Winston. Philomena had found her an employment with Winston.
What the bloody devil was Phil thinking?
And now it was too late to start out. Or perhaps not. Arrive in the middle of the night, pounding on the door—that’d get Winston’s attention.
If it wasn’t too late to save a young girl he should have protected.
“If I didn’t know better,” Zayn Carlyle said in a quietly bemused voice from the doorway, “I would think you were anxious to leave England—and here we’ve only just arrived.”
William turned. Leveled his gaze at his friend and passenger, a half-Egyptian dealer in armaments. Zayn knew bloody well he’d never wanted to come back here. Hadn’t even needed to. He could have written to Katherine that he had successfully retrieved the Possession from Millicent and India, that it had been moored safe and sound in Malta as he’d suspected.
But he’d come in person instead. And he hadn’t done it for Katherine.
He’d done it for Millicent.
Zayn sobered. “What’s happened?”
“Miss Millicent Germain has spent these past weeks with the most rut-hungry devil in all of England, that’s what’s happened.”
And it was his fault, because he’d been too angry to think beyond the immediate future.
Zayn raised a brow, waiting for a name.
“Winston,” William said. “She’s been working as a medic for Winston.”
Zayn’s mouth turned grim.
William pinched the bridge of his nose against a familiar, strangling guilt. Horrific images in his mind of his own brutality toward Millie, albeit with reason. Of another man’s brutality—the black-and-blue evidence of her brother Gavin’s fists.
William had seen it with his own eyes. Had stood by Millicent’s bed as she lay there, nearly dead.
Yet still, months later, he’d set the lash to her, five times.
For piracy, for her own good, to save her life.
Sod that. There’d been other choices he could have made. Surely there had, even then, even at the risk of his men’s respect. “I only hope it’s not too late,” he said, grabbing a satchel, looking inside it uselessly and tossing it aside because he wasn’t going anywhere until morning.
Zayn crossed his arms, frowning. “Are you certain you don’t want me to accompany you?”
“No sense in connecting your name with this mess.”
“Nonetheless, I shall gladly help in any way I can.”
A pit opened up in William’s gut. When he arrived at Winston’s estate, he may well be too late to save her from the worst of it.
But no matter what she’d endured in Winston’s employ, William would make bloody sure she never had to endure it again. He would offer his friend everything he could and hope it was enough to absolve him of his sins.
* * *
THE PLEASURE OF LIFE.
The headiness of it lingered on Winston’s tongue the next day, after making visits to some of the farthest reaches of the estate, and then the village—where he’d learned that Miles had been to see Cara again while Edward was away visiting parishioners.
Edward said Cara insisted she was well but that he didn’t believe her.
If she was well, why the need for secrecy?
Winston dismounted after returning from the village, handed the reins to a waiting footman and strode into the house, where no doubt Miles would have her nose in one of those new medical volumes.
And it made him feel...good. Seeing her eyes the moment she’d realized the volumes were for her made him want to give her...more. More things that would make her look at him as though he were the greatest man in the world.
Instead, he’d given her something very different.
And he wasn’t going to think of that now. This time, he would demand that she tell him what was the matter with Cara. There would be no refusals.
He found her in the library, at her favorite desk by the window, exactly as he expected to find her: leaning over a book, finger on the page, peering at something very closely. The sight of her reminded him instantly of the conservatory, the gentleness of her hands on his face, the taste of her... But that wasn’t why he was here.
“You will tell me what is the matter with Cara,” he said as evenly as he could, “and you will tell me now.”
She looked up at him as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “We’ve already discussed this. More than once.”
And meeting her eyes was not the same now as it had been before their tryst in the conservatory. He could still feel the way she’d touched his face, the whisper of her fingers.
No one had ever touched him that way before.
“This is no longer a discussion.” He said it because he had to, for Cara’s sake, and Edward’s. “I must ask you, as your employer, to tell me what you know.”
“It’s not mine to divulge,” she said sharply.
“I know there’s something the matter. You’ve visited her too many times.”
“Did it ever occur to you that Cara and I might be friends?”
“Cara was my friend long before she was yours. She’s my responsibility—”
“She’s responsible for herself.”
“—and I intend to see to it that she receives every means of treatment possible.”
She bolted from the chair and faced him. “You think I would not insist on further treatment myself if I believed it necessary? I thought you trusted my judgment.”
“I do trust your judgment.” But this was different. This was Cara.
“No, you don’t, or you wouldn’t be demanding that I betray her confidence.”
“All this sneaking around, secret examinations behind Edward’s back—”
“How was I to know he would be away for the afternoon?”
“I must know what’s the matter with her.”
“Why?” she cried, exasperated. “Because you feel guilty?” And immediately her mouth clamped shut, and Winston felt as if he’d been punched in the chest.
And now Miles was shaking her head. “I didn’t mean that.”
“What did Cara tell you?” But Winston already had a good idea what it was, and it made him feel sick.
