Justin was at her side in an instant. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
She shook her head.
He rested his hand at the small of her back, guiding her to an overstuffed sofa near the fireplace.
Outside, the skies darkened and thunder rent the air. It was followed by the sound of driving rain. It fell hard and fast against the windows of their room.
Helena hardly noticed the worsening weather. She sank down on the damask-covered sofa. “I fear I’ve drunk too much champagne.”
More lies. It wasn’t strong drink that made her stomach roil and caused perspiration to spring to her brow.
“I’m not used to it,” she said. “I never even drink wine, except at Christmas.”
Justin sat down beside her. “I wish you’d told me. I would have stopped filling your glass.”
“I wasn’t thinking.”
He touched her cheek with the back of his hand. His gray eyes were dark with concern. “You’ve gone white as a ghost.”
She ducked her head away from him. “Have I?”
“Shall I summon a doctor?”
The suggestion sent a jolt of alarm through her. “No. Absolutely not.” The last thing in the world she wanted was to be examined by a doctor. She hated the breed and trusted them even less.
“He might be able to prescribe something for it.”
Of course he would prescribe something. A bleeding, no doubt. In her bitter experience, medical men never passed on an opportunity to apply leeches or open a lady’s veins. “No,” she said again. “Truly, Justin. I don’t need anything. I’m only a little lightheaded.”
“Then just sit here a moment.” His hand moved gently on her back. “It’ll pass. It always does.”
Helena tried to focus on his words. To quell the rising panic in her breast. All would be well. When they returned to the Abbey, she would explain everything. He wasn’t an unreasonable man. Surely he would understand.
“You sound as though you were speaking from experience,” she said.
“Naturally. When I first arrived in India, I often drank too much.” A wry smile edged Justin’s mouth. “I was a British soldier in a devilish hot climate. It was practically obligatory.”
She looked up at him. “Were you terribly homesick?”
“There was nothing to be homesick for.”
“Not even for England?” she asked. “Not even for the sea?”
He seemed to consider. “I confess I did miss the sea. I daresay I should have joined Her Majesty’s Navy. But to a boy who’d spent the whole of his life staring out at the water, sailing away on a ship didn’t seem like much of an adventure. I didn’t want weevily biscuits and watch and watch about. I wanted the desert. The sound of foreign tongues and the taste of food rich with spices.”
“And drink,” she said.
“And drink,” he concurred. “Champagne is nothing compared to bhang and brandy. The few occasions I was foolish enough to indulge, my batman was obliged to make me a special physic. A noxious substance. A highly effective one, too. I’d attempt to replicate it, but I’d probably end up poisoning you.”
She huffed with unwilling amusement. “I shouldn’t like that.”
“Nor would I.” He drew his knuckles along the edge of her jaw. “I’ve only just acquired you. I’m not quite ready to let you go.”
A queer sort of ache settled in Helena’s heart. “I’m not going anywhere.”
He scanned her face, a hint of a smile still playing on his lips. “You’re getting your color back, at least.”
She was blushing. And he knew it, the rogue. She wasn’t accustomed to sitting so close to a man. Nor was she used to being touched with so much tenderness. The kiss they’d shared at the inn yesterday had been the most intimate experience of her whole life. “I’m feeling a little better.”
“Just a little?”
“A great deal better.”
He tipped up her chin with his fingers. He was no longer smiling. He looked deadly serious. Rather determined, in fact. “Are you sure you’re quite recovered?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“Good.” Justin bent his head and captured her mouth in a slow, and devastatingly thorough, kiss.
Helena’s eyes fell closed and her body tilted against his. He was a big man, tall, lean, and broad of shoulder, but though she was so much smaller, there was no awkwardness between them. They fit together perfectly. She wouldn’t have thought it possible.
Indeed, she could scarcely think at all.
His lips were warm and firm on hers. It made her heartbeat quicken and skip. She forgot about what it was that had upset her. Justin’s touch seemed to have that effect on her. Merely being close to him, feeling the heat from his body and inhaling the scent of his shaving soap, reassured her somehow. Made her feel safe and protected and…
Beloved.
No, not beloved. He didn’t love her. How could he? But the way he touched her, the way he leaned over her, enveloping her in his strength. It was something very like love. Or, at least, the way she imagined love might be.
“Justin…”
He drew back to look at her. His eyes were heavy-lidded, his chest rising and falling on a harsh breath. “Too much?”
“No. Not that.”
“Too fast?” he asked. “Have I overwhelmed you?”
Helena nodded. She felt suddenly foolish, and far younger than her five-and-twenty years. “I-I don’t know what to do.”
His gray gaze softened to a caress. He brought both hands to cradle her face. “Slower then,” he murmured. “More gently.”
Her lashes fluttered as he brushed kisses over her jaw, her cheek, and her temple. They were whisper-soft kisses. Courting kisses. But there was an underlying desperation to them, most evident when he took her mouth once more.
Helena made a soft sound low in her throat. Yesterday she’d received his kiss with passivity. She’d been constrained by her sense of propriety—inhibited by her lack of experience. But today, the rules that had governed her youth no longer applied. She was a grown woman. And she was married. Whatever the future held, Justin Thornhill was her husband.
