A Dream of Desire

by Nina Rowan

Fear seized her anew. Her heart raced.

  He was so close to her. His palm was warm on her cheek. She stared at his mouth. How often had she wondered what his lips would feel like against hers?

  Before he could speak again, Talia closed the scant distance between them and pressed her lips to his. Surprise stiffened James’s shoulders. He started to retreat, but Talia gripped the front of his shirt and increased the pressure of the kiss. Heat bloomed through her at the realization of a moment that had flourished so passionately and so often in her dreams.

  James jerked back, inhaling a sharp breath. Determined to prevent his escape, Talia stepped closer, nudging her breasts against his hard chest. He tensed and gripped her forearms. She curved her hand around the back of his neck and pulled him down to settle her mouth more firmly against his.

  He tightened his hold on her, even as his muscles corded with restraint. Talia dared to part her lips beneath his, both shocked and thrilled by her own boldness. Her blood coursed hot and swift through her veins as the warm, sugary taste of James filled her senses. He moved his hands to her waist, his body still rigid. His fingers dug into the fabric of her bodice as if he sought the strength to push her away.

  And then, suddenly, he surrendered. A groan escaped him as his mouth opened to hers in a deep union that flooded with desire. Talia closed her eyes and sank into the kiss, savoring the sensation of being in his arms, still wrapped in his coat, his mouth locked to hers.

  Sweet, delicious relief and yearning filled her heart. She unclenched her hand from his shirt and spread it across his chest, imagining what his taut, bare skin would feel like beneath her palm. She arched her body against his, emboldened by his capitulation and the coil of arousal wrapping around them…

  James broke away from her. He stumbled back, his breathing hard and his eyes brewing with shock and unfulfilled passion.

  Talia stared at him, her heart thumping. She pressed her fingers to her reddened lips, where the taste of him lingered.

  “Bloody hell, Talia.” James’s voice was hoarse, jagged. He turned away and dragged a hand through his hair. “This cannot happen. This will not happen.”

  Somehow, she managed to speak. “It did happen, James.”

  He spun around to glare at her, his jaw set with frustration. “You are Northwood’s sister, for God’s sake!”

  Tension lanced through Talia’s spine. She lifted her chin and sought the enviable pride that her mother had always embodied, the cool dignity Talia knew that she, too, possessed somewhere deep inside.

  “I am far more than Northwood’s sister, James,” she said, leveling her voice to a flat, composed tone. “I am Lady Talia Hall. I am the only daughter of the Earl of Rushton. Even in the shadow of scandal, my hand in marriage is sought by any number of peers, but I am offering myself to you without reservation. I want to be with you, James. I’ve wanted nothing else for—”

  “Stop.” The command snapped from him with such force that Talia retreated a step. James cursed again and pressed his hands to his eyes. He paced to the windows.

  “I’ll never get married, Talia, to you or anyone else,” he said, clenching and unclenching his fists at his sides. “Even if I did wish to wed, how could I subject a wife to a marriage in which her husband is gone months or years at a time?”

  “You don’t…” Talia swallowed past the growing lump in her throat. Her future began to unfurl before her, bleak and empty. “You don’t have to leave so often, James. And someday you’ll have to—”

  “I’ll have to what?” He spun to face her. “I have charge of the estate, yes, but I never intended to beget my own heir because I won’t stay in England. I’m not meant for marriage, Talia, no matter how…appealing the offer might be.”

  An ache constricted Talia’s heart. “You mean to tell me you’ll never return to London to stay?”

  “I’ve no intentions of doing so.” Some of the irritation appeared to drain from him as he approached her. His voice softened. “Talia, there’s so much to see in the world. So much to explore. I want to find the source of the Nile. I want to journey to Greenland one day. I want to map the interior of Australia and head an expedition to find geological specimens in China. It will take years to do everything I want to.”

  “And then when you’re finally finished with your expeditions, you’ll be a lonely old man with no one to care for you or love you,” Talia snapped.

  Her hand flew to her mouth. Shocked by the vehemence of her own words, she stared at James in mute apology.

