by Brenda Hiatt
Thor shrugged, though Dina thought he looked a bit sheepish. "Occasionally it's necessary to make an exception. This was one of those occasions." He shot an accusatory glance toward Silas, who appeared not to notice.
Instead, he was looking at the puppy in Dina's hands, his lip curled in a sneer that was all too familiar to her. "No doubt something is wrong with this one, making it unsuitable for the hunt," he said. "In which case, you'd have done better to drown it, Turpin, rather than let my sister pamper it into old age."
Dina clutched the little thing to her chest, remembering all too vividly the threats he had made against her only other pet, years ago. Before she could speak her mind to her brother, however, Violet did so.
"What a dreadful thing to say," she exclaimed. "I'm glad you do not breed foxhounds, or anything else, Mr. Moore, if that is how you feel."
Silas clearly realized he had blundered badly. "It was a jest," he said quickly. "Surely you cannot think that I would really—"
"No, I don't think it was a jest," Violet retorted, hands on her hips. "You have said more than one thing since your arrival yesterday that has struck me as rather mean-spirited. I have tried to give you the benefit of the doubt, Mr. Moore, but I begin to believe that everything Dina said about you is true after all."
Now Silas turned on Dina with a ferocity that made her step back, out of long habit. "And just what lies have you been telling her about me?" he demanded. "What gives you the right—?"
With a single step, Thor placed himself in front of her, facing Silas. "You no longer have the right to bully my wife, Moore," he said with deadly softness. "If you cannot keep a civil tongue in your head, you would do better to leave before I am moved to guarantee you can never bully anyone again."
Silas's eyes blazed and he made a move as though to sidestep Thor to get to Dina. Then, so suddenly that Dina did not quite see what had happened, her brother was on the ground, rubbing his jaw and blinking up at Thor.
"I—I must say, that was uncalled for," he stammered. Then, to Violet, "Miss Turpin, surely you do not wish me to leave? I assure you, I never intended the least harm."
Violet hesitated, her expression one of mingled pity and repugnance. "I suppose you must stay for Christmas dinner. You are Dina's brother, after all. But . . . perhaps it would be better if you did not stay for the whole of the holidays. It seems your continued presence here is likely to cause more friction than happiness."
For a long moment, Silas glared at all three of them from his awkward position on the ground. Then, with a snort of disgust, he scrambled to his feet.
"In that case, I beg you will make my excuses to Lord and Lady Rumble. I'll get my things and clear out at once, as I've no wish to cause anyone unhappiness —particularly you, Miss Turpin. I'm sure I can find a room in Alford. They're not likely to be full up on Christmas day."
With that, he slammed his hat back onto his head and turned on his heel to stalk toward the house without a backward glance.
"Oh, dear," Violet sighed. "He didn't take that well at all."
Dina put an arm about her shoulders, just as glad to have something to focus upon other than Thor's last words to her before Silas's interruption.
"Pray don't blame yourself, Violet. Silas has always had a vile temper. It was only a matter of time before something set him off."
Violet glanced again at Silas's retreating back. "Perhaps. But he was so charming, so attentive, last night at the ball. He did seem somewhat distracted after supper, but I was able to tease him back into a cheerful mood."
"Good riddance, if you ask me," Thor snapped. "I'm sorry, Dina," he added in a conciliatory tone, "but he really did seem to be trying to stir up trouble in one way or another."
Dina nodded, though it rankled a bit to have Thor's opinion of Silas proved right. Still, she couldn't help feeling a guilty relief that Violet had taken his measure without any overt warning from her.
"Yes, it's as well he is leaving. I only wish, well, that things might have turned out differently." She had so hoped that with his debts paid, Silas would accept her marriage and change for the better.
"I'm still cold," Violet declared suddenly. "Let's go back inside and have some of that hot rum punch, shall we?"
To this, Dina and Thor readily agreed. Once again, Dina put her puppy back with its mother, then turned to accompany the others to the house. Violet chattered all the way back, as though determined to smooth over the awkwardness of Silas's leaving.
