Noel's Wish

by Donna Lea Simpson

  “I demand a better attempt than that, Cobb, old man,” Ruston said, glancing over with a grin at Ann. “We must show our visitors that Russetshire men have what it takes to woo and win the fair maids. Try again!”

  With much laughter from the remaining staff, Cobb kissed Ellen again, this time taking her in his arms and sweeping her almost literally off her feet. The girl was red-faced when he was done, but a smile lingered on her curved lips.

  “Well done! Who else is there?”

  A tiny scullery maid stepped forward and chose one of the groom’s boys as her champion.

  “And who will you choose?” Ruston whispered to Ann.

  The voice in her ear nearly sent her skittering across the floor. Mossy had danced away from her some time ago, and she should have taken the opportunity to slip away, she realized, before Ruston approached her.

  “You don’t expect me to . . . oh, no! I couldn’t!”

  “Oh, yes, you will! Think about who, in this room, you would like to kiss. You will be called in about three minutes. And don’t even think about slipping away or I will make an embarrassingly large fuss when I find you and carry you bodily back.”

  Ruston moved back toward the ladder and called on the cook, a plump, cheery individual of about fifty who blushingly refused to name a man. To Ann’s surprise, she saw her own driver, Jacob Lesley, step forward.

  “Might you be wantin’ a volunteer, milord?” he asked, slapping his cap against his leg.

  The cook threw her apron over her face, but Ruston, laughing, ushered the driver over to the woman. “May I provide a willing fellow for you, Mrs. Jasper?”

  She nodded shyly, and Jacob scaled the ladder, plucked his berry and was back in front of her in seconds. He presented the berry to her and, wrapping his arms around her rotund waist, planted an enthusiastic kiss on her plump lips. She shrieked, threw the apron back over her face and scuttled off to the kitchen, almost bumping into the wall and doorway a couple of times.

  “Now me, Daddy!” Mossy said, dancing eagerly around, her kitten in her hands.

  Ruston stood, hands planted on his hips and feet apart, gazing down at her. “And what gentleman have you chosen, young lady? Might I hope to be your champion?”

  “I choose Noël,” she giggled, planting a kiss on the kitten’s pink nose. Noël sneezed and wiped his paw across his nose.

  Ruston expressed disappointment. “I suppose I have been supplanted in your affections by that little monster, even though he can’t be expected to scale the ladder and pluck a berry . . . just yet, anyway. So be it. There is only one lady left.” He turned his gimlet gaze on Ann.

  She felt her stomach lurch. How could she kiss him again? And yet how could she choose someone else? The whole thing was ridiculous, but she did not want to appear as Lady Ice this once. She shot a panicked glance around the rest of the room, and got an idea. She stepped forward boldly and smiled inwardly at the gleam in Ruston’s brown eyes. “I choose . . . Jacob!”

  Her driver was still watching the proceedings with great interest. His pale eyes widened and he shook his head.

  Ruston, who had been stalking toward her, stopped abruptly. He looked genuinely disappointed, Ann thought with amazement. His eyes narrowed then, and he considered.

  “You cannot choose someone who has already been chosen!” he announced.

  “But Jacob was not chosen; he volunteered!”

  “Ah, but he did kiss a woman, so the point is in dispute. Choose again!”

  He moved toward her, and she wanted to back away from the warm amber light in his eyes.

  “I-I-I . . .”

  He was right in front of her, looking down into her eyes.

  “Choose me,” he said, his voice deep and low. “Choose me, Ann. You won’t regret it.”

  Mesmerized by his stare, she said, before she thought, “I choose you.”

  A collective sigh swept through the room. Many of the giddy chambermaids and handsome footmen had stayed to watch, happy to suspend their numerous duties for a break. A high giggle broke out from Mossy.

  Ruston, his athletic form showing to great advantage, scaled the ladder and then jumped back down. He beckoned Ann, who walked toward him even though her knees felt weak. He offered her a berry.

  She took it and looked up at him as he put his hands on her shoulders. She wished she could read the expression in his golden brown eyes. He watched her even as he lowered his face toward hers, but then her eyes closed instinctively and the first touch of his lips was experienced as a sweet moment of bliss.

