by Merry Farmer
“Give it a chance,” Bond said, sounding wise, but also very, very old.
It knocked Isaac out of his uncertain thoughts. “Please. Let me bring you the new medicines. They may prove to be just the thing.”
Weak as he was, Bond raised an eyebrow. “I can’t pay for any newfangled medicines. I have Elaine’s bequest to think of.”
“I’ll give them to you for free,” Isaac said. “We’ll consider it our own scientific experiment. After all, the compound is so new that I can only judge its efficacy through trial.”
Bond continued to stare flatly at him. Isaac suddenly felt like a schoolboy who had incorrectly answered an easy question on an exam. Bond let out a breath and gestured for him to lean in close. He looked at the ladies once more, hinting that he didn’t want them to hear what he had to say. Isaac leaned in.
“My time here is short,” Bond said in no uncertain terms. “Those beautiful girls will be on their own when I’m gone. Unless you come to your senses with Rose,” he added in a gruff aside. “I refuse to prolong their sadness in any way. I don’t want them knowing how close the end is.”
“Are you sure that’s wise?” Isaac whispered.
Bond frowned. “Elaine wants to enter this silly regatta next week. If it’s the last thing I do, I will see her racing.” He paused. “And it very well may be the last thing I do. Don’t—” He held up a shaking hand as Isaac opened his mouth to protest. “Don’t tell me I’m wrong or that I have no right to finish my life this way.” His determination withered as he sank back against the pillows. “Just…just make certain that the girls are looked after. Make sure you’re looked after too.”
“What is he saying?” Elaine stepped forward. Her anxious glance shifted from Isaac to her father. “What did you say to Dr. Newsome, Papa?”
Isaac looked to Bond to know how to answer. Elaine and Rose both moved closer to the sofa.
Bond gathered his breath and said, “I told him that I’d like to try this fancy new medicine he says he has.”
Elaine’s worried look melted to relief. “Yes, Papa, yes. We’ll try the new medicine.” Isaac stood and she rushed to take his place on the footstool. “Dr. Newsome will fetch the medicine right now, won’t you?” She turned back to Isaac pleadingly.
“I…I have another patient to see,” Isaac said slowly. “Perhaps—”
“Rose will go with him,” Bond said, a glint in his eyes. “She can fetch the medicine and return here whilst Dr. Newsome sees to his patients.”
A grin pulled at the corner of Isaac’s mouth. The sly old dog. Even on Death’s door, he was playing matchmaker. And damn him, but a part of him was willing—eager, even—to listen to the man’s advice and give it a try. “My patient is in the country, not in town.”
Elaine caught her father’s glimmer of mischief. “We can wait. Rose can go with you to visit your patient, then accompany you back to town for the medicine.” She sent a smile Rose’s way.
Isaac pivoted to look at Rose, his pulse picking up. But her expression was unreadable. “If that meets with your approval,” he said.
Like a green youth, he held his breath, eager for her answer, eager for her to say she would go anywhere with him. The fact that her brow furrowed in thought as she glanced from him to Bond sent doubt swirling through him, and when she turned to him with a smile at last and said, “I can go with you,” Isaac could have danced for joy.
“The wagon is just out front,” he said, stepping toward her.
“Let me just fetch my hat and shawl.”
As Isaac followed Rose to the hall, Elaine leaned closer to her father, saying, “You see, Papa. Everything will be all right. We have so many years ahead of us.”
Rose must have heard too. As she plucked her hat from its peg near the door, she sent Isaac a wary look. Isaac had no desire to pretend with her, and let his expression fall. Sad resolution filled Rose’s face, and she nodded. But it wasn’t until they were outside, settled in the wagon, Lancelot champing at the bit, that she said, “He really is dying, isn’t he?”
Isaac let out a breath. “I’m afraid so.” He gripped the reins hard, muscles straining to keep Lancelot in line. What was wrong with the poor beast.
“I knew he was sick even before I was sent here.” Rose sighed, wringing her hands in her lap. “Bonnie thought I might be useful, since I used to help her out with—” She stopped suddenly, face reddening.
