Gallant Match

by Jennifer Blake

  Was that how Sonia saw his involvement with swords as a master at arms, a matter of posturing and ridiculous gestures for the sake of pride? He supposed she did—and so it was, in its way. He could give it up, he realized in some surprise, for the sake of a home like this, one where a lady graced the head of his table, ordered their meals, their children and their lives according to her lights and his occasional request.

  The lady he saw in his imagination was Sonia. How big a fool could he be?

  Tossing away the stub of his cheroot, he excused himself with all the polish he could manage and went to find her.

  She had left the company of the ladies, retreating to their rooms. When he joined her there, she had already undressed for bed and was sitting on a window seat in nightgown and wrapper, staring out into the darkness.

  He leaned in the doorway, watching her, looking at the scratches on the bottoms of her bare feet that were turned toward him, also her knife slash that had begun to heal. Until she whipped her head around as if sensing his presence.

  “I didn’t expect you for some time yet,” she said in waspish tones. “Could Doña Francesca find no more excuses to paw at you?”

  “Seemed best not to give her the chance.” He began to shrug out of his tight jacket. A seam parted, but he didn’t care.

  “Too bad. I suspect you could have been husband number five if you wanted to try for the job. Or would it be six?”

  “Didn’t take much notice as I wasn’t in the market.” Tossing the coat in the general direction of the slipper chair, he began to unfasten his shirt studs, dropping them on a nearby table.

  She moistened her lips as she watched his busy fingers. “I can’t imagine why not. She must be a wealthy woman, and I had it from one of the maids that she’s barely forty.”

  He paused in the act of pulling the shirt from his trousers, caught by the scorn in her voice. The cause that presented itself stunned him. She sounded almost jealous, maybe from thinking that he might have considered making love to the widow. As if he could think of such a thing while she was in the same house, the same country, maybe the same world.

  “Lady must have married early,” he answered, his voice mild and to the point as he dropped his shirt on the floor.

  “At fourteen, to a man thirty years her senior who promptly died. She liked being wed so well, however, that she made a habit of it.”

  “But she would not, I imagine, care to add a Kentucky mongrel to her list.” The words were carefully chosen to see how Sonia would answer. It was suddenly important to know if Doña Francesca’s preference might have encouraged her to see him as an acceptable entrant in the marriage stakes.

  “You aren’t—” she began then closed her lips tightly on the words.

  “Oh, but I am,” he answered, his mouth curving with satisfaction as he kicked out of his leather sandals. Un-fastening his trousers as he walked toward her on bare and silent feet, he went on, “I am the dirtiest of dogs because I fully intend to take advantage of the borrowed title as your husband.”

  “You do.”

  “Oh, yes.” He went to one knee in front of her, bent his head to lick the cut made with his knife on the bottom of her foot, washing it with the hot, wet heat of his tongue before rubbing it gently with his thumb. He kissed her knee, put his hands on her thighs as he insinuated two thumbs between them and rubbed slowly up and down, widening the space between them. His eyes were dark, rich with purpose, as he raised them to meet hers. “If you’re going to object, it had better be now. In a minute or two it’s going to be too late.”

  “It was too late when you came through the door,” she whispered, and drew him into her arms.

  Twenty-Two

  It was another full day before they could shake off the fetters of Doña Francesca’s hospitality. Even so, they were forced to accept the escort to Xalapa of her son, Don Javier, who felt it incumbent upon him to transport them in his carriage. Doña Sonia, the lady wife of Don Wallace, would be more comfortable, he said, and she could only agree. Since Kerr did the same, they entered the mountain town in conspicuous style, with several outriders and a servant in livery riding on the back.

  Don Javier was most pleased that they intended to take his advice concerning journeying by diligence to Vera Cruz. Unknown to him, his recommendation had no bearing. Time of travel was the deciding factor. Closer questioning had revealed that the literas, or litters, swaying contraptions not unlike sedan chairs though they were slung between two mules, would require some eight or nine days of tedious travel, while the diligence could make the trip in only four, five at most.

