Voyage With a Viscount

by Murdoch, Emily

“If you would just hold still for five minutes, then this ordeal would already be over,” she snapped back. “For both of us!”

  Rowena’s smile widened as she watched James open his mouth to retaliate, and then immediately wince as Adena twitched the bandage once more. To know that he was not in danger relieved her heart of so much concern. It was enough to know that he was well. It was enough to know that he was safe.

  “Do not be such an infant,” retorted Luke, and Rowena was forced to hide her smile as the Marquis of Dewsbury – her friend’s husband, she had to remind herself, for it was as much of a shock to her to discover the Marquis standing in their bedchamber as it was for James – grimaced as Adena poked his leg to keep him quiet.

  “Will both of you hush and be still?” Adena muttered, carefully tying a small knot in the bandage around James’ arm, as the two gentlemen sat side by side on the bed. “It may be early, but you will wake up the entire place with your yammering if you cannot stay quiet.”

  She looked up at Rowena as she handed her friend another clean strip of linen – donated by the fearful innkeeper, who looked as though he would rather not know that an illegal duel had taken place at his inn – and the two friends exchanged a glance: half mirth, half relief.

  “If you had not been so rash to jump to a fight,” Adena continued, turning to face her own husband now, who had the good grace to look a little sheepish, “then you would not have to put up with the pain now, then would you? All that running about in the carriage from inn to inn, searching for Rowena, and you both leapt to attack each other!”

  The two men murmured something incomprehensible, and quelled as Adena glared at them.

  James looked up at Rowena, and smiled gently, holding out his hand, which she immediately took. No words were needed between them: she could not help but be impressed with him, and it would not do to say such a thing before others.

  Watching, as she had been, from the side lines, it had been immediately clear that James had found his mark but had no wish to kill. The cut that Adena was so fastidiously seeing to on Luke’s leg was but a scratch: the bullet had barely touched him, and but for the heat of the moment, there would barely by a mark on him.

  Unwilling to kill, but able. Ready to protect her honour, defend it, risk his own life for it, but determined not to take a life himself.

  She stared into his sparkling eyes, and wondered whether she would ever meet a man that she could love more than he – for she did love him. How could she not? He was everything that she wanted from a man, everything that Oscar Bentley was not: brave, thoughtful, insightful, caring.

  As Adena clucked around her charges, Rowena tried to ignore the growing pressure on her hand from his that matched the growing pressure on her lungs. His eyes did not waver from hers, and she felt herself falling into them, unable to breathe for love of him.

  There was something between them, she knew it. She could feel it and surely he could too. But there was no agreement between them. Marriage had not been spoken of, a proposal was not necessary. She had taken him to her bedchamber, that was true, knowing what would happen – but there had seemed no other alternative. She had wanted him, and her honour was lost, and what else could she lose but her heart?

  “There.” Adena’s voice cut through her thoughts and jerked her to the present. James dropped her hand, and it fell empty and cold to her side. “The best thing you can do now is rest, and put as little weight on that leg,” looking pointedly at her husband, “and that arm,” turning to glare at James, “as possible.”

  “Yes ma’am,” said Luke with a lazy grin, which quickly vanished as she gave him what Rowena had always called, ‘Adena’s look’.

  “Let me help you take these downstairs,” Rowena said hastily, lest James say a single word as that was likely to set her friend off when she was in such a temper.

  She gathered up the excess linen strips, and tugged at Adena’s arm. “Come on.”

  Leaving the two men to sit together in silence – a far greater punishment, thought Rowena with a smile, then any duel – she stepped towards the door as her friend followed her.

  “Men,” Adena muttered under her breath as they moved down the stairs. “Such babies.”

  Rowena shivered. The thought that one, or both of them could have died over her rash decision to take pleasure with another: it was enough to make anyone stop and consider their actions.

