Captive of Sin

by Anna Campbell

  “You don’t have to entertain me or neglect your duties on my behalf.” Her voice was flat with disappointment. But what had she expected? That he’d devote his attention to her? Much as she wanted his company as a buffer against the unfamiliarity.

  Charis, don’t pretend that’s the reason.

  She forced an even tone. “You’ve already done so much for me.”

  “Don’t be absurd.” He emptied the glass in a single swallow and set it down with a crack. “I did what anyone would have.”

  “You’re too modest, Sir Gideon.”

  “Don’t make me out to be more than I am, Miss Watson.” His eyes glittered like obsidian as they focused on her. The tension that extended between them like a thin golden wire tightened to breaking point. “I’m as miserable a sinner as ever walked this earth. Pray remember that.”

  The invisible wire linking them snapped. He turned and stalked from the room, leaving her to stare after him in hopeless, hurt bewilderment. The sun turned away from her, and she shivered in the sudden, biting cold.

  Six

  Over the next days, Gideon saw little of Sarah. With his guest recuperating in her room, avoiding her proved a surprisingly simple matter.

  They shared dinner under the curious eyes of his servants. Occasionally, they crossed paths in a corridor, and he’d inquire after her health. All perfectly polite, two strangers passing the time of day. Thankfully, there was no hint of the burgeoning, dangerous intimacy that had hovered on the journey to Penrhyn.

  With every encounter, he couldn’t help noticing the remarkable beauty that emerged from beneath the disfiguring bruises. It was yet another of fate’s cruel jokes that the desperate, injured girl turned into a woman of spectacular attractions who stirred his sluggish blood.

  It was unlikely her brothers would track her this far, but Gideon wasn’t taking chances. He made sure someone always knew where she was. A pack of brawny villagers boosted the household staff, and shifts of men patrolled the approaches to the house.

  Even if he’d wanted to play nursemaid, he wouldn’t have had time. He was frantically busy. Mostly he was absent from the house, fielding endless requests and questions, and making decisions about the estate. After years of neglect, there were a thousand matters, small and large, to address.

  What became abundantly clear during his first day as its reluctant master was that Penrhyn was in his blood. He was home to stay.

  He could no more abandon the place than he could fly to Constantinople. When he’d seen the old house again, a sullen, unwelcome love had flooded him, a bone-deep sense that Penrhyn was meant to be his. Illogical, inconvenient, but undeniable. He couldn’t relinquish this windswept corner of the kingdom to anyone else’s stewardship. Although God knew who he kept it for. He was the last Trevithick. There would be no sons to inherit.

  That sad fact haunted him, a mournful threnody beneath his activity. And if the memory of one delicate woman also haunted him, he was too occupied to brood on the fact. At least during daylight hours. Nights were a different matter. He’d throw himself exhausted on his bed, only to lie awake listening to the endless crash of the waves and thinking about Sarah. Or worse, drifting into restless dreams where he was free to touch her as he never could in the harsh light of reality.

  With every hour, that hankering to touch her intensified. With every hour, the pain of knowing that he never would lacerated him.

  On the morning of his third day at Penrhyn, Gideon shut himself in his library, determined to tame the chaos his predecessors had left of the accounts.

  He’d been at work for about an hour when Sarah wandered into view through the tall windows facing the overgrown parterre. The dusty ledger in front of him immediately lost what small interest it held. He watched for Dorcas or one of the men set to guarding Sarah. But his visitor remained alone in the dewy, sunlit garden.

  For a forbidden, secret moment, he stared, drinking in her beauty. The bruises were barely noticeable now, and her face resumed its natural shape. Since yesterday she’d discarded her bandage, and she no longer moved as if every step hurt. To his relief, Akash’s assessment of her injuries as looking worse than they were had proven accurate.

  Sarah paused in a patch of light and turned her face to the pale February sun. Her lips curved with a natural sensuality.

  Gideon’s heart battered his ribs. His breath jammed in his chest. She was glorious. None of the fabled courtesans of India held a candle to her uniquely English loveliness.

  Was he so shallow that her pretty face made him want her?

