The Dead of Haggard Hall

by Marie Treanor

  “You wear too many layers,” he whispered. “Is it a test? Or protection?”

  “Both.”

  His lips stretched into a smile against my skin. His hands slid between my back and the wall, seeking and finding the fastenings of my overgown and gown, loosening them until the bodice drooped around my elbows. The cool evening air was sweet on my heated skin, though not nearly as wonderful as his hands and his mouth, caressing my shoulders and chest, and unexpectedly freeing one naked breast.

  This was where, if I’d had any sense, I would have called a halt. But my body and my spirit clamoured for his attention. It had been a long time since I’d known the touch of a man, and this one was so different from Gideon that I had no frame of reference. I just knew I wanted this so badly I might explode. So I threw my head back against the wall and closed my eyes, clasping him to my breast where he teased and kissed my nipple before drawing it into his mouth and pulling in a long, blissful stream that almost made me whimper.

  And then his hand replaced his mouth and he was kissing my lips once more, while his palm and his fingers worked magic on my breast. His other hand was dragging at my skirts; I didn’t stop him. His muffled groan when he found my naked thigh at last was music in my ears. He pulled the string of my drawers, and I felt them begin to fall. Like me, surely like me…

  All but panting, he dragged his mouth free, holding us still in that position for the space of several galloping heartbeats: his hands on my breast and my thigh, my dress rucked up almost to my hips, my drawers held up only by his body, and my arm flung around his neck in an attitude quite shamefully abandoned.

  “Tell me you want this,” he said in an unsteady whisper. “Tell me you want this, or I’ll stop. Silence will do, but only for a little, a very little…”

  My heart thundered in my ears, drowning out the sound of my own breath and his. A breeze rustled the tree branches above us. An owl hooted close by, and from inside the ballroom came the strains of music, no longer a Viennese waltz.

  Slowly, I dropped my hand from his neck, and his eyes closed in something very like agony. When I pushed both hands between us, he began to back off without protest. But my fingers had already found the fastening of his trousers, and his eyes flew open once more.

  I stood on tiptoe, turned up my face, and kissed his mouth. With a gasp, he pushed my skirts as far as possible to one side so they weren’t in the way. My questing hand found the huge, hard bulge of his member, and a tiny growl issued from my throat.

  His hand closed over mine, pressing my fingers around his shape. “You don’t trust me,” he murmured breathlessly. “You don’t know me.”

  “I know what you feel,” I whispered. “It overwhelms me, dizzies me…”

  “Do you not feel anything of your own?”

  “Oh yes,” I said, almost brokenly. “Oh God, yes!”

  And then my hands were brushed aside as he dealt with the opening of his own underwear. I was yanked upwards as my drawers fell downwards, and pressed into the wall. He pushed inside my throbbing body. Huge, hot, stretching me. My mouth opened in a silent cry, whether of shock or delight I had no idea.

  “Oh God,” I whispered again as all my bodily longings swirled and met around his sweet invasion. The pleasure would find me so fast, so powerfully, I would need to bite my lips to stop from screaming.

  He found his way fully inside with another surprisingly gentle thrust. I was so wet for him, his passage was easy, but to take him even deeper, I hooked my exposed leg over his hip and he growled deep in his throat, thrusting forward in what seemed involuntary action, but once begun, it seemed he couldn’t get enough. He pushed into me hard again and again, and I moved with him, straining and grinding, my open lips buried in his throat until he wrenched my chin up and sank his mouth in mine while he hammered me into the wall in a frenzy of long suppressed hunger.

  I took it all, absorbed it all, pushing my tongue into to his mouth, clinging, as the ecstasy began to build around our movements, soaring and galloping out of control. His emotions, his agony of pleasure rushed on me, swamping me, blasting me into the most violent climax of my life.

  Boneless, I managed somehow to cling to his mouth, muffling so far as I could the helpless sounds of my ecstasy. His panting matched mine as he thrust even faster, and then, with a stifled groan, grasped his member in his hand and pulled free to spill his seed outside my body.

