As his thrusts grew deeper and faster she tilted her hips up to him, her hands sliding down to clench at his buttocks, her nails sinking into his hard flesh. She cried out against his mouth, unable to stop herself, and he moaned in response, his hands bruising her shoulders, gasping out “Lydia —”
And then the rhythm was so hard and furious that she saw stars, felt the world tilt, and then she had no more thoughts at all.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Peregrin awoke with a start. The room was dark, the rain was still beating on the windows, the light in the stable-yard had been extinguished. And there was a woman beside him, breathing deeply and rhythmically. He turned over on his side and tried to make out her features, but the gloom was scarcely penetrable. But even so, he felt his heart lift, just knowing that she was there, just listening to her breathe. That was his Lydia, the girl he had been born to save, over and over again.
And he was going to save her once more, tonight, before the sun rose on the damp and dreary prospect outside, before that cursed husband of hers woke up. They were going to ride away together, and that would be an end of it. Money, he thought, slipping silently off the bed. Money, and food, and dry clothes. He had a few sturdy saddlebags in the tack room; he’d go and fetch those back to the house, and stuff them full with provisions and cash and stockings to get them safely to…
Where?
He’d think of that later. There was no time to waste.
***
It is very difficult to noiselessly enter a stable, especially as the hours are creeping towards dawn. Horses need no clocks to know that when the morning approaches, so too does their breakfast, and they are often awake and restless, strolling their boxes, listening to the night sounds, in the wee hours, waiting for someone to come and feed them. And their welcoming whinnies, when a human does approach the barn, can wake an entire estate.
Peregrin was stealthy, however. Hunched under an oiled leather coat, the rain drumming on his head, he wound through the puddles on the north side of the yard, where all the shutters had been closed against the storm, and unlocked the tack room’s back door with a key from the shining ring where he held all the estate’s keys. Noiselessly, thanking heaven above that he kept the hinges well-oiled, he stepped into the leather-scented space where the work horses’ harness and saddles were kept.
His own saddle was there, the brass fittings glinting gently in the glow from the shuttered lamp he carried, and beneath it the saddlebags were heaped. That was easy enough, he’d take Corsair, the black gelding he’d ridden up from Tivington — the horse was sturdy and sound, and could carry him swiftly to Scotland. But what of Lydia… he looked around at the tack, at the labeled hooks for the bridles, studying the name of each horse as he considered their personalities. He didn’t know how much riding Lydia had done since she had left Tivington — he assumed a little bit, since Sutton was such an avid horseman. Surely by now she was able to cling to a horse’s mane and ride a smooth canter without tumbling off, wasn’t she? Peregrin, practically born in the saddle, realized that he had no idea how much progress one could expect the average riding student to have made in the course of a few months. For all he knew, she was ready to ride to the hounds.
Martin, he thought, eying the bridles again. Martin’s plain snaffle bit said all that needed to be understood about the placid gelding’s sweet temperament. Yes, he was very tall — his dam had been a Scottish Clydesdale — but his amiability knew no limits. He would slow them down a bit, and his canter was a bit round and lurching, but she would soon get used to his movement. Peregrin nodded, as if to convince himself, and then stepped over a horse-rug heaped in the middle of the floor to get to the bridles.
That was when he stepped on the girl.
“OH!” she shouted, shoving at his leg. Peregrin tripped and fell over her, landing on his hands just shy of the wall. He turned around and saw a furious face pulling away the folds of the horses-rug.
“God’s eye, that hurt,” she snarled. “What are you doing down here in the middle of the night? Stealin’ are you? Think you’re a horse-thief? You can just get on out of here. Go on, get!”
Peregrin scrambled to his feet and retrieved the lantern before it could set the place afire. “Who are you?” he countered. “I’m master here, I’ll have you know.” For a little while longer, at least. He wondered briefly if the Archwoods would have the law on him for the theft of two horses. He didn’t think they would. He certainly hoped not.
She peered at him and then put her hand to her mouth. “You’re Mr. Fawkes,” she breathed. “Oh, lord. Oh, lord.”
