A Mistress for Major Bartlett

by Annie Burrows

  Sarah watched the dog leave as though it was betraying her. Tears were still rolling down her cheeks. And she was trembling.

  ‘Ben went with him,’ she said. And sat down abruptly on his bed as though her legs had no strength left in them.

  He nearly had done, too. Thank goodness he hadn’t. She shouldn’t be alone, not when she was so upset.

  ‘Ben is his dog,’ he explained, reaching out to take the little, trembling hand she’d rested on his leg and giving it what he hoped she’d find a comforting sort of squeeze.

  ‘No—’ she shook her head ‘—Gideon told me he belonged to all the Rogues. That you’d adopted him when you found him on some farm where you stayed.’

  He bowed his head. Swallowed. Her need to hear the truth was greater than his need to prolong his pretence of memory loss. ‘It was Major Flint who took the trouble to tame him. And though the creature accepted the rest of us as part of Flint’s pack, I suppose you would call it, he clearly feels he belongs to Flint.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Yes, I see. It was foolish of me to think...’

  He held her hand a bit tighter.

  ‘You were magnificent,’ he stated resolutely.

  ‘Me?’ She gave a convulsive shiver. ‘Look at me. I’m shaking like a leaf. It was horrible. Horrible. That was the first time I’ve ever stood up to someone like that. Face-to-face. I didn’t know I could. And now I just feel sick.’

  ‘It is always like that after a battle, for everyone. It’s odd. You can do incredible, awful things while the battle rages, without turning a hair, but then after, well, tremble like aspens.’

  ‘I wish I hadn’t had to. That was the first time I’ve ever spoken to Major Flint and it was as though he was my enemy. And he’s my—’ she gave a little hiccup of a sob ‘—he’s my b-brother. And he’s taken Ben. I thought we were a team,’ she said, gazing at the door through which they’d just gone. ‘I don’t care if he is Major F-Flint’s d-dog...I...’

  She bowed her head and gave in.

  Normally, the sight of a woman in tears would have made him run a mile. But not when that woman was Lady Sarah. He knew there was nothing he could do to assuage the grief Major Flint had just inflicted, one way and another. But he could at least hold her while she wept.

  The way she’d held him during his darkest hours.

  Chapter Seven

  Tom struggled to a sitting position, then scooted up until he could kneel behind her and put his arms round her. Though he’d half-feared she might flinch away, she actually turned and buried her face in his chest.

  Though he was naked, battered and bruised and practically a stranger to her.

  Pretty soon he was shaking with the effort of staying upright and keeping his arms round her, and half-bearing her weight. Heavens, but he was weak. His head was starting to spin by the time her sobs subsided.

  ‘I’m so sorry—’ she sniffed ‘—I’m not usually such a watering pot. And all over a man taking back his own dog, of all things.’

  ‘It wasn’t just that though, was it?’ he said grimly. ‘You’d only just heard your twin brother was cut to pieces by cavalry sabres.’

  She flinched. Pulled out of his arms. Scrubbed at her eyes with a corner of the sheet.

  He’d offended her. As well as blowing any chance he could carry on feigning ignorance of his identity and his past. Exhausted and depressed, he gave up the struggle to stay upright and lay back down against the pillows.

  ‘Oh, Tom, I’m so sorry. Here I am weeping all over you when I’m supposed to be the one looking after you.’ She leapt to her feet, tidying the sheet over him and generally fussing round the bed.

  ‘No. I’m sorry. I thought I could be of help. I know I can’t take the place Ben had in your affections, but I thought I could at least hold you. But I can’t even do that.’ He tried to lift his arm from the bed. ‘I’m useless. Trembling like a whipped pup.’

  ‘Don’t ever let anyone tell you you’re useless,’ she flung at him angrily.

  ‘Is that what they did to you? Is that why you fought Flint over me?’ That made sense. In himself, he was nothing to her. But he had just worked out that her family had no idea what she was capable of. So perhaps he’d become a sort of symbol of her prowess.

