Lords of Desire (36 page)

“James!” she scolded, though she couldn’t manage to put much heat into her voice, perhaps because he had mentioned love again. He loved her. He knew all her secrets and still he loved her.

When he took her hand and stroked his thumb over her palm, they both watched. Once again, Sarah marveled at the contrast of his skin against hers. His fingers were long and bronzed and dusted with hair, and the sight of his scraped knuckles thrilled her in a way that didn’t bear examination. Ladies were not bloodthirsty, after all.

“James?” she whispered.

“Hm?”

She turned her hand around and threaded her fingers through his. “I have one last confession.”

His thumb froze against her hand. “Another?”

“Yes. I think…that is, I am quite sure that I am terribly in love with you.”

“Ah, I see. Terribly?”

“Yes, horribly.”

Slowly, he raised her hand to his mouth for a long, lingering kiss that turned into a smile against her skin. “Good. I would hate to think myself alone in this misery. But I detect that you were recently in doubt.”

She swallowed the thickness from her throat. “Not doubt. Not of you. I have only felt so…confused. My life changed so completely. A new home, a new role, a new life. I was Mrs. Hood, and I did not know who she was.”

When she dared a look at James’s face, she found his brow falling into a deep frown. “I never thought…” he murmured. “That sounds horrid, Sarah.”

“No, it wasn’t horrid! It was only a change, and you have been lovely and patient and kind. And if it hadn’t been you…if it hadn’t beenyou, James, I would’ve been afraid and lost.

“But itwas you,” she said when he looked as if he would interrupt. “And now I know who I am again. I am Sarah. I am your wife. And I love you.”

James did not answer. He only stared down at their clasped hands, with his mouth set in a flat line.

Love and fear pulsed through Sarah’s veins. She had said too much, revealed something that might hurt him. “James?”

“I am thinking what I could do to help you adjust. I am trying to imagine how it would feel to give up my home and family and habits and start anew with a virtual stranger.”

Sarah could not help but smile at that. He was hardly a stranger anymore. The fear left her, dissipating through her skin and disappearing entirely.

She kissed his shoulder, but he didn’t look up. “The strangest thing was that I had never been allowed to even be alone with a man, and suddenly…” She smiled at him when he glanced up, a pained expression on his face. “Suddenly I was expected to bevery alone with a man, if you understand my meaning.”

James cringed. “I think I do.”

“But I have come to realize that the best solution for strangeness is complete immersion.”

“Immersion?”

“Yes. If you truly wish to help me adjust…?”

His eyes grew warmer at her tone and flickered down the sheet that hid her body. “Oh, I most certainly do.”

“Then I believe if you would focus your attentions on only my most pressing anxieties…”

James leaned a little closer and idly wrapped one hand into a trailing edge of the sheet.

“My God, Mrs. Hood. You are a genius. Pray tell, what is your most aching concern?”

Sarah nodded, trying to look solemn even as she blushed to the roots of her hair. “I am wondering…”

“Yes?” When he shifted, the sheet wrapped around her bosom became precariously loose.

“I understand that a husband has certain needs…”

His hand sneaked beneath the edge of the linen, and his fingers spread wide over her naked knee. “Oh, yes,” he answered, voice a little lower than it had been. “Definite needs.”

“But I’ve read several books on the subject, and it’s not clear…”

“Hm?” His thumb slipped higher, feathering against her thigh.

“Just how often”—she had to pause to draw a breath—“those needs mightarise. ”

“Ah,” James sighed sympathetically. “Poor wife, kept so thoroughly in the dark. Perhaps a demonstration would make it most clear?”

When he nuzzled her shoulder, the sheet finally gave up its hold and fell away. He bent his head immediately to his task.

“Oh, yes,” Sarah gasped. “A demonstration.”

He proved over the next few hours that a man’s needs might arise quite often between husband and wife. And Sarah proved herself a quick student of her new role.

SWEPT AWAY

KRISTI ASTOR

For the “Debs,”

otherwise known as Romance Unleashed:

Sandy, Teresa, Cynthia, Lori, Laura, Flo, Jackie,

Sophia, Pamela, Caroline, Kathleen, Kathy, Sally,

Barbara, Irene, Paula, Kate, Eve, and Jessica.

I’m so glad we found one another,

and am eternally grateful for your friendship!

