by Conkle, Gina
Wrung out and exhausted, she plopped down on the wet bench beside her boots drying in the sun. “I missed you this morning.”
Jonas donned his hat, frowning at the large, expensive carriage parked outside the Halsey barn. “I needed to talk with the Captain. I should’ve sent word.” His gaze pierced her from under the brim of his hat. “I didn’t know you were expecting guests.”
She tipped forward to untie her shoe, huffing at her impossibly stiff corset. “Mr. Haggerty’s arrival was a surprise. We didn’t expect him this soon.”
The stable master’s dog sniffed a carriage wheel. Head basking in the sun, he lifted a hind leg and gave the wheel a dousing. Jonas chuckled at the sight.
“But you did expect him.”
She tried again to bend low. “He is betrothed to me. A fact that didn’t seem to bother you last night.”
His mouth flattened in a grim line. She fussed with the bottom of her stomacher where a stay dug deep into the side of her waist. The corset, like the gown, was made for a youthful woman. The whalebone’s pinch and her ugly gown reminded her, she was twenty-four, not a young girl anymore. Life had changed and she needed to change with it, otherwise the things she wanted—a husband, children, to write a few Romanesque adventures—would all go up in smoke.
Like it or not, her best chance at what she wanted was inside her drawing room. Mr. Haggerty had made it clear what he wanted. Jonas had not.
She tried again to bend forward. “This blasted corset.”
“Here. Let me.” Jonas knelt before her and nudged her hem a discreet fraction. He was going to untie her shoes.
It was silly, watching him intently, his long, tanned fingers hooking the back of her shoe as he set the fripperies one at a time on the bench beside her. Wintry air nipped her. Toes curling, she started to hide them under her hem.
Big, warm hands wrapped around her silk-clad foot. Her arch tingled. A callused finger stroked a line from her ankle under her heel along her arch to the balls of her feet. The snagging sounds seduced her better than pretty words. She swallowed hard…last night’s passion. With fumbling hands, she raised her hood as if the cloth gave the privacy she craved with Jonas. He tucked her foot into one boot and took his time pulling up the leather.
His thumbs slid slowly up her calf.
“Jonas,” she whispered, glancing around the yard. At least they were alone.
Wide shoulders rose and fell with his measured breathing. Head bent and hat on, she couldn’t see his face, but he knew the impropriety of a man’s hands lingering under a woman’s hem. This was agony. To feel his warmth. To smell him and the spicy-scented soap he’d used to shave. Fisting in her cloak, she dare not touch him. If she did, they’d kiss. Full. Hot. Unguarded.
Jonas sought the second boot. His fingers dug into the leather. Would Mr. Haggerty with his grand plans to dress her be this affected? Her mouth clamped painfully. There was much to adore about Jonas and his silent strength, but even the best of men had to bare their hearts. Would Jonas count her worthy of the risk?
He tucked the second boot past her ankle, going faster. Officious hands left off with the leather half up her calf. “I expect to finish the chair in the next few days.” His voice was taut.
“That will be helpful.”
Jonas brushed her hem down and pushed off the ground. Hands clamped behind his back, he eyed the tower. His neck turned beet red, the color climbing up his cheeks. “About my conversation with the Captain…”
“Yes?” She rose from the bench, jamming her heel into the second boot.
The fit was awkward but they began their stroll to the tower, passing the kitchen garden with its rows of upturned soil. Chickens scratched through the snow, their beaks pecking the ground. She pulled the keys from her pocket and kept a respectable arm’s-length from Jonas.
“You know I came to settle things with the Captain,” he intoned. “It’s why I came back to Plumtree.”
Sunlight hurt her eyes, its blinding brightness bouncing off melting snow. She tugged her hood forward to shade her eyes. “Yes. To make your peace with him about the fire and your hasty departure.”
“And for being a neglectful grandson.” His baritone voice rumbled comfortingly at her side. “You, however, have been a fine example of family duty.”
