Improper Christmas

by Reed, Kristabel

  “Go on home, Fitzgerald,” William instructed.

  The wind howled across the flat plains and he took his coat, whipping it against his body. William braced against the sudden gust and waved his man away.

  “Come by in the morning!” he shouted over the wind.

  Fitzgerald looked as if he might argue, but a grin flashed across his face. William almost missed it, the quick curl of his lips, the knowing look in his gaze. It was there and gone so quickly, but then Fitzgerald merely offered a silent nod.

  William narrowed his eyes. He trusted his driver not to utter a word, but he didn’t like that Fitzgerald might think he’d taken Lillian as his mistress. William humphed. He’d learn soon enough.

  Fitzgerald climbed up into the seat and flicked the reins. The horses slowly moved away. William watched him for only a moment before turning and retreating into the warmth of the house.

  Returning to Lillian. He refused to leave her this night.

  Chapter Ten

  Lillian opened her eyes when the door closed behind William. She waited to see what he brought in with him this time, but after a long minute, he hadn’t returned. Just as well.

  She looked around the room, at the small pile of blankets, the baskets of food, the pot of stew on the fire that smelled heavenly. And the fire, with her new pile of wood, felt absolutely wonderful in the chilled room. Later, when she had more strength, Lillian could carry several logs upstairs and heat her bedroom.

  Even as she looked at William’s generosity, a heaviness settled in the pit of her stomach. He saw her as a pitiful woman. A woman incapable of taking care of herself. Lillian had no family who wished to associate with her, no money, no future.

  The door opened again, and a quick gust of wind accompanied William.

  Lillian sat up straight. She hadn’t expected him to return. Maybe it was impolite to leave without a farewell, but she clearly heard the carriage drive off. Had she not? She didn’t turn and look out the window, not with William now sitting before her on the table in front of her settee.

  In fact, Lillian couldn’t tear her gaze from his. His blue eyes shone with concern and worry. No pity. None.

  “Is your driver off to fetch something additional?” she asked and swallowed hard. She dearly wished for a cup of tea, but hadn’t the strength to make it herself and refused to ask him for yet more help. “I assure you, there’s no more I need.” Lillian smiled at him, though her throat burned and her chest ached. “You’ve been more than generous, Mr. Pennington.”

  He hesitated briefly, but she caught the move. “I sent my driver off until the morning.”

  Lillian stilled, her eyes wide at his confession.

  “I know I’ve taken a great liberty, but I simply cannot allow you to be on your own this evening.” He paused again and hesitated. Then he reached out and clasped her hand. “I’ve taken every precaution. No one but Fitzgerald knows I’m here.”

  He stopped again and leaned in closer. Lillian’s breath caught, but not on a cough as she feared. No, it was the look in his gaze, the intensity of it, the sincerity. The way he looked at her made Lillian feel as if the entire room narrowed to the two of them.

  It took her breath away in an entirely new and far too pleasant way.

  “Fitzgerald will not utter a word of my staying here to anyone,” William promised.

  “This is rather presumptuous of you, sir,” she managed. “I am not so ill I cannot tend to my own needs.”

  Lillian removed her hand from his and clasped both her hands on her lap. She swung her legs over the edge of the settee and sat stiffly. With her chin tilted up, she schooled her features into cool distance.

  No matter how she had grown to care for this man, or how sweet his actions looked now, Lillian absolutely could not allow it to go further. Not with Miss Simmons’s laughing face in her memory or the very real gossip that followed Lillian since Edmund’s engagement.

  “Should this become known, it could severely damage my reputation.” She stopped, carefully breathed, and swallowed around the lump in her throat. “I may not have many prospects, but I still will not allow myself to be scandalized.”

  She shook her head and stared at him. He didn’t look shocked or outraged. William simply watched her steadily, his gaze still warm and concerned; his hands twitched as if he wanted to reach out and hold hers once again.

