What a Lady Most Desires

by Lecia Cornwall

  Stephen felt his cheeks heat as she rose and went to the door. He wanted to bite his tongue in half. “How am I to communicate with him?” he called after her. “Shall we chat, or perhaps he can make hand signals when he wishes me to understand him?”

  Her footsteps paused. “I remember you as a remarkable man, able to bring out the very best in anyone, to charm them, make them feel as if they were the most important person on earth. You’re kind as well, to those most in need of kindness, or so I recall. I daresay you’ll find a way.”

  He thought about that, and felt shame at his behavior. He listened to her footsteps travel along the hall—ten paces—and then down the stairs—seven steps—until the sound of her faded completely.

  He concentrated on the tick of the clock, heard the occasional groan of pain from someone below, and the sound of birds outside the open window. Delphine remembered him as remarkable and charming? They hadn’t had more than a single brief exchange of banal pleasantries—and one apparently unforgettable kiss. Yet she had the essence of him, apparently, or thought she did. But surely those characteristics belonged to every gentleman—every whole, healthy gentleman. Did she expect him to be kind and charming now, broken, blind, and shamed?

  Somehow, with every gentle touch, with her seemingly endless patience, Delphine St. James made him feel as if he still had worth.

  He felt the loss of her already, the regret at leaving her behind when he returned to England. He realized he would have liked to know her better. Perhaps someday, when—if—he recovered his sight, if he didn’t die of gangrene, he would find her and thank her.

  If.

  Chapter 12

  Couldn’t the stubborn, stupid man see how very much he needed her?

  He’d been surprised that she was accompanying Meg—and him—on the journey home. Horrified, in fact. He was rude and curmudgeonly, when he spoke at all, but it was to be expected. He was in excruciating pain.

  Still, as the coach jolted and bumped over every rut in Belgium, he refused to utter a word. Beads of sweat lined his brow, and his fists were clenched so tightly that his knuckles shone. Was he being brave for her sake and Meg’s? She wished she could tell him he needn’t be, that he could scream or groan or rage against the pain if he wished to, but he was a gentleman, a soldier, a diplomat. He’d gritted his teeth when Sergeant Browning carried him down the stairs as carefully as he could. He’d swallowed a cry as they loaded him into the coach.

  The muscles in his neck stood out as they hit another rock in the road, and Delphine winced for him. He’d refused laudanum, and he pushed her hands away whenever she tried to mop his brow or adjust the rug that covered him. His face was as white as the sling that held his broken arm. She suspected he’d curse her outright if he’d been anyone else.

  If not for Meg, she would have given him permission—Sebastian had taught her all the wicked words there were, and hearing them now would not shock her. He had good reason. She repressed a sigh. Could such a brave man possibly be a coward?

  Delphine felt the anger in him as much as the pain, and wished she could protect him from the darkness of that too.

  Over the weeks since the battle, she’d touched other soldiers, held their hands, mopped their brows, held water to their lips, made them feel safe with a smile or a kind word, helped them see that the battle was behind them. She’d whispered that they could go home now, their duty done at last, to the loving arms of their wives, mothers, and sisters, and saw the hope and gratitude in their eyes.

  But Stephen had no one waiting for him. He faced weeks of recovery, then a court-martial, and after that—even he had no idea, she was certain. He refused to let anyone write to his sister. Could a man die of invisible injuries? The shame, the fear, the loss of his reputation would do as much harm as any bullet. She was afraid that if she looked away from him, even for an instant, that the Stephen Ives she had known and admired would fade away and be lost forever.

  If he couldn’t be brave, she would give him courage. If he couldn’t hope, she’d do it for him. Even if no one else in the world saw the honor in him, she did. She’d be his eyes until he could see again. She felt her own eyes fill with tears as the sun streamed through the window of the coach, illuminating the rings of exhaustion and pain under his eyes. The bruises on his face had faded to yellow, and the scrapes and cuts were slowly turning to the silver marks that would remain as scars. Delphine moved to close the shade.