CHAPTER 1

“He’s like Mr. Rochester and…and”—Christobel searched her mind for a proper literary example—“and Mr. Darcy, all rolled into one brooding, supercilious parcel.”Yes, that was it. Precisely. “Without the redeeming characteristics, of course,” she added with a sigh.

“Come now, Christobel,” her mother scolded. “Don’t be so dramatic. Mr. Leyden isn’t as bad as that.” She paused, chewing on her lower lip as she often did when dissembling.

Christobel gave her mother a knowing look. “Isn’t he?”

“Well, even if he is,” she relented, “he’s Jasper’s cousin and you must endure his company with good grace. I won’t have you acting childish and snippy—”

“I’ve never been anything but pleasant to Mr. Leyden, Mother. But goodness, you must admit he’s a terrible bore.”

In all the years they’d been acquainted, she’d tried to see past his deficiencies—his brooding silences and arrogant attitude coupled with his common birth and an ever-so-slight yet discernible limp—to find something to admire. Yet for all her trying, she’d found nothing in his character to merit more than a passing interest.

This never failed to puzzle her, as he was exactly the type of specimen she was often drawn to. Never could she walk past a starved dog or a bird with a broken wing and not take such a creature into her heart, to see to its care and comfort as best she could. Yet for Mr. Leyden, her brother-in-law’s most devoted cousin, she felt nothing more than a vague annoyance.

Perhaps, Christobel realized, it was because Mr. Leyden made his disapproval ofher so very evident. How many evenings had she suffered beneath his stare, his brow raised in censure as he watched her across the room while she laughed and coquetted? As if such activities—laughing and coquetting—were inappropriate behaviors for a young lady of her situation.

Christobel sighed heavily as she glanced out the train’s sooty window, the autumn colors blurring into a glorious canvas of reds and golds. What else was an unmarried girl to do at a house party but flirt and enjoy oneself? She shook her head, plucking absently at the folds of her skirt, wishing the train were taking her anywhere but to Edith and Jasper’s home—and Mr. Leyden’s unavoidable company.

“Don’t frown, dear. It isn’t good for your complexion.”

Christobel shifted her gaze from the window back to her mother, seated directly across from her in the train’s compartment. Beside her mother sat Simpson, her head tilted at an awkward angle as she dozed, snoring softly.

“How does she sleep so soundly, with all this noise and activity?” her mother asked with a smile.

Dear, dear Mother, who never frowned despite the misfortune that had plagued them since Father’s death. Indeed, the woman had smiled in the face of the insurmountable debt and near financial ruin her husband had left behind.

Her mother’s smile hadn’t faded as they’d been forced to sell off their furnishings and leave the only homes Christobel had ever known—their lovely country estate in Surrey and their town house in Wickham Road.

And now they were reduced tothis —rented flats in London during the summer season, and traveling from one of Christobel’s three sisters’ homes to the next for the remainder of the year.

The only servant they’d been able to keep on was the ever-loyal Simpson, who had been their housekeeper but now served as lady’s maid, housekeeper, and sometimes cook, at least when they were in London.

The situation was mortifying at best, almost enough to make Christobel wish to marry, simply so she could have a place to call home. Of course, it wasn’t as if she had many options, as far as her future was concerned. She could either marry or continue to remain the spinster sister, forced to rely on the charity of her siblings and their husbands.

She wasn’t entirely opposed to marriage, of course. It was just that their funds had been limited, especially after Father’s death. They’d not been able to afford a true season for her, not after the expense of putting out three girls before her. By now she’d become almost complacent, used to her mother’s companionship. They’d fallen into a comfortable routine, the two of them. No man of her acquaintance had inspired her to change her course, not yet.

“Whom do you suppose Edith has invited this year?” asked her mother. “She’s always so clever with her guest list.”

“Clever?” Christobel couldn’t help but laugh. “She’s shrewd, is what she is. Almost mercenary.”

Her mother nodded, a smile of satisfaction on her face. “Successful matches that led to marriages three years in a row now, isn’t it? Your sister is becoming a legend.”

“There must be a better use for such talents,” Christobel muttered uncharitably, then instantly regretted it.

After all, with what else had her sister to occupy herself, living so far north where genteel company was hard to come by? Poor Edith.

Of course, she could not blame Jasper for the misfortune of his place of birth. After all, Hadley Hall was a nice enough estate and would be more than tolerable were it located in, say, Kent or Surrey or Dorset rather than Lancashire.

