Chapter Three
Maxwell waited on the far end of the promenade the next afternoon, where he’d sent word for Belinda to meet him, and tugged at his jacket sleeves. Good Lord, he was nervous! He hadn’t been this much on edge since the last time he’d charged into battle. But then, this was Belinda. Little difference between her and the French.
Both had good reason to shoot him.
She’d surprised the devil out of him by asking to speak with him, but it wouldn’t be to simply reiterate that she thought him a monster and that she had no intention of supporting the academy. That could have been put into the message itself, with no need to see him face-to-face. Most likely, she planned to attempt to cajole him to her side and, when that failed, toss him onto the first ship bound for Australia.
Still, the best defense was a good offense, and an experienced soldier never gave his opponent time to regroup. Which was why he’d told her to meet him at the edge of the town, right where the cliffs began to rise from the sea. And why he’d called in every favor he had with the men in the barracks to arrange the surprise waiting for her.
As if out of a dream, her lithe figure appeared on the promenade.
She walked toward him, with the skirts of her ivory dress stirring around her legs in the sea breeze and her bonnet shielding her face from the sun, and his pulse spiked. Old desires—and dreams—died hard.
Dear God, she was beautiful, and not because of how she looked. Oh, she was pretty, certainly, but not classically. Not with that pert little nose that turned up slightly at the tip, those green eyes that were too big for her face, and that auburn hair that couldn’t decide if it wanted to be red or brown and never stayed in its pins.
No, it was her soul that radiated beauty and commanded a man’s attention. While other women were content to follow, Belinda led with her heart. Always had. Indeed, he’d fallen in love with her because of it.
And it was her kind heart that once again had them at odds.
She stopped in front of him. When her eyes met his, an electric jolt sped through him so intensely that he lost his breath.
“My apologies for being late.” The ribbons from her bonnet fluttered in the sea breeze, and she tucked them inside her jacket. “I dropped off a basket of sweet rolls at the hospital. It took longer than expected.”
“No apologies necessary.” His gaze languidly drifted over her. He felt like a blind man given back his sight, and he couldn’t stop staring. “You look lovely.”
“Maxwell, please don’t.” A faint blush pinked her cheeks, but he couldn’t have said whether from pleasure at the compliment or aggravation. At that moment, he didn’t particularly care which.
“You’d rather I’d lie and say the exact opposite?” When he reached for her hand, she didn’t pull away. Perhaps she didn’t think him a complete monster after all. “Very well. You’re the most hideous woman I’ve ever met, and every time I’m near you, I want to flee.”
She laughed at the absurdity of his words. But the urge to kiss her was simply too great to resist, and he turned over her hand to place a tender kiss against her palm.
Her laughter died. She stiffened, as if waiting for him to wound her again.
Her reaction eviscerated him. But he hid the pain by forcing a grin and adding, “I want nothing more than to put as much distance between us as possible.”
“You do, do you?” Suspicion thickened her voice.
“Absolutely.” He pressed his advantage by looping her arm around his and leading her down the steps to the rocky beach below. Her sweet scent of lavender filled his senses. “I cannot think of anything I’d rather do less than spend hours in your company.”
“Then it’s a good thing that we’ll only have to suffer a brief conversation this afternoon.”
He stopped short. When she slipped her arm free and walked on ahead a few paces, he stared after her. Did the little vixen mean that as part of their teasing in opposites, or was she serious?
Once again, Belinda had him on his toes. No wonder dukes fought for the privilege of courting her. There was never a dull moment in her company.
He caught up with her and took her arm, guiding her along the beach. “This way.”
“Where are we going?” She blinked against the late afternoon sun as it sank toward the horizon. “I was hoping we could talk.”
“We will. But first, just a short walk along the beach.” When she hesitated, he purposely misread her reaction and assured her, “Don’t worry. The tide won’t be in for several more hours.”
“It isn’t the tide that I’m worried about,” she muttered.
