Samantha James (8 page)

Simon had gone to a table near the window. “A glass of port?” he asked.

Anne nodded. Port, claret, whisky, whatever, she would welcome it if it lessened her sudden nervousness. There was something on his mind. She sensed it. As for her, well, there was little point in denying what leaped to the fore in hers.

The marriage had yet to be consummated. She had been surprised—grateful at the time—that he’d chosen to postpone her initiation until they had arrived at his home. It was only natural to be apprehensive about the night to come.

He poured, one for her, another for himself. She caught herself watching his hands, his fingers long and lean. And she wondered how they would feel, those warm, masculine fingertips sweeping over her body. Her heart climbed high. Her cheeks stung with heat.

Four days ago her world had been rent asunder. She wouldn’t fight what could not be altered. But all at once, she longed for this day and night to be over and done with.

She was willing to try to make their marriage work. Once this night was past, it would be easier. It would be
better
, she told herself.

She accepted the glass he offered. He took the chair adjacent.

“I trust you’re satisfied with your room?”

She smiled. “The view is incomparable. But I expect you know that.”

“I’m glad. I fear it was rather hastily done. If there is anything you wish to change—”

“No, no, it’s quite lovely.”

He set his glass aside. “There’s something we must discuss,” he said quietly.

“Yes?” She sipped her port.

“This marriage.”

This
marriage. Not…
our
marriage.

It was his choice of words, not so much the underlying quiet of his tone, that set off alarms ringing in her head. She had thought she knew what was coming. Now she wasn’t so sure. Still, he had been pleasant thus far. Gracious, and surprisingly so. Somehow that lent her the courage she needed.

“If you please, I—I have no need for explanations. Therefore, there’s no need to discuss—”

“There is every need.”

He sounded irritated. Rising, he prowled the room as restlessly as she had paced hers earlier. Finally he stopped before the fireplace.

His expression was hardly reassuring. “Why are you angry?” she asked softly.

He pressed his fingertips briefly against his temples, as if in frustration. “I am not angry,” he said.

“Aren’t you?”

“I am not. Forgive me for appearing otherwise.” His tone was abrupt. His hands dropped to his sides. He raised his head. “Let us be frank, Anne. Truly, I am not angry. And you need not be anxious. You need not dread this night.”

“Thank you,” she said earnestly. Her cheeks heated anew. “I admit, I
am
anxious. It’s not that I wish to—to avoid this night. It’s just that I…I’ve never—”

“I would be surprised,” he interrupted curtly, “if it were otherwise.”

By now her face was scalding. Dear God, was she really sitting here discussing her virgin state with the man who was about to render it no more?

“Yes, well, as such, I would simply like you to know that—”

“Anne.”

“—that I am well aware of what to expect. And I shall not—”

“Anne!”

She didn’t want to look at him. When she finally did, she discovered he was frowning rather severely. Why was she not surprised? she wondered with a spate of sarcasm.

But no. This was growing out of hand. “It seems to me,” she said rather briskly, “that we are making quite an unnecessary fuss about something that occurs in every marriage.”

There was an iron grimness to his features. “I assure you, Anne, this is quite necessary.”

“How so?”

“I don’t think you understand what I’m saying.”

“What then, precisely,
are
you saying?”

“I will not touch you. Not tonight. Not tomorrow. Not ever.”

He was right. She had not understood. She
did
not understand. These nights of their journey, she had thought that perhaps he was waiting until their arrival here at Rosewood. In deference to her virginity. Why, what else could it be?

“What?” she said faintly.

“You needn’t be afraid, Anne. I’m sure you’ve undoubtedly been brought up to believe that a wife must oblige her husband in their bed. I simply want you to know that I will not require that particular duty of you.”

Well, he had warned her he would be frank. Still, she hadn’t expected such bluntness—or such an announcement in the first place!

She looked at him, bemused.

Judging from his expression, he didn’t appear disposed to repeat his statement.

She took a steadying breath. If he had no qualms about such frank discussion, then neither should she. Still, the thought proved much easier than the deed. “Are you saying you expect me to stay here, to live with you here…like brother and sister?”

