His Christmas Pleasure (24 page)

He was tired. He’d risen early to work the horses, and this sort of dinner party had never been enjoyable to him.

But tonight was worse. And the only thing that would make it better would be shoving Sherwin’s face in his pianoforte.

Unfortunately, women thought Sherwin attractive.

Even the squire’s daughter was eyeing Sherwin with favor.

Celeste stood, a signal that the evening was coming to an end. “Everyone, this has been so enjoyable. Such a good way to honor the Christmas season.

Tomorrow we have a special treat. Landsdowne, do you wish to tell them?”

“I will be happy to do so,” Jonathan said. His ruddy cheeks were ruddier from the amount of brandy he’d been drinking. This was true of most of the men in the room, save for Andres … and Sherwin.

“Our new neighbor, the barón de Vasconia, will be honoring us with a Spanish Christmas tradition—a bonfire. I’ll have the wassail ready, and we shall enjoy ourselves tomorrow afternoon.” He raised a hand in Andres’s direction, but Dame Edith interrupted.

“What is so special about a bonfire?” Dame Edith pulled a face of distaste.

“We have them all the time. I don’t think foreigners invented a bonfire,” she grumbled to those around her.

“I didn’t say the Spanish invented bonfires,” Jonathan clarified with an apologetic look to Andres. “I said it is a Spanish tradition to light a bonfire at Christmas.”

“Yes, Dame Edith,” Andres said, wanting to speak for himself and his country. “We light the bonfire; we call it Hogueras and jump over it as protection against illness in the next year to come.”

“It’s great fun,” Celeste said. “Landsdowne jumped one at the baron’s estate and almost burnt his breeches.” She laughed and her husband laughed, but the other guests appeared puzzled.

Andres attempted to explain again. “You know the fire is a symbol of light. A good thing for Christmas.”

“Well,” Dame Edith said, “if it is dark, fire is always good. But here, we have enough good sense not to jump into a fire.”

There was a smattering of giggles at her English common sense.

“You shall see how it is on the morrow, Aunt,” Jonathan said.

“I doubt it,” Dame Edith replied. “I’m not going out there to stand in the cold and watch you gents set your breeches on fire.”

Her stance was seconded by a good majority of those around her. She then announced, “I for one am ready for my bed. Come, everyone.”

People moved from the chairs, heading toward the door. Andres started toward Abby, but Sherwin was beside her. Whispering in her ear. Again.

Andres forced himself to walk forward at a sedate pace. He ignored Sherwin and took his wife’s hand, raising it to his lips. “You were excellent this evening, palomita.”

She gave him a distracted smile that didn’t reach her eyes and pulled her hand back. “You will tell me if you hear anything else, won’t you?” she said to Sherwin. There was a line of worry across her forehead.

“Of course I will,” he said. He nodded to Andres. “Barón.” He left.

Abby took hold of Andres’s arm. “He said my mother has taken ill. My father is very concerned for her.”

Andres didn’t know what to say. “I’m certain your father will do everything he must for her.”

She nodded, her expression troubled.

“Why did Sherwin wait until now to tell you?” Andres asked, anxious to add another reason to his dislike.

Abby flinched at his tone. “He said he’d been waiting for the right moment.

There really hasn’t been a private one until now.”

Andres attempted to rein in his jealousy, to focus on her. “Come, it’s been a long day. We will think better on this in the morning.”

She let him lead her away, but her step was slow and he knew her mind wasn’t with him.

Meanwhile, on the stairs ahead of them, Dame Edith was telling anyone and everyone that she thought it foolish to jump over a perfectly good fire to make “Frenchie lovers” happy.

Andres offered no argument. In fact, he was heartily tired of the whole group.

At the top of the stairs, Celeste waited for them. She glanced down the hall to be certain they weren’t going to be overheard, then said, “I am so embarrassed. Please, Andres, do not take our older relatives’ stubbornness to heart. It’s the war. Newcastle is always certain the French will come sailing up the Tyne.”

“It is not a problem,” Andres said, more concerned with Abby than he was with the viejos.

