Marvelling anew at her innocence, he pulled her to his lap.
She wrapped her arms around his neck as he planted quick kisses on her brow, her eyes, her face. “I lose control when you touch me,” he whispered, sliding his hand to just below her breast.
She inhaled at his touch. “I like it when you touch me, too,” she whispered, face pink.
Inflamed, he teased her lips with his, coaxed them apart, sipped and tasted. The world disappeared. She responded with the innocence of newfound passion, her kisses reaching his soul.
“Faith,” he moaned as he briefly took his lips away then kissed her again, his hands moving finally to explore a gentle swell, tease a bud. She mewled and strained forward, responsive as all hell. He placed his hands on her hips to pull her closer.
“Poppy? Fay?”
It took great effort for Justin to pull his mind from passion. When Faith stood, or tried to, she wavered slightly and he grabbed her waist to steady her. She covered his hands with hers and looked into his eyes for a long moment. Rosy-cheeked, she turned to regard his daughter.
Beth stood on his bed, arms wide, calling, “Fay,” and giggled when Faith sprinted in mock charge toward her.
Energy renewed, Beth spent another hour entertaining them.
After Faith gave Beth back to Sally’s care, she returned to him and they ate a quiet lunch together. Justin could tell she was as preoccupied as he. “This afternoon, I want you to help me stand,” he said, cutting the silence. “The best exercise might be attempting to walk and I would like to try.”
“It might be a little soon.” Faith worried her lip. “But, if it’s what you want, I’ll help as much as I can.”
She moved furniture aside to clear him a wide path. He used his arms to raise himself then she helped him stand.
“Goodness, you look much bigger from here,” Faith said.
He was dizzy but refused to mention it, or give in to it. “Feels good to look down at you.”
“Now that you’re standing you seem…more wide shouldered, perhaps, as well as taller.”
“Am I putting too much weight on you?”
“No. No, it’s all right. How do your legs feel?”
“Shaky, like they belong to someone else.” He tried to take a step, but Faith was not prepared and they fell.
“We seem doomed to spending a good part of each day here,” Justin joked. “Shall we give it another try?”
Faith helped him up. “Warn me next time you want to try anything fancy.” When she let go and stood aside, he remained standing on his own for a good minute.
He stood again that night and four times the next day, Faith cheering him on. Each time he tried, he stood longer then the time before. After several days of practice, his legs stopped shaking. Before long, he could stand alone for nearly five minutes. A week later he executed his first step with considerable effort on both their parts.
“We did it!” he said hugging her. “I think the only thing wrong with my legs was lack of use. Thank you.”
“It was your determination, Justin. You’ve been relentless.”
“I couldn’t have done it without you. I could stand up to Vincent now, if he barged in here again. How grand would that be?” He flexed his fingers. “I wonder if I can still throw a good punch.” He lost his concentration and faltered.
“Enough for today.” Faith turned him back to the bed. “More tomorrow when you’re rested.”
The following days for Justin were filled with slow plodding steps, the nights with deep sober contemplation.
He fought an inner struggle over Faith’s seeming uniqueness among the women of his acquaintance. One side of him said, yes, she was genuine, loving, good. The other said no woman could be. He ached for wanting her, which was, in turn, driving him to the brink of insanity, raising him to dizzying heights, and frightening him to death.
The threat Vincent posed was real and it was serious. Not only was his life in jeopardy, but if Vincent discovered Faith’s hand in his recovery, hers would be too. He shuddered to think of it.
And what about Beth? If something happened to him, she would be abandoned again. Though Faith loved her, she would have no right under the law to keep her. And there was no one on earth he would rather have care for his daughter than Faith.
The best way he could think to provide for Beth’s future, would be to give her a mother who already loved her. He couldn’t take the chance Beth might be left in Vincent’s care again.
He must speak to Faith without delay.
That evening after dinner, he indicated the chair beside his, facing the hearth. “Sit down, Faith, please.”
When she did, he took her hands and searched her eyes. “You’ve given me so much, my daughter, my very life. Though I can never repay you, I find I need something more.” He paused. “Something extremely important to me.”
Faith wondered why Justin was so formal. “You know I’ll do anything to help you.”
“You mentioned that my old friend, the Vicar, recommended you to Vincent. Could you send Gabe a message to come here?”
“Of course, but why?”
Justin ran his hand through his hair. “I’ve given much thought to my situation.”
Faith had the impression that, were it possible, he would pace.
“If Vincent really wants me dead…” He hesitated. “He might…no, he will try again. And if he succeeds—”
“Justin no.”
“Don’t deny the facts, Faith. It’s not my intent to frighten you, but we have to be realistic. I’m concerned for you and Beth.” He looked at their clasped hands, squeezed. “I would ask the Vicar to marry us while he’s here.” He looked directly at her. “If you’re agreeable to the arrangement.”
