He stopped midway up the ladder and his dark gaze swung to me. “Courage is tempered with wisdom, madam. However, you are free to think whatever you wish.”
I took a step toward him, holding to his fierce look. “Even now you will not face the truth.”
In the next instant he dropped to the floor and strode to me, pushing his face close to mine.
“And tell me, Cozette, since you are so wise. What is the truth? Please enlighten me.”
I could see the fire of the young Ernest I once knew, but his expression was that of a man aged hard and left tainted by his experiences.
“The truth is that you still care for me.” I touched his cheek and he turned his head to avoid my hand.
“It doesn’t matter what I feel, Cozette. What’s done, is done. I cannot take back the past.”
“Ernest, I am not concerned about the past.”
He glanced at me, his expression clouded. He walked away, looking at the ceiling as he raked his hands through his hair. “What do you want, Cozette? A confession? Fine, I was wrong not to tell you. I was wrong not to warn you about Deavereux. There, is that sufficient? Are we even now? Please, it may be better if you just go now.” He started toward the ladder.
“The truth is I still care for you. Are you too blind to see that?”
He stopped, but did not turn around.
“But I cannot have you, Ernest.” Tears welled in my eyes. Twice in my life I was to lose him. My heart was breaking. “Because of someone else?” He turned to face me.
“Yes.”
He nodded once and started up the ladder. I hurried up the ladder. “You know then who I am talking about?”
He glanced over his shoulder as I popped my head through the entry to his room. With a reluctant sigh he helped me through the opening.
“I am afraid, Cozette, that I simply don’t care anymore.” He stared at me for a moment. “Of course, whomever it is, I wish you great happiness. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”
“It seems, Ernest, that while you may, and rightfully so, be quick to point out my affairs with other men, it seems you have not remained celibate.”
His gaze shot to mine. “Now, what in blue blazes are you taking about?”
“My mistress is with child, Ernest.”
He continued to stare at me, his expression unchanged. “Lady Archibald? She and the master had not slept in the same room since the train accident.”
“Exactly. And shortly thereafter, I proposed that you have an affair with her, do you remember?”
The book he’d taken from the library shelf slipped from his fingers. He blinked, looked away and pinned me with a scrutinizing look.
“And you assume simply by your proposition that I followed through blindly, obediently and now you think that, I am the father?”
“It stands to reason. I have seen her coming and going from the stables these past few months.”
He let out a long-suffering sigh and picked up the book. “I hate to disappoint you, Cozette, but I am not the father.”
“Ernest, do not think that I hold judgment against you for this—”
“While this is of little comfort to me, Cozette, the fact remains that I am neither now nor ever was engaged with Lady Archibald. Perhaps it is an immaculate conception. I do not know. Whatever the case, it does not involve me.”
“This is most puzzling, since I was certain you’d taken up my proposal.”
“My apologies once again, miss, for disappointing you.”
“Don’t you see, Ernest? That was the reason.”
Weariness showed on his face. “You are talking riddles, woman.”
“That is the reason I could not be with you. I thought the child was yours.”
“You mean this is not about Mr. Rodin?”
I shook my head.
He pressed his palm to his forehead. “My head hurts, Cozette.” He looked at me then with his piercing green eye. “I need to ask you something most plainly and you must answer me as clear as you can. Do you understand?”
I nodded, tears pricking the backs of my eyes. I wanted to run into his embrace and forget the past, forget everything except the bliss of being held in his arms.
“Can you accept me, just as I am?” He stood before me, his arms spread wide.
I swallowed a sob. “Ernest, can you accept me, and all the scars I carry inside me?” I raised my eyes to his steady gaze. I could hear the rapid gait of his breathing in time with the cadence of my heart. He took a step toward me and I met him halfway.
His fingers brushed the hair from my face, drifting low over my cheek. He softly traced my lips with his thumb, studying every part that he touched with care. He’d barely touched me and my body was more alive than it had ever been with another man. I closed my eyes in an effort to quell the desire spreading like wildfire through me.