  “You are cold – and mayhaps in shock a little, too,” Adena stopped on the stairs, and took the linens from her. “Run back upstairs and get your shawl, and you and I can break our fasts downstairs by the fire.”

  “I am quite well,” protested Rowena, but one look from her friend was enough. “I will go and retrieve my shawl,” she said meekly.

  The door to her chamber was slightly ajar when she reached it, and just as she reached out her hand to push it open, Rowena heard something that made her stop and pause.

  “…still not want to marry her?”

  Heart racing, heart horrified, Luke’s words echoed around the room for several seconds before she heard James’ answer.

  “My good man, I never intended to marry her in the first place!” James voice was exasperated, a little irritated, but clear through the gap in the door. “May I remind you that I am not the one that she actually eloped with?”

  Rowena’s cheeks crimsoned, but there was no one to see them. Stood as she was inches away from the door, she was unable to see anything but a chink of light, but the words spoken were easy to hear.

  “Nonetheless,” came Luke’s reply, “after taking her innocence, what else did you think you were going to do?”

  Her fingers were still outstretched, and as though unable to stop herself, Rowena pushed it forward just an inch, her heart pounding and her blood boiling.

  A glimpse of James appeared in the gap. He was smiling, and he shrugged with a wince as he replied, “I never had any intention of marrying her, and that was never promised. Understand, man, she wanted me to make love to her, and I was not strong enough to say no.”

  Shock and pain ricocheted through Rowena’s body as her mouth fell open in silent dismay. She had had no expectations, certainly, but it was devastating to hear that James had no feelings for her at all.

  As though he could hear her thoughts, she heard Luke ask quietly, “Have you no feelings for her at all?”

  From her vantage point, Rowena could not clearly see James’ face. Something flickered across it: pain, or confusion, or doubt, she could not tell, but she could hear his words, and his laughter.

  “Once you get the clothes off, all women are very much the same,” he joked.

  There was no decision: just action.

  “Well, I am glad that I know that now,” Rowena said icily as she pushed the door open and strode in. “I had known that marriage was not the destination of our voyage together, but I had hoped to be treated a little better on the way.”

  James’ eyes were wide with dismay and he rose from the bed hastily with his hands raised as though to stop her barrelling at him.

  But she had no intention of going anywhere near him. Hope had died within her, and all she could do was treat him as disdainfully as he had treated her.

  “Rowena, I – ”

  “To hear oneself spoken of like a piece of meat is incredibly unkind,” Rowena said quietly, staring at his cool eyes. “I hope that you never experience it as I have.”

  There was silence. Nothing moved and no one spoke for a full minute. Rowena kept her gaze on his, hoping for…she knew not what. A confession of love? How could it happen, hearing what she had just heard? Regrets? She did not want to hear that he regretted their lovemaking. No, there was nothing he could say, nothing at all that could make them what they had been, to take them back to what they once were.

  “I think I will see where Adena has got to.” Luke rose awkwardly and despite the pain in his leg, hobbled to the door, closing it behind him.

  * * *

  James had no
idea how to respond, but he knew how his heart moved: astonishment at her reaction, and joy, almost relief that Rowena Kerr clearly had feelings for him.

  “I admit myself surprised,” he said finally, as the two of them stood together alone in the room where they had shared so much. “I…I had not realised that you cared for me so.”

  “You should not have expected anything less,” Rowena countered, the anger in her eyes refusing to dissipate. “Do you think I give myself to any man, to anyone I meet?”

  The memory of her above him, of her discovery of her own body, of the pleasure rising in her, the flutter of her eyelashes, the moaning in her throat, made James smile.

  It was the wrong thing to do, and he knew it immediately.

  A flash of anger burst across her face. “Do you think that this is a laughing matter, sir? I suppose it must be, when any woman is exactly the same, once her clothes are off.”

  His smile vanished, and instead nausea rose up in his throat. By God, she had heard that – and if she had heard that, then she had heard all.

