Nicola Cornick (20 page)

He could read nothing but sadness in her face. ‘I am sorry too,’ she said slowly. ‘For all that happened. But it is done with now.’

‘But what of the rest?’ James ran a hand through his hair. He paced over to the French window as though he was unable to keep still. ‘You must finish the story.’

‘There is little more to tell.’ Alicia sighed. ‘I married Carberry and we returned to my father’s house. There was much carousing on the part of my father’s friends and creative suggestions for the wedding night…Carberry died that night,’ Alicia said deliberately. ‘He was puce with drink, excitement and excess, and he died before my eyes. Better for me, perhaps, that he had been drunk—too drunk at any rate to consummate his marriage!

‘I roused a servant to go for a physician—a reputable doctor who had attended my grandmother. He almost refused to come to such a house, but in the end he agreed, though there was nothing that could be done for Carberry anyway. My father was drunk in the arms of a maidservant, and so I took my chance and ran away. I ran all the way back to my grandmother’s house, desperately hoping that she would take me in.’ She paused, remembering with what trepidation she had hammered on the door of the darkened house. ‘And when I arrived she was there, and I was safe at last. I think I must have lost consciousness—I believe Caroline came to see me, but I remember nothing of it, and it was a long time before I recovered enough to ask about you, and then my grandmother told me that you had gone abroad. I remember little after that, but I think I was ill for a very long time…’

A stray breath of wind set the candle flames dancing. James watched as the tears gathered with dazzling brilliance in Alicia’s eyes. She cried soundlessly, but all the more poignantly for that, finding to her horror that once she had started she seemed unable to stop. It was relief, not misery that prompted her tears, for after so long a silence she could hardly believe that she had been able to tell James the truth. The relief of knowing that he believed her was overwhelming, and he had not turned from her in disgust—not yet…

It was only when the storm of her tears had begun to subside that Alicia realised that James had crossed the room to her side and had gathered her into his arms without a word. Her head was resting most comfortably on his shoulder and he was stroking her hair gently as he murmured soothing endearments. She felt warm and secure, and it was
entirely delightful. This discovery was such a surprise that she stopped crying in order to think about it, then immediately realised the impropriety of their situation. She drew back with a small hiccuping laugh, for was it not a little late to be considering propriety?

James let her go without haste and handed her his handkerchief.

‘I do apologise,’ Alicia said unsteadily. ‘I have ruined your jacket, my lord.’

‘It does not matter.’ She could hear the warmth in his voice although she found she could not look at him. ‘I am not such a slave to my tailor as I used to be!’

His face was in shadow. ‘I am only so very sorry that I ever believed ill of you, Alicia,’ he said sombrely. ‘I have treated you with the most appalling discourtesy and can only beg your pardon. When I think what you had to endure…The whole experience must have been quite dreadful for you, and then I had the insufferable arrogance to consider myself the injured party!’

He turned away, still driven by the oppressive fury he wanted to unleash on Broseley and Carberry. Well, Carberry was beyond his reach now, but Broseley…He would make him pay for everything that Alicia had suffered, but even then it would not be enough to compensate—it could never put things right for her. He tried to imagine how a young and gently bred girl would feel when confronted with the unbridled lust of a gross libertine such as George Carberry, and groaned aloud with despair. Such things were beyond his imagination. A moment later he was overcome with the most hopeless guilt at his failure to save her and was so ashamed that he could hardly look at her.

Alicia was trying to regain a little composure. She felt completely incapable of talking any more, or even thinking beyond the superficial, but seeing James’s agony she managed a watery smile. ‘You were not to know, my lord! And even if you had done, how could you have helped me? No one could intervene—not you, not my grandmother, nobody! It is best forgotten now for, believe me, I have learned to live with it in the intervening years. I am just grateful that we have had the opportunity to put matters to rights between us, even if it is a little late in the day.’

