Thornbrook Park (13 page)

***

When Lucy greeted her with a tray in the morning, Eve thought that Sophia was sleeping in instead of going down to breakfast.

“Thank you, Lucy.” She accepted the tray. “Have you heard if the lady has plans for us today or is she still abed?”

“You're at your leisure today. The earl and countess had an early breakfast together and have plans for the afternoon.”

“Plans?” This was new to her limited experience at Thornbrook Park, the lord and lady having plans together. She thought it a positive development. A married couple should escape for some time alone now and then.

Nodding quickly, Lucy obviously shared her enthusiasm. “He's arranged a picnic lunch. They're to have a carriage ride through the countryside followed by lunch alfresco. They're not even bringing a footman. The earl himself will manage the horses.”

“Is it unusual for them to proceed unaccompanied?” Lucy's excitement told Eve that it probably was.

“Very unusual, of late anyway. When they were first married, and I was just a kitchen girl, they used to go out alone all the time. Then, gradually less and less until it became a rare thing.” Lucy held her hands in front of her apron and blushed as she spoke, probably embarrassed to be telling tales.

Eve was glad for the information. She hoped that if they had drifted apart, they could find their way back to each other. But perhaps there hadn't been a rift and it was simply a matter of them making more time for one another. It wasn't any of her business, of course, but she wanted Sophia to be happy.

“A day to myself? What a novelty.” She hadn't had a day all on her own, without any pressing business, since she left India. “You're free to go, Lucy. I won't be needing you until it's time to get ready for the evening.”

“Are you sure? You can ring for me later if you need me.”

“I believe I can manage. But thank you.”

Not long after Lucy left her and she'd eaten her breakfast, Eve got up to go through her trunk. She found her saris, each swath of bold color a reminder of the daring adventures she'd had. Prama, her maid, had showed her how to drape the fabric around her body. She'd worn the chartreuse on her first and only elephant ride through the village that ended when her ride stopped for a drink and almost tipped her into the stream.

Once, in the crimson, she'd surprised Ben with her willingness to hold a snake from one of the vendors in the marketplace. She hadn't even minded how it wrapped around her wrist and slithered up her arm. It was cool and smooth, not slimy and not poisonous, or so the vendor had insisted.

Next, she found her spices. Ah, how she wished she had packed more of them. She couldn't make more than a few dishes before running out, but perhaps she could write to Adela Adams to send her more. Some of them were probably more valuable than most of her remaining jewels: the amethysts that had belonged to Ben's mother, the jade bangles he had bought her at the market, the gold ring that Ben had placed on her finger when they'd wed. A year after his death, it had proven too painful a reminder of the fact that she'd been a wife and was no longer. She'd packed it long before leaving.

There was a bronze statue of Vishnu, a quilt from her childhood, the last of Ben's cigars, unsmoked. How she'd hated the smell that now held bittersweet nostalgia. Perhaps she would light one later to jog her memory. Her
Kama
Sutra
that Prama had translated from Sanskrit to English. She opened the book to a racy illustration, a man and a woman kissing each other in private areas, but she did not blush. Some things needed no translation.

Most importantly, she found her photographs. There he was—Ben, his square jaw, his bold gaze looking straight into the camera, but not in the same way he'd looked at her. She would never see that look again. Tears came to her eyes, and for a half minute, she couldn't breathe. Ben.

She remembered the day he'd sat for the photograph, how she'd laughed at the faces he'd make, sticking his tongue out, crossing his eyes. In the end, he'd looked all too somber, seated upright, ramrod straight, no hint of a smile, not quite himself. But still, it was Ben, her Ben. Her husband. Her life. Her whole life, or so it had been not so very long ago.

Sometimes, it felt as though it had been so long since she had seen his face that he'd started to blur around the edges. Sometimes, she tried to imagine that Ben and his features would distort into Captain Thorne's. She felt ashamed that she could lose Ben so easily. But she would never lose him. Not really. He would always be a part of her. Staring at the photograph stirred a profound sadness that she didn't want to feel.

