by Judith James
“No, mignonne, it’s not.”
Reaching across the space that divided them, she found his hand and squeezed it tight, making his heart thud wildly in his chest. “It happened so quickly,” she offered, “and lasted barely a week. I was sixteen years old. My parents … their ship foundered. They … they were drowned. When it happened, Davey was away at sea, looking for Ross. Ross had been reported dead, a casualty of war, over a year before, but Davey wouldn’t accept it.” The swift sharp wave of pain surprised her, bringing tears to her eyes. She’d thought it long since eased. She’d never talked about this, any of it. It made Ross uncomfortable, and even Davey closed himself off if she brought it up. She hadn’t realized how close it hovered to the surface of her being.
“I’m not sure if you’re aware, but Ross is my half brother. His mother was my father’s first wife. She came from a very powerful family, as did my father. I don’t know what she was like. Ross … well, he doesn’t really speak of her, although he told me once he remembered her as being very cold. I don’t think they were very close. In any event, after she died, my father met my mother. She was from Bohemia, they fell madly in love, and they married.
“My father’s family was furious. She was a foreigner and had some Gypsy blood, and they felt her far beneath him. She told me once, that I was named after Kali Sara, the Romany goddess. Nobody would have cared. I was only a female. Jamie was a different matter, but at least Ross was heir, and that suited everyone. When Ross was declared dead …” She took a deep breath. “When Ross was declared dead and Jamie became my father’s heir it enraged them. They called him the Gypsy brat. My uncle was furious, and when my parents died… he became Jamie’s guardian, and mine, as well. He wanted me out of the way as quickly as possible, I suppose, so he could have full control over Jamie and no interference. He married me to an old crony of his, Lord Munroe. I hate the name. I hated him.”
“He … What was he like?”
“He was sixty-two years old, mean, vicious, smelly and sour, with rotting teeth. When he tried to kiss me, I gagged.”
“Your first experience, then, was not what you would have wished.”
“No, Gabe, it was not.” She was embarrassed to discuss it with him, but after all he’d shared with her, she couldn’t very well refuse. “It was damned unpleasant. He came to my room, drunk as a soldier, dragged me onto the bed and jumped on top of me. He was a very big man and I could hardly breathe. When I tried to protest he slapped me, and when he … well, suffice to say it was painful, and messy, and terribly embarrassing, and I cannot say I was eager to repeat it.”
“Did you?”
“Yes, three times, each time worse than the last, although from what I’ve gathered since, I was being very melodramatic. It seems to be the general way of things between husbands and wives.”
“No wonder I never lacked for clients.” It was a thoughtless remark and he regretted it the instant he said it, desperately seeking some way to take it back, but her startled laughter was genuine, and she looked at him in fond amusement. His heart eased as he realized that apparently, inadvertently, he’d done something right, or at least he hadn’t done anything wrong. “What happened then, Sarah? How did he die? How did you come to leave him?”
“My uncle came. He called to tell me that Jamie had disappeared on his way to boarding school. I didn’t believe it. I … Oh, God, Gabriel! We’d been so happy together, my parents, Ross, Jamie, Davey, and I. We loved each other so much, and in a year they were all gone!” Tears were streaming down her cheeks now.
Unaccustomed to offering comfort, Gabriel resorted to the methods that had worked with Jamie. “I’m sorry, mignonne,” he offered, awkwardly rubbing her back and patting her shoulder.
“It was a very dark time. I … I think in my grief for my parents, and for Ross, I let myself go numb. I stopped caring, stopped paying attention. Poor Jamie, he needed me and I let him down. If I’d been thinking … If only I’d—”
“Shhh, mignonne, it wasn’t your fault,” he said gently, putting his arms around her. Sobbing, no longer able to contain the guilt and pain she’d been holding in for so long, she didn’t resist as he pulled her into his lap, rocking her back and forth. He held her like that for several minutes, letting her cry, stroking her hair and patting her back as she soaked his shirt with her tears. Suddenly becoming aware of her in a different way, warm, soft, and vibrant, he groaned and changed position, praying she wouldn’t notice his rampant arousal. Christ, he was an animal! Carefully shifting her back onto her side of the bed, he used his shirttail to wipe her tears and then ruffled her hair, much as he used to do with Jamie. “Better now?”