  A smile tugged at his lips. He reached out and brushed a tendril of loose hair away from her neck. The light touch of his fingers sent tingles of awareness through her blood.

  “And you,” he said, “will be a cherished wife and a beloved mother. You will have an enormous circle of friends who value you beyond measure. You will be married to the love of your life.”

  You are the love of my life.

  Her heart crushed like a piece of paper within a tight fist. Nothing would keep James in England. Not even her.

  “Please, Talia.” James lifted her face so she had to look at him. Self-directed anger darkened his brown eyes. “Don’t give me the gift of your love. I won’t do anything good with it. Save your heart for a man who truly deserves it.”

  Talia clenched her back teeth together, fighting a sting of tears. Never before had James indicated he thought himself unworthy of anything, least of all a woman’s love. Part of her wanted to argue, to force him to understand that she would not have offered herself to him had she not known his value. But Talia did have her mother’s pride, uncultivated though it might be. If James did not want her heart, then she would take it back.

  “Very well.” She pulled away from the burn of his touch and crossed the room, clutching his still-warm coat around her body.

  At the door, she paused. He stood by the sideboard, his hands shoved into his trouser pockets and his shoulders slumped. His hair fell in a disheveled mess across his forehead.

  A twist of longing, of love, went through Talia, but she pushed it down beneath the layer of cold already creeping over her soul.

  “James, I ask only that you keep my…my behavior a confidence between us.”

  “Talia, I would die before causing you embarrassment or shame.” James cleared his throat. “No one will know of this. When…if I return, we will carry on as we did before.”

  “Agreed.” Talia pulled open the door, turning away from him as her heart broke in half. “Best of luck on your expedition then, James. I hope you find what you seek.”

  Because now I never will.

  Talia hurried back to her room, blinded by tears.

  Chapter Two

  May 1855

  One year later

  Clouds bruised the spring sky, heralding the possibility of a storm. A few raindrops had already fallen on the cobbled streets of Middlesex, and a straggly rooster pecked at a greasy puddle in the gutter. A newspaper man went past with a cart full of papers, and a milkmaid huddled in a doorway with brightly colored cans of milk at her feet. The greengrocer, baker, and barbershop doors were open, but only a few residents trudged through the town.

  Inside the cab they had hired at the railway station, Talia held the court papers in a tight grip. Across from her, Mr. Matthew Fletcher, member of the Ragged School Union and a schoolteacher, sat beside Miss Alice Colston. Alice’s face was white and pinched with concern beneath her plain blue bonnet, though not even the gray light and her evident anxiety could extinguish her angelic beauty.

  Alice glanced up and caught Talia’s eye. Talia smiled in reassurance, though her belly was also tight with nerves.

  “Peter has served his sentence,” she told Alice in a reminder meant to soothe.

  “And we’ve got a written order for his release,” Mr. Fletcher added. He’d removed his hat, and his brown hair was smoothed away from his high forehead, his narrow features calm behind his round spectacles.

  “All will be well,” he said, but
he didn’t sound especially convinced.

  Neither was Talia.

  Rain began to patter onto the roof of the cab as it rolled through the town. The dingy, redbrick walls of the prison came into view, only the spiked roofs of the interior buildings visible behind the enclosure. A prison van stood at the entrance, and iron grates covered every window like clenched, rusted teeth.

  The cab slowed at the prison gates, and Mr. Fletcher opened the window to transfer their admission papers to the guard. The guard swung the gates open, and they rolled to a halt at the prison entrance. The huge, green doors were embedded in a stone archway capped with the inscription: The House of Correction at Newhall.

  After descending from the cab, they entered the front office—a narrow room with a wall full of empty pigeonholes and a cupboard stacked with ledgers. The gate warder instructed them to sign the admission ledger before opening the door that led to the main yard.

  “Mr. Lawford will be with you in a moment,” he said.

  Talia stepped to the smudged window and peered out at the prison courtyard. A dozen warders in dark blue uniforms and leather belts stood at attention while a blond-haired man dressed in the uniform of the deputy governor inspected them for duty. After he dismissed them for work, the warders filed into the main building of the prison.

