Unbuttoning Miss Hardwick

by Deb Marlowe

  He didn’t let her comfort him for long. Pulling away, he stood and moved back. ‘Now you know, Chloe. Love doesn’t save you. There’s no magic in it.’ He shook his head at the plea she could not hide. ‘It was misguided love that created a monster like Connor. And twisted, thwarted love that killed my father.’

  Her tears were flowing freely now. ‘It’s horrible,’ she said. ‘But let it go, Braedon. It’s over.’

  He snorted. ‘It’s never over. Look at what happened last night.’

  ‘I’m so sorry for all that you have seen and suffered. But you are holding it close, deliberately choosing not to let it go. We all have pain. Everyone. But it is possible to move past it. It is necessary. I’m ready to help you. We all are.’ She breathed deeply and narrowed her gaze. ‘I’m asking you to try, Braedon. You have to start somewhere. Somewhere, some time, you have to trust someone.’ Silently she asked him to begin now, with her.

  ‘I know what you want,’ he said. ‘I can’t give it to you. I can’t make myself believe.’

  Her heart was breaking. Climbing to her feet, she went to the dressing room and came back with Skanda’s Spear. She stood tall in the middle of the room and planted it beside her.

  ‘So many stories I’ve heard of the Marauding Marquess,’ she whispered. ‘About captured French pay wagons and battles won and treaties forged.’ She choked out a small sob. ‘A hundred more I’ve dreamed up in my head. But never, in all of those tales, did I ever hear you called a coward.’

  He made a wordless sound of objection.

  ‘You are making a choice,’ she said. ‘You are choosing fear and isolation—the things you never told me this Spear represented.’ She picked it up and offered it to him. ‘I didn’t know if I was going to give this to you. But you’ve decided. So take it.’ Unending tears spilled out of her. ‘I hope you will be happy together.’

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Just past a fortnight later, Braedon leaned back against the magnificent porcelain display that housed his Japanese pole arm. He was drunk, but that didn’t keep him from pulling another long swig from the bottle in his hand.

  Above him, the domed centre of his weapons wing arched. All was complete—the wing finished, his many beautiful weapons displayed to full advantage. He’d come in here every day for a week, ready to gloat, longing for the rush of victory, the warm flush of accomplishment, or even quiet pleasure in seeing his beloved artefacts showcased so well.

  It wouldn’t come. None of it. He felt only empty instead. He didn’t understand—he’d thought when the project was finished, he would also feel complete. Here it was—a permanent, lasting mark on Denning, one that had nothing to do with either his father or his brother—one they would have despised, in fact. Their ghosts should have been defeated, permanently laid to rest. And yet Denning’s halls still echoed with their disappointment and displeasure, just as it always had.

  He drank again, but the bottle was empty. He stared at it, dangling in his hand, and wondered why the hell he didn’t feel full?

  He flung the thing away from him, scowling as it skittered across the marble floor. He knew why. He placed full blame on her—on Hardwick, who had helped him build this place, and on Chloe, who had left him unfit to enjoy it.

  Oh, God. He reached for the Spear of Skanda. Never far away, it rested on the floor nearby. Pulling it on to his lap, he began to stroke along its burnished wood. All of those years, all of this effort to create the perfect retreat. All of the careful manoeuvring to maintain his emotional boundaries. Wasted. He was here, where he should be. Alone, as he should be, and still he did not feel safe, secure or fulfilled.

  She had ruined him. She’d pressed her lithe body up against his armour and melted it with her warmth. She’d invaded his empty places, changed them with her presence, so that they no longer felt comfortable when she’d left them, but merely abandoned.

  She was nothing but a thief. She’d robbed him of his contentment, of his future. Fury and frustration seethed inside him.

  ‘Damn it all!’ the scream tore out of him and bounced around the dome above. Fists pounding, he shouted again.

  He thrust the Spear aside, got to his feet and began to move about the room. One by one he went to stand in front of his prized artefacts. Nothing. He was still hollow, still aching with emptiness. He went around to every one of his ancient treasures, but each failed him.

  Broken, forlorn, he went back to the centre of the room. He lay down, spreadeagled on the cold marble, and tried to clear his mind. To cast back and find where it had all gone wrong.

  He refused to let his mind dwell on his father or brother—he’d revisited that pain enough. Instead he thought of Thom, wondering what signs he’d missed, or if there had been something he might have noticed or done to change that disastrous outcome. He thought of Rob, and how in his rush to judgement, he’d inflicted the same sort of hurt on the boy that he’d resented himself.