His lips crooked into a half grin. “Worried that I’ll tie you down and hold you captive until you see reason and support the academy?”
“I think you’d enjoy it.”
A sharp pang of yearning reverberated shamelessly inside him at her unwitting innuendo. When they’d courted before, he’d never been anything more than a gentleman with her, no matter how much he’d longed to lay her down and strip her dress away. With his teeth.
He cleared his throat, but it didn’t keep a husky rasp from his voice. “A man has to do what a man has to do.”
She slid him a dubious sideways glance. “Including ropes and sailors’ knots?”
“I’d never use sailors’ knots against you.”
“Well, thank good—”
“I’m a soldier,” he continued, deadpan. “We use irons.”
Halting in her steps, she jerked her arm away. The hard look that she narrowed on him could have cut glass.
He chuckled at how easily she’d risen to the bait, how much he’d always liked stirring the fire inside her. Ignoring her irritated but surprisingly adorable sniff at his teasing, he once more took her arm.
He led her farther down the cliff face, until they were out of sight of the town and on an isolated stretch of beach fronted by tiny coves and other indentations carved into the soft limestone rock. Until they were alone.
“Perhaps we should stop and talk now,” she suggested, the nervousness visible in her.
“Perhaps we should explore what’s just beyond that next cliff.” Whatever it was that she wanted to say to him would keep until she saw the surprise. It was mercenary, he’d admit that, and done more than just to gain her favor with the board—he also did it simply because he wanted time alone with her. “There’s a stretch of sandy beach there that I think you’ll appreciate.”
She arched an unconvinced brow. “And I think you’re simply hoping to get me alone so you can charm me into supporting the academy.”
“You’ve given me no choice. When diplomacy fails, a good soldier attacks.”
He sensed immediately that he’d said the wrong thing, despite his joking tone. The very worst thing because she stiffened, turning instantly cold.
“I don’t need reminders of your military career, Maxwell,” she said into the wind, turning her face away as if she couldn’t bear to look at him. “I’m well aware of exactly how dedicated a soldier you are.”
Damnation. He should have known better. “Then how about a reminder that I’m more than just a soldier? I’m out of uniform. Hadn’t you noticed?”
“Oh, I noticed.” Yet she slightly turned her head back toward him in a surreptitious glance.
He stopped her and tugged her around to face him. “Take a good look, Belinda.” She startled slightly at his order. “A good, long look.”
For a moment, her bright eyes never left his as she stubbornly refused to do as he asked.
Then, as if unable to resist, she slowly lowered her gaze, trailing it over him, from the neckcloth his man had taken great pains to knot to perfection, to the tan cashmere jacket and brown and white diamond-pattern waistcoat beneath. He was certain she’d stop her perusal there, but the audacious woman continued on, her eyes drinking in the cut of his brown trousers all the way down to his boots.
When she began a languid return up the length of him, he nearly groaned at the torture that her heated look spiraled through him.
A stray curl had escaped the confines of her bonnet, and using it as an excuse to touch her, he reached to tuck it back into place.
“See?” He opportunistically caressed her cheek as he pulled his hand away, then thrilled at the soft shiver that sped through her. “This afternoon, I’m simply a civilian. Don’t think of me as a soldier.”
“I don’t think I can,” she admitted. Ignoring the affectionate touch he’d just taken, she busied herself with securing the ends of the ribbons that once more danced in the breeze. But she couldn’t hide the shaking of her hands. “I’ve only ever known you as a soldier.”
Feeling as if he were plunging right over the cliffs above them, he corrected, “You knew me as a man, Belinda.”
“I thought I did.” Her breathless voice was so soft that it was almost lost beneath the noise of the wind and waves. “I was wrong.”
“You knew me better than anyone.”
“No.” She gave up on securing the ribbons and tossed them away in irritation. “The man I knew would never have abandoned me.”
He didn’t attempt to lessen the wounding those words sliced into him, knowing he deserved it. Instead, he deepened the punishing pain by confirming her worst thoughts of him. “The man you knew would have done exactly that.”
