by Gayle Eden
“Ready.” She stood, smiling her thanks as a servant stepped out to collect their jug and glasses, and the maid called a young man from kitchen chores to take her boots and hat above.
Eyeing the breeze ruffling her short wavy hair, Rotherham said, “We’ll take the horses. Have you gloves?”
“Jem will fetch them, your lordship,” the elder maid called out before telling the boy to bring the Countess’s riding gloves.
By the time he did that, Audra appeared, dressed in blue broadcloth skirt and half boots, a blouse of soft blue, and calf length carriage coat. She’d let her hair down and tied it back at the nape.
“Be careful,” Alina called as they split up.
Rotherham packed the pistols in his saddle pouch when they were ready to mount up. He watched her settle in the saddle after a leg up from the groom, sitting astride and handling her mare well. They headed off to the park.
Though she had some sort of camisole on, her breasts pressed against the linen of the shirt enough to distract Rotherham, a few times on the ride. He did not fight the thought that he looked forward to another pleasuring of her. In some ways, he was grimly torturing himself. But even had they bedded traditionally, he had doubted he would stop the erotic play. In fact, he spent his morning ride expounding on it.
* * * *
“I’m bloody good at this,” Alina announced, amazed after blowing the third branch to smithereens. She handed the pistol back to Rotherham, who had stood aside after loading, teaching her how, and having packed four shots for her.
“You have a good eye, steady hand, better than some lads at the academy I recall.”
Alina watched him clean them and pack them in a case. He straightened and handed her the dagger. “It fits in your garter.” Then, dryly he asked, “Do you need to be told where to stab?”
She fingered the cool weapon, liking it, and pulling the small case off the blade and eyeing it. “No. if I ever felt the need to draw it, I’d be emotional enough to fight for my life with it.”
He nodded and watched as she replaced the blade cover and dropped it in her boot.
Standing there a moment more, she peered into the direction she had shot and mused, “I hope I never have to shoot someone.”
“I hope not, also. But he certainly isn’t going to get far, if he runs.”
“I’m not jesting, Rotherham.” She turned and examined his hard face. “I won’t be a victim if I can help it. Yet I don’t relish taking a life.”
His jaw flexed. “Is that some reference to the fact that I have?”
“No. I realize there are unavoidable instances. I am merely saying that shooting a branch is one thing…”
She observed the harshness in his sherry eyes. “I’m not judging you, or even asking you to explain. It was an impulsive comment.” Alina went into dangerous territory and said softly, “There are times, I feel like for every brick I take down and glimpse behind it—you put two more in its place. I know your expectations, and that you only ask the one thing of me—which in truth, my lord, covers a great deal—depending on how extreme one views it. Nevertheless, we have no past, only present, and future. I intend to take you at face value. To go on, as you allow things to, between us. But while no woman could quarrel with your generosity, you are distant, aloof, and stingy with what you offer—of yourself.”
His stare had not changed but Alina saw the chill come into it. She regretted already, her words.
Rotherham said eventually, “I made myself clear from the start, Alina.”
“I’m not just talking about sexually, I am speaking of other…intimacy… in fact, you have confused me somewhat. You obviously react to pleasing me, and at the same time, say I must come to you. How can I, Trevon, when I cannot read you. You hold yourself so aloof.”
He looked away from her in a slow deliberate manner. Trevon offered coolly, “I’ll bed you tonight—”
“Oh, bloody hell. Forget I said anything.” Alina all but stomped over to the horse, hopping twice before she gained the saddle
She gathered the reins, and then glared at him. “Why is it, I feel that even though you limit intimacy to sex, and want to reduce me to either a show piece Countess or sexual partner—even that thickens the wall you want there? It’s as if you don’t want to think of me as a woman, a person, who may move you to feel something—anything, that resembles closeness.”
Alina turned to leave, but turned back, watching him take his time getting on his own mount. She offered, “I could enjoy the life you’ve given me, I do. I sleep without worry, for the first time since my father died. That is more wonderful than I can explain to you. But we could have something more—if you would but trust me.”
He sat facing her, making no effort to come alongside. However, his figure in the saddle, his expression, was as forbidding as if he had already put miles between them. Trevon uttered eventually, “I wed you because you had all the potential to be a sophisticated and strong woman. A mature one. Do not become some reforming romantic, Alina. It wouldn’t please me.”
She felt pain and anger merge, a kind of sick, in her gut, sensation, that she did not have time to analyze.
Alina realized it showed on her face, yet rasped before turning her mount, “If you didn’t want me to care for you, or to want more, Trevon, you should not have given me anything. You should have never touched me.”
She turned and kneed the horse, riding rather blindly to the stables.
It was hours later, having requested dinner in her chambers, and after a bath, that Alina rubbed the heels of her hands against her temples—wishing she had waited, given it time—kept her mouth shut. She wished, she had simply enjoyed the outing, and she reminded herself how fortunate she was. She wished she had not pushed, or said what she did, this soon.
Sitting at the window seat, she rested her elbows on the ledge, head in her palms, hearing those familiar night sounds, and feeling, smelling too, a coming rain. Never in her life, had she been so consumed with understanding a man. Never, had she dreamed, day or night, of a voice, a look, an image.