“Yes, I’m sorry. I’m not usually so …”
“I know, mignonne. It’s not like you at all,” he said with a grin.
“Gabriel, I don’t know if I’ve ever really thanked you. If I’ve ever actually said it. Told you how grateful I am for what you did for Jamie.”
He hushed her, embarrassed and uncomfortable. “Shhh, Sarah, stop it, please. It’s not necessary. Your brother helped me as much as I helped him.”
“No, Gabe,” she said, hugging herself. “You may not want to hear it, but I need to say it. When my uncle came, when he told me that Jamie was gone, I woke up from the daze I was in, but it was too late. I knew he was behind it. I escaped my husband by dressing as a stable boy and stealing a horse. I came back here to hide and wait for Davey. I sailed with him for two years, you know, as we searched for Ross and Jamie, and every day I felt sick with fear, and sorrow, and guilt. We found Ross, thank God. And then we had news of Jamie after five long years. I couldn’t believe it. I thanked all the gods and all the angels. I wept with joy. And then they told us where he’d been. I was sick with fear, Gabriel.”
She looked directly into his eyes. “I couldn’t stop imagining the horrors he must have been through. I thought about it, and dreamt about it, and I knew it was my fault. I knew that however he might be wounded, it was because I’d failed him. Failed to protect him when he had no one else in the world.”
“Sarah, no! You were just a child yourself, an unmarried female. You would never have been allowed to be his guardian, and you couldn’t have kept him safe.”
“I could have run away with him, hidden him.”
“Why would you do such a thing? Take a boy who’d just lost his parents and live as a fugitive, forsaking his inheritance, putting him at risk? You had no way of knowing your uncle was capable of such a thing.”
She had no answer for that. She needed time to think about it. “I do know this, Gabriel. You did what I couldn’t do. As soon as I saw him, healthy and curious and proud, I knew that something, someone, had intervened, had protected him and kept him safe from harm. It was unbelievable, a miracle. You did that, Gabriel. And I have never been so grateful to anyone in my life.”
“So … that’s why you brought me here.”
“If you mean here to Cornwall, then yes. That’s why. You saved my brother. That makes you family. Ross or Davey will never tell you, but I know they feel the same.”
“What other here is there?” he asked quietly.
She looked surprised, flustered. “Why… here in my room, of course.”
It begged the question. “And why did you bring me here, to your room, Sarah?”
“I really don’t know, Gabriel. I didn’t mean to. It just seemed to … happen.”
Hesitant to push, he decided to let it rest. “Tell me the rest, mignonne. What happened to your husband and your uncle?”
“They died.”
“Sarah …”
“When we found Ross, he was being held as a prisoner of war. He might have been ransomed if … well, it appears that my uncle had known all along. He was quite likely complicit in my parents’ death, as well. They … they were wrecked off the coast, not that far from here, and there’s no doubt he was responsible for what happened to Jamie. It was said that highwaymen waylaid him, that he angered them somehow, or they w
ere particularly vicious. In any case, they took him from his coach and hung him from a tree, leaving his purse dangling round his neck. It did a great service to the local gentlemen of the road, as their victims were very polite and quick to hand over their purses for many months after. I’m certain it was Ross, or Davey, or both of them. They refuse to discuss it with me, even though I’m the one who was here while it all happened. It used to make me so angry. I felt I had a right to know.”
Gabriel grunted, realizing there was a great deal about Huntington he didn’t know, had never suspected. “You did, mignonne, you do,” he said, soothing her. “They think they protect you. They don’t understand.”