A thousand questions flooded Isaac’s mind, but the last thing he wanted to do was ask the wrong one and cause Rose to clam up again. “Do you have nursing experience?” he asked instead.
“I don’t know if you would call it that,” she answered.
When she didn’t offer anything else, silence fell between them. Lancelot fought him on one of the corners leading out to Fisher’s farm. Isaac’s mood was uncertain at best. He half hoped the drive with Rose would be sweet and cozy, that he could coax her out of whatever hesitation had caused her to pull away from him after their kiss the night before. Because, Lord help him, between everything Bond had said, and after the way she felt in his arms, the way she was so eager for intimacy, every bit of his determination to remain unmarried as a means of penance for Annabelle’s death was shattering.
“What will happen to Elaine when her father dies?” Rose broke the silence, dampening Isaac’s ardor.
He shrugged. “I’m not certain. I have reason to believe that Bond’s finances are in good order. He was born the second son of an Earl, you know.”
“Was he?”
Isaac nodded. “His father and older brother mismanaged the estate, though. They were forced to sell everything that they legally could. Lord Bond died several years ago, and the brother is living as a titled pauper somewhere. William was lucky. He attended Oxford and worked in the law for many years, earning enough to live comfortably.”
His narrative was interrupted as Lancelot reared and tried to shake off his bridle. The wagon jerked to the side, and Rose gripped the edge of her seat with one hand and her hat with the other. It took Isaac a few, heart-pounding seconds to get the horse to settle. In the back of his mind, he wondered whether or not he should stop and see if he could figure out what was wrong with Lancelot.
“I’m more concerned about you,” he said instead.
“Me?” Rose’s voice rose.
He sent her a quick look before focusing on driving once more. “Will you stay on with Miss Bond if…when the inevitable happens?”
Rose continued to hold her hat to her head even as she blinked. “I hadn’t considered. I…I would like to. If Elaine continues to need me.” She paused, then said, “In fact, I think she will need me. More than ever.”
A strange twist of bitter and sweet emotions coiled through Isaac’s gut. “You wouldn’t—” he began, swallowing and weighing whether he should continue with his question. “You wouldn’t consider…possibly…marrying?” Part of him couldn’t believe he’d asked something so bold.
Rose’s mouth slackened. She dragged her eyes away from Lancelot—who she’d been watching as intently as if she were driving—and stared at him. Isaac wished he could spare a glance to see if he could read the emotion in her eyes, see if he could determine what her answer would be if he should—
With a pitched cry, Lancelot broke into a run. Isaac’s full attention snapped to driving as the wagon shot off, headed for a downhill stretch of road. Rose gasped and gripped the seat with both hands.
“Whoa, boy, whoa!” Isaac called.
But Lancelot was off. The poor horse was foaming at the mouth. How had he not noticed? There was nothing Isaac could do to slow him, or to stop the wagon from careening down the road at a dizzying speed. Every bump they hit was magnified tenfold. The wagon began to shudder and list as Lancelot dragged it on. It tipped to one side, and there was a crack. Isaac gripped the reins harder, using every muscle he had to try to slow or steady Lancelot.
It was no use. He couldn’t steer the horse or the wagon. More cracks followed, and Ro
se screamed. They were going to crash. Panic nipped at the edges of Isaac’s focus, but he couldn’t let it get the better of him. He had to concentrate, had to find a way to rein Lancelot in and keep the wagon from smashing apart, dashing them to bits. If only he could steer. Lancelot might calm down, or at least lose speed, if he ran off the road into—
He spotted exactly what he needed, a thick stand of leafy bushes at the side of the road, next to the ancient, abandoned forge. The grass was overgrown, and the bushes might be enough to soften whatever impact they were in for. He tugged on the reins with all his might, praying that Lancelot would follow the commands.
It almost worked. Lancelot dashed off the road just as one of the wagon’s back wheels snapped clean off its axel. The wagon lurched to the side. Rose screamed again, crouching in on herself. A split-second later, Lancelot fell. The wagon splintered as forward momentum shattered the harness shaft. There was a sickening thump as the wagon made impact with the fallen horse, and then Isaac was flying through the air.