"And tomorrow is Boxing Day," she concluded as they reached the gardens. "We always have a wonderful time with the tenants and villagers, don't we Grant?"
Thor nodded. "Where is the party to be held this year?"
"At Farmer Kibble's. He and Farmer Puckridge have the largest barns," she explained to Dina, "so they generally take turns hosting the St. Stephen's Dance."
Dina tried to keep the wistfulness out of her smile. Her father, and Silas after him, had never cared for the Boxing Day tradition, honoring it only by giving most of the servants the day off and allowing Dina's mother —and later Dina —to distribute a bit of extra food among their poorest tenants. How much happier her childhood might have been with parents like Lord and Lady Rumble.
But there was no point in regretting what was long past —nor what was recently past —she supposed. Even though Thor had made it clear he still regarded her as friend, not lover, she could not regret what they had done last night. It was an experience she would treasure for the rest of her life.
She would not, however, humiliate herself again by begging for a resumption of such intimacies. She could have a good life here, so long as she did not spoil it with vain wishes. And that, she was determined, was just what she would have.
In fact, with Silas gone, perhaps she could recapture a bit of the youthful sense of Christmas she had missed as a child. Now that Silas had given up his scheme of wooing Violet, she could simply enjoy the rest of the yuletide season.
She simply had to avoid dwelling on the knowledge that Thor would likely never love her as she had hoped he might . . . as she loved him.
Chapter Nineteen
"I'll take Violet Turpin to wife one way or another if it kills me," Silas muttered as he drove into Alford an hour later.
Now that Dina's fortune was well and truly lost to him, marrying Violet seemed the only option remaining to keep him out of debtors' prison. Whatever Dina had said to turn her against him, Silas would undo the damage. He'd charmed women enough in the past to be confident he could do so now, when it mattered far more than ever before.
And in the unlikely circumstance that he could not . . . well, he'd recently believed Dina had been kidnapped for ransom. That option might serve if all else failed.
On sudden decision, he passed by the Half Moon, where he'd planned to bespeak a room, and drove instead to the house at the end of the street, where Plunkett had told him he lived. He stared at the weathered cottage with some distaste. Plunkett had told him he'd inherited the place from an uncle, but clearly he hadn't received any money to pay for its upkeep.
Still, Plunkett was familiar with both the area and those who populated it, and his financial straits, apparently even worse than Silas's, would make his help that much easier to purchase. Telling his man to bring his trunk, Silas jumped down from the box and went to knock at the door, a plan beginning to form.
Yes, one way or another, he was determined that Violet Turpin's fortune would be his before New Year's Day.
Thor accepted another mug of beer from Farmer Kibble with a perfunctory smile before resuming his frown to watch the dancers in the middle of the barn floor. Dina seemed to be enjoying herself, dancing a reel with the estimable Mr. Kibble's eldest son, but he was almost certain she wasn't really happy.
He didn't see how she could be, after the distant way she had behaved toward him this morning and, even more noticeably, last night.
When they had gone upstairs to their chambers after a protracted evening of Christmas fes
tivities, he'd already had his arguments prepared against the inevitable moment when she would again insist that they share a bed. He was tired, she was tired, there had been too much emotional turmoil that day with her brother leaving, and, of course, his concern about hurting her.
But none of those reasons had been required.
Upon reaching the end of the west wing, she had murmured a polite good-night and stepped into her chamber, leaving him blinking in the hallway. And today she had treated him with the same studied politeness, smiling more sincerely at Rush and Stormy as they took their leave this morning than she had smiled at Thor himself —her husband.
Though he could not claim that she had precisely avoided him, Dina had given him not the least hint that she desired any repetition of the intimacies that had both thrilled and frightened him on Christmas Eve. Far from cajoling him, as she'd done that night, she seemed willing to pretend it had never happened. It was exactly what he'd hoped for.
And it was driving him mad.
