So he was still sweet. But back then, he’d been sweet like a meringue—all froth and sugar, no substance. Now…
She walked after him, her fingers tapping a worried percussion against the rough wood rail of the fence. He stopped ten yards away, on the opposite side of the fence. A few thin strips of wood. Not really much of a barrier.
Kate took a deep breath. “I see you’re coddling the horse again.”
He let out an amused snort of air. “Someone has to.”
She couldn’t look at him. If she did, she might stare at the way his shirt plastered to his biceps, might think of that wet fabric under his waistcoat, clinging to his abdomen.
She might imagine—oh, drat. She was. Kate turned into the wind, hoping the breeze would cool her flaming cheeks.
She sniffed and set her foot on the wooden stile that traversed the fence. It was composed of an ingenious set of narrow, wooden steps, placed so that humans, but not cattle, could clamber across on agile feet. Still, she felt as graceless climbing those narrow strips of wood as if she were an ox. A well-laced corset and heeled half boots, set with jet buttons, were all well and good in a drawing room. They weren’t made for scaling fences.
When she reached the top, she glanced down at her husband. His gaze was not fixed on her face, as would have been proper. He stood too straight, his eyes caught on that bare strip of ankle revealed by her movement. The moment lasted just long enough for him to blink and look up. He offered her his arm; she took it.
As if he hadn’t looked at her legs. As if she hadn’t looked at him, either. When her heels wobbled on the last step, he steadied her; and when she stood beside him, he looked away. So did she. Her gaze settled on the horse. It lifted its head and stared at her, its ears tilting forward. Some women of her acquaintance had practically grown up on horseback; Kate had been thrown once when she was younger, and the broken leg she’d nursed had left her somewhat shy of the animals. Her father had once explained to her what that particular tilt of the ears meant. It was either horse language for I am very hungry, or the equine equivalent of Help, a wolf! Now, which one was it?
“Don’t look at him.” Ned’s voice was deep, right beside her.
“Why ever not?” She kept her voice light, to disguise the flutter in her stomach.
“Because he’s nervous.”
Help, a wolf! it was. She looked away—but her eyes caught on her husband, and she felt her stomach contracting. She quickly looked back to Champion. Twenty yards away, the horse peeled his lips back. She caught a glimpse of yellowing teeth.
“He’s going to think you’re challenging him.” Ned sounded amused. But the alternative to looking at Champion was looking at her husband.
“Maybe I am,” she teased. “I should like to be lady of this pasture. I should reign over the goats in spring, and the straw in winter.” And I would command you to move piles of hay in your shirtsleeves. Daily.
“You may reign over as many goats as you wish, if you just—oh, damn.”
Across the field, Champion stamped. Kate had only a second to realize how serious the situation was before the animal charged toward them. Hooves pounded against turf. She didn’t think he would actually trample her, but before she could turn and scramble over the stile, Ned had picked her up for the second time that day, and swung her over the fence. She landed, awkwardly, and grasped the fence rail to keep from crumpling to the ground.
He vaulted lightly after her, and then turned to face her.
Champion’s charge came up short, and the horse let out what sounded to Kate’s ear like a very self-satisfied whinny.
“I take it back,” Kate said, catching her breath. “He may rule all the goats.”
When Ned had swung her over, she’d twisted to face away from the pasture. Her husband had landed catlike next to her, and as Champion came close, he stepped nearer, his body pressing her against the fence rail. He didn’t seem angry; he merely smiled at her.
“I suppose you think I’m very foolish.” She spoke softly; Champion was just behind her.
“What? Because you challenged a creature twice as strong as you and five times as fast?” Kate flushed.
“Not foolish in the least,” he said, peering into her eyes.
“No?”
“You weren’t in any danger. I was there. I wouldn’t have let anything happen to you.”
Kate froze, unable to breathe. He stood so close to her, scarcely six inches away. Every breath she took narrowed that distance between them by a finger’s breadth. His gaze dropped to her bodice, to the high neck of her ivory walking dress. She felt as if he could see through the lace collar, as if she were the one wearing translucent fabric.
Help. A wolf.
He was impossibly close. To him, she’d always been a wife. And she’d learned all too well what it meant to be a wife. She was to engage in delicate charity and complex embroidery. She was a figure to be trussed up in a corset and petticoats, to be protected when necessary and indulged when not. A lady did not get her hands dirty. Kate had learned that all too well from her parents.
She wondered what Ned would say if she told him she’d arranged Louisa’s escape. If he would even believe her capable of that much, or if he imagined that she was as frivolous—as superfluous—as Harcroft had said.
She could hear the animal’s breath behind her. She had never realized that a solitary horse could breathe so loudly.
“Why isn’t he going?” She pitched her voice low, but even she could hear the desperation in her words.
Ned did not move his eyes from her. “I don’t know. I think he can smell the peppermints in my pocket. Here.”
He moved his hand slowly, slowly to his waistcoat pocket; then, just as agonizingly slowly, he pulled it away. His hand was close enough to brush her cheek.
He tossed another candy, throwing it far off into the grass.