He did not like the term. “Not precisely.”

“How then—precisely?” Anger began to gather in her breast, sharp and ripe. Anger—and the image of his mouth on hers, the night he’d kissed her on the terrace.

“We won’t live together as husband and wife.”

Anne swallowed, her eyes fixed wide on his face. “Are you”—Lord, but was there any way to put this delicately?—“unable?”

His look of chilling reprisal left her in no doubt he was not.

She stared at him numbly. The workings of her mind seemed sluggish. “What then?”

His jaw clenched. “This is not easy for me, Anne!”

“And it is for me?” She was on her feet, as if someone had suddenly dug a knife into her back. Her lips compressed. Her eyes were sizzling. “Why, Simon? I believe I am due a proper explanation.
Why
won’t we live as husband and wife?”

“I cannot be a proper husband.” His tone was gritty. “Rest assured, Anne. It’s not you. It’s me. I—I cannot be a proper husband to anyone.”

Rest assured,
he said. Anne was anything but assured. Why, she was outraged. Bewildered. Hurt. She felt herself flooded by a dozen different emotions.

But most of all, she was humiliated. Beyond reason. Beyond comprehension. Beyond anything she’d ever known before.

“So,” she said slowly. “We will not share a bed. We will not share a room. We will not be lying together. Is that what you mean?” She formed each word carefully, with slow precision.

He said nothing.

“You did state that it is quite…
necessary
…that I understand. So please, I suggest you speak plainly.”

Still he did not speak.

“I presume, then, that we won’t make love?”

His expression had turned black as night. His mouth was a grim slash in his face.

“Say it, Simon. Since we are being
frank
with each other, say it.”

“You are right. We—we won’t make love.”

Anne thought of her parents. A squeeze of the hand. A shared glance when they thought no one was watching. She was not an innocent, not in that way. She knew what physical love was. She also knew what
real
love was, the kind her parents had experienced. What Caro and John had. The kind of love she had always thought would someday be hers.

Oh, how she felt the fool!

It seemed she was to be denied it. Denied everything. Her heart cried out in angry despair.

And in that moment, she thought of Caro and John. God, it seemed a lifetime ago that Izzie and Jack had bounced on her bed. While she hadn’t given the prospect any real thought, she had never doubted that
she
would someday have little ones of her own.

“What if I want children?” she asked levelly.

“I want no children.”

A flat denouncement. A cold finality. So. It wasn’t enough that she must endure this sham of a marriage. He would deny her what many women cherished above all else.

A painful tightness wedged in her chest. She almost wished she had not asked!

Helplessly she stared at him. Did he see the pain in her heart? Did he even care? She didn’t understand it. She didn’t understand
him
.

“We’ll wait a suitable amount of time,” he was saying, “then separate. A year should suffice. Perhaps two. Once we are divorced—”

Anne gasped. “Divorce?” she cried. “I’ll never be able to marry after that. I’ll be ostracized.”

“I’ll take the brunt of it. No one will blame you. You can say whatever you like. That I was unfaithful.”

Her head was spinning. Was she so thick
headed, then, that she hadn’t considered the possibility? Her throat constricted. It was a common enough practice—one she loathed—one she’d certainly never imagined she might have to contend with!

“
Will
you be…unfaithful?”

It seemed forever before he answered. “No,” he stated very quietly. “I will not be unfaithful.”

Bitterness choked her. He asked much of her. Yet he allowed her no choice but to agree.

“Do we understand each other?”

Anne drew a deep breath, steadying herself both inside and out. Inside she was scalded. But she wouldn’t let him see it, not even a glimpse. She would not shrink. She would not cringe, she would not cower, and by God, she would not cry. Instead she kept her head high, her shoulders back, unflinching in her regard.

“It seems we do,” she said, her voice very low. “You choose not to think of me as a wife. Therefore, I shall strive not to think of you as a husband. But there is something I wish for
you
to understand. Were I to choose to lie in the arms of my husband night after night, I should consider it a privilege—and not a duty.”