“What’s all that supposed to mean?” he asked suspiciously.
“Only that I hope you’re not doin’ what I think you’re doin’,” she said stoutly. “For I won’t let you.”
“What in God’s name do you think I’m doing?” Peregrin was growing angrier by the second. He didn’t have time for this rigmarole with some maidservant!
“You’re breaking madam’s heart, that’s what you’re doin’,” she snapped. “You had your chance, you know that, and you blew it! And now she’s married to that Lord Oaf, and mercy on us all if he recovers. You can’t just steal her away now. And what do you think, she’ll be able to ride away with you in this storm? She can’t ride a horse!”
“Can’t ride?” Peregrin felt his heart sinking to the vicinity of his muddy boots. “She never went on learning?”
“Why would she? She doesn’t give a hoot for horses — only wanted to impress you. She hasn’t been on a horse since the day you took her out of the yard alone. And fell, and ended up married. You think the Lord Oaf takes her riding? He scarcely knows she’s alive most of the time.”
“Oh God,” he said, hand to his forehead. The dark room was whirling about him, his desperate, foolish plans were shattered at his feet. There was no running away, no way to escape the mess they’d made of their lives. “Oh, God.” He couldn’t think of anything else to say.
“Religious man, are you?” The maid crossed her arms across her chest and regarded him without pleasure. “Maybe you should have gone into the church, if you were so poor and destitute that you couldn’t have your own house.”
“Not in the least,” he muttered. “But it seems like a suitable thing to say, when one is faced with such a bloody awful set-down.” He shook his head. “Look — what’s your name?”
“Mary,” she replied grimly. “I’m the madam’s maid — have been since she was a little girl. You want me to take her a message, just make it a message worth taking. Not something that will make her cry her eyes out. I’m not cleaning up your messes for you any more.”
Her maid, of course. He remembered her now, trailing behind Lydia on the way to the stables, her face mutinous. What a spitfire this one was, not at all suitable to be the maid of a future countess. But Lydia was so sweet — perhaps this little cat did her fighting for her. “Tell her—” He paused, at a loss for words. What on earth could he say? Dear Lydia, I have failed you again. Dear Lydia, good luck with that brute. Dear Lydia, write me if he dies. He grimaced, ground his teeth, did all but paw the floor and grunt. And then he made up his mind. He wasn’t going to fail again. He wasn’t going to let anything stand between them, not this time. “Tell her I will tie her to the saddle if I must, but she is coming with me to Scotland tonight and that is final.”
Mary’s jaw dropped.
“Go on, be quick about it,” he ordered. “Get her a few dresses and what she needs — it must fit into this.” And he pulled up one of the saddlebags and shoved it at her. “And come back with her!” he called after her, as she went rushing out into the pouring rain, the saddle bag over her head to keep her hair dry.
“We’re going to do this,” he said, his voice cutting through the rain splashing on the cobbles, the neighing of the horses as they saw Mary go running through the yard, the beating of his own heart. What did it matter now if the horses awoke the house? Who was going to stop him from leaving? This w
as his house, these were his people. For a short time, at least.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
“You can’t be serious,” Lydia said, rubbing sleep from her eyes. “Where is he now?”
“Saddling a horse, I reckon.” Mary pulled back the sheets and picked up the wreck of Lydia’s gown, which had gotten kicked away during their sport and was presently a rumbled mess near the foot of the bed.
“He must be mad — he can’t be in earnest.”
“He’s in deadly earnest,” Mary said shortly. “This dress can’t be worn again without being laundered and pressed. Couldn’t you be more careful?”
“Oh, what difference does it make! Get me another one and do be quick about it. I have to get down to the stable and talk to Peregrin. He has to understand that I can’t run away with him. What a fool! Where would we go?”
“The other ones are in the stable yet,” Mary sighed. “I didn’t bring them back in because none of the footmen wanted to go back out in the rain. I thought it could wait until morning. They all went to sleep in the attic with the grooms.”
