by Kristi Astor
Mostly, his change of heart last night when holding Roxana’s hand in the dance alarmed him. She did not fit into his plans and he did not know that he was overreacting to a strong desire to bed her.
Slapping his hat against his thigh, Max walked toward the newer graves. His ears stung with the cold. Pausing at his mother’s grave, he whispered a prayer. He barely remembered her. His father’s grave came next. Then his two brothers lay side-by-side in the cold ground. Imagining them so still and robbed of life after too short of lives made his throat ache.
The gate clanged behind him and he turned. Roxana wove her way among the tombstones, her head down. She read the markers and touched her gloved hand to the tombstone of his father’s sister who had died in infancy.
She rounded the corner and drew up short. She looked at the recent row of graves and then up at him. “Am I intruding?”
“No. The gate was unlatched; I came to shut it.” He did not come to the graves often. He found it still too difficult. If he did not look upon the markers he could think of the long silence as merely the gap between letters that happened when his brothers adventured around the world.
Max had never left England; his duties to the estate prevented lengthy trips abroad. How he had looked forward to those letters describing places he would never see.
“I saw you without a hat. I thought you could use this gift early.” She reached under her cloak and drew out a muffler the color of burnished ivory. She drew up as she realized his hat was in his hand.
“My hat does not keep my neck warm. If you would, please.” He held out his hat for her to hold.
She took it, while handing him the folded rectangle of fabric.
He wound the long ribbed silk scarf around his neck, pulling the edges up to cover his stinging ears. The scarf was thicker and much warmer than he expected. The lengthwise stitches gave it enough substance to stand high. “Thank you, Miss Winston.”
Roxana read the markers as the first flakes of snow hurtled down. “Your brothers?”
“This was Samuel. He died in Aboukir. And this is Alexander. He died at Copenhagen.” Words seemed so inadequate.
“Would you tell me about them?” she said softly.
He looked at the graves. “They both fell in battle. Samuel lingered a while, but we did not know soon enough to get to him.” Max had been preparing to go the continent when the news arrived that Samuel had expired. Then their sealed coffins had arrived, dashing any hopes he had of mistake.
He could feel her watching him and he wanted to say so much more, yet his throat felt closed.
Roxana sidled closer to him as if seeking his warmth or offering hers. Yet he kept thinking how cold his brothers must be, lying in their wooden boxes in the frozen ground.
“It must be extraordinarily difficult to have lost brothers,” she said. “I have been incredibly lucky to have all my sisters and brother hale and hearty.”
“They were both . . .” his voice trailed off. She offered sympathy, not a suggestion that his brothers were not healthy. Good health was little impediment to a bullet. “They were both so full of life. It is hard to believe they’re gone. I’m sorry you did not meet them.”
Roxana glanced up at him. “You are afraid Thomas will suffer the same fate?”
Max’s first inclination was to deny any fear, but he was deathly afraid of just that. When each of his brothers died it was as if a piece of him had withered and blackened too. His own role in their choices haunted him and bore down on him with the weight of a medieval press. “Yes.”
“Have you explained your fears to Thomas?”
“Miss Winston, you do not understand.”
“Oh, I think I do. As the oldest it is ever my feeling that I must shelter my siblings from every ill wind that blows. Accepting that I cannot protect them from every true thing in the world has been difficult for me.”
Again Max wondered about her family life. She said so little about it. Yet he knew she had not offered advice that led to death. Alexander, at least, had considered taking a living their father had open, but had really wanted a chance to serve under his hero Nelson. Unable to imagine his wild younger brother as a clergyman, Max had urged him to that course. The living could be held until Alexander decided if he wanted it after experiencing the world.
“I know you want to protect Thomas, even though he has charged me with dissuading you from being so adamant with his learning the estate. Honestly, my sympathies lie more with your position.”
Max clasped his hands behind his back. The wind riffled his hair, but to hold it down was futile. Snowflakes fell against his skin and hair, then quickly melted. “Do you think I am being too harsh with him?”