What happened next was a blur of green and brown as he flew through the bush he’d been aiming for and landed with a shock of pain on thick grass. He lay stunned and aching for an indeterminate amount of time. The roar of the wagon running away had hushed, leaving the paradoxical sweetness of birds singing in the empty forest around him. He rolled to his side, testing his muscles and bones for injury.
Rose’s groan of pain in the grass not far from him snapped his senses back to full focus.
“Rose?” He pushed himself to his hands and knees, satisfied that he was as whole as he could be. “Rose, are you all right.”
He scrambled to where she lay on her side, hugging herself. Her gaze was unfocused until Isaac reached her, pulling her into his arms. Then it cleared. She focused on him, blinking rapidly.
“Are you okay, are you okay?” she breathed frantically.
“I am,” he said, smoothing a hand through her tangled hair. Her hat flopped to one side, barely held on by a single hatpin. “Are you hurt? Are you in pain?”
“I…” She winced, rolling in his arms as though checking her limbs. “I braced myself…with my arms…the grass was soft…my leg….”
“What’s wrong with your leg?” He shifted his hold on her, pulling up her skirt, half expecting to see her limbs sticking out at broken angles.
But she was in one piece. Her stockinged legs were straight and whole. He tested them anyhow, searching for breaks and watching to see if she cringed. But no, somehow, miraculously, nothing was broken. On either of them, despite several shallow scratches. The wagon must have slowed enough before crashing and the overgrown grass around the old forge had been thick and soft enough to cushion what otherwise could have been a deadly impact.
“We’re alive,” Rose gasped. She gripped his arms, spread her hands across his shoulders, touched his face. “We’re both alive.”
Something clicked in Isaac’s mind, like fire being touched to gunpowder. They were alive. He’d never felt so alive in his life. Relief and power rushed through him, and a wild, heady, almost insane sort of joy overtook him. He pulled Rose closer and brought his mouth crashing down over hers, as if she was the bringer of the fresh, sweet life that ignited his soul.
Rose felt as though sunlight burst inside of her at Isaac’s kiss. She didn’t care that they were sprawled in the grass beside a wrecked wagon. Her brain couldn’t have formed a rational thought if her life depended on it. The fact that she still had a life was all she could comprehend. She should be dead. She should have died in the wreck, or of some venereal disease or casual violence when she was a whore. She should have been killed by the merciless blows dealt by the criminal who lured her to the West. She should be dead so many times over, but she wasn’t. She was alive and vibrant in Isaac’s arms.
His mouth was demanding as it covered and explored hers. The passion behind his short, desperate breaths spun her head. His hands spread across her waist and back, searched up, covering the curves of her breasts through the simple cotton of her dress. She wanted more of that, more of him, and tugged frantically at his shirt. It slipped away from his trousers, and she splayed her hands across the hot flesh of his sides. It was insane, but also perfect, the essence of the vibrancy that pulsed through her.
Isaac groaned at her touch, his mouth moving from hers to her neck. Even that wasn’t enough for Rose. She dug her fingertips into his back, gasping as he slid his tongue across her skin. His hands moved to undo the buttons running down the front of her bodice, and soon his kisses followed. Her whole body blazed with need as he unhooked the top of her corset and freed her breasts. The familiar sensual ache between her legs was suddenly stronger than anything she’d felt before. She knew what came next, knew what she needed, and wriggled to signal Isaac to give it to her.
Only then did she realize they had somehow shifted until she lay on her back in the grass. It was disorienting to know they’d moved together without being aware. The entire world seemed warped and disjointed around them, but Rose had a hard time caring. How could she want anything but the intense pleasure that Isaac’s every touch, the pull of his mouth as he gently suckled her breast, and the completion she felt was within her grasp? She reached for him, finding the fastenings of his trousers and loosening them.
He let out a ragged gasp as she slid her hands beneath his undone waistband to stroke his cock with both hands. He was rigid with need, and growing harder by the second. She sighed at the hot thickness of his length in her hands, knowing full well everything it meant and everything it could do. She wanted him inside of her, plundering her with abandon and stretching her to her limits. And even though she couldn’t form those wants into words, he seemed to hear her.
