by Jo Beverley
Anger had been replaced with a hint of a smile.
“What are you laughing at?”
“You’re beautiful, even if you’re not eighteen. And that comes free of charge. And I like to make you turn from a lily to a blush-pink rose. The journey will take four to five hours. Can you drive that long?”
It astonished her that he asked instead of stating it. Warmed her. “Probably not. We’ll travel post.”
“Where will we stay?”
Even thawed, he was making this trip entirely her concern, dissociating himself while being obedient to her commands. She would not be weakened by that.
“There must be an inn.”
“The Peregrine, where I am known. We are engaged to wed, but an unchaperoned journey is still slightly shocking.”
“Only slightly. I’m not a delicate young miss, and we’ll have separate rooms. I’ll order the post chaise and a hasty breakfast, and we’ll set out in an hour.”
She left with that, creeping back to her room feeling like a naughty child. No, like a wicked woman.
She was wicked to have let it go this far when it could never go further, but at least she had told him the truth. She felt lighter for that, happier, cleansed of deceptions and sins.
As reward, she’d steal the two remaining weeks for herself before saying farewell forever.
Chapter Eight
They sped out of London as true daylight broke, alone. She’d announced that they did not need their personal servants. She very much wanted to be alone with him, and it wasn’t for lustful reasons. She hungered to know him better.
“You never really explained how you joined the army,” she said as they passed through Camberwell Toll Gate. “Didn’t your parents object?”
“Somewhat. I think they recognized the madman in me, though.”
“You’re not mad.”
He smiled. “I feed off excitement as a vampire feeds off blood,” he said again, making her instantly hot and needy. The glint in his eyes sent off warning signals, but it was so much part of him that she rejoiced.
“I can’t cure you,” she said calmly.
“I don’t want to be cured. I think you’re something of a madwoman yourself.”
Oh no. She was not going to talk about sex in broad daylight. “So your parents let you go.”
His smile acknowledged her retreat. “Bought me a commission in the regiment of my choice. Waved me farewell.” The smile faded. “And I more or less forgot about them.”
He leaned back into his corner and stared into nothing. “It was all so exciting, so new. New friends, new places, new challenges. Then when it ceased to be new, ceased to be pleasant, it had swallowed me whole. I always assumed they’d be there, frozen like waxworks, when I was ready to return.”
Maria inhaled a careful breath, thinking carefully about what to say. “Did you never return home?”
“Not in the last five years. I could have. I should have . . .”
“Your family understood, I’m sure. They must have been proud of you. And later, their spirits guided you to safety.”
He turned sharply at that. “Pap. Good men with adoring families died all the time.”
Shame flooded her for speaking such an empty platitude, but all she could think to say was another. “They must want you to be happy.”
“I am attempting to live, and live well.”
It was like trying to read a foreign script. “Why is it so hard, Van? Do you not want a good life?”
“Do I deserve one? For some reason you see me as something worth saving. I’m not so sure.” But then he turned to look out of the window, and she knew he wanted to be left in peace.
She granted him that, for now. She felt as if she were cracking open the cage of a seething demon, here in a confined space. She remembered, an eon ago, feeling inadequate and unprepared. Back then, she’d had no idea of the true challenge. Back then, however, she hadn’t cared as she cared now.
After the first change of horses, she broke the silence. “Tell me about getting a tattoo.”
His brows rose, but he answered. “It hurts.”
“I suppose it must. Does it take a long time?”
“Ours did.”
“Do you ever regret having a devil engraved on your chest?”
It was meant to be a light question, but he said, “I have wondered if I was inviting a dark fate.”
“That’s not possible!”
“It’s surprising what’s possible.”
“Did your friends’ designs have any mysterious power?”
“Hawk was always hawkish, but he’s become more so. Con . . . It was strange that he chose a dragon. I’ve never been sure what it meant to him.”
“A taste for sacrificial virgins?” she suggested.
He laughed, fully, eyes bright. “I have no idea. We’ve been out of touch too long.”
She risked a probing question. “I gather he came home after Waterloo. Why haven’t you seen him?”
That killed the laughter, but he shrugged. “I came home in January, and he was hunting in the Shires. When I visited Steynings he wasn’t in the area.”
“You could have written, arranged a meeting.”
“Perhaps I didn’t want him involved in my mess.”
That made her heart ache, but it was hopeful that he was speaking of these things. Perhaps the physical act of moving toward home was moving his mind. Had their passionate night had any part in this? She’d like to think so.
Over the hours they chatted about childhood, and families—but only the sunnier aspects—and about the easier parts of their adult lives. It was clear that his childhood had been happy, his family loved, and that one of his greatest problems since returning to England might have been loneliness.
At the fourth change she suggested that they stop for refreshments, but he looked around almost like a dog sniffing the air, and said, “No. Not long now.”