  The deputy governor, William Lawford, went to the governor’s lodge at the far end of the court, then returned to the yard with a tall, skinny boy of sixteen who trailed behind him with hunched shoulders. His black hair hung in his eyes, and he wore a gray prison shirt and trousers too big for his thin frame.

  Talia’s heart filled with guilt at the sight of the boy. She stepped away from the window, trying not to imagine all he had endured during his incarceration. The door opened, and Lawford and Peter Colston entered.

  “Peter!” Alice gave a little cry at the sight of her brother and hurried forward to embrace him. Though the boy bore her touch, he didn’t move to return the gesture.

  “I’m so happy to see you, Peter,” Alice said, her voice catching.

  “Peter has been greatly anticipating this day.” William Lawford gripped the boy’s shoulder and gave Alice a smile. A handsome man in his mid-thirties, Mr. Lawford wore both his rank and his good looks with ease. “As have we. Always a pleasure to see one of our boys released back into the bosom of his family.”

  Alice brushed Peter’s hair away from his eyes. “You look dreadfully thin.”

  “Peter’s been a bit stubborn about taking his meals,” Lawford said, his smile swerving to Peter now. “Isn’t that right, Peter? Had him inspected by the surgeon, who found nothing amiss. Certainly it hasn’t been for lack of sustenance.”

  “I would hope not,” Talia remarked.

  Peter blinked, his expression still vacant, and Talia wondered for a moment if he even remembered her. Her throat tightened. Likely he didn’t want to remember her.

  Lawford’s smile remained fixed in place. “Ah, Lady Talia Hall. What an entirely unexpected surprise.”

  “Accompanying Miss Colston is the closest I could get to the inside of your prison,” Talia said. “My application to visit was denied for a third time last week.”

  “Pity.” Lawford wrote in a ledger and turned it toward Peter. “Sign here, Peter. Smythe, take Peter to change into his regular clothes.”

  Peter bent to scratch his mark in the ledger, then followed the gate warder to another room. At Lawford’s instruction, Alice also signed her name.

  “Since Mr. Fletcher and I are here now,” Talia said to Lawford, “perhaps you might spare a half hour for a tour?”

  “If I’d a half hour to spare, I would be honored,” Lawford replied smoothly. “But I’m afraid we have a schedule to maintain. And seeing as your application has been denied…well, I’d hate to jeopardize my own position by allowing you access.”

  “You’ve seen the prison inspection report, have you not, Mr. Lawford?” Talia extended the papers she held. “Many of the gaols have been condemned for the wretched nature of their conditions and enforced labor. The inspection of penal institutions for juveniles is not scheduled until next year. I intend to submit to the House of Commons committee that it be carried out this summer instead, as the results of the report will have a strong bearing on our request for government funding.”

  A hush fell over the room when the words stopped tumbling from Talia’s mouth. Her heartbeat increased in pace. Lawford didn’t take the papers, instead turning to examine the ledger before slowly closing it.

  “My lady, I admire your commitment to criminals, as I’m sure they do as well. But surely there are more pressing matters for a lady of your rank to consider? Why must you lower yourself to aid the most worthless members of society?”

  Talia’s jaw tightened. She despised that word. Worthless. She’d felt that way herself in the past, when society had reviled her and she’d struggled to fit into the world again. Only recently had she discovered that she had the ability to help people who had little recourse, to prove both herself and them worthy. She would certainly not let Mr. Lawford—or anyone else, for that matter—belittle her efforts.

  “They are not worthless, Mr. Lawford,” she said. “They are boys who might become productive members of society if given a decent education or a chance to learn a trade.”

  “Which I have attempted to provide to boys like Peter Colston.” Lawford bowed slightly in Alice’s direction. “I’m sorry, Miss Colston. I did try to help your brother, but he’s resisted any effort on my part.”

  “What kind of help did you provide?” Mr. Fletcher inquired. “Has Peter learned to read or write under your care?”