  “Leave it,” he said gruffly. “At least I can feel the warmth of the sun, even if I cannot see it. What time is it?”

  “We’re nearly at Antwerp,” Delphine said quickly as Meg looked at the tiny watch pinned to her bosom. Delphine silenced her friend with a shake of her head when Meg opened her mouth to say there was some distance to go yet.

  “I could read aloud for a while, or we might talk to pass the time,” Delphine said.

  “No!” he snapped. “God, I wish I was riding with Nicholas.” There was no reply to that, since it was impossible. He shifted restlessly, and she watched the muscles of his jaw tense with the pain even that caused him. Her hands moved to adjust the blanket on his knees, but he tore it out of her hands and tossed it on the floor like a petulant child. The air in the coach was as thick with tension as it was with dust and heat.

  “When is Dorothea’s child due?” Meg asked him with brittle brightness, trying to start a conversation. “She must be as excited as I am. Perhaps we could correspond, compare our experience. You must be quite pleased to be an uncle yet again, and I’m sure she could offer me some advice—”

  “No,” he murmured again.

  “No?” Meg squeaked.

  “Don’t write to her, Meg. Don’t tell her. I don’t want her to know.” His tone was flat, an officer issuing a command, a diplomat dictating official policy.

  Meg leaned forward to clasp his hand. “But surely she would want to know.”

  The coach hit a rut and Stephen gripped Meg’s hand for an instant, but gave no other indication of how much he was hurting.

  “No,” he said again, letting Meg go. He turned his eyes toward the window, staring out at a landscape he could not see. “Doe could not cope with—this—and I won’t cause her any more pain or worry.”

  “I understand,” Meg said, but her face was filled with confusion and sadness. Women were far stronger and braver than men gave them credit for being.

  Stephen regretted his brusque tone when the ladies lapsed into an uneasy silence. He suspected they’d be chattering like magpies if he weren’t here. He knew they were trying to help, but he felt like an invalid, useless, weak, and broken, sitting with the women while the men rode alongside. Even poor voiceless Browning was mounted on a horse. Delphine had informed him that the sergeant was right outside the window, ready to come to Stephen’s assistance at a mere wave of his hand.

  He kept his hand firmly in his lap. He hated needing someone to take care of him day and night, but he could not do the simplest things for himself. He could not eat, or read, or walk across a room. He could not even piss alone. He had no freedom, no privacy, no life at all beyond the endless pain and darkness. Browning was silent, patient and gentle. A lance had pierced his cheek and severed his tongue, and he would never speak again. Nor could he write, aside from being able to carefully form the letters of his own name. Aside from that, his rank, and his regiment, no one knew very much about him. He was a dragoon, and that was sufficient for Nicholas to approve him.

  Stephen closed his eyes, pretended he was asleep, felt the light coming through the window, hot when they rode across open road, cool when they passed through shady woodland. He listened to the sounds outside, the jingle of harness and the sound of male voices. Inside the coach, he heard the soft sounds of light fabric, the slight crackle of the pages of a book turning. He could smell Delphine’s perfume again, and found he could even discern it from Meg’s scent.

  Delphine. He sighed. He imagined he’d be leaving her behind in Brussels, but it seemed she w
as returning to England with Meg and Nicholas, and by extension, himself. It was unexpected, unwanted.

  When he had gone to Vienna, he’d hired a companion for his sister, someone to act as chaperone, friend, and nursemaid if necessary. He had never imagined that someone would play that role for him, especially not Delphine St. James.

  Another bump in the road, another red-hot shaft of agony pierced him, and he gritted his teeth, held his silence, though he wanted to scream. He would scream, if the journey took much longer.

  Delphine began talking. “There’s a horse in that field watching us, a big roan. He’s scarred on one side. D’you suppose he was in the battle?”

  He could picture the animal, thought of his own stallion, probably killed under him, poor creature, but he kept his eyes closed, stayed silent.

