult height.

  Such random thoughts surfaced and drifted away as he released her for long enough to wriggle out of his waistcoat, pull the shirt over his head, all the while kissing her as if the touch of her lips were keeping him alive.

  Then his hands were on her again, and he was kissing her neck and then lower. With her bodice now completely unfastened, her gown slipped down her body to pool around her feet, and she kicked free of it and curved her spine so he had room to continue to feast while she pressed the rest of her body to his.

  The knock on the door was repeated twice before either of them surfaced enough to notice.

  She left his arms reluctantly, and picked up a robe on the way to the door. “It will be Wilson with the hot water.”

  He caught her arm; just a touch, but it was enough to stop her. “Will she be more likely to talk to the other servants about us if she knows the truth? Or if she doesn’t?”

  Sarah shook her head. “Wilson will not talk. Not when I have asked her not to do so. But still...”

  The knock sounded again, and Sarah opened the door, wide enough that Wilson could carry in the large jug of water. The maid’s eyes fixed on Nate’s naked torso and widened so far, the white showed all around the iris.

  “I will just put this on the washstand, my lady. My lord.”

  “Before you, go, Wilson, my husband and I wish to speak to you.”

  Wilson slopped the water as she put the jug down. “I did not tell anyone, my lady. I will not.”

  Sarah nodded. “I know. You have been a loyal servant to me these past two years, since the duke insisted that he could afford to give me and Charlotte a maid each. When I go to live with my husband, I shall still need a maid who is used to my ways and whom I know I can trust. Will you come with me, Wilson?”

  “I am heir to an earl, if that helps,” Nate offered.

  “I know, my lord. That is, the servants know you have been paying court to my lady. No one knows that you have wed her.”

  “Seven years ago,” Sarah told her. “We were wed seven years ago, Wilson, and then torn apart by my father and grandfather, who sent Nate far away and told me our marriage was a lie. But now he is back and we are together again.”

  It was the right note to take with a woman who loved horrid novels. Her eyes shone, and she pressed her hands together under her chin. “It is just like a story!” she breathed out.

  “We need to tell Elias before we tell anyone else,” Sarah added. “Keep our secret, even within the house, until tomorrow afternoon, Wilson. After that, we will begin to let others know, and at the end of the week, His Grace plans to announce it to the whole of Society at a ball.”

  “Ooooh!” Wilson was clearly thrilled to her core. “It is just like The Lost Little Lord. He is your son, then, my lady, and yours, my lord. The legitimate heir, stolen from his people and labouring in poverty! You can trust me, my lady. I will not say a word until you give me leave. Oh, the dear little boy!”

  Dismissed, she floated from the room with a dreamy smile.

  Nate chuckled. “I hope you plan for us to speak to Elias soon, my love, before your maid bursts.” He took her back into his arms and bent to kiss her ear and then behind it and down her throat.

  Sarah, as she felt her robe slipping to the floor, retained enough sense to answer, “In the morning, Nate. We will go up to the nursery in the morning.”

  15

  Half an hour later, Sarah lay in Nate’s arms, her head pillowed on his shoulder. His mind, which had stopped working somewhere between their kiss by the door and the moment they tumbled naked into the bed, had begun turning over again, even though most of it was still occupied with vague thoughts best summed up in the Scots word ‘Wow!’

  He dropped a kiss onto her hair. “I love you,” he said, again. He had lost count of the number of repetitions this evening alone. But it was worth saying again.

  “I love you, too,” she replied, and shifted so that she could meet his eyes. “I do not remember it being so good, Nate. Can we do it again?”

  “Soon,” he assured her, and even the question had his masculine equipment stirring with interest. “I was not patient,” he added. “Next time, let me see if I can do better. Seven years is a long time to be celibate.”

  Her eyebrows lifted. “Were you? All the time? I thought you were a sailor—do they not say a girl in every port?”

  A rather clumsy interrogation, but she had the right to know, after all. “I cannot claim an excess of virtue, dearest heart. I thought I had lost you forever, that you had been forced to marry someone else. But my only experience was with you, and that was sublime. I could not bear the thought of lying with any other woman. And the mere idea of being one in a line of men, with a female anxious to get it over, take my coin, and move to the next encounter… It shrivelled me where I stood. But when I refused the services offered from the comfort boats, the other sailors took exception.” He smiled at the memory of his solution.

  “So, I took the whore of my choice off to a private corner where we wouldn’t be observed, told her I was wed and didn’t plan to break my vows, and paid her to keep silent about what we did. She took my money and went to sleep.”

  She and later co-conspirators must have spoken among their colleagues, because whenever the ship returned to a port they’d been before, the pleasure girls would fight among themselves for the chance to be the one to go off with him. In time he was appointed the doctor’s assistant and also grew tall and broad enough to hold his own in a fight, and he was able to give up the masquerade.

  Sarah kissed his chin. “Clever. I would not have... That is, I would have forgiven you if...”

  Nate kissed her back, and no nonsense with chins, either. When she surfaced for air, he told her, “I kept my vows, Sarah, my love. I will not say I was not tempted from time to time, for I am only a man. But all my drea
ms have been of you, and I have never danced the horizontal hornpipe with anyone else.”

  The piece of navy slang had her giggling, but she replied, “Nor I. You know I planned to find a husband, but it was for Elias, and every man I put on my list got crossed off again.”

  Nate, well into his second wind, was losing interest in the conversation. “In fairness, I should tell you that, when the woman I was with was not tired, we talked about a woman’s pleasure. I know I was ignorant in the beginning, my love. I set out to learn how to bring my future wife—who always had your face, my love—the same joy you gave me, and who better to learn from than a woman whose business is pleasure?”

  His hands were between them now, seeking to find what made her gasp; what made her moan, and it was on a moan that she said, “You were a good student, then, beloved.”

  * * *

  Their conjugal activities in the three days of their marriage had been pleasant, much better than the awkwardness of the first time. Pleasant was a totally inadequate word for what Sarah had experienced the previous night. Twice.

  Again, this morning, when they first woke, and nearly a fourth time when they were assisting each other to dress, except that Wilson had knocked on the door with her hot chocolate, and with a choice of beverages for Nate.

  As Sarah sat before her mirror while Wilson pinned her hair up into a simple roll, her eyes kept drifting to where Nate leaned against a post of the bed, sipping his morning coffee, composed and handsome in fawn pantaloons and a waistcoat in a rich dark red over his snowy shirt. She had set the silver pin in his cravat, and been rewarded with a kiss that made it necessary to tie the cravat again.

  Every time their eyes met, he smiled, and his smile sent a warm thrill right to her core. She had wondered if his casual touches, his burning glances, would have less power after they had been intimate again, but the opposite appeared to be true.