They took a side path to the tower, but the manor’s back edifice was in full view. So, too, was the drawing room’s glass doors where Mr. Haggerty kept watch. Waving, she attempted a smile but her lips stuck to her gums. Mr. Haggerty scowled, giving her a curt nod.
“We do what we must,” she said, facing the tower again.
“Which brings me to you.”
“Me?”
“As I said, you are a shining example of family honor and responsibility.”
“Don’t you mean a liar? This past year I’ve managed to deceive my father’s publisher and his antiquarian friends. And though I’ve not said marriage vows, I feel like I’ve cuckolded the man standing in my mother’s drawing room. I could allow myself those first sins because they help my family. But the last? It was all for me.”
Muddy snow sucked her boots. Misery was a stone in the pit of her stomach. Had she mucked up her future for an unwise tumble? The corset banded her ribs in a painful grip and the skin between her legs was sore. Jonas would soon put Plumtree behind him. No, Jonas would soon put her behind him. It had to be the reason for his stiff gait and lack of eye contact. He was ready to run off the same as he did ten years ago.
But, this time he’d not come back.
They walked into the tower’s shadow, the sun’s loss chilling her. She fussed with her skirts, trying to save her hems. It was daft since she wished the gown gone forever.
“For me, too,” he said.
Her head snapped up. “What?”
“Last night was…” Words trailing, Jonas squinted at nothing in particular.
She leaned in. “Yes?”
The toes of her boots pushed deeper in the earth. Her heart expanded as if it climbed into her throat. She couldn’t swallow. She didn’t breathe. She teetered, waiting, hoping.
“I want to do what’s right. I’ll follow your excellent example and do my best for the Captain.” Hands firmly behind his back and feet spread wide, Jonas spewed words. “I think we should, that is, considering what happened last night, we ought to come to an arrangement ourselves. You are a fine woman. My income cannot rival what you’ve enjoyed. I established a decent annuity from my work with the earl…that and re-establishing Braithwaite Furniture should count as worthy for your consideration. We’ll muddle through.”
“Muddle through?”
Jonas’s little speech had all the ardor of a limp vegetable. Who was this man standing before her with all his talk of family responsibility and income? Mrs. Bainbridge’s words of wisdom blended with her mother’s. An arrangement with a man was cold comfort. Jonas was doing his duty and giving her the promise of a comfortable life.
He wasn’t giving her his heart.
She opened the tower door. Her limbs numbed as if she’d slept oddly on them. Nothing worked properly, certainly not the man in front of her. Jonas tugged his cravat as if it were Tyburn’s noose.
No! No! No!
This wasn’t happening.
The back doors of the drawing room opened. Mr. Haggerty stepped outside, facing the tower and shading his eyes. In a way, the man waiting for her by the drawing room was willing to give her more than her friend of many years. It was heart-aching. Demoralizing.
“Thank you for your kind offer, but I cannot accept.” She faced Jonas, pained to the soles of her feet.
His jaw dropped. “Livvy?”
Jonas blanched. The blankness in his eyes searching her…he was empty. Hollow.
The numbness faded, replaced by discomfort. Everywhere. Her stomach churned. She wanted to cast up her accounts. Hand on her midsection, she pressed her stomacher.
“You don’t have to work on the chair,” she mumbled.
/> “Bugger the chair.” He took a step toward her and stopped when she took a step back.
Clarity was bright as the blinding winter sun. She knew what she wanted and she’d not settle for anything less.
“All these years, I didn’t know what I’ve been waiting for. But now I do,” she said, her voice growing steadier with each word. “It was you. Not some business arrangement or a man to choose me out of a sense of duty and responsibility. It was you I’ve wanted.”
Head shaking and arms spread wide, he said, “I cannot be more here than this.”
Jonas glowered at her, his black brows snapping in a fierce show of emotion. At least he showed anger well. She’d take it if it meant getting the rest of him. All of him. It was his love, his heart she wanted.
“I don’t know what else to do, what else to give.” His arms flopped to his sides.
Her fist clenched on her breast bone, a tremor edging her voice. “There’s only one thing I want from you, but you…I…”
She searched his eyes unable to finish. Then, quietly, proudly, she walked away.