“Are these feelings are unrequited dreams of our youth, Ernest? Or are they real? How will we know for sure?”
I kissed his fingers, turning my head as he continued his languid trail down the slope of my neck and farther down between my breasts.
“We can’t see the future, Cozette. But in this I speak the truth. I deeply regret the chances I’ve allowed to pass. And I promise that I will never be so blind again.”
He leaned forward, pressing his lips to my forehead, my closed eyelids and my cheeks. His breath, warm and sweet, hovered near my mouth awaiting my permission. “Ernest,” I whispered, forgetting all else. I met his mouth with ready exuberance, hooking my arms around his neck, surrendering to his kiss. Relief flooded me. I held his face as though discovering for the first time my unbridled joy in finding him again. His kisses grew urgent, even as his anxious hands, like mine, sought to make up for lost time. “It was you at Lady Graham’s ball, wasn’t it?”
He leaned back and offered me a grin. “I told Mrs. Farrington that Lady Archibald had forgotten her umbrella.”
His ardent kisses drowned out my laughter.
Clothes dropped away in haste and with his mouth fused to mine, he swept me into his arms and carried me to his bed. No hesitation, no barriers stood between us, only years of deprived passion, freed now by the truth.
I reached for him, accepting him into my embrace. Here was my secret lover. His mouth closed over my aching breast, drawing my aroused tip to his teasing tongue. His manhood lay firm against my thigh, stirring the dampness of my sheath. Memory of his exquisite skill in the sequestered room at Lady Graham’s heightened my arousal. I parted my knees, in silent invitation, no longer wanting to be separate from him.
“My sweet little bird,” he whispered.
His singular gaze held mine, shimmering with confidence and reverence as he pushed inside my warm glove. Of all the men I’d lain with, none compared to the comfort of him. In every way he was my companion, my confidant, and my lover. He knew my past—some that we shared, and years we had not. But we’d managed to find our way back into each other’s arms.
Slowly and gently, he filled me, and years of torment subsided as he lowered his mouth to mine in a searing kiss. His hand curled beneath my hip as he tortured my desire, drawing out partway, only to enter deeper and more firm with each stroke.
His skin, warm and slick, slid over mine, heating my body to a fevered pitch, prolonging the anticipation of our joining. Smoke curled inside me, and my body grew tight with need. A cool afternoon breeze wafted over us, kissing my face, even as Ernest did. I sighed as I kissed the strength of his muscled shoulder. He lifted my hip, giving him greater depth, and I surrendered to the dizzying euphoria as he drove harder into me.
“Look at me, Cozette,” he insisted through his jagged breath. “I have waited…so long….”
I held his fierce gaze as my body shattered in a blinding rush. His breathing labored, he pushed into me with a deep groan and spilled his seed, claiming me even as he had claimed my heart. Breathless, he lay on top of me and I relished the rapid beat of his heart to mine.
He kissed my b
reast and braced himself above me. Still joined with me, he grinned. “You realize I don’t plan to ever let you leave this bed.” He kissed me quickly and turned to his side, pulling me close.
“Come here. I want to hold you to make sure you are real before I take you again.”
I curled into his embrace, resting my cheek on his chest. I had no desire to leave his bed. But there was more that I needed to know. “Ernest?”
He took my hand and kissed each finger.
“Do you think that it is wealth that appeals to me?”
He laughed, lifting my chin to meet his face. “I know fully that it is not my wealth you seek.” A sly grin lifted his tempting mouth.
“It isn’t, you know. I just want you to understand.” I teased his nipple, pleased to see it respond.
“That is good, as I must tell you my wages are not that of a lord.”
He turned my face to his.
“Why this discussion now? Have I not pleased you enough to make you mindless for anything but my pleasuring you?”
