Something passed in her eyes, a shadow of disappointment that Michael didn’t understand. “We shouldn’t discuss this now,” she said stiffly.
“There is no better time than now,” Mr. Oxley informed her. He looked to Michael. “So, you wish to see the matter done right?”
“Yes,” Michael said, and made an attempt to sit. He felt at a disadvantage having this discussion while lying on his belly.
Miss Halloran immediately came to his aid, pushing the rector out of the way. “You shouldn’t try and get up,” she chastised.
“I want to sit,” Michael said.
With an impatient sound, she helped him turn over and sit up. Folding the feather pillow, she placed it under the small of his back. For one brief, disconcerting moment, their noses were less than an inch from each other—
The world came to a halt…and Michael was struck anew at how deeply he was attracted to this woman. She aroused him as no other ever had. If he leaned forward, he could press his lips to hers.
What’s more, she felt the same magnetic draw. He could see it in the sherry gold of her eyes. Time stood still…until Mr. Oxley cleared his throat, reminding them they were not alone.
Miss Halloran flew back to the end of the bed, blushing in a most becoming way.
Michael wasn’t surprised to see the hint of laughter in the rector’s eyes. The old dog confirmed Michael’s suspicions by saying, “You’ll do, Mr. Severson. You’ll do.”
“As what?” Miss Halloran asked, regaining her prim composure. Michael liked that about her. She could be so cool and controlled on the surface, but it didn’t take much for him to slip past her defenses to the hot-blooded woman beneath. And he knew she wasn’t that way with every man. What lay between them was very rare.
“I’ll do as a husband,” he answered.
“But I refused your offer,” she returned crisply, her pride getting the better of her. “You don’t remember because you were shot, but we agreed to part company.”
Michael frowned, uncertain. Would he have let her get away? He didn’t think so.
“Everything has been changed now,” he argued, wondering why she was so fiercely independent.
Or was it that she did not want to be associated with him in any way?
The thought was sobering, especially when she looked to Mr. Oxley, and said, “Will you please give us a moment alone?”
The rector sensed the change in attitude. He looked from Miss Halloran to Michael, wavering a second before saying, “I will be outside the door.” He left, leaving the door open.
Boldly, she closed it, then, crossing her arms, walked to the window, her back stiff.
“You really have no choice,” Michael said mildly.
When she didn’t answer, he dared to ask the question uppermost in his mind. “I have a reputation, Miss Halloran. You know that.” Memories were coming back to him, including her asking if he had murdered Aletta.
She nodded.
“The world is much smaller than we think,” he said. “I’ve learned that the hard way. If you do not marry me and accept the protection of my name, such as it is, then you will be hounded by this incident for the rest of your days. Think on it. How would you support yourself, Isabel?” he asked, taking the liberty of using her given name. It was like music. “The Reverend Oxley assures me everyone in the parish already feels you have overstepped the boundaries of propriety in taking care of me.”
He had chosen his words deliberately, and they had the desired effect. She faced him, her eyes wide in alarm, a slow dark color creeping up her neck. “Mrs. Oxley saw to your more personal needs. I was just—” She stopped, at a loss for words. “I only did what was expedient,” she replied in a small voice.
“And I am doing what is right. It doesn’t make any difference what the truth is. What people think is what you have to live with.”
Her voice so soft he had to strain to hear it, she agreed, “I know.”
He pressed his case. “There is something between us. Something that draws us to each other. Do you not sense it as I do?”
He paused, silently daring her to be honest. A small frown had formed on her forehead. She did not wish to give him what he wanted, but in the end, her character would not let her lie. “I feel it,” she admitted.
“Then that is all the more reason we should marry,” he answered.
“If anything, it is a reason not to.”
Michael frowned, unable to comprehend her reasoning. “Do you believe I can’t take care of a wife? I assure you, Isabel, I am a wealthy man. And, rumors to the contrary, an honorable one. I can take care of a wife.”
