Yet even as she shook her head in horrified denial, comprehension settled like a dead weight in her chest and she knew it to be true. Why had she not considered such a possibility when she first conceived the idea? Blast it! It had seemed a sufficient method to gain Nick’s attention.
She prayed he would behave in a civilized manner. But she knew that was expecting too much. Although he did not love her, she did not doubt that his inherent maleness included feelings of possession. That very belief had motivated her into humoring Sir Hiram’s attentions these last few weeks. Yet she had not anticipated Nick confronting Sir Hiram directly. She had encouraged Sir Hiram. The fault was hers. If her husband had issues with her relationship with Sir Hiram, then he should address them to her. She was not some dimwitted female to be held unaccountable for her actions.
Tearing off her gloves, she dashed to the stables, her boots pounding the earth with a vengeance. Admittedly, her fear for Sir Hiram was only second to her sense of personal indignation. Uncharitable of her, but it was nonetheless the case.
Her aunt squawked behind her, “Meredith, where are you going?”
“To knock someone’s head in,” she grumbled, never breaking stride.
Meredith fetched Petunia from her stall herself, not wasting the time it would take to call one of the grooms. She was in the process of saddling the mare when Aunt Eleanor arrived breathlessly, both hands pressed to her sides.
“Dearest, you’re not wearing a riding habit,” her aunt panted.
“It doesn’t matter,” Meredith snapped, ignoring the rest of her aunt’s objections as she placed her boot in the stirrup and swung herself up.
“Meredith, your legs!”
She glanced at her bare calves and knees, exposed for all to see, and shrugged. “I haven’t the time to change. And you know exactly why. I’ve been courting scandal for months now. Nick thrashing Sir Hiram will feed the local fervor and very well push me over the brink.” She sighed, meeting her aunt’s eyes hopefully. “Perhaps I’m wrong and Nick only wants to talk to the man. Surely he’ll behave in a civilized fashion.”
Aunt Eleanor’s wide eyes blinked. “For goodness sake, of course he won’t! This is Nick we’re discussing. What are you waiting for?” Her aunt slapped Petunia’s rump with determined vigor. Meredith almost lost hold of the reins as her horse lunged from the stables at a gallop.
Aunt Eleanor’s cry warbled on the air like a shrill songbird as Meredith took off. “Do hurry! You must save us!” The rest of her cry faded to a distant whisper on the wind. “And Sir Hiram too!”
Meredith dismounted and hurried up the steps to where the front door gaped open. The throng of babbling servants was visible even before she stepped inside the foyer.
“Excuse me! Is Sir Hiram…” Her voice died away as the housekeeper stepped back from the throng, revealing Hiram Rawlins. Two servants carried him, one holding his feet and the other bearing him beneath the arms. His head lolled from side to side as if his neck could no longer support its weight. Mewling whimpers keened from his throat, reminding her of a newborn puppy.
Apparently she was too late.
Her hand flew to her mouth as Sir Hiram’s nose, red and swollen, came into better view. She rushed forward to offer her sympathies, feeling wretched that what began as a ploy to gain her husband’s attention had led to this. Sir Hiram, appearing to weave in and out of consciousness, recognized her and released an unmanly shriek, lurching wildly in the arms of the two servants bearing him as if a fire hot poker prodded his backside.
“Stay away from me!” He turned beseeching eyes on his servants. “Out! Get her out!”
The housekeeper faced her, face screwed tight with apology. “I’m sorry, my lady—”
Meredith held up a placating hand. “I understand. I have no wish to distress Sir Hiram. I’ll leave.” She paused at the door, glancing over her shoulder to ask, “The gentleman just here…how long ago did he leave?”
“Just a few moments before you arrived, my lady,” the housekeeper replied.
“Thank you.” Nodding, she hurried out.
If Nick were headed to Oak Run, she would have passed him. That meant only one thing. He was returning to London on the south road. And he had no intention of seeing her. His sole purpose in coming had been to trounce Sir Hiram. And not face her. Grim resolve hardened her heart. Unacceptable.
He would not get off that lightly.
