Flawless (23 page)

“Kiss me, Vivie.” He paused. His need to know would ruin everything, but it was just that: a need. Greater than desire. Certainly greater than his pride. “Unless Mr. Elden has already left you satisfied.”

She flinched. “That’s the second time you’ve insinuated that I’m capable of being unfaithful. Liars always suspect their own dishonesty from others. Perhaps the same goes for adulterers.” Lips pursed, expression unyielding, she pulled his hands from her hair. “Get out, Miles.”

He straightened. The bones of his spine seemed to creak as he did, protesting the distance his mind forced between their bodies. He could tell her—
Vivie, my love, I never did
. But she was hardly in the mood to hear the truth, and he needed to decide what the bloody hell he truly wanted from his wife.

H
e’d smelled of fried meat
and stale ale. The food stench made her hollow stomach contract. Viv’s mouth watered, but she was going to vomit. His lips had been like two wet slabs of fish pressing against her cheek. His snaking tongue pushed into her mouth.

Then her mother—she’d swung a pipe. The metal made a spongy sound against his ribs. He’d bellowed and raged until she hit him again, square on the face.

Viv awoke screaming.

Disoriented in the dark, she struck out and screamed again when her fists met flesh. Hands were grabbing her, holding her down. She flared to life once more. Her feet kicked and her body bucked with a terrified energy she didn’t want to control.

“Don’t touch me!”

“Viv, good Lord—Viv! Wake up!”

Strong hands held her shoulders until the last embers of her dream went cold. And all the while a low, beguiling voice eased her out of that realm of old fears and hideous memories.
“Come back to me, Vivienne. Come back. Calm down. It’ll be all right now.”

Oh, God. Miles.

What had she said? What did he know?

Frightened for entirely different reasons, she laid her hands over his. Her heart wouldn’t quiet. “Miles, I’m here.” She tried to swallow, but her throat was lined with gravel. “Stop, please. I’m awake.”

She lay on sweat-damp sheets and shivered. Collecting her thoughts was like chasing dandelion fluff. She’d never catch them all. She only knew that her nightmare was back, a memory from her childhood made slow and viscous.

Miles had pulled her from it. Three days on from their fight, having barely spoken—that mattered not at all. He’d heard her cries and he’d come to her.

“Wait here.”

He lit a single oil lamp on her bedside table. Wearing only a white nightshirt, he crossed the bedroom on bare feet. Viv soaked up the unexpected intimacy of his appearance. When was the last time she’d seen his heels? Or the dark hair dusting the backs of his calves? The curve of his taut backside seemed almost entirely new, as were the rounded caps of his shoulders. Miles poured water from the pitcher on her washstand, first fortifying himself with a drink before returning to her bed.

Chloe opened the door connecting their rooms. “Are you all right, my lady?”

“Fine, Chloe. Just a bad dream.”

“Oh! My lord!” She tightened her shawl around her body and dropped her gaze. “I didn’t—That is . . .”

“Back to bed with you, now,” he said softly. “I have this.”

She bobbed a quick curtsy and fled.

The mattress dipped under his weight as he sat. Again, that intimacy. Her husband was coming to bed. In a deep, desperate part of Viv’s heart, no other dream existed.

Her terror transformed yet again. Whatever he had overheard would be incoherent nonsense. She could still keep her secret. But what about the sweet, warm reassurance that he had rescued her from the terrible black? Miles as . . . her champion?

No. That was impossible.

Yet her feeling of security didn’t dissipate. In fact, he intensified it by cradling the back of her head and pressing the glass to her lips. She drank greedily, heedless of the water spilling down her throat. Only once she’d finished, her thirst sated, did Miles use the bed sheet to dry her chin and neck.

How was she supposed to resist tenderness? Any number of coy innuendos and sidelong leers—easy to deflect. Years of practice had fortified her against his usual methods of seduction. This was entirely new. A tiny flicker of hope flared to life.

The mattress shifted.

“Good night,” he said, voice low and gruff.

Before she could doubt, Viv found his hand in the pallid lamplight. “Stay. Please.”