  Don Javier’s approval of them was so great that it seemed he might insist on conducting them to Vera Cruz in his carriage for the continued joy of their company. Only the sad reflection that this fine vehicle would likely be shaken to pieces on the rough roads dissuaded him. To compensate, he insisted on procuring their seats in the diligence departing the following morning, also arranging their room at the small inn where he left them. He might have stayed with them through the night, waving them off with the dawn, except for the need to gather the items on the list handed him by his mother on his departure. At last he bowed himself back into his carriage, and they were alone.

  “Your conquest this time around, I think,” Kerr commented as they stood waving goodbye.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Sonia said on a laugh. “Don Javier is married.”

  “Doesn’t keep him from sighing after what he can’t have.”

  She turned her head, searching Kerr’s face. He was watching the dust kicked up by the carriage, his gaze clear and uncomplicated. If he meant anything more by his comment, it was not apparent.

  The air in Xalapa was cooler than at the Casa de las Flores. The flowers were brighter and more highly scented as well, no doubt from the increase in altitude. Streets in the town were narrow and winding, branching off without plan into mysterious alleys and culs-desac. Clouds seemed to hang low, enveloping everything in a fine and floating mist that their landlady called the chipi chipi, though she promised a view of the ancient volcano of Citlaltépetl, lord of mountains and tallest in the country, should it lift.

  They were not so blessed. The mist drifted over the town, dripping from the eaves of the inn throughout the night. She and Kerr listened to it as they lay together on a rough mattress of corn husks slung on ropes. To Sonia, it had the sound of falling tears. And it was still with them at dawn when, shivering in the chill mountain air, they climbed into the heavy diligence and began the last leg of their journey to Vera Cruz.

  The trip was every bit as horrendous as Doña Francesca had warned. The wide iron wheels of the coach ground through deep sand, jolting over hidden rocks with tooth-rattling thuds. The great wooden body, minus any pretense of springs, swayed in a sickening manner, leaning out over chasms and tipping forward as they descended inclines. Its leather seats smelled of sweat, chicken feathers, the moldy hay that covered the floor and the manure scent of the mules that wafted back to them. The hooves of the mules also threw up great clouds of dust that settled in a gray-brown and gritty pall over every surface. No other passengers shared their misery due to the good offices of Don Javier who had apparently hired the entire conveyance, but that was the only consolation.

  Sonia was jostled from one side to the other, jounced high so her head hit the coach ceiling, and thrown to the floor when she failed to catch the knotted rope that served as a handhold. After the third or fourth time that she slid off the seat, dangling only by the rope, Kerr caught her up and disentangled her hand before plunking her down beside him. He encircled her with a hard arm, clamping her to his side while bracing his feet on the forward bench.

  She tried to sit up straight so he need not support her weight. He only growled and drew her close again, throwing over her the serape he had acquired at the inn.

  She was just as happy to subside against him. His chest on which she lay was broad and padded with muscle, his arm unyielding in its hold. Fr
om that more secure vantage point, she was able to take greater interest in what slid past the diligence windows.

  It was an exotic panorama, from the cloud-shrouded peak of Citlaltépetl, pink-tinged in the morning light, to the mountain track that led to Perote Prison from which those who had been captured during the Mier Expedition had recently been released. In it moved donkeys with panniers slung on either side in which rode bright-eyed, dark-skinned children, also mule trains driven by horsemen with wild faces and saddles decorated with silver, tumbling waterfalls and a bird with a tail so long it seemed impossible it could fly. But these were the highlights in a landscape that was otherwise the same, made up of trees, rocks and the winding road that stretched ahead of them. After a time, Sonia grew sleepy. Closing her eyes, she kicked off her borrowed slippers, lifted her feet to the seat and snuggled into Kerr’s side.

