Leslie Lafoy (19 page)

“I don’t think I’ve ever had wine for breakfast,” she said, grinning and handing the bottle back to him. He saw the memory dart through her awareness just before her smile faded and she added, “Although I did have champagne the morning after the wedding. I suppose that counts, doesn’t it?”

“Only if it wasn’t left over from the night before,” Barrett countered as she settled down on the window seat and reached for a hard roll. “Without the bubbles, it’s nothing more than expensive grape juice.”

She instantly brightened. “Then this is a first.”

Henri hadn’t thought to have a fresh bottle of spirits for the morning after? He hadn’t thought enough of his bride to make the first morning of their life together a special one for her? She should have rolled out of the bed and left the boorish son of a bitch right then and there. Any man who thought hours-old champagne acceptable had to have been a thoughtless, inconsiderate lover. If he’d been the only man with whom Belle had ever lain, then—

“What?” she asked, her brow cocked.

Barrett sucked in his cheeks and listened to the shaky voice of good judgment. “An observation I don’t have any business making.”

“And that’s going to stop you?”

“Yes. Yes, it is.”
For the moment,
he silently added, assuaging the part of himself that was outraged by the way her husband had treated her.

“Coward,” she accused with twinkling eyes, handing him a bit of cheese and sausage between two slivers of bread.

Lord, she had beautiful eyes. The kind that a man could happily search for an eternity and never become bored. And that smile of hers could melt an old monk’s resolve. Mercifully, she turned her attention back to the food. Barrett took a huge gulp of the wine to distract his mind and, as the inexpensive alcohol singed a path down his throat, marshal his stumbling wits. “Haven’t you ever heard the saying ‘Discretion is the better part of valor’?”

“I seem to vaguely recall it. My mother’s favorite credo was ‘Idle hands are the devil’s playthings.’”

That was generally true. And the devil always had a damned good time. He took another drink. “What was your father’s favorite?”

“‘Don’t tell your mother,’” she replied, grinning at the sandwich she was making.

Barrett laughed outright, imagining Belle as a child looking up at her father, grinning impishly and nodding until her curls bounced.

“What were your parents’ favorite admonishments when you were young?”

The amusing vision was gone, instantly replaced by a long string of shadowed memories. He unclenched his jaw and took another drink, reminding himself that he was the one who had broached the subject and was, therefore, obliged to provide an answer. “Mother’s was—still is, actually—‘Actions speak louder than words and are heard by all.’ Father’s has always been ‘Wealth brings responsibility.’ I wouldn’t be at all surprised if they were his last earthly words.”

“What kind of responsibility?” she asked warily, her little sandwich seemingly forgotten as she looked up at him. “Does he ever say?”

He snorted and drank again. With a blitheness that he most definitely didn’t feel, he explained, “Oh, there are all sorts of them. To give to charity. Preferably at a large ceremony with important people and newspapermen in attendance. To invest wisely. Meaning profitably, of course. To studiously respect and maintain the lines of social class. To never spend a pound when a pence will do. To serve Queen and Country in a dignified but publicly noticeable way.”

“Then they had to have been very proud of you when you enlisted in the army.”

She was trying to find the silver lining; he could hear it in her voice. The nice thing about cheap wine, he mused, taking another drink, was that it hit fast and hard. And effectively. He smiled, appreciating the dulling edges. “I’d guess that they tried to make my service look as altruistic as they possibly could.”

She made a little scoffing sound. “How could it be considered even remotely selfish, Barrett?”

“I enlisted,” he replied, lifting the bottle in a toast to his stupidity, “because I was hoping to get myself killed.”

One golden brow shot up. “That’s not a very good reason.”

“Yes,” he agreed, knowing that his smile was a bit lopsided and not caring overly much, “but it would have been damned expedient if it had actually worked. It obviously didn’t, though. Despite my best efforts. Then I met Carden and he rather roughly took me by the scruff of the neck and shook some sense into me.”

He thought she said something about that being a good thing, but his awareness was flooding with the past. The thrill, the sweet hope. The horror. And the granite mountain of guilt and regret that had come down on his shoulders. Bless the wine; it made it all seem like someone else’s misery.