She closed the trunk, dusted her hands, washed, dressed, and decided to go in search of some writing materials. It was time she wrote to Colonel Adams, asking for his assistance in locating Mr. Strump. She could enclose a note for Adela, too. And then, perhaps, if time remained, she might get started on her novel at last. If she couldn't recover her fortune, she could try to make a new one with her writing, enough to get by, at least.

The library, she realized, was a room she hadn't taken the time to explore. She knew they had one at Thornbrook Park. She'd walked through it quickly on her first day before moving on to get through the rest of the house. It held an extensive collection of books, filling shelves tall enough to require a ladder, and a few shorter shelves in the middle of the large room with two writing desks, reading tables, and several seating areas.

It dwarfed the library at Averford House, not that she'd taken time to look through that one, either. She'd merely sparred with Marcus in the center of the room. She stroked her lips, remembering the feel of his kiss, then snapped from her reverie. Yes, it was time to investigate the library.

When she arrived, she stopped at a reading table behind the center shelves. Someone else had been enjoying the library, from the looks of it. A snifter remained on the table next to a book of Romantic poems, the same book she'd held last night. Marcus? Had he come here after dinner? There was still a little liquor in the bottom of the glass. Brandy, she deduced, swirling it around in the stream of sunlight stretching across the room from the far window.

On the other side of the table was a small leather-bound book, a pen tucked inside, ink neatly capped next to it. She picked up the journal and the pen rolled out. The pen had probably been marking a place. Eve didn't want the owner, possibly Marcus, to think she had been snooping. It appeared to be a notebook or a ledger. She picked up the pen from the floor and opened the book to replace it. At least, that was her intention.

31 May, 1898

So lonely. I expected war would be brutal. Violent. Desolate. But I never counted on the loneliness. How can one be lonely when surrounded by a hundred other men?

It's as if the walls are caving in. The feeling is more cramped and dark with every passing moment. I need laughter. I need light. I need… something. Something that feels so very far away.

Marcus's war journal, she realized. She knew she should stop reading, put it down immediately. These were obviously private thoughts, meant for him alone. But she wanted to know if his whole four years were so bleak and lonely, so awful. She had to know that he'd found some of the light and the laughter he craved. One more page. She skipped ahead.

19 June, 1898

Cooper and I patrolled the edge of the field, searching the brush for potential dangers. He was the first to find one of the box bombs we'd practiced dismantling. I warned him to take his time. He rushes so that one would think it a race against time. And of course, there's always a danger, but more danger in making a mistake than not disabling a bomb fast enough.

Only this morning, he shared the letter from his wife, Prudence, with a story of their son, youngest of the four children, getting a new tooth. No matter what happens, it remains imperative that Cooper gets back to his family. I couldn't ask for a better friend.

Eve smiled at the lightness of his tone, despite the obvious dangers he and his friend Cooper faced. She was glad he'd found a friend.

She skipped another few pages, read a bit, and then another, before she finally forced herself to put it down. When she read his comparison between his bond with Cooper and his lack of camaraderie with his own brother back home, her heart nearly broke for him.

“Oh, Marcus,” she said out loud and then jumped at the sound of her own voice. She wasn't concerned that he had heard her, wherever he was, as much as she feared that speaking it aloud would make it true, that she was falling a little in love with Marcus. But it wasn't love, she corrected herself. It was infatuation, perhaps. Or lust, pure and simple.

Of course, it couldn't hurt for Eve to imagine herself in his arms, to think what she might do to watch those lush lips part to speak her name. She was entitled to her fantasies, as long as they stayed just that.

She imagined herself in costume as an exotic harem girl and Marcus as the sheik who'd purchased her. They'd look over a copy of
Scheherazade
, taking turns to read to each other aloud. She would perform her own version of the Dance of the Forty Veils, swiveling her hips and dropping veil after veil until finally Marcus couldn't bear it any longer.