  “I hope he’s come back home, and the scars will heal with time, and he’ll enjoy the rest of his life in peace,” Delphine mused, still speaking of the horse—or was she? Despite her soothing tone, Stephen felt fear well in his breast. Would he heal? The carriage rolled on in endless darkness, and he listened to the sound of her voice, drew strength from it. It helped him endure in dignified silence. It was better than dissolving into gibbering misery. For that much, he was grateful to her.

  Chapter 13

  Stephen had never been seasick before, but the blindness made the motion of the ship unbearable, and he was sick again and again as they crossed the channel, until his body was too weak to throw up anymore, and his broken ribs burned. He struggled to get up, but Browning’s careful hands held him down, confining him to the narrow cot in the stinking little cabin.

  “I need some air. Take me up on deck.” The sergeant picked him up like a child in his powerful arms. “I can walk,” he insisted.

  “The ship is pitching rather badly. If you fall, you’ll do more damage to your ribs or your arm,” Delphine said. When had she arrived? In his mind’s eye, Delphine’s voice was issuing from Browning’s lips, and it was she who carried him. The infernal woman apparently served as Browning’s tongue, and Browning was her strength. He gritted his teeth, concentrated on not being sick in front of her. He was grateful when Browning set him down carefully on the deck, in a spot sheltered from the spray. The air was cold, but fresh and clean, and he immediately felt the seasickness ebb.

  “Better?” she asked.

  “Still here?”

  “I am,” she said brightly. “Do you want anything? A rug, or a cloak, perhaps?”

  “No.” He leaned back and drew deep gulps of air.

  She didn’t say anything more, but she remained somewhere nearby. The wind brought snatches of her perfume, and he heard the fabric of her cloak snapping like a sail.

  “Are you afraid I’ll jump overboard?” he asked.

  She took a long moment to reply, and he wondered if she was there after all. “Will you?” she said at last.

  “Would it matter?”

  “Yes, very much. I would be forced to jump in after you, and that would ruin this gown. I like it very well, you see.”

  “What color is it?”

  “It’s striped, pale pink and white,” she said.

  “And the trim?”

  “A deeper pink ribbon at the bodice and cuffs. My spencer is moss green, but also trimmed with pink.”

  “And there’s a matching bonnet, isn’t there? Straw, trimmed with green feathers,” he said, picturing it in his mind.

  She laughed. “You’re very good.”

  “And lace gloves.”

  “White kid,” she corrected. “Have you always taken such an interest in ladies’ fashions?”

  “My sister was an invalid for a time, and when I would go out, she would insist I come back armed with news of the latest dresses, gowns, and shoes. A modiste’s pattern books weren’t good enough. She would make me describe everything London ladies were wearing in painful detail. I became an expert on clocked stockings, pin-tucks, and muslin flounces. I know the names of at least nine different bonnet styles.”

  She laughed. “You are an example to brothers everywhere. The only thing my brother ever brought me when I was sick was a basket of toads,” she said. “It took my nurse and three footmen an hour to catch them, while I stood on the bed and screamed.”

  He tried to imagine the Delphine he’d seen at the duchess’s ball afraid of toads. That Delphine would have faced down an army of crack French crapauds, or toads, and he’d wager that if she had, they would have been the ones standing on the bed screaming at the end of it. “I thought you weren’t afraid of anything,” he said.

  “I’m afraid of a good many things.”

  “Like what?” he asked.

  “Deep water,” she replied, all mirth gone from her voice.

  “Then I promise not to jump today. Not that I could find my way to the railing without assistance. What else are you afraid of?” She was silent, and he frowned.

  “Come now, my fears are perfectly obvious, at least to everyone else,” he said. “Isn’t it fair that you should share yours?”

  “You may ask, my lord, but a lady must be allowed to keep some secrets to herself.” Her tone was stiff. Had he touched a nerve?

  “We must be nearing the docks,” he said, changing the subject.

  “How did you know?”

  He grimaced. “I can hear the gulls, for one thing. And for another, I can smell it.”