Lydia, who had been pulling her chemise over her head, stopped midway, with only her eyes peeking out. “I haven’t anything to wear?”
Mary held up the wrinkled traveling costume. “And if I can find your stays.”
Lydia shook her head. “I haven’t any idea where they could be.”
“Probably somewhere in all these blankets,” Mary remarked, and tossed the dress over a chair so that she could rummage about in the bedclothes. Eventually she emerged triumphant, holding up Lydia’s abandoned stays and petticoat. “You had quite a night.”
“I don’t know what came over me,” Lydia confessed, blushing. “But I don’t know that I regret it.”
“Don’t bother,” Mary advised. “You have enough regrets, spending one night with your true love doesn’t have to be one of them.”
“That’s very sage wisdom.” Lydia got up so that Mary could start getting her clothes onto her. “But I doubt my husband would agree.”
“Your husband is a dolt.” Mary tied laces and adjusted filmy fabric with professional efficiency. “I advise you to find a wise-woman for a posset that helps you get with child as quickly and as often as possible for the next few years, and then tell him to find his own apartments in Town.”
Lydia nodded, sucking in her breath so that her stays could be tightened. It wasn’t the worst idea, really. All she had to do was survive childbed two or three times.
“And then you can have an affair with your Peregrin at your leisure,” Mary continued. She picked up the gown and shook it, then sighed and carried it over for Lydia to step into. “It will be the ideal marriage for a member of the ton — a husband to pay your bills and a lover to please you.”
“It’s not exactly a fairy tale,” Lydia said doubtfully.
“Ah, now you’re getting greedy.”
That was almost certainly true. Lydia chewed her lip dolefully. “He will be frightfully upset.”
“Well, all men are greedy, but this one is just asking for the moon. He can’t have it. He had his chance with you, and he left it.”
A sudden sadness swept over Lydia. “I wish he hadn’t,” she whispered. “I wish I’d encouraged him more.”
Mary came and put her hands on Lydia’s shoulders. “Now you listen to me,” she said firmly. “Both of you have been crying for the moon, since this whole thing started. You knew you had to marry Lord Sutton. It was your duty. And he knew it too. You’ve done your duty and there’s nothing more to be said about it, do you hear me?”
Lydia nodded shakily.
“You poor Quality!” Mary shook her head and went to look for a hair-brush. “Too many rules for you to ever be happy!”
***
Lydia crept along the upstairs hall, hoping that if any of the bedrooms that lined it were occupied, their residents were safely asleep. There was no longer a light coming from beneath the door of her husband’s room, which she thought was a sign he was still doing well. She tried to push down the disappointment; it was wrong to wish for a man’s death, and she knew it, but she could not help but feel a pang at how close she had come to being free of him.
The house stayed silent as she crept down the stairs, but for an occasional creak or groan as the wind whipped across the fields and swirled against the brick and glass of the building. She thought of going outside into that gale and shivered, goosebumps already rising on her arms in the drafty entryway. She looked for a moment at the front door and then turned for the kitchen — she’d go out the back door and creep out to the stables that way, it was closer than walking around the house.
She’d made it halfway down the hall when she heard the back door open and shut, the wind howling down the hall to pluck at her skirts and stir her hair, and froze. Was it Peregrin? Or was someone else coming in, maybe a footman or the coachman, someone who would carry tales to her husband? She darted through the first door she saw, but it was too late; a figure had already emerged from the kitchen door. She could only hope he hadn’t seen her in the darkness!
Lydia had scarcely gotten her bearings — a quick glance around, shadowy furniture, a few tall windows that looked out at the park — when the door opened again behind her. She whirled, and saw him there, dripping wet, and felt her heart sink.
“Peregrin,” she sighed, going to him. “You will catch your death.”
He set down a shuttered lantern, shrugged out of an oilskin, dropping the wet thing on the floorboards, and reached out with one hand to cup her chin. He leaned down and gave her a lingering kiss; she shivered with pleasure. But then she took a few quick steps back, and even in the dim room, she could see the change in his face.