“I know,” she sighed. “I’m so tired of it all now. I don’t suppose I really care anymore. My husband died of natural causes a few weeks after I left him, leaving me the title of countess, and two small estates. I was out to sea with Davey and didn’t hear of it for several months. I’m convinced he was killed by a combination of bitterness, bile, and apoplexy, but according to his family and polite society, it was shame and a broken heart brought on by my scandalous behavior that did him in.”
“Naughty child,” he whispered with a grin.
She smiled back at him. “There was some good that came out of it, though.”
“And how is that, chère?
“Well, it horrified everyone. Not what my husband or my uncle did to me, but what I did to them. I became a social outcast, and in an odd way, it set me free.”
“Free?” He was finding it hard to follow her words, when most of his being was focused on her hand, smooth and warm in his.
“Yes, free. Think of it, Gabe!” She turned to face him, eager to share this new idea. He tightened his grip on her hand, not eager to have it escape him. “People like us, people who’ve been forced out of the world they know by habit or by birth, pushed or shoved or maybe just allowed to walk into new ones, they get to see that the rules of those worlds have no intrinsic meaning, hold no fundamental truth. Once you recognize that, you’re free. Free to choose what makes sense, free to be yourself instead of what others expect you to be. Instead of knowing your place, you can get to know yourself!”
He tilted his head back, caught by the idea, considering for some time before responding. “But what if the self you find is someone you don’t like, mignonne?”
She gave a low, husky laugh that sent a sweet thrill up his spine.
“Are you speaking of yourself, Gabriel?” she drawled, sleep clawing at her. “Because if you are, I would have to disagree. I may be a poor judge of character, but I find I like you very much.” She punctuated that astonishing statement with a little sigh, wrinkling her nose and falling asleep.
Weary himself, he lay beside her, savoring her words, I find I like you very much, and savoring the feel of her hand in his, as his thumb traced patterns across her knuckles. It amazed him to think that only six months ago, he’d been dead inside, alone and friendless, trading his body for money and favors, and dreading the coming of tomorrow. Now here he was, lying comfortably in the bed of a lovely woman, holding hands like lovers, talking and chatting like old friends, and falling asleep together like a happy and contented old couple.
A sudden bolt of fear seized him, twisting his vitals, and clamping tight around his throat. It couldn’t be real. Such a life was never meant for him. Certainly, not such a woman. She was clean and sweet, kind and wholesome, everything he was not. He needed to take stock, to slow this headlong rush toward destruction. He concentrated on breathing until his panic receded. If he were careful, he might keep her as a friend. But he had to be careful not to reach too high, not to want too much, or he’d lose it all.
CHAPTER
11
Despite Gabriel’s best intentions, it was growing increasingly difficult for him to stay within the bounds of friendship. As novel and as rewarding as the intimacy of friendship was for him, he was a healthy male in the prime of life, and in peak condition. He was also a deeply sensual man, a thing he had found to be a curse as he responded repeatedly to sensations and situations he neither welcomed nor enjoyed. In response, he had learned to detach and distance himself, so that sex became a dark mechanical exercise, a performance he could summon at will, and dismiss just as easily. He had realized early in life that it was the only thing he was wanted for, all that he had of value to anyone, other than Jamie. It had become his main form of relating to others, and it left him feeling angry, ashamed, and utterly alone.
Sarah expected more from him, wanted his company in ways no one else ever had. He had wanted to be listened to, wanted someone to care about what he thought, what he did, and who he was, and she offered him all of these things. She saw him as something better than he was, not as damaged goods or some bitter, jaded whore. There were times when he saw himself through her eyes and he knew she thought him brave, strong, and kind, because of her brother. She had no idea that his rescue of Jamie had been largely a selfish act, as necessary to his own survival as it had been to the boy’s. But when she looked at him that way, he found himself wanting to be that man.
