Читать книгу Regency Affairs Part 2: Books 7-12 Of 12 - Ann Lethbridge - Страница 17

Kit woke with a start from confused dreams about Hattie, his uncle and various jumping-jacks. A single candle shone by the bed and there was an engraving of some biblical scene hanging on the opposite wall. The room was small and austere, a sickroom and utterly unfamiliar.

His entire body ached and his right eye was swollen shut. And he was dressed in a voluminous nightshirt, unlike the sort he normally wore. His head ached like the very devil.

He searched his mind, trying to figure out how he’d arrived here. The events of the afternoon came flooding back. As far as bright ideas went, taking on four men was not one of his better ones. But try as he might, between landing the first punch and to just now, his mind was a blank.

He put a hand to the back of his head, probing. A huge pain shot through him, blinding in its intensity. He’d obviously banged his head. But beyond a few aches and pains, he would survive. There was no reason to stay here, helpless and at the mercy of some unknown quack.

He swung his feet over the side of the bed and started to push his protesting body to a stand.

‘Oh, no, you don’t. You are to stay in bed and get well.’ Cool hands pushed him back down on to crisp linen sheets. He turned his head in case his fevered mind had conjured her up.

The candlelight made her blonde hair shine and highlighted the hollow at the base of her throat. An angel. No, an angel would not wear a sprigged muslin. An angel would be dressed in flowing robes. It was Hattie in the flesh and blood. Her sewing had fallen to the floor as she stood to enforce her command. The sheer domesticity of the scene made him want to weep.

He rubbed his left eye and tried to open his right to make sure he wasn’t dreaming. He could not remember the last time when someone volunteered to look after him. Since an early age, it had always been someone who was paid and done out of duty, rather than for any other reason. A sense of great humbleness filled Kit. Hattie had done this for him.

‘Where am I?’

‘At my house.’

‘Your house?’ Kit searched his mind, but the big black well prevented him. ‘What am I doing here? The last thing I remember is getting into a fight with a stubborn drunk.’

‘You are to stay in bed until the doctor says that you can rise.’ She crossed her arms and glared at him. ‘I’d be grateful if you obliged me in this if nothing else.’

He tried to catch her hand before remembering how she’d walked away from him and settled for clutching the sheet instead. He refused to beg. He had deliberately driven her away.

‘Hattie? Why am I here? How? You live miles away from Stagshaw. The last thing I recall is the fight near the cockpit. And that drunk with his paws on you.’

‘Not too far.’ She turned her face from him, revealing her slender neck. ‘I had them bring you to my house. It seemed the best place. A bit closer than Southview. I was being practical after … after the fight. You couldn’t be left on your own, waiting for the doctor to show up.’

‘I thank you.’

‘It was the least I could do in the circumstances. I’d do it for any wretch who risked their neck to save me.’

Kit swallowed with difficulty. She’d had him brought here out of duty. ‘Why?’

She stood up without speaking and moved over to the right, away from his vision.

‘Why, Hattie? There must have been a dozen other places I could have gone.’

‘You were injured trying to save me. It seemed to be the Christian thing to do. I could hardly count on your valet or Mr Hook to look after you properly.’

‘Beggars can’t be choosers. I shall put my faith in your nursing skill.’ He hated how his heart thumped. He knew it for a lie. He couldn’t think of anyone he’d rather have nursing him and it frightened him. She’d forgiven his outburst without him doing anything.

‘It is good of you to accept what is going to happen.’

‘You haven’t given me much choice.’ He lay back on the pillows and breathed in the lavender scent. The smell reminded him of when he was a young boy in his room back in Hampshire, safe and secure without a care. He could almost picture the scene with the fire blazing and his nurse sitting, knitting socks, while a kettle hummed in the background.

‘You were in no fit state.’

‘My head pains me.’ Kit tore his mind away from the memory. He always swore that he’d never voluntarily think about his childhood, and certainly not with a great longing. He must have hit his head far harder than he’d thought.