Chapter Ten
Jonas tossed his laundry into the sea chest. Cambric shirts tangled with neck cloths which twined with stockings and breeches. He kicked the chest against the wall. It slid across the floor and banged into the wall supporting the window, the same window Livvy Halsey had climbed in and out of his bedchamber.
“Bloody sea chest,” he mumbled and lifted the lid.
“Bad day at the Halseys?” The Captain shuffled inside and his rump dropped into the winged chair by the fire.
“No.”
“Want to tell me about it?”
“No.”
Jonas rearranged the clothes, but it was all for naught. He added more chaos than order. From his crouch in front of the sea chest, he took a good look at the Captain. The lines on the old man’s face, the snowy hair peeking out of his night cap, the spindly ankles above his shoes. His grandfather sniffed and dabbed a handkerchief to his nose. He nursed his annual winter ailment, a mild fever with the sniffles. It came every winter when Jonas was a boy. The Captain would wear his banyan and nurse himself with beef tea, spending a day or two abed.
Holding on to the sea chest, Jonas’s heart cracked. His grandfather had been his rock, but the Captain, who was always old, was getting older. The finality of it hit him in the same place on his chest where Livvy had fisted her hand on her breast bone. Life’s threads were fragile.
Apparently, the thread between him and Livvy Halsey was fragile, too. He’d believed differently. Facing her had scared him, so too had her rejection. Emotion slid like quicksilver through his veins. His blood boiled worse than when he faced down real pirates.
“I always thought she was allowed too much freedom.” The Captain chuckled, settling in the chair. “A continental mother…what else can one expect?”
“Mrs. Halsey is a fine woman with a kind heart.” Jonas picked up the empty leather pouch that once held the watch. “So is Livvy.”
“Indeed. But one can only assume the disaster that comes from letting a girl have that much independence and book learning. Not to mention all that digging in the dirt she did with her father.” The Captain shivered visibly. “Disastrous.”
Jonas tucked the leather back in the sea chest. “Or it makes for a fascinating woman.”
“She’s a woman who wants her way.”
“Because she’s certain about what she wants. It’s refreshing.” His shoulders squared with a sense of purpose. Yes, Livvy knew what she wanted and she was not going to settle for anything less.
And she wanted his heart. Bared to him. Open. Honest. Ready to give and receive.
“Didn’t seem refreshing when you stormed in an hour ago,” the Captain said sagely.
He shut the sea chest. “Because I was angry.”
“And you solved your anger by stomping off?”
“No, she did.”
“If there’s one thing I’ve learned,” the Captain said, raising a bony finger to the ceiling. “With women, a man must try and try again until he gets it right.”
“What is the it in your wisdom, sir?”
The old man shrugged. “Understanding mystery of a woman. The right woman, the kind who makes a man move heaven and earth to have her because he will be miserable for the rest of his days if she is not by his side. That’s the it I mean.”
Jonas removed his earring and stared at the gold piece in his palm. He had crossed oceans, thinking of Livvy. He would cross them again if it meant reaching this ephemeral understanding. Slipping the gold onto his finger, it went past the first knuckle. Perhaps it wasn’t all that difficult. He didn’t have to cross an ocean. He had to cross a meadow and this time give Livvy what she wanted.
It was him. All of him. Even the parts he was scared to show.
“What are you going to do m’boy?”
“I’m going to try again. This time, I’ll get it right.” Jonas exited the room. From the corner of his eye, he caught the Captain’s fists clenched high in victory.
*
“The carving is amazingly intact,” Mr. Kendall said in awe.
Livvy wrapped her shawl tightly about, her breath fogging the tower window. True to form, Mr. Kendall insisted on seeing all items to be catalogued in the marital contract, especially the curule chair.
The rule of not allowing others into the tower was set aside.