  She had the grace to look abashed.

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ He shrugged one shoulder. ‘I’ve always known I’m not worth fighting for, myself.’

  ‘Please, don’t be disappointed in me. I didn’t know you when I found you on the battlefield. And I was... Oh, you can’t think what a difference it made when your men put their faith in me. When they believed I was capable of nursing you. When nobody has ever thought I’m capable of anything.’

  ‘Yes. I think I can.’ He gave her a rueful smile. ‘Nobody’s ever thought I was worth a damn. And in my case, they were right.’

  ‘Oh, no. I’m sure that’s not true. You’re an officer in the army. Artillery, no less. Which shows you have intelligence. And to rise to the rank of major, you must be, um...’

  He gave a snort. ‘All it shows is that I’ve survived.’

  ‘Oh, no! Far more than that. One thing I do know about the artillery is that you cannot buy promotion, or use influence to gain it. You must have earned every single promotion you’ve ever had.’

  ‘Be that as it may, if Major Flint had found you nursing someone like Bennington Ffog...’ His lip curled as he named the man who’d been her most prominent admirer. The fop who’d been in charge of her twin’s regiment. And the man after whom his own men had named the Dog. Bennington Dog, they called him, shortening it to just Ben when the animal didn’t respond to the mouthful of English. Which made them swear the name was all the more appropriate. Not only did the hound have fur the exact shade of the Colonel’s luxuriant whiskers, the two of them had about the same level of intelligence. And having seen the man lolloping around after Lady Sarah with his tongue hanging out, the way Ben had done the day before, he couldn’t disagree with them.

  Not only that, but they were both hunting mad. He’d had a notion that if he’d thrown a bone and shouted ‘fetch,’ the Colonel would have yelled ‘tally ho’ and gone off in hot pursuit.

  ‘Not even Flint would have suggested removing you from his bed and leaving him to rot. Or risk moving him, rather than have you tainted by the association. If Flint had found you in his arms, he’d have been talking about making it right by marrying him.’

  ‘Oh. Yes. I hadn’t thought of that.’

  ‘Well, you should.’ He seethed. Nobody thought Bennington Ffog was unsuitable—though he had less brains than his horse—because he had money and breeding. Whereas even Flint didn’t want him anywhere near her. ‘Your brothers would prefer to see me dead than married to you.’

  She gave a bitter little smile. ‘That’s what you think. I think they’d prefer to see me married to anyone than being...being...oh, why are we talking about marriage? You don’t want it, any more than I do.’

  ‘It isn’t a question of wanting it, or not. I haven’t anything to offer a woman. Let alone a lady. I can’t marry.’

  Her eyes flicked down over his naked torso with a certain sort of gleam.

  Good God! She seemed to think he did have something to offer a woman. His heart beat a little harder. His plan to get her to let him kiss her didn’t seem so far-fetched, after all. She was attracted to him. How that could be when she’d seen him at his very weakest, when he could hardly sit up for five minutes, when he was covered with cuts and bruises, he couldn’t think.

  But she’d definitely given him a hungry little look. Even if she had swiftly wiped her face clean of expression and resumed her mask of polite, ladylike respectability.

  She already looked on him as a kind of symbol of rebellion. How far, he wondered, could he get her to rebel? Against the n
arrow confinement of her life? Against the injustice of having to put up with men like Bennington Ffog slavering over her?

  ‘I’m sorry I got cross. I don’t want to fight with you, Tom. I just...’ She rubbed wearily at her forehead.

  She probably didn’t want him slavering over her, either. She was only just beginning to change her mind about kissing him. He’d better not push his luck, after that one slim sign of encouragement, or she’d bolt like an unbroken filly. He’d have to persuade her to trust him, before making another move.

  What? What was he thinking? He never bothered to persuade a woman to trust him, or attempted to woo her gently. But then no other woman was like Lady Sarah. Wasn’t she worth making an effort for?

  Besides, he wasn’t going anywhere. And neither, to judge from her spirited resistance to Flint’s orders, was she.