Her lips tightened, her face pale. Her resistance was an insult, and her capitulation, when it came, was hardly flattering. “You are right. I have no choice.”
Immediately the door opened. “Exactly what I said!” Mr. Oxley declared, unrepentant over eavesdropping. He was followed into the tiny room by his wife, a woman with rosy cheeks and sparkling eyes. She carried a bowl of steaming broth in hands wrapped in a cloth. She was careful to set it down before crowding around Miss Halloran with open arms.
“This is wonderful news!” Mrs. Oxley said. “You are to be married, my dear. Your life will be so much better. You’ll be raising your own children and not those of others.”
Her husband rubbed his hands together in expectation. “We have work to do. The wheels must be set in motion. We’ll have to post the banns and—”
“Excuse me, Rector,” Michael interrupted, “but I insist on being married by special license.”
Mr. Oxley frowned. He obviously preferred matters to be done the formal way. “The price the bishop charges for a license is exorbitant.”
“The price is of no matter,” Michael assured him, wanting to impress Isabel and win her approval. “A speedy marriage is. Besides, no one of my class marries by the banns. Send someone and make the necessary arrangements with all due haste. I’ll pay well for the trouble.” He added, “I must also insist on making a donation to your parish for all you have done for me. Will five hundred pounds be acceptable?”
Mr. Oxley’s knees almost buckled. “That is too much,” he protested.
“I assure you, it is little recompense when compared to how much I value my life,” Michael answered.
Mr. Oxley took Michael’s hand, shaking it vigorously with his excitement. “It is most generous, sir, most generous.”
However, Miss Halloran’s reaction was completely different and the opposite of anything Michael could have anticipated—she walked out of the room without a word.
Six
Isabel walked straight out of the cottage but stopped in the front yard. The ground was damp from the previous day’s rain. Shoots from hardy perennials were breaking the surface of the earth in Mrs. Oxley’s garden. Beyond the yard, separated by a low stone wall, was the road. Isabel crossed her arms and stared at it, debating whether or not she should just keep walking.
Jingles, the Oxley’s gray mouser, jumped down from the edge of the rain barrel where he’d been taking a sip. He glided up to her and rubbed his back against her leg, purring as he swirled her skirts.
Usually Isabel had time to give him a pat but not then. Instead she struggled with pride and temptation.
“Isabel?” Mrs. Oxley’s soft voice said from the doorway.
“Yes?” Isabel turned, forcing a smile.
The rector’s wife came out onto the step, holding the door open. “Are you feeling yourself?”
“I am.” Her throat tightened. “I need a moment.”
She’d hoped that would be the end of it. It wasn’t. Mrs. Oxley came out into the yard, closing the door behind her. “What is it, child? What troubles you?”
“I am hardly a child.”
“Then what is it, my friend?” Mrs. Oxley corrected herself and Isabel was embarrassed by her churlishness. She had to explain. The Oxleys had been so generous, she couldn’t shut them out.
“I barely know him,” she said
tightly. And he’d called the name of another woman when he’d been unconscious.
It was all so confusing. He claimed he hadn’t killed Aletta, and her every instinct told her to believe him.
Then what had the actress been to him? A lover? Certainly. Something more? Deeper?
The jealousy Isabel experienced was unreasonable. She barely knew the man. This was a side of herself she’d not faced before. An object of her jealousy was a woman who had been dead a decade or more.
She’d thought she was different from her mother. More independent. Certainly more sensible.
But what if she wasn’t?
She didn’t say as much to Mrs. Oxley. The rector’s wife enjoyed probing into other’s reasons and motivations, and Isabel needed to keep all this close.
Mrs. Oxley smiled reassuringly. “I know the announcing of the banns gives a couple time to reflect, and this is all very quick, but sometimes it isn’t always necessary to know the man you are marrying too well.”
Isabel made her doubt plain. “It isn’t?”
The older woman shook her head. “Sometimes our hearts know better than our heads.”