She knew deep down that wall was carved when the scars on his back were put there. She did not need him to tell her who or how. She simply wanted to—No—she suddenly needed to touch something more of him, to see something like the kiss he had given her. She wanted…. behind that wall.
Dragging her hands over her face, Alina stared out at the night, hands under her chin whilst her mind chased regret and desires at the same time.
If only she had waited…
The door between their rooms clicked open. Alina did not turn to look, even though she knew Rotherham was leaning in the doorway. She could feel his gaze going over the room, the low turned lamp, and her image.
“Are you well, Madam?”
“Yes,” her tone was gruff. She cleared her throat, adding, “I apologize… for today. It’s a…female thing.” She hated saying that.
“Yes. Your menses are over?”
“Nearly.” She drew in a breath and let it out.
Gathering herself, Alina turned her head, and then stood, walking idly to the lamp. “We go to London this week?”
“Yes.”
She felt him watching her closely. “I shall look forward to the theater. Audra will also. We used to read plays, but never saw one.”
“I’ve a private box at several theaters.”
She nodded and trailed her fingers over the amusing paperweight she had bought in Paris, a plump little baker, in hat and apron, with a curled mustache and whimsical smile. “The museum too, the botanical gardens, I shall enjoy that. We…we used to read the papers, and…” She turned from that, and went to the edge of the bed, hands behind her back. Alina managed a smile she cast at his more shadowed image. All save the sherry eyes—which seemed to pierce through any gloom. “It will be interesting, will it not, to see who sends cards? “
“I will let you know whom to accept. Some are nothing more than boring musicals, where some deb is being s
hown off—and some mama is desiring of your presence there, to improve her own standing. Others, are grand balls, formal suppers, where the powerful gather. Those, you can likely pick and choose yourself, since the majority of the hostesses have equal importance.”
“Very well. And the hells?”
“Some private, some not. We’ll decide on a schedule, once we are settled in.”
Alina nodded; too aware that under the discussion was the residue of their earlier conversation. She was ready to let it go, and in some sense regretted it. Yet, drawn to him, even in the dark distance, still not fully understanding why.
She glanced toward the window as a shower started and a gust of rain scented night breeze that hissed as the rain formed a curtain. Still watching that liquid obscure all else, she mused aloud, “Isn’t it odd, how we can imagine life—and things in it, which would make everything perfect—without actually realizing people will be in it, too. Choices made, the times we understand that, though things can be altered. We are still ourselves?”
“I suppose.”
She smiled slightly, but with a frown between her brows. “I mean, of course, not only those things we know are our strengths and weaknesses. But unexpected things that we have to work through. When you are a girl or a young woman, faced with a grim outlook—it is the things that you imagine will make everything perfect.”
“Understandable.”
Alina turned her head to regard him once more. “I read a poem once, that has always stayed with me… in essence, it says, you never know hunger until you’ve starved more than a day. You never know the feeling of being alone, until you are in a crowd of people. The last lines are something like, (bread will feed me, water will quench my thirst, but my soul is only satisfied hour by hour). I take that to mean, we never know what we will long for more, or sacrifice to have, do we?”
He did not answer yet, but neither did he leave.
Alina sat on the bench at the edge of the bed, staring somewhere at the outline of his bare feet. “Can you overlook my outburst today? I haven’t spoken so since Mother used to provoke me.”
“‘Tis forgotten.”
“Thank you.”
She was still staring sightless when he moved into the room.
He stopped before her and instead of forcing her to look up, Rotherham sat on his haunches, his swarthy face now bathed in the lamp light and sherry eyes holding hers when she lifted it.
One hand came to her face, his thumb touching her bottom lip, as he offered, “I don’t want to cower you, Alina. Nor to correct you like a child. I do not even want to suppress your temper. Even if it is aimed at me. I’ve a bloody cold one myself.” His thumb brushed across her lower lip softly. “We’re both adults. I do not regard you as less than a mature woman. But you had no illusions, and knew exactly who I was, when we wed. Did you not?”
She reached and touched his hand, bringing it down as she answered, “Yes, of course.”
He did not pull his hand free where it rested on her thigh. “Behind a wall or not, I can make you feel pleasure. Do not reject something we both enjoy, simply because it’s a hunger only.”
Trevon leaned in and kissed her, softly at first, then opening his mouth and gliding his tongue between her parting lips.
Alina’s fingers tightened on that handhold as the heady pleasure filled her body. His taste, the way he slowly, sensually, stroked over her tongue and explored her mouth, brought that same heat and dizziness. It brought a hunger too—that she indulged, taking what she could of him, what he offered, and giving him the only thing, he allowed. Instinct, that craving, led her to move her head slightly and delve, seek, stroke the masculine secrets inside.
He pulled back after a soft shorter kiss. Trevon slid his hand from hers and stood. He stepped back.
She arose too. A few inches separated them. Her gaze remained on his hooded eyes and tense face, while the mingling of his taste, his scent, stirred her senses.
She whispered, “You know I’ll come to you eventually, don’t you?”