This time, when his lips found hers, she put her arms around his neck and she kissed him back.
Any doubts Justin had about whether or not Helena could stand his touch promptly went up in flames. Her hands curved insistently on his neck, tugging him down to her uplifted face and returning his kisses with an innocent ardor that made his blood surge in his veins.
She wanted him.
It shouldn’t matter, but it did. She was his wife. The first person on earth to ever truly belong to him.
He set his arm about her waist and drew her closer, crushing her heavy skirts against his legs in a waterfall of silk and horsehair crinoline. She was pillow soft and pliant, tasting of champagne and smelling of Indian jasmine, starched petticoats, and warm, willing woman. It was the most enticing blend of fragrances he’d ever encountered. It made her seem some exotic combination of respectable British lady and mysterious, Far Eastern siren.
He slid his hand behind her neck as his mouth moved on hers, gentling her and coaxing her, until her lips half parted beneath his. He might have made a sound at that. A murmur of approval, perhaps, or—heaven help him—a growl of pleasure. It was wholly inappropriate and far too much too soon, but—good Lord!—she was so soft and so sweet.
And she was his.
All his.
He raised his head. “Would you like to spend the night here?”
Helena’s arms were still around him. Deliciously so. He could feel her fingers threaded in his hair. “At the hotel?”
“I’ve reserved the room.”
She pulled back, her hands sliding from his neck to rest on the front of his waistcoat. He saw her throat spasm in a visible swallow. “I tho
ught we were going home.”
“To the Abbey?” Justin glanced toward the window. “If the rain continues, there’s every chance the road will be impassible by nightfall.”
“Does that mean we’re stuck here?” She didn’t look pleased by the idea.
“No. But it means we’ll need to leave fairly soon if we’re to make it back safely.” He hated to ask. “Do you want to go?”
“I had rather hoped we might.” Her hands fell to her lap. “I haven’t been sleeping very well since I left London.”
Justin felt a flicker of disappointment. He wanted to point out that there was a perfectly serviceable bed in their hotel room, but he knew very well that that wasn’t the crux of her objection. She simply didn’t wish to share a bed with him. Not yet, at any rate.
He was going to have to woo her.
A damnable prospect.
What did he know of wooing? His romantic past—what there was of it—consisted of brief interludes with willing widows or impersonal tumbles with tarts. He’d never properly wooed anyone. He’d never even kept a mistress. It had seemed far too much trouble. Especially when his heart had never been engaged. And after Cawnpore…
He hadn’t felt himself worthy of kindness or gentleness. And he’d been even less inclined to offer it. Not to a willing widow or a tart. And certainly not to a wife.
Good God, but a matrimonial advertisement was supposed to alleviate the need for any of this emotional claptrap. If he’d wanted to embark on a courtship, he’d have found a woman at a village assembly somewhere. A plain, no-nonsense sort of female. The daughter of a tradesman or the widow of a soldier. He’d never have chosen a lady of such beauty and refinement. He knew what he was. And what he deserved.
But as Helena gazed up at him, her lips rosy from his kisses and her eyes soft as velvet, he realized that whether he deserved her or not, she was his. And he’d be damned if he made her unhappy.
He took hold of her hands. They were pale and slender in his. “We won’t have much privacy at the Abbey. Boothroyd will likely importune me as soon as we return. He has no sense of timing. Nor does Neville, come to that.”
“Life at the Abbey sounds very…informal.”
The corner of his mouth lifted. “That’s one way of putting it.” His thumbs slid over the silken skin on the backs of her hands. “It won’t be what you’re used to.”
“You’ve said that before. I hope you’re not still trying to warn me off.”
“Would it work this time?”
“We are married, sir. I am your wife.”
“Ah,” he said. “I thought I recognized you.”
A smile glimmered in her eyes. She tugged at his hands until he obediently bent his head. And then she kissed him, her lips clinging to his, warm and sweet.
His heart thundered in his chest. “Take care,” he said huskily. “Much more of this and I’ll begin to think you’re growing fond of me.”
Her hands moved in his, returning the clasp of his fingers. “Would that be so bad?”
“Who can say? It’s uncharted territory. No woman has yet developed a tendre for me.”
“I don’t believe that.”
“Of course you don’t. You find me irresistible.”
A blush rose in her face. “I find you infuriating. Especially when you tease me.”
He nuzzled her cheek. “And I find you beautiful beyond words.”
It was quite the most revolting thing he’d ever said to a woman. The sort of treacle an ardent swain would spout to his sweetheart.
It was also the absolute truth.
“How did such a lovely creature ever come to answer my advertisement?” he asked, rubbing his cheek against hers.
Her breath was a delicate whisper against his ear. “It was fate.”
“Mmm. I remember. Something to do with our having both gone to see the Koh-i-Noor in the summer of ’51, wasn’t it?”
“Don’t laugh.”
“I’m not laughing.” And he wasn’t. His heart was too full, the moment too perfect.