And did.
When she opened her mouth to reply, he cut her off. “The past is over.” And nothing that he wanted to discuss with her. “We’re different people now, with different responsibilities and concerns, and there’s no point in arguing about the past when nothing can be done to change it.”
She arched a piqued brow. “When we’re so able to argue about the future, you mean?”
“When I’d rather not argue with you at all.” Solemnly, all teasing gone, he held out his hand in invitation to continue their walk. “You once trusted me. Give me the chance to earn back that trust.”
She hesitated.
“Please.”
For a long moment, she didn’t move. Then she gave a jerking nod.
Not letting himself think about the racing of his heartbeat when her hand slipped into his, he guided her carefully over the rocks as they gave way to sand just beyond the rounded front of the cliff face towering above them. Overhead, in the last light of sunset, gulls cried out against the din of the rolling waves striking far across the wide stretch of beach exposed by the outgoing tide.
“What was it that you called me in yesterday’s meeting?” Although he knew very well. Despite not allowing it to show, he’d been pierced by the accusation. “A monster?”
Remorse flashed over her face, yet the stubborn woman didn’t apologize. But he hadn’t expected her to.
“I’m not a monster, Belinda. I’m simply trying to save as many lives as possible.” He stopped, turning so that he blocked her view into the narrow cove behind him. “Give me the opportunity to convince you that I have only the best interests of everyone at heart. That’s all I’m asking for. Just the chance to be heard.”
He stepped aside to reveal the surprise waiting for her.
* * *
Belinda gasped. “A picnic?”
She blinked at the sight, unable for a moment to believe her eyes. No, she was wrong—this was so much more than a picnic. This was… oh, this was simply magical!
A sailcloth lay spread across the patch of powdery white sand, anchored in place against the wind on all four corners by large brass lanterns whose flames danced in the sea breeze, their oil giving off a spicy scent. Scattered across the cloth were several dishes covered with lids so that she couldn’t see what they contained, along with several pillows in jewel-tone satins and a long and narrow Turkish rug edging the side of the sailcloth. A small fire of driftwood flickered on the rocks a few feet away.
All like something out of The Arabian Nights… exotic and romantic, complete with red rose petals scattered across the white cloth.
“How…” She was too stunned to finish. Thank goodness that amazement covered her face, because it hid the confused thrill pulsating through her that Maxwell had gone to all this trouble for her.
“With the aid of the men at the barracks.” He led her to the rug and helped her to gracefully lower herself. “Do you like it?”
She loved it. And yet… “I won’t support the academy, if that’s what this is about.”
He repeated pointedly, matching her own stubbornness, “Do you like it?”
“It’s tolerable,” she grudgingly admitted.
Quirking a knowing smile, he placed one of the pillows behind her so she could recline. Then he sat beside her.
She gestured at the spread. “Why go to all this trouble?”
“Because you’re right. I want your support.” He reached to pour her a glass of wine. “I’m not above being the type of man who charms his way into a woman’s affections.”
At that, she couldn’t prevent a little laugh. Charming. He was definitely that, all right. But she knew the truth. That he didn’t have to charm his way back into her affections because he’d never completely left them, despite everything. Which was what had always bothered her most… How could a man whom she’d known well enough to love with all her heart fool her so well?
He held out the glass to her. “Surely you don’t begrudge a man the opportunity to use every weapon at his disposal?”
“I suppose that would depend upon how the weapon was wielded,” she clarified, accepting the wine.
His eyes shone knowingly. “And who was doing the wielding?”
She pressed her lips tightly together. Drat him. She couldn’t properly answer that without digging herself deeper. The devil knew it, too. He was nothing if not razor-sharp, always had been. His mind had been one of the things she’d loved best about him. That and his understanding of how much her charity work meant to her, how much purpose she found in helping others.
Yet she wasn’t a dolt herself. “Since when does a picnic count as a weapon?”
“Wait until you’ve had my cooking.” He winked at her.