Hattie laid a cool cloth on his forehead. ‘Is that better?’

A warm glow flooded through him. Despite her words dismissing him earlier, Hattie had stayed by his side. More than that, she’d obviously insisted that he was carried to her house. She’d publicly declared their friendship, after telling him that they were finished. Women were a different species entirely. He reached out his hand. ‘You need not have done that.’

‘Allow me to make my own decisions. I prefer to have my conscience at rest than worrying over your health.’

Kit struggled to upright. He clutched the blanket to his chest and tried to make sense of the turn of events. Nothing, simply flashes of voices. However, with each breath, he found himself more distracted by the way Hattie’s hair curled about her shoulders and the shadowy place at her throat. ‘Did you undress me? How did I get this nightshirt?’

A merry peal of laughter filled the room. ‘You may stop looking shocked. You would think you were unused to a woman’s attentions. It is not as if I haven’t seen the male form before.’

‘Hattie!’ He pulled the collar of his nightshirt up.

‘The doctor did it for me.’ She shook her head. ‘He wanted to examine the wound to your chest, but it turned out to be just a light cut. But your shirt is ruined. I found one of my late husband’s nightshirts. It seemed sensible. Sleeping in one’s clothes is hardly advisable at any time, but particularly not when one has been injured.’

He collapsed back against the pillows. He should have expected respectability from her. It was wrong that he’d briefly hoped that she’d been unable to resist taking a peek. ‘The ruffian managed to miss. Sometimes my luck astonishes me. He must have been unable to see straight.’

‘There was a deflection, something was in the way.’ She sobered and her teeth worried her bottom lip.

‘Out with it. Let me know the worst.’

‘I’m afraid the jumping-jack took the brunt of one knife blow and then you managed to twist the knife out of his hand.’

Kit fell back amongst the pillows. Had the jumping-jack not been in his breast pocket, the knife would have sliced through his chest. A cold shiver went through him. ‘Obviously a good-luck charm. I intend to keep it.’

‘I’ll get it for you.’ She handed him the remains of the jumping-jack and shook her head. ‘I don’t think it is worth saving.’

‘I must be more sentimental than you.’ He smiled up at her. ‘I think it is worth keeping.’

‘That is your choice.’

‘I shall treasure it always. Generally I take better care of my gifts than this.’

Her lips parted as if she was about to say something, but thought better of it. ‘You need to rest. The doctor left some more laudanum for you.’

Kit shook his head. He felt as if he had been run over by a cart and then stamped on, but he could manage. If he drank the laudanum, the dreams about his childhood would start again—a figure in a blue dress smiling down at him, laughing at her boy, asking him to be brave.

He forced a wry smile and hoped Hattie would believe him. ‘I dislike having my wits clouded. I’ve endured worse pain.’

‘It is here if you change your mind.’ She put a small glass beside the bed. He was aware of the intimacy and how her hair fell about her shoulders.

Gingerly he felt his jaw, sore but unbroken. He wanted her, he wanted to feel her move under him and catch her soft sigh in his mouth as she surrendered to the heat and passion. But he also wanted to hear her laugh, see her smile and above all he wanted to talk to her.

‘Is there some reason why you are nursing me?’ he asked in case she decided to leave.

‘Instead of Mr Hook?’ Hattie leant forwards and tucked the bedclothes about his body. Impersonal, but intimate at the same time. Her round gown gaped slightly and he caught a glimpse of the shadowy hollow between her breasts.

He tore his mind away from such thoughts. Hattie nursed his broken body out of compassion and duty. The fact that he noticed her considerable assets showed him that death would have to find another victim. He’d recover. It was merely his blinding headache that bothered him.

‘If you like, Rupert could have done it.’

She laughed. ‘He appeared distinctly ill at the prospect of blood. I’d no wish to torture him.’

‘And Johnson, my valet?’

‘Your valet was no use. Last seen in the ale tent, according to Mr Hook, rather the worse for wear.’

