Everything and the Moon (23 page)

Victoria rushed past him and tried the door. It didn't budge.

“I invite you to look for the key,” he said insolently. “It's on my person.”

“You're mad!”

“No,” he said, pinning her against the wall. “Just furious. No one makes a fool out of me.”

“My husband will kill you,” she said in a low voice. “He knows where I am. If he finds you here—”

“He will assume you are cuckolding him,” Eversleigh finished for her, stroking her bare shoulder with a revolting brand of tenderness.

Victoria knew that Robert would never believe the worst of her, especially in light of Eversleigh's past behavior. “He will kill you,” she repeated.

Eversleigh's hand slipped down to the crook of her waist. “How did you manage to trap him into marriage, I wonder. What a devious little governess you turned out to be.”

“Get your hands off me,” she hissed.

He ignored her, cupping the curve of her hip. “Your charms are obvious,” he mused, “but you're not precisely marriage material for the heir to a marquessate.”

Victoria tried to ignore the revulsion rolling in her stomach. “I will tell you one more time to remove your hands from my person,” she warned.

“Or you'll do what?” he said with an amused smile, clearly not believing that she could be any kind of threat to him.

Victoria slammed her foot down on his with all the force she could muster, and then, while he was howling with surprise, she brought her knee up and jammed it into his groin. Eversleigh immediately collapsed onto the floor. He hissed something. Victoria thought he might be calling her a bitch, but he was in so much pain that his words were unclear. She brushed her hands together and allowed herself a satisfied smile. “I've learned a thing or two since our last encounter,” she said.

Before she could say any more, someone started pounding on the door. Robert, she thought, and then was proved correct when she heard him bellow her name in the hall.

She grabbed the doorknob, but the door wouldn't budge. “Damn,” she muttered, remembering that Eversleigh had locked it. “Just one moment, Robert,” she called out.

“What the devil is going on in there?” he demanded. “You've been gone for hours.”

It certainly hadn't been hours, but Victoria didn't see any point in arguing the issue. She wanted to remove herself from the washroom just as badly as he did. “I'll be right out,” she said to the door. Then she turned around and regarded the pathetic heap on the floor. “Give me the key.”

Eversleigh, even in his emasculated state, somehow managed a snicker.

“Who are you talking to?” Robert yelled.

Victoria ignored him. “The key!” she demanded, fixing a furious stare on Eversleigh. “Or I swear I'll do it again.”

“Do what again?” Robert said. “Victoria, I insist that you open this door.”

Exasperated, Victoria planted her hands on her hips and yelled back, “I would if I had the bloody key!” She turned to Eversleigh and ground out, “The key.”

“Never.”

Victoria flexed her foot. “I'll kick you this time. I wager I could do more damage with my foot than I did with my knee.”

“Stand clear of the door, Torie!” Robert yelled. “I'm breaking it down.”

“Oh, Robert, I really wish you—” She jumped back in time to avoid a splintering crash.

Robert stood in the doorway, heaving with exertion and seething with anger. The door swung drunkenly on one of its hinges. “Are you all right?” he said, rushing to her side. Then he looked down. His face turned nearly purple with rage. “What is he doing on the floor?” he asked, his words chillingly even.

Victoria knew it wasn't the right time to laugh, but she couldn't help it. “I put him there,” she said.

“Would you care to elucidate further?” Robert requested, kicking Eversleigh onto his stomach and planting the sole of his boot on the man's back.

“Do you remember our carriage ride up from Ramsgate?”

“Intimately.”

“Not that part,” Victoria said quickly, blushing. “When I…Ah…When I accidentally nudged you—”

“I remember,” he cut in. His voice was clipped, but Victoria thought she could detect the beginnings of humor in it.

“Right,” she replied. “I do try to learn from my mistakes, and I could not help but remember how incapacitated you were. I thought the same might work on Eversleigh.”

Robert started to shake with laughter.

Victoria shrugged and stopped trying to hold back her smile. “He had the requisite parts,” she explained.

Robert held up his hand. “No further explanation is needed,” he said, chuckling all the while. “You are ever resourceful, my lady, and I love you.”