Her breath hitched. She stared at him, speechless. She couldn’t have replied right then even if she’d known what to say.
He stretched out casually across the length of the rug behind her, propping himself up on one elbow. He reached to pluck a grape from the cluster lying on a platter in front of them. “You always liked picnics, and I thought this might be a good way for us to catch up on what our lives have been like since we last spoke.”
Not wanting to reopen old wounds, she waved a hand toward the spread. “You spent your life lounging with Scheherazade by lantern light?”
“Actually, when I wasn’t being shot at, I spent my summers mostly laboring in the hot sun, the rainy seasons fighting off mosquitoes, and my nights sleeping in cramped barracks with thirty other men.” He blew out a long-suffering sigh and popped the grape into his mouth. “Every last one of whom snored loudly enough to shake the rafters.”
When she laughed, he plucked a second grape and held it up to her lips.
Her belly pinched. Fearing that he was offering far more than a mere grape, she raised her wineglass to her lips like a shield. “If you think a picnic can sway me, you’re mistaken.”
“Not a picnic. I told you. A chance to get to know each other again.”
In one last desperate attempt to cling to her pride, she sat up and busied herself with uncovering the dishes, each more exotic than the one before. Focusing all of her attention on a bowl of yellow rice, she mumbled, “I think we know each other well enough already.”
“Not nearly well enough.”
His low voice sent a warm tingle spiraling through her, which did nothing to put her at ease and everything to cause her hand to tremor as she lifted the lid on a plate of red chicken.
“I want you to know the man I’ve become, so you can understand why I’m set on opening the academy. Perhaps we can find common ground.”
She wasn’t certain she wanted to know him any better. “That depends.” She sat back, her fingers tightening around her wineglass. “What do you want to know about me?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?” she squeaked out. That pricked at her pride.
Mischief sparkled in his eyes, as if he could see right through her and knew exactly how much his comment baited her. Then he took the glass out of her hand, set it aside, and raised the grape once more to her lips.
She hesitated, then opened her mouth to let him place it on her tongue. She simply couldn’t resist. Being with him like this felt too familiar to deny. Too right.
“I don’t need to know about you,” he explained, suddenly solemn, “because I made a point of always knowing what your life was like, what you were doing, all the charities you were involved with. No matter how far I traveled, I was never able to put you behind me.”
Instead of lowering his hand, he audaciously stroked his thumb over her bottom lip. She shivered, but she couldn’t tell which was making her head spin more—the deep, husky purr of his voice or the way he caressed her mouth, as if pondering whether he wanted to kiss her. Or devour her.
Then he dropped his hand so suddenly that she nearly whimpered at the loss of his touch. He reached for a plate and began to spoon out small bites of the various dishes. “But there is one thing I still need to know.”
She inhaled a deep breath to steady herself. “Which is?”
“Why are you so concerned about the pensioners?” He held out the plate to her, as casually as if they were friends lunching on the green in Hyde Park instead of adversaries on a secluded stretch of beach. “They’ll be taken care of, I promise you. They’ll have good homes, perhaps even in Chelsea or Greenwich.”
She took the plate and held it awkwardly. For one desperate moment, she wanted to tell him, in case it made a difference in keeping the men here in their home. But how could she share the awful truth? That it was the pensioners who comforted her and gave her strength and understanding when he’d abandoned her, choosing the army over her. That she was right here in Brighton when she received word that her father had died, helping in the hospital. Over the years, being a hospital patroness gave her a feeling of closeness to both of the men she’d lost, a connection she hadn’t yet been able to relinquish. The pensioners had helped her survive when the darkness had closed in upon her. Now it was her turn to protect them and help them survive, just as they’d helped her.
How could she ever make him understand all that? If he even deserved to know in the first place.
She set the plate down, untouched, and threw his question back at him. “Why are you so concerned about training cadets? Surely they can learn battle tactics and leadership better on the field than in classrooms and on parade grounds.”
