“For a London gentleman, Wyn, you certainly seem very comfortable in a barn.”
“This is a stable, Diantha, and I have told you that I am not from London.” He drew a stool close to the side of the big brownish red and white cow.
“Not from London.” She dangled the empty bucket against the knee of her pin-striped skirt. The stained muslin was more suited to farm tasks than the blue gown from the attic, and it didn’t smell like camphor. “But you spend a great deal of time there, don’t you?”
“There and elsewhere.” He took the bucket from her.
“Where elsewhere?”
“I believe this is an occasion when if you persist in prying I may rely upon evasion.” He sat on the low stool and placed the bucket beneath the cow’s heavy udder, and Diantha stared quite unashamedly. It did not feel wrong to look at him overlong. It felt right.
She licked her lips. “Do you believe in Destiny?”
“No.” He drew off his coat and deposited it on a bench, his white shirt stretching tight across his shoulders. “But I have absolutely no doubt that you do.”
“Why?”
“A Grand Plan . . .” He unbuttoned his cuffs and folded the linen up his forearms.
“Oh.” It was difficult to manage more words. If God had invented a sight to set her entire body aquiver, Wyn Yale removing his clothes was it. She gripped the stall door for steadiness. “But I suspect destiny would tend to disturb any plans a person made,” she mumbled, “so it is complicated.”
“I daresay.”
She moved closer to him. He drew her like this, from that first day. It might have something to do with the way his shirt pulled at his shoulders, or the strength in his arms revealed by the cuffed sleeves. She could not breathe properly. Not to be wondered at. He’d put his hands on the cow’s teats and they were strong and sinewy too, and although it was perfectly ridiculous and a little peculiar she could not help remembering them on her teats. And then for the hundredth time she thought about his mouth there and how he had touched her and what he’d said to her.
“What about Reincarnation? Do you believe in that?”
“Probably not.” The muscles in his hands and arms flexed, and jets of milk squirted into the bucket with tinny clangs. “Are we to engage in a discussion of world philosophies today, Miss Lucas?” he said with a slight smile.
She believed in Reincarnation. At this moment she was certain she had been here before, with him. Not milking a cow, of course. But together like this doing mundane tasks. Alone together. Her heart felt it, and it was incredibly disconcerting because she didn’t believe in any of that heart nonsense. But Reincarnation seemed another thing altogether.
“I’ve been reading a lot these past few days,” she managed. “I always thought my stepfather’s collection of archeological journals and scholarly what-have-you peculiar enough. But the library here is very curious. A remarkable selection for a lady, really.”
“Perhaps the lady did not live here alone.”
“You may be right. Yesterday I came across a book on the religions of the East Indies.”
“Thus Reincarnation.”
“The day before that I found a book on a man named Buddha who often went about without a shirt, apparently. There were picture plates.” She stared at Wyn’s muscle-corded arms and thought perhaps Annie could not be blamed for having run off with the farmhand after all. Every time Wyn’s hand flexed, a muscle strained the cuff above his elbow. It made her agitated inside. “It seems that Buddha started an entire religion, quite an interesting one with some truly marvelous ideas.”
“You read this book?”
“Wouldn’t you?”
He smiled. It made her warm, rather low. She wanted him to touch her again. There. “I didn’t understand the half of it, really.” Her voice was foolishly breathy. The milk was making a light splashing sound now. “You are very good at that.”
“I have recently had practice. Will you come over here or shall I bring the cow to you?”
He gave up the stool to crouch in the straw beside her. The cow turned its head and stared at her with wide-set eyes.
“Is this any easier than smoking a cigar?”
“About the same level of difficulty, I should say. Like putting on one’s shoes or sweeping a stoop. I imagine you will be able to manage it.”
“Have you swept stoops?”
“In my day, I did it all. Are you actually interested in milking this cow? Because—”
“I am!” She grasped a teat. It was warm and soft. She tugged. “Nothing is happening.”
“It is not a bellpull, minx. You cannot summon a maid with it.”
“You are very droll, Mr. Yale.”
“That is what they say, Miss Lucas.”
Her delight deflated. “Who? All the ladies in London?”
“No.” He reached forward and surrounded her hand with his, and all the ladies in London simply vanished. His palm was large and wonderfully warm, and she wanted to sit here holding hands with him forever. He repositioned her fingers, but she could barely attend. He was so close now, at her shoulder, as close as he’d been when he assisted her down from the tree and she had almost planted her mouth on his.
“Then who?” she asked a little thinly.
His hand cupped hers. “All the gentlemen in London, of course. Apply pressure in this manner.” His voice sounded husky. It was not only her, then. He felt this too, this thing that made her heart thud and body weak with anticipation. He must.
If she did not divert her thoughts she would be begging him for kisses in moments. “Do you think it would be naïve for a person to believe in Destiny and Reincarnation at once?” she uttered.
“I have never felt the need to insist upon a man confining his most cherished beliefs to the parameters of a system devised by others.”
Her hand, guided by his, caught the rhythm. Then she was sorry she’d learned so swiftly because he released her.