Dull, gloomy Lancashire, where mills and factories often dulled the sky to gray. Part of Jasper’s family’s fortune had been made in the mills—cotton mills, to be precise.

Unfortunate, yes, but there had been enough good breeding in Jasper Hadley’s lineage to make him an acceptable groom for Edith, nonetheless.

Indeed, Jasper was a dear, a worthy match for Edith.If only… Christobel let the thought trail off. No use wishing the impossible. Her mother had done the best she could after Father’s death. A wave of guilt washed over her, shaming her. She should be grateful for her sister and brother-in-law’s generosity. Yet she could not help the feeling of unease that crept into her heart as the train chugged northward.

She glanced at the watch she wore on a thin, gold chain around her neck, then dropped it back against her blouse.

Across the train’s compartment, her mother smiled at her—a warm, fond smile. “Why don’t you sleep, dear? We’ve still a ways to go before we reach Manchester.”

A weary Christobel nodded. Indeed, hours of travel still lay ahead. Nearly two hours remained till they reached Manchester, and then they must change for the Oldham Loop to Cranford, where Jasper would fetch them and drive them the short distance to Hadley Hall.

Too tired to read the volume of poetry that lay on the seat beside her, she closed her eyes and allowed the train’s rhythmic movements to lull her into a dreamless sleep.

“And Mr. Godey has requested a room next to Lady Margaret’s, so I’ll put him here.”

“Good heavens, Edith! However can you keep it all straight?” Christobel shook her head in amazement as Edith laid down the last of the cards on the table before them—each card representing one of her expected houseguests. Later, the cards would be placed in special holders on each guest’s door.

Edith just shrugged. “It’s been much less difficult this year. Except for the complication with Mr. Aberforth, that is.”

Apparently a Mrs. Lovelace had requested a room beside Mr. Aberforth, which wouldn’t be a problem except that a Mrs. Roth had requested easy proximity to Mr. Aberforth’s room, too. Had Edith known that Mr. Aberforth was currently keeping company with two ladies, she would never have invited them both.

How could Edith look so calm and serene, Christobel wondered, dealing with such arrangements as this? But as usual, Edith looked entirely unruffled, her warm brown eyes as tranquil as ever. Edith had always been the great beauty of the family, the one on whose shoulders the greatest responsibility of marrying well had lain.

After all, everything about Edith was the height of fashion—the feminine ideal—from her dark, glossy hair to her porcelain-hued skin and deep brown eyes lined in kohl.

Christobel, on the other hand, had never been a beauty. Oh, she was perfectly attractive enough, she reasoned, just nothing as extraordinary as her sisters were, all doe-eyed beauties like their mother. She’d inherited her father’s green eyes, eyes that were too sharp, too expressive to be fashionable.

And though Christobel spent far too much time out-of-doors, she refused to paint her face with enamel before brushing it with rice or pearl powder. Thus, her skin was noticeably tanned, with a dusting of freckles that were hard to conceal and gave her mother much to fret about.

It wasn’t that she eschewed cosmetics altogether—she enjoyed visiting Madame Rachel’s salon in Bond Street as much as any other young lady. She had pots of face and lip rouge, bottles of Jordan Water. Still, her looks would never rate above average, a fact that didn’t bother her in the least.

With a shrug, Christobel turned her attention back to the cards spread on the table.

“What of these?” she asked, tapping two cards with unfamiliar names written in Edith’s precise script. “I don’t believe I’m acquainted with either.”

“They’re new acquaintances, both. Miss Bartlett is a lovely girl, quite fair of face.

Bookish, I suppose, and somewhat solemn.” Edith raised her brows, a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. “I was hoping that she and John Leyden might suit.”

“No!” Christobel exclaimed, laying a hand on Edith’s wrist. “You’re actually hoping to make a match for Mr. Leyden?”

Edith nodded. “It’s high time, don’t you think? He spends far too much time at the mill.

He’ll never meet the proper sort there.”

Christobel couldn’t help but smile as she reached for her teacup and took a sip. Knowing Edith as she did, she was certain that much time and consideration went into selecting this Miss Bartlett. She likelywas a good match for Mr. Leyden, and Edith would no doubt make her intentions quite clear on the matter. How fascinating it was going to be, watching Mr. Leyden squirm under such machinations.