Kit silently blessed Rupert’s quick thinking. If they had found Johnson, he would not be here. And despite everything, he was glad to be here. In this room. With Hattie. He valued her friendship. He groaned, remembering the taste of her mouth. He wanted to taste it again, particularly now.

At her look he said, ‘I gave him the day off. It is his to use as he pleases.’

‘You are a generous employer.’

‘I can afford to be. Johnson’s ability with boot polish and the starching of neckcloths is second to none.’ He watched her, waiting for the slightest hint of what she was thinking, if she was aware of him as he was of her. ‘No doubt he will turn up early in the morning with a suit of clothes. Johnson takes his job very seriously.’

‘It is good to know. I will leave a note for Mrs Hampstead so she isn’t surprised.’

‘You still haven’t said. Why did you insist on bringing me here?’

‘You saved me from those drunken men and I’m determined you will be nursed with all care and attention.’ She dipped her head. ‘Too many people in my life have died who were not nursed properly. It was time to make sure it didn’t happen again.’

Her husband. It was painfully simple to guess who she wasn’t naming. Kit hated the twinge of jealousy he felt for Charles Wilkinson, the hero of Talavera. He had to be slipping. He prided himself on not caring about anyone’s past or who they had loved. It was only the present that interested him. Ever. Except Hattie’s past interfered with his present. She had the capacity for life.

He breathed in and his ribs ached.

‘Then I’m grateful,’ he said stiffly. ‘You mustn’t feel you should sit up with me. It will take more than a few knocks on my head to kill a reprobate like me.’

‘You always insist on painting yourself blacker than you are.’

‘I will not have you thinking I am better.’

‘It was my fault that you were involved in the fight. I do pay my debts, Sir Christopher, and I owe you a great one.’

Kit watched how her slender fingers moved in the candlelight. She no longer wore a wedding ring. ‘I enjoyed the fight for the most part. It suited my mood.’

‘You enjoyed it?’ She blinked rapidly. ‘How could you enjoy something like that?’

Kit closed his eyes. It had felt good to work off his excess anger. He wanted to show her that he could do something for her and he had. The bruises and cuts were superficial. ‘There’s a certain amount of satisfaction in seeing someone get what they thoroughly deserve. He should never have done that.’

‘But you are hurt. You didn’t have to.’

‘What would you have used—your elbows?’ It was far harder to remember how Hattie looked, than to think about the way his hands and face hurt.

Her jaw became set. ‘I can look after myself. I’ve been doing it for a long while now.’

‘And I’ve been worse.’ He forced his face into a ghost of a smile. ‘Nothing appears broken. I will mend.’

‘You will mend because I intend on making certain that you do.’

‘Well, I feel that my presence is an imposition. And you even have me dressed in one of your husband’s nightshirts.’ Kit hated that he sounded so ungrateful.

‘He never wore it.’ Shutters came down on her eyes, instantly hiding her soul from him. ‘Somehow, I never could get rid of the linen. I found it when I got out the sheet for the bed. It seemed the ideal opportunity to put it to practical use.’

It annoyed him that even after all this time, she still mourned her late husband. He was under no illusion that when he left a woman, within a few months she had forgotten him. Sometimes the bed they had shared was barely cold before another entered it.

He certainly made no effort to remember any of them. There might be tears for a little while, but ultimately they both went on their respective ways. It was the way it had to be. Remembering never did anyone any good.

Kit refused to think about the little boy he’d been, crying for a mother who never came. A mother who never came not because she was dead and living with the angels, but because she had left, unable to stand living with him. He had crouched down on the landing when his nurse thought he was in bed and had heard everything, seen everything. Silently he had willed his mother to glance up at him and stop. She kept walking with a handkerchief pressed to her face. She had been the most beautiful thing in his life and then she was gone, no more than a memory.

‘You must have been very close.’ He choked out the words, tearing his mind away from the unwelcome thought. He must have hit his head far harder than he’d considered. Normally he had no trouble in forgetting his mother. The illusion of her exquisiteness and delicacy had been well and truly shattered when he discovered a pile of old newspapers, complete with the criminal conversation trial of his mother, detailing her lovers. ‘That much is clear.’

