by Sophia James
‘Never knew.’
Another expletive, this time softer. ‘Who did know?’
‘My aunts. They said I needed to...forget it...to get over it...to go on...’
‘Tell me his name and I will kill him for you.’
At that she laughed because at the time she had desired nothing more than Kenneth Davis’s demise in a horrible and slow way.
‘I hated him for a good five or so years and then one day I saw that such a loathing was hurting even more than the scratches and bruises and fright he had left me with. So I forgave him, just like that. There is a power in mercy that allows one the will to live again, I think, a force that nullifies the endless wrath. At least it was so with me.’
She could hear his heartbeat through the thin layer of his shirt, the beat slowing to a more even rhythm. His breathing, too, was deeper as long fingers wound into the hair at her nape, the sun rising over the far-off hills bright today and with more than a hint of the warmth to come.
‘I would never hurt you, Adelaide. I hope that you at least believe that.’
‘I do.’
* * *
His awareness of her this time was tempered by anger. She had been hurt and he could help, the shock of betrayal binding them, like iron filings to a magnet, cleaved together by pain.
His wife was a much better person than he was. After the fire both anger and gall had leached the life from his soul and he had not wanted to offer clemency to anyone.
But here, now, for the first time in six months, he felt he was not made of thin glass ready to shatter and splinter under the pressure of emotion or touch.
He had also not thought of his own impotence for all of the last five moments, the ever-consuming sadness and rage diminished by the quiet trust her confession had allowed him.
He wondered then how she would view any sexual intimacy given the horror of her attack. His celibacy had been forced upon him, but perhaps hers had been, too. He closed his eyes against the measure of terror the sixteen-year-old Adelaide must have felt.
Who had been on her side, hunting out the offender and punishing him? Who had understood her anger and her shame and gone out into the world to diminish it?
Nobody.
She had been as alone as he was with her old unwise aunts and an uncle who seemed to barely know her.
If he ever had a daughter, he would make certain that she knew exactly who to turn to, he promised that he would. The thought caught him unawares and he stiffened.
A daughter.
God.
He had never wanted a wife until now and here he was conjuring up a whole damned family.
An impotent husband does not a father make.
Uncurling his hands, he stepped back, pasting a smile across regret and hoping Adelaide had not seen it.
* * *
He was back to looking furious again, she thought, as he let her go, and her cheeks burnt with the memory of all she had blurted out.
She had not meant to tell anyone, ever, but in the small cottage beside the ruins of his house Gabriel Hughes had looked so damn strong and solid that it had just flowed out, the cork unstopped and years of enforced silence broken.
Making fists of her hands, she tried to find a return to the inconsequential. But it was all so hard.
She liked him.
She did.
She liked every single thing about Gabriel Hughes. His eyes. His body. His voice. His hands. His stillness. His danger. His distance.
He was still hiding things, she knew that, too. She could see it in his eyes and in his stance and in the way he looked at her sometimes as though the truth lay through a gossamer-thin layer of falsity and he wanted her to know it.
But not just yet.
This was their honeymoon and for now they were skirting around each other, two damaged souls struggling to make sense of things that should never have happened.
Her world had been torn into small chunks of truth that were falling through the air to find a new earthly pattern, locked together before God and the law. Like one of the jigsaws her Aunt Josephine loved, hundreds of pieces, all only waiting to be fitted to form one perfect and complete whole.
Adelaide smiled. She was not perfect and neither was Gabriel Hughes, but together they could be. She at least had to be certain of that. When he turned away to walk out into the sunshine she followed him.
They picked their way towards the Manor, past the ruined walls and blackened timber and then climbing to a higher stand of stone with a platform behind, the pasture studded in clover and daisies.
‘This is where I will rebuild at first, out of the wind and with a view across the valley. It will be a smaller house this time, but built on rock.’
‘Like the parable in the Bible from Matthew?’
He smiled as though her words held a truth. ‘Then the question is, I suppose, am I a wise man or a foolish one?
In answer she simply stamped her feet on the thick bed of stone. The sound travelled around the clearing in an echo.
‘It’s a beautiful view. Swansdowne, my childhood home, had the same sort of vistas. I remember the river and the trees.’ She swept her hand in front of her, indicating the line of oaks along the drive and the lake. ‘London holds no real charm against the beauty of the countryside.’
‘Amethyst Wylde says the same thing. It’s why she seldom ventures down to the city.’
‘How did you meet them, the Wyldes, I mean?’
He stooped to pick a sheath of grass and his fingers peeled off the many husks of seed as he spoke. ‘Daniel and I were at school together, but it was only later that I got to know him properly. He enjoys horse racing and so did I and we spent a lot of time pitting our skills against each other. He knows horses like the back of his hand.’
‘And you?’
‘I used to, but it’s been a while since I spent a great deal of time upon one.’