What would she think if she knew what he did to her in his dreams, how he made her cry out, made her forget her loathsome husband, made her forget herself. She would be disgusted and disappointed if she knew. He realized, belatedly, that by allowing himself to dream about her, waking or asleep, he was only making things worse. Determined to cut back his visits until he’d reasserted some control, his resolve lasted two days, and then he found himself mooning like some lost puppy below her balcony again. Bewitched and bedeviled, prepared to sabotage everything he’d built in his life over the past half year, in defiance of all his own rules, he decided to do what he’d been dreaming of doing for the past several months. He decided he was going to kiss her. A part of him clamored in alarm, shouting that he was about to make the biggest mistake of his life, but as he took the familiar path into the starlit night, he ignored it, promising himself if it was a mistake, she would forgive him.
Sarah waited for him, snug in her bed, hidden beneath a mound of blankets and books, and her ugly nightgown. A fire was lit against the November chill. She watched uncertainly as he approached. There was something unusual about him this evening. His eyes glittered and he seemed edgy, restless, as he stopped beside her bed. She’d not seen him the worse for drink for several weeks now. Not since he’d told her of his nightmare, and though he seemed somewhat unsteady, different somehow, he didn’t appear to have been drinking.
“May I, mignonne?” he asked, gesturing to the bed.
“Of course.” She drew up her legs and moved her books and cushions, making a space for him. “I didn’t think you’d be coming.” It was a question as much as a statement.
Choosing to ignore it, he settled his length beside her. “What are you reading, chère?” he asked, his voice soft and beguiling.
She shivered at his tone. It struck her suddenly that she’d been playing a dangerous game inviting this man to her room, to her bed. Except it hadn’t been a game. It had seemed natural and right, and somehow innocent. But the man beside her now was no innocent, and he watched her with eyes that were hot and hungry. He reached out his hand and she held her breath as he plucked the book from her frozen fingers, and tossed it to the floor. He held her captive with his eyes, intent and predatory, and his lips curved in a slow smile as he drew a path along the curve of her arm with his fingertip, gently skimming her skin through the thin material of her gown. Sensuous, unhurried, his wicked fingers traced the contours of her body, barely brushing her elbow, her shoulder, the curve of a breast, leaving delicious thrills of pleasure and anticipation in their wake.
Stunned, unable to move, she knew she was seeing a part of him she’d never seen before. She’d guessed at it, the first night they met in Madame’s library; she’d seen a flash of it when he’d wanted to punish her and warn her away, but this was something else, someone else, and though she searched his familiar face, there was no trace of the man
she’d come to know. She was bedazzled, unable to turn away as he shifted his body, moving closer, his fingers tracing her neckline now, stroking gently back and forth, hooking and tugging at her gown as her heart thudded in her chest and her body strained and ached, longing for his touch. She closed her eyes, fighting back tears as his clever fingers lightly brushed the swell of her breast, and then tightened around its bud. She gasped. Released from his spell and frightened by her own reactions, she tried to push him away. “No, Gabriel, stop!”
Lost in sensation, he was only dimly aware of her struggle, and it took him a moment to collect himself. When he did, lust was replaced by anger. What had she expected, inviting him to her bed? What had he expected, that she’d welcome him? He’d known she’d be disgusted, but it wounded him, nonetheless. Well, he’d come for a kiss, and a kiss he’d have. Pulling her roughly beneath him, he held her hands above her head and plundered her mouth, claiming the prize he’d come for. Letting her go abruptly, he sat up, his back to her, and fought to master himself. He knew he should apologize. He knew he should leave. But at that moment, he was afraid to look at her and he was incapable of speech. They sat there for what seemed an eternity, lost in a sea of silence.
Finally she spoke, “One would think, with all your vast experience, you would make a better job of it.”
He turned to look at her, and replied with a voice as cool as her own. “This is the second time you’ve complained of my kisses, mignonne. I shall be certain not to trouble you with them again.” Rising from the bed, he moved toward the balcony, hesitated, and turned instead to sprawl on the window seat. Reaching for the wine flask, he took a swallow, grimaced, and leaned back tiredly, resting his head against the wall. She was still talking to him at least. He might as well wait until she threw him out.