‘Why would you say that?’ Hattie clenched her hands together so tightly he could see the white knuckles. Her eyes glittered in the candlelight.

Silently Kit prayed that there wouldn’t be tears. He hated tears. He’d lost count of the crocodile tears various women had shed in order to gain some trinket or another.

‘You always look away when you speak about him.’

‘We weren’t close.’ Her hesitant voice trembled with barely suppressed passion. ‘I found out after he died that I never really knew him at all.’

‘I’m sorry.’ To his surprise, he meant it. ‘A wife should know her husband. They should not have secrets.’

‘Don’t be,’ she snapped and then appeared to recollect where she was. She sat up straighter and smoothed her sprigged muslin. She continued in a self-deprecating tone. ‘I used to be very naïve and believed because a man told you that he worshipped the ground you walked on that he meant it.’

‘He didn’t?’ Kit put his hands behind his head. The news that Charles Wilkinson was not a paragon made things easier.

Hattie was silent for such a long while that he wondered if she’d fallen asleep. Then, when he was about to whisper her name, she slowly began to speak.

‘He had an adored mistress and a scattering of illegitimate children. Born before and after our marriage. I was the socially acceptable wife.’ Her hands shook and she clasped them together until her knuckles shone white as she choked out the words. With each trembling syllable, the words sped up until they became a raging torrent. ‘He feared if he married the woman he truly loved that his father would cut him off without a penny. It would not have been so bad if I had known how he felt, but I had no inkling. It came as a great shock.’

She finished on a half-laugh combined with a sob.

A coward. Powerful and primitive urges filled Kit. He longed to wring his neck for making a woman like Hattie suffer.

‘So it was an arranged marriage?’ he asked, trying to understand why someone who was so passionate had opted for something as bloodless as an arranged marriage.

‘It was a marriage because he took me out to a summer house and whispered sweet nothings, swearing eternal devotion.’ A single tear tracked down her cheek. She brushed it away before he could capture it. ‘I was in love with the romance of it all. My husband knew the right words to woo me. I only discovered the truth after it was far too late.’

‘On your wedding night?’

Her throat worked up and down. Her entire being vibrated with anguish. ‘Worse, after he died. Stupid fool that I was. I swallowed his lies whole, never questioned. He was away, fighting, most of the time.’

‘You never questioned or you didn’t want to question?’ he enquired.

She gave a sickly smile. ‘It made it easy to keep my illusions. I lived for his letters. They were so sweet and so full of promises.’

‘Were you in love with him?’ He held up his hand, appalled that the question had slipped out. ‘That was bad of me. I apologise. I have no right to ask.’

She turned her blue-green shimmering eyes to him. ‘Sometimes I wonder if I ever loved him or just the idea of him,’ she said in a deadly calm voice which contrasted with her earlier anguish. ‘When I found out about his perfidy, I discovered that I couldn’t tell anyone about the truth of the marriage.’

‘Why?’

‘I’ve my pride. I paid his debts and settled his other loose ends in the most expedient fashion. Then, Stephanie needed help and so I gave it, selfishly gaining a new start to my life where no one could pity me.’

‘And no one knows about it? Not even your sister?’

‘You know now.’ She wiped her eyes with fierce fingers. ‘I didn’t want you to have some mistaken idea about my marriage. Or how I might feel about my late husband.’

Kit’s heart leapt. Her marriage was far different from the one he’d imagined. He wasn’t competing against some perfect ghost, but rather she’d been damaged in some way because of her late husband’s heavy-handedness. It put the kiss they had shared in an entirely different perspective.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I had no idea.’

She dipped her head. Her hands were folded in her lap. ‘You can’t lose something you never had.’

He watched her without saying anything, but he could see she was teetering on a knife’s edge. He doubted that she would have shared this information even a few hours ago. The fight had changed everything. He was very glad it had. The minor discomfort of a few bruises and pulled muscles was nothing compared to the relief of not competing against a ghost.

