Kiss Me Softly

by Cecilia Gray

  But truly, a tavern brawl! And a subterfuge regarding her identity. It was a lot to have accomplished in an hour. Who knew what she could do in a few more hours?

  She felt the man who had come to her aid walking a few steps behind her and to the side. She turned to face him and he stopped.

  Generally, Sera felt prickles of unease whenever men followed her. Which they had done, constantly, ever since she was a child. Then, it had been because they wanted to gawk at her hair or test the dewiness of her skin. It was only recently that their attentions and desires had become something more, something dark and hungry she could see in their eyes that pressed against her malevolently.

  But that was not the case with her fiancé, and it was definitely not the case with this man. Which made no sense, because if anyone should make her feel uncomfortable, it should be he and his hulking frame.

  He was taller than creation, with wide, muscular shoulders. Forearms larger than some men’s thighs—although that was perhaps an exaggeration if taken literally. His nose might once have held a graceful slope, but was now crooked at bridge and tip. His ears lay neatly against his head. Brown hair with a mix of ginger streaks stood in disarray. He seemed ready to test the seams of his fine coat with his masculinity, yet one would not go so far as to call him attractive..

  He had a fine pair of blue eyes, ice blue.

  But what really held her attention, what should have made her most nervous, was his utter stillness—even when he was moving. A complete façade of relaxation, for one could see the coiled tension beneath, ready to strike.

  “Sir, what do you mean by this?” she asked.

  He sighed and ran his large hand through his copper hair. “I’m worried a lass as young as yourself, married, but without her lady’s maid or husband and heading out into the night, without a coach, I might add, might mean you’d taken more than a significant bonk to the head.” His words rumbled around her like thunder, even when speaking in a tone as soft as he was.

  “But I received no such injury.” She needed to get rid of him. How was she to have a grand adventure if he forced her into the hands of a physician? Surely at some point her scarf would be removed, and the moment anyone got a look at her pale, white locks, they would recognize her. There were quite a few bar songs about her hair, after all. “I’m engaged on an urgent family matter. A private matter.”

  “I figured as much. But injuries are tricky. I’ve seen men walk away from a fight only to drop unconscious hours later, after a long bleed they didn’t know was happening. So if it’s all the same to you—”

  “I do not require someone to look after me,” she said.

  That’s what her family always thought. That she needed looking after. That she was frail. That she might break. If she was honest with herself, and she often was, the reason she was going through with this wedding was to prove to her family that she could be the one taking care of them for a change. That her beauty and her youth did not make her weak.

  “I didn’t say you did, but I would appreciate it if you would allow me to see you safely to your destination, for my own peace of mind.”

  She didn’t even know her next destination. She’d expected to pass the time in the tavern, perhaps enjoying a meal and listening to music and possibly even conversing with a stranger. But now that her evening had begun so serendipitously with a fight, she couldn’t settle for less. “I’m afraid the matter is rather private.”

  He nodded. His eyes searched the empty street behind her, lit only by the lamps of the tavern and the bakery. With a glance over his shoulder toward the former establishment, he turned back to her. Sighing heavily, he shrugged. “As you wish.”

  “Thank you, both for your concern and your understanding.” She whipped around as a gust of wind blew through the streets. Her skirts lifted, her hood flew back, and her scarf was dragged off. In an instant, her hair came loose in the wind, unfurling like the flag itself.

  His eyes widened and he swore beneath his breath.

  She quickly bundled her hair back up, cursing herself for not taking more care, for not using pins so she could have made the arrangement more secure.

  “I’m sorry about this,” he said.

  She noticed that he’d come closer, that he was next to her in fact. “I beg your pardon?”

  “The Abernathys would never forgive me, and I could never forgive myself, if something were to happen to you.”

  Then he hefted her over his shoulder, ignoring her undignified scream as she beat against his back. She didn’t want to cause a scene, but she also did not want to be manhandled by someone who apparently knew her identity and the family she was to marry into. Still, she was powerless against his strength—something she supposed was common among many in her acquaintance—but that didn’t make it any less frustrating. He strode down a side street.

  She heard the whinny of horses and looked over her shoulder. A coachman was standing by a carriage, and upon seeing the hulking Goliath, jumped in.

  “Don’t say anything and don’t look at her,” the man said to the driver. He opened the carriage door, stuffed her inside, and leapt in beside her. “To Woodbury Hall.”

  Across from him, Sera seethed, her chest heaving.

  She’d been alone with men before, of course. Her father, for one. And on several occasions their families had sought to give her privacy with Tom while they became acquainted, and were often running off to check on tea or whatever else so she and Tom might have several private moments. She and Benjamin had even been left alone on one occasion during a summer storm when they’d all needed to scatter to separate rooms to shutter the windows, and she’d been too afraid to leave his side. But she’d been younger then—fourteen. And had always thought of him as an older brother.

  This man was no brother to her, and the coach was not the size of Woodbury Hall.

  She supposed that if there was one way to make her night more exciting after a tavern brawl, then kidnapping was it. At least that’s what her sister Bridget would think of the situation.

