by Jo Goodman
“Shall I add coals to fire?” he asked.
Lily fingers tightened on his shoulders, keeping him close. “Attend to this fire first, s’il vous plait.”
Chuckling wickedly, Sherry obliged. With exquisite attention to detail, he proved he knew her body as intimately as his own. Each touch elicited a response. He felt the pulse thrumming in her neck, heard the small cry at the back of her throat. She seemed to fairly vibrate with need and her skin retracted in anticipation of his mouth following the same path as his hands. What pleased her pleased him as well. When her fingertips trailed down his spine, he felt a shiver that went much deeper than his skin. She cupped his buttocks, settling him against her, cradling him with her thighs. Parting her legs, she made room for him there, then held her breath, releasing it with the same measured slowness as his entry.
For a moment it was as if they shared the same skin, a single heartbeat. That fusion was deliciously intense for as long as it lasted, but the most satisfying pleasure lay in what made them distinct and complimentary, and to that end, they engaged each other like fencers, thrusting, parrying, appreciating that first one could be the aggressor, then the other.
Lily felt herself contract around him, and even when Sherry found his own release, she did not want him to move. They lay on their sides, bodies flush, legs tangled, still joined as their breathing quieted. Lily nudged Sherry’s lips with her own. She hummed her contentment against his mouth and felt the shape of his lips change.
“Are you smiling, my lord?” she whispered.
“Can you doubt it?”
They fell silent. Sherry’s fingers sifted idly through Lily’s hair. Lily traced the line of his collarbone. When he moved a second time to ease himself from her, she didn’t stop him, but rolled onto her back and repaired her nightgown while he remained propped on an elbow on his side. Candlelight flickered across Lily’s features. Sherry’s were more shadowed.
Searching out something in his face that would give her ease, Lily asked, “You do not mind?”
Sherry was not entirely surprised by the question, only that she had waited so long to ask it. The few times he had tried to draw her out after leaving the abbey, she had politely changed the subject. It seemed she was determined to have the conversation now that they might have had hours ago. “You will have to say all of it, Lily,” he told her gently. “If you mean to be sure of my answer, then you must ask all of the question.”
She drew in a shallow breath, bracing herself. “You do not mind that I am a bastard?”
“No.”
Lily waited. “You have nothing else to say?”
“No.”
“It is not a ridiculous question, Sherry. There are husbands who would find it unacceptable and reason enough for divorce.”
One of his dark eyebrows lifted. “Trust your judgment, Lily. You did not marry one of those witless fellows.”
She smiled a little at that. “I am your viscountess, though. It seems to me that I should be—”
Sherry placed his index finger perpendicular to her lips. “A touch higher in the instep?” Removing his finger, he kissed her. “Very well, I will cede that position to you. It was deuced uncomfortable.”
Lily was torn between relief and amusement. Her sigh vibrated with a bit of a chuckle. She was quiet for a long moment, then added in a voice not much above a whisper and filled with emotion, “It was good of you to suggest Paris.”
“Was it? You have no regrets?”
Her heart swelled a little when she heard the uncertainty in his voice. She found his hand. “None, Sherry. You always made it my choice. This morning, when we were going to the abbey, even then I didn’t know if I would put the question of my birth to her. I could not have told you then how I hoped she would answer. To discover Sister Mary Joseph was now the Reverend Mother quite took my breath away. If I had known—if Mr. Bingham had breathed a word of it—I do not think we would have crossed the channel, but once I saw her, or more accurately, once she saw me, the truth simply was there between us whether we said so or not. It seemed we might as well say so.”
“It was difficult for her?”
“Not so much as you might think. She was rather more relieved, I thought. She had never denied me in her heart, Sherry. That is what she said, and I believe her. Had you realized who my father was?”
“I did not know that she was your mother, Lily. Not with any certainty. I confess, I gave no thought at all to your father.”
“Howard Sterling,” she said as though for the first time. “Odd, is it not, how things are resolved in a family? An indiscretion with his fiancée’s cousin has the consequence of pregnancy; she keeps the secret until after he is married, then begs a favor of him and Lillian to raise her child. The three of them travel to Paris for her confinement, and after she gives birth they return to London, and she retires to the abbey and takes up a life altogether different than she might have known.”
Lily shook her head, marveling at the caprices of human nature. “So I am raised by my father, while the woman who became my mother never knew the truth of it.”
Sherry was not entirely certain this was the case, though he did not raise the question. It was quite possible that Woodridge had not been lying about Lillian Sterling’s adulterous affairs or her giving up her husband’s diplomatic secrets. A liar sometimes told the truth, he knew, just as a good woman could be moved to betray others when she believed she had been betrayed herself.
He merely said, “So Caroline Bingham never told Lillian?”
“No. She said my father loved Lillian and that she could not bear to come between them, not when she loved Lillian as well. He only sought her out because he had had words with my mo—with Lillian.” She frowned a little. “It’s all very confusing. Caroline is Sister Mary Joseph. Lillian is my mother, yet not my mother, and my mother is the Reverend Mother. Has there ever been such a muddle, do you think?”
“In the royal family, certainly. But as for the rest of us, I don’t believe so, no.”
Lily gave him a soft poke in the ribs with her elbow.
“You meant it to be a rhetorical question, then,” Sherry said, pretending to nurse his ribs. “I wondered.”
“I was not conceived in love, Sherry, but by way of consolation. I am not certain what to make of that.”
“I should not be surprised if that isn’t more often the way of things. You cannot doubt that they loved you.”
“No, not at all. At every turn, they were moved to protect me.”