  Lillian cleared her throat and straightened her shoulders. “I think it best if — ”

  “Miss Norwood,” William interrupted. “I assure you, I have no ungentlemanly intentions. I simply wish to care for you through this fever.”

  He didn’t reach for her again, but he leaned just a breath closer. “Please. Do not send me away.”

  Oh. She blinked but did not pull back. Lillian looked at him, truly studying him.

  “Why would you wish to help?”

  “It’s my duty to see to you through Christmas,” he told her, the words quite plain in the quietness of the room. “We committed to this season together.”

  She tilted her head in disbelief, but said no more. William seemed to take her silence as agreement. He nodded once and stood, gathering her half-eaten and forgotten bowl of soup.

  “No — ” she began to protest.

  He leveled a look on her that froze Lillian where she sat. Her heart did a slow flip in her chest, and she dutifully leaned back and cuddled deeper into the blanket. William nodded once, the corners of his lips lifting in a slight smile, and he turned for the kitchen.

  She watched him disappear around a corner and couldn’t help the wide grin that caught her lips. Her heart beat wildly in her chest, though not from her struggle to breathe. William cared for her.

  He may not care for her as she did him; Miss Simmons’s laughing smile remained firmly in Lillian’s mind’s eye. However, he could have just as easily sent a maid to see to her during this sickness.

  Instead, he came himself and vowed to stay.

  It was completely improper. Absolutely so. However, Lillian hadn’t the fortitude to protest any further.

  Arranging the blankets over her again, she sat still and listened for his return. He wasn’t long, only another moment. He held two bowls in his hands, and once more Lillian bit her lip on a smile.

  It wouldn’t do at all to show him she felt any more toward him than friendship and gratitude.

  “Do you often play such a strict nursemaid?” she asked, humor coloring her tone.

  He nodded solemnly and set the bowls on the table. “The soldiers under me considered me a tyrant when it came to our well-being.” He looked at her, and once more his face softened. “So, yes, I am very strict.”

  Lillian laughed, which ended on a cough. She doubled over and held the handkerchief to her mouth. Gasping for breath, she waited another moment to ensure she stopped coughing then straightened.

  When she looked up, William stood by the fireplace with a spoon over the heating pot of stew. She blinked at him but didn’t trust her voice to question what he was doing. After another moment he stepped away, his hand under the wooden spoon, and slowly closed the distance between them.

  “Here,” he offered and sat beside her. “Warm honey.”

  It felt wonderful as it slid down her throat, warm and thick, and it almost immediately helped ease the pain.

  Slowly sitting up, she eyed him warily. “Why?” she asked, slightly embarrassed over her helplessness. “Why do all this for a stranger?”

  William shook his head just once. “You’re not a stranger, Lillian.”

  Her name flowed around her when he spoke it. She blinked and purposely burst the warm bubble that somehow surrounded them. She needed to distance herself from William and his kindness. No matter how much she’d rather live in this wonderful moment.

  “Stop questioning my motives and just accept my help.” His lips curled at the corners again. “We are friends, are we not?”

  “No.” Lillian shook her head. “We were members of a committee.” She swal
lowed, the sweetness of the honey now sour. “What of Miss Simmons? What if she learns of this kindness of yours?” Again she shook her head. “It will not sit kindly with her.”

  William jerked back. However, he offered her the spoon of warm honey again. Lillian shook her head, and he carefully set it aside, his eyes on her.

  “I disagree,” he said simply. “We are friends. I am not a friend to Miss Simmons, but I am yours.”

  Lillian tried to hear any change in inflection when he said Violet Simmons’s name, but his voice remained even. His gaze never flinched as he steadily watched her.

  “I commanded soldiers like you,” he went on after a moment.

  “Sickly and to be pitied?” she asked.

  He shook his head, and that small upturn of his lips returned. “No. Stubborn and a little blind.”

  Confused, Lillian blinked at him. “Blind?” she repeated. “How so?”

  “For weeks now,” William said slowly, “I’ve spent the majority of my time with you. I sought no one else out, I needed no one else.”