Arrangement? Faith sat straighter. Feeling weighted down in the region of her heart, she removed her hands from his.
“If anything should happen to me,” he said. “As my wife, you would be Beth’s legal guardian. Since there are trusts in place for my wife and children—nothing Vincent can touch—both of you would be well cared for.”
“Justin. Stop.” Against a sudden chill, Faith rose to stir the already blazing fire, glad to have her back to him so she could recover from the pain of his cold proposal.
“If you find the thought of marriage to me distasteful,” he said to her back. “I’ll understand.”
She turned in surprise.
“I ask that you consider Beth before you make your decision.” He spoke with a hurried, nervous edge to his voice. “I’ll not pressure you, for you must consider the potential danger in aligning yourself to me. Please take some time to think about this. Whatever you decide, I would like to speak with Gabriel. Could you send him a note tomorrow?”
Faith tried to speak, but no words would come. She blinked several times to stop her tears.
“Will you at least consider it?”
Who was this cold, hard man?
Then she remembered. He was the man who trusted no one.
She’d thought he was beginning to care for her. What a fool. He’d been right all along. Faith Wickham was a silly little girl.
“I’ll…consider it. Good night, Justin.” She went to her room and shut the door between. Throwing herself on her bed, she looked at the gold brocade canopy above her. The man was a simpleton. He’d asked her to marry him, but did he say he cared for her? She slapped a tassel. He speaks not of tenderness, but common sense…nonsense more like. He attempts to use persuasion to win a heart already, foolishly, filled with love. “Oh!” She rocked to a standing position. “More fool you, Justin Devereux!”
Faith bathed and donned her nightgown and sat on the settee before her hearth. She watched the flame shifting from orange to yellow and back, and wished she might say no, just to see what the oaf would do.
But she couldn’t. The arrogant man was destined to be hers, every chiselled inch of him. She’d known it from the first.
She would marry him, of course—she had love enough for both of th
em—but she would make him suffer the torments of hell before she would give him her answer.
The next morning, when she went to Justin, he sat by the window, examining the vase in his hand, pretending he was not waiting for her. He set it down when she entered, as if it was inconvenient to do so, and asked, offhandedly, if she had an answer for him.
She opened the curtains. “About what?” she asked, staring out, seeing nothing. A minute later, when he said nothing, she turned to him.
His jaw was set rigid. “Marriage,” he said. “To me.”
To occupy her hands and eyes, and keep them off him, she swept the hearth. “You mean the arrangement for me to become Beth’s mother?” She didn’t so much as look his way.
“I mean, about marrying me. You have to do that, you know, to become Beth’s guardian.”
She set aside the broom and strode right up to him. “Let’s speak plainly. I will be Beth’s mother or nothing.”
He gave her a fierce scowl. “Damn it woman, you cannot be her mother, unless you marry me. Now, do you have a response or not?”
“Not.” She sent for Vicar Kendrick first thing, as Justin requested, and spent the rest of the day with Beth.
The Vicar wrote to say he would be there in a week. Those days passed in quiet exercise, but each began the same way. “Faith, have you an answer for me today?”
“Not today,” became her usual reply.
Conversations became businesslike, Faith became more miserable.
Justin stopped asking, and she did not offer a reply.
The following Monday, as Beth tied a rose silk ribbon around Justin’s face, it was apparent to Faith that he was preparing to ask again. He looked just that forlorn when he set himself to it.
Between his dejected look and the ribbon—the end of which he was attempting to spit from his mouth—Faith couldn’t keep her weak self from smiling.
At her look, he pulled the ribbon off with purpose, but when he saw Beth’s disappointment, he tickled her. And when Beth caught her breath, Justin looked at Faith with such hope, it was almost her undoing.
“It’s been over a week, Faith. Can you answer my question?”
“What question was that?”
“Damnation.”
“Damnation,” Beth repeated.
“Hush, darling,” Faith said smoothing Beth’s curls, trying to hide her smile.
“To become my wife. Do you think so little of the offer?”
Faith looked at the man she loved, and though her heart went out to him, she wanted him to understand what it felt like to be on the receiving end of a cold offer. “For such an arrangement, an answer is unnecessary until the Vicar arrives.”
“Perhaps I seemed unfeeling—”
“Perhaps?”
He reached for her hands; she placed them behind her back. His look hardened. “I didn’t mean to sound harsh,” he said with as little emotion as his proposal held. “I…wanted you to realize the danger involved. I…care…perhaps more than I’d like.” He made to grasp her by the waist, but she skirted his reach.
Someone knocked on his door.
Faith returned with breakfast. “Have mine,” she said, placing it before him. “I’m not hungry. Beth and I are going outside.”
“Bloody hell.”
