A Lady's Wish (10 page)

He could not be so sanguine. Brow pressed to the counterpane, he tried to slow his pulse but found he could not. A man who commanded dozens of other men upon the most dangerous surface on earth, and he could not now command his own heartbeats.

“Patricia, did you go that morning?” he whispered. “Were you merely late?”

Silence met him.

“Tell me you went,” he uttered, heart in his throat, “and that I have not been alone in regretting that I left that day after so short a time.” The vulnerability in his voice was foreign to him. He could not alter it. “Tell me.”

But she slept, her breathing light and even, and she told him nothing.

He turned his head and took in her beauty. Her hair spread in abandoned tangles upon the white linen, her lips closed now, soft and pink, lashes and lids draped over the cornflowers he had never forgotten.

“I was a coward.” He spoke quietly. “By your speech, your dress, your very being, I knew I did not deserve you and I feared you recognized that. I feared you would not come, and I was too afraid to remain as the minutes passed, to see that proven true.” He stroked her cheek, her skin silken and warm. “If I had not left when I did, I might have waited there for you forever, Patricia Ramsay.”

She stirred, releasing a soft sigh, and turned her face into his palm.

“Did you love your husband, my beautiful, passionate Isolde?” he whispered. “Tell me he did not repay your love with coldness, and I will be content for the years I lost to him.” He held his breath. “Did you love him?”

The sweet smile traced her lips once more, wistful as though in dreaming. “I loved you.”

N
ik did not sleep. He spent the remaining hours of the night composing a speech in his head. In truth he had been composing it for nine years. By the time black gave way to gray in the sky without, he was prepared. He could not give her a title but if she wished to retain the baronet’s, he would not deny her that. He could, however, give her wealth, and a heart thoroughly hers since that day nine years ago.

But when she stirred and her cornflower eyes opened sleepily into the pale dawn light, then she stretched like a kitten and offered him her enticing smile, he lost sufficient rational mind to give his speech. He kissed her, she touched him, and instead he gave her pleasure again.

After, when she slipped back into sleep, he arose and went to his bedchamber and dressed. Her scent lingered upon his skin and he nearly returned to her. He restrained himself, going instead to the taproom to command coffee and the settlement of the bill. Rum shuffled in and tugged his cap.

“Be setting off this morning, Cap’n?”

“We will accompany Lady Morgan’s party to their destination. Instruct Mr. Carr to prepare the carriage.”

Rum gave him a shrewd look. “Coming on the fifteenth tomorrows, sir.”

“I had no idea you could read so well, Rum. I am impressed. Less impressed, of course, that you seem to be reading my correspondence.” He allowed himself a slight grin.

Rum scowled, his weathered face puckering. “T’aint right, a sailor not going after treasure.”

“We’ve time still.” But Nik had already found his treasure. His friend Jag’s would have to wait.

Through the taproom window a carriage appeared clattering into the yard. Its yellow-rimmed wheels and black, crested panels were encrusted with mud, the four showy animals in the traces likewise spattered. A gentleman and a lady climbed from it and moments later entered the taproom. Nik bowed. The gentleman nodded.

He returned to his coffee.

“Sir?”

He swiveled about, brow lifted.

“I beg your pardon,” the gentleman drawled. “My lady wishes me to inquire of you whether a party of three ladies resides within this inn?” His cool gaze swept up and down Nik with entitled ease. “You seem a gentleman and so I have not hesitated to ask. Anything to avoid commerce with an innkeeper, I say.”

Aside from the round, sand-colored dog cradled in her arms, the lady was a study in angles, with drawn skin that proclaimed her mature years. But the features could not be mistaken, pale, protruding eyes and long nose. Without doubt, Miss Haye’s sister.

“There is such a party in residence here,” Nik replied. “I have recently assisted them with a mishap with their carriage.”

The lady sniffed. “Never mind that. Lord Perth and I have now arrived and you are released from your assistance to my daughter-in-law’s party.”

It was a dismissal, plain and clear.

“It was my honor.”

“Undoubtedly.” The gentleman glanced about the room, taking in a pair of laborers at a far table, and curled his lip.

Nik schooled his features to a shipmaster’s diplomatic impassivity. “Madam, allow me to introduce myself. I am Nikolas Acton. You are perhaps the Dowager Lady Morgan?”