  And his aim wasn’t full congress. He knew he could never be with her, in that way. All he wanted was a kiss. Just one. Willingly given.

  ‘You’ve worn yourself out looking after me,’ he said, reaching up to soothe the little frown line pleating her brows. She didn’t slap his hand away, but closed her eyes and sort of sank into his caress. The innocent little gesture of gratitude made his heart skip more than it would have done had another woman come in here and stripped naked.

  ‘If I had any decency about me,’ he growled, ‘I’d offer to leave here and go to a hospital or something. That would be the honourable course to take. But I’m not going to.’

  Her eyes flew open. She regarded him with frank curiosity. ‘Because you aren’t an honourable man?’

  Hell, no. He wasn’t in the slightest bit honourable. Or he wouldn’t be planning ways to gain her trust so that he could take advantage.

  ‘More to the point,’ he said with what he hoped was a disarming grin, ‘because you haven’t asked me to leave. For some reason, which I suspect has nothing to do with me at all, you want me right where you’ve got me.’

  She flushed. Moved away a little, so that her forehead was out of his reach. He let his hand fall back to his side.

  ‘You’re right.’ She lifted her chin. ‘I do want you to stay here with me. It may be terribly shallow of me, but while I’m looking after you, while you have to depend on me for everything, I feel as if my life has some purpose, for once.’

  ‘Well, I’m happy to stay as sick as you like, for as long as you feel you need to nurse someone.’

  ‘Oh, Tom, don’t say that. I want you to get well. You have to get well. To show everyone that...and to myself that—’ She broke off, shaking her head. ‘It’s terribly selfish of me, isn’t it? To be nursing you just to prove a point?’ She peeped up at him from under lowered lashes.

  He reached out and took her hand.

  ‘I’m sure you have perfectly good reasons for everything you do. I know, better than anyone, that people are apt to judge others on their actions, without pausing to consider what their motives might be.’

  She gasped. Clasped his hand a little tighter. ‘That’s very generous of you.’

  He gave a wry smile. ‘Not really. But after the way Major Flint jumped to all the wrong conclusions about us, because of what he saw—me naked, you clasped in my arms—’ he quirked one eyebrow suggestively ‘—he assumed guilt. People always assume the worst. Though how he could have thought the worst of you...’ He scowled, not only because Flint had suggested it, but also because he minded that Flint thought it.

  He’d never cared what anyone thought of any of his women before. Not that Lady Sarah was his woman.

  Perhaps he felt protective towards her because no other woman had ever gone to such lengths on his behalf before. Even if it was only to prove a point.

  ‘Tom, you have got to stop thinking I’m some kind of angel. I’m not. I stumbled into looking after you for a whole series of stupid, selfish, reasons. Not one of them was the slightest bit angelic, I assure you.’

  ‘Tell me, then. I should like to know how you came to stumble upon me. What someone like you was doing on a battlefield at all.’

  * * *

  She searched his face for evidence that he condemned her for being on the battlefield. She couldn’t find it. He just looked interested. Curious.

  When was the last time anyone had wanted to know why she’d done anything? Been interested in hearing her side of things, rather than just passing judgement on her?

  ‘I went to the battlefield searching for Gideon,’ she said. ‘Or his body. Or some answers. That was what I told myself. But I suspect it was all lunacy, really. I just couldn’t believe he was dead. They wouldn’t tell me anything that would have convinced me. Not even when the funeral was to be, or where,’ she said, hitching her knee up on to the side of the bed so that she could look him full in the face. And judge his reaction. She took a deep breath.

  ‘And I was so sure that Gideon couldn’t have died without me knowing it, in my heart. Our nurse always used to say we were one soul, living in two bodies, you see. And we were so close, so very close, that I thought...I thought...’ She shook her head. ‘How could I have been so wrong? So foolish?’

  He gripped her hand tightly. ‘You weren’t foolish at all.’