“A little light reading?” A voice interrupted Eve's fantasy.

She startled and dropped the journal. The shelves had concealed her from the door, lending her a false sense of security. She hadn't counted on the thick Aubusson rug masking his steps until it was too late.

“Marcus.” Her heart hammered. How to explain herself? “I just wanted to put the pen back in the journal. I didn't know it was a journal, of course, until I opened it.” She swallowed guiltily. “I should have known you were here from the book of Romantic poems, of course.”

“The same volume you held last night.” He closed the distance between them one slow step at a time, stopping so close that their bodies nearly touched. She wondered if he held his hands behind his back to prevent his reaching out for her, as she longed to reach out for him. “I brought it over after dinner. My refuge, the library. Gabriel never comes here.”

“It's an excellent library. I don't blame you. Your father's doing?”

“His great-grandfather. Some of these books are older than the house.”

“Built in 1722? By the first Earl of Averford?” She struggled to remember what Finch had said when he'd recounted the history of the house while showing her around that first day.

“In 1724.” Marcus smiled. “Very close. The first Averford was reportedly a favorite of George the First.”

“Which is why your great-grandfather was named George? I'm guessing. I noticed his portrait in the gallery.”

“You're probably correct. I never thought about it. Great-Grandfather's first son was George, too, but he met a nasty end at an early age. Drowned in a barrel of wine while trying to steal a taste. They say he haunts the wine cellar, but I've never seen him.”

“Perhaps Finch invited Mrs. Hoyle down there to scare him off. We could always ask Agatha if she senses a presence.”

“Gabriel wouldn't like that since one of Agatha's séances sent Sophia's first maid scampering, or so I've heard.”

“I would have thought Bowles more loyal. She'd been with Sophia since our coming out. Mrs. Jenks is a vast improvement, though. I'm not sure Sophia could get on without her.”

“I wouldn't underestimate Sophia. She's most likely made of steel to be able to put up with my brother.”

“The sixth Earl of Averford, who, curiously, is not named George.” She didn't wish to speak of her friends any longer. Perhaps because thinking of them was at odds with what she wanted to do with the man intended for Sophia's sister. “The tradition ended after the drowning?”

He nodded. “Grandfather was Edward, and so was Father. Mother wouldn't dream of using a family name. She went with Gabriel, the angel, because she admired his statue in the Pantheon. An angel's name for my brother, isn't that rich?”

He didn't laugh, so neither did she. “You should be Michael, then, shouldn't you? Gabriel and Michael, both angels?”

“Mother has a sense of humor. She named one of us for an angel, and the other for the god of war, Mars, practically assuring from my birth that we would never get along.”

“Or perhaps she named you for Marcus Agrippa, the commissioner of the Pantheon? If she holds a fondness for the Pantheon, it would make sense.”

“Marcus Agrippa?” He narrowed his eyes. “How do you know so much?”

She laughed at last, her spirit lightened, and gestured around them. Wouldn't Colonel Adams scold her for showing off? “I read, Marcus. Everything and anything. When you spend a lot of time alone, you begin to consider—”

“Books to be your friends.” He finished for her, the crooked half smile spreading into a full one. “They were mine, too, growing up, my very best friends. I suspect that we're a lot alike.”

“Perhaps too much alike,” she said, meeting his gaze. “I should go.”

He let his hands free to take one of hers, lacing their fingers together. “Stay. No one's at home to bother us. Sophia and Gabriel went out. Brandon trotted off with the groundskeeper to explore. The servants have straightened up in here by now. We can be alone.”

“Exactly why I should go. We can't torture ourselves. This can't go much further.” Once she said it, she realized her mistake. She should have said that this couldn't go
any
further, putting an end to all possibility.

He nodded in agreement. “I know. Gabriel cornered me today about marrying Alice. He tried to force me.”

“Force you, how?”

“With idle threats. Ridiculous, really. He threatened to eliminate my inheritance.”