‘What would he have wanted for you?’

‘What he would have wanted is no concern of mine.’ She shook her head. ‘Stephanie keeps telling me that he’d have wanted me to marry. Charles Wilkinson was a dear friend of my brother-in-law’s. Every time she brings the subject of remarriage up, I become more determined to stay a widow.’

‘You are allowing him to define you.’

‘I beg your pardon.’ Her nostrils quivered like she was a wild deer, catching the scent of a hunter.

‘You devoted your life to making Charles Wilkinson seem respectable. Why on earth did you do that?’ Kit asked, keeping his voice soft and steady. He wanted to release her from the prison she’d encased herself in. Misplaced guilt. She had sealed herself off from love and desire. She denied her passionate nature. ‘Where has that led you? Are you any happier for it?’

‘Since when did my happiness become any of your concern?’

‘Since I decided to fight for you. What happened, happened, Hattie. You can’t change it, but you can stop allowing your life to be defined by it. It is not good to live in fear. You are a passionate woman. Why must you shut yourself off from life?’

‘I will accept that you have no idea what you are saying due to the laudanum.’

Before Kit could protest she stood up and walked out of the room. Kit clenched his fist and slammed it down on the bedclothes. Since when did he break his rules about non-interference? It was better to allow her to go. Her life was nothing to do with him. She should be able to lead the sort of life she wanted, even if it was limited.

He should be thanking his lucky stars for the narrow escape. There could never be a future with her. He shuddered with the memory of the taunts he’d suffered, and the way respectable women had turned away from him in his youth after they had found out The Scandal.

Hattie laid her fevered cheek against the cool plaster of the hall and attempted to regain some measure of control. Her hand trembled so much that the wax spilt, burning her wrist. She set the candle down on the floor and forced herself to breathe in deeply.

She had made a mistake, a colossal mistake. She’d vowed never to speak about her husband’s betrayal. Ever.

Now she’d confessed the bald truth to a man who was little more than a stranger, simply to keep from confessing how she felt about him!

What was worse—he’d said the things she had known in her heart. Every single word was true as much as she might wish it were a lie. She had allowed herself to be defined by Charles and what he’d done. She had hated what he’d done to her, but everyone considered her to be the grieving widow. How could she besmirch the memory of a hero? She’d used it as a way to lick her wounds for years but it was hypocrisy of the highest order. She had stopped living. Her dreams were just that—dreams.

Neither did she want everyone to know of her humiliation. Even now that burning sense of shame filled her. She hadn’t been able to keep her husband happy. He had secretly laughed at her feeble attempts. His mistress had taken great delight in showing her the letters. She knew nothing about making love. Sensible and unattractive, lacking any real fire or passion. She’d longed to scream that he was wrong. But how could she when she had lived her life without passion?

Hattie hugged her arms and sank down to the floor. She wanted to feel passion, the real sort, the feeling-utterly-alive sort that she had felt when Kit kissed her at the Roman ruins. She had never had that all-consuming feeling before. She wanted to be alive, instead of existing.

When she had discovered the mistress’s address, she had visited her. Hattie had not wanted Charles’s miniature, but throwing it on the fire had seemed less than charitable. She had packed it up along with a few personal items so that the children would have something to remember their father by. Afterwards, Hattie had been sick in the street. The obvious love that woman had for Charles contrasted with her infatuation and fantasy of the perfect marriage.

All she’d wanted to do was to run away and hide. And she had—all the way to Northumberland. She’d been successful as well.

Undone by a man’s nightshirt. How pathetic was that?

Hattie pressed her hands against her eyes and tried to control the shaking in her limbs. She refused to cry after all this time. Not again and most definitely not over him.

It had been a mistake to insist that Kit return to the Dower House, rather than allowing the doctor to look after him. And then she had further compounded the mistake by sitting up and watching him sleep.

What he must think of her! She hardly knew what she thought of herself! All she knew was that she could not have gone on with the pretence that somehow she had loved Charles with a deep and unyielding love when he’d asked.