His face hardened with a small deepening in the lines at the corners of his eyes. “Because I’m fed up with a system in which promising young men never have the chance to reach their full potential or demonstrate what they’re capable of becoming. If we can enroll more cadets, then we can train better officers, and everyone has the opportunity to rise in the ranks as high as their competence and skills allow.” He turned away from her, squinting into the sun that was sinking in a blood-red ball toward the horizon. “And perhaps more men can return alive from the battlefield.”
She bit her lip. All good points. But… “Once they return, don’t they deserve to be taken care of? To be given a permanent home and not be shuffled about from place to place whenever the army decides it no longer wants them around? What does that say to the men who risk their lives for England?”
“That once a soldier, always a soldier.”
She leaned toward him, unwilling to let him dismiss her concerns so easily. “They have every right—”
“The real question,” he interrupted, countering her offensive with one of his own, “is why you asked to meet me this afternoon.” He rested his forearm across his bent knee, his hand clenching lightly into a fist as if to keep himself from reaching for her. “Obviously, it wasn’t to tell me that you haven’t changed your mind.”
Guilt sparked inside her. When she’d schemed to avoid Pomperly, she’d still believed Maxwell to be the horrible, selfish blackguard who’d used her and cast her away, who deserved to be used in kind. But now, knowing how much it meant to him to have proper training for the soldiers, he seemed far less of a monster.
“Because I need you,” she answered grudgingly.
He chuckled, a low sound that rumbled into her. “Why do I think it’s not the way a man wants to be needed by a woman?”
Oh, that devil! Her face flushed hot. “That is not what I meant, and you know it!”
Without a repentant bone in his body, he stroked his knuckles across her cheek. “Pity.”
Stunned, she clutched at the rug beneath her, desperate to hold on to anything as the world rocked around her. He couldn’t possibly mean… could he?
Then the reality of their past crashed over her. What a fool she was! To let herself think it, even for a fleeting heartbeat—no. She doubted he held a single affection toward her. Even the trouble of this picnic wasn’t for her but to try to persuade her to his side.
She pushed his hand away to hide her mortification that the devil could affect her even now. And to quash an unexpected pang of sadness that she didn’t have the same effect on him. “There’s a dinner at the Pavilion with His Majesty.” She busied her empty hands by pulling at the yarns in the rug beneath her. “The Duke of Pomperly has invited me to be his guest. But I prefer not to attend with him.”
“Then refuse.” His blunt response startled her. So did the suddenly sharp edge to his voice. With any other man, she would have claimed he was jealous.
“I cannot refuse an invitation to dine with the king, even if it comes from a man whom I’d rather avoid.” Nor could she afford to offend a board member. “But I can refuse if I’m already attending the dinner with someone else.”
“Who?”
Guilt at using him to avoid Pomperly added to the knot sitting in her belly like a lead ball, and she bit her bottom lip. “You.”
“I see,” he drawled, his face inscrutable.
“You’re a brigadier, one of the highest-ranking officers in Brighton,” she rushed out. “Surely you’ll receive an invitation or can wrangle one. Or I can contact the Pavilion and request that you be put on the guest list. So I thought—I thought that you’d—” Now that the scheme was hatched, the words poured from her as she attempted to find purchase in her persuasion. And failing. Because he returned her gaze with an unreadable expression, with no indication if he were sympathetic to her situation. Or simply thought her mad.
She fell silent, realizing with embarrassment that her explanation was paltry justification for using him.
He covered her hand with his, stilling her nervous fingers against the rug. “I’ll accompany you.”
She blinked. “You will?”
“But not to spite Pomperly.” Masculine pride underpinned his voice. “I’ll do it on two conditions.”
She felt as if she were negotiating terms of surrender with the enemy. “Which are?”
“I’ll escort you to the dinner if you agree to accompany me to the barracks to meet the soldiers.”
Suspicion prickled at the backs of her knees. “Why?”