“Can he do that? Would he?” She knew the brothers didn't get along, but she had no idea that Gabriel could be so devious.

He shook his head. “Of course not. He can't. I'm not sure he wouldn't try. But I made a deal with him instead. I agreed to marry Alice in exchange for the farm.”

She dropped her hand as if scorched. “What about Alice? How does she feel about all this? Did either of you even consider her?”

“No one's going to force Alice into anything. I think I can win her admiration, if not her love. It's possible that we could be happy together. Tolerably so, at least.”

“What every girl dreams, to be tolerably happy in life.” She felt a little sick.

“Please, don't be cross with me.” He reached out to stroke her cheek with the back of his hand. She wished she were numb to the low, rolling hum of desire skittering along her nerves. “You know I'm in a bind. I'm responsible for the Coopers. I will not deceive Alice. I'll be sure she knows how I feel about her.”

“Which is?”

“That I hold her in very high esteem.”

She exhaled, not even realizing that she'd been holding her breath awaiting an answer. “But you don't love her?”

“No. I don't love her. Not now, maybe eventually.” He looped an arm around her waist. “People marry for reasons other than love all the time. You know it well.”

She peeked up at him from under her lashes. “I do.”

“Then please don't hold it against me. I feel like we're having a lovers' quarrel, and we're not even lovers.”

Yet.
She sensed that he'd been about to say “yet” and thought the better of it. But was he so far from wrong? Even now, she was prepared to return his embrace, to cradle his head against her bosom and tell him it would all work out somehow.

And that was precisely the problem. As impossible as it seemed that they could get together, she'd hoped it would all work out. Could she do that? Become a man's lover? She'd begun to believe it possible, even as she denied it could be. She knew it was wrong, but how right it felt between them.

“I don't hold it against you, Marcus,” she said at last. “I wish you well. It's noble that you want to give the Coopers a better life. As long as Alice gets to know you as I do, I'm certain that she won't be able to resist you.”

She turned away, toward the bookshelves behind them, to hide her forming tears.

“Eve.” He placed himself in front of her again. “I'm not promised right now, at this moment. I'm free to give myself to anyone I choose. We can't have any more than today, but we can have today.”

“What are you suggesting?” Her pulse raced, wildfire in her veins.

He gripped her by the shoulders, his mouth opening ravenously on hers, and then he broke the kiss as suddenly as it had begun. “For today, at least, we could pretend we have each other, and no one else. No demands, no promises to keep.”

Heat pooled at her core. For today. Truly, what harm would be done? “What would you think of me?”

“The same that I think of you now. You're a beautiful woman who deserves to be adored. Do you mean to shut yourself away and never love again?”

She didn't mean to remarry, but she'd enjoyed relations with her husband. Could she really imagine giving it up entirely?

“‘Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,'” she quoted Herrick. This was her chance. She might never have another.

“That's it, yes.” His eyes were heavy-lidded as he leaned in to kiss her again. “My suite or your room, which is closer?”

“No. Here. Now. Before I change my mind. You said we were safe from discovery?” Frantic, she pushed his coat from his shoulders.

He shrugged out of it. “No one will interrupt us.”

She sought his mouth, nibbling gently on his lower lip as he fumbled with the buttons on her dress. He managed one, two—she lost count—but suddenly his palm grazed her breast and she stilled, savoring the sensation of flesh on flesh. Two years of pent-up desire simmered in her veins, building toward an unstoppable release. His body pressed against hers, backing her up and lowering her to the table. She ran her hands over him, shifting beneath him so that she could feel more of him against her.

“Marcus.” He found the hem of her skirt and pushed it up, allowing her to wrap her legs around him, to pull him tighter against her until she could feel his erection straining against his trousers and her linens. She gasped at the heat of his hand on her tender thighs and mewled softly when he slipped a finger inside her. “Yes.”

“Yes,” he echoed, sliding the finger in, out, and circling around her delicate nub until she quivered, biting her lip to keep from calling out. He leaned over her, blazing a trail of kisses down her neck to her breast, flicking his tongue across her nipple through the silk of her chemise that he couldn't quite remove. “I can't hold back. I need you now. Please.”