She wanted to cleanse the knowledge of him and their marriage from her soul. She wanted to live her life rather than being defined by the old one.

Hattie stood up straight, and brushed the tears from her eyes. ‘I’ll live. Whatever happens. No one is going to laugh at me again. At the same time as writing me letters of sweet promise, Charles mocked me in those to his mistress. She showed them to me. Sometimes even now, I wake up in a sweat remembering the phrases. That stops now. I start living the life I was meant to.’

She picked up the candle and started down the hallway to her room. Kit did not need her to play nurse. She was through with being pathetic. She would be strong and aloof. She’d do her duty. And then she’d start to follow her dreams.

‘Hattie? Harriet? Wait.’

She continued to walk towards the stairs, pretending she had not heard him call. The great Kit Foxton could survive the night without her panting over him, like some love-starved widow.

‘Wait.’ The note of despair tore at her heart.

She half-turned and saw him standing in the doorway of the sickroom with tousled hair and a shadow of beard on his chin. The voluminous white nightshirt revealed his muscular calves and bare feet. And where on any other man it would have looked ridiculous, somehow, on Kit, it highlighted his absolute masculinity.

‘You were supposed to stay in bed.’

‘You were supposed to stay by my side.’ He gave the semblance of a smile. ‘Looking after me. My nurse flees—what choice do I have but to go after her?’

Despite her misgivings, a hot spark smouldered its way around her insides. She wanted to touch his skin and see if it was silky smooth. If she took one step towards him, she’d be in his arms. She curled her hand into a tight fist about the candlestick and turned away from the enticing picture.

‘It is late. Back to bed with you,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘And if I don’t get some sleep, I will be in no fit state tomorrow. Tomorrow is sure to bring a steady stream of visitors, well-wishers and the downright curious. Your exploits will be picked over for days to come. The talk of the village.’

‘I prefer to think of it as heroics. Don’t disabuse me of the notion.’

‘Heroics, if you must, but now is not the time for you to be up.’

‘I wouldn’t be if you acted sensibly and stayed. I believe I offended you. It wasn’t my intention.’

‘It is nothing to do with you. Nothing at all. I’m tired. I need to rest.’ Hattie concentrated on keeping the candle steady. ‘If you need someone, I’ll wake Mrs Hampstead.’

She hoped he thought her voice stern and unyielding. To her ears, it sounded hopelessly breathless.

‘Come here.’ His voice allowed for no refusal.

Hattie took a step towards the stairs. Her stomach tensed. If she started towards him, she’d be in his arms, begging for his touch. And she already knew that was a hopeless cause. ‘That wouldn’t be a good idea.’

‘I’ve gone beyond what you consider a good idea or not, Harriet.’ He ran his hands through his hair. ‘Come here. Let me see your face. All I can see is the light from the candle.’

She wiped the back of her hand across her eyes and straightened her skirt. He was too far away and the candlelight hid her upset state. ‘No one calls me Harriet.’

‘I know. It is why I am doing so.’ He held out his hand. ‘I’ve no wish to frighten you. Come back and talk to me.’

‘Why should I?’

‘I had no idea about your husband’s betrayal. I thought your prim reserve was from a different cause. I’m sorry.’

‘It served my purpose.’ Hattie raised her chin. ‘It is the first time I could speak of it.’

‘Are you crying over him?’

‘I shed my last tear for him a long time ago.’

‘Then why the tears?’

‘Because I’ve wasted my life.’ When she said the words, she knew she meant them. They had sprung from a place deep within her. She’d wanted to erase all trace of Charles from her life, but she hadn’t done. For too long she had been hiding, fearful of the long shadow. ‘It is not what I wanted. I had so many plans. I’ve done none of them.’

His hand closed about hers and gently took the candlestick from her. ‘You will burn your hand.’

‘I already have.’ She gave a shaky laugh. ‘It is fine. I won’t set the house on fire.’

