… but no-one had ever looked at her like Charles. No-one had ever stared at her with fire in his eyes, a fire that spoke of lust and tenderness in equal measure, and she would never stop enjoying how it felt no matter how many vows she took. It was instinctive, elemental—sinful. Unstoppable.
‘It’s—it’s very good.’ She had to speak, had to find some way of dispelling the tension in the room. ‘I can’t tell who made it.’
‘I’ve been given so many pies by various elderly women that I can’t assign a face to a pie anymore. I should have created a number system.’
Susan smiled. She couldn’t help it. ‘You’re being spoiled.’
‘I know. I don’t deserve it.’
‘Who’s the young man downstairs, watching the workers?’
‘The man writing down everything everyone says, in a slightly disquieting fashion? Isaac Weeks. He’s got himself a fine job for the Village Herald–it covers the nine villages surrounding Twitchall now as well, so he’s got more than enough news to be going on with. He’s decided this place is interesting.’
‘I think he’s decided that you are interesting. Not this place.’
‘There’s nothing interesting about reviving something that’s been left to rot. This place should never have been left in the state it was.’
‘Yes.’ Now wasn’t the time to bring home the fact that Charles had left the mill to go to rack and ruin. Not willingly, but–but dash it, he should have come back to see how it was being run. Should have come back to see her. ‘I agree.’
‘I know you agree.’ Charles pushed forward another fragment of pie. Susan delicately took it. ‘You were most eloquent about it.’
‘I’ve always spoken entirely too much.’
‘Not true.’ The conversation was straying into dangerous territory; Charles’s tone had changed, becoming quieter. More intimate. ‘You always saw flaws in yourself that don’t exist.’
‘I trust myself to have a more objective view of my flaws than you.’
‘True.’ A long, slow pause that only increased the sudden heat in the air. ‘I’ve never been objective about you in the slightest.’
If she could ignore the words, pretend that they had never been spoken, then perhaps she could ignore the fire growing in her. The swift, dark hunger that had risen in her at the sound of his voice, weakening her resolve and strengthening her base, animal instincts in a single, terrifying rush. If she could only find a stupid, non-committal phrase to stay… oh, if she could only stop staring at him…
The pie. She could comment on the pie, make some remark about it–eat another piece of it. Susan reached forward, hastily attempting to pick up another wedge of pie, and gasped.
Her fingers brushed against Charles’s. His touch lingered against her skin, his palm hot and tight as he suddenly took her hand in his. His grip was effortlessly forceful, pinning her to her seat with nothing more than a slow stroke of his fingers against her knuckles, her skin quivering.
‘Don’t ask me to be sorry.’ Charles’s voice was little more than a murmur now, a murmur that made Susan think irresistibly of silent bedchambers. ‘Don’t.’
‘We can’t.’ She had meant to say you can’t, but that would be dishonest. A part of her wanted this too; wanted him to take her other hand as well. Wanted him to lean over the desk, food and dog forgotten. ‘We—’
‘I know. I know.’ His hand was still so tight around hers—how safe she felt. Safe and frightened and thirsty for something that she’d never tasted. ‘But just this moment. Just… just this moment…’
Was he leaning closer, or was she? It didn’t matter—it didn’t matter at all. The moment was as big as the world, and all she had to do was wait. Wait for his mouth on hers—wait for that slow, shivering rush of ecstasy that she knew she would feel, that she had imagined feeling for so many long, lonely years…
A hideous, gulping bark shattered the moment. Susan blinked, staring at Charles in complete confusion before they turned to look at the spaniel.
The dog barked once, almost apologetically, and was lavishly sick all over the desk.
‘What the—oh, damn it!’ Charles let go of Susan’s hands as he dived for his papers, saving them at the last moment from the dog’s upset stomach. ‘You greedy beast, gobbling up your meal as if you’ll never have another one—don’t do it again! Oh, please, don’t do it again…’
Susan took a step backward. The desire in her still burned, but was soon covered by a freezing wave of shame. If the dog hadn’t brought her back to reality, what would she have done? Would she really have ruined everything? ‘I’ll go and find someone to help clean up.’
