His deep voice was firm. “We aren’t far from my home. I hope you’ll accept my offer of sanctuary.”
Five
Gideon expected Miss Watson to demur. After all, only yesterday she’d been so desperate to escape that she’d risked her life to run away. But she turned a solemn hazel gaze in his direction and, after a moment, nodded.
He couldn’t help noting her beautiful eyes, remarkable even in her bruised face. A striking mixture of green and gold, they were the shifting, fascinating color of the tarns he remembered from the woods near Penrhyn.
“I accept, Sir Gideon. Thank you.” Her lush lashes lowered to shade her eyes to malachite. “I just hope your many kindnesses to me don’t bring you trouble.”
More damned gratitude. He dismissed her remark with a grunt. “I’m not sure how kind you’ll think I am when you see the house. I haven’t been back since I was sixteen. Even then, it was far from luxurious. Lord knows what state the place is in now.”
According to his father’s solicitors, the old manor still stood as it had stood through four hundred years of wild Cornish weather. They hadn’t, however, been able to vouchsafe the property’s condition. Ramshackle, Gideon guessed, reading between the lines of legal nonsense.
Neither his father nor his older brother had been much of a manager. No reason that should change because Sir Barker Trevithick’s despised younger son vanished into Asia. Before breaking his neck in a drunken hunting accident, Sir Barker hadn’t known whether his second son was alive or dead. Nor, Gideon grimly knew, had he much cared. But then, he’d thought the succession rested safely in Harry’s plate-size hands.
Like so much about Gideon’s return to England, the deaths of his father and brother aroused conflicting reactions. Neither had ever evinced an ounce of affection for him, and he wasn’t hypocritical enough to pretend to mourn their passing. Nonetheless, there was a…regret when he thought of two lives so close to his own wasted in debauchery and drunkenness.
Curiosity lit Sarah’s face, and she leaned forward, bracing herself against the jolting carriage. “Has the house been unoccupied since you left?”
“No. My older brother lived there until last winter, when a fever took him.”
He kept his voice steady and unemotional. Still, the girl’s expression filled with compassion. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered.
Her ready sympathy made him uncomfortable. “We weren’t close.” To say the least. Wild beasts received a more tender upbringing than the two young Trevithicks.
“Then I’m sorry for that too,” she said. “Family is important.”
“Not to me,” he said tersely. “And I hardly think your experience is any improvement on mine.”
Her jaw firmed. “My brothers’ brutality can’t destroy my faith in human relations. That would give them too great a victory.”
Again, he couldn’t stifle his admiration for her indomitable spirit. “You’re a brave young woman.” And she’d need every scrap of that bravery before she was done. He paused and forced himself to set before her a factor she should consider. “It will be a bachelor establishment, Miss Watson. Me. Tulliver. A few servants. Akash when he arrives in a couple of days.”
Briefly, she raised her good hand to touch her mottled cheek. The gesture indicated uncertainty and drew his unwilling attention to her face. This morning both the bruising and the swelling had subsided. A hint of her true features emerged like a shadowy reflection in a mirror. With a doomed sinking in his gut, Gideon recognized that Miss Watson promised to prove a beauty under her injuries.
When he’d rescued her, he hadn’t spared a thought for her physical attractions. She was just a woman needing help. The last thing he wanted to deal with was a winsome female. She would only be a blistering reminder of everything he’d never have.
Fate clearly was in a mood to torment him.
“No ladies at all?” She sounded hesitant. He couldn’t blame her. For a gently bred girl, the prospect of moving into a masculine household must be daunting. “No aged spinster aunts or widowed cousins?”
“I’m afraid not.” He wished he could reassure her that his aid came without risk of consequences. He wished to God he had some alternative plan for her safety. “We may get away with it. I’ve been abroad a long time, and I have no plans to join local society. The house is remote, and the villagers distrust outsiders.”
Nervously, she plucked at the bandage on her arm, her fingers long, pale, and graceful. He noticed she held her arm more easily against the swaying carriage. Clearly Akash’s potions had relieved the worst of her pain.