She looked down her narrow nose at him, an impressive feat for a diminutive lady to accomplish with a man of his height.

“I am.”

“And you, my lord—” He should not ask, for rather more reasons than the appalling show of bad manners it represented. “How might you be connected to this charming family?”

“I am Lady Morgan’s fiancé, of course.”

Chapter Nine

P
atricia awoke to absolute, perfect, delicious languor. She stretched out her toes, then her fingers, then her legs and arms and her entire body. Warm beneath the covers, she could see the fire fading to embers in the grate. He had lit it after making love to her a second time. A smile crept across her lips.

It expanded.

Then it burst into delirious joy.

She sat up, strewing the covers around her, and took in clean, glorious lungfuls of air. He
must
love her. No man could make love to a woman like that without strong feeling.

She hoped.

She leapt out of the bed in which he had brought her to ecstasy many times, and did a little pirouette. She felt like a girl again, but this time absolutely free. No more bowing to her mother-in-law’s wishes, or even to Oliver’s. If Oliver had wanted her to know something important, he should have told her before he died. She had better things to do than go running around after secret messages.

Better things to do?

A better
man
to do.

She slapped her palms against her cheeks and dissolved into laughter.

Calanthia burst into the room. “Tricky, you—”

Patricia grabbed up her shift off the floor and threw it over her head.

“What on earth are you doing standing in the middle of your room completely naked?”

“Mm. Bathing?” She could not wipe the silly smile from her face.

Callie’s brow creased. “Well that is neither here nor there.” She set her fists on her hips. “What did you do to poor Captain Acton?”

“Do?” Rather, he had done most of it to her. But she very much hoped he would teach her how to reciprocate soon.

“Yes,
do
. For I can only imagine you sent him away, which is positively criminal when anybody can see that he is smitten with you. For pity’s sake, he asked me if you are in love with Lord Perth.”

Her pulse sped, cold dread grabbing her.

“Is he gone?”

“At least half an hour since.”

“I did not send him away. I did not even speak with him this morning.” Not since dawn when he had taken her in his arms again and given her fierce, tender pleasure that had left her calling his name repeatedly against his shoulder. “Why would he ask about Lord Perth? And what did you say?”

“I said of course you are not!”

Patricia sank to her bed. He had left. Oh, God,
he had left
, after making love to her like that. But he had given her precisely what she asked for—a single night. And now it was just as nine years ago and her heart must be broken in silence again. She wanted to curl up in a ball and cry forever.

Calanthia shook her head. “Tricky, you are an ass.”

She choked back tears. “Callie, I cannot—”

“No. I will not refrain from using the wonderfully apt language Maggie has taught me. If you cannot see it you must be blind. He looks at you like the men of our family look at their pointer bitches. You are simply too much of a sapskull to see it, traipsing about as though widowhood were something to be desired rather than corrected.”

“I do not wish to remain a widow.” She wished quite desperately to be Mrs. Nikolas Acton. But that, it seemed, was not to be. How could he have left her
again
?

“You behave as though you do.” Calanthia’s brow came down. “I don’t know why you have been holding yourself aloof from every gentleman who comes to call. You are not wearing the willow for Oliver. But— and I cannot believe I am about to speak words alarmingly like the dowager’s— but your sons deserve a father and you deserve a husband. Captain Acton is perfectly breathtaking, a famous war hero, and charming, and you are a fool if you think gentlemen like that appear upon one’s doorstep every day. A girl would be lucky if such a man came along even once in a lifetime.” She relaxed her stance. “There, I have had my say.”

“I appreciate your concern for the boys.” Her words lumbered over the lump in her throat. “But you must be mistaken about Captain Acton.” Wretchedly mistaken. Perhaps she should have told him everything. She had dreamed telling him she loved him, and it had been the sweetest fantasy.

But . . . ?

“Callie, why did he ask you about Lord Perth?”

“Because the dullard is here! The dowager too.” She flopped down into a chair. “It is the most horrid ending to a lovely holiday that I have ever experienced.”

“They are here? Whatever for?”

“She got a notion into her head from something Auntie Elsbeth suggested in London, that you went off on this trip to find a new father for the boys. She has brought Lord Perth to finally make you an offer. You won’t accept him. Oh, say you will not!”