  So the long days of travel passed, in a blur of fatigue and swaying, jouncing progress. They alighted now and then to stretch their legs while the mules were changed. At night they slept at small inns where the only comforts were cold water to remove their dirt, scrawny chickens cooked with oil, garlic and frijoles, and a wooden plank for a mattress.

  Gradually, they descended into warmer levels where lovely green valleys appeared, palms thrust their umbrellas of fronds toward the sky and trees hung with vines dripped spent blossoms onto the roadway. Though the land flattened by degrees, the road did not improve but grew dustier still. The heat steadily increased as well, becoming a stifling pall. At last, at the morning stop on the fifth day, the coachman announced that they would sleep that night in Vera Cruz.

  Vera Cruz.

  Sonia could feel her nerves winch tighter at the very sound of the name. Dread formed a hard knot in her stomach as the diligence jerked into motion once more. Kerr reached for her, and she leaned against him, letting her head fall back on his shoulder, feeling the strength of his protection, listening to the steady beat of his heart.

  She should not be so compliant. She should be planning some way to escape him now that they had returned to civilization. It would have been less than intelligent to chance it on the long trek down from the mountains to the seacoast, but surely it might be managed nearer to Vera Cruz? Vessels left from there to other parts of the world every day. The war had not changed that unless there was a blockade, and it seemed unlikely such a thing could have been set in place already. If she could arrange passage to Havana, it should be easy enough to transfer there to a packet bound for Mobile.

  She had no money.

  That was a drawback, yes, but not an insurmountable one. With luck her aunt might have arrived at the port. She would know how to apply for funds, even if she had not managed to save her small hoard when the Lime Rock sank. It would require time and some subterfuge to gain her father’s assistance but, once it was forthcoming, she and Tante Lily could go where they wished.

  That was, of course, if she could avoid Jean Pierre while she remained at Vera Cruz. Yes, and Kerr as well.

  How very tiring it all sounded, and childish as well. Hiding, lying, sneaking about like a thief, worrying that someone would snatch her back into some variety of imprisonment. Where was the freedom in that?

  No, she was done with such things. She would face whatever came. She would do it standing at Kerr’s side while he achieved what he had come so far to do. She owed him that much for the care he had given her. Whatever happened, he had shown her what love could be like between a man and a woman, and loving.

  Love.

  She loved him. It was strange but true.

  When had it happened? She could not be certain. It might have been when she first caught sight of him in the lantern glow at the town house. Yes, or when he gave her the choice of walking up the gangway of the Lime Rock instead of being carried. It could have been the night he forced the seaman overboard for daring to lay hands on her, or the afternoon when he had swum in the pool with dragonflies floating above him. So many choices, so many memories that she could not separate them. She would save them, however, pressed in the memory book of her mind to be taken out when she was very old, and sighed over as she sat before a winter fire.

  Stirring a little, she tilted her head so she could see his face. He was staring out the open window, his gaze unfocused. His hand, where he held her to him, smoothed over the turn of her waist in an endless caress. She wondered if he realized it.

  Alerted by her gaze, he turned his head to look down at her. “What is it?”

  “I was thinking, wondering what you intend to do when we reach where we’re going.”

  “Discover if your aunt is in residence, and her direction.”

  “And if she is with Jean Pierre?”

  “Then we’ll go there.”

  She searched his eyes, trying to guess at the thoughts that moved in their shadowed gray depths. They were as closed to her as before she knew she loved him.

  The thought of a confrontation between him and Jean Pierre was disturbing, more so than anything she could imagine. “Do you think…” she began, then stopped.

  “Probably not, but what?”

  “Do you know if Jean Pierre realizes you blame him for your brother’s death?”

  “He’d not have run from me all these years otherwise, wouldn’t have left New Orleans so soon after I arrived. Or stayed away, for that matter.”

  “He doesn’t know you’re coming, or didn’t. Suppose Tante Lily is with him. Suppose she has let fall that you are my escort?”