Nick’s satisfaction grew as the distance between him and Meredith lengthened. He had seen to the matter of Rawlins and not given into temptation. He was leaving without seeing her. No matter what his body and heart urged. He had met the challenge and risen above it. He was not weak. Not vulnerable. Not his mother.
The pounding of horse’s hooves behind him intruded on his thoughts, and he glanced over his shoulder to see Meredith charging toward him, skirts whipping about her thighs. The sight of her mocked his self-congratulatory attitude and sent a bolt of panic to his heart.
He spun his horse about and called out in a hard voice, “Go home, Meredith.”
At the pace at which she galloped, she either failed to hear him or chose to ignore him. It made no difference. Any moment she would be upon him. He whirled back around and urged his horse into a gallop, caring little that he appeared to be running away, that he could be accused of cowardice. Desperate situations called for desperate measures. Even the most hardened army chose to retreat in times of need.
“Stop!” The wind carried her voice to his ears, but he didn’t break speed.
Suddenly, a great force hit him in the back. He twisted around, letting go of his reins as he locked hold of her body so he would take the brunt of the fall. Because no question about it. They were going to fall. Hard.
They toppled to the ground in an undignified tangle of limbs. For an interminable moment he lay stunned, Meredith’s not insubstantial weight sprawled on top of him as he stared dumbly at the gently swaying canopy of branches and leaves overhead, waiting for his body to alert him of any broken bones. After a few moments he ascertained nothing more than a pervading general soreness.
“Have you lost your bloody mind, woman?” he choked out.
Her head popped up and she glared at him through a tumble of fire-shot hair. The offending mass fell into his face. He batted at it, finally settling for wrapping his hand around the silken strands and holding it behind her head. The action thrust their faces closer, nose-to-nose. Dangerous proximity.
“No more than you. How dare you attack Sir Hiram—”
“Oh, I dare,” he thundered. “Any man who dallies with what’s mine shall get exactly what’s coming. I’m not Edmund. I’ll not tolerate another man’s pursuit of my wife.”
“Your wife,” she mocked, eyes snapping green fire. “You are no more husband to me than Edmund.”
“Liar,” he hissed, rolling her beneath him in one fluid motion.
He couldn’t control himself. Her words were a red flag in his face. His mouth slammed over hers in need. She matched that need, grabbing his face in both her hands and moaning into his mouth. The taste of her undid him. As he pulled back to tear free of his trousers, she made short work of shedding her undergarments. Reaching beneath her skirts, he grabbed her hips and pulled her against him. It had been too long, too many nights apart. He had to have her. No more dreaming about her and waking up in cold sweats in his empty bed.
There was nothing gentle or easy about it. He drove deeply into her womb. She clutched his shoulders, panting and crying out against his ear. He rode her hard, grinding her into the unforgiving earth, channeling all his fury, all his frustration, into every plunge.
He grabbed fistfuls of her hair and forced her glazed eyes to focus on his face. “You’re my wife.”
She bit her lip against her moans and nodded.
“Say it,” he ground out, never ceasing his pounding pace.
“I’m your wife,” she sobbed, rotating her pelvis to take him in even deeper.
Dropping
his mouth to her neck, he bit the tendons stretched taut. He thrust one final time, his groan rumbling up from deep in his chest and echoing among the silent woods. For a long moment he couldn’t move, could do no more than hold her in his arms and breathe in her intoxicating scent. Mint and honey. God, how he had missed it. Missed her.
Bodies still joined, he pulled back to glare at her, his fury more acute than before he tupped her in the road like a common whore. She must have read some of that fury because she took hold of his waistcoat with two clenched hands as if frightened he would pull away. If her desperate grip did not sufficiently convey her feelings, then her hoarse, “Nick,” certainly did. The longing in her face and the pleading in her grip were unmistakable.
His only response was a curt shake of his head.
“You want me,” she accused.
As though in agreement, his member twitched to life inside her. He wrenched free and rearranged his clothing before his body betrayed him again.
“I came here for one purpose. To set Rawlins straight on the matter of your availability. You shouldn’t have followed me. This”—he gestured back and forth between their bodies—” just happened. I have to get back to Town.”