His hesitation became a rushing sound in her ears. The
thump of eager blood. The morbid fear of rejection.
Not now, Miles. Not like this.

How could she bear the next few weeks, few months, if he disappointed her again?

A soft half smile shaped his mouth—lips so finely carved yet so perfectly masculine. “Shove up, then.”

Viv nearly gasped her relief. She shimmied a few inches from the edge of the bed to make room. Miles eased back the covers and slid inside. His bare feet brushed hers. She flinched.

“Easy,” he said. “Your invitation. Your rules.”

He wore his nightshirt and she her fine linen nightgown. The intimacy of lying torso-to-torso, leg-to-leg, however, was as shocking as any sexual act they’d ever shared. More shocking was her body’s reaction. She simply became a part of him, softening like butter on hot toast.

Strong arms circled her with assured power, yes, but without the intimidating sexuality she’d come to expect from his embrace. Long-boned fingers remained in neutral places—flat, still, comforting. Warm lips rested gently at her temple. His pelvis made no untoward advances. The thrill of safety was as profound and unexpected as watching Miles use a bullwhip. This was a man who could take care of her.

Would it be so wrong to forget the past and start from that moment?

“Are you going to tell me about it?” he asked.

“No.”

Being so near to him, wearing his body like an extra skin, she could feel the way his breathing changed. She had
expected fervent excitement. Instead, he simply exhaled. He sounded . . . tired. Maybe even frustrated.

“I would’ve surprised you had I chosen to confide,” she said. “Isn’t that true?”

“Absolutely.” He petted the damp hair back from her forehead. “And in a moment or two, you’ll remember some reason for why I shouldn’t be here. Then I’ll go.”

A sob bubbled out of Viv’s throat. The resilience of his vital arms and the breadth of his chest offered a place of refuge. Deep, heavy sobs kept coming, lunging out of her body. Through it all, Miles held her.

He was steadily dismantling every truth she’d come to believe about him, about their marriage, working with the confidence of a hypnotist. If she had any sense, she’d do just as he suggested: tell him to leave. Lock the door. Throw away the key.

Because none of it is real
.
None of it will last.

But as her sobs eased and his hands remained civil and soothing along her back, Viv lost her will. He lulled it out of her with the patience of water and earth. This was too much beautiful comfort to deny.

“Viv . . . were you raped?”

She raised her head. The lines on the inside of either brow tightened as he frowned. Those lovely, dark brows. Troubled. For her sake.

Although she wouldn’t tell him everything, she could mollify his curiosity—not entirely for his sake, but because his sympathy was threatening to break her heart.

“No, I never was.”

“And your father, he didn’t hurt you?”

“No. Not ever. Well . . .” She offered a wan smile. “Not with obvious intent. He frightened me. He was hard and exacting. But I always assumed he must care a little.”

“Why is that? Because he took you in?”

“No, because he never compromised. He wouldn’t have given me his name if he hadn’t wanted me to have it.”

For long minutes he was silent. His left hand rested on his stomach outside the covers. He twirled his wedding ring. Thinking, thinking.

“Then, this dream?”

“Miles, you know I was adopted. I was eight. That means I spent eight years in places I don’t want to discuss.” She shivered and dove back into the refuge of his arms. Weathering his scrutiny was far easier when she didn’t have to look him in the eye. “Being here,” she whispered against the smooth heat of his cotton-covered shoulder, “being here brings it all back. The conditions. The struggle to survive—it’s all right here to see. Does that make sense?”

“Yes.” He was stroking her upper arm now, hypnotizing her once more. “I think it does.”

Miles left her bed before
dawn, but not before staring down at the fan of golden hair that spilled across her pillow and the soft curve of her cheek. An elemental craving sped his heart. Unlike those initial weeks when he’d convinced himself that his interest in Viv was purely sexual, he was under no such delusions now. Not after holding her as the last tremors of a nightmare shook her body. Not after hearing the fear in her
voice and wanting nothing more than to sweep it all away.