  “It can’t be helped. He’ll either run again or stand and face me.”

  “What then?” she asked, the words so soft they barely stirred the air.

  “Depends on what passes between us, and what he does about it.”

  She could not think the outcome would be anything less than a duel. Nor was it possible to imagine that Jean Pierre would prevail against Kerr’s superior strength and skill with a sword. The best she could hope for was that the meeting would end at first blood and with, perhaps, an apology from her future husband.

  Would that suffice? Would Kerr accept it and go on his way?

  She opened her lips to ask him not to leave her with Jean Pierre, no matter what happened, but to take her with him wherever he went. The words would not come. She could not risk a refusal. Hearing it would be too great a disappointment to bear.

  “Don’t look like that,” Kerr commanded, his voice gruff, made uneven by a jolt of the wheels into a hole in the road. Hard on the words, he lowered his head and took her mouth.

  She opened to him as naturally as a flower to the kiss of the sun. Yet her manner was not so calm or innocent. Frantic need gripped her. She wanted him as she had wanted nothing else in all her days. Her heart ached with it; her breath was strangled by unshed tears. Every inch of her skin tingled in anticipation of his touch. It came, the light clasp of his hand on her hip as he drew her against the lower part of his body, and she shuddered with the pleasure that swept through her.

  His serape had been discarded that morning, becoming a pillow for her to rest against. The edges of his waistcoat parted as she slid her hand between them, flattening her palm on his linen-shielded chest. She smoothed over its hard planes while a soft moan of frustration sounded in her throat. She wanted to press against him, needed to feel the heat of his naked skin against her breasts, the abrasion of the curling hair that grew there. A moment later, she twisted her fingers in the placket of his shirt, jerking the studs from their holes.

  He groaned, every muscle tensing, hardening under her hands. She dragged open the edges of his shirt, even as she nipped at his lower lip, trailed a string of kisses down his chin to his neck. The hollow at the base of his throat enticed her and she dipped inside, tasting the salty flavor of him, feeling his pulse throb against the tip of her tongue.

  She could not be sidetracked for long. Shifting, she angled her head and laved the hard bead of his nipple with her tongue, worried it delicately with her teeth while reaching lower to press her hand
to the hard, hot length that stretched the front of his trousers.

  His harsh gasp, barely heard above the clatter of hooves and rattle of harness, was her reward. Also the feel of his hand sliding down her thigh, gathering her skirts, finding warm flesh underneath them.

  She inhaled with a soft sound as he found her, parted moist and heated folds. Without volition, she pressed against him, seeking the incursion of his long fingers. And it came, so quickly, so surely that she melted, straining to take him deeper.

  With a soft curse, he dragged her higher, brought her up to straddle him. Releasing the waist of his trousers, spreading them open, he urged her to cover him. She sank upon him, moaning, bending her neck to press her forehead to his. The sense of control the position gave her was astonishing, the increase in sensation astounding. She wanted to stay there, locked upon him forever.

  “Kerr,” she whispered, “mon coeur.”

  “Command me,” he said, though his temples were damp with perspiration and the trembling of fierce restraint ran over him in fine waves. “Have it as you will.”

  Never in her life had she felt so powerful or so free. Stronger still was the fierce gratitude she felt for his instruction in this miracle of joining. No other man could have shown her so well. Never again would she know this miracle of entwined bodies and melding souls. This was likely the last time they would be together like this, the last time he would hold her, last time she would taste him, feel him so fully seated inside her, hotly throbbing against her capturing tenderness with every beat of his heart.

  The diligence rocked, bounced, fell into a pothole and jounced out again. As she lifted and fell upon him in vital imitation, she felt the burning ache of tears. Felt also the raging desire inside her to drive upon him, absorb him, make him a part of her. The need overcame all thought and control. She moved upon him with aching muscles. Her lungs burned, her heart flailed against her ribs. She drew back, staring fearfully into his eyes.