‘Teach me to ride properly, then, so that I may see the lands of Ravenshill from a horse without being in danger of falling off.’
He was laughing as a shout from behind made him turn. A man whom she did not recognise walked towards them.
‘Wesley. I thought it was you.’ His smile was wide and generous as Gabriel put out his hand.
‘Alexander Watkins, may I introduce you to my new wife, Lady Adelaide Wesley. Alex is a neighbour and an old friend.’
The newcomer smiled. ‘’Tis a pleasure, my lady. My property borders this one to the east and my own wife will be more than interested to know I have met you. If you would like to visit, we would be more than pleased for the company.’ His eyes swept over the vista of the ruined Manor. ‘Will you repair it, Gabe?’
‘To start with I will build another house up here.’
‘A good choice, then. When you begin it I’ll give you a hand. I have some cattle you might like to look at, too. A new breeding programme has given me great rewards and...’
Adelaide turned her face into the sun as they were speaking of farming and profit and new breeds of livestock. There could be windows here facing the valley and wide doors to be able to access the lawn and gardens. To plan and build a home was exciting and hopeful, and something she had not thought she would have wanted to do.
She was taken from her reveries by Alexander Watkins saying goodbye and asking them both to come calling on his wife and himself soon.
‘Thank you, that would be lovely.’ Adelaide was quick to give him a smile as he left.
‘I could help him with his eczema.’
‘The red and itchy skin on his cheeks?’
‘I will make him up a salve and see how he goes with it. I had another patient once at Northbridge with the same complaint, only worse, and I should like to see if it clears up as quickly and completely as hers
did.’
Gabriel Hughes stood before her, the light burnishing his face. All the many stories told of him by the ton surged into memory: his finesse, his conquests, his name whispered soft in the halls by those who watched him. A lover of great repute who’d left a trail of broken hearts behind him as he passed.
He was married now, though. To her. The ring on the third finger of his left hand caught the sun. She had seen it in the window of Phillips, the jewellers on Bond Street, and had gone in and bought it, a diamond set in the cut of its gold. Bound to each other through life and death, for better or for worse. For richer or for poorer.
He must have seen her worry for he reached out and took her hand, his skin warm from the sun.
A start. A direction.
She wished he might kiss her, hard and slow and well. But he did not. Rather he tucked her arm into his and led her back to the annex behind the Manor.
Chapter Fifteen
An hour after supper he knocked at the door of the chamber Adelaide was using and waited until she came to open it. She had let her hair down, he saw, and the chestnut of it curled to her waist.
‘I thought we might talk.’ He smiled, the edges of his eyes creasing in humour.
‘Here?’ Uncertainty lay in her query.
‘It’s private.’ His glance went to a book left open on the small table near the chair. When she hurried over to close it he caught sight of small neat rows of writing.
A diary and full of the worry he could see so plainly on her face? Once he had written his thoughts and dreams down, too. God, that seemed like for ever ago.
‘It is poetry. I am certain that they are dreadful and I have never shown another soul, but...I write them anyway, sometimes two or three a day and then not for months.’
‘But today the muse struck?’
‘With a vengeance. I imagine I shall burn them all before the week’s end, but for now they help.’
‘Help make sense of what is between us?’
Her smile dulled. ‘Or of what is not, my lord?’
She was braver than any woman he had ever met and much more direct. Under the valour he saw other things, too, fright and concern the most noticeable amongst them. He should tell her all that he was and was not but even the thought made him blanch.
‘I had imagined...’ She stopped and then began again. ‘I had imagined it different...the intimacy of a marriage.’
‘What was it you had envisaged?’
The corners of her mouth turned in a smile.
* * *
‘This,’ she answered, bringing her arms around his neck. ‘And this,’ she added, touching her lips to his before pressing down, the magic of him exploding into every part of her.
She had no idea quite what happened next given her lack of any experience, but she had read numerous romance books from the library and could guess at some of the ramifications of what she was doing.
But he surprised her as he dragged her forward, slanting her mouth to his own and tasting. No restraint in it, either, though there was anger, too, amidst the need as his fingers threaded through her hair. Their breath combined in the closeness and his heart beat like a drum, pounding between them with such a force that she pulled back.
‘Adelaide.’ Her name before his mouth returned, his tongue forcing itself in and then she was falling and falling outside of herself and deep into the ache of promise and hope. No boundaries, no notion of where he stopped and she began, a mutual sharing at the well of wonder. Nothing mattered save them here, pressed against each other and asking for whatever they would give, or take. Just lust, the roiling truth of it in the way he deepened the kiss, brokering no refusal and accepting no passive response.
She let him in without holding anything back; he was strong and beautiful, enigmatic and dangerous. All those flavours and more, the sadness in him and the anger were a part of what he showed her, too, as he let her understand just what one could know from a kiss.
And when she thought she might begin to comprehend, he held her still, the shaky sound of her own breath filling the room as he broke the contact.