As a gambler, he understood his weaknesses as well as he knew that twirling his ring was his tell. When there wasn’t an ante to be won, he hardly enjoyed looking such weakness in the face—hence the convenient oblivion of his vices. But he was no longer that man, and the stakes of this game were the highest he’d ever wagered. The time had come to be honest.

He was in love with his wife.

As if that news did not shake the very foundations of his life, he returned to his own room, finished his morning toilette, and broke his fast. Something precious would have been ruined had Viv awoken in his arms. Instinctually, he knew it just as birds knew to migrate. She had not been herself last night, but likely as close to her true self as he had ever witnessed.

Although their conjugal relationship had yet to resume—and it would resume, one day, if Miles planned to remain sane—he wouldn’t have traded these last few weeks for a pound of brilliants. Forget Neil Elden and forget their fight. Kneeling with her beside the breakfast table had been one of the most singularly erotic moments of his life. So near to his temptation.

And last night, screams fueled by unknowable nightmares had yanked him out of his sleep. She hadn’t fought when he closed his arms around her. Just the opposite. Sweet Christ, she had
asked
him to stay. The wonder of their closeness was as marvelous as a ball of blown glass, and just as delicate.

That she wouldn’t confide in him should have been a minor concern. But the need to know prodded in his brain and somewhere near his heart. What was she so afraid of?

Funny. Sipping the liquid off the last dregs of his tea, he’d never considered that the dream might be pure fantasy. He knew—his gut knew—that her nightmares had been conceived in life.

Maybe he would talk to her about it. They had become so much closer, but he hesitated. Again, that idea of blown glass. They would shatter with the least little jostle. In previous years, he would have avoided such concerns by topping up his tumbler of Hennessey and seeking out a game of chance. That morning, however, he had more reading to do. Not the Romantic poets his father so detested, but a mining and drilling pamphlet Ike Penberthy had lent him.

Miles needed to understand it, because his idea would not be quelled. Daring and untested, it would be the key to proving himself to Viv.

Two short weeks after her
nightmare, Viv accomplished what she could to combat it by founding the Auxiliary.

Or, the beginnings of it. Right now it was little more than a plain, bare warehouse made of corrugated tin. She had Neil Elden to thank for that. His enthusiasm about the project reminded her of Sir William’s decision to found a home for orphan children. It heartened Viv to think that such men existed in the world. They built themselves from nothing and gave back in return. Her father would have been satisfied with the results.

But so much work remained.

“This is marvelous,” Alice said, her voice soft as a churchgoer.

Together they stepped through the threshold. Alice carried her newborn daughter in one arm while David and John ran through the warehouse’s cobweb-draped shadows. Two windows at the front and back of the building provided its only light, but it would serve their purposes well.

“I’m envisioning rows of cots on one side.” Viv swept her arm to the left. “We could designate an area to care for young children, with rotating volunteers to assist in their care.”

“And for the remainder of the space?”

“What we discussed before: a laundry, a quilting circle and seamstresses, a food kitchen. So many men are here without families. Tasks such as cleaning and mending their own clothes can become a forgotten chore. We can provide those services.”

Alice nodded. “That will help attract some of the widows from the slums.”

Knowing all too well the boundaries of a desperate woman’s pride, Viv added her affirmation. “I promised you that from the first. It’s a business, not a charity. Women in need will register their names, children, and skills. Whether they wish to volunteer details of their circumstances should be left to their discretion. My hope is that none should need to stay for more than a few weeks. Just long enough to find suitable employment, or to return to their families
elsewhere. But some of the best may sign on permanently, as you see fit.”

“Me, my lady?”

“Absolutely. I cannot accomplish all of this and manage my business, too.”

A smile quirked across Alice’s lips. She still wore the haggard fatigue of a new mother, but her skin had taken on more color. Dark hair was neatly combed and bound in a bun. The brightness of her wide green eyes made for a lovely contrast. Even the strains of her family’s circumstance no longer dimmed her quiet, earthy beauty.

“From what I hear,” she said, her tone teasing, “your husband controls the brokerage. No lady of quality would attempt such a feat.”