“Just to talk to them.” His deep voice curled softly around her, nearly lost beneath the sound of the rolling waves breaking against the shore. “To find out what their lives in the army have been like.”
Without agreeing, she asked a bit breathlessly, very aware of the warmth of his hand still covering hers, “And your second condition?”
“That you want to spend the evening with me because you want to be with me.”
Clinging to what little pride she had left, she lifted her chin with an imperious sniff, but succeeded only in drawing a grin from him. Oh, that infuriating devil!
“Why would I want to spend the evening with you?” she asked, determined to pretend that he wasn’t affecting her when he was actually shaking her to her core.
He smiled with arrogant charm. “Because you like me.”
“Ha!” Her indignation flared at that. But blast it, she couldn’t bring herself to pull her hand from his. “I don’t like you.”
His eyes gleamed. “A great deal.”
“A very little,” she shot back. Then she grumbled, “And less with each passing moment.”
With a quirk of his brow, he lifted her hand to his lips to place a kiss to her palm. She managed to fight down the tremble that threatened to sweep through her. But when he slid his mouth down to her wrist, her pulse spiked tellingly against his lips, and he smiled.
“A great deal,” he repeated in a rakish murmur.
He slipped a hand behind her nape and tugged her gently toward him before her confused mind had the chance to realize what was happening so she could stop him. Then his lips found hers, and stopping him was the very last thing she wanted to do.
Closing her eyes against the agonizing flood of bittersweet memories that his tender kiss unlocked, she placed her hand against his chest for something solid to cling to as the world around her fell away completely. His heart pounded beneath her fingertips, an echo to her own racing pulse, and she knew she was lost. The achingly sweet kiss tasted of the past, of love and promise… of home.
When he shifted back, breaking the kiss, the loss of contact was so powerful that a whimper rose on her lips.
He stared at her wide-eyed, as if he couldn’t believe that he’d kissed her, with a bewildered expression that she was certain mirrored her own. But for all the confusion that kiss created, the pull of it had been irresistible.
“Maxwell,” she whispered, her right hand rising to touch her lips. She could still feel the heat and strength of his kiss, like a shadow of the love they’d once shared. A ghost pain of the life together that fate denied them.
“Forgive me.” He reached to once again gently take her hand, this time covering it with both of his. And this time, she couldn’t hold back the trembling.
“Of course.” But her voice sounded strained, as if every lie she was telling herself was audible in it. “It was only a kiss.” Oh, it was so much more than that! “It was nothing.” It was simply breathtaking. “We both got caught up in old memories and feelings and…” And something inside her had desperately wanted that kiss. “It won’t happen again.” Even now she yearned to be taken back into his arms, kissed breathless, and told that everything was going to be all right, as if the past had never happened—
But the past couldn’t be changed. She was a fool to wish that it could.
“It was only a kiss... nothing,” she repeated. This time, she meant every word.
“No.” He gave her fingers a tender squeeze. “I meant about what happened ten years ago.”
That small touch of affection raced up her arm and landed warmly in her breast. Heavens, she desperately needed an anchor! But the soothing caress of his fingers over the backs of hers only increased the spinning inside her head. So did that stunning declaration.
“Forgive me, Belinda.” The hard set of his jaw told her how difficult this was for him. “I made what I thought was the best decision at the time.”
One that ended up nearly destroying her. She pulled her hand away and pressed her fist to her chest to physically hold back the pain of old wounds that were once more bleeding as if still fresh.
“Why should I forgive?” Somehow, she kept her voice even. She wanted to scream!
“Because I’m not the man I was before.”
Oh, that was certainly true. She could see the changes in him with her own eyes. Age had mellowed his brashness, and maturity had dulled the impulsive edge she so clearly remembered in the young man he’d once been.
But was he truly repentant for what he’d done, or was he simply playing her for a fool… again?
As if reading her doubts, he slowly pulled at her bonnet ribbons, untying them with a gentle tug. She inhaled sharply at the far-too familiar gesture but couldn’t find the resolve to push his hands away.