  And he thought of Chloe. How perplexed and distressed he’d been when she’d left this place. He remembered how he’d reacted to her in London with reluctant fascination and trepidation. How the hurt at her reluctance to give him the Spear had paled, because he’d already made the horrific decision to leave her behind.

  And then, as the cold seeped into his bones and his gaze fixed on the precise pattern above, it struck him—the ultimately important question. Why? Why had he been so afraid of her? Why had he known, so firmly and deeply in his soul, that he had to set her away? To save himself pain? To avoid feeling the cavernous void inside of him? Well, he’d done neither.

  In fact, he suddenly wondered if these weren’t the same grievous emotions that he’d carried with him since he was a child. Perhaps Chloe hadn’t changed them or added to them. She’d merely made him more aware of them, because she had fleetingly taken them away.

  He sat up, struck by a sudden notion. His hands shaking, his heart pounding in sudden excitement, he climbed to his feet, flung open the display and carefully took out the pole arm. It felt awkward in his hand. He had no training with this sort of weapon, was not sure how to control it. He couldn’t fight with it; he would be a danger to himself and to others. Understanding bloomed in his soul and gave birth to hope. Maybe love was the same. A thing of beauty, which could be twisted into a weapon in the wrong hands.

  Perhaps, just as with a blade, all the importance, responsibility and power of love rested with the wielder. And that meant that the real question was not if he believed or trusted in love, but if he believed and trusted in Chloe.

  He did.

  My God, it was true. He trusted her. She held a number of substantial weapons in her personal arsenal, and from the beginning, she had wielded them for him. Her warmth, her generosity, even her commitment to finding the joy in her own life, had eased him. She’d agreed to help him on his quest, though she’d been under no obligation. She’d shared herself with him. She’d listened to his darkest secrets and given him back comfort and light. She’d taken away the hurt he carried and he hadn’t even recognised its absence—he’d only feared its return.

  Bemused, he dropped the pole arm and looked around with new eyes. At last he understood the question. Now what of the answer? His feet were moving into a run before he even finished the thought.

  * * *

  Chloe sat on the rock promontory and let the soft sea wind soothe her. The tide hurried by, on its way to rejoin the vast ocean stretching before her. Spray occasionally reached her, gentle at this time of day, touching her cheeks with bright drops of comfort. She looked over her shoulder, towards the empty shore, thinking that it was time for Rob to return.

  For several weeks they had travelled the coast, exploring villages and beaches. They had tried out several cottages, but none felt like they were meant to stay. Until this one, perhaps. Situated alone outside the village of Deal, it had much to recomme
nd it. An ideal location, tucked into a protective basin, a short, wide trail down to the beach, and this glorious curved arm of rocks, which allowed Chloe to climb right out to the turbulence that echoed in her soul, and at same time created a protected cove ideal for Rob to explore.

  As their journey had begun, Rob had clung a bit, keeping to her side, watching her expression closely. But as the days had passed and they had grown used to each other, he had relaxed, and his confidence had grown. They had been in this place nearly a sennight now, and he’d taken to disappearing in the morning, exploring down the shore with Fitz at his side. Chloe suspected that he had found a friend, for he’d returned lighter-hearted these last few days, eager to share his treasures: pretty shells, coloured pebbles or fantastically smooth driftwood.

  She looked again towards the shore and saw Braedon’s figure striding along instead of the boy’s. She closed her eyes against the vision and turned back to the sea. It wasn’t the first time her imagination had forged a picture of what her heart wanted most.

  It was the first time the image had shouted her name, however.

  Looking again, she found him scrambling over the rocks towards her. He was here! Her heart stopped, then stumbled to a fast, hopeful pace.

  He didn’t speak as he drew nearer, just perched next to her and looked out across the blue expanse. They sat in silence. Chloe waited, her nervous fingers fidgeting endlessly with her skirts.

  ‘No one has ever dared call me a coward before,’ he said at last.

  Disappointment swamped her. Now her fingers stilled. Had he come all this way just to quarrel? She straightened her shoulders. Very well, then. The time of her easing his way was long over. ‘I’d say it was high time someone did, then.’

  He laughed. ‘I’m sure you are right.’

  She stared at him in mock wonder. ‘Well, that’s a first, isn’t it?’

  He leaned back on his hands and smiled at her. Her breath caught. It was a true smile, open and unguarded.