There was a troubled silence before Sarah spoke. “My safety is more important than my name.” She sounded as though she reached that conclusion reluctantly. As she looked up, she managed a shaky smile. “I still can’t see why you take this trouble. Your generosity to a stranger does you credit.”
Gideon shifted uncomfortably under her wholehearted approbation. He desperately needed to shatter the encroaching intimacy, fine as spider’s web, strong as steel, but something in her unblinking regard forced the truth from him.
“I abhor injustice. I abhor bullies. Everything in me resists allowing men who treat a woman as you’ve been treated to profit from their evil.” His voice roughened with emotion. “While there is breath in my body, Miss Watson, I’ll do my utmost to ensure your freedom and security.”
Immediately he repented his impulsive declaration.
Her eyes glowed gold as a streak of sunlight striking a forest pool. Her lips parted, but no words emerged. She leaned toward him but, thank God, didn’t touch him. Even so, his skin itched as though she reached for him.
Damn, damn, damn. He should have recognized the looming danger before this. He needed to destroy this building affinity, not encourage it. Why hadn’t he kept his blasted mouth shut?
At last he interpreted exactly what her expression portended. His inescapable conclusions made his stomach lurch with nausea.
Miss Watson regarded him with unstinting, uncritical, and completely unwarranted hero worship.
Following his moving declaration of unconditional protection, Sir Gideon’s withdrawal was tangible. She stifled a prickle of hurt she had no right to feel.
He spent most of the day asleep. Or feigning sleep. She couldn’t be sure. What she could be sure of was that he wouldn’t welcome her curiosity. Even though curiosity about him gnawed at her mind like hungry rats.
His apparent oblivion provided her with uninterrupted hours to study her companion. The mysterious ailment had passed although he was still pale and gaunt. Charis was guiltily aware that her reckless escape had prompted his attack although she had no idea why. His suffering had been so extreme, she could hardly bear witnessing it. The agonizing frustration was that she could do so little to help.
She gathered he endured these awful spells on a regular basis. What on earth was wrong with him? She hadn’t seen anything like his illness before although she’d nursed her father and her mother and ministered to many sick tenants on the estate.
Gideon Trevithick puzzled her. He fascinated her. She’d never known anyone to compare to him. She’d never known anyone who affected her the way he did. He was such a compelling mixture of strength and vulnerability. Every time she looked at him, her heart launched into a tipsy dance. This breathless excitement was unfamiliar and frightening. None of her suitors had stirred this hunger for their merest presence.
Perhaps she felt this way because he’d saved her. First in Winchester, then from those vile miscreants in the alley. A shudder rippled through her as she imagined what would have happened in Portsmouth if Gideon hadn’t appeared like a guardian angel. Degradation and death had edged so close.
But as her eyes traced Sir Gideon’s dark features, she knew her interest went beyond gratitude. Deep and sincere as that gratitude was. He was beautiful, he was brave, he was damaged, he was frighteningly clever. And the briefest sight of him made her breath jam in her throat.
De
ar Lord, she’d known him little more than a day, and already she brimmed with giddy, irrational longings. What state would she be in after three weeks in his company?
At least the continuing silence served one good purpose. He didn’t question her further, saving her from dredging up more lies to prick her conscience. Ingrained habits of mistrust and caution urged her to keep her identity secret, although if anyone deserved her honesty, it was Sir Gideon.
Now she was about to move into his house. A forbidden thrill raced through her at the prospect. A thrill mixed with apprehension. If the world discovered she lived under his roof without a chaperone, she’d be ruined. Another good reason to keep her identity secret.
She glanced across at her sleeping rescuer and couldn’t help thinking that ruin had never looked so alluring.
Oh, Charis, wicked, wicked. The angels weep for you.
Charis’s endlessly circling thoughts eventually took on the carriage’s rocking rhythm and lulled her into a half-waking state. Each lurch of the coach worsened her aches and reminded her she was far from recovered after Hubert’s beating.