The statement broke through Isabel’s carefully nurtured reserve. She was tired, exhausted from days of worry. She laughed, the sound bitter. “That is not true. My mother’s life was miserable. She should have thought with her head and not her heart.”
“Why was that?” Mrs. Oxley asked, full of concern.
“Because she followed her heart and paid a hard price. The man she fell in love with, my father, didn’t return those feelings. He was already married to another and happy with his life. Mother was his mistress and nothing more. By the time she realized he would never return her feelings, I was on the way. Nor did he want anything to do with me. It was as if her bearing his child made her distasteful to him. She went back to Lancashire and married a man who was a good provider. My stepfather loved my mother deeply, but her past was always between them.”
“Could she not find happiness in her marriage?”
“There was always a deep sadness about her…and my stepfather. I think he wondered whom she loved best.”
“Some men are like that,” Mrs. Oxley agreed. “Always measuring themselves against another. However, I must speak out for passion. I was once promised to a man who would have been good for me to marry. He was well thought of and very respectable. Everyone admired him. He also came from money.”
“What happened?”
“I jilted him.”
“You?” Isabel asked, surprised.
“Yes, and I eloped with Mr. Oxley. It was the wisest move I ever made. We’ve been very happy.” She placed a motherly hand on Isabel’s arm. “I understand your fears and, considering your background, I can see why you would be afraid to act rashly. You might even believe it would be easier not to have to feel anything at all than to make the wrong decision.”
“Yes,” Isabel agreed, realizing Mrs. Oxley did understand.
“I’ve counseled several young women who were about to enter into the state of holy matrimony, women who had doubts like yours. I urge each of you to think with your heart and with your head. It’s a difficult decision, Isabel, because there are no rules, no certainties. What seems right today may not last the morrow. We must all feel our way and pray the Lord helps guide us.”
A chilly breeze circled around them, and Isabel glanced at the yard and the line of trees beyond, the first buds of spring giving their limbs a red hue. “I have prayed, Mrs. Oxley. Prayed, and prayed, and prayed. I don’t know if anyone is listening.”
“Someone is. And, perhaps, my dear, the reason you are feeling so conflicted is because a part of you wants to marry Mr. Severson. A part that right now, you don’t trust.”
Her words went straight to Isabel’s deepest fears.
“And if you don’t believe God cares enough to notice you,” Mrs. Oxley continued, “then know I am listening.” She tucked a strand of Isabel’s hair that had blown free back behind her ear. It was a motherly gesture, and almost Isabel’s undoing.
Tears threatened. She forced them back. “I just want something of substance in my life,” she confessed. “Something I can trust and believe in.” Dear Lord, she sounded like a fool.
“Like what?” Mrs. Oxley asked. “If it is money you wish, then Mr. Severson has all you could need and more.”
“Money makes for a cold bed partner.”
“You’re right,” the rector’s wife agreed. “But what is it you want?”
To be loved. The thought leaped into Isabel’s mind with a truth that was humbling.
She realized that was why she’d allowed herself to be charmed by Richard, even when later she recognized there was nothing charming about him.
Isabel looked at her friend, who seemed so wise and understanding, and knew she would never confess her thoughts aloud, not even to Mrs. Oxley. Such a confession would make her vulnerable. “I don’t know what I want,” she murmured.
Mrs. Oxley was not fooled. “Yes, you do. Isabel, you are too suspicious. I don’t know what made you that way, and I won’t pry. But I will ask that, at least this time, we trust that what is happening is God’s plan.”
“What if God is wrong?” Isabel shot back, expecting the rector’s wife to fly into a tizzy.
She didn’t. Instead, she shocked Isabel by asking, “Are you afraid Mr. Severson will hurt you?”
“No—” She thought of the painful jealousy she’d experienced when Mr. Severson had called out Aletta’s name. “At least, not physically.”