‘Susan, don’t leave. Please.’ There was pure desperation in Charles’s voice now. ‘We’ll clean up this mess, and—and—’
‘And nothing.’ Susan turned away. It took every ounce of strength she had, but she managed it. ‘Nothing at all.’
She thought the abrupt bang of the door as she left the room would make her feel better, stronger somehow, but it didn’t. Nothing did. She walked down the stairs as quickly as she could, the touch of Charles’s hand still lingering on her skin like smoke after a flame had been extinguished. If she kept her eyes down and averted her face from all these chattering men, all these recognisable faces with stories and pasts that she knew, she might be able to escape this ill-advised adventure unscathed.
‘Miss Harwood!’ Oh, no—old Geoffrey. A nice man in his way, but the most astonishing talker. ‘How nice to see you back in this old place! Come here and have a look at the—’
‘I’m afraid I can’t. Good day to you.’
Lord, let her get out of this nest of unwitting vipers as quickly as possible.
Susan walked away so quickly that she didn’t notice Isaac Weeks watching her. The young journalist pulled himself away from the knot of men he’d been interviewing, staring at Susan as she left the mill.
‘I wouldn’t stare too hard at that one, lad.’ One of the men laughed coarsely, the others joining in. ‘She’s running off to a nunnery.’
Well that was odd. Isaac watched Susan’s retreating figure. She didn’t look like the religious type. ‘A nunnery?’
‘Oh, yes. Some place across the sea.’ Another man shook his head darkly. ‘Don’t know what’s got into her.’
‘Ah, she’s always been a bit restless.’ The first old man sighed. ‘But she was a bit short with Geoffrey. Don’t know what bee’s in her bonnet today.’
The other old men began launching in with various ideas as to the change in Miss Harwood’s mental state. Isaac retreated a little from the chattering group, pencil in hand, his eyes fixed dreamily on a blank wall as he began to think in earnest.
Running away to a nunnery, eh? That was definitely more exciting than mill restoration, as worthy as the project was. More people would want to read about an unmarried woman destined for a religious life than a mill being painstakingly put back together–and she was pretty, in a severe looking way. Pretty, destined to become a nun, and… and well, she had run rather quickly out of Mr. Weldon’s office, hadn’t she?
‘Say.’ He spoke casually to the nearby to the group of men, not wishing to disturb the delicate bones of an idea that had just begun to take shape. ‘Miss Harwood… did she know Mr. Weldon before he went to London?’
‘Oh yes. Thick as thieves, as children.’ One of the men sighed. ‘Half of our wives practically had the banns sent out. But she was always a prayerful type, and he was never going to stay here.’
‘Lord, no.’ Another man chuckled. ‘He was out as soon as he’d made his first coins here. It’s like that, young man—things almost happen, and then they don’t. Every man’s way of living, like.’
Isaac nodded. He let the men fall back into conversation, the first lines of his piece drifting into order in the privacy of his mind.
He wouldn’t be too gossipy. He wanted to make his name one day, after all—it wouldn’t be very fitting to have scandal sheets attached to his w
orthier work. But Christ, this story was going to be boring if he didn’t add a little salt and pepper to it… and Mr. Weldon was handsome in his way, with his stern manner, and Miss Harwood had looked so very stricken as she’d left his office.
He wouldn’t invent. He wouldn’t create scandal where there wasn’t any. But he could certainly allude to what he’d seen, and let his less ethical readers decide. He even had the perfect way to introduce the idea… several worthy gentlemen have informed me that Mr. Weldon and Miss Harwood shared a friendship many years ago, a sympathy that has apparently lasted…
Charles had always loved the mill at night. He rarely spent time in his new mills, more than able to run operations without ever having to set foot on the workers scurried about, and he hadn’t realised how much he’d missed it. Especially at night, when everyone had gone home and even the guard dogs slept on their chains.