Livvy stared out the mullioned window as lifeless and empty as she’d been since leaving Jonas at the tower door. The world of valuations and assets could hang. Her heart was broken. Pain stole her wish for conversation, and Mr. Haggerty thoughtfully left her alone. She’d tossed the blanket high up on the tower bed, but her betrothed saw the maneuver. His eyes flashed blackly and he stalked off to examine the broken gladius and breast plate, letting her stew while her mother and Mr. Kendall haggled over earthly goods.
There were more worthy things to discuss. Love or the lack of it.
But no one brought up that marital asset.
Livvy traced a circle in the foggy glass. This was not an auspicious beginning to her soon-to-be marriage.
Drawing in the glass, she spied a dark figure running through the meadow. She dragged her palm over the mullioned panes. Jonas? Snow kicked up behind him. His long legs ate up the ground as if the devil nipped his heels.
She unlatched the window. “Jonas?”
“Livvy!” He ran faster to the tower, his black coat flaring like a cape behind him until he was under her window. Jonas dropped down on both knees. He took off his hat and set it over his heart. “Livvy.”
There was a commotion behind her. Heels slamming the floor, voices, but she planted both hands wide on the windowsill and blocked them out.
“Is something wrong? Is the Captain in good health?”
“The Captain is well,” he said, panting from his sprint. “But, I am not.”
“What?” She leaned out at the waist.
“Livvy, I made a mess of things with you. I wasn’t entirely truthful.”
“What the devil is going on here?” Good Mr. Kendall tried to muscle his way to a spot at the window, but Mr. Haggerty grabbed his arm.
“Go on,” she said, facing out the window again.
Jonas pulled something off his forefinger and held it high between thumb and forefinger. Sunlight glinted on gold.
“It’s my earring. I told you and your mother only part of the story.”
“Why the devil does anyone care about the man’s earring?” Mr. Kendall said behind her.
“Mr. Kendall, please.” Her mother’s voice was at her shoulder. “I want to hear this.”
“The day I got the earring, I was waiting with the other sailors, but I was lonely. Sad.” His arms spread wide, hanging there a second before flopping to his sides. “I didn’t want to die alone. I wanted to be with people who meant a great deal to me. People like…you.”
Her breath caught. “Yes.”
“When it was my turn
, I laid my head on the piercer’s table. He put a chunk of wood between my neck and earlobe. Just before he drove the needle into my ear he said something that changed everything. Something that made me decide to return to England…to return to you.”
“What was it?” her mother whispered at Livvy’s back.
“He warned me there would be pain.” Jonas smiled as if the weight of the world had come off his shoulders. “And then he said, ‘Think of what makes you happy’.”
“And?” Livvy’s hand balled tightly on her breastbone.
“I thought of you.”
Air gusted from her. Emotions twined, soft and endearing for the man pouring out his heart to her.
“I thought of years of laughing with you, of wading in the River Trent, and you speaking your mind and me listening. And I wanted more. I wanted the rest of my life to be that and more with you, because I love you, Livvy Halsey. I think I always have.”
“Oh, Jonas! Stay right there!” She tore across the room and sped down the stairs, her plain, leather shoes beating a staccato rhythm.
Outside the tower, she tromped through muddy snow, splashing her skirts. Jonas waited for her, both knees in the snow. She tackled him and showered his face with kisses as they rolled in the snow.
“I love you, Jonas,” she cried between kisses. Tears began to flow, wetting her cheeks and his. “I will marry you.”
“A tale of a painful ear-piercing?” Mr. Kendall’s voice carried from the tower. “That has to be the worst marriage proposal I have ever had the displeasure of hearing.”
“I think it’s wonderful,” her mother said, her voice joyful.
Jonas wrapped his arms and the ends of his coat around her, keeping his back in the snow. He kissed her tears and her cheeks. From her side vision, she spied Mr. Haggerty looking out the window, an odd half-smile on his face as she hugged Jonas.
Livvy couldn’t be sure, but she thought he said something about, “…this is a good time to renegotiate the price of the curule chair…”
She took the gold earring and slipped it on her finger. “I’ll wear this ring forever. Because whatever we do, whatever adventures are to be had, we are in this life together.”