“Perhaps that is why you are similarly moved to protect others.”
“Do you think so?”
“I think the scoundrels would agree with me.”
Lily bolted upright. “Sherry! The scoundrels! They wrote to us.”
Sherry made a grab at her nightgown but came up with a fistful of the sheet instead. Sighing, he sat up, and watched Lily hurrying across the cold floor on tiptoe. “You might have taken a moment to put on your slippers,” he called after her. “Your feet will be like ice. Do not think I will allow you to warm them against me.” He thought he heard her low chuckle from the dressing room, but he could not be certain. It might only have been the rustling of paper as she rummaged through her reticule.
“Here it is!”
That announcement preceded her bounding back to the bed by only seconds. Sherry barely had time to raise the blankets. Lily dove under them and immediately began to rub her icy toes against his calves. “Your heart is as cold as your feet,” he said.
“I know. It is shameless how I abuse you, Sherry.” She gave him the letter. “Here. You must open it. It arrived before we left this morning. You were out making arrangements for our carriage. I put it away so that we might read it together on the journey, and then . . .”
“I understand well enough what happened then.” He recognized his godmother’s stamp as he broke the seal. “They had some help from Lady Rivendale. Perhaps some encouragement also. I did not expect they would write.” He u
nfolded the paper, saw it was Dash penning the thing again, and read aloud.
Dear Lord and Lady Sheridan,
We hope you are having a jolly good time in Paris and desire you to know there is no need to hurry home.
“That does not sound promising, does it?” Lily said, edging closer.
Aunt Georgia is in fine health after taking a turn on the banister and nipping her derry aire on the newel post. Pinch heard her remark it was only her pride that was broozed. We are all agreed that she must needs win at cards tonight as it will go a long way to unbroozing her.
“Oh dear,” Lily said.
We can tell you now that Mr. and Mrs. Caldwell are also in good spirits after learning their dotter did not swallow Aunt Georgia’s pearl earbob. Dr. Harris came to the house and there was a great dust up, but Midge found the earbob in Aunt Georgia’s bodice and he was acclaimed to be a hero by all.
“Have you noticed the spelling is improved?” Lily said weakly. She slid a bit lower when Sherry cast her an incredulous sideways glance.
We hear from Blue that Ned Craven has come to a bad end. Ned got a taste of his own when someone informed on him. Two blokes took him out of the Ruin at night and Blue sez we won’t see him again. Ever, he sez. The long and short of it done the deed. He sez we should tell you that most particular.
Lily frowned. “The long and short of it? What does that mean? And what are the boys doing in Holborn?” She felt Sherry shift slightly, communicating his sudden discomfort. “Sherry?”
“I doubt the boys were in Holborn.”
“Sherry.”
There was nothing for it but to explain. It was a bad piece of luck the thing had happened while he was gone from London. “I had an arrangement, shall we say, with Blue to relieve Holborn of Mr. Craven’s presence. The long and short of it—”
Lily sunk her nails into his forearm, stopping him. “Those men. The ones who came to Granville. One was quite tall, and the other was most definitely not. They are the long and short it.”
He sighed. “Yes.”
“It will be transportation, won’t it?”
“Yes. Van Diemen’s Land.”
She had to consider it only a moment. “Good. Go on. What else do they write?”
We are pleased to tell you that Sir Arthur Meredith has been a visitor but not pleased to report he is toplofty. He sez we are your awards now and that means you will be our keepers because we are badly in need of keepers. Pinch told him that was fine because we already decided we are keeping you.
Warmest regards,
Dash Pinch Smidgen
Sir Arthur sez we must have new names now not meazurments. We like Peregrine, Beowulf, and Thor.
Lily and Sherry stared at the letter, then at each other. For a moment neither of them spoke, the import of this final notation being rather more than they could properly take in.
“How soon can we leave?” asked Lily.
“Morning,” said Sherry.
“Will you mind?” This last they said almost simultaneously, then quickly shook their heads in unison.
Sherry set the letter aside, blew out the candle, and slipped deeper under the covers to join Lily. She snuggled against him, fitting her bottom neatly in the curve of his thighs and drawing his arm about her waist.
“Do you know, Sherry, I think I like the idea of the scoundrels being our awards. It seems fitting somehow, more distinctly appropriate, as if we earned the right to name them that.”
“It occurred to me also. They know how to turn a phrase.”
“Twist our hearts, you mean.”
“Just so.” He bent his head and kissed the curve of her neck. “My reward,” he said quietly, his mouth hovering above her fragrant skin.
“Hmm?”
“My reward, though I am quite certain I haven’t earned you.”
Lily smiled sleepily, threading her fingers through his. “It is quite enough that you think you must.”
Sherry chuckled, tickling her with his breath as it stirred her hair. He felt her hand tighten in his, then slowly relax, and he was careful not to disturb her again.
Lily listened to the cadence of his breathing change. She nested more heavily against him as sleep pulled at her as well. Spreading his palm across the gentle swell of her belly, she held it there. The warmth of his hand comforted her. “No reward at all here,” she whispered. “But a blessing.”
His suspicions confirmed, Sherry’s mouth curved in a tender smile. His arm tightened the merest fraction. He would wait until morning to tell Lily the truth he had learned in this moment: that holding her made him doubly blessed.
She would be naturally dubious, of course, but then she’d smile at him as if she’d swallowed the sun. He did indeed have an extraordinary talent for getting what he wanted.
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Copyright © 2005 by Joanne Dobrzanski
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ISBN: 978-0-8217-7775-6