  If only the truth were so uncomplicated. He could resist the lure of beauty if beauty alone attracted him. But the waif he’d rescued in Winchester had become a woman of endless allure. Strong. Brave. Tender. Sweet.

  Ah, so sweet.

  A long plait fell down the supple line of Sarah’s back. Gideon’s hand, lying idle on the desk, flexed as if it tangled in that silky bronze mane. He locked his teeth and cursed himself for a fool. Such fantasies were futile.

  Knowing he tormented himself to no purpose, he hungrily watched the subtle sway of her hips as she started walking again. The way the ill-fitting cotton frock skimmed her lissome waist. He frowned. Why was she still wearing the cheap dress from Portsmouth? He’d asked Mrs. Pollett to find her fresh clothing.

  He’d sort it out later. He bent to his work, determined to punish himself no further with impossible yearnings. Then, helplessly, he raised his gaze as Sarah strolled through a morning more like April than February and disappeared behind a hedge of overgrown camellias.

  A page of figures his eyes failed to register. Another. Another.

  From here, the grounds sloped down to the cliffs. Given the decrepitude of the rest of the estate, Gideon guessed the paths were unstable, falling to pieces. There was danger for someone who didn’t know Penrhyn. Devil take them, where were the people supposed to be watching her?

  “Damn it,” he muttered, and shoved the thick ledgers aside. He snatched his gloves from the desk and leaped into a run.

  Charis was sitting on a worn stone bench when she heard Gideon’s purposeful footsteps. He was in a tearing hurry. She couldn’t imagine why. Especially as he’d worked so hard to stay out of her way since they’d arrived. She tried to tell herself he was busy, and she had no right to feel slighted, but some instinct insisted the lack of contact wasn’t accidental.

  He broke into the cleared space and paused, breathing heavily. He appeared to be searching for something.

  Although she’d sworn she’d behave with circumspection in his presence, although she’d preserved a polite façade when encountering him in the house, her heart beat so fast, her greeting stuck in her throat. She hadn’t expected to see him this morning, and his arrival threw her good intentions into disarray.

  He looked toward the cliff edge, scanned the clearing, then finally turned in her direction. His face flooded with visible relief. “There you are.”

  Every time she saw him, it was like the first time. As she experienced anew the shock of his male beauty, the world seemed to tumble away from her feet, leaving her suspended in space. The sensation was dizzying, scary, overwhelming.

  Today, his onyx eyes were clear, and he moved with an easy freedom that fitted his long-limbed body. He’d spent the recent days outdoors, and the exercise suited him.

  She swallowed to dislodge the lump in her throat, but her voice still emerged as a croak. “Sir Gideon, what’s wrong?”

  “I saw you heading down here.” He ran his hand through his hair, ruffling it into beguiling untidiness. “I wasn’t sure of the state of the cliff edge.”

  It hardly hurt to smile now. Just a slight ache. A glimpse in her bedroom mirror before she’d come outside had revealed a face she finally recognized as hers. “So you rushed to my rescue again.” She tamped down a twinge of forbidden pleasure that he’d come seeking her.

  He made a noncommittal noise in his throat. “You’re looking better.”

  “
I’m feeling better.” She fiddled nervously with her mother’s pearl ring and tried to think of something clever to say. Nothing came to mind. Hard to recall she’d been the toast of Bath society. Sir Gideon made her act like a gauche schoolgirl.

  “I’m glad.” That half smile appeared. Odd—disturbing—how familiar and dear it was.

  A charged silence fell. She knew she devoured him with her eyes. What made no sense was that he seemed to devour her in return. Then it was as if he recalled his resolve to keep his distance.

  “Well, my apologies for disturbing you.” He sounded stiff, awkward. “As you’re in no immediate danger…”

  “I’ll be careful.”

  She wished she could make him stay. Absurd when they were strangers, but she’d missed him in the last days. To her chagrin, Sarah found herself blushing, as though she spoke her foolish yearning aloud.

  She waited in tense misery for him to forsake her to loneliness. But he took a step closer and gestured to the glorious view. The sea was blue and calm today. The waves played like soft music under their conversation. “It looks gentle, but don’t mistake its peril.”