‘I am sorry.’ He whispered this as she closed her eyes, the red warm world of sensation lessening, blurred by disbelief.
I am sorry? Sorry because he could not utter the words she might have liked to hear, the forever words, the loving words? Sorry because she could feel the tremble of unease that ran through him as easily as if it were her own?
* * *
Adelaide’s nails dug into his arms and he knew she wanted more. His heart pounded as noticeably as it always did when he touched her, but his member had not risen. Nay, it lay warm in the crease of his groin, a quiet thing of no mind for all he’d felt as he kissed her.
The anger in him seethed, and the shame, the manners he usually held on to squeezing through the fury. He needed to be away from such failure, to ride against the wind and the rain and the open air until the roiling unfairness of what had happened to him settled and he could cope again.
But he didn’t dare to leave her here, alone with her quick mind to pull all the pieces together and make a sense of them. He wanted neither pity nor help. He didn’t wish for mesmerising or sympathy, either, hapless words against a condition that was unchangeable.
His mind wanted her, God, it did without a doubt, but his body and flesh had not made the connection. Would they ever?
Tonight she had initiated the play with the flush of sex on her cheeks and the look of wonder in her eyes, as beguiling as hell and as sensual. Six months ago he would have been on her, emptying his seed until well into the night, a shared pleasure, a mutual satisfaction. But he was dead now from the waist down, withered and perished and numb.
Gabriel Hughes. Impotent.
How people would laugh should that come to be known.
By anyone at all.
He set her back from him, making sure that she could stand and was glad that she looked away. He could not answer questions or feign humour. He could barely even manage to speak.
‘I shall see you tomorrow, sweetheart.’ The endearment rolled off his tongue unmindful and he bowed slightly before leaving the room.
* * *
Sweetheart? Was she truly that? Adelaide breathed out. Hard.
If so, why did he not stay to take his ease, and lie beside her? Could he not see that she wanted him to? Should she simply say it to him? Stay with me. Hold me. Show me what it is to love a woman well.
Her only experience at a sexual intimacy had been Kenneth Davis’s brutal attack on her all those years ago and in the darkness and terror she had no real idea as to what had happened to his body. Gabriel was soft and slow and burning, his hands against her skin as if they wanted to be there, as if she were precious and beautiful and needed.
She still felt the shock of his mouth and the silver flame of light that rose to envelop her, his breath and her breath one, and an age-old knowledge of each other that needed no formal tuition.
She felt quickened somehow, waiting for more, a need that had no beginning or end, but just was.
Her aunts could have told her what this all meant had they still been alive, with all their reading and far-ranging knowledge, but there was no one else to ask. No sisters or cousins. No friends whom she might have confided in, either.
Alone.
She had always been that. Even at Northbridge in the care of her uncle, her fear of venturing out further after Kenneth Davis’s attack growing through the years, rather than diminishing. The village girls treated her with respect and her patients with more, but she had never had true friendship until now with Gabriel Hughes. She had told him her deepest secret and enjoyed every single conversation and she had married him for ever.
Before she knew what she was doing she had a thick shawl around her shoulders and, taking a can
dle, opened the door and followed him.
* * *
Gabriel was tired of it all.
He wanted to enjoy his wife in the deepest sense of doing so, with his whole body and his mind. Tonight had left him tense and wound up as tight as any spring. He ached to know how far Adelaide might let him go and if his body naked against her own would respond in the way he had long since forgotten.
‘God, please help me.’ He whispered this into the smallness of his chamber and crossed to the window.
It was warm and he took off his cravat and unbuttoned his shirt.
He saw her reflection in the glass as she stood behind him, the pale of her face and the candle flickering. He brought the folds of linen together so that at least his chest was not bare. Then he turned.
‘Adelaide.’
‘Gabriel.’ She seldom said his name unbidden and he liked the sound of it from her lips, almost bold.
‘I want to be married...properly. I want you to take me to your bed and help me to understand what it means to be a wife.’
No hidden meanings, no unexplained intentions. So like her to place things down like that. The danger intensified. But she was beside him now and parting the front of his shirt before reaching in.
He waited, feeling the familiar instant spark, but nothing more. Still, the smell of her close and the soft curl of her hair held him captive and when she looked up it was easy to bring her into his arms.
He could pleasure her. He could still do that. A new excitement clung to defeat. His body was not useless. It was well practised and most efficient at eliciting what a woman desired.
Second nature. Understood. An authority and a master at the gentle arts of loving. Even if finally it was not enough, he knew he would try.
‘Are you sure?’
She smiled and that was what did it, the happiness in her and the humour. He had never taken a woman to bed he truly liked... That truth left him astonished, but he shook it away and lifted her into his arms.
This time he was careful, careful as he sat her down on his bed and slipped off her shoes, careful as he undid the ties of her bodice so that each loosened thread exposed the soft fabric of a chemise beneath.
