by Dalton, Lily
He rubbed his hands down her arms. It wasn’t a seductive touch, but one that spoke of affection. “Tomorrow we return to London.”
“Yes. Just in time for Christmas.”
“Before we go, I need to tell you something.”
“What’s that?”
Touching her chin, he lifted her gaze to his. He felt freed. Somehow the words that had seemed so difficult before weren’t any longer.
“I never wanted anything more than I wanted you,” he said quietly. “From the first moment I saw you.”
She said nothing, but her eyes softened and she let out a little breath.
He continued, having so much more to say. “On paper, I had everything, a title and wealth, to be a worthy husband to you. But on the inside, here in my heart and inside my head, I felt like a fraud. For living the life I’d lived and for doubting who I was. I believed myself wholly unworthy of someone as lovely as you. I know it sounds strange to say, but the happier we were, the more fearful I became that one day you would see me for what I was.”
She stared up into his eyes. “What you are is a good man.”
“But not then. That day, everything came crashing down. We lost the baby, and I believed I’d lost you too. When I should have stayed beside you and held you and proved to you I was someone else…I didn’t. I was wrong.” He touched her face and looked down into the green eyes that had always enchanted him. “I can’t take those memories and those hurts away, but I can tell you I love you. I have always loved you.”
Chapter Eighteen
I love you too. The words hovered at the back of her tongue. She did love him. Desperately. She always had. But she hesitated. Why? When she wanted to throw her arms around him and kiss him and cry yes to happiness. Yes, to forever.
“It’s all right,” he said. “I don’t expect you to say you love me too. Not after these few days. I just wanted you to know before we left Lacenfleet how I felt, now more than ever. Sophia, I wouldn’t have been the honorable man my mother describes in the letter if not for you.” He pointed at the wooden chest.
“That’s not true.”
I love you too. Still, the words wouldn’t come.
She wanted to cry because it hurt her to be so begrudging, that she couldn’t simply let go of the fear that had consumed her for so long.
She’d forgiven him, but why couldn’t she forget?
“It is true.” He took her in his arms, embracing her tight, the naked admiration in his eyes almost more than she could bear, because she craved it so deeply, but feared once they left this magical place, that light would fade. She wouldn’t be able to survive losing him a second time. She needed more days like this one with Claxton before she could at last say good-bye to her doubts. A history. Then she could finally surrender everything. She could again give him her heart. “If you’d not been here, goose, I would have thrown that first quest on the fire with his portrait without ever having read it, a coward from my pain.”
She shook her head. “You’re the furthest thing from a coward. To hear what you have suffered at the hands of your own father, a man who should have treasured you. I can hardly bear it.”
“No pity.” He mouth found hers, breathtakingly ardent.
“Vane.” She sighed. “No, never pity.”
He had fought his battle and won.
“I need you now,” he murmured. His mouth burned a hot path down her neck to her breasts.
Sophia stared into his eyes, her heart swollen with a love she couldn’t express in words, so strong and consuming she felt terrified from the immensity of it. “Claxton, I—”
He touched his fingertips to her lips. “I told you. You don’t have to say anything. Not until you’re ready.”
Sophia melted in his arms, lost to his touch. He scattered kisses along her temple and cheek. Down her throat.
“Let me make love to you now,” he rasped against her skin. “One last time before we go…then again in our bed in London.”
“Please,” she begged, grasping fistfuls of his shirt and tugging the linen free from his breeches.
“We’ve got to be quiet.” He laughed, a chuckle deep in his throat. He cupped her breasts in his hands and squeezed before plucking at the tiny pearl buttons at the center of her bodice. “The Kettles—”
“Yes, quiet.” She tugged his shirttails from his breeches, tilting her head, so he could kiss her neck.
Suddenly, he stilled in her arms. A low, jagged breath issued from his lips.
“Vane?”
She felt something there at her breast. The brush of his fingertips, the sensation of—
Oh no.