Mrs. Oxley pressed her lips together, her brow furrowing as if she heard what Isabel wasn’t saying. “One would have to be blind not to see the attraction between you and Mr. Severson. I wish you could have more time to know each other better. I don’t know your history, Miss Halloran, but I know you are not some village girl. There is quality about you. Oh, please,” she said, when Isabel opened her mouth to protest, “we’ve all known. You move among us, but you don’t belong here. Perhaps Mr. and Mrs. Wardley were too dense to see, but the rest of us haven’t been. I don’t know why you must earn your own way, but Mr. Severson is doing the right thing. If you refuse him, you may find yourself in very dire straits. There is a line a woman like you must not cross. If you do, there will be no going back.”
Isabel didn’t know what to say. Mrs. Oxley was a shrewd judge of character. She’d known. “What if I don’t ever find my place?” she asked quietly.
“Miss Halloran, instead of preparing for things to go wrong, imagine them turning out wonderful. Life isn’t a present where you have to be pleasantly happy all the time. You need the challenges to give it meaning. It would be nice if we could predict our lives or be able to see the future. We’d also be bored. At some point, a decision has to be made, and you must trust you’ve made the right one.”
There was that word “trust” again.
Jingles gave a loud meow, a sign he wanted attention. Isabel picked him up, holding him to her chest, appreciating the diversion he provided. She looked at the petite older woman with new respect. “You are very wise.”
“I’ve had more experience at life than you,” Mrs. Oxley countered, giving a scratch to the point behind Jingles’s ears he liked so much.
“You’re right about me wanting to see the future. You seem to have no regrets over the decisions you’ve made, but what if you had? What advice would you give me then? You want to see an idyllic ending—”
“I do.”
“But I don’t. I see all the things that could go wrong.”
“Like what, dear?”
Like falling in love with someone who could never love her.
And it hit Isabel that she could fall in love with Mr. Severson. She might even be halfway there. It should have been impossible…and she wasn’t quite certain when it had happened.
“Oh, dear,” she whispered, handing the cat to Mrs. Oxley.
“What is it?” her friend asked.
“I can’t m
arry him,” Isabel said.
“You have no choice.”
“Yes, I do.” Isabel started for the cottage, her mind made up.
“Miss Halloran—” Mrs. Oxley called, but Isabel didn’t wait to hear her opinion. She was already through the door.
Mr. Oxley sat in his favorite chair before the fire, his eyes closed. Having caught him eavesdropping once, Isabel had no doubt he’d been about it again and was probably pretending to take a nap. She went directly to Mr. Severson’s room and shut the door firmly behind her.
Mr. Severson rested on his stomach, his eyes closed, and he did not open them when she entered the room. The bed was too small for him. His broad shoulders and long legs filled it to the point where his feet hung over the bottom edge.
When they’d first undressed him, they had not been able to find a nightshirt in the portmanteau stashed in the phaeton’s boot beside her own valise. Mr. Oxley’s nightshirt didn’t fit him well. Mr. Severson’s arms were several inches too long. She’d not noticed those details when he’d been so sick. However, now she saw everything.
He opened his eyes. His mussed dark hair made his face seem paler. His features were drawn. He’d lost weight.
Concern welled up inside her. The bowl of cooling broth still sat on the table where Mrs. Oxley had placed it. Someone should have fed him but, what with the marriage nonsense, his nourishment had been forgotten.
With a frustrated sound, Isabel pulled the wooden chair up to his bed and picked up the bowl and spoon. The broth was warm to the touch, the perfect temperature really.
Mr. Severson frowned.
“I need to feed this to you,” she said. “You haven’t eaten anything for days other than Maribelle’s sleeping draught.” She leaned forward to spoon broth into his mouth, the angle a bit awkward.
“It would be easier if I sat up,” he said. “Help me.”
Isabel had no choice but to help him. However, this time she kept an arm’s distance from him, her eyes carefully averted. She picked up the bowl.
“It would be easier if you sat on the edge of the bed,” he suggested, “instead of that chair.”
Temptation of a Proper Governess Page 7