She could not see the horse. She heard only its breathing. No tentative footfalls signaling its departure. Nothing. She could imagine Champion, warily scenting the wind, considering whether to put its back to its enemies.
Ned winked at Kate, and her toes curled.
“I don’t dare move,” she confessed.
“Really?” He gave her a naughty smile. “I can think of a dozen ways in which I might use that to my benefit.”
Kate swallowed. If she’d been reluctant to move before, his words rooted her in place now. Her half boots seemed to be made of thick iron. Her arms were bound at her side. Her mind filled with all the wicked things he might do to her. He might kiss her. He might run his hand down her side. He might undo those mother-of-pearl buttons at her neck and peel back the lace at her bodice.
He looked in her eyes. That old, heady desire swirled through her. A breeze eddied between their bodies, and she felt its caress as if it were his. His eyes narrowed, oh so subtly. He leaned forward.
Maybe this was why she had come here, danger or no danger, plan or no plan. She needed to assure herself that on some basic, primeval level, Edward Carhart still thought of her as his wife. To see if he would treat her as carefully, as gentlemanly, as before.
Champion moved away. Kate felt an elusive brush of wind against the nape of her neck, a wisp of air turning to nothing. Then, the clop of hooves.
“There,” Ned said. He had not dropped his gaze. Her lips tingled; her skin seemed too tight. He was going to kiss her. And foolishly, after three years of absence, she still wanted him to try. She wanted to believe he would attempt to revitalize their phantom marriage. She wanted to put her hands on the rough, wet fabric of his shirt, to feel the skin beneath. She wanted a taste of his carefree casualness, some indication that he thought of her as more than a delicate duke’s daughter. She wanted to believe he felt something for her, even if it was an emotion as evanescent and fleeting as desire. She bit her lip in an agony, waiting for him to move forward.
Instead he pulled away. “There,” he declared again. “Now you’re free to leave.”
Leave. She could leave? She stared at his profile in disbelief. After he’d practically pinned her to a fence post and joked he could use her twelve ways—after all that, he thought she could leave before he tried even one of them?
She bit her lip, hard. She could taste copper salt on her tongue. She could finally breathe now—and her breath seemed heated to fury.
“I can leave?”
He didn’t look back at her. His hands were balled at his sides.
“I can leave? And here I thought that was what you were best at.”
He flinched and looked back at her. “I was trying to be a gentleman.”
“I think,” Kate said, “you are the most obtuse man in all of Christendom.”
“Possible, but unlikely.” He gave her an apologetic shrug. “There are a great many Christians, and a good number of them are idiots. If there were not, Britain would never have gotten into a war with China over the importation of opium.”
She kicked at his boot—not hard, but enough to vent her frustration in physical form. “If I want to speak in hyperbole, I am going to do it. And don’t believe you can stop me with irrelevant political analysis. It’s neither sporting nor gentlemanly.”
“Trust me,” he said wryly, “right now, all I can think about is being a gentleman. It taxes my brain to think of anything except my gentlemanly duties.”
He swallowed and glanced down her neck. It was almost as if he’d never left, as if they were three months into their marriage. As if she were the one yearning forward, while he held himself back in polite denial.
“I retract my statement.” Her voice shook. “You are not the most obtuse man in all of Christendom.”
“No, no. You were perfectly right. The lady of the pasture always retains the right to hyperbole. Use it with my blessing.”
“There’s no need,” Kate said. “I’ve realized that I am the most obtuse woman.”
That finally brought his gaze flying from her bodice to her eyes.
She’d come out here to see if there was any substance to this marriage of theirs, to ascertain if he could accept a wife who took on unladylike pursuits. But she was still susceptible to him after all these years. And despite his informal attire, he still treated her as if he were the consummate gentleman.
“Here I am,” she continued, her voice still shaking, “practically begging you to kiss me. That you haven’t done so…well. I’m not so innocent that I miss the import of that. Men are creatures of lust, and if you haven’t given in to yours, you probably haven’t got any. At least not for me.”
His mouth dropped open.
“Just say so.” She looked up into his eyes. “Make this simple for both of us, if you will. Tell me you have no interest in me. Tell me, so I can stop standing in the middle of a field, believing you might kiss me. It’s been three years, Ned, and I am sick to death of waiting for you.”
He turned to her; his eyebrows drew down. He stared at her for a few seconds, and then he shook his head.
“Speak already.” She felt on the edge of desperation. “Tell me. What have you to fear? I can’t hurt you. And you can’t possibly hurt me more than you already have.”
“Women are the most curious creatures.” He reached out and caught a strand of her hair against her cheek.
That bare contact froze her. “Oh?”
“That’s what you think, is it? That I haven’t kissed you for lack of interest?”
“If you really wanted me, you wouldn’t be able to hold back. I understand how these things work.”
“Someone has been telling you lies. You must think all men are beasts by nature. That we see a thing, and like Champion, we charge unthinking across the field.”
He leaned toward her, and Kate moved back. The wood of the fence post pressed against her.
“You must think we have no semblance of control, that we can do nothing except obey our baser urges.”
That had rather been the import of the furtive discussions she’d conducted with her married friends. It was, after all, why men took mistresses—because they could not control their urges. So she’d been told.