Rising to his feet, he couldn’t help eyeing her exposed limbs. Her inner thighs were red where he had chafed the sensitive skin. The sight only flamed his desire for her again.
“Cover yourself,” he snapped.
She pushed her skirts down over her legs, her eyes large in her face as she stared up at him. “This didn’t just happen. It was meant to happen. Just like you and I are meant—”
“Don’t even say it. It was just sex. Good sex. Great. But that’s all.” He motioned to where she sat in the road. “It doesn’t mean anything. Animals do it in the dirt.”
Red suffused her face. “We’re not animals.”
He whirled around to find where his horse had wandered, ready to resume his escape.
“Nick!”
Sighing in vexation, he turned and watched her struggle to her feet. “What is it you want from me?” he shouted, arms spread wide in a gesture of defeat.
She opened and closed her mouth several times before choking out, “You. I want you. I love you.”
For a brief instant a small flame of happiness lit deep inside him, in some dormant part of him long dead, but he snuffed it out before it had time to grow. He stared at her for a long moment before uttering the only words he could. “You can’t.”
“I do,” she cried, eyes bright and glowing.
“I can’t,” he bit out.
“You claim that I belong to you—” She paused, biting her lip before her voice cracked with the plea. “—well, let yourself belong to me!”
“I can’t,” he repeated, looking away from her. “You want what I can’t give.”
Her shoulders slumped, but she managed to accuse, “You’re afraid. I would never have thought fear could rule you.”
Nick turned his back on her again and walked to his horse, grazing by the side of the road, refusing to let her provoke him into further argument.
She stumbled after him, grabbing his arm. “Our marriage doesn’t have to be like your parents’—our lives don’t!”
Nick shrugged his arm free and swung himself up into the saddle. Knowing she watched, he resisted looking back, even when he thought he heard her release a choked sob.
Riding away, he told himself that it didn’t matter that he left his heart behind.
Nick walked for hours. Until the sun dipped beneath rooftops and night settled on the city. He walked aimlessly, no direction in mind. The sounds of night emerged, thickening the air—sounds of revelry and carousing that marked the end of a day. When he passed the crumbling walls of Aldate, he could no longer pretend. He knew his destination. His feet well remembered the path to his old home.
Sailors, soldiers, and whores roamed the streets of Whitechapel arm in arm. Rough-looking men loitered in doorways, eyeing the expensive lines of his coat, sizing him up, clearly trying to decide whether he was a target worth testing. He met their gazes unflinchingly until they looked away, waiting, he knew, for easier prey.
His boots ground to a halt before the Ruby Cock. His head fell back to take in the dilapidated sign that hung from one hinge. It was like opening a door to the past. Eight years old again, his eyes drifted to the left and the dark alley that loomed there, beckoning him. Home sweet home.
Why had he returned to this place now, so many years later? Careful not to dig too deep for that answer, he entered the alley, his feet shuffling slowly forward. The twin walls pressed in on either side of him, smaller and tighter than memory recalled. But still just as dark. A passageway straight to hell. He followed the alley’s curve until he stood before their old rented room. Light crept from the slits of the boarded-up window. He knocked, feeling strange doing so. Memories flooded him with such clarity that he felt like pushing the door open and simply walking inside. He half expected to find his mother waiting for him, as if the last twenty-five years had never occurred.
When no one answered his knock, Nick did just that. With a push of his hand, the door swung inward. The overwhelming stench of urine and stale sex greeted him. Pressing a hand over his nose to ward off the pervading stink, he surveyed the room, smaller and more pitiable than he remembered. Almost as if he summoned her, a woman lay there, curled on her side with her back to him. His throat constricted at the sight of her long dark hair. It couldn’t be.
“Mama?” His voice sounded strange and far away to his ears.
The woman rolled over. The face of a stranger stared at him. Of course it wasn’t his mother. His mother was dead. Still, in his mind she was forever trapped in this room. The prostitute staring at him didn’t possess a fragment of her beauty. She was an older woman. The haggard lines of her face told the depravity of a life long accustomed to the abuses of poverty.