“But you do believe in God.” She felt light-headed. “Don’t you?”
“I admit that I am not entirely convinced.”
“Then what do you believe in?”
“Good manners, the faculty of human reason, and hell.” The words fell starkly into the straw-scented air.
Diantha’s fingers ceased moving of their own accord. The urge to weep beset her.
In a clear, quiet voice he added, “And, lately, hope.”
Her hand slipped away from the teat and she swiveled around to face him. There was no bleakness in his face. Desire lit his silvery eyes and something else she did not understand but it dashed away all thought of weeping. A muscle in his jaw flexed and she saw him take a breath, heard it in the stillness surrounded by the soft sounds of animals and the mad chatter of birds in the hedge without.
His gaze dipped to her mouth and there was nothing more she wanted than to be kissed by him. Nothing in the world.
She could not prevent herself; she leaned forward. He leaned forward. Their breaths mingled, an intimacy for which she was thoroughly unprepared.
He closed the space between them. It was a mere brushing of lips, the most innocent caress.
And then it was not. Then it became more.
His hand came around the back of her neck and secured her mouth against his and he kissed her like she’d dreamed every night for endless nights, like there was nothing more he wanted than to be kissing her, feeling her like she felt him in every part of her body. He tasted her, used the tip of his tongue to part her lips, and she succumbed. She allowed him into her mouth, to touch her like he had touched her before, but this was not the same. Now the caress of his mouth recalled her to his hands on her body, and to his body when she’d held him in the midst of fever, and she knew it was all different. She wanted even more than kisses. She wanted him. She ached with wanting him.
His thumb stroked her cheek, his fingertips slipping into her hair, and it was sublime, the most tender touch, reverent and delectable like the opening up w
ithin her that needed him. She lifted her hand and skimmed her fingers along the taut strength of his forearm. It made her hungry. It made her delirious with pleasure. A sound came from his chest and he sought her deeper, capturing her tongue and making her desperate for more, for his body against hers, for his hands all over her. She slid forward on the stool.
The cow lowed.
Wyn pulled back and his hand fell.
Diantha sucked in breath and opened her eyes. His looked unfocused. Then something else flickered within the gray, something unsettling that made her stomach plunge.
She leaped up. “D-Don’t say ‘God, no,’ ” she stuttered. “Please.”
“What?” He seemed confused. “I wasn’t going to say—”
“I did not ask for that.” She pressed her fingertips to her damp lips. “You cannot stuff me into my traveling trunk and take me home.”
He bent his head and ran his hand around the back of his neck. Each motion struck her with agonizing beauty. She couldn’t bear it. She wanted him so much. Not just in her feminine regions where she was becoming accustomed to feeling her response to his male angularity and elegance. This need spread in her chest and limbs. She felt moved and deep down inside her this all felt right, like she was meant to be kissing him and only him.
She backed away. “Don’t say something horrid or make threats.”
His gaze snapped up, a spark of anger in it. “I won’t. Damn it, Diantha—”
“And don’t swear at me. It is against the rules. Number Seven.” She darted forward and snatched up the bucket. “Thank you for teaching me how to milk a cow. I’m leaving now.” Dragging the bucket at her side, she hastened from the stable because she knew she must run away or throw herself at him, and the first seemed a better alternative for eventually reaching Calais.
But at present she did not wish to be in Calais. She wished to be in his arms.
Chapter 19
If Mrs. Polley noticed that her employers were not on speaking terms with each other at supper, she was remarkably discreet about it. Fortunately Owen prattled on—as always—and the meal was consumed until Wyn excused himself courteously—as always.
Mrs. Polley ushered Owen to his gatehouse. “That man will have us at an early start tomorrow and we’ll be in the rain and mud and Lord knows what other troubles again, so you’d best have yourself a good sleep, boy.”
He snatched up another biscuit, tipped his cap with an “Evening, miss,” and whistled for Ramses to follow.
Diantha took her plate to the washbasin. “We must have straightening up to do before departing.”
“I saw to that already, miss.” Mrs. Polley wiped the table.
“Thank you, Mrs. Polley. You have been a great help this past fortnight and I’m very glad you agreed to come with us.”
“Well now, miss, I couldn’t let a fine young lady go off on a wild goose chase with that dark man intending no good.”
Intending no good. If that meant he had intended for her to develop an enormous partiality for the caress of his mouth and hands, then yes certainly he had intended her no good.
“It is not a wild goose chase, Mrs. Polley. And despite all I have demanded of him, he has tried diligently to behave as a gentleman.”
“A gentleman is as a gentleman does,” she muttered, packing away the remaining oatcakes.
In their bedchamber, Mrs. Polley unlaced her stays and Diantha laid her stained, wrinkled gown across a chair and could barely remember what it was like to live in her stepfather’s house and wear fresh garments and not know a dark, handsome Welshman.
Without conversation, her companion fell asleep. Diantha had become accustomed to this, missing Faith’s chatter at night, and occasionally talked herself to sleep because Mrs. Polley never woke anyway. But she could not rest now. Too much had happened to her lips and sensibilities today, and her stomach rumbled.