The reel ended and Thor quickly set down his mug and stood up from the bale of straw where he'd been sitting, determined to claim Dina for the next dance before some other farmer could do so. He was a moment too late, however, for as soon as she turned from exchanging thanks with young Bill Kibble, old Mr. Inker stepped forward and seized her hand.
Thor sighed and headed back to his straw bale, but was intercepted by blowsy Mrs. Puckridge, who'd clearly had a drop more ale than was good for her, though it was only noon.
"Hi, now, Mr. Turpin, why for b'an't you dancin'?" she demanded. "Yon Tim Bumble is fiddling better than I ever heard him. Come on, then, and show me how the fine Lunnon gents hop to a reel, won't you?"
He could hardly refuse without insulting her, so reluctantly followed her to the set, where she took a place only two down from Dina. Thor nodded to his wife and received a stiff, cordial smile in return. The music began, a lively jig of a tune, and he tried to throw himself into the dance as enthusiastically as everyone else seemed to be doing, though his attention was almost wholly on Dina, diagonally across from him.
Her blue dimity gown fit her curves exceedingly well, and as she skipped along to the movements of the dance, its full skirts occasionally flipped up high enough to reveal her ankles and even, once, one shapely calf. Thor swallowed and looked away, fighting an absurd but almost overwhelming impulse to snatch her away from so many common, admiring eyes and have her all to himself in some corner.
"My compliments," he said as the movements of the dance brought them briefly together. "You dance as well on a dirt floor as you do on polished oak."
Though her green eyes widened slightly as though in surprise, she responded with only a small, polite smile and a perfunctory thank-you before moving on.
A few minutes later, Violet moved past him down the line, partnered by a sturdy farm lad. "What have you done to upset Dina?" she asked accusingly as Thor swung her about as the dance demanded. "You two have scarce spoken today."
"Nothing," he replied, but she moved on down the line before he could ask whether Violet had any theories. All he could think was that Dina was angry about the way he had sent her brother packing the day before, though she'd said nothing about it.
When the reel ended, he thanked Mrs. Puckridge, declining her offer of dalliance with feigned regret before hurrying to Dina's side. "Might I have this next dance?" he asked, forestalling young Rufus Eubanks who had clearly been about to ask the same thing.
Dina hesitated long enough to cost him a pang, but then she nodded. "Of course." She did not sound eager, however.
"Or we could sit it out," he suggested, trying not to show how her reluctance hurt him. "I'm beginning to think we need to talk."
"If that is what you would prefer," she said, sounding as though it did not matter in the least, one way or another.
He glanced around the gaily festooned barn and assured himself that Violet and both of his parents were happily occupied: Violet lining up for the next dance, his father deep in a discussion of crops with Farmer Kibble and his mother chatting about childbirth with half a dozen village women.
"Over here." He indicated a stack of hay bales piled near the ladder to the loft.
She followed him without protest, but when he seated himself on a bale, she remained standing rather than sit down beside him. "What did you wish to say?" she asked. "I did promise Eb Bullfinch I would teach him the quadrille."
Thor felt somewhat at a loss in the face of her cool politeness, but forced himself to speak, now that he had the chance. "I can't help feeling I've done something to upset you, Dina, and I wish you would tell me what it is."
She gave a slight shrug. "I am not upset."
"Is it your brother? Perhaps I was harsher than necessary, but when he tried to threaten you—"
"Silas behaved poorly. You were well within your rights to ask him to leave." Still, she showed no real emotion, nor did she meet his eyes, her gaze straying instead to the dancers in the middle of the barn floor.
"But perhaps I did not consider your feelings as I ought," he persisted, reaching out to place a hand on her arm. "Dina, please believe that the last thing I wanted to do was to upset you."
She moved away from his touch, but so casually that he could not quite call it a rejection. "I told you, I am not upset. I'm sorry if I have done anything to give you that impression."