A large, yellow-tinted moon hung low in the sky. Charles looked at it through the window, taking brief comfort in its light, before a wave of sadness flooded him once again.
Susan had walked away from him without a word. They had been close to something–a shouting match, a kiss–but at the last possible moment, all that possibility had shattered into pieces. He had already done so much here, achieved so much… but Susan, the real reason he’d returned, seemed forever lost to him.
He jumped as a canine snore split the air. The spaniel, with its paw all but healed and its jowls even bigger than usual thanks to three meals of meat every day, slept with deep calm on a pile of cotton scraps.
At least the dog was well. He hadn’t managed to get a vet to see to it yet, and he hadn’t taken a proper look at the creature after he’d managed to get the glass out of its paw, but it seemed a cheerful little thing. Fatter than ever, more idiotic with every passing day–oh, for a life like that. An existence untroubled by higher feeling, where all love was returned. And Morton was agreeing to pay for the mill, or at least some of it, and the workers were doing their jobs well. This was a fine place, and a fine situation, if only he could look beyond the state of his own heart.
A distant bark made the spaniel twitch in its bed. One of the guard dogs had been awoken by something–and damn it, the groundsman hadn’t arrived to let them off their chains. It was probably a pigeon, or a rat–and if it was a criminal, well, all the nervous tension in his breast would probably mean he could put up a good fight.
‘Well?’ He tried to sound frightening, but it came out as oddly imperious. As if he were holding a picnic in the middle of an empty mill at the dead of light. ‘I wouldn’t come any closer, if I were you.’
He stopped as the small, wavering shadow on the threshold of the half-open door grew more distinct. The shape rapidly became familiar: a graceful severity to the limbs, a touch of chaos in the hair…
‘Susan.’ Her name almost caught in his throat. ‘Is something wrong?’
‘No.’ Susan drew closer. In the light of the moon she looked almost ghostly; Charles paused, fighting the irrational certainty that this was a visitation from beyond the veil. That happened, didn’t it–one could be visited by the people one cared about that had died, especially in moments of danger and trouble. ‘There’s nothing wrong.’
‘You frightened me.’
‘Good.’ A slight smile hung at the corner of Susan’s mouth. No ghost, then–she was as vibrantly alive as ever, despite her paleness. ‘You deserve to be frightened.’
‘Did the dogs scare you?’
‘No. They’re chained, and I knew them as puppies. You should never hire local guard dogs–they roll over and lick anyone who treated them well when they were young.’
‘I didn’t know that.’ What a thing to know–the security of his other mills had now been abruptly called into question. That was one of Susan’s many gifts; a single conversation with her could upend one’s world in the space of a moment. ‘Did you come here to tell me that?’
‘… No.’
‘I… I wasn’t expecting you to come back.’
‘I didn’t expect to come back.’ Susan spoke stiffly, her hands tightly clasped. ‘I–I’m not sure why I’ve decided to come back, if I’m perfectly honest.’
‘Well. You’ll have to be perfectly honest if you’re going to become a nun, aren’t you?’
‘Was that an attempt at humour?’
‘I believe so. I’m sorry that it didn’t work.’ God, it was difficult to talk to her. It was as if she built a wall between them with each word. ‘It probably isn’t something to joke about.’
‘No. I would say not.’ Susan paused, a faint line of weariness between her brows. ‘And don’t tell me that I used to joke so very much when I was younger. It isn’t true.’
‘I wasn’t going to say it.’
‘Yes you were.’
‘If you’re going to pretend that we don’t know one another well anymore, then you have to pretend that you don’t know what I’m thinking.’
‘Then you were thinking it?’
‘Of course.’ Lord, how he’d missed talking to her. ‘You know me.’
However far he attempted to advance, he always found himself at an impasse. Susan’s choice to take the veil was so strange, so utterly unlike any part of her personality that he knew, that it left him at a literal loss for words.
‘I don’t think you know me anymore.’ Susan looked down at her hands, as if wishing to take courage from her own body. ‘Perhaps we never did.’
‘That’s not true.’
‘We were very young.’