  “Rowena,” he began, but he was interrupted.

  “Can you even comprehend how rude and dismissive your words are?” Rowena spoke with an air of finality that hurt James, but she continued, “I do not think you can. I do not think that it even occurred to you that there was another person that you were injuring.”

  James coloured, and took a deep breath. It would take much to admit this to her – it was a strain to admit it to himself. “Rowena, I…you have to understand. ‘Tis difficult for me to speak of my true feelings to anyone, let alone a stranger I had just met – not you!” He said hastily. “Dewsbury. I did not want to appear…well, weak before him. To let him see how greatly I cared for you, for him to know how desperately I wanted you…”

  His voice trailed off as he saw the anger rise in the woman he loved.

  “Being true to your own feelings would have been the honourable thing to do,” she said coldly. “If you had any, that is.”

  A spark of anger rushed through James now, and he could not help but say, “Feelings? Rowena, you barely comprehend your own feelings, so do not tell me what my own are. Three days ago, you thought you were in love with someone else! I thought that I was nothing more than an itch you wanted to scratch – how could I assume that you cared for me?”

  As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he knew that they were the wrong thing to say. The outrage in her eyes, the bristling of her shoulders, was enough.

  “I apologise, Rowena, I – ”

  “I have no wish to stay here a moment longer,” she said curtly, striding forwards and grabbing her luggage in one hand.

  James tried to move towards her but she was too fast for him, stepping through the door and down the stairs as he called out, “Rowena!”

  There was no reply, and he hurtled to the door, but had to pause for a moment as stars appeared before his eyes. He had lost too much blood to be running after anyone, but he must get to her: Rowena Kerr could not leave the King’s Head Inn without knowing his true feelings for her.

  He would not let her.

  “Rowena!” James called again as she reached the bottom of the stairs, and he started to move again, losing ground as she almost ran through the inn.

  By the time that he had stumbled outside, Rowena was being handed into a coach by the Marquis of Dewsbury, a look of revulsion on his face as he beheld the staggering Viscount.

  “Rowena, wait!”

  But she did not wait. She did not even look back, and as the Marquis settled himself into the coach after her he tried to run forward – and the coach pulled away.

  James, Viscount of Paendly, stood in the courtyard of the King’s Head Inn for above ten minutes, watching the road that Rowena Kerr had taken, left with nothing but a freshly bleeding arm and a secret bleeding heart.

  9

  When Rowena opened her eyes, she once again had to remind herself exactly where she was.

  She would have expected the room to feel familiar, now that she had been staying with Adena for nigh on a month, and yet it still felt strange, alien. Someone else’s room, as though the real owner had just stepped outside for a moment. As though they were going to open the door at any time and express surprise that there was someone else in their bed.

  But the green curtained windows were hers now, as was the large bed covered in blankets, and the small dressing table at one side of the door. She knew each inch of this room, and yet it was not her room.

  Her room was still at her parents’ house. Rowena grimaced, and tried to sit up in bed, but her lethargy was too overpowering, and she fell back onto the pillows. She could rise in five minutes or so. There was no rush, after all. Nowhere to be. No one to see.

  The sadness that had been kept at bay by sleep crept over her once more, and Rowena tried to shake it off. She was not in love with James, she reminded herself, as she was forced to do every morning. He had just used her for her body. He had not cared for her a jot.

  A memory of that night – that wonderful night – rose up in her mind. The gentle kisses on her lips, and then the not-so-gentle kisses down her neck, and towards her –

  The rush of heat and love that always accompanied these memories died away almost instantly as the sadness returned. It had meant so much to her, that night. But it had meant nothing to him.

  It made her feel a little sick to think that she would never see him again.

  Rowena lay, dull and depressed, in the large bed for another two hours, until the chiming of eleven by the clock in the hallway forced her to accept that she could no longer laze about in bed.