He tore the folded page from her bodice.
“What the hell is this?” He held the folded square of paper in her face. “That damned list? You wear it here against your heart, a ward against me?”
He paled, his face having gone devoid of emotion. A sudden flick of his wrist unfolded the page with a snap.
“Vane, don’t be unfair. And please don’t misunderstand. Everything happened so fast, and I felt so scared. I just needed to keep my head in the right place, my heart—”
“Unfair?” he roared. “After everything? After last night? Don’t you know what that meant to me? Don’t you understand what we did? And you still woke up this morning and thought this of me?”
“I just—I just need more time. It’s only been four days, even less really…and I felt so overwhelmed—”
He trembled with rage. “Do you think I don’t feel? That I can’t love?”
He lunged forward to toss the list on the fire.
“No,” she wailed for some inexplicable reason, not ready to let go of the one thing that had given her power when she’d felt so powerless. It should be her choice when to burn it, not his. Once it was gone, she’d have no choice but to love him completely, to take the terrifying chance her heart might get broken again.
With the poker, she fished out the curling rectangle, an impulsive move she regretted instantly, for the page, already consumed by flame, floated on the air, an ashen wraith, to flatten against her skirt.
She beat it away with her hands, but too late. The flames latched onto the muslin. She screamed. Claxton cursed, throwing her to the floor, where he tore her skirts from her legs.
“There’s more,” she shrieked. “There.”
Flames rippled across the carpet, devouring old threads and the ancient wood beneath, but most horrifying of all, the little wooden chest containing his mother’s family treasures and Lord Haden’s letter, still unread.
Vane threw her a glance, one that in the brief second it lasted, screamed betrayal.
I gave you my love, and you give me this?
In that moment, she knew. She loved him more than anything. I love you. I take it back. Please forgive me.
But it was too late. She had doubted not only him, but herself, and in doing so destroyed everything she’d ever wanted.
Mr. and Mrs. Kettle rushed into the room, their faces transformed by fear. Sophia’s nose filled with smoke and her heart with frantic dread. How quickly the fire grew out of control. All she could think was that she had done this to them. Camellia House was on fire, a place she had so come to love now destroyed by her petty insistence on keeping a meaningless list.
Vane lifted her, snatching up her redingote. He carried her away from the horrible heat and light through the vestibule and out the door until his boots met snow and he flung her from his arms.
“Go,” he ordered, his eyes wild and furious. He threw the garment at her. “Stay out and don’t return.”
*
Sophia did not return. She waited with Mrs. Branigan in the stable, the both of them inconsolable until the fire had been put out. By then, villagers crowded into the yard, having come from the village to offer help. Boots trampled the melting snow, turning the grounds into an ugly mud bog.
Mr. Branigan eventually returned, his skin shadowed by soot and his eyes with regret.
Still, he explained to them one bit of good fortune. The frost, having thawed earlier that day, allowed Mr. Kettle to install a hose on a functional pump. The availability of water, combined with Lord Claxton’s quick action in smothering the flames with the heaviest draperies, allowed the fire to be extinguished. Although he described the great room as severely damaged, the remainder of the house had been largely spared.
“But no one was hurt?” Sophia demanded softly through tears.
He shook his head. “No one hurt.”
Thank God. But she could never face Claxton again, not after what she had done. He had given her the gift of his love, and in return, she’d continued to harbor secret doubts, ones that had brought about the destruction of not only the new trust between them but also his mother’s home. A place that had inspired his sweetest childhood memories. Just as heartbreaking, he’d lost the treasure chest of mementos, of a family he had never known. Such precious items could never be replaced or rebuilt. She had taken all those things from him.
All for an imbecilic list she ought to have burned the same night it had been written, committing its sins to the past. Claxton’s stunned look of betrayal would forever be preserved in her mind.
How would he ever forgive her? How could she ever expect him to?