  “I can hardly resist exploring. I hope you don’t mind. Penrhyn has such fairy-tale charm.” Her instant affinity for this place had only strengthened. Each night, she went to sleep in her paneled corner bedroom listening to the sea. “Like La Belle au Bois Dormant.”

  Again that half smile. Her poor, longing heart skipped a beat every time she saw it. “On my honor, there are no sleeping princesses here, Miss Watson.”

  “Perhaps a prince?” she asked lightly, then regretted not keeping her mouth shut.

  His expression closed, became remote. “No princes either.”

  She waited for him to storm off as he had from the library the last time she’d attempted to share more than platitudes. But he remained where he was, frowning down at the ground.

  Eventually, she broke the uncomfortable silence. “What are your plans for the property?”

  His eyes were guarded as they focused on her, but to her surprise, he answered readily enough. “There’s potential for the estate to be profitable. It was once. The woods contain good timber and while the land isn’t much use for crops, it will support sheep. Most of the skilled men have gone, but we could set up a fishing fleet again. First I mean to reopen the tin mines.”

  “Tin?” She leaned back on her arms. She still wasn’t used to having the full use of both arms. Her wrist gave the occasional twinge, but it was almost back to full working order.

  “Yes.” He moved close enough to raise one booted foot onto the far end of her bench. He rested one arm on his thigh and bent toward her. Her skin prickled with awareness, and her breath became shallow and choppy. She prayed he didn’t notice. “The land is littered with worked-out diggings, but there’s still ore to be found. The sea and tin have always kept the Trevithicks.”

  He spoke with an odd lack of involvement, but she wasn’t convinced he was as unemotional about his home as he wanted her to believe. She’d seen his face when he glimpsed it for the first time upon his return. “Will you restore the house?”

  To her astonishment, a glint lit his dark eyes. “I’ll demolish it and build a modern villa.”

  Shocked, she jumped to her feet. “That would be an act of unforgivable vandalism.”

  He laughed softly. “Just teasing you, Miss Watson.” To her regret, he straightened and shifted out of reach. “I’ve remarked your predilection for Penrhyn.”

  Her color rose, and she curled her hands at her sides. “I can’t believe you don’t care. The house needs to be loved.”

  The more she saw of Penrhyn’s master, the more she believed that was true of him too. How she wished she could restore him to joy. But the last days had made it apparent that he regarded her as a duty and nothing more.

  “It’s only bricks and mortar,” he said mildly.

  “You’ll feel differently when you have children,” she said fiercely, even as she flinched to contemplate him marrying another woman.

  The brief moment of levity evaporated. His voice was terse. “I have no plans to marry.”

  “Of course you’ll marry. You’re young, you’re handsome, you’re…”

  He silenced her with a cutting gesture of one hand. “Spare my blushes, Miss Watson.”

  His sarcasm stung, although she knew she deserved the set-down. Her cheeks stung with humiliated heat. She wished she could keep her impulsive comments to herself, but something about Sir Gideon made her burst into ill-considered speech at the very worst of moments. The merest sight of him, and any pretensions of poise flew into the ether.

  “I’m sorry,” she said in a subdued voice. “I had no right to say those things. You must think I’m a rag-mannered hoyden.”

  “No.”

  Just “no”? What was she to make of that? What did he think of her? She stifled the needy, desperate questions that struggled to the surface. She’d already embarrassed him—and herself—sufficiently. Frantically, she cast around for some neutral topic. “When I came out, I was looking for the path to the beach.”

  His mouth lengthened with disapproval. “It’s steep and not easy for a lady. That’s how I remember it nine years ago. I suspect it’s in worse repair now. You’d be better staying in the grounds.”

  Lady Charis Weston would have stepped aside, let him return to his work as he clearly wished. Sarah Watson was a more demanding creature and desperate for a few more minutes of his company. “Can’t we at least try?”

  Sudden amusement flashed across his face, banishing the sternness, making him look years younger. “You’re a stubborn scrap of a thing, aren’t you?”