Frustrated, Thor stood, since she would not sit. "Of course you are giving me that impression. Since your brother left, you have treated me almost like a stranger, when before, you —we—"
Finally, she looked him in the eye. "Not a stranger, surely. I thought I was treating you as a friend."
"A friend?" He blinked at her, confused.
"Is that not what you wanted?"
"Er, yes, but—" How to explain to her that he wanted far more than that, especially when he'd insisted both to her and himself that he did not? When he knew friendship was the best, safest thing for both of them?
"Then where is the problem?" she asked lightly. "Ah, I believe the quadrille is next, and I did promise Eb. If you will excuse me?"
Turning, she walked away, neither quickly nor slowly, leaving him to frown after her. He was no closer to understanding the change in Dina's attitude than he had been before. And he had never desired her more.
It was all Dina could do to keep from glancing over her shoulder as she deliberately walked away from Thor. Had she imagined that pleading in his eyes? Most likely, since it was what she most wanted to see there. She would not allow her romantic fancies to pull her back into foolish dreams or embarrassing displays of affection that would not be returned.
Still, she could not quite subdue a flutter of hope as she recalled his words and, more, his expressions both during the last dance and just now, by the loft. If anything, however, it only firmed her resolve to continue on her present course, waiting for him to make the next move. If he did, she would respond willingly enough. And if he did not, well, at least she would not have humiliated herself again.
"Are you ready to learn the quadrille, Eb?" she asked the ruddy-cheeked farm lad waiting eagerly near the rough stage where three of his fellows plied fiddle, tin-whistle and drum.
"Oh, aye, Miz Turpin," he exclaimed, brushing a straw-colored shock of hair out of his eyes. "Once't I learn a fancy Lunnon dance like that, Daisy Gill will be sure to pay me more mind, don't you think?"
"You'll charm stars into her eyes," Dina assured him, hoping she was not raising the lad's hopes too high. She knew all too well how that felt.
When the music started a moment later, Dina did her best to walk clumsy Eb through the figures of the popular quadrille, pointing out to him where it differed from the familiar cotillion. He needed a lot of coaching, which was as well, since Thor had joined the same set just as the dance began. If she was frequently tempted to watch him as he partnered little Becky Spinet, she was careful not to show it.
It was a novel experience, teaching someone a dance she'd
only learned earlier that year, to the inexpert tune scratched out by the country musicians. Dina did her best to savor that novelty, telling herself that life held many such small pleasures and that she would be a fool to overlook them while pining after the ones she could not have.
By the time the dance ended, she could truthfully compliment Eb on his improvement, as he'd learned at least two of the five figures. Beaming, he pumped her hand in thanks, then went off to find his Daisy. Dina could not help grinning as she watched him go, but her grin abruptly faded when she turned to find Thor at her elbow, a serious, searching expression in his eyes.
"This time, let's actually dance," he said before she could come up with some excuse to hurry off. "You deserve a reward after that good deed." He nodded after Eb.
"Very well," she replied airily, determined that he not see what his nearness did to her. All of the dances so far had been reels and square, figured dances, which meant there would be little contact between them, and almost no chance for conversation.
Safer, surely, than not dancing, all things considered.
Then, to her great surprise, old Tim Bumble scraped out the opening strains to a waltz on his battered fiddle and balding Mr. Mallet joined in with his tin whistle.
"Did you—?" she started to ask, before noticing that Thor looked as surprised as she did. Then she saw Violet hurrying away from the musicians, a mischievous smile on her face. When she caught Dina's eye, she sent her a conspiratorial wink.
"My sister has clearly spent too much time in my mother's company of late," Thor commented with a shake of his head.
Dina would have to have a talk with Violet, let her know that now, with things standing as they did with Thor, Violet was doing her no favors by such machinations. At the moment, however, she simply had to get through this waltz without embarrassing herself.
"I think it is commendable that your father sponsors something on this scale for his tenants every year," she said, trying very hard to ignore the thrill that went through her at the touch of Thor's hand on her back, the feel of her own hand in his.