“Of course not.” She went to her traveling case. “I must go down.” She pulled on a gown.

“Tricky, you have forgotten your stays. And petticoat.”

“Button me, will you?”

“But—”

“If you do not button me I shall go down like this.”

Five minutes later, her hair hastily knotted, wearing no stockings or stays, with circles beneath her eyes and a pain of loss in her heart so powerful she could barely draw breath, she met Oliver’s mother and her suitor in the parlor.

“Good morning, daughter.” The dowager’s gaze raked her, but she put her cheek forward to be bussed.

“I will not kiss you hello, my lady. I do not particularly like you, and I do not kiss people I do not like.” She turned to the sandy-haired gentleman standing by the hearth, dressed to the nines in shining boots and high collars. The contrast between his haughty astonishment and Nik’s sparkling smile would have been comical if her heart weren’t breaking. “And I am never, ever going to kiss you, my lord.” Tears trembled at the back of her throat. “I wish you will both leave now.”

“Patricia! How dare you speak to me in such a manner, and to Lord Perth who has come this distance to condescend to you?”

“You are not my mother any longer, Lady Morgan, and I really don’t see the need to pretend you are. As for Lord Perth, I believe I have made it clear enough with my indifference to him upon numerous occasions that I am not desirous of his suit, although I am not unaware of the honor he does me. Now, if you will excuse me, I must dress.” She turned.

“You ungrateful girl!” trailed into the foyer behind her, but Patricia did not care. She had lost the man she loved,
again
. Now the only thing she had left was life to live, this time according to her own choices.

“What happens now?” Callie’s eyes were bright.

“We finish our journey.” She may as well conclude matters with Oliver once and for all before moving on with her life, and he had sent her on this journey for their sons’ sake apparently. The ache inside her was violent. But at least she had one night with Nik, one perfect night in which she had lived with passion.

Calanthia touched her arm. “Tricky, I admire you. Your courage. It is so . . . real.”

She managed a weak smile. “Oh, do not admire me. I learned it all from a young man I met years ago and have never stopped dreaming of since.”

T
he road was mired muck beneath his horse’s hooves and Nik was taking it in the wrong direction.

He did not want to leave her. But his mind and body rebelled against his heart, saddling his horse and riding off, every word his father and brothers had ever uttered of his worthlessness clamoring in his ears. Forcefully his heart reminded his head that he had faced down ships with double his cannonry, blown a hole in a French blockade a mile long, and bent his bow into wind that could tear canvas from spars. He was a goddamned war hero! But the voices in his head insisted that all amounted to nothing, and his horse continued to carry him away from the woman he loved who once again had told him she wanted him while poised to marry another man.

A cluster of buildings appeared in the mists ahead and he rode into the posting house yard. His horse needed the rest, but he needed her.

“Why, Captain Acton. What a delightful surprise!”

He turned to the trilling voice emerging from the building. He recognized the woman’s fluttering smile and prominent nose.

He bowed. “Good day, Mrs. Chapel.”

“Acton?” A gentleman paused at the threshold, Miss Chapel upon his arm. “Captain Nikolas Acton?”

“I am afraid you have the advantage of me, sir.”

The man chuckled. “No doubt you believe so. It was quite a night, that night in Lisbon. With the quantity of Port we consumed, I am frankly surprised I recall it myself.” He nodded to the ladies. “Pray forgive my candid speech, cousins. Wartime makes men apt to drink to excess and do foolish things. Doesn’t it, Acton? Why, I believe at one point that night we were even comparing battle scars.” He chuckled and came forward to clasp Nik’s hand. “George Chapel. Fine to see you again.”

“Captain Acton,” Miss Chapel said, fixing him with a direct look, “you have not yet thrown off your doldrums, I see.”

“My dear Tansy!” her mother tittered. “What will you say next?”

“He is terribly sad, Mama. Anyone can see that if they look beneath the handsome surface.”

“Oh, dear.” Mrs. Chapel waved her kerchief about her flushed face. “What am I to do with her? She fancies herself an artist.”

“But he is a naval officer and you were in the army, George,” Miss Chapel said. “How did you meet?”