“Well, there is a problem,” Celeste continued. “Perhaps we should wait on having the bonfire. It was a wonderful experience at your house last week …

but that was with a group of friends who are rather sophisticated, even though we live out in the country. Jonathan and I do not want you to be insulted by a lack of interest.”

“It is fine,” Andres said with a shrug. He would rather not be subjected to more of Dame Edith’s opinions as it was.

“Thank you for your understanding,” Celeste said with relief. “Sleep well.”

She walked to her room.

Abby hadn’t said anything. Andres doubted if she’d even registered the conversation. He waited until he and Abby were alone in their room to say,

“Your mother will feel better.”

“I hate this. What if my being away, her unhappiness with me, has added to her illness?” Abby said, and Andres felt his temper flare. She was worried about disappointing her mother while her husband had just been all but flayed alive downstairs?

As he undressed for bed, he told himself that was fine. But then there was that element of newly discovered jealousy.

Sherwin had known exactly what to say to set Abby away from Andres. He could feel her distance. She took extra long to brush her hair and polish her teeth. She was too quiet and thoughtful.

Andres waited for her in bed. He knew he appeared composed, but in his mind he was imagining how good it would feel to go to Sherwin’s room and bury a fist in the dandy’s mouth.

Abby sat on the edge of the bed. Andres reached for her, running his hand up and down her arm. “Your mother will be better,” he promised. “Come here.”

He said his “come here” with just the right inflection for her to know what he really wanted. He needed to make love to his wife. He needed to know she chose him over that scheming Sherwin.

But for the first time, Abby didn’t come to him.

She stood, walked a few steps away, and turned to face him, confessing,

“Andres, if something happens to my mother because of my actions, I don’t know what I’ll do.”

Andres heard the fear in her voice. “Abby, you don’t know if what Sherwin says is true.”

“It is. I can feel it.” She paced around the room, rubbing her arms. “I left without saying anything, and she is the closest person to me.”

He’d thought he was the closest person to her. Certainly, she was the only one he had. Without Abby, he had nothing.

And yet, she had so much. She had a family that protected and cared for her.

She even had money. Trust or not, money would be there, and that would always be an attraction to other men.

For a moment, he considered risking all. He wanted to say I love you. These were words that had been gibberish to him before meeting Abby, before loving her.

Sitting naked in this bed with the light from the hearth throwing shadows on the wall, he felt the words on the tip of his tongue. I love you. I need you.

Come to bed with me.

And then what?

Perhaps she was rejecting him because she was aware that she had made a mistake. She hadn’t married a man like Sherwin, who could sing and easily be part of the company. She’d married an outsider. A loner. A man who had no family. Not even a country.

“Abby, come here.”

She flinched and looked away.

He waited, hurt evolving into anger.

“I thought you would understand,” she said, tears building in every word.

“I think I do,” he said.

She cocked her head.

“You don’t value what I’ve done,” Andres said.

Abby shook her head, as if amazed. “You? We aren’t talking about you. This is my mother I’m worried about.”

“And you don’t know anything except for what Sherwin has said,” Andres pointed out, quite rationally, he thought.

But not rational to Abby. “What did you expect him to do? Blurt such news out upon first seeing me?”

“That would be sensible,” Andres answered.

“It would not.” Abby held her hand up, as if waving him away. “How could Freddie know my true feelings? To him, I eloped as if the opinion of my parents meant nothing. I was there under their roof one day and gone, vanished, the next. You saw my father in Scotland. He was deeply hurt.”

“He was angry to have been outmaneuvered,” Andres said, feeling as if he had to defend himself. If he had told her to cut off her right hand, she could not have looked more offended. “You—How—” She groaned her displeasure, as if words failed her, but she regrouped. “You don’t know how he felt. You don’t know him as I do. He felt betrayed. He was hurt. I hurt him.”

“I know that if your mother wanted to tell you she was not well, she could have written,” Andres said, and the moment the words were out, he knew they had come across as callous.

Abby went still, her face pale, her red-rimmed eyes narrowing. “You don’t know what my parents would do. You barely know me.”

