Hurting Sarah’s feelings hadn’t been Millie’s intention, but before she could make her apology for speaking too harshly, the maid curtsied and fled the room. Millie took a moment to spear her bonnet with a pin, keeping it in place, and went to find Isaac. She would have to ask Sarah for her pardon later.
Isaac waited in the main foyer, studying a suit of armor near the grand doors. He looked up when she reached the top of the staircase, smiling in greeting. Millie hurried down to him.
He bowed to her. “I thought we might take a walk this morning, Miss Wedgewood.”
“I had the very same idea.” She took his arm at once. That was when she realized she did not wear any gloves. Sarah must have kept them when she made her abrupt departure from the room. Though walking about with ungloved hands was not the worst of sins, she still winced the moment she realized it.
Once they were out in the sunlight, Isaac spoke to her quietly. “Are you well, Millie? There is something not quite right about you today.” He tipped his head to meet her gaze. “You smile, but you feel far away.”
“I am sorry. I do not mean to be a puzzle to you.” She sighed, but the sigh led to a deep yawn. She covered her mouth with the back of her hand. “Oh, I am sorry. I have not slept well of late.”
“You apologize too much.” He examined her face closely, then his eyes swept the front of the house. “No one is watching. Here, come with me. I have just the thing.”
“Just the thing for what?” she asked, lengthening her step to keep up with his pace. He almost seemed excited.
“A nap.”
Millie laughed. “What? Outside?”
“Precisely. The perfect place for someone suffering from nightmares.”
“I never said nightmares—”
“You did not need to.” He adjusted his arm, taking her hand. “As one who suffers regularly from horrid dreams, it is easy enough to recognize the symptoms in another.”
Of course. His nightmares of the war. But her bad dreams were nothing like that. Nothing truly horrible had happened to her. She ought to give him sympathy, not receive it from him. She opened her mouth again, to decline his well-meant kindness, but stopped when they entered a stand of trees not far from the house.
“Here we are. What do you think?” Isaac stopped them before a net hanging from two trees. “The marquess installed it here years ago, after he returned from a trip to India. I had one during one of my campaigns on the Continent. Best sleep I had during the whole of the war.”
“A hammock.” She had heard of them, of course. Sailors slept in canvas hammocks aboard ships. Poorer families installed them in houses, for children to sleep one on top of another. Had she ever heard of one like this before? At a country estate?
“I have been sorely tempted to replace my bed with one of these.” He gave the netting a push. “They rock in the breeze, like a cradle.”
“It looks rather like a net for catching fish. Or birds.” And she had no particular wish to be caught. Millie ventured closer. “How does one even use it?”
Isaac opened the hammock, raising one side high in the air. Then he turned, still holding it up, and moved backward as though he meant to swing. Once his backside was in the net, he leaned into it and let the net take him. Though nothing about his maneuver appeared elegant, as he shifted and finally settled, she found herself intrigued.
“You slept in one of those?”
“I did. Comfortably,” he reminded her, looking up from his place in the net. Once he was in it, the sides of the netting cradled him rather than closing upon him. “Once you master the trick of getting inside, it isn’t so bad. Here. Try.” He sat up, threw his legs out, and stood.
“I will be caught in it, all tangled like a fish.” Millie hesitantly touched one side of the dangerous thing.
“Here. I will hold it on this side for you.” He took a firm grasp of the other end. “Back into it, as I did.”
Millie eyed the net dubiously. “Very well. If I fall, I will hold you responsible.”
“Noted.” Isaac gave her his crooked smile, that dimple appearing in his cheek.
She mimicked what Isaac had done, and he held his end of the net steady. Millie closed her eyes tightly, up until the moment she pulled her legs inside with her, reclining in the netting. She opened one eye, then the other, to see the canopy of trees above.
“There you are. Perfectly situated.” Isaac stood over her, releasing the side of the net slowly. “Comfortable?”