She’d been noting the mileposts to Brighton, forgetting that his home was not in the town. They were six miles away and must be close to Steynings.
He spoke to the postboys, giving instructions, and not far from the inn they took a side road. She read the signpost. Mayfield, Barkholme, and Hawk in the Vale.
“Hawk in the Vale?” she guessed.
“That’s the nearest village, yes. It’s pronounced Hawk’nvale.”
“Like your friend’s name.”
“Almost. The family’s been there about as long as the village.”
He was looking out of the window, but it was no longer a means to escape conversation. She knew he was seeking signs of home. They reached the top of a rise, and he pointed to the left across rolling hills to a white house on a hillside. “That’s Steynings.”
She relaxed. Perhaps he’d just needed to come here to embrace his home and his purpose. Perhaps their talk along the way had helped as well, and their night of passion. Whatever had worked the miracle, she sensed that he was finally, truly, coming home.
Her face suddenly ached with unshed tears, but she made herself be happy. Soon her task would be over, and she could go on with her life with an easy conscience.
“How long until we get there?” she asked.
“An hour, likely. It’s not far, but we’re off the good roads.”
“It’s a handsome house.”
The house had disappeared behind trees now, and he turned to her. “Built new by my Dutch ancestor who came across with William of Orange and married into the English. Then fancied up in the Palladian style by my grandfather.” He flashed her a slight smile. “Around here, we’re the nouveau riche.”
“The Hawkinville name was in the Domesday Book, I assume.”
“Lord yes.”
“And Lord Wyvern?”
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“That title’s only a couple of hundred years old, and it belongs to Devon, not Sussex. But the Somerfords have been here for five hundred years or so. Typical English blue blood. Saxon, Norman, Dane, and a bit of everything else that’s come by in the last thousand years. Like the Dunpott-Ffyfes.”
“True.”
They shared a smile that might be the most honest one ever.
Eventually the coach slowed to turn into a village. “Hawk’nvale,” he said with soft satisfaction.
It lay in a gentle valley, with a broken row of old cottages set along the river. Each had a narrow garden running down to the water. That style marked a truly ancient settlement dating back to the times when rivers were more important than roads.
The large church set on a rise across the village green had a square Anglo-Saxon tower that marked it as at least eight hundred years old. To either side, like curved arms, lay newer buildings, so that the whole village embraced the green.
Surely it stood ready to embrace a returning son.
They drew up on the modern side of the village, in front of the stuccoed Peregrine Inn and climbed down.
“This is New Hawk,” Van said, looking around. “Down by the river is Old Hawk.”
“Where does Major Hawkinville live?”
“Wherever he puts his hat. But his father’s house is in Old Hawk, of course. The walled place with the tower inside.”
It was so much part of the older section of the village that her eye had ignored it. Now she saw a walled conglomeration of buildings surely going back in parts to the days of the ancient church. “Ancient, but not handsome,” she remembered.
“Did it actually hold against the Normans?” she asked in fascination.
“The wall’s not that old, but the tower probably saw William the Conqueror go past. It’s a fascinating old place, but getting impossible to live in comfortably.”
A tall, cheerful man strode out of the main doors to greet them. He seemed glowingly happy to see Van. Van, smiling, introduced him as Smithers, the innkeeper.
The healing was happening, she was sure.
Mr. Smithers regaled her with stories of the Young Georges’ impish youth as he led her to her room. It proved to be as up to date as her own at home. A maid brought water and she freshened herself. When she went down, she was directed to a private parlor where Van had arranged a meal.
She was glad of it, but would have been as happy to go directly to his home. To complete this healing journey. He wasn’t in the room yet, so she looked out of the window at the green, watching people cross, sometimes stop to chat. This had the feel of a good place.
She heard laughter, and returned to the door of the parlor to look out. Van stood in the middle of a group of men of all ages and types, a few maidservants hovering as well. It was clear they all were delighted to see him home again, and were at ease with him. He looked more relaxed than ever.
And younger. Much younger.
He was home.
She’d done her job.
All that remained now was to set him free.
After the meal they hired the inn’s gig and drove to Steynings Park. Though she was sure he could manage a gig, he insisted that she drive.
The neglect soon became obvious. The road worsened, the hedges were untrimmed, the ditches at the sides of the road appeared clogged. All the kinds of things that didn’t get done without someone in charge.
“Have you not been here at all?” she asked.
“Once. There was nothing I could do.”
She could have pursued that, but let it go.
When they came to the walls of the estate it was as well the iron gates stood open because the gatekeeper’s cottage was deserted. From a slight sag, she suspected the gates couldn’t be moved without a mighty struggle.
“That isn’t a recent problem,” he said as if she’d remarked on it. “My father felt it was unseemly to have closed gates, as if the local people weren’t welcome.”
“I like that.”
“He was a very likable man. Very generous and trusting.”