Then he seemed to shake it off. “We have to go,” he told her, voice low. “I only have to fill this saddlebag — I have some blunt in the overseer’s office. It will see us for a few weeks, perhaps more.”
“Go? Where will we go? What happens after a few weeks?”
“I’ll find work,” he said carelessly. “There is always work for a horseman. Perhaps if the seas grow safe again, we can go to America.”
“America!” Lydia shook her head, astonished. “Peregrin, you are talking like a madman!”
“Or worse, a man in love.” He sighed heavily and gazed at her for a long moment, as if trying to gauge how far she was willing to go for him. Not far enough, it seemed, to please him. “Lydia, I thought you loved me.”
“I do love you.”
“As much as I love you?”
“Is this a contest?” Lydia burst out, more loudly than she had intended. She covered her mouth for a moment and then went on in a lower tone. “Listen to me, Peregrin — we can’t do this. We can’t just run away from our responsibilities, from our duties. That was true back at Tivington and it’s true now. We were being foolish to think we could be together. My family — they made it very clear what they expected of me. I couldn’t go against their wishes. And that’s truly why we’re not together. I never should have blamed you. I never should have said those things to you last night. It was wrong of me, and I’m sorry. I do love you, and I always will. But this cannot be.”
Peregrin was silent through her speech, those his eyes were bright and his fists were clenched at his side. Now he spoke up, and his voice was impassioned. “I don’t want to go on without you. I’m not saying that I can’t — I’m saying that I don’t want to. And I’m willing to risk everything… to give up everything, to be with you.” He paused and took a shaky breath before he went on.
“I know I can’t ask you to do the same, but I want you to know: this offer will always stand. I’m always ready to run away with you. There will never be a woman to take your place, Lydia.” He spread his hands to say that his speech was done, his well run dry, and on his face a slow, sad smile replaced the deadly earnestness of a moment before. “But I’m going to ask you one last time, to come away with me, right now, and let us be happy together.”
H
e knew that she was going to refuse him once again. Lydia swallowed a sob, and tried to smile, but the quivering of her lips would not allow it. Instead she opened her mouth and spoke the words he knew were coming. “I will not run away with you, Peregrin,” she whispered, her breath catching, the lump in her throat rising ever more painfully. This was it, she thought. This was the last good-bye. Her talk of affairs with Mary had been well and good, but this kind of love — this was too big and too painful for occasional liaisons to ever satisfy. “It’s best if I go as soon as Frederick can be moved, and we be given some time apart… to forget.”
His eyes blazed in the orange lamplight and he crossed the space between them in one bounding step, catching up her hands in his and clutching them to his chest. Even now, consumed with sorrow, her body responded to his nearness with a quick rising wave of passion that made her gasp.
“I will never forget you,” he vowed passionately, and he bent to take her lips in a searing kiss that seemed to drain all the energy from Lydia’s limbs. She sagged against him, her hands still pressed against his hard chest, fingers grasped tightly in his fists as if he would never let her go. She sighed into his mouth, rivers of pure sensation rippling all over her, the great promising warmth unfolding deep within her, an anticipation of pleasure to come.
He dragged his lips from hers and his smoldering eyes asked the question. She nodded slowly, unable to deny him, deny herself, the release from the craving within.
He bent over her mouth again, eyes dark with passion, and slowly began backing her across the room, step by step forced by the hardness now pressed against her. She felt the resistance when her legs bumped against furniture, felt the softness of the divan, and then he was folding his body over her, gently pushing her down onto the plush fabric. They’d be caught, she thought wildly, and for a brief moment she stiffened, resisting him. But the house was quiet, and there was not a soul abroad to catch them. And what if they did? She had already thrown her happiness away by marrying Frederick, she had already given up Peregrin’s offer to take her away — she’d be damned if she wouldn’t take one more moment of pleasure from him before she went away from him forever.
The Honorable Nobody (Heroines on Horseback Book 2) Page 24