She tried for a lighter note. ‘At least I shall now have no fear that we shall spend the Season avoiding each other—or cutting each other dead! No, we may be comfortable, you and I, knowing that the past is laid to rest and we are free of it.’

It was only what James himself had said earlier, but now it rang a
little hollow. Now that she had got over her immediate relief at telling him the truth, Alicia found the prospect of a future of mild friendship with James almost as intolerable as their previous antipathy had been. The relationship between them had always been characterised by intense emotion—first love then hatred—but it had never been one of bland insipidity and she could not bear to think of it degenerating into that now. However, she had no way of knowing how James would feel once he had had time to assimilate her story. It was hardly an edifying tale, and she could not blame him if he never wanted to think of it again.

Neither did James himself seem much taken by her words for he did not smile. Watching her in the glow from the firelight, he was suddenly aware of an extraordinary shift in perspective. It was as if for the previous seven years he had lived with all his beliefs and values displaced. Now, suddenly and shockingly, they had shifted back like the changing colours of a kaleidoscope, abruptly forming the most perfect and brilliant pattern. The thread of affinity stretched between them once more, both precious and amazingly strong. He could not tear his gaze away from her.

The intensity of his regard disturbed Alicia. She felt completely exhausted from the effort of reliving the experience and suddenly ill-equipped to deal with her thoughts on the future. She was glad when the clock on the mantelpiece chimed the hour and broke the moment.

‘Eight o’clock! I really must go before my grandmother has roused the whole county to look for me!’

‘I sent a message before dinner,’ James replied, with a smile. ‘Your mare has thrown a shoe and you have been staying at the blacksmith’s whilst the damage is repaired. They have given you some supper and you will be on your way home shortly!’

‘I see!’ Alicia smiled mischievously. ‘He will gain a reputation as a remarkably slow worker! It can only have been three o’clock when I set out!’

‘Yes, indeed…Alicia, before you go, there is something I should like to show you…’

James had moved back to the French windows which, like those of the Great Hall, gave onto the terrace at the back of the house. The latch was stiff and squeaky from disuse, but it lifted with only slight resistance and the door opened silently. The fire guttered and roared as the cold night air flooded in, then James stood aside to let Alicia pass and they were outside with the door closed behind them.

Alicia shivered in the cold air, but after the emotional scene in the
study it acted like a tonic and helped to clear her head. Here at the back of the house the ivy grew thickly over the mellow stonework and tumbled down over the lichened terrace towards the sweep of grass above the moat. The air was filled with the scent of cypress and the sky was clear. The lamplit room behind them seemed suddenly distant. Alicia turned questioningly to James.

‘Wait…’ His voice was barely above a murmur. ‘The moon is rising behind the hill. In a moment—’

He broke off as the moon topped the hill, pouring its light pure and clear along the water of the moat and turning its path to rippling silver. The night was suddenly alive, the shapes of the trees cut as sharply as sentinels, the gardens mercilessly exposed in the bright white light. As though on cue, a barn owl slid like a shadow from the trees, hunting along the edge of the moat before disappearing into the dark.

It had been a mistake to go out into the darkness. As Alicia moved forward to the balustrade at the front of the terrace, James put his hand on the parapet, barring her way. It was too dark to see his face, but she was acutely aware of his tall figure beside her, his proximity infinitely disturbing to her senses.

‘Alicia…’ She read the warning note in his voice a second too late, for he was already drawing her gently into his arms. This time was very different from before: his mouth moved softly, persuasively, over hers, keeping a tight control as the kiss became more searching. It teased and provoked her until the slow-burning in Alicia’s blood threatened to overwhelm her defences completely.

She arched her body against his, running her fingers into the thick black hair so that she could pull his mouth back down to hers when he would have drawn back. She wanted more, much more. James groaned. He could not resist.

He knew he ought to stop, that the onus had to be on him because Alicia was too inexperienced to understand what she was doing to him with her breathless endearments and soft gasps of pleasure. The trouble was that his inclination and his duty were diametrically opposed—and duty had never appealed to him very much as a concept anyway. He kissed her again lightly, first one corner of her mouth, then the opposite one, waiting until she caught her breath on a moan before he captured her lips fully once more and resumed the slow, exquisite exploration of a moment before.