“Yes,” he uttered it simply.
She smiled slightly and glanced over at the window, feeling more than seeing when he turned to leave. “I don’t mind, you know. In fact, I shall doubtless dream of it.”
There was a pause, a silence, as if he had stilled, but afterwards the click of his door told her that he had gone.
Alina hugged her arms around herself and walked to the window, letting the cooled air waft her face. She wanted him. It was of little consequence that she must go to him, other than that unknown reason that such a thing mattered to him. She wanted to kiss, touch, and feel him, on her skin—feel him breathing and moving against her. It did not have to make sense anymore.
She admitted to an ever-increasing need… to have that ultimate joining of flesh and flesh.
Chapter 5
London
“Dear Lord,” Audra groaned, resting her elbows by her cup as she and Alina had breakfast. “I cannot take another day of teas with dragons in turbans that look at me with those eyes trying to bore through my skull.”
“Me either,” Alina confessed, sitting back with her own cup. They had gotten in just after dawn from a ball, and the whole of the first two weeks had been nothing but morning or noon teas where they were scrutinized by groups of ton hostesses. Others, with lady this or that sitting silent and listening to every answer to a question out to them, raising their brows when neither she nor Audra answered.
Evenings were for suppers and late nights, balls and routs, or some assembly. The only good thing was that they had the most fashionable wardrobe, and at times could escape to the park and ride. The bad things were the endless stares and whispers, the outright snorts behind their backs. It was obvious they were objects of curiosity, and elegant wardrobe, high fashion aside, their ties to Rotherham garnered them even more scrutiny. They were not going to be absorbed into the upper echelons. Frankly, Alina desired it less every day.
Audra said, lifting her cup to sip, “I think I shall find a few literary clubs to join. Men have choices of clubs to escape the dreaded gathers. Whereas we…”
“…Yes. I think Rotherham and Maybry attend a military club—but not the conservative groups. Now that we have made the rounds, I see no reason we cannot view more of London. I gather Rotherham would not mind if we joined some of the more popular ladies societies.”
“Or unpopular.” Audra chuckled on a sigh. “I saw those trousers and shirts he had the tailor make for you. I noticed he is expanding your reading a bit…”
“Um, the works of rather radical thinkers. But the only people, who consider that radical thought, are either men who do not wish women educated and equal, or women who cannot understand females who invent, or study, or are talented and pursue some profession with it.”
“Yes. I fear society will be another hundred years stuck two hundred in the past. I have never heard so much talk on income, bloodlines, titles, and pairing up, simply for the sake of it staying (blue). One is aware of it, but the ton is obsessed with it.”
“Indeed. That is what the social season is for.” Alina absently stared at the paper she had read earlier. “What have you on your agenda?”
“Nothing, other than Rane’s offer to…” The sister paused at Alina’s raised brow. “What?”
“You call him Rane?” Alina grinned.
Audra flushed. “We’ve…we’re.. Building a sort of friendship.”
“Friendship,” Alina mused, looking at her sister’s hazel eyes and flushed face. “You know it would delight me, if it were more than that, for your sake.”
“We’ll see.” Audra took a sip of coffee. “I’ve questions I need answered for my own sake, that only time can answer. In any event, he apparently has a house, smaller than this—but well addressed. Although completely repaired, it is not done with furnishing. He claims to have no talent for that. But having the benefit of his choosing my wardrobe, I doubt very much his taste is lacking.”
“D
ressing a woman is nothing like furnishing a home.” Alina glanced up and around at the elegant dining room. “Rotherham simply had the luck of gathering art and such from his travels, and being wealthy enough to have everything made custom. I think he mentioned that he simply filled this mansion, and the servants placed it where it belonged.”
“It’s lovely.”
“Yes.” Alina had to agree, it was comfortable but elegant, and unique among the townhouses she had visited thus far.
She looked at her sister. “Perhaps the viscount wishes your personal input< You always had a trick for making even the worst hovels a home. I doubt a well addressed one would be difficult, and it would be rather an interesting challenge.”
Audra arose as the servants came in, as did Alina.
“Very well, let’s do go. Even if it causes more talk.”
They headed for the hall.
Alina said drolly, “one cannot imagine anyone at this address managing to miss being whispered about.”
They laughed, as they had after many a tense gathering where the rude were not so subtle in their disapproval of them both. They did note however that when Rotherham was with them, those seemed to trickle to cool nods, and avoiding anything overtly discourteous.
Alina, a bit later, was gowned in a deep green satin day gown and light coat, and a stylish small hat of white and green. Audra was in peach and white stripe, a hip length nip waistcoat, having drawn her silken hair up with combs. They called for the carriage, and after climbing aboard, took it to the street address that Rane had given Audra.
The homes were not as elaborate as the earl’s address. But, they were mansions just the same, impressive to two ladies who had lived with dirt floors those years in Berkshire. The doors were black lacquer on one side of the street, red on the other, both with brass knockers. Each home had a side carriage house, and what looked like an apartment above that, and enough of a garden at the side, some lawn in the back, walled in.
As they approached the door, they noted three stories made up the house, windows large on each, which was vital in the summer months.