Their fingers intertwined and he leaned forward to brush his lips over her brow.
He didn’t believe in fate. He didn’t trust it. The universe had never dropped good fortune into his lap. The only luck he’d ever had was what he’d made for himself. Even then, success had often left him hollow.
If she wanted to believe they’d been fated to meet, he wouldn’t argue. But he had no illusions. He recognized their union for exactly what it was. It wasn’t fate or destiny or providence. It was blind chance. As fleeting and ephemeral as a vapor of ether.
He intended to savor every precious second of it.
“I’m a cad,” he said several kisses later. They were both breathing heavily. “I’ll keep you here until the weather makes it impossible to return.”
“You wouldn’t.”
He kissed her once more. “I can be quite ruthless when it comes to getting what I want. Make no mistake.”
“And what you want is to remain here at the hotel.”
“And you want to return to the Abbey.”
“I do,” she said. “I know it’s silly, but I feel safe there. I can’t explain it.”
Justin didn’t require an explanation. He already knew how much she valued her safety. It was why she’d married him. Not because she cared for him, nor even because she found him particularly attractive. It was because she needed a man to protect her. And Finchley, for whatever reason, had promised her that Justin was that man.
“He told me that Mr. Thornhill had been a soldier,” he’d heard her say to Boothroyd. “And that he knew how to keep a woman safe.”
Bitterness swirled like acid in his stomach. He felt all at once the full weight of his responsibility for her—and the full extent of his own unworthiness. If she trusted him at all, it was only because she didn’t know him. He’d kept the worst of himself locked away. His past couldn’t bear close scrutiny. And if ever he shared it with her…
Well. It certainly wouldn’t inspire the sort of tender embraces they were enjoying now.
“Are you certain you’re up to the journey?” he asked. “It’s thirteen miles of poor road.”
“I can manage.”
“Then I’d best send for the coach before the weather worsens.” He moved to release her, but she squeezed his hands, her expression uncertain.
“You really don’t mind, Justin?”
He minded like the very devil. He only hoped he didn’t show it. “No, I don’t mind.” He raised one of her hands to his lips, adding, “At the moment, I have the rather imbecilic idea that I’d do anything in the world to make you happy.”
And so he would.
Three quarters of an hour later saw them bundled in the coach and on the road back to King’s Abbot. The rain was unrelenting, making the drive along the cliff’s edge a far more delicate business that it was in less treacherous weather. The coachman held the horses back to a walk on the turnings and, by the time they arrived at the Abbey, the sun was sinking.
They were greeted in the entry hall by Mr. Boothroyd and Neville, along with the elderly cook, Mrs. Whitlock, and the new housekeeper, Mrs. Standish. Mrs. Standish looked at Helena down the length of her nose. She was retiring for the night, or so she informed her, and didn’t wish to be disturbed.
“I’ve been given the evening off,” she said, “to allow me time to settle into my quarters.”
Mrs. Whitlock was somewhat more welcoming. She was also slightly inebriated, the faint scent of cooking sherry lingering about her wiry person. She promised them stew for their supper and fresh bread and butter before teetering back to the kitchen below.
Helena watched the two women leave with a sense of chagrin. She’d expected that one of them would show her to her room. And she’d cherished some small hope of ordering a bath.
&
nbsp; If she hadn’t been feeling so dreadfully vulnerable at the hotel, she might have taken advantage of their excellent plumbing and had a bath there. As it was, she’d been unable to stop thinking about who might be staying in the other rooms. Countless strangers, any one of whom might recognize her.
But that wasn’t going to happen now. She was safe at the Abbey. The rain made her safer still. With any luck, the cliff road would be impassible by the time she retired. And then tonight, for the first time in a long while, she would be able to fall asleep without fear.
“We weren’t expecting you back this evening, sir,” Mr. Boothroyd said.
Justin stripped off his gloves. “A minor change of plans.”
Mr. Boothroyd pursed his lips. He looked her way, disapproval etched into his face. “Mrs. Thornhill. You’ll be wanting to freshen up, I suppose. Neville? Show your mistress to her—”
“I’ll see to my wife.” Justin offered her his arm. “If you’ll allow me?”
She tucked her hand in the crook of his elbow. He said not a word as he escorted her up the staircase to the second floor. He’d been equally quiet in the coach. At the hotel he said he’d do anything to make her happy, but it hadn’t been long into their journey before he’d fallen into what could only be described as a sullen silence. She was certain he was displeased with her.
Lord knew he had ample cause.
Between her reaction to the prospect of their sharing a bedchamber and her unwillingness to remain at the hotel for the night, she no doubt appeared to be every bit as spoiled and flighty as the frivolous creature Mr. Boothroyd had accused her of being at their first meeting.
“This way.” Justin turned left at the top of the stairs, leading her down a wide hall papered in patterned-yellow silk. Their path was lit by evenly spaced wall sconces flickering with gaslight.
“I had no notion the Abbey was fitted for gas,” she said.
“Only in the corridors and the drawing room.”
She shot him an inquiring look. “Is that dictated by design?”
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