With fast, jerky movements, he pulled her skirt and petticoat up. His hands sent shivers through her as he stroked her thighs, pushing them apart, and finding her hot, wet sex. He let out a rough, visceral sound as he stroked her, and Rose cried out at the pleasure that shot through her. Time had suddenly sped up and slowed to a single moment all at once. The urgency of their situation was wild. Isaac couldn’t wait, and neither could she.
He was inside of her in an instant, pushing deep and filling her. Rose let out a cry of victory and grabbed hold of him. She dug her fingertips into the firm, tense muscle of his backside as he thrust hard into her, over and over, at a punishing pace. The insanity of the situation, the intensity of the emotions that were too big to hold inside, sent orgasm pummeling through her, and she cried out in completion.
Moments later, Isaac let out a muffled cry as he lost himself in her. Rose knew enough to know his climax had been raw and powerful, and that he hadn’t had the presence of mind not to spill himself inside of her. But what had been a dangerous risk and even an offense in her former profession, was suddenly the most glorious thing that could have happened. Even as Isaac sagged, spent, on top of her, Rose hugged him, laughing. Sudden, inexplicable, inappropriate, and mad beyond measure, she finally had everything she’d ever wanted from a man.
CHAPTER 7
T he blissful euphoria of mating that had swallowed Isaac whole subsided slowly. A thick sense of unreality permeated him. It wasn’t until Rose laughed quietly that he even had the presence of mind to roll to the side so that he wasn’t crushing her. As soon as he did, as soon as the cool air swirled against his exposed skin and quickly softening erection, the full impact of what they’d just done hit him.
“My God,” he murmured, half astounded, half horrified. He tugged at his trousers to cover himself. His awareness of the world around the two of them slammed into sharper focus, and with it, panic set in. “Dear God, what have we done?”
He scrambled to a crouch, fastening his trousers and tucking in his shirt while searching the road for signs that anyone had seen them or would see them. Rose moved more slowly, but only by a bit. She pushed her skirt back into place and sat so that she could do up her bodice.
She was beautiful. Seeing her disheveled and pink from passion
threatened to fire Isaac’s blood all over again, even with sense firmly returned. What he had done was unforgivable. He had taken advantage of her in the most shameful way—minutes after a wreck that could have killed them, no less—but seeing her hair tangled, her skirt in disarray and not quite covering her calves, and her lips swollen from the ardor of his passion made him want her all over again.
He was a cad of the worst sort.
“I’m sorry,” he said, leaning toward her but pulling back. He didn’t have a right to touch her now. “I’m so, so sorry.” Shame bowed his head.
“Why?”
Rose’s question snapped it back up again. “Why?” He blinked, right back to being muddled and dizzy again.
Rose shifted to kneel in front of him, reaching for his hand. With her eyes downcast, she admitted, “I’ve been wanting to do that for a long time.”
Isaac’s mouth fell open, but not a single word came out. She’d been wanting to rut in the grass like pagans with him? She’d wanted him to take her without a care for her comfort or propriety, out in the open where anyone could have wandered by and seen them? After a wagon wreck that nearly killed them?
The wagon. Lancelot.
Another burst of energy hit him, and he jumped to his feet, twisting to face the wreckage that had been his wagon. “Lancelot?”
Guilt like nothing he’d known before seized him, and he stumbled toward the carnage. How could he possibly have lost his head so completely that he would disgrace Rose moments after his wagon had been destroyed and his horse—yes, it didn’t take an expert to see that Lancelot was dead. He let out a strangled moan of regret and rushed to the far side of the wreck where the horse lay.
It was impossible to tell for sure, but from the angle of Lancelot’s body, it looked as though his neck had been broken. It was exceptionally rare for a horse to perish that way, but it also looked as though the speeding wagon had smashed into him when the harness shaft broke. He could have had other internal injuries as well. And it was as likely as not that whatever had been effecting his behavior over the last few days had contributed to the whole thing.