  It speaks volume for my physical and mental state that I was sorry.

  Although for this care of me, for this consideration, I was very swiftly grateful. My monthly bleeding was due within a few days, but one could never be sure.

  He collapsed against me, the wall supporting both of us. For several moments, we sprawled there, our harsh, panting breaths mingling in the night-scented air.

  At last, he hauled himself semi-upright. His legs, his whole body seemed to tremble with the effort.

  “Barbara Darke, you are amazing,” he whispered, and kissed my mouth. “Thank you.”

  Slowly, reluctantly, I withdrew my mind from his intense daze of pleasure. It wasn’t fair when he couldn’t tell how I felt. Well, he probably could, for our bodies seemed to communicate pretty well.

  Voices sounded close by, a tingle of female laughter. Cigar smoke drifted with the sounds on the breeze.

  “Oh no,” I breathed. “Look at me!”

  My breasts and one thigh exposed, my hair tumbled like some hoyden while a man pressed me into the dark wall. How much would anyone see from the terrace if they came this far along?

  “I am looking,” Patrick said in a hoarse whisper. “So much beauty and boldness and utter temptation. I want you again.”

  Fresh lust released its moisture between my legs, and my internal muscles contracted as if searching for him.

  “People,” I managed in a mixture of panic and need.

  He touched his forehead to mine. “I know.”

  With reluctance, he pulled my bodice back up over my shoulders and reached down to drag my drawers back up. He even retied them for me before he brushed down my skirts. Only then did he readjust his own clothing.

  “This way.” Taking my hand, he led me around the tree and the corner of the main house. My legs shook under me as we crept along, so perhaps it was fortunate that after only a few yards, he pushed open a door I could barely see and guided me into a dark corridor. From there, we went through another door, which he closed behind us and then released my hand to feel his way through the darkness. I heard the hissing of a match and a moment later, a warm if faint glow surrounded him. He looked rumpled and sensual and in spite of our so recent intimacy, butterflies gambolled in my stomach.

  He lit another candle from the first and turned to me, holding out his hand peremptorily.

  I tried for lightness. “What are your intentions, sir?”

  “For life?”

  “No, right now.”

  “Well, until I lit the candles, I planned to help you fix your dress and your hair, but now I see you, I have the urge to dally a little longer.”

  “I should go back to Emily,” I whispered. I wanted nothing more than to dally with him.

  He advanced on me, and my heart lurched. A frown tugged down his brow. “Did I hurt you?” he asked with surprising gentleness.

  I shook my head. “Oh no. You were…wonderful.”

  His eyes cleared, lit up with a smile of as much amusement as pleasure. “You are wonderfully honest. I hope.”

  He touched my cheek with just a hint of uncertainty that plucked at my heart. By way of answer, I caught his hand and kissed it. His fingers clung to my lips in a soft caress.

  “I didn’t plan to go so far,” he said hoarsely. “This…urgency with you took me by surprise.”

  “And me,” I acknowledged, trying to regain my self-possession.

  His lips quirked, but he didn’t drop hi
s gaze. “I’m not quite sure what we’re doing,” he said carefully. “But please don’t ever regret that we did it.”

  I found myself smiling. “I don’t believe I will. You are…intense.”

  “I know. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. I like it. Oh dear, stop me talking.” Hastily, I began to rearrange my dress.

  He turned me gently and refastened both gowns. “I’m afraid the black silk is marked at the shoulder,” he said ruefully. “I believe it will tear. Do you want to just take it off since you have the red gown underneath?”

  I shook my head. “No, no one will notice a tear. They’d only wonder if I appeared to have changed halfway through the evening.”

  “Do you care what people think?” he asked curiously.

  “I care for my privacy.”

  I felt him nod, as if he understood that, before he walked around to stand in front of me consideringly. “It’s been a while since I’ve played lady’s maid, but I think I can put your hair back as it was.”

  I stood still under his hands, absorbing his touch, his concentration. Something was growing inside me that I didn’t want and didn’t know how to deal with. And yet it felt like happiness folding warmly around my heart.