“The very thought causes my rose to weep once again for you, milord.”
“There, then give me but a moment and I shall remedy your precious ache, my love.”
He captured my finger softly between his lips and grinned at me with a gleam in his eye.
“Ernest, you aren’t aware, then, of Lord Archibald’s will?” He was apparently unaware of how his life was about to change. His brow furrowed as his expression sobered.
“What about it? Has he put the estate up for sale? Jensen and I have saved a little—”
“Ernest.” I held my fingers to his lips and his gaze softened. He kissed my fingers.
“He left you his estate. He left you everything.” I waited for a response, sure that there would be some measure of glee in this good news.
“And what of Lady Archibald?”
I shook my head. “He left her nothing, the beast. I’m sorry, Ernest. He may have been your father by blood, but you are nothing at all like him.”
He lay on his back, silent, as he stared at the ceiling. “Are you certain about this, Cozette?”
“I stood in the same room as his legal counsel read the papers.” I pushed up on my elbow to look down at him directly. “You mean you had no idea?”
His gaze turned to mine and he shook his head. “What of the others? Jensen, Miss Farrington?”
“Their fate is in your hands now, Ernest, as is mine. But I will offer that Mistress Archibald is going to need your compassion, I suspect, as will Jensen when he discovers he is to be a father.” I stared down at his body, honed by hard work and sun, tangled in the bedsheets, and my desire ignited again to have him.
“I suspected he might be having an affair. He has admired her from afar for years.”
He turned to look at me, reaching up to stroke my cheek.
“We will live here as we always have, I suppose. Do you think they would find that agreeable? We are like family, aren’t we?”
“Indeed we are, and Mrs. Farrington will be most pleased she will not have to sneak in her husband when he comes to visit.” I held his hand to my cheek. He was a good man, a kind man.
“Good, that’s settled, then.” He turned on his side and cupped my breast, flicking his thumb over my rosy tip. He glanced at me with a wicked gleam in his eye. “How shall we celebrate this newfound fortune?”
“If we are to start fresh I need to know one thing more.”
“Woman, your curiosity will be the death of me.” He slapped his hand to his chest and flopped back on the pillow.
“I want to know about your scars. How did it happen.”
“Cozette, let us leave the past in the past. It was long ago. It doesn’t matter now.”
“Please, Ernest, I want no secrets between us.”
“I don’t wish to spoil the moment. Can we speak of other things?” He eased me to my back and kissed the valley between my breasts. I clamped my hand over my breast, blocking his mouth.
“You are stubborn.” He held my gaze for a moment. “Very well, but promise that you will say nothing until I finish, and after this, we are never to talk of it for the rest of our days—do you understand?”
I nodded.
He took a deep breath and kissed my other breast before he laid his head on my chest. I threaded my fingers through his dark curls, now speckled with silver. I savored this moment, here with the elusive man of my dreams. In all the men I’d known, each had bits and pieces of my perfect lover, but not until now were they all complete in one man.
“No pity, Cozette.”
“You’ve made that clear, Ernest. Now, tell me,” I prompted. A cold trickle of fear clung to the edge of my heart. I sensed something that I tried to shove away, hoping silently my instinct was wrong. However, even as I steeled myself to the possibility, this much I knew. If Ernest had suspected, even for a moment, that my life was in danger, he would have done anything to protect me.
“When Abbot found out that I’d helped you escape, he demanded compensation for his loss. He lied, telling me if I gave him all my savings, he wouldn’t send his men after you.”
“May his soul burn in hell,” I muttered.
“Cozette.” He gave quiet warning.
I waited with a sickening sense in the pit of my stomach.
“I didn’t trust him, but what choice did I have? I gave him everything. All that I had saved to get to London and to start our new life together.”
Hot tears escaped the corners of my eyes, sliding over my flushed cheeks. I swallowed. “And the scars, your eye injury—what of those?” I grasped his hand, closing my eyes tight as he pressed my hand to his lips.