  Oh. But she’d been wrong before, had read things where naught existed. Lillian believed things were different with William, but then Miss Simmons arrived…

  She shook her head.

  “We had a task to accomplish,” she insisted.

  William once more sat on the table and took her hand. “A task, with our skill, we could’ve accomplished in days. Not weeks.” His smile widened, but his eyes remained so intent on hers, Lillian’s breath caught.

  “A task was no more than a ruse to spend time with you.” He paused for only a beat. “Do you not believe that when two people spend time on a task together, they grow to know each other better?”

  “I suppose.” Lillian didn’t pull her fingers from his, but the feel of his skin against hers did not help her wild, racing thoughts.

  “Forgive me for not being as traditional as I should’ve been with you.” William’s voice lowered and wound through her like the honey had.

  Lillian swallowed hard and tried to remember all the walls around her heart. All the times she’d been hurt, the disappointments.

  “But our work seemed an opportune way to measure our temperaments.”

  She blinked at him again and wondered if maybe she hadn’t read William’s interest in her all wrong. Perhaps she had and had jumped to conclusions over Miss Simmons.

  “I’m interested in you, Miss Norwood,” William confessed. “And have been interested in you since the first. I thought you were aware of that,” he added ruefully.

  Stunned, she averted her gaze. Lillian didn’t know how to respond to that; his confession was all she hoped for. More. Happiness clogged her throat, making the words she wanted to say trip over each other.

  “For a moment,” she said slowly, “I thought perhaps… but then I saw you with Miss Simmons, and I realized in my current circumstances — ” Lillian looked up and met his gaze, her hand waving weakly around to indicate her small cottage. “I realized I’m not a proper courtship for you.”

  William leaned forward and cupped her cheek. “You’re a perfect match for me.”

  “My circumstances are not — ”

  “Lillian.” He cut her off with the softly spoken word. “It’s you I want. Not an arbitrary station in life.”

  She laughed lightly. “And you tell me this in my current state?” Lillian shook her head and coughed a little, but nothing like the heaviness of earlier.

  William reached again for the spoon, but she reached out and grasped his wrist.

  “My life is anything but traditional,” she said.

  He huffed out a laugh in agreement. The spoon clattered back on the table, and he carefully framed her face with his hands. His warm fingers smoothed back her hair, but he never once tore his gaze from hers.

  Anticipation whirled through her, but she remained perfectly still. Slowly, he closed the distance between them. Her breath caught, and her blood hummed. His lips, cool and dry, pressed against hers.

  Lillian’s heart flipped, hard, in her chest. Her fingers curled around his wrists, and her eyes fluttered closed. She sighed into his touch, as if her very bones melted.

  She was tired, her cough had only abated thanks to the warm honey, and she sat wrapped in two blankets — but the feel of William’s mouth against hers was all that mattered.

  In small increments, he deepened the kiss, sweeping his tongue over her lower lip until she opened her mouth to him. This wasn’t the frantic need Lillian read about in the nearly forbidden books she had during her father’s illness.

  It was slow and powerful, as if the kiss swept over her. His hands on her face cradled her like she was the most precious thing on earth. The kiss deepened and spread through her like a spark, a slow moving fire.

  Breathing hard, she pulled back, but not out of William’s embrace.

  “I thought you did not have any ungentlemanly intentions,” she teased.

  William looked shocked for a moment, his eyes wide. Then he laughed and relaxed. Lillian smiled at him. She wanted to hear his laugh every day.

  Chapter Eleven

  William slipped his arm around her waist and helped Lillian up the stairs. She insisted she could walk on her own and refused to allow him to carry her. He appreciated her stubbornness when dealing with workers or the various shops they frequented.

  He did not like her stubbornness when it came to her health.

  But their argument only resulted in her deep cough returning, so he compromised. With every step she leaned more and more against him, her head on his shoulder, her fingers clutching the back of his shirt. Her breathing grew ragged, heavy; each breath sounded as if it hurt, a struggle to take in.