She’d never felt so choked with sadness, so dead inside.
“Mr. Branigan,” she said numbly. “Would you please take me down into Lacenfleet?”
The young man displayed reluctance, clearly in fear of provoking the duke’s displeasure, but at last, when faced with her tears, he took pity on her. She would indeed be home for Christmas, but with her spirit broken and more hopeless than she’d ever imagined.
They arrived at the village inn a short time later, she with no possessions other than the clothes she wore, ruined by soot and flame.
“My lady,” exclaimed the innkeeper. “What a relief to see you in good health. We all saw the smoke. This gentleman who says he knows you had just inquired as to your residence. I was just about to tell him the terrible news.”
Only then did Sophia look at the man who stood beside him. She recognized the familiar face and golden hair of a childhood friend.
“Oh, Fox,” she exclaimed, dissolving into tears and collapsing into his arms. “Please take me home.”
Within moments his carriage conveyed them toward the Mowbray ferry landing, where the vehicle paused to await the disembarkment of a wagon and horses that had just come over from the other side. The river, swollen from melted ice and snow, nearly overwhelmed the dock.
“I came on behalf of your family, of course,” Fox explained from the seat opposite her. “They, having heard nothing from you since the night of your grandfather’s party, wished to confirm your well-being as soon as the river became passable.”
Her well-being. She would never be well again. What she had told Claxton last night was true. The past four days had been the most uncommon of her life. Now forever, they would be shadowed in darkness. She grieved their loss and Claxton’s loss like a death.
“Sophia.” He extended a handkerchief, which she gratefully clutched to her eyes. “You must tell me what happened.”
“I can’t,” she rasped. “It’s all too terrible.”
He pulled aside the window curtain, an action that provided a direct view of Camellia House high upon the hill over Lacenfleet. Even from this distance, Sophia clearly saw the gaping hole and the cloud of soot that smudged the lovely façade. She moaned and buried her head in her hands.
It was then that Fox’s composure fractured.
“Why is he not with you?” he demanded ferociously. “Why have you left in this fashion, unescorted, with only the clothes on your back? As if in secrecy. As if in escape?”
She shook her head, unable to respond for a sudden eruption of tears. He lunged across the carriage, taking her in his arms. Sobs racked her body.
“Tell me, Sophia, what did he do to you? If Vinson were here, he would demand to know. Since he is not, then I will.”
Just then the door of the carriage flew open. Claxton’s face appeared in the door opening, his eyes cruel and his skin and clothing blackened by soot. He breathed heavily and his features were strained, as if he’d run all the way on foot. His boot slammed onto the step and he gripped the handle, for all appearances prepared to hurl himself inside.
“You would leave me now?” He uttered the words hoarsely, his gaze only briefly veering to Havering before returning to her. His body shuddered with some emotion, his expression grew hard, and he fell back to simply stand and stare. “I was a coward for abandoning you before, for not fighting harder for us. But make no mistake. It’s you, Sophia, who are the coward today.”
Nostrils flaring with rage, he slammed the door.
“Oh, Fox,” she cried. “It’s not what he did to me, but what I did to him. He will never forgive me.”
*
Two days later, upon returning to town, Vane took residence in his London house instead of his club. He had no fear of crossing paths with Sophia because from what he could surmise, she had not spent one moment in their marital home, but had flown straight into her family’s waiting arms. He expected it was just a matter of time before Wolverton summoned him to discuss their separation.
“It’s officially ‘eve,’” Haden said, looking at his timepiece. “Christmas Eve, that is, which means it’s almost time for me to depart.”
Vane didn’t bite. Haden had been dangling some supposed invitation in front of his nose all evening. As if Vane had ever cared about society or parties before, and he most especially did not now.
“Where will you go tonight, Claxton?” asked Rabe, who also made ready to depart, donning his hat and gloves.