And thus used by Maurice. Thank heavens Van didn’t hold that against her.
Weeds tufted the long drive, evidence not just of neglect but that little traffic had passed this way. The drive took them straight up to the square house with the two curving Palladian wings on either side.
The windows were dirty, and a sad air of neglect hung over the place, but there was no sign of serious decay. He directed her down the side of the house to a separate stableyard at the back. A middle-aged man came out lethargically to take the horse.
Van greeted the man as Lumley, but there seemed little fondness there. Probably the few staff remaining in the house were short on wages and tired of neglect.
Van assisted her down. “Let’s do the guided tour, but even at its best, Steynings wasn’t a jewel. I suppose some architects must be better than others.”
As they toured the house, she saw what he meant. In places the proportions were not quite right, and some doors were inconveniently placed. All the same, it was a pleasant home, and ghosts of happier times lingered in pictures on the walls and arrangements of cloth-shrouded furniture.
She looked at one excellent portrait of his Dutch ancestor. “You never thought of selling this?”
“All or nothing.”
Victory or death, even in financial matters. Infuriating in one way, but she couldn’t help admiring it.
They ended up in a small drawing room, where the cloths had been removed and tea set out. She sat to pour. “I don’t see that much needs to be done here other than cleaning.”
He roamed the room restlessly. “There’s some leakage from the roof. Brickwork needing pointing. Possibly dry rot in one section of the basement. Not obvious things, but if neglected the place will crumble about somebody’s ears one day.”
She passed him a cup. “The nine thousand will cover it?”
“Oh yes. And the servants etcetera.”
It seemed invasive to quiz him on his affairs, but he needed to focus on them. “And the estate? Is it profitable?”
A look suggested that he thought it was invasive, too, but he answered. “Slightly. Times are hard now the war’s over, but we’ll make do once some money’s been plowed in. Drainage, fencing, marling. All the things tenants put off. I should have been here helping, shouldn’t I? I should have sold the damn pictures and plowed in the money.”
She sipped, deliberately calm. “Why didn’t you?”
She thought he wasn’t going to answer, but then he said, “Now, I’m not sure.” He looked around the room as if it represented the whole house. “I couldn’t bear to peck away here like a crow pecking out the eyes of the dead—”
He stopped, and she could find no words to invade that silence.
He suddenly put down his cup and saucer and said, “Come upstairs. There’s something I want to show you.”
They’d toured all the main rooms, but she rose and went with him up the wide stairs and along a short corridor. He opened a door and invited her in. She entered and looked around curiously at what was probably the master bedchamber, shrouded in white cloths.
Then she saw his expression. “No, Van.”
It was instinctive and she didn’t entirely mean it, but she knew she must.
He came close to rest warm fingers on either side of her face. “Why not?”
Her wretched body was already shimmering with excitement but she knew she had to do what was best for him. He was running away into something simple. “The servants . . .”
“Aren’t likely to come up here unless ordered to.” He unfastened her bonnet ribbons and tossed it aside, then her cap, then began on her hairpins.
She whipped herself out of his hands and retreated clutchin
g her wanton hair. “No!”
He simply stood there, temptation incarnate, by his need as much as his beauty. “Why not?”
She struggled to push back loosened pins, to re-create order. “We didn’t come here for this.”
“We didn’t come for tea, either. We’ve just had tea.”
“Is that what it is for you? Like tea?” It was nonsensical, but she threw it as a weapon.
“I don’t much like tea.” Then he sobered. “Is this one of the games you like, or do you really not want to?”
It made her feel ashamed, and confused, and uncertain, and she wanted to soothe him in the one way that seemed to work. . . .
“Marry me, Maria.”
At the shocking words, she retreated another step, shaking her head. “No, Van. No. That was never part of this.”
He became still. “So. It was just an amusement for you.”
“No!”
“Then what? Why not? Am I wrong in feeling there’s something special between us?”
She lowered her hands and felt a heavy hank of hair tumble down her back. “Not wrong, but not right either. I’m eight years older than you.”
“Well then,” he said, “will you mind if I marry Natalie?”
She just stared. Eventually she managed to say, “If she’s willing—”
“She’s nine years younger than I am.”
She could have slapped him. “That’s not the same thing!” Then she braced herself to say the words that always hurt. “More importantly, I’m barren.”
She saw it hit him, shaking him. “Are you sure?”
“Of course I’m sure.” She snared the fallen hair, coiled it, and fixed it in place. “I’ve never shown any sign of conceiving.” She fired a fatal arrow. “And it wasn’t Maurice’s fault. Natalie is his daughter.”
His sudden pallor made his eyes an even more brilliant blue. He bent abruptly to pick up the hairpins that had fallen from her hair, and when he rose, he was merely sober. “What if I don’t care?”
“You have to care. It’s your duty to care.”
“Maria, I love you.”
She shook her head. “No. You can’t.”