  Worry churned in his stomach, and he nearly set the candelabra on the step and carried her the rest of the way, her stubbornness be damned.

  Only two steps remained, however. Then she could rest. And he’d rather that then spending precious moments arguing with her. Again.

  Finally they walked into her bedroom, a cold, dark room that didn’t look as if it were occupied in days. William hastily set the candelabra on what appeared to be her vanity and ignored her protests. He carefully lifted her into his arms, cradling her gently to his chest, and crossed the several feet to her bed.

  Improper? He did not care.

  Lillian’s protests were mumbled and weak, and that alone worried him more than the protests themselves. He set her on the bed, careful to wrap the blankets around her and prop her against the pillows.

  “Thank you,” she whispered.

  “You’re welcome.” He brushed a few wisps of her hair off her heated skin.

  Turning, he quickly set and lighted the fire before retreating downstairs for another bowl of soup, the wassail, the honey, and several of the biscuits Mary insisted on packing. At the base of the stairs, he stopped and returned for the brandy.

  “You tend to me better than a nursemaid,” Lillian said the moment he stepped into her room.

  William sat on the bed, all thoughts of impropriety gone; she looked at him with glassy eyes set in a too-pale face. But she smiled brightly at him and took the offered wassail.

  “If anyone knew you were here,” she said softly, “we’d scandalize not only everyone in Chesham, but all five villages!”

  “Wouldn’t that be a fun scandal?” William asked with a smile.

  Lillian tilted her head and studied him curiously. But she dutifully sipped the mulled cider.

  Once they were married, it wouldn’t matter. Looking at Lillian, he wasn’t certain she was ready to hear those words. And he wanted her entirely healthy and active when he proposed.

  “I’m not certain how much fun it’d be.” She moved her shoulders in a slight shrug and offered him another grin. “But it’d definitely be the talk.”

  She cleared her throat and sighed deeply. It ended on a cough. William took the cup of wassail and set it on the table by her bed, ready to exchange it for the honey. Behind him, the fi
re blazed cheerily. He should set the honey there, to keep it warm for her.

  “I’m fine.” Lillian spoke insistently, even if there was no fire behind her words. She took a slow breath and met his gaze. “Truly, I’m fine. I plan to sleep for the rest of today and most likely all of tomorrow. There’s no need for you to stay. It’ll be much better,” she said with a slight dip in her words. She spoke of a potential scandal, he knew.

  “I’ll be much happier if you’re warm in your own bed,” she added and took his hand. “And then tomorrow you can attend the feast and later, you can tell me all that transpired.”

  Her smile widened, and if it wasn’t for her glassy eyes and shortness of breath, he might have believed her.

  “Tell me if our efforts were a triumph.”

  He grasped her hand and stroked her knuckles. William frowned at the feel of her hot, dry skin. “I’d never leave one of my soldiers on the field if they were wounded. Why would I leave you if you’re not well?”

  “It’s not a pleasant thing, to look after the sick. I know,” she added, her voice distant. “I tended my father for years.”

  She cleared her throat and tried to smile. He saw the tiredness there, the weakness despite her attempts to mask it.

  “And I don’t want you missing the feast,” she added with what he now knew to be a brave smile.

  “We’ll host another,” he promised. “Perhaps this summer.”

  Lillian’s eyes drifted closed, but her lips curled up. He leaned forward to brush hair off her heated forehead.

  “We shall host the next,” he continued softly. “Mrs. Martins will not be allowed to horn in on the accolades.”

  She laughed, but it sounded hollow and frail.

  He moved. William didn’t think and didn’t much care what anyone else thought, either. He tugged off his shoes and slipped beneath the blankets. Lillian didn’t even protest when he gathered her against his chest.

  “I’m worried,” he admitted.

  “Do not worry, William,” she whispered against his chest. “It’s no more than a fever. It’ll pass within the day.”