She would never know what those words cost him. There was a price to be paid, Simon decided grimly, a very dear price. Not by Anne.

But by him.

I cannot be a proper husband.

He had sensed her confusion. He’d felt the exact moment it crystallized into something far different.

A twinge of admiration cut through him. Though her pride had been wounded, she did not run, she did not hide, she did not retreat. Instead she had faced him with courage and
dignity. She had not liked what he’d had to say—no, she’d not liked it at all! But she had stood up to him, her eyes never wavering from his as she delivered those final words.

Simon was well aware she was convinced he was an unfeeling bastard.

It would be easier this way, for both of them. She did not see it now, but perhaps she would in the years to come when he was no more than a memory. An unpleasant one, at that.

Yet now that it was over and done, in its wake came a wealth of regret.

Even now he battled his conscience.

It was best this way, he decided wearily. Best that she thought him an ogre. Best that she expected nothing from him.

It could
only
be this way, he told himself. It would not be fair to her to hope for what he could not give.

Because if she did, he would only fail her.

Welcome to Rosewood
, mocked a voice in his mind. Oh, but he could not! Perhaps it was wrong. Perhaps he would end his days in the fiery pits of hell. For the very lovely Anne continued to rouse a feeling long dormant in him. Something that had been absent for five long years…

And Simon most surely did not welcome it.

Given the state of affairs, Anne had not thought to sleep a whit. Instead she slept like the dead,
not rousing until the morning light peeped through the curtains. Through the draperies, she saw that while yesterday’s marvelous sunshine had dimmed, it looked to be a lovely day. She lay unmoving for a few seconds, tempted to stay where she was. But no.
No.
She was neither weak of limb nor faint of heart. Whatever this day would bring, she would face it head-on.

Her trunk had been brought in last evening while they dined. After a quick wash in the basin, she rummaged through the assortment of gowns, tugging out a lightweight muslin with a minimum of fuss and fripperies. There was no hope of lacing up a corset by herself; she donned but one petticoat. Through a goodly time of twisting and reaching and stretching, she managed to struggle into the gown. Standing before the mirror on the dressing table, she piled her hair into a loose knot on her crown and secured it with several pins.

Duffy was in the dining room when she entered.

“Good morning, mum,” he greeted cheerily. “May I fetch you a bit of breakfast?”

She flashed a smile. “Thank you, Duffy. That would be lovely.”

The “bit of breakfast” turned out to be enough to feed a Scottish regiment, Anne declared as he set several plates before her.

Anne ate her breakfast alone, with the excep
tion of Duffy, who poked his head in the dining room occasionally to see if there was anything she needed. Once again the fare was simple but filling. Anne ate heartily of the plump sausages, potatoes, and bread slathered with rich yellow butter.

When Duffy next appeared, Anne looked up with a smile. “Is my husband about?”

“No, mum. He left early this morning to tend to his business.”

“And what is his business, Duffy?”

“Well, mum, he has a good bit of everything. Land, tenants, crops”—Duffy grinned—“and the fattest sheep in the county, I daresay.”

Just what he’d said he was. A country gentleman. Anne glanced outside. She was almost disappointed to see that the day was brightening. She’d much rather be out-of-doors than closeted inside. She’d hoped to spend at least part of the day walking or riding. But she was a married woman now, she reminded herself staunchly, with the responsibility of taking care of a daily household. Regardless of her role in Simon’s bed—or lack of it, she thought with a touch of derision—it was a task that must be dealt with. It might as well begin today.

And there was no denying there was a good deal of work to be done.

Her first task was to meet the cook, Mrs. Wilder. She was a ruddy-cheeked woman with
a manner as hearty as the food she prepared, and Anne liked her immediately. Anne’s compliments were genuine; Mrs. Wilder beamed.