  The coach lurched into a slow roll. Christian held tightly to his seat to keep from being flung against Sera, who sat across from him. His stomach roiled at the swaying movement and he closed his eyes, forcing a calming breath through his nose.

  When Christian had left the Abernathys well into their cups at Woodbury Hall earlier that evening, he had assumed he was escaping trouble. Tom, the bridegroom, had toasted his bride-to-be so many times he was well into his cups. Benjamin and Graham, his younger brothers, seemed equally inclined to imbibe against their natural character. He had felt out of place, so he left. He was not Tom’s friend, while he liked him just fine, but the man was a bit older. Christian had known Benjamin and Graham since childhood. They had begun as school chums and grown into friends, serving in the war together. But he still felt odd when included in their set, and even more so when Tom was present.

  It was quite another thing when Robert was there. Robert was not titled, either, but his father was. He was the leader of their group and managed to keep even Lord Damon Savage, one of their more notorious friends, at bay. And while none of them ever mentioned his upbringing, it was fairly clear that Christian did not belong.

  Just as he did not belong in this carriage this close to Sera Belle… soon to be Abernathy. Her family were rich and respectable, but it wouldn’t matter if she were discovered on the streets. He was not fit to lick her boots. No one was.

  “I presume you are lost,” he said. “A sleepwalking incident, perhaps?”

  Her gray gaze was all steel and annoyance. “Who are you?”

  “Christian Hughes.”

  Again, her pink lips formed a small O, as round as her eyes. She could have been thinking any number of things. Homicide Hughes. The Bastard Hughes.

  “Ben and Graham’s friend?”

  He cocked his head. He would not have assumed that to be her first thought. “Yes.”

  “I suppose you know who I am given where this coac
h is heading?”

  The carriage pitched around a corner, and his stomach pitched with it. He grimaced. “Of course.”

  She worried her lip. He forced his gaze back up to her eyes.

  “You won’t feel compelled to tell them, will you?”

  “I would never betray a lady’s trust.” He had pretty enough manners. He’d been taught them all his life. His father—biologically, at least—was the recently deceased Baron Strafford, and his impregnation of Christian’s mother, his kitchen maid, aside, the man had seen him clothed, fed, and educated like a son under the guise of being his ward. “But,” he added, “that trust would need to be given. I must ask—are you running away? Is your hand being forced?”

  “No!” Her hands waved in front of her face to stop him from speaking, as if she were genuinely horrified by the notion. “Tom would never.”

  “Aye, he wouldn’t.” That was true enough. Tom wouldn’t smack a horse’s rump to move the beast, that’s how gentle he was. The Jolly Giant. A nickname that held true enough, as long as Christian was not around to be compared in size. “But his father, on the other hand…” His jaw tensed at the notion of the Duke of Rivington forcing Sera into a marriage to gain access to her father’s fortune.

  “There has been an understanding between our families for years,” she said.

  His understanding of the understanding was that the match had been between their youngest children—Sera of the Belles and Gray of the Abernathy’s. But Gray had found the arrangement so distasteful, given her youth, that he had declined his inheritance and fled, and Tom had taken his place. It would be understandable for Sera to want out of the arrangement. With her face and fortune, she could have anyone. The next monarch, if she were so inclined.

  “If you are bound to your understanding, then why have I found you fleeing the night before the marriage vows?”

  “Fleeing?” Her cheeks flushed as she hid her laugh behind a gloved hand. “Fleeing? Really? Is that what you think of me?”

  “The evidence is hard to dispute.”

  She folded her hands in her lap and looked at him the way his schoolteacher used to, as though he was an errant child with a lecture due. “You’re familiar with my sisters’ reputations?”

  Who did not know the Tale of the Belles? “Of course I—” The coach moved from cobbles to dirt road, its wheels slipping with the transition. He felt the contents of his stomach bubble up and had to close his eyes to settle himself.

  “Are you all right?” she asked.

  He nodded too hastily.

  “Are you ill from the movement of the carriage?”

  He pried one of his eyes open. He hardly ever admitted the weakness and usually addressed it by facing in the direction of the moving carriage, but in an attempt to be gentlemanly, he had sacrificed that seat to her. Something he was now regretting. But he didn’t want her to know his weakness. Not this slip of a girl. “I know who you are, Miss Sera Belle.”

  She flinched at her name. “Then please remember, between them and my father, who raised me. If I were fleeing a marriage, I certainly wouldn’t do it on foot. I also would not make my way into town, when the road to London or Brighton is in the opposite direction. I would not be empty-handed. And this, of course, presumes that my father would force me into a marriage against my will. And that I would be so disobedient a daughter as to bring shame to my family.” Color rose high in her cheeks and her hands began to tremble. “But that must be what you think of me. A pretty face and nothing else.”

  He couldn’t have been more surprised if she’d slapped him clean across the cheek, and he would have deserved no less. “My apologies, Miss Belle. It would seem that in a short while I have not only seen you physically injured and grievously handled against your will, I have insulted both your intelligence and your character.””

  Her brows rose in surprise. “Thank you. I accept your apology.”

  “That still, however, does not soothe my curiosity and concern regarding your current circumstances.”