Please.
On top of everything else—his kissing, his caresses—that one word, “please.” She came undone.

***

God help him, Marcus tried to stay in control. The beauty of the woman, her fallen hair like spun gold against the dark of her gown, challenged his resolve, but her softness beneath him drove him over the edge. He couldn't remember ever feeling so lost in a woman before Eve. At the moment, he could scarce remember his own name.

She moved a fraction, rubbing against him, and he hardened to the point of aching. He set his teeth on edge, struggling to hold back, to make it last, though he felt like a schoolboy, new to all sensation. She made him feel new again, filled with awe and reverence.

On a kiss, he entered her, the wave of ecstasy threatening to pull him under as she pulsed around him. He gasped for air, the feeling of being inside her nearly overwhelming him. She writhed and urged him deeper, faster, pulling him to her on a ragged whimper and burying her face in his shoulder as she climaxed with a violent shudder. He joined her there at the edge of heaven, dissolving like foam in their ocean of bliss.

For a moment, he stayed atop her, both of them struggling to steady their ragged breathing. Their gazes locked and held. Those gas-flame eyes led him right back to her through the gauzy haze, and he'd never felt more intensely alive and aware.

Suddenly, she sat up, adjusted her skirts, and began to button her dress. He did up his shirt and retrieved his coat from the floor. A hundred times would never be enough, a thousand, millions. How could he court Alice? How could he not?

But they still had today. All day. He reached for her. “Eve.”

“They'll be coming back.” She flashed a dazed smile. “They'll all be back, who knows when. I need to freshen up.”

“Of course. I'll meet you back at your room, then. It's our day, our only chance. I'll take you for a picnic, how's that? Somewhere no one will find us, our own little paradise.”

“A picnic? It sounds lovely, but—”

He placed his fingers to her lips. “A picnic. Why not? It seems to be the day for it. Unless you have any objection to sitting on a blanket over grass and eating cold chicken, cheese, and bread?

“No objection.” She smiled. “I'll get my hat.”

***

Filled with a sublime joy that she'd never thought to feel again, she rode beside Marcus in the front seat of the car.

“When did you learn to drive?” she asked, trying not to sound astonished by his unexpected accomplishment.

“Another thing I learned away at war.”

“Lord Averford took his lady out in a carriage, so I assume your brother doesn't know how to drive.”

Marcus nodded, never taking his gaze from the road. “Why would he? He employs a driver to make a position for someone in need.”

“I see. Why learn to drive and risk putting a man out of work?” She knew Lord Averford well enough by now.

He raised a fist and deepened his voice to an authoritative tone. “It's our responsibility to provide.”

They swerved slightly and she gave a shriek. “Both hands on the wheel, please, Captain Thorne.”

“Don't be a ninny.” He flashed her a smile. “Or I'll go faster.”

“I think we're going quite fast enough.” It was a much more thrilling ride than any she had taken with Dale. Her spirit felt as light and free as the breeze whipping through her hair with the glass down. She didn't even mind that her chignon had fallen loose. “Where are we headed?”

“I'm not sure, but I'll know when we get there. As long as we're headed in the opposite direction from the earl.”

She agreed. “We can't afford to run into them. Do you know where they've gone?”

“Gabriel's favorite spot is the grassy banks of the creek just before it widens to the lake on the northwest side of the property. Good fishing. I'm guessing he's brought his pole.”

“To fish? While they're picnicking?” She nibbled her lip. “Sophia won't like it.”

“No?” He seemed surprised. “She objects to his manly pursuits?”

“When they take his attention from her, of course.” She laughed.

“I see.” His brows knit. “How do you think things are between them?”

“Between Sophia and Gabriel?” At once, she realized that he shared her concerns for them.

“It's hard to say. Is Sophia happy? Yes, I suppose. She has the life she has always imagined for herself.”