Alicia did not care about anything at all, other than that James should carry on kissing her. She slid her hands beneath his jacket, luxuriating
in the warmth she could feel emanating from the skin beneath his linen shirt. Her caress wrung a groan from him and he savagely forced her lips further apart, the skilful, sensuous demand of his tongue causing a flaming heat to wash through her in response. For a long, mindless interval they surrendered to their mutual need, locked in each other’s arms.

When James’s mouth finally, reluctantly, left Alicia’s, it was only to renew its torment, tracing a burning line from the point of her jaw to the delicate curve above her collarbone. Alicia’s head fell back in pleasure, the auburn hair spilling over his arm as James lowered his lips to the tantalising swell of her breasts which were barely revealed by the severely cut riding jacket.

Fortunately, from James’s point of view, the drawback of the high neck was more than amply compensated for by the row of tiny buttons down the front of the jacket. These proved no hindrance to his experienced fingers, and in very little time he had undone enough to lay bare much more of the deliciously creamy skin beneath. He let his mouth drift teasingly over the curves he had exposed until Alicia dug her fingers into his back in an agony of wanting.

To play with fire…They were engulfed once again in the same searing tide of emotion that had threatened them earlier in the evening, only this time it was a thousand times more potent, releasing all tension between the two of them.

James found himself perilously close to losing all self-control. He made a desperate grasp for his sanity, turning his face against Alicia’s hair and breathing hard. The faint, flowery perfume that clung to her skin was almost his undoing, and when she instinctively pressed closer to him he gave a groan and put her forcibly from him. He had miscalculated in thinking that he could dictate the situation. He wanted her so badly that the physical ache was almost intolerable and the inclination to abandon all rational thought was almost as strong. They could blot out all of the past seven years in an ecstasy that would bind them closer than ever…

And yet James knew that he could not do it. Alicia was in such a vulnerable state now that whatever happened between them at such a time might be bitterly regretted by her later. He suspected that he would be able to seduce her very easily now because the chemistry between the two of them was in danger of carrying them beyond the point of coherent thought. But it would be a mistake. Alicia had suffered enough as a result of the careless whims of men who had used her for advan
tage—he would not add himself to their number. Nor did he simply want to take her and dismiss her casually when the moment had passed. She affected him too profoundly for that.

Acting in such a responsible way was hardly his specialty, James reflected sardonically to himself as he leant both hands on the parapet and attempted to bring his wayward impulses firmly under control. Under normal circumstances there could only be one outcome to an encounter between himself and a young and beautiful widow—particularly when she was alone with him at one of his establishments. But Alicia had always been different. Cursing under his breath, he admitted to himself that, whilst his feelings for her were all too obvious on one level, they ran very deep on others.

He took her very firmly by the arm and steered her straight back into the house.

‘One thing I cannot have on my conscience is the responsibility for you catching a chill!’ There was an undertone of laughter in James’s voice, though he still sounded shaken. ‘And you were right, Alicia—you had better go now! I can’t deny that I want you to stay with me, but it would not serve. God knows, I must be getting old! I never thought to find myself acting so much against my own inclinations!’

He scanned Alicia’s face, upturned to his, and his gaze softened as he smiled. ‘Damn it, Alicia, don’t make it any more difficult for me! I’m hardly a candidate for sainthood as it is!’

It was a mild evening for March and Alicia had not felt the cold at all until James had let her go. Then, slowly, sanity had reasserted itself and with it a bereft chill that had made her shiver. More than anything in the world she wanted James to take her back in his arms and blot out the cold for ever. She stared up at him, watching as desire for her darkened his eyes again, and the moment hung in the balance. She knew she could make him change his mind, wanted to do it…Then she pulled herself together, picked up her cloak and turned towards the door.