“Say that you’ll forgive me,” he cajoled, removing the bonnet and setting it aside.
Then he reached up to her hair and scandalously pulled loose the pins holding her chignon. Spurred on by the sea breeze, her hair spilled free, stirring in the wind around her shoulders.
He stilled as his eyes drank her in. Not moving, not touching, only looking… yet the heated intensity in him coiled a powerful longing deep inside her.
Somehow finding the strength to keep her wits about her, she rasped out in a breathless whisper, “I don’t want your apology.”
“Good. Because I’m not giving one.”
Surprise darted through her, and her lips parted. Taking her reaction as an invitation, he brushed his thumb over her bottom lip. His eyes softened as he focused on the caress, as if touching her like this was the most important thing in the world.
“I’ve made a lifetime of mistakes,” he admitted, remorse roughening his voice, “and I’ve learned that apologies are meaningless. I would never demean you by offering one.” She stiffened beneath his touch, so stunned that for a moment she forgot to breathe. “An apology, no matter how sincere, can never make up for the pain I caused you. And for that, I am truly sorry.”
Fresh anguish sliced into her heart, and she flinched at the pain, so fierce it was visceral. There was a time when she would have given anything to hear those words from him. But that was ten years ago—a different lifetime. Hearing them now brought only torment at the reminder of all they’d lost.
He stared at her so intensely that the little hairs on her arms stood on end. As if he had so much more he wanted to confess. But he said nothing and instead dared to comb his fingers through her hair.
Her heart skipped. In that missed beat, she saw everything her life could have been with him, the family and home they could have made, the dreams and hopes they could have shared—
Then it was gone in a flash of brutal reality.
The pain was vicious. Because her heart knew the truth… that Maxwell didn’t regret what he’d done. What he regretted was that fate had brought them together again while she still blamed him, when he needed her on his side in the fight over the academy. When he once more needed her help to advance his career.
“I can’t forgive you.” She slowly pushed his hand down and moved away, unable to bear his touch a moment longer.
Wisely, he remained where he was, as if sensing that reaching for her again would be the worst mistake he could make. “Not now,” he asked solemnly, “or not ever?”
Unable to find the courage to put full voice to how much he’d wounded her, how the darkness of that time nearly destroyed her, she whispered instead, “I think… I think our picnic’s over.”
* * *
Richard Marbury, Duke of Pomperly, watched the two figures walking together up from the beach in twilight’s darkening shadows. He noted the way Belinda rested her hand on Thorpe’s arm, how his hand reached up to cover hers—only for a moment before dropping back to his side. A gesture of tenderness and affection. One she marked by stiffening ever so slightly, but in her connection to him not shifting away.
Then Pomperly turned away from his carriage window and signaled with a sharp rap of his cane to the roof for his driver to move on.
So the rumors he’d heard about the duchess’s youthful liaison with Maxwell Thorpe were true after all. And from the looks of things, the two were picking up right where they’d left off.
“Not if I have anything to say about it,” he grumbled.
Belinda was the perfect choice to become Duchess of Pomperly, and nothing was going to get in his way of making her his. Certainly not some upstart baron’s son turned army officer who didn’t have the good sense to realize when he was overstepping. Very much overstepping, in fact, to think that he could win himself a duchess.
Oh, she might find him pleasant enough as an old friend. Or attractive enough for an assignation or two, to take care of whatever physical needs hadn’t been satisfied since Winchester died. But certainly nothing beyond that.
A brigadier’s wife? He snorted. Even Belinda wasn’t reformer enough for that.
No, she was meant to be a duchess. His duchess. Well-cultured, already familiar with the demands of the rank and how to navigate the highest levels of Society, possessing a nice fortune of her own and so would never need to touch his—she was perfect. Doubly so, considering that she was barren and that he already had heirs from his previous duchess. There would be no children to interfere in their marriage.
No mere army officer was going to steal her away.
He’d just have to make certain that Thorpe was put in his proper place… all the way to Africa.