She wiggled her shoulders and her eyebrows raised. “Yes. What a surprise. Except for this.” Her bonnet folded oddly against the net. She pulled the pin out and took off the bonnet, holding it up.
Isaac took it from her, then walked to a tree a few feet away and sat beneath its shade. “Now you may nap, and I will guard your rest.”
“You will sit there. On the ground.”
“Yes.”
She frowned. “While I sleep?”
“Yes.”
Millie folded her hands over her stomach and watched as the leaves above her trembled in the breeze. “Why?” Her heart sped as she asked, though it had no reason for excitement. The question was simple. A good question, too.
“Because you face a hard thing.” His voice was quiet, carrying through the stillness of nature quite well. “And one should not face battle when tired. It impairs judgement. Slows reactions.”
“Were you tired when you went to battle?” she asked, eyes still open. The green above soothed her, the netting of the hammock holding her in a gentle embrace. One could sleep quite well under such circumstances.
“Most of the time.” He sighed, a heavy sound, the weight of all he left unsaid settling in her heart. How often had he marched into the night on a general’s orders? Or laid awake, anticipating battle the next morning? Had he feared for his life or thought himself immortal until he took injury? They were questions she had no right to ask. No man would answer such things, either.
“I am sorry for that,” she said instead. “Did you have nightmares for a long time after?”
“They have never stopped.”
She closed her eyes, aching for him. They said nothing for a time, and the birds in nearby trees began to sing and call to one another again. She did not sway much in the hanging bed, but the summer breeze caressed her arms and cheeks and brushed her hair away from her eyes.
When careful fingertips brushed against her forehead, moving her hair back, Millie blinked awake. Had she slept an hour or only a few minutes? She could not quite tell. The sun was no longer bright with the new morning’s light. Isaac stood over her, his hand upon her cheek.
Millie smiled up at him, warmth from sleep and from his touch mingling into a contentment she had never felt before. “Isaac. What time is it?”
There was a look, a warmth in his deep brown eyes that intrigued her. “Time to wake.” He withdrew his hand and held the net again. She saw her bonnet pinned between his left side and arm. “Be careful.”
Millie struggled to sit up, putting one leg outside the net most indecorously. “Getting out is more difficult—”
She gasped as the net seemed to give way, flipping her out upon the one leg unprepared to take her full weight while the other foot tangled somehow. She staggered forward, one hand holding to the rope and the other grasping Isaac’s arm.
Without quite understanding how it happened, Millie abruptly found herself upon the ground, one foot still caught in the air, and Isaac beneath her. Laughing. The man laughed, as though he had never laughed before.
She had certainly never heard him laugh like that. Deep, and long, and then gasping. His arm went around her waist, and she pulled her foot one last time. She freed herself from the net, but her knee came down with such force into Isaac’s leg that he cut off his laugh with a groan.
“I am sorry,” she said, pushing herself up with both hands. One of the hands was on the ground, the other on his chest, so she pushed the breath out of him as well. They were a tangle of skirts
, arms, legs, and it was all the dratted hammock’s fault.
Millie looked down at him, uncertain if she dare try to move again. Their gazes caught, a wry smile upon his handsome face. “Millie.”
It was only her name. He had said it many times. She had heard it her whole life. But everything changed when he said it this time, with the way he said it, as though it were a precious word. A declaration.
Her lips parted, she meant to speak. To ask him something.
Then she bent and kissed him instead. Carefully. Tenderly. Asking him something after all, but without using words. He touched her face, accepted the press of her lips and returned each token she offered with one of his own.
Nothing else mattered. Nothing in the whole world. Just Isaac.
Then she withdrew, sitting upon the ground, looking down at him. Isaac kept his gaze directed upward when she moved away, staring up into the trees. He dropped his hand to his chest, just over his heart.
Did he feel it, too? That tugging, that longing, that made her want to curl into his side and stay forever.
“Please. Do not do that again.” Desperation filled each word.