‘Young enough to know one another. People married at our age.’
Susan’s mouth twitched, as if there was something that she wanted to say. ‘Many did. We didn’t.’
‘No. We didn’t.’ Charles tried to find the right words, but sighed instead. ‘I chose fortune.’
‘I hope the money kept you contented. It must have, given that you never came back.’
‘Don’t tell me that I cut myself off from everything important. Don’t you dare.’
‘Don’t you dare tell me not to dare!’
‘Can’t you tell that you’re being such a–’
‘Being a what? A what, Charles?’
‘A hypocrite.’
Susan’s eyes widened. She stared at him, wordless, as Charles continued. Lord, he shouldn’t–but damn it, it was as if the words had been building in him for the last two weeks and had no other way to escape. ‘Yes, you heard me. A hypocrite. The most obvious hypocrite I’ve ever met, and I’ve met some shining examples of the genre.’
‘You’ll take that back.’
‘I won’t, because it’s accurate. You point your finger at me and accuse me of remoteness, of arrogance, of removing myself from life in search of something more personally gratifying. How precisely is that different from your plan to flee to the Continent and wall yourself up in a convent?’
‘There’s all the difference in the world, and you know it!’
‘I know you, and I know it’s the same.’
‘People don’t choose a religious life because they’re fleeing something. They choose it because they’re gaining something—they’re sacrificing lesser things for something greater!’
‘I don’t give a damn about people. I give a damn about you. And you were never the sort of person who would abandon the real, living world around you for the hideous living death of a cloistered community.’
‘Take that back.’
‘I won’t. If I’m a remote, arrogant bastard, Susan Harwood, then you are a hypocrite.’ Charles paused, his next words practically burning his throat. ‘And I love you for it, as I love you for everything else.’
At first the silence was unnerving. All Susan did was look at him, her face white, her eyes dark pools of inexpressible emotion in the faint light of the moon. God, he shouldn’t have said it–should have prepared her for it at least, or kept it inside, rather than blurt it out in the middle of an ugly argument…
… but he had said it, an
d he wasn’t sorry for it. He’d say it again a thousand times, if only she’d let him.
He braced himself as Susan came towards him. Perhaps she was going to kiss him, or say something cutting, or—or—
‘I hate you.’ She beat his chest with harsh, savage fists, her hair tumbling about her shoulders as it came free of its pins. Charles, taken aback, gripped her upper arms in a vain attempt to stop her. ‘I’ve never hated anyone more.’
‘Because I disappointed you?’
‘Because you left me!’
‘But I’ll never leave you again.’ Charles tried to catch a flailing fist, but failed. ‘I’ll never leave you again, if you’ll have me.’
‘I… I hate you…’ But her blows were growing weaker by the moment. Soon all she did was grip his shirt; how divine her hands felt against his chest, her warm fingers a hair’s breadth from his flesh. ‘I… oh, Lord, I…’
There was nothing else for it. A want that had smouldered for years blazed into sudden, aching brightness, as Charles bent his head to hers and kissed her.
It was a long, deep kiss that made him growl as he did it, unable to bear the sheer richness of pleasure long denied. At first Susan was still, silent, shocked–oh, but then her hands moved to his neck, pulling him closer, any harsh words melting into a trailing sigh of ecstasy.
There was no sweetness to this kiss. It was nothing like what Charles had imagined; the softness of old friends meeting again, realising what they had always felt. This was raw, painful, singing in its intensity–and damn it, he wouldn’t have it any other way. Wouldn’t have anyone other than Susan in his arms, her body pressed tightly against his as she explored his mouth with clumsy, desperate ardour.
‘Come here.’ A stupid thing to say–how could they be any closer than they already were? But he did want her closer–wanted her skin on his, without the encumbrance of clothes. Susan wrapped her arms around his neck with even more fierceness, as if she understood the thrust of his request despite the lack of logic in it, and a wave of lust flooded Charles so severely that it almost felt like violence.
Wedded in White: The Brothers Duke: Book Six Page 4