Andres climbed out of bed. “Don’t know you?” She had become all he could think about. He rose early every morning and worked hard because he wanted to prove to her she’d made the right choice.

He walked up to her, took her by the arms. “I’ve touched every inch of you,”

he vowed. “I’ve been inside you. I’ve heard you cry out my name. I knowyou.”

Her jaw hardened. “That is nothing,” she said.

Andres almost staggered back. “Nothing?” Her charge confused his brain.

“How does what you take from me compare to the hurts and needs of people who nurtured me?” she asked. “Who care about me.”

I love you. “I care for you.” To say more would call for a commitment he feared to make. Instead, he held his breath, waiting for her response.

“Is that all?” She made a self-deprecating sound, as if she found herself part of a ruse. “Care?”

He wanted to kiss her. To force her to understand.

But she pulled away, and he let her go.

“I’ve hurt them, Andres.” The tears were flowing now. She doubled her fist and pressed it against her stomach, as if in pain. “I suddenly can’t live with that.”

Andres straightened. He heard what she was saying. She didn’t want him.

“It’s being here, isn’t it?” he said, his voice sounding like that of a stranger.

“You’ve looked at the people here, at your own kind, and you believe you’ve made a mistake, haven’t you?”

Abby was starting to cry so hard that she was hiccuping. “What?” She shook her head as if denying his charge.

But Andres found he wasn’t that far from breaking himself.

Abby had tricked him. Without his being aware, she had slipped past walls he’d carefully erected to protect himself. She had shown him a life he’d not dared to even dream of. She’d let him be happy, fulfilled, and now she was telling him it was a lie.

Just as his father had brought him to his house and then shot himself because Andres had not been enough.

However, Abby had introduced him to something he’d wanted without ever realizing it. She’d given him a home and the warmth of her spirit. She’d been a helpmate, a lover, a kindred spirit.

And it had all been a lie.

Of course, he was the fool. He knew better than to trust. He knew it … and yet love had come upon him, wooing him, tempting him, deceiving him.

“Go to your mother,” he said. “Go back to London.”

He turned and started dressing. “What are you doing?” she asked.

“Leaving.”

There was a pause of disbelief. He finished buttoning his breeches and reached for his boots.

“You can’t go.” Her voice was tight, insistent.

He stamped a foot into the heel of his boot before looking up at her. “Why not?”

She stood in front of him, her unruly curls going this way and that. “We’re guests.”

That was it? Her only reason for wanting him to stay?

He yanked his shirt on over his head. “Make my apologies,” he said. Picking up his coat and neck cloth, he left.

AAbby couldn’t believe Andres had just walked out.

He’d shown no sympathy or willingness to share the blame for the pain she had brought upon her mother. And then he’d abandoned her.

She took a step toward the door.

The distress she’d felt over the information her mother was ill was nothing compared to what she experienced realizing Andres had abandoned her. And it had all happened so fast.

Yes, Freddie’s news had upset her. She felt ashamed that while she’d been enjoying heself, while she’d been experiencing a freedom she’d not known before, her mother had fallen into despair. If anything happened to her because of Abby’s selfishness, Abby didn’t think she could live with herself.

She did believe what Freddie had said. She and her mother were close, and she could sense the truth of his story. After receiving that first letter from her mother, she had anticipated others, which had not come. Illness would explain the lack of return mail.

But she didn’t comprehend why Andres was not more sympathetic. Why hadn’t he understood?

Was it because he was so accustomed to doing what he wanted when he wanted to do it? He had no family. He was free of the burden of guilt … but she had thought he would have empathized.

She’d thought she’d meant more to him than that.

Suddenly, Abby realized exactly how much of herself had walked out the door with him. She cared so much for him. She’d fallen in love with him.

And he’d left.

Her temper provided a shield. She doubled her fists, wishing she’d been in her own home, where she could pick up things and break them. What a fool she’d been. Again!

It felt good to be angry, and sad, too. She sat in a side chair, crossing her arms against her stomach. It hurt to think Andres didn’t care for her.

Physically hurt. She even felt feverish, and she realized that this was much worse than what she’d ever felt for Freddie.