“I fell in love and it turned out badly.”

He started at the sound of his voice, stunned and appalled that he’d actually spoken the thought. He closed his eyes and silently swore, angry with himself for having inadvertently opened the door of what had always been his very private hell. How to close it again without being an absolute ass about it?

“I’m sorry,” Belle said softly. “You must have loved her very much.”

“In hindsight,” he offered aloud, “I can see how I should have done things differently, but at the time…” He shrugged and took another drink. “You can’t change the past,” he reminded himself. “All you can do is learn to live with your mistakes and keep from making them again.”

“That’s very true,” she allowed, nodding and smiling gently. “I learned to never again surrender my good judgment. No matter how handsome he is, no matter how big the gun is, no matter how horrific the scandal.”

God love her; she’d offered him an out, a change in the direction of the conversation. And for some unfathomable reason—the wine, he suspected—he wasn’t willing to take the generous gift. Instead, he sucked in a deep breath and countered, “I learned that men of God are just men. And that falling in love with a woman can be her death sentence.”

“Barrett, talking about this is obviously distressing for you. Perhaps—”

“I know my mother,” he interjected, shaking his head. He stopped abruptly and waited for the world to quit moving before adding, “She couldn’t keep from mentioning the greatest of my scandals. As a ploy for discouraging females with what she sees as social-climbing aspirations, it works every time.”

He winced as the shadings of his words penetrated his alcohol-hazed brain. But if Belle saw the backhanded insult in them, she didn’t take obvious offense. Her voice was soft, her gaze tender as she looked up at him and said, “She didn’t mention the details, Barrett. And there’s no need for me to know them.”

Yes, but as inexplicable as it was, he felt a need to share them with her. And, most oddly, that was the full extent of his feelings on it all. “Her name was Suzanna,” he provided, “and she was the bishop’s unhappy wife. He blew her brains out right in front of me on a dance floor. Then turned the gun on himself.”

“Oh, God.”

“I didn’t see it coming, Belle,” he went on. “Not until a second too late. The letter he left behind was brutal. Honest, but brutal. And it was made public at the inquest.”

She looked down at the sandwich in her hand and then deliberately set it aside as she summarized, “You were devastated at the loss and your parents were mortified by your involvement.”

“Mortified” was a good choice of words; at least it was the one that came closest to describing the aftermath from his parents’ side of the debacle.

“How long ago did all this happen?”

“Six—almost seven—years.” A time that, at the moment, felt like an eternity. “One good thing came of it, though,” he offered, relieved to have the telling done.

“What was that?”

He smiled and offered her the nearly empty bottle. “It was at that point that I largely stopped living my life trying to please them. Life’s been considerably simpler since.”

As she took a smallish sip, he added, “And life stayed simple until I had that damned weak moment and agreed to get on with finding a wife so they could have blasted grandchildren. I should have just gone to an orphanage, bought a handful, and had them delivered with bows.”

She grinned, set the bottle on the seat beside her, and retrieved her sandwich. “It’s not too late to do that, you know. How many do your parents want?”

Remembering the sandwich he held in his own hand, Barrett took a bite while he tried to decide. “A good dozen or two would probably suffice.”

“That would be terribly expensive, I should think. Do you suppose they’d be satisfied with eight or so? That many would be much more affordable.”

“I make a very good living as an investigator and they know it,” he countered ruefully as she ate. “I don’t want to be accused of scrimping. I’m guilty of enough sins already.”

She washed down the bite with another sip of the wine and then handed the bottle to him, saying, “I’ve always thought that sins, like beauty, are in the eye of the beholder. You certainly don’t seem overly sinful to me, Barrett Stanbridge.”

He stood there with a half-eaten sandwich in one hand, a mostly empty bottle of wine in the other, and the most delicious bit of sweet temptation sitting in front of him. Sparkling eyes, a luscious smile, darling ringlets framing a flawless face … She didn’t have the slightest notion of what sin was. Oh, the delights he could show her … He exhaled long and hard and wondrously asked, “Just how did you come out of a war with your naïveté intact?”