  Lawford’s clear, blue gaze didn’t waver. “The boys received daily lessons of a religious nature, of course. We fully understand they are wayward souls whose moral corruption is not irredeemable. We also believe they must be set upon the right path before being allowed to chart their own course.”

  “And for you, does the right path include punishments such as those carried out at Birmingham?” Fletcher asked, his voice icy.

  Lawford chuckled. “I’m afraid you draw comparisons where none exist, Mr. Fletcher. Birmingham was a prison for adult offenders. Newhall is for boys like Peter Colston who…do forgive me, Miss Colston…possess an aggravated character.”

  “Peter is a good boy, Mr. Lawford,” Alice said, her hand at her throat. “We are a respectable family.”

  Lawford lifted an inquiring eyebrow. “I know you and your father have tried, Miss Colston. And I do hope Peter recognizes his good fortune and renounces his offending ways. Though I must tell you, his defiance while under my care does not give me much hope for his reformation.”

  “Mr. Lawford, I strongly suggest you give us access to your facility before the House of Commons meeting,” Talia said. “If you are running a benevolent institution as you claim, then why not allow us to see the facilities and talk to the boys—”

  “My lady, your application has been denied.” Lawford’s voice sharpened. “I have no further authority on the matter.” He glanced at Alice. “Miss Colston, I beg your pardon for this unpleasantness on what should be a day of joy for you and your family.”

  “May we speak with Lieutenant Lawford, sir?” Talia asked. She had the satisfaction of seeing Lawford’s features tighten with distaste.

  “My uncle is ill and has returned to London for care,” he replied curtly. “He leaves the responsibilities of Newhall to me in his…infirm state.”

  Yet another reason why Newhall crouched under a cloud of suspicion. Whispers abounded about Lieutenant George Lawford’s illness, which was purported to be an addiction to alcohol. Despite the rumors, he had once overseen the prison hulks that transported convicts to Australia and other colonies, but he’d been stripped of his duties when inspections of the ships revealed abhorrent conditions and numerous deaths. Last year Lieutenant Lawford had been “retired” to Newhall to oversee the small juvenile detention facility.

  Shortly after
his appointment, he’d selected his nephew William as deputy governor, ostensibly as an aide to help with his own duties. Everyone knew, however, that William had quickly taken over every detail of the prison’s management and, in all but name and salary, served as de facto governor of Newhall while concealing his uncle’s lack of interest in governing.

  “I believe my father, the Earl of Rushton, is acquainted with Lieutenant Lawford,” Talia said, tugging her gloves farther up her wrists. “He’s been with the Home Office for a year now. I’ve little doubt he’ll be willing to assist me in the matter of prison reports upon his return to London.”

  Actually, she had little doubt her father would throw a fit of rage when he learned his only daughter was seeking access to prisons and associating with juvenile delinquents…but Mr. Lawford certainly didn’t need to know that.

  Lawford tilted his head. “Yes, I’m sure your father will be delighted with your latest cause, my lady.”

  His voice wrapped the remark in sarcasm.

  Before Talia could respond, the gate warder came through the door, followed by Peter. Dressed in an old shirt, jacket, and trousers, he kept his gaze on the floor even when Alice approached again and began speaking to him in a low voice.

  Talia went to the door, trying to hide her disappointment—even though she had hardly expected Mr. Lawford to allow her access to Newhall, she’d hoped to find some chink in his armor that she could use to her advantage.

  She glanced toward Alice, her gaze sliding past her friend to where Mr. Lawford stood behind the desk. He was watching Alice, his blue eyes attentive and speculating, as if he were attempting to solve a puzzle.

  Apprehension rose in Talia’s chest. It was a look she was uncomfortably familiar with, having received such speculative glances after her mother had an affair with a younger man. Almost four years after her parents’ subsequent divorce, Talia still sometimes had to deflect unwanted male attention.

  She moved forward to touch Alice’s arm and gestured to the door. Alice nodded, her face shadowed as she urged Peter to follow them. Before the boy could, Lawford reached out to grip his hand.