  Even more astonishingly, his black eyes swept her body, subjecting her to a thorough, masculine inspection. Instant agonizing tension extended between them. Heat crawled over her skin, and her heart bucked and plunged in her chest. Her nipples puckered with painful swiftness, and something warmed and melted in the pit of her stomach.

  The powerful, unfamiliar sensations frightened Charis. It was as if the body she’d known for twenty years suddenly belonged to a stranger. With every ragged breath, the hard points of her nipples rubbed against her shift. The friction was maddening, unstoppable, infuriating.

  She lifted a shaking hand to her breast to ease the ache, then realized what she did. Her face became hotter. He couldn’t miss her discomfort. She wished the ground would open up and swallow her like the whale had swallowed Jonah.

  She lowered her head to hide her mortifying reaction, to break that scorching connection with his eyes. “Not exactly a scrap,” she muttered, turning away to rip at the leaves of a camellia.

  “No, perhaps not.” He released a harsh laugh, bitter and without amusement. She didn’t have the courage to check his expression. “Let’s show you our fine beach.”

  She sucked in a shuddering breath while delight and self-consciousness vied within her. Now that she wasn’t looking at him, she gained some small control over herself.

  “I’d like that,” she said almost inaudibly.

  Feeling like the greatest fool in Creation, she scattered the shreds of greenery on the ground and nerved herself to glance at him under her lashes. She’d expected to see anger or contempt or disgust, but his expression was, as so often, inscrutable. Was there a chance he hadn’t noticed how flustered she was?

  At least he was still here. More, he planned to escort her to the beach. Breathlessly, she waited for him to take her arm, but he merely gestured her toward the overgrown path and fell into step behind her.

  He went ahead once they had to fight their way through a mass of untidy rhododendrons. Like everything else at Penrhyn, the garden reeked of neglect. Charis knew it was insane but she felt that the house cried out to her to save it, to make it a home.

  Stupid fancy. She was only a temporary visitor to this beautiful place. She’d leave soon, to be quickly forgotten by Penrhyn and its owner.

  The bleak knowledge set like concrete i
n her belly.

  Her host was as unkempt as the manor. She studied his tall figure as he forged a path for her. He wore breeches and shirtsleeves, and his boots were old and scuffed. Still, he was utterly splendid. Her pulse, which had started to steady, kicked into a gallop again. She pictured him standing on the prow of a ship. A gold ring glinting in one ear. A cutlass at his waist. A knife clenched between his teeth.

  He stopped to lift a prickly bramble high over her head. “What are you smiling about?”

  She hadn’t realized she was smiling. “Were any of your ancestors pirates?”

  “Black Jack Trevithick was one of Bess’s Sea Hawks.” As she passed him, he flashed her a grin that was devilment personified. Her unruly heart somersaulted. Heaven help her. “His portrait’s in the long gallery. At least it was. Black Jack looks like me, so my father may have retired it. My father and brother took after my grandmother’s family, the St. Ledgers. But I’m all Black Trevithick.”

  “Is that because of your hair color?”

  “Partly. Also black temper, black nature, black sheep, black heart.”

  She couldn’t restrain a startled laugh as she pushed her way through the shrubbery ahead of him. “Goodness. I find myself quite terrified to be in your presence.”

  Of course it wasn’t true. Gideon Trevithick’s company was as intoxicating as champagne. He unsettled her more than anybody she’d ever met. He confused and troubled her. But she could hardly countenance that once she left, she’d never hear his voice again.

  Although of course it wasn’t just his conversation that made her head swim with excitement. He was handsome. More than handsome. He was beautiful, like some being sent down from heaven to illuminate dull earth. And strong and virile and manly. No woman with blood in her veins could fail to respond to his attractions.

  Perhaps when he knew who she really was, he’d consider courting her. She saw no evidence of huge riches at Penrhyn. Could he overcome his disinterest in her person if he knew he married the greatest heiress in England? The Earl of Marley’s title had lapsed along with the entail upon her father’s death. Every penny, every acre, of the massive Weston inheritance devolved upon the earl’s one direct descendant, his daughter.