  Without releasing her, he deepened the kiss, and her hazy awareness that there were people watching drifted away. Sensation throbbed through her body, a body she had thought devoid of natural feeling. A giddy dizziness swept over her and she was no longer sure if she stood or sat or what; all she knew was his lips were soft, his kiss tasted like cinnamon, and he was . . .

  She gasped as she felt his tongue touch her lips, tickling and teasing with delicious darting movements. And then he released her.

  They had the rapt attention of the small crowd, including Jacob. Ann felt a fiery blush steal over her body. She had not wanted that moment to end, although she was still puzzled by what she had felt in his arms. It was as if her body, deep down to some secret core, was awakening from a long slumber.

  He held out his hand and she glanced down. He had a fistful of berries—at least twenty, and maybe more.

  “Shall I redeem these all at once or shall I take my kisses one by one, through the evening and night?”

  Chapter Nine

  Ann dressed slowly. Ellen fussed around, laying out the right gloves to go with the deep amethyst gown her mistress had donned for dinner and finding a shawl to go with the gown.

  She shrieked and Ann whirled to find Noël blinking up at the maid from under a pile of discarded dresses. He skittered away, a whirlwind of energy, finally burrowing into Ann’s reticule.

  She laughed. “That is what that little demon did to me this morning. He had gotten himself buried in my shawl on the bed and when I went to put it on, he jumped at me.” She dumped the kitten out of her small evening bag and the little animal sped across the room and out the door.

  “Green-eyed little devil-cat,” Ellen said.

  There was silence for a moment.

  “And so you chose Cobb to kiss you,” Ann said, watching her lady’s maid tidy the vanity table.

  Ellen huffed and tossed her head. “Little did I know the man was a cold fish!”

  “You didn’t feel anything when he kissed you?”

  “I . . . I wouldn’t say that. But I was that embarrassed that the master . . . I mean his master, had to tell him to do it proper! You’d think I was an antidote!”

  “He was just on his dignity, Ellen, that’s all. Some . . . some of us find it hard to thaw, you know.”

  “Still!” There was silence for a moment. “Isn’t Lord Montrose the handsome one, though,” Ellen said, sneaking a sly glance at her mistress’s face.

  “And I think he is aware of it,” Ann said quellingly.

  “Do you think him vain? I have heard Cobb complain in the servants’ hall that the master does not think enough of his appearance. It is Cobb’s bane in life, he says.”

  Ann did not answer. No, she did not really think Ruston conceited. She was trying to find excuses not to like him. If that was the best she could come up with . . . “I will go down now.”

  She heard laughter as she descended and she followed the sound to the rose parlor. She entered to find Ruston on the floor with Noël on his stomach, worrying frantically at his waistcoat buttons. How the creature had gotten from her room down to the rose parlor so quickly was beyond her, but the little devil seemed to be everywhere at once sometimes.

  Mossy gaily grasped her kitten and danced away. “I’m going to take him upstairs now. He hasn’t had his dinner yet.”

  “Please, don’t let me interrupt,” Ann said.

  Ruston clambered to his fee
t as Mossy skipped from the room. “Let her go.” He brushed himself off. “Cobb would be mortified to see me like this,” he muttered, straightening his cuffs and smoothing his breeches.

  Ann realized she was watching his broad hands straighten his breeches and quickly looked away. She was shy, suddenly, not knowing what to say after the frivolity of the afternoon.

  He stepped in front of her, reached in his pocket, took her hand and placed one berry in it. “I think I will claim one kiss now.”

  “Why are you doing this?” she moaned, looking away. She didn’t think she could bear another of his soul-shattering kisses just then . . . or ever. They left her feeling weak and strange.

  He clutched her shoulders and drew her near, not answering. He tipped her face up with one hand and kissed her, possessing her lips with a gentleness that seared her soul. She shivered, and despite all her resolutions found herself responding, opening to him like a flower to warming sunshine.

  When he released her, he gave her a long searching look in the dimness of the rose room. “How could anyone call you Lady Ice?”

  She pulled away from him. “I despise that name,” she cried.

  “How did it happen?”