She spent the rest of the morning and afternoon inspecting each room, paper and pencil in hand, Duffy serving as her guide. She was rather shocked by the condition of the house, though she kept her opinion to herself. With the exception of the kitchen, which was positively spotless, the dining room, and the master suite, dreadful was the only way she could think to describe the rest of the house. It was not the patina of age that made it so, or a shabby state of disrepair. It was simply that all was in need of a thoroughly vigorous cleaning.

“Duffy,” she asked as they proceeded down the last long hall, “has there ever been a full staff employed at Rosewood?”

“Oh, yes, mum. But not…” He paused. “Not for a long while,” he finished.

A long while
.

He’d said it again, yet Anne harbored the distinct sensation he’d been about to say something else. Her curiosity was more than a little piqued, but she decided it wouldn’t be wise to press further. Duffy was clearly loyal to Simon, and it would not be fair to him. She certainly didn’t want him to feel he was telling tales on his master.

They had halted midway along the main corridor of the house in front of a massive pair of
oak doors. Anne looked them up and down. “What is this room?”

“It’s the library, mum.”

Anne smiled. “How delightful.”

Duffy, however, appeared rather discomfited. “I don’t think you’ll wish to go in there, mum.”

“Whyever not?”

“I just…I just don’t think you will, mum.”

Anne closed her fingers around the door handle.

His eyes widened. “Mum—”

“Oh, it’s quite all right,” she said calmly. “I’ll be freshening up for dinner after this, so there’s no need to accompany me any longer.”

“Of course, mum.” There was no doubt he was unhappy.

“Oh, and Duffy?”

“Yes, mum?”

“Thank you for your assistance today.”

His smile was wide and genuine.

Anne waited until he’d disappeared around the corner, then entered the library.

Her nose wrinkled. The air was stale. It was so dark she could scarcely see. There was no question the room had not been in use for weeks. Months. Perhaps even years, she thought in irritation.

She marched forward. Her footsteps echoed on the dark mahogany floor. She headed toward the bank of windows, tripping several
times as she made her way. Finally she thrust her hand through the draperies, which had been closed tight as well. Feeling for the latch, she finally found it.

Rats! It was stuck. She mustered her strength. There! A vigorous push and the window opened. With both hands she shoved the draperies wide, only to grope for her handkerchief and press it to her mouth in the next instant, coughing at the sudden whirlwind of dust. But it was worth it, she thought, as light flooded inside.

Stepping back, she dusted off her hands in satisfaction and turned.

The sheer immensity of the room stole her breath, yet in a vastly different way than the dust had robbed her of breath, which, of course, mired everything. A matter of course by now, she thought wryly, gazing around.

And indeed, everything in the room seemed to match that immensity. It was circular. Towering shelves scaled high, clear to the ceiling. A balcony encircled, granting access to the highest shelves.

Once, this room had surely been incredible. It didn’t matter that there were no grand Corinthian columns reaching to a domed, hand-painted ceiling. It would have been out of place here anyway, she thought absently. Instead, bookshelves of English oak climbed aloft, stately and tall, meeting the wood-paneled ceiling.

A desktop globe perched atop the ebony ta
ble in the corner. Beyond the massive desk in the center of the room, a pair of Georgian library chairs flanked the fireplace. She could only imagine curling up in one of those chairs on a rainy day, a fire burning warmly in the grate, the gilt and bronze mantel clock ticking away the hours.

But it was not the grime of disuse that shocked her. That stunned her to the breadth of her soul…and that held her rooted to the spot.

Many of the shelves were bare. Literally dozens of books lay scattered across the floor, in every direction. They were not stacked neatly, waiting their turn to be shelved. No, it was more as if they’d been caught in a tempest, a tempest that had spun through the room and spent its anger.

There was a faint scent of mustiness. Anne trailed a finger down the back of the leather chair behind the desk; the leather was worn smooth. Someone had once spent a great deal of time here. Yet now the dictionary stand stood empty, the shelves naked. How sad. How tragic that something so marvelous had been abandoned, left to molder.

It was as if time had suddenly ceased, like a door left ajar, never to be opened again.

Who had done this? Why? And why had it been left in this state? She suspected she knew the answer to the first; she had yet to discover the others.