Victoria sighed, completely forgetting Eversleigh's presence. “And I love you,” she sighed. “So very much.”

“If I might interrupt this touching scene,” Eversleigh said.

Robert kicked him. “You may not.” His eyes flew back to his wife. “Oh, Victoria, do you really mean it?”

“With all my heart.”

He reached out to embrace her, but Eversleigh was in the way. “Is there a window in there?” he asked, flicking his head toward the washroom.

Victoria nodded.

“Big enough for a man?”

Her lips twitched. “I'd say so.”

“How utterly convenient.” Robert picked up Eversleigh by his collar and the seat of his pants, and shoved him halfway out the window. “Last time you attacked my wife, I believe I told you I'd tear you from limb to limb if you repeated your insults.”

“She wasn't your wife then,” Eversleigh spat out.

Robert slugged him in the stomach, then turned to Victoria and said, “It's amazing how good that feels. Would you like give it a try?”

“No, thank you. I would have to touch him, you see.”

“Very wise,” Robert murmured. Turning his attention back to Eversleigh, he said, “My marriage has left me in remarkable good humor, and it is for that reason alone that I do not kill you right now. But if you should approach my wife ever again, I will not hesitate to put a bullet between your eyes. Do I make myself clear?”

Eversleigh may have tried to nod, but it was hard to tell as he was hanging upside down outside the window.

“Do I make myself clear?” Robert roared. Victoria actually took a step back. She'd had no idea he was still so furious; he'd been keeping such a firm control on his emotions.

“Yes, damn you!” Eversleigh yelled.

Robert dropped him.

Victoria rushed to the window. “Was it very far to the ground?” she asked.

Robert looked out. “Not so far. But do you happen to know if the Lindworthys have dogs?”

“Dogs? No, why?”

He smiled. “It looks a little messy out there. I was just curious.”

Victoria clapped her hand over her mouth. “Did you…? Did we…?”

“We certainly did. Eversleigh's valet is going to have a devil of a time washing his hair.”

There was no holding in her laughter at that one. Victoria doubled over with giggles, managing to catch her breath only long enough to gasp, “Move, so I can see!” She peered out the window just in time to catch Eversleigh shaking his head like a dog as he quit the scene, vicious invective streaming from his mouth all the while. She pulled her head back in the window. “It certainly smelled noxious,” she said.

But Robert's face had grown serious. “Victoria,” he began awkwardly, “What you said… Did you…”

“Yes, I meant it,” she said, taking his hands in hers. “I love you. I just wasn't able to say it before now.”

He blinked. “You needed to knee a man in the groin before you could tell me you loved me?”

“No!” Then she thought about his words. “Well, yes, in a way. I've always been so fearful that you would run my life. But I've learned that having you with me doesn't mean that I can't take care of myself just as well.”

“You certainly made short work of Eversleigh.”

Her chin lifted a notch and she allowed herself a satisfied smile. “Yes, I did, didn't I? And do you know, but I think I couldn't have done it without you.”

“Victoria, you did this all on your own. I wasn't even present.”

“Yes, you were.” She picked up his hand and placed it over her heart. “You were here. And you made me strong.”

“Torie, you're the strongest woman I know. You always have been.”

She didn't even try to put a halt to the tears rolling down her cheeks. “I'm so much better with you than I am without you. Robert, I love you so much.”

Robert leaned down to kiss her, then realized that the door to the retiring room was still hanging on its hinge. He shut the connecting door and locked it. “There,” he murmured in what he hoped was his best rakish voice. “Now I have you all to myself.”

“You certainly do, my lord. You certainly do.”

Many minutes later, Victoria pulled her mouth a fraction of an inch away from his. “Robert,” she said, “do you realize—”

“Hush, woman, I'm trying to kiss you, and there's damned little room to maneuver in here.”

“Yes, but do you realize—”

He cut her off with his mouth. Victoria surrendered to his kiss for another minute, but then she pulled away again. “What I wanted to tell you—”

He let out a dramatic sigh. “What?”

“Someday our children are going to ask us what the most meaningful moment of our lives was. And they're going to want to know where it happened.”