“It’s nothing. I didn’t mean that, and it’s best if we don’t discuss this further.” She closed her book and picked it up.
“What did Cara tell you?”
“Good afternoon, Your Grace,” she said, and headed for the door.
“She told you everything, didn’t she?” Bloody hell. Miles knew it all—his sin, the baby, Cara’s barrenness.
Miles paused. Turned, with her arms around the book. “You weren’t supposed to know.”
“I wasn’t supposed to know? Perhaps I didn’t want you to know.”
“I won’t tell anyone.”
“I betrayed my best friend in the entire world—my two best friends—and that betrayal cost them both a lifetime of happiness, and there isn’t one bloody thing I can do about it. Do you have any idea what that feels like?” he demanded. “Do you?”
“What if I told you I do? You aren’t the only person in the world who has regrets.
“I wish I could tell you what you want to know—for your sake and Edward’s—but Cara is my friend.” She said it forcefully, as if Cara were her only friend in the world. And then she turned back toward the door.
“Do not leave,” he ordered. “I haven’t finished.”
She disappeared without bothering to respond.
And he stood there without bothering to go after her. Because she knew. She knew his blackest sin, and he had no idea what to do about it.
* * *
SHE EXPECTED HIM to follow her. Was surprised when he didn’t.
She left her book on a side table in the entrance hall, went out the front door and into the gardens—straight down the very path she’d watched Winston take with the princess that day—all the way to the end of the third pond.
And then she turned around.
Faced the house.
From here it looked like a palace, sprawling in both directions, dotted with too many windows to count. It made her feel small.
And compared to Winston and his grandeur, she was small.
But she would not betray a friend ever again—not even knowing how tormented he must be. He was afraid for Cara, and she knew why, and she’d promised Cara she wouldn’t let him know, but now she had.
Watching him just now, the look in his eyes made her heart ache. Regret. Shame. Resignation. They were Millie’s closest companions. She knew better than he could imagine what it felt like to make a mistake that could not be fixed.
His pain sliced through her, reaching a place she did not want him to touch.
And she wished she could help him, but he’d been right that day in Paris. There was nothing she could give him that would undo the past.
CHAPTER TWENTY
AFTER A LONG WALK in the gardens and a bit of time in the conservatory, Millie retrieved her book from the entrance hall and returned to her rooms. Absently she closed the door, feeling the weight of the book in her hands, the smoothness of the cover, the crisp corner of the pages. Sitting down at her writing desk, she tried to read for a while but couldn’t seem to concentrate.
The sky grew darker, and she lit a candle. Its warm glow flickered over the set of volumes Winston had given her.
She would take them when she left. She probably shouldn’t, but she would.
And when will you leave?
Soon. She pulled the book closer, tried to brush the question aside with renewed attention to a section about the spleen.
How soon?
She focused on each word, each sentence. Studied the detailed plates, cross-referenced the diagrams to the text. But it was no use. Finally, she set the book aside and decided to prepare for bed even though it was much too early.
She removed her wig, jacket, waistcoat. Brushed her hair until it was smooth and shiny, went to the dresser... and pulled out the nightgown Cara had given her. It felt soft and feminine in her hands. A great longing filled her—a longing for something she wasn’t quite sure of—and she set the nightgown on the dresser.
Before she could leave, she would need to make plans.
She disrobed, washed and opened her jar of salve. Standing in front of the glass, she held up her hair, dipped her fingers in the salve, and began tending to the scars on her back.
Suddenly there was a knock, and Winston’s angry voice came through the door. “Miles, I wish to speak with you about this afternoon.”
“I can’t!” Dear God—she snatched up the nightgown. “Not right now—” But the door was already opening. “Wait—”
There was no time to stop him as she fumbled with the nightgown, searching for the sleeves—
Winston came in. Saw her. His expression changed from upset to stunned in a heartbeat.
“What do you want?” she cried, hugging the nightgown to her chest.
“My apologies. I had no idea—” But now his gaze shifted past her, and his expression changed. “God’s blood,” he breathed.
She turned— No. Oh, no. The looking glass. “Please leave,” she said, and turned so her back faced the wall, too aware that the nightgown she held concealed very little.
“Who did this to you?” he demanded.
“It’s nothing for you to concern yourself with. In any case, it’s of no consequence anymore.” She did not want him to know the truth of her past any more than he wanted her to know his.
“It’s of consequence to me,” he said in a voice that was too low, too controlled. “Very great consequence. Is this Lady Pennington’s doing?” His eyes had turned murderous.
Philomena? “No! Of course not.”
“Your former employer? The one whose name you also refused to divulge?”
“Please, Your Grace, please leave, and let us not speak of it anymore.”
“Have you committed a crime?” She could see him trying to figure out what act might carry an unusual punishment such as this.
“It was my brother,” she finally lied, because he clearly was not going to stop until he had an answer, and Gavin may not have done this, but he had very nearly killed her with his fists a month before she’d been lashed.
“Your brother.”