But it could be easily set to rights. Oh, she could see it already, the shelves waxed and shining, the wood richly agleam. And with the sun aslant, pouring through the bank of mullioned windows, what a heavenly retreat it would be!

One by one, she began to gather up the books—poetry, the classics, volumes of histories, travel journals—it was an extensive library. When her arms were full, she piled the books on the long, trestled worktable, sorting them by size. She would sort them again later. Eventually her arms and back wearied. She stood up, stretching.

There were various nooks and crannies built into the shelves where one might read or study. Her eyes lit on one such place. This one, however, had once housed a large display case.

No more. Shattered pieces of glass littered the floor. It was then she noted the manuscript pages, which had suffered the same fate as so many of the books. She guessed that they had been locked away in the case. Some of the pages lay under the glass, some over, spread across the floor like a deck of cards left to the mercy of the wind.

She moved closer, easing down on her knees and bending low. With utmost care she picked up the nearest one. As she suspected, it was vellum. Reverently she fingered it; it was frag
ile and worn.

The text was Latin. In the center of this particular page was a drawing of three men atop donkeys. They traversed a path that led to a church, while angels hovered overhead. It was beautifully embellished, the edges gilded. It was easy to envision a scribe, hunched over a table lit by candlelight, poring over his task for weeks, perhaps even months.

Anne had seen such manuscripts before, but only in museums. It was surely hundreds of years old, she thought in awe. Again the question surfaced. Why had it been left like this? What possible reason could there—

“What are you doing?”

The voice came from directly behind her. Unalerted as she was, Anne pushed herself upright. The heel of her hand bore the weight of her entire body. But she’d forgotten the broken glass. She felt a sharp pain as a hundred tiny slivers bit deeply through the skin.

Anne ignored it. She jerked upright, spinning around to face her husband.

His brows were drawn together fiercely, his tone no less than icy. His gaze went from the vellum to her face—and did not stray. She could have sworn she heard his jaw lock.

“You’re just the person I wished to see,” she said brightly. “Your library is quite lovely, but atrociously maintained, I fear. Which brings
me to ask…may I have your leave to hire a housekeeper? Forgive my directness, but Rosewood Manor is sorely in need of one, and perhaps several housemaids as well. And I do believe their first task should be this library.” Anne’s cough was not entirely exaggerated. “My word, it’s enough to send a body into fits!”

“No,” he said.

Anne blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“No.” This time it was quite deliberately stressed. “I want no one snooping in this room.”

I don’t want
you
snooping in this room.

That was what he really meant. He left her in no doubt!

But while he made no pretense at manners, Anne accorded hers most generously, she was certain. Her mother would surely be proud.

“This is the most glorious room in the house,” she said pleasantly. “I’m hardly a scholar”—she waved the page in her hand—“but these pages may possibly be quite rare. Indeed, they may be quite valuable. Perhaps you should consider having an expert in to—”

“I know exactly what they are. And I repeat, this room is never to be used.”

Anne’s smile froze. Her iciness matched his. “If it’s never to be used,” she pointed out, “then perhaps it should be locked.”

“I live here alone,” he said curtly. “There’s been no need.”

Anne stood as rigidly erect as he, her injured palm hidden behind her back. His control was maddening. And, damn it all! her hand was beginning to throb. And she could tell it was bleeding. She twined it into her skirts. Blast it, she could only hope it wasn’t dripping onto those precious pages of vellum!

“You are free to employ a housekeeper,” he went on, “and whatever maids you wish. Do whatever you like in the rest of the house, but this room is not to be touched.”

“Ah,” she said snidely. “Are we to come to another understanding?”

Their eyes locked. Each tested the resolve reflected in the other’s eyes.

“Call it what you will,” he said finally.

“I do believe I’ve married a madman,” Anne remarked. “What I cannot believe is that I ever allowed you to kiss me.”

He appreciated neither the cut of her words themselves nor the slice of her tone. In fact, she had the feeling he was gnashing his teeth.

All at once his eyes narrowed. “What are you hiding?” he asked sharply.