Robert lifted his head and regarded the cramped washroom, then chuckled. “Darling, we're just going to have to lie and say we traveled to China, because no one would believe this.”

Then he kissed her again.

S
everal months later Victoria was watching snowflakes through the window of the Macclesfield carriage as she and Robert returned home from supper at Castleford. Robert hadn't wanted to visit his father, but she had insisted that they needed to make peace with their families before they could think about beginning a family of their own.

Victoria's reunion with her own father had occurred two weeks earlier. It had been difficult at first, and Victoria still wouldn't say that their relationship was completely repaired, but at least the healing process had begun. After this visit to Castleford, she felt that Robert and his father had reached a similar point in their own relationship.

She let out a soft sigh and turned back to the carriage's interior. Robert had dozed off, his dark lashes sinfully long against his cheeks. She reached out to brush away a lock of his hair, and his eyelids fluttered open.

He yawned. “Did I fall asleep?”

“Just for a moment,” Victoria said. Then she yawned, too. “Goodness, it must be catching.”

Robert smiled. “Yawns?”

Victoria nodded, still yawning.

“I didn't expect that we'd be there so late,” Robert said.

“I'm glad we were. I wanted you to have time with your father. He is a good man. A bit misguided, but he loves you, and that is what is important.”

Robert pulled her closer to him. “Victoria, you have the biggest heart of anyone I have ever met. How can you possibly forgive him for the way he treated you?”

“You forgave my father,” she pointed out.

“Only because you ordered me to.”

Victoria swatted at his shoulder. “If nothing else, we can learn from their mistakes. For when we have our own children.”

“I suppose if one must find a silver lining,” he muttered.

“I would hope we could learn
soon
,” she said pointedly.

Robert was clearly still sleepy, because he didn't catch her hint and just gave her a dutiful nod.

“Very soon,” Victoria repeated. “Maybe by early summer.”

He wasn't such a dolt that he missed her meaning twice. “What?” he gasped, sitting up straight.

She nodded and placed his hand on her abdomen.

“Are you certain? You haven't been queasy. I would have noticed if you had morning sickness.”

Victoria gave him an amused smile. “Are you disappointed that I am not having trouble keeping my breakfast down?”

“No, of course not, it's just…”

“Just what, Robert?”

His throat worked, and Victoria was surprised to see a tear forming in his eye. She was even more surprised when he didn't move to brush it away.

He turned to her and kissed her lightly on the cheek. “When we finally married I never thought I could be happier than I was at that very moment, but you've gone and proved me wrong.”

“It's nice to prove you wrong from time to time.” She laughed. Then Robert suddenly stiffened, startling her. “What is it?”

“You're going to think I'm mad,” he said, sounding a bit baffled.

“Perhaps, but only in the nicest possible way,” she teased.

“The moon,” he said. “I could swear it just
winked
at me.”

Victoria twisted her head to look back out the window. The moon hung heavy and low in the night sky. “It looks perfectly normal to me.”

“It must have been a tree branch,” Robert muttered, “crossing in front of our window.”

Victoria smiled. “Isn't it interesting how the moon follows one wherever one goes?”

“There is a scientific explanation for—”

“I know, I know. But I prefer to think it follows me.”

Robert looked back up at the moon, still dumbstruck over the winking incident. “Do you remember when I promised you the moon?” he asked. “When I promised you everything and the moon?”

She nodded sleepily. “I have everything I need right here in this carriage. I don't need the moon anymore.”

Robert watched as the moon followed their carriage, winking at him once again. “What the devil?” He craned his head to look for a tree branch. He didn't see one.

“What is it?” Victoria mumbled, burrowing into his side.

Robert stared at the moon, silently daring it to wink again. It remained mockingly full. “Darling,” he said distractedly, “about the moon…”

“Yes?”

“I don't think it matters whether you want it or not.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The moon. I think it's yours.”

Victoria yawned, not bothering to open her eyes. “Fine. I'm glad to have it.”

“But—” Robert shook his head. He was growing fanciful. The moon didn't belong to his wife. It didn't follow her, protect her. It certainly didn't
wink
at anybody.

But he stared out the window the rest of the way home, just in case.