  ‘Ah, Chloe, I begin to think that there are far too many firsts between us to count.’

  She couldn’t stop looking at him. He looked so…there. Completely present, somehow. As if he’d stopped keeping out a wary eye for something behind him, stopped blocking her from what lay ahead.

  She bit her lip, afraid to trust it. ‘I’m glad for it, then,’ she said. ‘But it’s the lasts between us that worry me.’

  He sat up and reached for her hand. ‘They don’t worry me.’ His voice rumbled like the sea against the rocks, just as intense. ‘I hope we have many of both.’ He took her other hand. ‘I hope you are the first and last woman I chase to the end of this island. I want to wake up every morning with your face the first thing I see, and the last before I go to sleep at night.’ He moved closer and touched her cheek. ‘I know that you will be the first and last woman I say this to: I need you, Chloe. I love you.’

  She clutched him tight with one hand and covered her mouth with the other. ‘I don’t understand,’ she whispered. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘I listened,’ he said simply. ‘I finally heard you. I opened my eyes and saw how generous you are and how blind I have been. I saw how I kept closing the door and you kept slipping through the cracks. I stopped and looked back and realised that with you, for the first time, I learned to accept tenderness and caring and concern and even to give it back a little, as well.’

  He grabbed her hands again and she saw a bit of desperation return to his eyes. ‘I don’t want to stop. You were right. It’s the only way to move past the pain. I want to learn more, give and take more.’ His fingers tightened on hers. ‘Will you teach me?’

  She bit her lip and searched his face. ‘Yes,’ she said on a whisper. ‘Yes.’

  He threw his head back and whooped with joy. She laughed along with him until, growing serious again, he assured her, ‘I’m sure I’ll be a horrible pupil. I’ve been hiding for so long. But I trust you to stay. You’ve seen what lurks inside of me and still you care. I trust you not to turn away when I slide back into darkness, but to lead me to the light.’

  ‘You know I will,’ she told him. ‘But I’m so glad you took this first step—it had to be on your own.’

  His eyes clouded. ‘It wasn’t easy—but you know that.’

  ‘And I couldn’t be happier.’ She cradled her cheek into his large hand. ‘But, Braedon, it’s not only me you must worry about. There’s Rob—’

  She stopped as a sheepish grin stole over his face.

  ‘I know.’ He ducked his head. ‘I hurt him first, if not deepest. I’m afraid I’ve been…not a coward, but cautious.’

  ‘It’s you—’ she realised suddenly ‘—you he’s been off with in the mornings?’

  He nodded. ‘I read your letters to Mairi. It’s not her fault,’ he said quickly. ‘I had to find you. I’m afraid I made a pest of myself.’ He grinned. ‘I saw in them how close you and Rob had become. I felt like I needed his blessing.’

  Her mouth twisted. ‘And did he give it?’

  ‘Look and see.’ He motioned toward the shore.

  Rob was there, at the edge of the rocks. Fitz frolicked at his feet as he jumped in the air and shouted something that the wind carried away.

  ‘What is that he’s holding?’ she asked, shading her eyes and getting to her feet.

  ‘It’s Skanda’s Spear.’

  She knew her face fell as he continued.

  ‘This morning I asked Rob what I should do with it.’

  ‘And what was his answer?’

  ‘Well, I was of the mind to throw the thing into the sea.’

  She gasped and he shrugged. ‘I meant to show you that I’ve finally and truly chosen you.’

  She blinked back tears. ‘Would you do that?’

  ‘I’d do anything to show you how hard I’m holding on to the hope that you’ve given me.’ He blinked hard and after a moment, he went on, ‘Rob pointed out that the thing would only be likely to roll back in with the tide and make someone else miserable.’

  Chloe laughed.

  ‘I thought of a cave then, or a cache in the cliffs back home, but Rob had another suggestion.’

  ‘What was that,’ she asked, genuinely curious.

  ‘He suggested that I give it to you. And further—that we make a baby girl and leave it to her—and to her daughter after that and on down the line, so that no man will ever be tormented by the thing again.’ Nervous, he looked into her face. ‘What do you think?’

  Her eyes welled over. ‘I think it is a brilliant idea.’

  He smiled in relief. ‘I promised him that if you agreed, I’d kiss you good and proper, so that he would know.’

  Chloe laughed through her tears. ‘Then let’s not disappoint him.’

  They didn’t.

  * * * * *

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  ISBN: 9781459230552

  Copyright © 2012 by Debra Bess

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