by Mary Balogh
There were shouts from outside their cocoon of snow, though none sounded deeply concerned. Elizabeth was laughing and sputtering—from beneath Colin. He was laughing too as he raised his head and brushed foolishly and ineffectually at the snow covering her bonnet and shoulders.
“I will never live that one down,” he said.
“I forgot to ask in what ways I might trust you,” she said. “Foolish of me.”
“With your life, ma’am,” he said, grinning at her. “Behold yourself unharmed and only snow caked. At least, I hope you are unharmed.” It occurred to him that his weight might be squashing her.
And then the most ghastly thing happened.
He thought about it afterward—he could not stop thinking, in fact—and squirmed with intense discomfort every time. What the devil had possessed him? And what the devil must she think even though she had assured him that she would not think about it at all.
He kissed her.
Which would not, perhaps, have been quite so bad if it had been a brief, brotherly smack on the lips—or, preferably, the cheek—to apologize for spilling her into the snow. Though even then . . . even then it would have been disrespectful to the point of . . . He could not think of a suitable word with which to complete the thought.
But this was not a brief kiss, or at least not very brief. And there was nothing brotherly about it. It was indeed on the lips, or, rather, it was all heat and moisture and mouths more than just lips, and for a fraction of a moment—or forever, he was not sure which—he felt as though someone had wrapped him in a large blanket that had been heated before a roaring fire. Except that the heat was inside him as well as all about him. And for that fraction of a moment—or that eternity, he was not sure which—he wanted her.
Elizabeth. The widowed Lady Overfield. A woman in her mid-thirties. Poised and mature and serene and inhabiting a universe so far beyond his own inferior world of uncertainty and immaturity that . . .
What the devil would she think?
When he raised his head, it did not look as if she was thinking much of anything at all. Her eyes were closed and she seemed a bit dazed.
“Oh, the devil,” he said. Which was a marvelous way of groveling and apologizing. The snow seemed to have frozen his brain. Disrespectful did not even begin to cover what his behavior had been.
“Do we have a few broken legs and heads in here?” Alexander’s voice called, cheerful enough when one considered his words.
“That was a spectacular landing,” Harry said, offering his hand to Elizabeth as Colin scrambled to his feet.
“If we were giving prizes,” Wren said, knee deep in snow as she brushed at Colin’s greatcoat, “you two would win the trophy for the most spectacular disaster.”
“But alas,” Harry said, “you get only the glory.”
“You look dazed, Lizzie,” her mother was saying. “You did not hurt yourself, did you?”
“Oh, not at all,” Elizabeth assured her, laughing. “Not even my pride is dented. I was not the one steering.”
“I might have known I would be blamed,” Colin said. “Well, heap it on. My shoulders are broad.”
“I say,” one of Molenor’s boys called from a short distance away, “I have never seen anything so funny in my life.”
The boy was obviously given to hyperbole—as was Wren.
“Ah,” Alexander said. “Perfect timing. The sleigh is coming with something to warm us.”
It was indeed, and it was a very welcome distraction. A couple of servants, bundled up and smiling cheerfully, had arrived with two large containers of steaming chocolate and one of hot punch as well as a jar of sweet biscuits and a covered dish of warmed mince pies. They all tucked into the repast as though they had been fasting all day and warmed their gloved hands about their steaming mugs, ignoring the handles.
“We must have feathers for brains,” the dowager duchess said, “spending the afternoon shivering out here when we could be warm and comfortable indoors. And dry.”
“I would not have missed this for all the comfort in the world, Mama,” Lady Jessica cried, though she was breathing in the steam from her chocolate as she spoke. “This is the best Christmas ever. Is it not, Abby? And there is still the party to look forward to tomorrow evening and some fresh faces.”
“It is the best,” her dearest friend agreed. “Gentlemen as well as ladies, I hope. Tomorrow, that is.”
“Oh, to be young again,” the dowager duchess said. “I am returning to the house. Althea, will you come too?”
“I will indeed, Louise,” Mrs. Westcott said. “Though I do agree with Jessica. A family Christmas is always a lovely thing, but a family Christmas with snow—and a Boxing Day party to look forward to—is unsurpassable.”
She left Elizabeth’s side and Colin took her place before he could lose his nerve completely. In which case he would have found himself in the impossible situation of having to avoid both her person and her eye for the rest of his life.
“Elizabeth,” he said, “will you forgive me?”
She did not pretend not to know what he was talking about. “For the kiss?” she said, smiling at him. “There is nothing to forgive.”
“I do not know what came over me,” he said. “I did not . . . Well, I did not mean any disrespect. Whatever will you think of me?”
“I will think nothing,” she assured him, “except that you were quick enough to know that a dumping in the deep snow was preferable to a collision with another sled. And that you comforted me afterward with a kiss. It was both appreciated and flattering. And it will be forgotten from this moment on.”
“Well,” he said. “I have rarely embarrassed myself more.”