  “Madness,” I whispered.

  His gaze shifted to my face. “But sweet,” he said, dropping a kiss on my lips. “There. That looks rather good, though I say it myself. Now, do you want to brave the gossips and return to the ballroom together? Bearing in mind that Cartwright is vicious and has already ruined reputations just to spite me. Or shall we go separately?”

  I frowned. “Separately, then.” Although I wanted to know about Cartwright and those reputations. Did he mean Caroline’s? Were the rumours false, then? I wished I didn’t want that quite so much.

  “Very well, I’ll go back the way we came in. You go on to the end of the passage. It will bring you out just at the ballroom, and you can return to Emily as if nothing happened.”

  I smiled. She’d see it in my face. Everyone would see that I was different because of what I had done with Patrick Haggard—bold and daring and so, so delicious. I shivered.

  He bent and kissed my mouth, more carefully than outside, but still very thoroughly. Then I left him and blew out the candles, and we went our separate ways.

  * * * * *

  My mother had called me darkly wicked. Which was exactly how I felt in the afterglow of what I’d just done with Patrick. Each step sent tingles shooting outward from between my legs as delicious reminders. What we’d done and where we’d done it was forbidden by all the normal laws of morality and decency, and yet I felt neither cheap nor abused. On the contrary, I felt glorious, bold and invincible.

  Gideon had always said I looked different immediately after we’d made love—like a cat with the cream—so I did my best to fasten a neutral expression on my face and not to appear too smug. In fact, just thinking of Gideon helped there.

  Is this betrayal? I wondered. Gideon would never expect me to live and die alone just because he was dead. On the other hand, he would have thought in terms of love and marriage, not…this, whatever it was. Explosive, irresistible lust, sweet and wicked.

  I’m a fallen woman. My breath caught in silent laughter as I crossed the ballroom in search of Emily. Surely Gideon would get used to that too, as he had to my communicating with spirits. My fear was that he’d move on entirely and I’d miss him…

  The trouble was, even if I’d known Gideon would never speak to me again, I’d still have welcomed Patrick’s embrace.

  My searching gaze found Patrick first. He was sitting in conversation beside Sir Neil and Caroline Jordan. I looked quickly away and in doing so, caught several other people in surreptitious observation of the same tableau. One of them was Hugh Cartwright, who caught my gaze with his brows raised as if saying, “You see what I mean?”

  I began to think I did.

  “There you are!” Emily exclaimed. “Mr. Fredericks was looking for you. You missed your dance.”

  “Oh dear, how rude of me,” I said guiltily. “I had to fix my dress, and I totally forgot.” In fact, I’d lost my dance card. I must have dropped it outside. I’d have to find an excuse to go outside and retrieve it before anyone else discovered it and asked awkward questions. I owed it to Emily, as well as to my own teaching career, not to lose my reputation.

  * * * * *

  When I glanced towards Patrick again, Caroline was no longer with him, but was dancing with Mr. Faversham. Patrick and Sir Neil seemed to be enjoying a continued conversation. A few moments later, Patrick stood and pushed the old gentleman’s chair towards the ante room where card tables had been set up.

  I felt as if my evening was finished. I wanted the ball to be over so that I could be alone and savour the event. In fact, I’d no idea how to pass the time, since I couldn’t follow Patrick around, hanging off his arm like an adoring and slightly annoying bride.

  “Shouldn’t I carry your fan or something?” I asked Emily.

  “You know I don’t have one,” Emily said wryly. “Just enjoy yourself. I’ll send Mr. Fredericks to you as soon as I catch sight of him.”

  I fetched myself a glass of wine, and sat down in the same, quiet seat I’d occupied earlier beside Irene and Miss Salton, long since departed to bed, and watched the dancers.

  A little later, someone sat beside me, and I turned to see Caroline open the dance card on her lap. “And so, who is next? No one, I see. What about you?”

  I opened my mouth to tell her I’d mislaid my dance card, when she slid it from under hers and onto my knee.

  I blinked stupidly. “Thank you.”