  With an exasperated sigh, she crossed her arms in front of her chest. “If you must know, while I happily accept the arrangement, I wanted just one night of adventure before committing to it, and was hoping to enjoy a meal and some music at the tavern.”

  “A meal?” he repeated. “And music?”

  “It may seem silly to you.” She leaned across the carriage earnestly. “I have always been Sera Belle and now I will always be Sera Abernathy and it seems I’ve always been something that other people have labeled me. For just one night, I wanted to see what I could become on my own.”

  His heart thudded inside the cavern of his chest. She was ungodly beautiful, but there was more than that, a hint of yearning within her that he recognized in himself.

  “You must think I’m an idiot.” She slumped against her seat. “I’m not usually so reckless.”

  “I think you’re amazingly courageous,” he said.

  “Are you funning with me?”

  He’d never been more serious in his life. What had he done at sixteen beside pick fights? “No.”

  “Then you’ll return me to the tavern?”

  A laugh escaped his lips. “I’m afraid that I’ve become a party to your escapade, and thus must see you safely through to your wedding. But if you’d like a meal and music, I believe I can oblige.”

  She squealed and clapped her hands. She was so young in that moment that he was overwhelmed by the inherent wrongness of their being together. Not that he was old, but he was world-worn in a way she would never understand, God willing. “Where to?”

  “Still Woodbury,” he said.

  “But you said—”

  “You wanted one night of adventure. Very well. I shall accommodate you. Make a list of everything you’ve wanted to experience, and I shall do my best to see them accomplished, but only within the bounds of propriety and safety.”

  “Propriety?” she said, raising a saucy eyebrow.

  “As much as can be afforded under the circumstances.” God, Benjamin and Graham would have his head. Robert, too. Savage was the only one of them he imagined being amused about the matter, which was precisely why he had been excluded from the invitation list for tomorrow.

  “But, well,” she sputtered. “I don’t have a list.”

  “Of course you do,” he said. “A meal, which you can enjoy as you wish. Music as well. There must be more.”

  Her gaze turned pensive. She gazed out the window. They had left town and were on the short road to Woodbury Hall. The line of trees cast shadows over the carriage, obscuring her face in darkness and then illuminating her in the moonlight.

  She glanced up, her gaze clashing with his, and he felt a tight ball of wariness in the pit of his gut at her expression. She nodded, licking her bottom lip. “I have questions. For one, where are you taking me?”

  “The gardener’s cottage at Woodbury Hall. You know it?” It was an unoccupied house on the edge of Woodbury’’s lake. He’d been it in several times over the years. It was roomy, with an open floor plan that allowed for a pianoforte, a tall bookshelf, and comfortable seating in kitchen and sitting-room combined. It was on the other side of the lake from the Hall, so there would be no one to overhear them, but at night, if they were to light a candle too close to the window, surely it would be spotted. He’d have to take care.

  She nodded. “I have yet to see the inside.”

  “It’s adequate. There is a kitchen and a piano. Your music and meal, as it were.”

  “But the point of the meal was that I was to be anyone.”

  “Ah, but you are,” he said. “Mrs. Plain, was it?”

  She winced. “Sera will do.”

  He rapped on the coach’s ceiling and said, “Stop here.”

  The clopping of horses’ hooves slowed to nothing. He jumped out and gave her his hand. The moonlight lit up the whitewashed stone of Woodbury Hall and the reflective surface of the lake. He’d stopped the carriage just shy of the turn-off to
the property so it remained behind a bank of trees. After instructing the coachman to remain there, he offered his arm to walk her toward the cottage.

  Even though she wore a simple dress with long sleeves, gloves, a scarf, and a cloak with a fur-trimmed hood, she shivered. He resisted the urge to warm her. She was young. About to be married, but still just sixteen.

  The grass gave way beneath his boots. In the hush of the night, he became acutely aware of every sound. The rustling wind, her slippered feet, the swish of her skirts as she kept pace beside him. He glanced to the hulking four-story structure of Woodbury Hall. There was one lit window on the first floor, but no one standing by it to mark their progress. The rest of the property seemed in a deep, dark sleep reserved for fairytales. In preparation, he knew, for tomorrow’s wedding.

  Sera’s wedding.

  He glanced sharply down at her. Her face was set with determination. He hadn’t given much thought to her before tonight. She was legend, was lore. The angelic beauty of London that made priests and nuns faint in her presence, so close was she to holiness. She was like him in that regard. All story and no substance.

  Still, he could see the merit of religious reverence. Even her youthful face managed an otherworldly aloofness, such was the porcelain nature of her high cheekbones, the perfect tilt of her lips. He would burn in hell for assisting in what would be the ruination of any young girl, but he imagined the toll for assisting Sera would be even higher.

  But he couldn’t bring himself to care.

  She needed him in her madcap adventure, and he found he liked it.

  They approached the front door to the darkened cottage. He knew from experience with hide-and-seek on the property that it was never locked. With a quick push, he opened the door.

  They stepped inside. His heart quickened. It was one thing to be alone with Sera in a moving carriage with a driver as chaperone, however unofficial. Another to be in the open air. But quite another to be in a private room.