Rather than letting her go, he pulled her to his hard body. ‘Silence. Perfect silence.’

He bent his head and captured her lips, demanding a response. Hattie opened her mouth and tasted the sweet interior.

A deep and dark fire welled up inside her, blotting out everything else. She twined her hands about his neck and held him close, allowing her body to say things that she didn’t dare. His mouth travelled over her face, softly nuzzling her cheeks and temple. ‘Hush now.’

A soft moan escaped from her throat. With the last vestige of common sense, she put her hands on his shoulders and created a space between their bodies. ‘I ought to go.’

‘Why did you bring me here?’ he said, sliding his hands down her back and cupping her body to his.

‘I told you. Because I wanted to make sure you lived. You saved me and my honour.’ Hattie kept her head up and looked him straight in the eye, attempting to ignore the fire blazing in her nether regions. If she wasn’t hanging on to him, she’d fall. Her legs had become wobblier than jelly.

‘It is poor excuse. We have gone beyond such things.’ He traced the outline of her lips. ‘Whatever you do, give solid reasons, rather than mealy-mouthed excuses.’

He placed a kiss in the corner of her mouth.

‘Why do you think I brought you here?’

‘Because you craved intimacy. You wanted more to your life than a solitary kiss in windswept ruins.’ His fingers touched her face, gentle but at the same time wildly exciting. ‘You wanted it as badly as I do. You have been driving me mad with longing, Harriet. The things I want to do with you.’

She turned her face to his palm. She was tempted to pinch herself to see if she was awake or if she had somehow fallen asleep and was dreaming. ‘Did I?’

‘You do.’ He put his hands on her shoulders. His face turned grave. ‘I’m not making promises that I can’t keep, Harriet. You understand that. It is about living in the moment with no regrets. I can offer you a summer and that is all.’

‘I’m aware of the rules of engagement, as it were.’ She tucked her head into her chest, torn between a longing to put her head on his chest and listen to his heartbeat and the instinct to flee. He wasn’t offering anything honourable, only pleasure and only for the summer.

There was nothing wrong with taking her pleasure. She was a widow, rather than a débutante in search of good marriage. Sir Christopher was notoriously single. With discretion all things were possible.

‘A summer affair sounds intriguing, but we must be circumspect,’ she said quickly before she lost her nerve.

He raised an eyebrow. ‘Bringing me here is circumspect? The story will be all around the village before morning.’

‘I brought you here because you were injured.’ Hattie tilted her chin upwards to show she had considered the potential for disaster. ‘I was doing my Christian duty. No one dare gainsay that.’

‘You kissed me all the same. And shall do again, I wager.’

A single finger lifted her face so she was staring directly into his eyes. His lashes were far too long and pretty for a man, she thought abstractly. She wasn’t in love with him, not in the way she had thought she’d been in love with Charles. She desired him and his touch. Her heart was safe, more than safe. Passion might burn white-hot, but it rapidly turned to ash. She knew not to want for ever with this man. She’d settle for living in the moment for this one summer. ‘Then we are agreed.’

‘Until the summer ends.’ He bent his head and softly kissed her lips. This time, the kiss was less fierce. It was a gentle heart-stopping persuasion. His mouth pressed kisses against her eyes, her nose and trailed down to her ear. Hattie knew that Charles had never kissed her like this. These kisses were about giving pleasure and healing.

She twined her arms about his neck, pressing her body against his. Hattie opened her mouth and allowed her tongue to tangle with his. In that kiss, all her fears and regrets fell away and all she knew was the feel of his lips against hers.

Her hand mimicked his and slid down the length of his torso. Instantly he stiffened.

‘Is something wrong?’

He groaned in the back of his throat and put her from him. His face contorted in pain as he rotated his shoulder. ‘I’m sorry. It is worse than I thought.’

She clapped her hands over her mouth. She’d been so intent on assuaging her own anguish that she’d forgotten about his very real pain. ‘You are hurt. You have no business being up and about. This should never have happened.’