“Bloodyell,” Beth said.
“Come along, darling, Poppy is tired.” Beth kissed him on the cheek, his smile so filled with love for his daughter, Faith ached to have him look at her that way.
As she left his room, a spoon bounced off the door frame, beside her, but she did not look back.
“You’re one damned stubborn woman, do you know that?” he shouted after her. “Perhaps I would be better off if you said no!”
Good. He deserved to be frustrated, the thick-skulled village idiot.
Faith woke to the same blood-curdling scream as on her first night at Killashandra, and she ran.
Justin struggled wildly, his cries satanic, his sobs heartrending, calling Beth over and over.
Faith tried to calm him with soothing words, to stroke his brow, but she couldn’t stop him from thrashing about. She held his arms by his side. “Wake up, Justin. You’re having a nightmare. You’re safe. Beth is safe. Darling, please open your eyes. Look at me.”
He stopped struggling and looked at her…with the same unseeing orbs of her nightmare, the empty eyes she’d seen that first morning, and she gasped in terror. “Justin! Wake up!” She shook him, called his name, but it was no use. He was gone.
Justin was gone.
Gone from her forever.
She’d treated him abominably and now she would never have a chance to show him how she really felt. The wail of anguish that was torn from her incited him to renewed combat.
Heart beating apace with her struggle, Faith tried to use her weight to hold him down, but he threw her aside with incredible strength, and she landed in a heap on the floor, while he continued to grapple with some unseen assailant.
Returning to his side, Faith sought divine help. Astounded by his strength, desperate to stop him, lest he do himself harm, Faith straddled him as she’d seen Harris do, but he fought her with the desperation of the damned, hurting her in his frenzy.
She protected her face with her hands as he reached for her, but he grabbed her shoulders, digging into her bruised flesh, and shoving her to the far side of the bed. “Justin, stop. Please.” She dragged herself up and tried to grab his wrists. But he used her hold on him to his own advantage, and turned her, twisting one of her arms painfully behind her.
“Stop it!” she screamed as loud as she dared, afraid to alert anyone to the happenings in the sickroom.
He towered above her, crushing her twisted arm beneath her.
“Justin! You’re hurting me!”
Eyes wide with horror, awareness registered on his face.
Justin stopped moving, as if he were seeing her for the first time. He took in the crumpled bedding, their awkward positions, and let her go. “Faith?”
“You know me!” She began to sob. She couldn’t stop, even as she pulled her sore arm free. “You’re not gone.” She touched his dear face. You’re here and you’re…” Mine, she nearly said. “Oh, Justin. I thought….”
“My God!” He cradled her as if she were made of spun sugar. “What have I done?” He set her away, to examine her, remorse in his expression. “If I hurt you…oh, Faith, I’m so sorry.”
“You were fighting demons,” she whispered, loving the feel of his lips on her neck, raising her chin to give him access.
He kissed her eyes, her tear trails. “One demon, yes.”
“Who?”
He took a breath, held her face between his hands. “Vincent wouldn’t let me stop the carriage from going over the cliff. He tried to keep me from rescuing Beth.”
When Justin let her go, Faith felt adrift. He gazed at the ceiling, searching. “That’s not how it happened. I think…Faith, I remember. I think I remember the carriage accident.”
“Tell me.”
“Did I hurt you? Really?”
Faith saw the life in his eyes, felt his lips on her fingers, and thanked God he could see and speak to her. “I’m fine,” she whispered. “And so are you.”
He tucked her face beneath his chin, which she thought a fine place for it to be, and he squeezed her. He told her of his search to find Catherine and Vincent after they had taken Beth, of the cliff in Bognor, where he found the carriage. When he told her Vincent said Beth was in the carriage, he faltered.
“If it’s too difficult….”
“I want to. Are you warm enough?”
Faith smiled. “Tell me.”
He took a breath. “When the carriage went over, the cab whipped about and the door tore from its hinges. I knew Beth would fall out and be dashed against the jagged rocks below.” His sigh was ragged. “Tonight, in my dream, I was fighting Vincent, though I never did. What I did was run to grab the carriage, to hold it back, but it dragged me over wi
th it.”
Faith held him tighter. “I can’t imagine it.” She shuddered. “And I’m glad I can’t.”
Justin lay his cheek against her hair, his heart slowing. “If Vincent discovers you helped me, you’ll be in jeopardy too. It’s driving me crazy, thinking he’ll darken our lives this day or the next … to finish the deed.”
“You’ll be ready, Justin, when the time comes to confront Vincent. We’ll see to it.”
“I could kill him for making me believe Beth was in that carriage. Cat didn’t want Beth … for other than a pawn. She wanted to trade Beth, to keep me from divorcing her, so she and Vincent could continue their relationship accepted by society.”
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