“We shared a mutual acquaintance. Have you seen Grace lately, Acton, or is he still on the Continent?”

“I believe he has been in Paris for some time.” Nik was not interested in war reminiscences, only in retracing his steps. In eight years upon the sea he had learned to fight. Like Grace and Chapel, he had thrown himself into the fray for England. Now, like he had won every battle he ever entered, he would win her. And if by the time he reached the inn she was no longer there, he would find her. This time he knew her name.

His breaths stilled.

Good God.

He pivoted to the horses. “Rum, where is the letter?”

His steward tugged an envelope from his coat pocket. Nik snatched Jag’s missive and tore it open.

“Acton?” Chapel said. “Is everything quite all right?”

He scanned the page.

A companion of my early years on the Peninsula—a gentleman I believe you met upon one of your brief sojourns on land with us—discovered a treasure of great worth.

Nik’s hands shook. “Chapel, who drank with us that night in Lisbon, other than John Grace?”

Chapel’s brows went up. “Babcocke and Sams, two of Britain’s finest.”

“Anyone else?”

“Well, you seafaring boys, of course.”

Nik’s shoulders fell. “No other army officers?”

Chapel shrugged. “Morgan was there, of course. But he barely touched a drop so I cannot say he drank with us.” He cast an apologetic grin at Miss Chapel. “One shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, but I never did care for Oliver Morgan. A soldier needs to loosen his cravat every once in a while, but that fellow was far too stiff.”

Nik’s heart thundered. In all the years since those months when he had searched for Patricia, he had only spoken of her to one man. A man he met and drank with one cold winter night on the Peninsula, who once he’d heard the beginning of Nik’s story encouraged him to continue it. In detail.

A man whose name until this moment he had forgotten.

Rather, he had made himself forget.

He’d been thoroughly disguised, and perhaps even at the time he knew Morgan was not. In a drunken monologue he had told him everything, from the color of her hair to their appointment to meet at the Maypole the following morning. Wallowing in his regret, he had looked up from his empty glass to Morgan’s pale, cool eyes and the man’s only words were, “Perhaps if you had waited longer that morning, you would not have lost her.”

“Come to think of it,” Chapel said in an odd voice, “after that night Morgan seemed peculiarly interested in you. He pestered Jag with any number of questions about your people and what not. Once when we were passing through a port I even heard him speaking with common sailors about you.” He chuckled. “Jealousy, no doubt. Not every fellow can be a war hero and a handsome devil too.” He smiled down at Miss Chapel.

Nik dropped his gaze to the letter in his unsteady hands.

The treasure will not remain long in its present location . . . In short, it could easily be lost.

Coincidence, be damned. He would not lose this treasure. Never again.

“Forgive me, Chapel. Ladies.” He bowed and cut for his horse.

“Acton? Are you well, old chap?”

“Captain Acton, where are you going?”

He swung atop his mount and pulled it around. “To a May Day festival.”

T
he cousins greeted Patricia, Calanthia, and Oliver’s aunt with embraces and fond kisses. Patricia sank into their warmth, welcoming the women’s fawning attention for the distraction it provided. Even when the gentlemen seized opportunity to turn conversation to dogs and hunting she was grateful. But she found she could not wish away her feelings, as she had not been able nine years ago in this same house. She escaped to the garden, all brown and wet beneath the late-winter sun, where her aunt found her.

“Dear me, you mustn’t fritter the afternoon away here.” She smiled vaguely. “Not when Oliver’s letter specifically indicated you must go to the festival grounds.”

Patricia’s eyes popped wide. “How do you know of Oliver’s letter? But it never said such a thing!”

“I daresay your letter was different from mine, the dear boy. He always wished to please his old aunt.” Her eyes grew mistier.

Patricia grasped her hand. “Aunt, I pray you, explain this to me. Did my husband send you a letter as well?”

“Years ago.” A tear teetered upon the rim of her protruding eye. Patricia’s pulse raced.

“May I see it?”

“Oh, no, no. He would not care for that. He never liked anyone else to know he confided in me, especially not his mother. Poor boy was terrified of her, after all.”

“Terrified? Aunt Elsbeth, please tell me what you know!”

She patted Patricia’s hand. “Go to the Maypole, dear. Oliver buried a treasure there for you.”