  She crossed to the harpsichord in the corner and touched the keys, desperate to stay away from him. She shot him a glance. “You must know! If you have heard the name, you have heard the story!”

  “I was only in London for three days after arriving from the Continent, but yes, I heard the story. I heard that you crushed young Madison like an insect under your heel after leading him on for months. I heard you humiliated him in public and he had to slink away on his ‘grand tour’ to escape the laughter.” His words were harsh but his tone curiously neutral.

  “Ah, yes,” she laughed, a bitter, sharp sound that echoed. She hit a discordant note and walked away from the instrument. “Poor, young Madison. Poor lovesick boy who dogged my every step for months, no matter what I said to him. Poor love-starved fellow, who laid his hands on me one night when I was walking in my garden, bundled me into a waiting carriage and abducted me!”

  Ruston’s dark brows shot up. “Abducted you? Whatever was he thinking?”

  “You tell me! He said we would be married at Gretna and that I would learn to love him.”

  “What happened?”

  “We stopped at an inn outside of London to water the horses, and I screamed for help. I was able to bribe the innkeeper, who was greedy and could see where the best possibility of money lay. I was able to obtain his help, at the cost of my diamond earrings, and get back to London. Only Madison’s immediate friends knew about it, and I threatened them by saying I would charge Madison if they opened their mouths.”

  “But I heard that you publicly humiliated Madison, and that that is what sent him to the Continent,” Ruston said.

  Ann slapped her palm down on a table. “The fool had the temerity to approach me at Sally Jersey’s Christmas Ball to ask me to dance. I had had enough. I could not bear the thought of him touching me with his damp sweaty hands, hands so wet even gloves could not disguise it. No longer was I going to be confined by courtesy. I told him that if I ever desired public humiliation, I would dance with him, clumsy oaf! After all I had been through, that was what finally sent him away! Being laughed at by the ton!”

  And that was the explanation for the infamous Lady Ice, Ruston thought. It showed what happened when one knew only a part of the story. “Is that why you are leaving London over Christmas?”

  “Yes, I could not bear the whispers, the censure.” She shook her head.

  Ruston wondered, was her icy demeanor her way of protecting herself, insulating herself from the ravages of a cruel world? Instead of being frigid, was she only too vulnerable? He would soon know.

  He approached her and stripped off her long lavender gloves one and then the other as she watched with wide violet eyes. Ah, yes, her flesh was warm and her elegant long-fingered hands as subtly arousing as he had remembered. He placed another pale berry in the palm of one of her naked hands and raised the other hand to his mouth, turning it so the palm faced him. He watched her eyes as he laid a soft kiss in the middle of her palm, and then curled her fingers around it. If he was not mistaken, her breathing was faster and her cheeks just slightly flushed.

  He hoped this evening lasted a long, long time, because he intended to get to the bottom of the mystery of Lady Ann Beecham-Brooke before the end of it.

  • • •

  They had talked about everything, Ann thought, but each other. Mossy had returned to eat dinner with them and conversation had been lively and diverse. Formality between them was absurd, she decided, and so Ann started calling him Charles, and he called her Ann back, with a significant look, as if daring her to object. But she didn’t. The sound of her name on his lips gave her a little thrill. His voice had a deep timbre when he said it, and it pleased her much more than it should have.

  He was well-traveled, she learned. At the end of the war he had been in Brussels, and talked about the euphoria after Napoleon’s defeat. Since then he had been to Switzerland, Germany and Italy, and she watched his eyes light with enthusiasm as he spoke of the art treasures of Italy, the museums he had seen, the majesty of the Vatican.

  And now, as he had planned, he would go on to the Balkans and thence to Greece, Ann thought, leaving behind his child once again. She could not forgive him for his blindness there, for not seeing how his leaving would affect his precious daughter. Mossy was resigned to it, no doubt, Ann thought, watching the girl’s wide-eyed fascination with her father’s stories.

  Dinner was done. “It is time for your bed, Mossy,” Ann said after the child’s fourth yawn.

  “Will you come up with me?” she said.

  Ann glanced at Charles, who nodded, and said, “I will. Let’s go.”

  Catching her eye, Charles said, “Meet me in the rose parlor after you put her to bed.”