The sweet fog that had wrapped around her thoughts, shutting out everything but Isaac, disappeared at once, chased away by the harsh winds of reality.
He remained upon the ground still, as though he had been felled in battle. Indeed, he spoke as a doomed man. “Not unless you mean to give me hope.”
Millie picked up her bonnet, where it had fallen and been crushed. Ruined completely. She twisted one of the ribbons around her fingers. “Hope for what, Isaac?”
He grunted as he sat up, facing her, still there upon the ground. “I have never met anyone like you, Millicent Wedgewood. Prospective villainess.” He shoved his gloved hand through his hair, his hat somewhere on the ground behind them. “I could love you.”
Her gaze shifted up to his, and she quite forgot to breathe for several long moments. “You could?” Her heart pounded anew in her chest, but its hopeful rhythm did not last long.
“Yes. Enough to marry you.” There was pain, so much pain, in his crooked smile. “But I do not think you want that.” He stood and turned his back on her, going after the missing hat. Millie lowered her eyes again to her bonnet, the ribbons crushed in her grasp.
“No. I suppose I do not. Or, rather, I suppose I cannot.” Everything would end for her family. Lady Olivia would revenge herself upon Millie, with Lord Carning’s help.
Was this why Emmeline had run away, hidden from Society, without regard for who she hurt? Because she had fallen in love?
Millie loved Isaac. She saw that at last. Sarah had been right, as she always was. Isaac could tuck Millie away in the country and love her forever and always, and she would be happy.
But Lady Olivia would surely make it difficult for them to ever enter Society again. Lord Carning would spread rumors, too, whispering in ears as he did before.
Just the same, Millie could not do what Lady Olivia wanted. She could not hurt Isaac. Never, in a thousand years; she did not know how to even pretend to hurt him.
“I need to go.” The words slipped from her lips, and she stumbled to her feet to obey her own pronouncement. “Thank you. For everything.” Her hands shook, but she forced a smile when she met his eyes again. “Good afternoon, Isaac.”
Millie did not believe in dramatics, so she did not run. She walked. Slowly and deliberately walked away from him. The short nap had helped, though the kissing had muddled her thoughts again. What was she to do?
She passed servants in the house. They either did not notice the state of her hair and clothing or they were exceptionally well-trained not to react to such things. Or perhaps they did not care.
She stepped into her room, and Sarah stood there. The maid stretched out her hand, a slip of paper in her grasp. “I know where your sister is, miss.”
Chapter 21
Isaac paced the nursery, his nephew cradled close to his chest sleepily sucking on his two middle fingers. The baby’s eyes were closed, and he cooed to himself sweetly as he fell into a doze. The warmth, the soft infant sounds, of baby Isaac soothed his uncle more than anyone’s words possibly could.
What was it about children, the tiniest in particular, that made one view life differently?
“I heard you were skulking in my nursery again.” Esther came up beside him as softly as she had spoken, her son’s only reaction to smile sleepily upon hearing his mother’s voice.
“I cannot help that my favorite person resides in your nursery.” He settled into a gentle rocking motion, swaying like a tree in a breeze.
“You ought to get married, Isaac. You will make such a wonderful father. Attentive. Doting. All your children will be spoiled rather terribly.” Esther kissed her baby’s head to punctuate her remark.
Isaac did not even try to make light of his sister’s teasing. His mind rested heavily upon matters too close to his heart. “My nephew will be the only child in my life for some time yet.”
“You sound as though you do not enjoy that idea. I will make certain my son does not take your remark amiss.” Esther settled in a chair near the nursery’s small hearth. “What happened, Isaac? I have not seen you in a bleak mood like this in some time.”
“Bleak?” He came to sit in the chair near hers, keeping his nephew cradled close to his chest. He lowered himself slowly enough that the baby did not wake from his gentle slumber. “I protest your use of that word, Essie.”