For most of the day, they traversed rough moorland. In the late afternoon, Charis was awake to notice they passed between two gateposts, worn and covered in ivy. Rampant lions held carved stone shields so old and moss-encrusted, any detail was long obliterated. Rusted gates hung drunkenly, smothered in weeds that had died last summer and never been cut back. Soon after, they entered a thick wood.
Charis stirred to mark the change in the landscape but was too tired to ponder its significance. She stretched stiff muscles and bit back a moan as the movement tested her injuries. With a sigh she couldn’t restrain, she leaned her head back against the seat, hoping to heaven there wasn’t another night of travel ahead. She was heartily sick of the rattling, bumping coach.
They continued for another half hour or so. Interlacing branches above the rutted track turned the interior of the carriage into shadowy mystery. In his corner, Sir Gideon was a silent, magnetic presence, his long legs stretched across the well between the benches, his arms crossed over his hard chest. She had no idea whether he was asleep or pretending.
To her regret, Charis knew she looked like she’d been dragged through a bush. She’d been a fright yesterday, and the day’s traveling would only worsen her appearance. Since he’d changed his clothes, Gideon had regained his louche elegance. Even the faint beard darkening his jaw enhanced his masculine appeal, adding a rakish air to his chiseled features. She closed her eyes and told herself to think of something other than Sir Gideon. A command impossible to obey.
Through her fog of discomfort and exhaustion, Charis heard Tulliver shout and felt the carriage shudder to a halt. She opened dazed eyes. They’d left the wood, and late sunlight flooded through the windows.
She leaned her head out the window and looked up at the grizzled figure in the driver’s seat. “Why have we stopped, Tulliver?”
“Look, miss.” He gestured with his whip. “Penrhyn.”
With a glance at Sir Gideon’s motionless figure, she forced her tired muscles into ungainly movement. She scrambled from the coach and turned in the direction Tulliver indicated.
And fell in love at first sight.
They were on a slight rise. Behind stretched the woods they’d just driven through. In front, the land sloped gently down to the cliffs. Beyond was the glory of the sea, deep blue in the fading light.
Part of sky, sea, wild landscape was the house perched on the edge of the cliffs, looking westward. Centuries old. Worn. Welcoming, even at this distance. Its soft golden stone glowed in the long rays of sunlight. Penrhyn called to Charis across the pale winter grass that trembled in the fresh sea breeze.
“It takes your breath away, doesn’t it?”
Reluctantly, she tore her gaze from the house to look at Gideon, who emerged from the carriage behind her. He’d been nurtured in this glorious place. No wonder he was so remarkable. She swallowed to shift the lump of emotion that lodged in her throat at the house’s perfect beauty. “It’s magnificent.”
He stopped beside her, close enough for her to be aware of his commanding height. She wasn’t an especially short woman, but he made her feel small and fragile. Her heart did its usual dip and leap at his nearness. How she wished she could control her foolish reactions.
“Yes, it is.” His voice was calm. Artificially so, she guessed. Although his striking face was impassive, she couldn’t mistake the tension in his lean frame. “I wondered if it had changed. It hasn’t.”
Charis frowned, confused by the currents swirling beneath his calm surface. For someone who had left his home many years ago, he appeared less than overjoyed to be back. “How could you bear to stay away for so long?”
Sudden emotion darkened his face, and his eyes burned as they met hers. The searing look lasted barely a second before he returned his attention to the old house. “How can I bear to come back?” he muttered, seemingly against his will.
“You sound like you hate it,” she said, aghast.
He shook his head, and a lock of black hair fell across his forehead. “No, I love it. That’s what makes everything so impossible.”
The corrosive honesty of his response flooded her with astonishment. Sir Gideon didn’t strike her as a confiding man. That he revealed as much as he did indicated his turmoil.
With an abrupt movement, he turned on his heel and climbed back into the carriage. Shocked, bewildered, Charis watched him go. It was as though he couldn’t bear to look on his inheritance any longer. But for a moment, the hardness in his gaze had shattered, and she’d glimpsed a longing that made her heart stutter.