  “Yes, there’s a fishing boat passing by us,” she said. “It’s filled to the gunwales.”

  “I prefer the smell of fish once it’s been cooked,” he said.

  “You’ve never lived by the sea, then.”

  “No. My grandfather’s estate was in the midlands, and his cook’s specialties were venison and roast goose.”

  “No baked hake, no ling-and-launces, no stargazy pie? We used to dig for oysters at low tide on the shore at my grandmother’s house by the sea. They squirt, you know.”

  “Grandmothers?” he asked. She sounded like a girl, excited and very young. He imagined her with her pink-and-white-striped skirt tucked up into her belt, her feet bare, her hair long and loose as she roamed the beach with her bucket and shovel, and felt a yearning to see her like that.

  “No, oysters,” she said. “Look, there’s an Indiaman. Oh, I mean—”

  “Is it arriving or departing?” he asked quickly.

  “I don’t know. How would you be able to tell?” she asked.

  He took a long sniff of the air. “I don’t smell spice, or tea. Are there men loading it?”

  “Why, yes—they’re rolling barrels up the plank.”

  “Then it’s going out, probably on the next tide.”

  “There are people on the dockside. A lot of soldiers, probably back from—” she broke off, and he knew what she saw—men who were wounded, exhausted, and dirty, an army coming home from war. At least this time it was finished. He wondered if Hallet was among them. Not that he’d recognize him, even if he could see, since he was very sure he had never met the man.

  Delphine was babbling about everything she saw, probably to amuse him, and to keep his mind off his circumstances. It was like reading a letter about a voyage rather than being present for it, and yet he found he could picture everything she described perfectly. For a moment, with Delphine by his side, it almost felt as if he could see again.

  Her chatter made him feel like the man he’d been before—whole, normal. Almost. It was an illusion, of course. He could not see the eager light in her green eyes, the sparkle of sunlight on her hair, the damned pink-and-white dress she wore. He wished—

  He shut his eyes, rubbed them for the thousandth time, and opened them again, praying his sight would miraculously come back. It did not.

  He was still blind.

  Chapter 14

  The young captain glanced up from the regimental lists before him, and smiled nervously at the Duke of Temberlay, peer and war hero. “Sergeant Hallet must have been discharged. He may have died, even. There’s no record of hi
m, Your Grace.”

  He had no idea what had happened to the particular sergeant His Grace wanted, or to hundreds of others, for that matter, and he wouldn’t know until the final butcher’s bill reached him here at Horse Guards. Even then, well—men disappeared in battle, lost forever, and some signed their enlistment papers with an x, and recruiters could not spell. Hallet’s name might have been written down as Hall, or Mallet, or Tom Turkey. All the captain was sure of was that he had no facts to give the very annoyed, very large duke looming over him.

  No one on the Continent seemed in any hurry to send information, and he was left to fight the battle all over again here in London, fending off the volleys of questions from anxious wives and mothers, as well as important people like Temberlay, all of them looking for news of someone who had fought at Waterloo. Sergeant Hallet might even be safely back home, wherever that was. Whoever and wherever the man was, the captain hoped he didn’t owe Temberlay money. His Grace did not look like the forgiving type.

  “Is there anything—or anyone—else I can help with, Your Grace?”

  “Do you have a file on Major Lord Stephen Ives?” the duke asked, leaning forward in his seat, pinning the captain to his own chair with a sharp look.

  “I—” The captain ran a finger around the inside of his collar, and tried to assess whether His Grace would welcome the ill news he had of Major Lord Ives. The major was due to be court-martialed. He’d been granted a brief reprieve because he’d been badly injured during the battle, and if the captain knew anything, he knew the army liked to be certain their cowards were completely healthy when the time came to disgrace them or hang them.

  “He is to be arrested when he arrives in England, held for questioning prior to a court-martial,” he said carefully.

  Temberlay shook his head. “He’s in my custody until the court martial. There is no need to arrest him. I will be responsible for him. Have they set a date for the trial?”

  “The first of October, Your Grace.”