“Master Archibald showed up at the orphanage a few days after you left. I had no idea who he was, but after he and Abbot exchanged words and I suspect a few coins, he told me I was to go to work for him.”
A sudden realization gripped my heart. Were his injuries at the hand of Lord Archibald? I sat upright. Fury filled my soul for a man already cold and dead. “Did that bastard do this to you, Ernest? The swine—I suspected him of brutality from the first. I feared for the mistress many times, but I had no idea he’d stoop so low as to strike a child.”
He pushed himself up, bracing his body over me. “Master Archibald did nothing of the sort. Master Archibald came to my aid. Now, you vowed to let me tell my story without interruption. Do not force me to turn you over my knee and paddle you.”
I offered him a sly grin.
“Wipe that look off your face if you wish to me to continue.” He touched my mouth, following with a soft, thorough kiss.
“I will be quiet,” I whispered, stroking my finger over his lips.
“The master and I were never close, but he treated me well. We had an agreement—if I would be silent about my identity, he would see to my mother’s care.”
“All his business trips? And that is why you couldn’t reveal who you were?” I realized then what he’d had to live with.
“He was seeing to my mother for many of them. Until she passed on.”
“And you never saw her again?”
“She knew of me only through the master’s visits. In the end, she didn’t recognize him, nor did she remember who I was.”
I stared at the tree branches swaying lazily outside his chamber window.
“But you haven’t told me about this.” I touched his eye patch and let my fingers skim across the deep-welted scars, trailing over his shoulder. Though faded with time, they were still evident on his bronzed skin.
“I was about to climb into the carriage behind Master Archibald when I noticed Abbot riding from the barn, hell-bent for somewhere. I don’t know why, but stepped in front of him and grabbed his reins, demanding to know his destination. He warned me to let go, but the sneer on his face made me hold tight. Somehow, I knew that he’d found you.”
His hand rubbed gently over my thigh as he spoke, his gaze distant in reliving the moment.
“The next thing I
knew he was hitting me with his horse whip. I tried to pull him from the horse, but he jabbed my eye with the end of the riding stick.”
“Oh, Ernest. I hope that fate has not been kind to Mr. Abbot for all the suffering he’s caused.”
“And do you think for a moment that if I could go back and change any of what happened that I would?” He held my chin, forcing me to look at him.
My vision blurred from my tears. I could only shake my head, for I knew the answer was no.
“Archibald fought him off with his cane and struck a lucrative bargain to make up for his loss. Abbot relented, reluctantly, but he took the money. That’s all that mattered to him.”
“My dearest love, I am so, so sorry.” Tears streamed down my cheeks. It was the first time I remembered crying since the day I’d left him at the orphanage.
He drew me close, comforting me even as he had done many years ago.
“Shh, now this is why I didn’t want to say anything. This is none of your doing,” he soothed.
My fingers trembled as I touched the soft leather patch covering his eye. “I want no more secrets between us.”
He covered my hand, his gaze unsure. “Cozette, this isn’t necessary.”
“Ernest, your eyes are what I first loved about you. They are what kept me going each day. Whether you have sight in one or both, I will cherish them. And most especially when you look at me.”
His hand was warm on mine for a moment more and I knew that he struggled with what my reaction might be. He lifted the patch and drew it slowly over his head.
The left pupil was a milky, lifeless form of its deep green twin that held a steady gaze on me. A deep, jagged scar jutted at the corner of his eye, where laugh lines should have been.
He sighed quietly and cleared his throat. “It is unpleasant, I give you that. Here, now, let me just put this back on—”
I stopped his hand. “No, it does not affect me as you think. Abbot may have robbed you of your sight in one eye, but he did not touch your soul, and that is what will keep me in your bed.” I kissed him fully, long and hard, pouring out the years that I’d waited for him, hoping to free him of any doubt.
The Diary of Cozette Page 33