“I think you are teaching him as you were taught. You are not impatient, nor are you unreasonable. You have high expectations of him, but not impossible expectations. I believe that Thomas feels the rules have changed without notice.”
Max gestured toward the graves. The rules had changed. Death had changed all their lives. “When did Thomas tell you this?”
“When we were decorating the ballroom.” Miss Winston turned her head back toward the graves, her bonnet hiding her expression from him. Her voice was evenly modulated, not shrill or accusatory. “I hope I am not too forward, but I promised Thomas I would speak with you.”
Had she watched Max for a moment to catch him alone? So far he had only seen her employ such tactics for Gregory. “And I thought you must have been laying in wait for Mr. Breedon.”
Roxana’s head dipped forward. “I was, but I believe he did not walk today, as is his habit.”
Tenseness had crept into her voice, negating Max’s disappointment that Roxana was not watching for him.
Max reached out and put his arm around her shoulders. She felt rigid under his touch. He told himself he offered her only comfort, but he suspected he sought solace for himself.
“I’m sorry, I did not mean to digress. I did suggest to Thomas that he speak to you himself, but he declined. He said you would not listen to him.”
“I listen.”
“Yes, I believe you do, but have you given Thomas the full measure of your thoughts?”
“I’ve told him my intention is to keep him my heir,” said Max.
Roxana moved forward and brushed snow from Alexander’s tombstone. The snow fell all around her, dusting her blue cloak with white specks. “Do you suppose your father yearned for a military life?”
“Why?”
She turned and looked back at Max. “He encouraged three of his sons to follow the drum, did he not? Would not at least one son normally be encouraged to become a member of the clergy? And a third perhaps encouraged to engage in civil service? Many positions in the government are drawn by appointment, are they not?”
“I do not think he foresaw this outcome. And I think my brother’s deaths took the will to live out of him. I will not have this future for Thomas.” His own role in encouraging their choices figured more prominently in his mind. They had trusted him. That they had to take employment while he, as the oldest son, had everything was a crushing weight he found hard to bear.
Had his father planted the enthusiasm for military careers in his brothers’ minds? Even in his, for even as he knew he was the fortunate one, he’d envied his brothers’ carefree military careers.
Roxana turned around and walked toward him. He wanted more than anything to pull her to him, just to feel alive. But that felt blasphemous in this place.
“I suppose it is small comfort to think they are all in a better place,” she said softly. Reaching out from under the folds of her cloak, she put her gloved hand on his sleeve.
“Indeed.” As far as he could see, the gentle rolling hills and the massive house on the hill behind them was his. There was no place better than this.
Her touch heated him, provided barrier to the chill wind. A snowflake fell on her dark lashes and clung for a moment. The cold had brightened her cheeks and he felt caught in a moment ou
t of time. He could hear his brothers urging him to quit being a stick-in-the-mud and have fun. Kiss the girl.
But his place was to do the right thing. A duke could not go around kissing unmarried girls without them thinking that he would offer for them. After looking at the graves, he knew he could not marry. It was a fleeting fancy that he would not spend the rest of his life alone. His duty lay in grooming Thomas to take over the title and estate.
Roxana deserved better than a dalliance that would lead to nothing. And his behavior in the kissing bower had been beyond the bounds of acceptable. Nothing good ever came from incorrect behavior.
Another snowflake fell on her cheek and he wanted to touch his lips to the moisture. “We should return to the house, Roxy.”
She took a step back and smiled. “Ah, but it is so beautiful out here. I love snow. Ah, and there is Mr. Breedon on his constitutional after all. You should of course go back to the house, and I will just say hello to Mr. Breedon.”
She skipped toward the gate, excitement coloring her eyes. He watched her run toward Mr. Breedon with all the enthusiasm of a child. She scooped up a handful of snow to throw just before she reached him. And Max was left behind with the dead and buried.