She laughed and removed one hand from about her mug to set on his sleeve. “I hope I have not spoiled your day,” she said, patting his arm. “My mother was quite right about a family Christmas—with snow. I hope you feel we are in some way your family too.”
“Thank you,” he said. “I do. It has been a joy to come here, though I love my home too. Have you seen where I live—Withington House? It is a lovely place.”
“I saw it last year when Wren still lived there,” she said, “before she married Alex. I went there the day after I first met her in the hope of making a friend of her, and we have been friends ever since.”
“I hope you will come there again before you return home,” he said. “Maybe with Alexander and Wren and your mother. I believe you intend to stay on for a while after everyone else returns home.”
“We do,” she said. “Do you intend making Withington your permanent home?”
The house belonged to Wren, but she had offered it to Colin back in the spring when she discovered that he lived in London, even during the summer, when most of the ton deserted it for their country homes. He had wanted to purchase it from her, but she had insisted that he be her guest there for a year, at which time he would be able to make a more informed decision.
“I am inclined to say yes,” he said. “But I am not sure it would be the right thing to do.”
“Oh?” She raised her eyebrows.
“No,” he said, taking the empty cup from her hands. “I am going to have to think about it.”
It would be easy to hide there forever, in a house that was just the right size for him, with Wren and Alexander close by and friendly neighbors all about. But hide was the key word. He was Baron Hodges. He was head of his family. He had duties and responsibilities. If Justin, his elder brother, had not died, he would be free to hide to his heart’s content. Indeed, there would be nothing to hide from. But Justin had died, and three years later so had their father. Colin had been left with a mother and three sisters—and the title and all that came with it.
“I will be delighted to visit with Alex and Wren,” Elizabeth said. “So will my mother, I know.”
There did not seem to be
anything else to say. Had she really forgiven him? Not been disgusted? Was she really willing to step inside his own home? Had he really kissed her? Colin looked down into his cup and swirled the thick residue of chocolate at the bottom of it. He was not sure he could forgive himself. Not for wanting her anyway. Good God!
Fortunately Alexander suggested at that moment that they return to the house to warm up properly, and Elizabeth moved away to walk with Abigail and Anna. Colin hung back a few moments to return with Camille and Harry, who was carrying Sarah.
She was so terribly beautiful. Elizabeth, that was.
Four
The perfect Christmas Day concluded with a light evening meal, charades, a few card games, and singing about the pianoforte. No one was late to bed. It had been a busy day, much of it spent outdoors, and they all admitted to being tired.
“If you do not take care, Alexander,” Louise, the Dowager Duchess of Netherby, warned, “you will be starting a family tradition and be stuck with us all every year.”
“It is our fondest hope that that is exactly what will happen,” he said. “Is it not, Wren?”
“Indeed it is,” she agreed. “We can almost certainly promise a somewhat less shabby house by next year, Cousin Louise. I am not so sure about the snow, though. But there is still tomorrow to look forward to—a somewhat more relaxed day, perhaps, with the neighborhood party coming in the evening. If people can get here, that is.”
“The carolers came last night,” Thomas, Lord Molenor, reminded her. “Why not everyone else tomorrow?”
“We cannot promise a wedding every year either,” Wren added, smiling at Viola and Marcel.
It had been a very nearly perfect Christmas Day, Elizabeth agreed as she climbed the stairs with her mother and Mrs. Kingsley. It really had been, she assured herself after she had bidden them a good night and shut the door of her room firmly behind her.
Very nearly perfect.
Except that she was quite unable to forget the dreadful embarrassment of the afternoon. She had had to call upon all her inner resources for the rest of the day to be her usual cheerful, sensible self. Her reaction was very silly, for it was Christmas and they had been sledding and laughing after being tipped into a snowbank. It was really not surprising that they had ended up kissing each other.
Was it?
The last man to kiss her, apart from a few familial pecks on the cheek, was Desmond, and that had been so many years ago she could not say precisely when it had been. But, goodness, he had been dead for six years, and she had left him a year before that. She was thirty-five years old, and this afternoon she had kissed a gorgeous boy. No, she was exaggerating, even belittling him. He was not a boy. He was twenty-six years old, very definitely a man. But he was gorgeous. And she had kissed him just as much as he had kissed her. She hoped not more. Oh, surely she had not done anything to provoke that kiss. How humiliating if she had—or if he thought she had.
She set her candle down on the dresser, avoided her image in the glass, and was very thankful that she had given her maid the afternoon and evening off. It was a relief to be alone at last.
She had reacted to that kiss with sexual awareness. She had wanted him as she had not wanted any man since Desmond in the early years of their marriage. Certainly she had never felt it with Sir Geoffrey Codaire, though she had almost made up her mind to marry him if he asked her again in the spring.
The rest of her day had been fairly ruined. She had kept her distance from Colin, as far as that was possible in a family gathering and without being too obvious about it. But she had watched him covertly. He had been reserved and a bit shy yesterday. Today he had been at ease and enjoying himself. He had thrown himself with open enthusiasm into the charades. He had sung with everyone else, standing beside the pianoforte and watching Cousin Mildred play. He had kissed Mary Kingsley under the kissing bough when they found themselves beneath it at the same moment—and neither had seemed consumed by embarrassment or guilt. Indeed, they had smiled and laughed and he had even executed a mock bow as family members applauded and whistled.