“Please don’t make me discuss it.” And that much was true. She didn’t want to talk about the horror of that day, that she’d clung to the mainmast aboard William’s ship as he’d punished her for her piracy. He would have been well within his rights to do much worse.
Even now, shame burned hot on her cheeks.
Winston’s gaze on her gentled, almost looked pained, and he nodded. Looked at her dressing table. “You’ve been rubbing salve into the wounds.”
“They’re not wounds. They’re scars.” Ugly, horrible scars. And he’d already seen her nude once, but now he’d seen the worst of it. She would never look like Princess Katja, and she needed him to leave.
He went to the dressing table and, to her horror, picked up the tin of salve. “Let me help you,” he said softly.
“I’ve already finished.”
“I doubt that.”
So she tried the truth. “I don’t want you to see them again.”
He dismissed that with a shake of his head. “Do they hurt?”
“No. Not anymore. But they’re hideous.”
He dipped two fingers into the salve. “Can’t you trust me?” he asked quietly.
She was already out on a limb with trusting him—on horseback, in the conservatory—and so she dared a few steps past him, away from the wall, and presented her back to him, fully aware that she was entirely nude from behind because the nightgown she held only covered her front. But with those scars, it hardly mattered.
“The two in the center,” she said now. “They’re the hardest to reach.”
He didn’t say a word, but she felt his fingers touch her skin—warm, light, smoothing the salve along the ridge of one of her scars. And she knew exactly which one just by his touch—knew their pattern by heart. The first two lashes had landed across her shoulder blades in nearly parallel lines. The next two crisscrossed, making a lopsided X across the middle of her back. The final lash had struck her just above her buttocks.
Hang her! Hang her! She could hear the crew’s terrifying shouts. The cheers that came with each blow.
She shuddered and felt his hand fall away.
“Did I hurt you?”
“No. Just a chill.”
And so he began rubbing again—long, smooth strokes, gentle circular ones. Warm. Comforting.
And soon, more than that.
She felt him move to the lowest scar, felt his fingers skirt along the top of her buttocks.
“I want to know your name.” His voice was low and rough, closer to her ear than it should have been.
Half-a-dozen excuses leaped to her tongue, but she didn’t want them. Not right now. “It’s Millicent.”
“Millicent.” He said it softly. “Of course.”
His hands worked magic over her skin, igniting a slow burn on the inside, too, way down low. She knew the moment he finished with the salve, heard him set it aside, but his hands lingered.
She felt them on her shoulders.
He lifted a lock of her hair and let it slide through his fingers, and then pulled it back, away from her face, brushing his lips against her temple.
Her breath grew unsteady.
“So beautiful,” he murmured.
The entire universe froze, suspended, except for his hand letting the hair slip from his fingers and reaching for her face.
Touching, barely touching. Her jaw. Her chin. Her cheek.
Beautiful. He thought she was beautiful?
“Hidden beneath your men’s clothes,” he murmured against her hair. “A secret goddess.”
He caressed his hands down her sides, slipping them around her in an intimate embrace. He kissed her ear, her temple. And then he simply held her,
his jacket and waistcoat and breeches pressing into her unclothed back and bottom.
She imagined touching him in that way she’d hoped never to touch a man again, except now the idea of it made her feel soft and liquid on the inside, warm and yearning in all the places he had touched her.
She turned her face toward him. Her nose pressed against his cheek, and her mouth hovered by his chin. “Winston.” His name was a breath on her lips.
“Mmm?”
“I want to touch you.”
He stilled.
She felt her pulse at the base of her throat, waiting for his response. She breathed in the scent of his skin, felt its roughness.
After a long moment, he lifted her nightgown in his hands, so that they both held it now. “You’d best put this back on,” he whispered roughly. Already he was searching for its opening.
And surely he wanted her touch—she could feel his hardness inside his breeches—but now he had found the bottom of her nightgown, and he moved back a little, and there was nothing to do but let him slip it over her head. She put her arms through the holes, and the nightgown whispered to her knees.
Finally, she turned to face him.
His dark eyes searched hers as if she was a wonder he’d never beheld. And she realized, now, that she wanted more than just to touch him.
She wanted him to open her womanhood.
His arms hung at his sides. A muscle in his jaw worked. “I need to leave.”
“I wish you wouldn’t.”
He closed his eyes.
She hesitated, gripped by a moment of doubt. And then she reached for his placket. Found it beneath the vee at the front of his waistcoat and worked it open, loosing him into her hands.
He didn’t move. She heard him let out a long, unsteady breath, eyes still closed, jaw tight now.
His member was large, heavy with desire. She smoothed her hands along it, circling it with her fingers, brushing her thumb over the soft, blunt tip. Her heart felt full as she stroked him—once, again, and again, and then sliding one hand down to gently cup his sac.
She heard his quick intake of breath, glanced up to find his eyes open and on fire, watching her touch him.
He took hold of her wrists, pulled her hands away.
A Promise by Daylight Page 19