She laughed and took the bottle back from him. “I’m not naïve,” she alleged just before taking another sip.

“Belle, darling,” he drawled, “in some ways you’re as innocent as the proverbial lamb.”

“It’s an illusion,” she countered, beaming. “A part of my concerted efforts to make everyone think I’m something of a lady.”

He understood illusions. And their frailty. “I’m going to move while I still can,” he announced, turning away and heading for the door.

“Did you ever think of something we could do to pass the time?” she called after him.

“No,” he lied, telling himself he was a better man for it. “I’ll see if I can find some cleaning rags in the cellar.”

Oh, for the want of a bed and the absence of a conscience …

*   *   *

Rain pelting the windowpanes at her back, Isabella leaned into the corner of the window seat and surveyed the room. The curtains had been shaken out, the ashes removed from the hearth, and the layer of dust had been hauled away in one manner or another. The space certainly wasn’t pristine, but with the makeshift broom, the equally cobbled together mop, and a good five hours of concerted work, they’d at least made it habitable. All it needed to be cozy, she mused, was furniture. Most notably a tall bedstead with a thick down mattress that would let her drown in sleep. God, she silently groaned, stifling a yawn, she was so tired.

And there was so much yet to do, she reminded herself in the same breath. Judging by how long the crashing and banging and swearing had been going on downstairs, the carters were hauling in an outrageous number of crates. To her mind, “rudimentary” would have been a couple of blankets, two place settings, a couple of pots, a few coffee beans, and a simple little coffee grinder. What Aiden and his wife considered to be basic household goods seemed—by the sounds of it—to be considerably more than that. And it all had to be unpacked and put somewhere.

But Barrett could be counted on to help with the task, she reminded herself, sliding her gaze to the other end of the window seat. He leaned back into his corner, his arms crossed over his chest, his long legs stretched out, his head tipped back and his eyes closed. How much younger he looked when sleeping. The beginnings of a dark beard shadowed his jaw and the tiniest of smiles curved his lips upward. His hair was still deliciously tousled and the thick fringe of lashes lying on the chiseled planes of his cheekbones …

The center of her chest tightened and deep within her a warmth pulsed and spread. There was no denying the truth of what it was and she didn’t try. There would come a time when he purposefully reached for her. When he did, she would willingly, happily step into his arms. Just as countless numbers of other women before her had. And just like them, she’d be released and expected to go her own way. How many of them, she wondered, had ached at the thought of having to do that?

She tore her gaze away, fastening it on the cold hearth. It was beyond foolish to dream, however softly, of any sort of forever with Barrett. He’d marry, not out of love or for his own happiness, but appropriately and only to meet his parents’ expectations. He had no hope for more than that, no willingness to risk his heart again. She understood how he’d come to that point, but the certain emptiness of his life …

Quietly clearing her throat and blinking back the tears, Isabella lifted her chin and deliberately listened to the sounds below. Were those feminine voices? She leaned slightly forward, tilting her head to better gather the higher pitched sounds. Yes, she decided, sitting back abruptly. She looked down at her gown and silently groaned. It was as filthy as the room had once been, the hem was stained from her forays through soggy markets that morning, and the damn wrinkle was still there. God. And her hair! Instinctively, she reached up in the hope that by some miracle she’d find the unruly curls—for once in her life—tamed.

But even as she considered making quick repairs, the stairs squeaked. Barrett bolted upright in the same second, his hand instantly going to the small of his back.

“I think it’s Alex and Sera,” she offered in quick assurance, gently grasping his arm to stay his motion. “I heard female voices a minute ago.”

He blinked, held his breath, and went motionless as he listened to their guests’ progress up the stairs. “Damn,” he muttered, sagging and bringing his hand forward. “I could do without having to be charming.”

She laughed and patted his arm, saying, “Maybe, if you’re not, they won’t stay long.”

“There’s that optimism again,” he countered, smiling and shaking his head as he pushed himself to his feet.

He’d barely gained them when two large dogs bounded into the room, followed by two equally exuberant young ladies. The older one was dark haired and tanned. The younger looked very much like a blond china doll.