  ‘Oh, but I was. I realised it not long before those Hussars came charging along the road, scattering wreckage in their path. I felt just like Ben, who was howling with panic from under that broken wagon. Stuck there, with no idea where to go next. And then when that deserter tried to steal Castor—’ She shuddered.

  ‘You must have been terrified.’

  ‘No! That was just it. Not of him, at any rate. Only of losing the horse. Not for any sensible reason, either. But because he was the last present Gideon had given me. My last tangible link to him. He had another grey, to match, and we used to go riding out together. Cutting a dash, don’t you know? Golden-haired twins on matching horses. He even wanted me to have a riding habit made up in the same colour and style as his uniform, to heighten the effect. So that people would say we looked like the heavenly twins, Castor and Pollux.’

  ‘I saw you,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, so you did,’ she replied, remembering the day and him leaning up against the tree. ‘You winked at me.’

  He wriggled uncomfortably, opening his mouth as though reaching for something to say. But there wasn’t anything she wanted to hear about that day. That time. The man he’d been then. So she plunged on hurriedly.

  ‘Anyway, I couldn’t bear losing Castor. So I went back to Brussels to find somewhere safe to hide him, in case the French really were about to overrun the town. I slept in the stable with him, because I was afraid to take my eyes off him. I’d only been under the wagon trying to untie Ben for a few moments, you see, and that was all it took for the deserter to get his reins in his hands. I never gave a thought to my own safety, or anything sensible. It was all about keeping some link, any link, to Gideon.’ She hung her head.

  ‘Even when I started to accept he really had...died...my head was still full of nonsense. When you just fell into my lap, I told myself that was the purpose for my being there. It made me feel better, for a while, to think that maybe some fate had directed me to you. That those feelings I had, that I simply had to come back to Brussels, were some kind of intuition, or something. That’s how foolish I’ve been...’

  ‘No. I won’t hear you say bad things about yourself.’

  ‘But I ran away from home. Worried my poor sister, who is in a fragile state of health. Angered her husband. Flouted Justin. All because I refused to accept the truth. Oh, how could I have gone about spouting all that nonsense about not sensing his spirit leaving the world? Madame le Brun must have thought I was deranged, turning up on her doorstep babbling the way I did.’

  ‘Sometimes,’ he said grimly, ‘when something bad happens and you don’t want to believe it, you get this shout inside. This great,
overwhelming No! It drowns out everything else. All common sense. Even when the evidence is right before your eyes you won’t see it. All you can hear, or say, or feel is that No.’

  She stared at him in amazement. She’d half-expected him to roll his eyes, the way her older brother and sisters did whenever she mentioned her belief about her link to her twin. They always said she should have grown out of the tales her ‘ignorant, ill-educated and superstitious’ nurse had told her.

  ‘I’ve never held all that much regard for common sense,’ she told him. ‘Because,’ she added hesitantly, ‘nobody has ever been able to explain, for all their rational, cynical cleverness, how it was that I always knew when Gideon was about to get into a scrape. How I could always sense when he was on his way home. Or how, when he was home, we only had to look at each other to understand what the other was thinking.’

  ‘Really? That’s astonishing.’

  He meant it, too, she could tell. He wasn’t humouring her, or even making fun of her, let alone trying to rob her of her beliefs.

  ‘Thank you for saying that, Tom, about the No.’ Even though everyone she knew insisted Tom was bad, what he’d just said had actually helped her untangle her muddled thoughts. Had helped her look upon her loss and confusion from a new perspective.

  How was that possible, when he scarcely knew her?

  ‘You speak as though you have felt just like I did when they told me Gideon was dead. Almost impossible to believe, it was so bad. Did something like that happen to you?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said gruffly. ‘When my father died. I lost everything I thought I had. Everything I thought I was. And, even once the shout of No died down,’ he said, giving her a very speaking look, ‘I still didn’t know who I was. There was no going back, yet it took me a long time to forge a new path for myself. But you will get there,’ he assured her. ‘You are strong.’

  He thought she was strong? Then he was the only man...no, the only person ever to think so.