After Roxana’s loosely packed snowball hit him on the shoulder, Mr. Breedon turned and scowled at her. With his round face he resembled a petulant child more than an angry man. Hardly the expression to strike fear in a miscreant. She could not imagine a situation where she would ever fear Mr. Breedon.
Roxana had actually meant to miss. She laughed anyway and stepped forward, allowing her legs to slide out from under her. The heavy wet snow was not so deep that it provided cushion for her fall, and she was throwing the game before she even started. She suspected Max would provide a worthy opponent in a snow fight, and she would never have to pull back. That is, if he could be persuaded to relax.
“Do you not love snow, Mr. Breedon?” Her thin cotton dress sopped up the moisture like a sponge.
“No.”
Roxana scrambled upright, making sure that Mr. Breedon was allowed a healthy glimpse of her ankles. Did he even notice? He had not stepped forward to help her to her feet.
“I am sorry, then.” She brushed snow from his shoulder. “I will contain my enthusiasm.”
“My apologies, Miss Winston. I fear that I am quite worried about the snow.”
“The snow?”
“Yes, I am afraid this snowfall may make the roads impassable.”
Roxana slid her gloved hand into the crook of Mr. Breedon’s elbow. Why was he concerned about the snow? “The party has just started. Surely you do not plan to leave soon?”
“I hate feeling as if I am trapped in a place and cannot leave.”
“If the snow delays your departure, then I cannot be dissuaded from liking it even more.”
Mr. Breedon shuddered. “Well, frozen ground makes better traveling than mud, so it may not be such a bad event after all.”
They walked along the snow-blanketed path as the flakes fell all around them, creating a veil between them and the whitening countryside. At least the trees they walked between blocked the wind. Although she was starting to feel the sting of the cold where moisture had seeped through the darned areas in her glove, and holding Mr. Breedon’s arm meant her thin cloak was open, allowing the frigid air to penetrate the wet muslin of her gown. Perhaps falling down had not been such a good idea, and it had failed to draw Mr. Breedon closer, as was her intent.
“I think the snow quite beautiful,” said Roxana.
Mr. Breedon’s lips flattened to that simple slash in his face. “Makes my knee hurt.”
“Was your injury from a riding accident?” inquired Roxana.
Mr. Breedon shook his head. “My phaeton overturned.”
“It must be perfectly terrible to have such a thing occur. I am not entirely sure those high carriages are safe. You are quite brave to drive one.”
“I was not driving,” squawked Mr. Breedon. “They must have wanted to cause me injury.”
Roxana was not quite sure who they were.
“Well, I am truly sorry for your difficulties. I wish I could ease your pain.”
Mr. Breedon stopped abruptly and swung around in front of her on the path. “Miss Winston, are you my friend?”
The question took her by surprise. “I should hope so.”
He screwed up his mouth. “My mama thinks you are offering false coin because . . .”
Roxana’s heart pounded heavily in her chest. One misstep and her chances of bringing Mr. Breedon to a place where she could ask for a financial settlement would crumble. What if he asked to marry her without compromising her? What if he held himself to the rigid bounds of propriety?
“Because you are well heeled?” She finished for him and looked down at her toes, toes she could barely feel, which was blessed relief from the stinging they had been doing earlier.
“That is usually why women toss their handkerchiefs in my direction.”
“Yes, but I do like you, Gregory. You are very kind and . . . and . . . gentle. Mr. Scullin and his grace treat me quite differently. They frighten me at times. I am very comfortable with you. What proof could I offer to you my affection is genuine?” Roxana had a clue, but she could not suggest it.
“My mam a says something is havey-cavey about you being here at the party without your parents.”
Roxana took a leap of faith. “Yes, but you do not always agree with your parents’ assessments.”
He stared at her as if unable to make up his mind. Roxana stood her ground although she shivered in earnest. A cold spot grew in her heart. She feared that self-absorbed Mr. Breedon actually had started to care for her, and what she intended to do would wound him. Even though she would treat a monetary settlement as a loan to be repaid, he would see her actions as a betrayal.