  “Patrick found it. It’s his night for saving reputations.” Her smile was a little crooked. “Although in your case, I suspect he was responsible for risking it in the first place.”

  I searched her face. “Is that what he’s doing? Saving your reputation? Did he risk that in the first place too?”

  “It was never his to risk. Patrick and I have been friends since childhood. He has always been a frequent visitor in our house. For some, that is enough to prove an illicit relationship.” Her gaze flickered towards the dancers, and I followed it to Hugh Cartwright, then dancing with Emily. “We know he started the rumours, spread them to the newspapers. We could sue for libel. We choose to rise above it and simply show that Patrick is my husband’s friend as much as mine. Neil’s preference for his company despite the scurrilous things written about him and me, should give a few people food for thought. I dislike being talked about.”

  “Cartwright tried to ruin you just to attract ill will to Patrick?”

  “My husband is well liked and respected, despite his ill health.” She turned back to me. “You find us an odd couple. Most people do, which is why the lies fell on such fertile ground. I was eighteen years old when my father married me to a man nearly thirty years my senior. I was angry, bitter, disappointed. But the funny thing was, once married, I grew to love Neil very quickly. I would never betray him.”

  She wanted me to believe her. I could sense that much without trying. Combined with her openness to a stranger, it made her whole story suspicious. She had no need to tell me all this. I was no one who could harm her or help her. Yet I caught no dishonesty or deception from her.

  “I’m sorry this has happened to you,” I said. “I’m just not sure why you’re telling me.”

  A smile flickered across her face. “Because Patrick is a troubled man. He needs a Neil in his life, and he has—forgive me—become somewhat obsessed with you.”

  I felt a flush rise up through my body. “Are you warning me off?” I asked as pleasantly as I could.

  A peal of genuine laughter surprised me. “The opposite, Mrs. Darke. If he loves you, he has hope.”

  My jaw was in danger of hitting the floor. I hung on to it with difficulty. “He doesn’t love me
,” I said flatly. “He barely knows me, and what he does know, he neither believes nor likes. I am a schoolteacher of an incurably independent character. I am, besides, a natural medium subject to perpetual hauntings and unexpected spiritual invasion. I am not his Neil.”

  “We all need different rocks,” she said mildly. “And I have no intention of trying to choose his or yours. I merely wanted to remove the obstacle of this rumour of his tie to me. It doesn’t exist, except through friendship.”

  She was, I thought, a fascinating woman. I could think of nothing to say to her that did not involve pleading for reassurance or for information about Patrick, so I held my tongue to the roof of my mouth.

  Caroline gave me a little nudge with her shoulder. “He was sure you’d come to take advantage of Arthur and Emily, and he meant to nip it in the bud. You took him by surprise. Trust me, he does not dislike you. Like you, he is not conventional. He is a creature of impulse and yet capable of great thought and kindness. You might well be good for each other. And if you can exorcise the ghost of Rose from his life, his friends will be most grateful.”

  “Rose,” I said, latching on to the one thread that had nothing to do with my relationship to Patrick—I didn’t want that poked or even touched. I didn’t know if it existed beyond a wicked fumble in the dark that a lady should never have allowed. “Her ghost is still here. Actually as well as metaphorically. Something is wrong in this house.”

  “Too many ghosts?” she asked lightly.

  “The ghosts I would expect. The malevolence is…newer.” Until I said it, I hadn’t really acknowledged the fact. But it began to fit with some of my other rather hideous suspicions.

  Caroline gave a little shrug. “There have certainly been a lot of unexplained tragedies here in recent years. Perhaps putting those to rest will make the house a happier place. Although with Arthur and Emily in residence, I’m sure it will become so anyway. And here comes Mr. Fredericks, clearly a man with a goal. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll make myself visible to my own partner.”

  * * * * *

  I only glimpsed Patrick from a distance for the rest of the ball, which was, clearly, a resounding success. Emily, undoubted belle of the ball, brought an infectious joy to the occasion through her natural good spirits and instinctive hostess talents.