  It did not take her long to dress – what care should she take, after all? She was going to see no one special. Luke and Adena had few visitors to their London home, if any, so Rowena was surprised to see her friend bidding farewell to a striking woman, tall and slim, in the hall.

  “You must write,” Adena was saying, and there was a catch in her voice as she embraced the stranger. “You must promise me, even if it takes an age for the letters to reach me: I must know how you do there.”

  “You have my word,” the woman replied as Rowena reached the bottom step. “I promise you, Adena, if this was my will – ”

  Her words were cut off as Rowena stepped into the drawing room. Luke looked up at she entered, and smiled gently.

  “Good morning.”

  “Only just,” Rowena said with an answering smile. Throwing herself into a chair, she asked quietly, “Who is that woman in the hallway?”

  If she did not know any better, she would have said that Luke hesitated for a moment before answering, but answer he did. “Miss Margaret Berry. A school friend of Adena’s, I understand, or some such thing.”

  Rowena glanced to the door, now closed and barring any sight or sound of the beautiful stranger. “She did not seem particularly cheerful.”

  Luke barked a laugh. “No, well, she would not. She is emigrating, against her wishes. ‘Tis a curious tale, and not one for me to tell. Toast?”

  His hand moved to ring the bell, but Rowena shook her head. “No, I thank you. I feel a little queasy, and would rather have tea than anything to eat.”

  “Nothing to eat again?” Adena strode through the door shaking her head at her friend. “Really, Rowena, you will fade away completely if you do not eat something!”

  “Do not scold me,” Rowena replied placidly, knowing her friend too well to take her seriously. “I am quite well, I just have no appetite this early in the morning.”

  Adena raised an eyebrow. “My girl, ‘tis nearly midday!”

  A rush of affection rose up in Rowena’s heart to be spoken to by her friend – who was, though she would not remind her of it, two full years younger than herself.

  “My girl?” Rowena smiled, the first smile for a few days.

  Adena seemed to know what she was thinking. As she sat down in a chair opposite her friend, she laid a plate of buttered bread on her lap, and had the good grac
e to smile demurely.

  “Well, as a married woman, you know, I can dictate almost anything to you.”

  Rowena tried to ignore the pain that this remark gave her. She had dearly wanted to be a married woman herself, but James had not wanted that. He had not wanted her.

  In an attempt to stave off the pain that was maiming her heart in that moment, she smiled bracingly and said, “Adena Garland, as you once were, I had only eloped for two days – two days, mark you – and you had already got married!”

  It was through a medley of pain for herself and happiness for her friend that Rowena watched Adena beam at her husband.

  “When you know,” she said quietly, “you know.”

  Luke rose from his chair, dipped his face to his wife’s and gave her a passionate kiss, and return to his seat without a word.

  Impossible as it was to not look at this display of affection without envy, Rowena was captivated by the devotion that Luke showed to his wife – his bride, for now it was but six weeks since they had married.

  Sadness, envy, joy, it was all confused within her heart, and there was no control of it. There seemed to be no control of her emotions at all, recently.

  A cup of steaming tea had appeared by her side, she had not noticed how, but as she raised it her lips, Rowena found that she could simply not take a simple sip. Placing it beside her, undrunk, her gaze wandered around the room and lingered on the window. Faces, blurred through the glass, strode past them.

  One day she may see someone she recognised: James, perhaps.

  At once she tried to force that thought from her mind. James did not know that she was here, no one did. And even if he did, he would not come here. He had not wanted her.

  It was at that moment that Rowena became aware that she was being watched. It started as a prickling at the back of her neck, and then a heat across her cheeks. She looked around.

  Adena was watching her carefully, with a knowing look on her face. Opening her mouth, she said kindly, “Luke, be a darling and go away.”

  Rowena could not help but roll her eyes at the way her friend addressed her husband, but he seemed to enjoy it more than anything else. Laughing, he rose and kissed his wife on the cheek before inclining his head to her, and leaving the room.