She extended a hand as thin as a skeleton’s. “For the right coin, I’ll be anything you want.” Her burst of coarse laughter further reminded Nick this woman wasn’t his mother. But she could have been had his mother spent another fifteen years plying her trade in this slum. For the first time, Nick saw her death as a blessing. Better she had died when she did than suffer another day of this life.
Perhaps his mother’s death had guaranteed him life, freeing him to pursue his own happiness. What kind of fool was he to throw away a chance at happiness when true happiness in life was so hard won? Just because his mother suffered—because the man she had loved destroyed her—didn’t mean he couldn’t find a measure of happiness, love. Love with Meredith.
Following this realization, something unfurled deep in his chest and he breathed easier. Only one thought emerged, buoying him even in the abject misery of his surroundings.
Meredith.
He’d been lucky enough to find her. Lucky enough to win her love. Only a damn fool would throw it away.
He whirled from the doorway, love for Meredith spurring him to run. Hopefully his stupidity hadn’t chased her away. Sudden self-doubt assailed him, stopping him in his tracks. What if she didn’t want him anymore? What if he had succeeded and pushed her completely out of his life? His future yawned before him, a vast bleak hole at the possibility of life without her. With a single hard shake of his head he resolved not to let that happen. He would prove his love—or spend the rest of his life trying. She didn’t have a choice. He was hers whether she wanted him or not.
The need to reach Meredith consumed him. So much that he didn’t notice the three burly figures coming at him from the shadows until they knocked him off his feet. Lying there, head reeling, the grisly appearance of his attackers took more definite shape. The features of one face in particular stood out, and Nick felt the absurd impulse to laugh. Trust life to toss up another hurdle the instant he came close to easing the gnawing emptiness inside him.
“What have we here? Looks like you lost your way,” a thug sniggered, slapping a slat of wood in the palm of his hand.
“Hello, Skelly,” Nick murmured, wiping the salty trickle of blood from his lip with the back of his hand.
“Caulfield,” Skelly greeted, his gaunt face stretched wide in smile. “I’ve been waiting for this moment ever since that night you and your bitch humiliated me. Just didn’t think you would make it so convenient.”
“Bloody nob,” another thug sneered. “Cocks always get them in trouble.”
“Is that it?” Skelly asked. “Got tired of that bit of lace? Wanted to come slumming for a whore from the old neighborhood? You should have come to my place. I could have had one of my girls show you a real good time.”
The three closed in, and Nick knew from the deadly gleam in Skelly’s eyes that he was interested in more than a bit of rough play. He braced himself, instinct tightening every muscle to singing awareness. When the first blow came, he was ready, old instincts soaring to life as he deflected it and disabled the attacker with a kick to the groin. The fists of the others rained blows on his back. Turning to meet their attack, he made out a flash of silver in the gloom. The blade descended in an arch toward him. With a strange sense of detachment, he registered that someone was going to die.
Nick vowed it would not be him.
Chapter 26
Vicar Browne’s voice droned like a bee in Meredith’s ear. She tried to concentrate on his words, but it was pointless. Shifting uncomfortably on the hard pew, she refolded her gloved hands in her lap and relived her encounter with Nick for the hundredth time, wondering if she could have done anything differently. She had bared her heart and soul right along with her body on that road. The only thing was to beg. Or confess to him that she carried his child. The irony wasn’t lost on her. To find herself with child after everything—
Nick probably wouldn’t even believe her. True, he would know soon enough. The whole world would, but she wouldn’t use their child as a weapon to hold him to her.
Sir Hiram’s pew was inauspiciously vacant—or auspiciously—depending on how one viewed it. The church buzzed with titters and disapproving stares this morning, a testament to the fact that everyone knew Nick had thrashed Sir Hiram before immediately returning for London. Such did not bode well for her reputation. In everyone’s eyes, his actions meant only one thing. He had cast aside his wife due to her improper relationship with Sir Hiram. Yet she didn’t possess the heart to care. All she wanted was Nick. Not Society’s approval.
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