“I do hope we are friends, Mr. Breedon. I would not be averse to being more than friends, but I have been given to understand that I would not meet your parents’ expectations. I quite understand that, although your parents could not find fault with my lineage or my c-connections.” She gestured to the house as the wind resumed and blew right through her.
“B-b-because I have f-f-four sisters my p-p-portion will be small.” Her teeth chattered and she could no longer stop them. Her portion would be nonexistent, but Mr. Breedon did not need to know that.
“Are you cold, Miss Winston?”
Nearly frozen solid, but at least he noticed. She nodded her head.
Max had slid his arm around her shoulders, or he would have seen her back inside. Mr. Breedon stared at her as if he had never been confronted with such a dilemma.
“C-c-could you warm me?” she asked.
He grabbed her arms and began rubbing vigorously up and down. Roxana was impatient with his obtuseness and she stepped forward, touching their chests together. Finally, he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her against his warm body. She settled her gloved hands at his side, barely feeling her fingers.
“Oh, thank you,” she whispered. Even through his clothes she could feel warmth. She tucked her head into the crook of his neck, her nose touching his chin.
“You are like ice,” said Mr. Breedon.
“I am sorry, although I feel much warmer already.”
He rubbed her back fiercely. She would have asked him to be gentler, but she needed him to make an advance before she turned into an ice sculpture, before he realized he should be leading her back to the house, before she began to think he did not like women.
Finally, his stroking changed and Roxana took that moment to lift her head and meet his eyes. Their lips were only an inch apart and he was not so much taller than her that he would have to bend over. Roxana stared at his milky white face and his little eyes and she lowered her lashes for fear he would see her assessment for the coldhearted thing it was. If he did not kiss her now, she knew he would never be persuaded to compromise her.
Finally his lips nipped at hers. Roxan
a tried not to pull away or resist. And she was acutely aware of her lack of engagement. With Max her heart had pounded and her knees had gone weak; with Gregory she felt only chilled and detached.
She tightened her arms around him and waited . . . waited . . . would he not do it again? Her eyes fluttered open just as Mr. Breedon was plunging forward for another kiss. His face hit hers with the speed of a galloping horse, and Roxana wondered if teeth could bruise. But she had to concentrate hard to keep her teeth from chattering. Lord knew biting him would not further her cause.
Mr. Breedon folded both his arms around her back, and in her half-frozen state she tried to convince herself that his embrace was pleasant even if his kiss was not. Oh stars, Max’s lips had felt so much better, firm, where Gregory’s were nonexistent. And it was as if he intended to squeeze the life out of her in his bear hug.
Mrs. Porter had told her that men were pretty much interchangeable when it came to matters of intimacy, but oh she was so wrong, thought Roxana as she pushed at Gregory’s shoulders.
Max leaned against the wrought iron fence, the cold of the bars seeping through his greatcoat. Yet as he watched Roxana charm and cajole Mr. Breedon, Max knew he needed to keep her in his sights. That was the trouble with having an unchaperoned guest; no mother or father would raise the alarm if Roxana was gone too long.
When Breedon kissed her, Max slammed his hat low on his head and trudged toward them. How could she? When the taste of her burned in his mouth, the feel of her curves imprinted on his brain, and the sight of her blue eyes made his insides turn to mush, how could she throw herself at that overgrown boy?
Because Breedon would perchance marry her, whispered a devil on Max’s shoulder, and he could not. Not if he wanted to keep Thomas as his heir. Her scheming and manipulation bothered him, but she seemed to like Mr. Breedon. Had Max not watched her face light up as she saw he was out walking? Could she really care about the lout?
The snow came down in clumps and the wind shifted over it, filling in the indentations of their footfalls, erasing the hollow where she had fallen—deliberately, Max assumed. God, for one of her tricks on him, he’d show her what a real man would do. Yet, Breedon seemed to be giving her a good demonstration of a far-too-intimate kiss, without the thin excuse of mistletoe hanging overhead.