“It fits. You certainly carry on as a hopeless man. What is it that has upset you?”
Isaac leaned his head back against the small chair, meant more for a woman the size of his sister or a nursery maid than someone of his stature. “Nightmares. That is all.”
“I am sorry those still trouble you.” Her brows drew together in sympathy with his words. “Would it help if you slept somewhere else? I do hate that you are in that old house all alone.”
“There are a dozen servants nearby at all times,” Isaac countered. “I am not alone.”
“Servants are not the same as family.” Esther tapped the arm of the chair, studying him nearly as intently as she had when she’d painted his portrait. “You dine alone, you spend your days alone, and you go to bed alone with your nightmares.”
“Essie.” Isaac glowered at her. “I am a bachelor. All of those things are quite normal for one in my position.”
“You are not like other bachelors. You have no family to distract you, but you do not go away to parties and entertainments. You spend all your time shut up in your house. Never going out into the neighborhood unless I insist upon your escort. I worry for you.”
“Because you are a kind sister. But you need not trouble yourself.”
“What do you think of Miss Wedgewood?” Esther asked abruptly. “You seemed terribly concerned for her before.”
“Your evaluation of the situation was correct. I cannot abide to see someone in distress if I might be capable of offering assistance.” He kept his eyes upon the sleeping baby, watching as the child’s chest rose and fell. “I wish to help her. She means nothing more to me.” Little Isaac’s fingers had fallen out of his mouth, but the baby occasionally made small sucking motions with his lips.
Esther said nothing for a time. The peaceful silence was deceptive, however. Isaac knew his sister well enough to sense the way her thoughts churned before she spoke again. “Isaac. I think you have grown to care for Miss Wedgewood. I have not seen you smile as you have in her company since before you left for the war, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen you as distressed as you were when you feared for her well-being.”
Isaac shifted in the chair, but not enough to disturb the child in his arm. “I have compassion for her.”
“No. You are smitten with her.”
Why waste his breath arguing? Esther was right, but he would not admit it to her. He had thought on their shared kisses and nothing else for the whole of the day. Kissing her behind the church had been as much to t
est his feelings as to fulfill her dare. Kissing her in the grass, after her tumble from the hammock, had been her decision. One he had enjoyed, up until the moment he realized his heart was already too broken to be of any use to her.
He was too broken.
“Miss Wedgewood is chasing Society’s good opinion.” Isaac could state that truth with a firmness no one would argue. “I am not at all a suitable match for her.”
“You are a baronet with a powerful earl as your brother-in-law. That is good enough for most hostesses in London.” Essie tried to tease with her words, but when he did not even glance at her, his sister sighed. “Does she know how you feel?”
“Yes.” He had as good as told her everything. Enough to marry you. But I do not think you want that. Millie’s confirmation of his assessment had wounded him. His feelings were outside of her agenda to raise her family from the dregs of Society back to an elevated and respected position. She wanted to be someone of importance. She did not desire the title of Lady Fox, though no woman he knew would fulfill the role so well as Millie.
Esther made a sound of annoyance. A snort, truthfully, worthy of his horse. Then she came to him, bending to collect her son in her arms. “Out in the hall. I have something to say to you.” She walked away with the baby, doubtless to put her son in his bed.
Isaac shrugged to himself, though what Esther might say intrigued him. His sister hadn’t experienced a romance the likes of which poets or musicians would pen. Yet she was excessively happy, and very much in love, with Silas.
When he stepped out into the hall, the nursery maid waited. She curtsied and then went inside the room to see to her charge. A moment later, Esther came out and immediately linked an arm through his. “Walk with me.”
“As you wish, countess,” Isaac agreed with a dip of his head.
She gave him a slanted glare. “Do not think you can get out of this conversation with levity. It is high time we had this talk. You may be my older brother, but that obviously does not make you the wiser of the two of us.”
Engaging Sir Isaac: An Inglewood Romance Page 22