‘I’m very glad it did.’ He gave a ghost of a smile. ‘I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. You must never cry alone in a corridor again.’

‘You should have done. The last thing I wanted to do is to cause you to get worse.’ She felt the hot tears prick the backs of her eyes. ‘You are the one who is supposed to be recovering from a terrible fight. You shouldn’t have to comfort me because of something that happened seven years ago.’

‘Allow me to be the judge of that.’

‘You are to get back in bed.’

‘And you shall join me in a bit of bed-sport?’

Hattie knew her face flamed. ‘Mrs Hampstead will be up soon. We need to be discreet.’

She found it hard to believe that she was even discussing the possibility … of an affair.

‘I would love to make love with you, Harriet. Right here and right now, but … it wouldn’t be wise. My body aches too much.’

‘The last thing I want to do is hurt you.’ She looped her arm about his.

‘It was worth having that fight simply to have you kiss me properly. I intend to hold you to your promise.’

‘Which promise would that be?’ Her voice sounded hoarse and seductive, foreign to her ears.

He smiled down at her and then immediately winced, going pale.

‘You are to stay in bed tomorrow and I will have no excuses.’

‘You are a saucy wench, Harriet. Ordering me to stay in bed, while your mouth is cherry ripe.’ He gave her a hooded look. ‘What else do you intend?’

His using her full name made her seem special and different from the Hattie who had been at the fair, but she also recognised the teasing note. She had never been teased in this way before, or indeed felt comfortable enough to tease back. A ripple of contentment went through her.

‘I thought all fallen women were bold,’ she retorted.

‘You haven’t fallen yet … It is not anyone else’s business. It will stay that way if we are discreet.’ He twisted a lock of her hair about his fingers. ‘Reputations can be protected. I intend to do all that is in my power to be discreet and to prevent speculation.’

‘I know. You can’t promise … but you will try.’ Her insides twisted. Open her mouth and insert her foot. She wanted this. She wanted that dark heat from earlier to consume her. Charles’s love-making had been perfunctory and tepid to say the least. Even his early kisses in the summer house had been respectful. If she had known what it was like to be kissed by a master, maybe she would have stopped it. Hattie squeezed her eyes shut. No regrets. Ever. ‘After you recover …’

‘After I recover, we will take up where we left off. I want you, Hattie. That wanting is not going to go away. Trust me.’

She half-opened her eyes. He was looking at her with an intent gaze, but she could also see the pain in the way he held his mouth. ‘I trust you.’

He dropped a kiss on her nose. ‘This is where you leave me. If you stay, I will want to make love to you and my mind may be willing, but my flesh is weak. When we make love I want to be strong. I want to give you pleasure. Immense pleasure.’

Her stomach tightened at the thought. He was interested in her pleasure, not just his own. She tried and failed to imagine having this conversation with anyone else. ‘I … I don’t know what to say.’

‘Run along before I change my mind and do something we both regret.’

‘I promised to stay.’ The words escaped from her mouth. She swallowed hard and tried again in a calmer tone. ‘At least allow me to see you back to your bed.’

‘When? When did you promise?’ The colour drained from his face, leaving him pale and tense.

‘At the fair, you asked me.’ Hattie blinked rapidly. Somehow she had made a mistake and she wasn’t even sure what it was. She felt sick. If he hadn’t requested her to stay, she’d never have confessed. She should have thought that it wasn’t anything but a plea for the hurt to be gone. ‘Surely you remember? You must remember.’

His gaze became troubled. Slowly he shook his head. ‘Everything remains hazy. It remains a blank. You mustn’t take what I said literally.’

‘I brought you here because you asked me to stay with you.’ Hattie’s heart pounded. He didn’t remember when he’d gripped her hand. It had seemed so important to her and he’d forgotten.

‘I can take responsibility for myself tonight. I want you to dream of me in what little is left of the night.’

‘And afterwards …’

He cupped her face with his hands. ‘I want you, Harriet Wilkinson, never doubt that. I want to make long slow love to you and show you how good it can be between us.’