“To bed, I suppose.” Vane had given the servants two days’ leave in honor of the holiday. He wanted to be alone. He had not slept in two days, not since the fire. Not since Sophia had left Lacenfleet in the company of Lord Havering. If he could just force himself to fall asleep, he might stay there forever.
“To bed? But it’s Christmas Eve.” His cousin frowned.
“And?” Vane answered stolidly.
From outside came the sound of waits singing on the pavement outside his window, a song of hope and goodwill toward one’s common man, two sentiments he could not summon within himself.
“Come with me to Mother’s,” Rabe insisted.
“Thank you,” Vane answered. “But no.”
Haden jumped in. “I, for one, have accepted an invitation to participate in one generous family’s traditional holiday festivities.”
Vane spread the morning’s newspaper on the table and pretended to read. It wouldn’t do to murder his only remaining immediate relation on Christmas Eve. Perhaps, though, tomorrow.
“Well?” demanded Haden.
“Well, what?” Vane responded darkly.
“Aren’t you going to ask who invited me to spend Christmas Eve with them?”
“No,” Vane growled, his head feeling as if it might just explode.
“The two of you are imbeciles.” Rabe rolled his eyes. “Tell us, who invited you, Haden?”
Haden puffed his chest out and smiled. “The Duchess of Claxton.”
Rabe whistled through his teeth.
Vane glared at his brother, his hands seizing the paper. “No, she didn’t.”
Haden’s eyebrows jumped with mischief. “Yes, she did. That morning after the duel. I can only assume the invitation still stands.” Turning to gaze into the gilt-framed wall mirror, he whistled cheerfully and pinned a sprig of holly to his lapel.
“If I were you, I would assume,” Vane seethed, “that the invitation has been rescinded.”
“Last I checked I was still her brother by marriage. You might do well to—”
“Don’t say it,” Vane warned.
Haden’s good humor dimmed. “Suit yourself. But you can’t stay here forever being miserable. I think if you would only talk to her—”
“I hope y
ou choke on mistletoe,” Claxton growled.
He wasn’t trying to be funny. Mistletoe’s knobby thin branches would be exquisitely painful if thrust down one’s throat, and as an added benefit in his brother’s case, poisonous.
“Hmm. Mistletoe,” Haden mused. “Her Grace has two lovely sisters.”
“I’ll visit tomorrow, Claxton,” said Rabe.
“Don’t bother. I plan to be asleep.” Or drunk.
Haden and Rabe exchanged looks of exasperation. A moment later the door closed behind them. At last. Silence.
Damn, and the memory of Sophia’s beautiful face. He curled his fists and pressed them against his forehead, aching for her with such a sudden miserable intensity he—
A sudden rapping came on the door.
Damn it, Haden. He waited for his footman to answer, but then remembered…he had no servants. The rapping continued unabated, driving a nail straight through his skull.
Unlocking the door, he bellowed, “Next time remember your key—”
A different face waited there. Vane snarled, for there on his doorstep stood Lord Havering, his eyes ablaze, as if prepared for battle.
“You and I are going to have a talk,” he said.
But puzzlingly…behind him stood Haden and Rabe.
They all, in a rush of tall hats, shoulders, and winter scarves, pushed past him into the vestibule. He considered walking straight out the door into the night without his coat or hat. He’d just keep walking until he could walk no more and spend the night, or maybe a month, at some anonymous inn.
But this was his house, and he wasn’t leaving. He firmly shut the door on the cold and proceeded to return from whence he had come. They all waited for him beneath the arched threshold of his study, doffing their hats, with expressions of grim-faced determination. He could only assume that Havering had been sent as Wolverton’s representative to present the terms for a separation and that his own blood relations had been recruited to bear witness and to intercede, as necessary, if Claxton did not take the proposed provisos well. No doubt Havering would talk talk talk and expect him to listen.
“Listen here, Claxton,” declared Havering, proving his point. “This nonsense between you and her Grace is going to stop right here, tonight.”