She wished to the depths of her being that she understood him. She wished to the depths of her being that he considered her worthy of his confidence. More than either, she wished she could do something to ease his unspoken anguish.
But she was a stranger. A brief visitor to his life. She had no significance for him beyond the present moment.
She glanced up at Tulliver, who had witnessed the whole exchange with his usual sangfroid. There was a light in his eyes that might have been understanding and was certainly pity.
For whom? Sir Gideon? Or the pathetically infatuated Miss Watson?
His voice was kind. “You might as well get back in, miss. We’ve got a mile or so to go.”
Charis’s shoulders sagged with weariness, and she limped after Gideon into the vehicle. Tulliver whipped the horses to a canter as they turned for the house. Gideon settled into his corner and stared out the window.
The sun plunged toward the sea in flaming glory by the time they passed through a crumbling stone arch and into the paved courtyard in front of Penrhyn. A closer viewing revealed the house was shabby and unkempt, but nothing could destroy the enchantment it laid over Charis. An enchantment indelibly part of the yearning she felt for its master.
“Parts stretch back to the fifteenth century, although most of it is Elizabethan.” They were the first words Gideon had spoken since that tense, revealing moment on the rise.
“It’s beautiful.”
He gave a short, caustic laugh. Through the dimness, she read the derision on his face. “Believe me, your enthusiasm will wane when you get inside to a cold house and damp sheets and a makeshift supper—if we manage any supper at all.”
“I don’t care.” His cynicism couldn’t damp her pleasure in Penrhyn. The ancient stones breathed warmth. The house had been loved, and it would be loved again. It was old and knew how to wait.
Holcombe Hall was a cold white Palladian pile. Architecturally perfect. Built for a Marquess of Burkett last century when the Farrell family still had money and prestige. She’d hated it from the moment she’d arrived there after her mother’s marriage to the late Lord Burkett. God rot his miserable soul.
As the coach slowed, two men dashed out to hold the tired horses. Four women hurriedly lined worn steps rising to a heavy door.
“Let the circus begin,” Gideon said
bleakly. With a savage movement, he opened the door and leaped to the ground before the carriage reached a complete stop.
Gideon sucked air into lungs constricted with an anger he didn’t understand. He hadn’t expected his return to his boyhood home to be so fraught with emotion. But at the first sight of the old house, he’d felt crushed between the urge to escape and the yearning to stay forever.
Another deep breath in a futile attempt to calm his galloping pulse. The essence of Penrhyn overwhelmed his senses, cleared the last sour traces of yesterday’s laudanum. And brought back a thousand agonizing memories.
Still he drank in the air—tangy with salt and wild thyme and sun on old stone and good Cornish earth. He was home and the sweet, fragrant reality split his heart in two.
“Sir Gideon, welcome home!”
The familiar voice wrenched him from distraction. He straightened and fought to mask his tumultuous reactions. He met a shrewd blue gaze in a lined face. A face he knew. Behind the tall, rake-thin old man, the staff bowed and curtsied.
Surprise and something approaching pleasure stirred. “Pollett? Elias Pollett?”
The man’s eyes shone bright with welcome. “Aye, lad…Sir Gideon.”
Pollett had been his father’s head groom. Even when Gideon was a boy, Pollett had seemed old. Gideon’s memories of his family were unfailingly desolate. His memories of the local people less so. Mostly they’d ignored him. Which was kinder than any treatment he’d received from his father. But Pollett had been an ally as far as he was able. He’d secretly taught Gideon to ride after Sir Barker abandoned his son as a hopeless case.
“How did the solicitors know to give you a position?”
“I never left, sir. A few of us stayed to see the house secure until you got back from furrin parts and took charge.”
Took charge? What a joke. Gideon wasn’t even sure he intended to remain. Although the scents of sea and wild herbs insisted he belonged here. Demanded he accepted he was a Trevithick to the bone. Like all Trevithicks, born at Penrhyn and fated to die at Penrhyn. As much part of this place as the cliffs and the waves and the wheeling, crying gulls.
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