“You’re half right,” he continued. “We are all beasts. And we do have base urges—deep, dark thoughts that you would shrink from, Kate, if you heard what they whispered. We have wants, and trust me, I want.”
She swallowed and looked up at him. He looked no different than before. He had that carefree, casual smile on his face, and for all that he loomed over her, his stance was easy. But she saw something in his expression—a tightening of his brow, the unbidden press of his lips—some quiet, unexplainable thing that suggested gray clouds lurked behind the casual sunrise of his smile.
“Right now,” Ned said, lifting a hand toward her, “I am thinking about taking you against that post.”
Her lungs contracted.
“Trust me when I say I am a beast.”
His fingers brushed down the rough lace at her neck. He found the line of her collarbone through the fabric. The gentleness of his touch belied the harshness of his tone; his hands were warm against her skin. He ran his finger down the seam of her bodice, down her ribs. The trail burned a line down her body. And then his palm cupped her waist and he pulled her closer. She tilted her head up to look in his face. His eyes were hot and unforgiving, and she could almost see the beast that he claimed he was reflected in them. And then his head dipped down—oh so slowly, so gently.
She might have escaped if she had simply turned her head. But she tasted the heat of his breath; she could still feel his words searing into her lips. I am thinking about taking you against that post.
In the back of her mind a voice called out in warning. He would kiss her and be done; he might even have her against that post. It was his prerogative as her husband. And when he was done, he would walk away. As always, she would be the one left wanting upon his departure. She had to protect herself. She had to turn—
But she was already wanting, and it would serve nobody to send him away. And the truth was, women were beasts, too. She could feel the desire in her, crouched like some dark panther, ready to strike if he backed away.
He didn’t. Instead, his lips touched hers. They were gentle for only that first blessed second of searing contact. Then his hands came behind her and he lifted her up, pressing her against the post. His body imprinted itself against hers. His mouth opened, and he took the kiss she had so desperately wanted. His lips were not kind or polite or gentlemanly; his kiss was dark and deep and desperate, and Kate could have drowned in it. He tasted incongruously of peppermint. She gave back, because she wanted, and she had not stopped wanting.
She was not sure how long they kissed. It might have been a minute; it could have been an hour. But when he pulled his head away, she felt the sunshine on the back of her neck, heard a lark calling in some sad minor key from the faraway forest. Every nerve in her body had come to life; every sense was heightened.
“You see,” Ned said, “men are beasts. But the difference is, I control my beast. It doesn’t control me. Don’t think my control means anything other than…my control. Because right now the beast wants. It wants to ravage you, out here in the open where anyone can see. It wants to take you, and it will be damned if you’re not ready.”
“I’ve always been ready.” She heard the confession slip from her mouth, so clear and crystalline.
“Really?” His tone was dry. “‘I think our marriage might dry up and blow away,’” he paraphrased at her, “‘with one good gust of wind.’ Kate, you don’t even trust me. I would be a monster if I came back after a three-year absence and expected everything to resume, just like that.”
“You don’t need trust to consummate a marriage, Ned.” She shook her head. “I am nothing if not practical.” But her heart was beating in impractical little thumps.
“Would you tell me why Harcroft made you so uneasy today? I know he can sometimes be a bit exacting, a bit too perfect. But I’ve known him since the two of us were in short pa
nts. He means well. He was—is a friend of mine, you know.”
Everyone thought Harcroft meant well. It was the hell of the situation, that anyone she told would run to Harcroft, seeking confirmation of her tale. The man seemed reasonable. Nobody would give credence to a week-old collection of bruises, not when Harcroft explained them away so capably. And besides, she’d promised Louisa to keep silent.
As for Kate’s own wants and desires—the substance of her marriage, the yearning of her flesh for his—set on the scale opposite Louisa’s life, they balanced to nothing.
Ned thought Harcroft meant well. They had been not only friends, but best friends. When Ned had asked, Harcroft had welcomed Lady Blakely into society despite her lack of provenance. His support had made the difference between a grudging acceptance and a complete denial. He had smoothed over a situation that might otherwise have proven difficult. They all owed Harcroft. Nobody even asked whether Louisa might have been prudent to run away.
She backed away, but the post prevented her retreat. “No. You’re right. I don’t trust you, yet. If you had left your new wife to the depredations of the ton, exposed her to jokes and uncouth wagers, would you trust yourself?”
“Kate, I—”
She set her hands against his chest and shoved. She had hoped he would stagger away; instead, he moved back, gracefully, as if her push had been nothing more than a gentle reminder.
He scrubbed one hand through his drying hair, which had fallen into his eyes again. “I left England to prove something to myself. I suppose…I suppose I still have a great deal to prove to you.” He said it in a tone of surprise, as if he were somehow just discovering he had a wife and responsibilities.
Hardly reassuring. He hadn’t needed a reminder of what he owed Harcroft.
CHAPTER SIX
NED’S DAY HAD NOT improved. Supper conversation had been blighted; nobody had wanted to act as if this were a typical house party, where the men would consume a quantity of port before meeting the women for a companionable game of charades. Bare civility, it seemed, was charade enough.
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