  She hesitated, remembering the pocketful of berries he still had, but in the end acquiesced. It was what she wanted to do, after all, and she would be leaving in the morning. She had come to enjoy his company too much for her future tranquillity, but she would indulge herself this once and be with him.

  Up in Mossy’s blue and white chamber, Ann dismissed Sarah with a smile and helped the little girl into her nightie. A child seemed such a fragile thing, she thought, and yet their sturdy hearts and bodies survived all of the insensitivity of adults, and they grew into the men and women who would shape the future.

  Noël pounced out from under the bed and attacked Mossy’s bare toes, and she shrieked, collapsing on the bed in a fit of giggles. Ann picked up the tiny kitten, which immediately started to purr, the sound a vibrating rumble in its tiny body. She held him and sat down on the bed beside Mossy.

  “Do you say prayers at night?”

  “Sometimes, when I remember.”

  Ann put the kitten up near Mossy’s neck, pulling her covers up so they were tucked around her snugly against the chill of the room. Noël circled twice and tucked himself into a tight little ball after one quick lick to his hind leg.

  “What do you pray for?” Ann looked down into the hazel eyes that sparkled in the dim light of the candle.

  “For Daddy to stay home. For him and Grandfather Chase and Grandmother Chase to be safe, and . . . and other things.”

  For Daddy to stay home. Ann felt the anger again and quelled it with difficulty. She had said all she could to Charles and now it was time for her to go.

  “Thank you for helping me with Daddy’s sampler,” Mossy said. “Do you think he’ll like it?”

  Ann glanced over at the framed sampler, sitting on a table by the bed. Together they had washed it, dried it and framed it with a frame found in the attic. Nothing could correct the slanting stitches or misspelling, but to Ann it was the more precious for all of the love and effort that went into it, all the hopes and dreams and prayers.

  “He will adore it and treasure it forever. I wish I cou
ld be here when he opens it Christmas morning.”

  Mossy’s tiny face pinched with unhappiness and Ann wished she had not mentioned having to leave. In just a couple of days this child’s happiness had become so very important to her, and she was torn apart inside knowing she could do nothing about her coming sadness.

  “It’s time for you to sleep,” Ann said, blowing out the candle. She bent down and touched her lips to the child’s smooth forehead, wishing, yearning to hold her in her arms and tell her she would be there for her whenever she needed a friend. If only she had that right.

  “Good night, Lady Ann.”

  “Just Ann, honey.”

  “Good night, Just Ann Honey,” Mossy said with a tiny smile.

  Ann ruffled her silky hair. “Scamp.”

  As the door closed, Mossy touched the soft fur of her kitten and felt the reassuring rumble of a purr start in the tiny figure.

  “Noël, we have to keep her here somehow. Daddy likes her, an’ I like her, and she’s sad. We could make her happy again. We’ll have to think of something. We’ll have to think of something quick.”

  • • •

  The rose parlor was dimly lit, with only one branch of beeswax candles and the embers of the fireplace lighting the dusky reaches. Ann entered uncertainly. He had said the rose parlor, had he not? Then she felt his presence. She wasn’t sure where he was yet, but she could feel something in the air, some vibration that touched her and enveloped her. “Charles?”

  “Ann.”

  His voice was almost in her ear and she whirled, startled. He reached out for her, steadying her. “I’m sorry; I did not mean to startle you.”

  “But you did!” she snapped.

  “Again, I apologize. Please, come and sit by the fire. It is a desperately cold night.”

  He led her to the fire, but when she started to sit on a chair he pulled her down, onto a deep, soft rug on the hearth.

  “I-I-I cannot sit on the floor!”

  “Of course you can. It is warmer here, and snug.”

  And dangerous, Ann thought, eyeing him nervously, tucking her gown securely around her ankles. He sat down by her, so close she could feel the animal warmth emanating from his body. He smelled delicious, like spice, and she had an absurd urge to nibble at his neck, as if he were a gingerbread man. She shifted, trying to move away a little, but found that was not practical, for she moved away from the warmth of the fire if she did. It was as if he had placed her strategically, knowing what her next move would be and countering it.