Finally she arose, slipped into her green gown and tied it about her waist with a sash, then stole on quiet feet down to the kitchen.
The scent of tobacco smoke met her in the foyer. She ought to have anticipated this; the nights when he had touched her he’d been awake late too. But on those nights he had been foxed.
Stomach wild with butterflies, she went along the corridor to the kitchen. He stood by the hearth. A cigar burned atop the simmering remains of the peat fire.
“Good evening.” Without seeing, he knew she stood there. He seemed to have an uncanny sense of such things.
“I thought the cigar that you let me smoke today was your last,” she said, because what else, after all, could be said?
“This is it.”
“But why aren’t you smoking it?”
He turned toward her then, and his silvery eyes gleamed unnaturally. Hot.
Fear jerked through her. “It hasn’t passed entirely, has it? The illness. It has come back.”
“No.”
“But you have that fevered look in your eyes again. You want a brandy, don’t you?”
“Of course I want a brandy.” He ran a hand through his hair and gripped the back of his neck. “But I want you rather a great deal more.”
Her body flushed with an achy thrill.
“You can have me,” she said shakily. “Only for the present, of course,” she added, because the flash of panic in his eyes was worse than the feverishness. “I must eventually accept Mr. H since that is the plan. But you can have me first.”
“I cannot.”
“I am compromised anyway. But I was perfectly aware that would be the case when I set out from Teresa’s house. So if anyone were ever to discover—”
“They will not,” he said firmly. “It is my job to ensure that they do not.”
“My family will.” Very soon they would find her absent from Brennon Manor and begin looking for her.
“Certain members of your family have reason to trust me in this.” He seemed very serious.
“I knew there was something more to—to everything about you,” she said in a hushed tone. “Mr. Eads called you the Raven, and I’m not such a ninny that I don’t understand special names like that have some significance. But I don’t know why that would mean my family would trust you if they were to discover I’ve been with you these past weeks. Anyway, they are fully aware that I am prone to inappropriate behavior. My stepfather tells me nearly every day.”
He took a tight breath, his shoulders rigid. “Rescuing girls like you is what I do.”
“Rescuing girls? Like me?”
“Lost girls, in particular. Runaways. Though occasionally a child or amnesiac if I am fortunate. Or a horse.” He seemed to speak ironically. “But mostly it seems to be the girls they assign me. I am, it seems, adept at encouraging young women to do as I wish.”
“Assign you? Who are ‘they’?”
“There really isn’t any more I can say.” He turned away. “Now, if you will be so good as to absent yourself from this room and not reappear until the morning, I will be much obliged.”
“But I want you to kiss me.”
“You haven’t any idea what you’re saying. You are an innocent.”
“I am quite ready not to be so any longer. I’ve been quite ready for an age already. Perhaps it runs in my blood, my mother being what—” She halted, desperation rising in her breast. “I’m not really asking all that much.”
“You’re not asking . . . ?” He was clearly struggling. “Allow me to put it in terms you may understand better: Heroes do not deflower innocent girls.”
“Oh, for pity’s sake!” She slapped her hands against her skirt. “I am through with trying to convince you to kiss me and—er—do whatever else.”
“Yes, well, it is the ‘whatever else’ that presents the problem.” He ran his hand around to the back of his neck again, tightening linen over muscle. Diantha nearly launched herself at him.
Her hands fisted. “My pride”—and self-control—“cannot take any more of this battering.” Against every desire, she pivoted abo
ut, but swung back around and burst out, “When you kissed me— The way you— And you look at me so intensely at moments. Like a wolf sizing up his prey.”
“It is the drink,” he said quietly.
She swallowed hard over her thick heartbeats. “The drink?”
“I crave intoxication. In my blood there is a hunger beyond all else to lose myself in something that is not me. To feel pleasure and satisfaction, and relief, at any cost.” He held her gaze steadily. “It would not be you. You would be merely a female body.”
“Oh.” She had not understood this. “And ouch.”
“Diantha.” His voice dropped. “You know that I find you beautiful.”
“You called me pretty, but with all due respect, gentlemen tend to break Rule Number Six remarkably often.” This hurt. Wretchedly. But it should not hurt so much. “And actually, it would be mutual, the—the part about simply wanting to feel pleasure and satisfaction. So that is only suitable.” She ignored the tight ball of nausea in her midriff.
“No.” There was the uncompromising word again. “Allow me to behave as the gentleman you believe me to be.”
She wanted to damn him for being a gentleman when she least wanted that. But her throat was closed. Instead she folded her arms over her sick middle, swiveled about again, and tripped over the bucket of milk she left in the corridor earlier when she’d been so distracted by his kiss. She went sprawling with a clang and creamy milk and skirts all jumbling sloppily across the cold stone floor.
He came flying into the corridor and onto his knees before her with a haste she might have liked if she weren’t mortified.
“Are you injured?” His quick gaze scanned her from brow to toe.
“Only embarrassed. That was not the grand exit I intended.”
“Grand exits are often tiresome anyway.” He grasped her hand, and she could sit in this puddle forever if he would continue looking at her with such intensity.
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