He had fair hair that was thick and wavy and always slightly unruly even when it had obviously been brushed recently. He had blue eyes and white teeth, which were ever so slightly crooked at the front on top—an imperfection that somehow only enhanced his attractiveness. He was tall and slender and lithe, and . . . Oh, and young.
Elizabeth shivered as she cast aside her shawl and dress and then her stockings and undergarments and pulled on her nightgown before eyeing the water in the jug beside the washstand with some misgiving. The water would, of course, be cold. She was tempted to go to bed with an unwashed face, but finally found the courage to wash both it and her neck as well as her hands and arms to the elbows. She dried herself briskly and huddled inside her dressing gown.
The truth was that she had allowed herself to become a little infatuated with Colin Handrich, Lord Hodges, and it just would not do. Good heavens, she was very close to being middle-aged. Some would say there was no close about it. How pathetic, not to mention horrifying, it would be if anyone guessed. Well, no one would guess because she would be more herself tomorrow.
She carried the candle to the small table beside her bed, slid reluctantly out of her dressing gown, and got into bed after snuffing the candle. She made a cocoon of the blankets, pulling them up about her ears while she warmed up.
Sleep eluded her.
* * *
• • •
It did not snow again, but it would take a few days for all that had come down to melt. The roads would be slushy and muddy and treacherous for quite a while. Colin resigned himself to at least another day and night spent at Brambledean. It was not difficult. He was enjoying himself.
He spent the morning of Boxing Day outside building snowmen, only to have his most artistic creation knocked down and trampled upon by young Sarah Cunningham while everyone else’s snowmen were left intact. He snatched her up and held her, giggling, above his head before setting her down and chasing her with a snowball, which he finally hurled deliberately to miss.
He spent much of the afternoon in the drawing room, talking with Harry Westcott and the Duke of Netherby about the wars and watching Joel Cunningham, sitting slightly apart from everyone else, sketch first the dowager countess and then Lady Matilda Westcott without their knowing it. He was amazingly skilled. Both subjects were not only perfectly recognizable in the resulting drawings; their very essence seemed to have been captured too.
“It must be gratifying to have such talent,” Colin commented when Joel closed his sketching book.
Cunningham looked back over his shoulder at him. “Well, it is,” he agreed, “though I take no credit for it, only for making the effort to use it. But we are all talented, and in more than one way. Unfortunately, many people do not recognize their talents or consider them commonplace or inferior to other people’s.”
“Now you will have us wondering for the rest of the day,” Harry said, laughing, “what our talents are. Are you sure we all have them, Joel?”
Colin wondered what the realization of his illegitimacy and the resulting loss of his title and properties and fortune had done to Captain Harry Westcott. His world had been turned upside down and inside out. Yet he seemed as cheerful now as Colin remembered him from the slight acquaintance he had had with him before it happened. Except that there seemed to be a core of hardness in him now, carefully hidden from his family, that had surely not been there when he was a carefree, wealthy young earl, sowing a few fairly harmless wild oats.
Colin’s eyes came to rest upon Elizabeth, who had been avoiding him if he was not mistaken. He deeply regretted that brief, unguarded kiss in the snowbank yesterday that must have caused her reserve. Although she had been gracious about accepting his apology, she must despise him, or at the very least wish to make it clear that such disrespect was not to be encouraged.
&nb
sp; She caught his eye even as he thought it and smiled warmly at him. She made no move to come closer, however, and he kept his distance from her.
Bertrand Lamarr and his twin, Lady Estelle, had set up a game of spillikins with Lady Jessica Archer at the far end of the drawing room and were calling for someone else to join them so they could form two teams. Colin got obligingly to his feet. Lady Estelle was apparently to be his partner. She was an attractive combination of shyness and vivacity. And she was really very pretty. Also very young. Too young. She was eighteen, eight years younger than he. She smiled at him and blushed.
Lady Jessica was beaming at him too. But she was also not immune to the charms of young Bertrand, he had noticed.
“I was spillikins champion of my school class,” Colin said with a grin. “Be warned, you two.”
Lady Estelle laughed while the other two jeered.
* * *
• • •
Wren and Alexander had decided to use the ballroom for the Boxing Day party even though they admitted it was probably too large and was really the most shabby room in the house.
“And that is saying something,” Alex had added with a rueful chuckle.
But they had invited almost everyone in the village and surrounding countryside, not only the members of the gentry, and the drawing room would simply not be large enough even if only half of those invited came. So one third of the ballroom had been set up with tables for refreshments, while chairs had been set about the perimeter of the remaining two thirds, and the whole room had been decorated with more greenery and ribbons and bows. It was to be lit with dozens of candles, and really who cared that the room would have been looked upon askance by the highest sticklers of the ton? Their Christmas party did not pretend to be a ton ball.