Chapter 7
A kiss?
Alice, her heart nearly leaping out of her chest, her skin going instantly clammy, smiled almost maniacally and had to stop the sudden urge to throw herself into his arms. Oh, finally, finally! “Very well,” she managed to say lightly. “I have been engaged three times, after all.” Alice knew she sounded calm enough, but inside she was such a jumble nerves she sincerely doubted she’d be able to take a step without keeling over. How many times had she wondered what it would be like to kiss Henderson? Those nights lying in bed, pressing the back of her hand against her lips and imaging she was pressing her mouth against his.
Except that Henderson was standing there in front of her, arms crossed casually, looking for all the world as if he’d just asked to shake her hand. A thrush flew overhead and he was momentarily distracted, and when he turned back, he looked at her expectantly, with an almost bored look on his handsome face. He gave her a quick smile. “Perhaps not.”
“Oh, no, that would be fine. A fair exchange for saving my life,” Alice said, knowing she was grandly overstating the matter. Although people had died of adder bites. Sick people. Small children.
“Very well.” He looked as if he’d wished he’d never claimed such a reward, but Alice refused to give up on what might very well be the only time she’d ever get to kiss him.
He took two steps, his blue eyes moving from her green ones down to her lips. He placed one hand on each upper arm, holding her gently. Henderson Southwell is going to kiss me. Now. Oh God! He was so near, she could see his beard starting to grow, the way his upper lip seemed sharply carved, but his lower fuller. With her knees knocking beneath her skirts and her heart beating madly in her chest, Alice leaned forward just a bit, and closed her eyes, her entire body focused on her lips and the touch that would soon be on them.
There. Oh, yes.
And then, to her horror, Alice burst out laughing. It was something she’d done all her life. She’d nearly laughed at her first fiancé’s funeral and had laughed standing in the vestibule waiting for Lord Northrup to show up. And she laughed now, even as her heart broke. How she hated herself at that moment, for Henderson immediately withdrew and Alice opened her eyes to see him looking down at her with an expression of puzzled bemusement.
“I’m so sorry, Henny,” Alice said, still laughing, still dying inside. How could she explain her laughter? How could she tell him that she’d been dreaming of his kiss since she was fifteen years old and the thought that this moment had finally come had sent her into such a nervous state she could hardly stand? She couldn’t. And so she said the first thing that came into her head, the first thing that didn’t seem ridiculous. “It’s just that it’s almost like kissing Oliver.”
He narrowed his eyes and let out a small answering laugh before dropping his hands and stepping back, and Alice felt so very cold at that moment, missing the warmth and strength of his hands on her arms.
“Well, then.” He jammed his hands into his pockets and looked down the path.
Alice truly felt like crying. She would never get another chance to kiss the one man she loved. Lord Northrup was a nice enough fellow and she did hold him in great affection, but she hadn’t loved him. Hadn’t nearly swooned when he’d kissed her, though the two times he had gathered enough courage to do so, it was mildly pleasant. Kissing Henderson had to be better than that, and now she would never find out.
“I think we should have another go of it,” she said, with almost desperate nonchalance. “That hardly counted as a kiss.”
His head whipped around and his eyes took on the strangest glint. “You have surprised me, Alice Hubbard.”
“Have I?”
“Indeed you have. All right then, another kiss. And if you tell me that it’s like kissing your brother, I’m afraid I’ll have to bring your brother before the magistrate.”
His words sent a thrill of anticipation down her spine, knowing she was about to be thoroughly kissed by a man who knew how to kiss a woman—if the rumors about him had been true.
This time, there was no warning, no gentle hold on her upper arms. This time, he stepped forward, placed one hand behind her neck, and pulled her forward, flush against him so she could feel the hard plane of his body. Then he bent his head and she was being kissed, kissed as she had never been in her entire life. With three engagements and three near-marriages, no one had consumed her the way Henderson did at that moment. His was not the gentle kiss of a man courting a woman, his was the kiss of a man who wanted something more. Alice let out a startled cry, then a muffled moan when she felt his tongue invade her mouth and brush against her own, caressing, capturing, making her feel things no man had ever made her feel. A shock of sensation between her legs nearly had her knees buckling beneath her and she wanted, needed, something more. When she pressed against him with almost frantic need, throwing her arms around him in abandon, she felt his arousal and stiffened. Even though she had never felt a man’s part before, she knew what it was pressing hot against the juncture of her thighs, knew what it meant that it was hard and long.
Letting out a low sound more growl than moan, Henderson stepped back, his eyes fierce and dark as Alice swayed toward him, as if her body was not ready to release him. Alice lifted a trembling hand to her mouth. What had just happened? Was that the way all kisses were supposed to feel?
“Would you call that a brotherly kiss, Alice?” And then he let out a harsh laugh that Alice could only interpret as triumphant. As if that kiss was only a means to teach her a lesson, which she supposed she deserved. Apparently she had wounded his pride when she’d compared his kiss to a brotherly peck and he had used all his talents to prove her wrong.
“Hardly,” she said, taking a shaking breath. “It was nothing like any kiss I’ve experienced.” There, she’d put him in his place, implying with her tone that she’d not been altogether pleased with the kiss and reminding him that she had been kissed—and more than once. Why she felt the need to gain the upper hand, she couldn’t say. Perhaps it was because she was standing there with knees still shaking, with a dull throb between her legs, and he was standing there, arms crossed casually across his chest, smiling at her. His eyes flickered at her words, but then his smile widened.
“I do apologize. I am used to kissing women who have, let us say, a bit more experience.”
“Please do spare me your false apology. You were trying to teach me a lesson and nothing more.”
“Perhaps. You did seem in need of one.”
Alice put her hands on her hips, outraged. “You needn’t be so smug. It wasn’t that good.”
His burst of laughter was even more annoying than his smugness. “Of course it was.” He waggled his eyebrows. “But I have done better.”
Alice wrinkled her nose. “I suppose it was passable. And certainly nothing I would like repeated.”
Henderson took up the reins of his horse, which had been happily munching on the grass at the side of the road, and pulled out his watch. “We’re still on time for tea,” he said happily, and Alice shot him another look of annoyance. Food. How could he think about food when they’d just kissed…like that? With tongues and bodies and moans? Then he stopped and leaned toward her. “I don’t understand what you are in such a huff about. The prize was your idea, if you recall.”
Alice’s cheeks flushed instantly, because in truth, that was what she’d been hinting at, though she would die before admitting such.
“You are utterly conceited if you think that ever in a hundred years I would have guessed you would ask for a kiss,” she said with a toss of her head.
“And utterly correct.”
* * *
Alice walked ahead of him, still in a snit, and he stared at her back, angrier with himself than he had ever been. He hadn’t meant for that kiss to be so carnal, but when she’d likened kissing him to kissing her brother, it had driven him a bit mad. Now he knew what she tasted like, how soft her lips where, the way she sounded when he pleased her. It was only a small leap to picture her beneath him, naked, looking up at him, her eyes drowsy with desire. The way her eyes had looked when he’d pulled away, like a woman who was aroused and wanted more, would haunt him this night and all the nights to come.
Oh, God, how would he ever get that image out of his head?
“Are your father and brother in residence?” he asked, being careful to keep his tone neutral.
“No. They both stayed in London. Why?” She paused on the path and looked up at him from beneath the brim of her bonnet, her cheeks flushed, her lips rosy and slightly swollen. His cock, which had finally begun to grow small, jumped to life and he tugged on his jacket to make certain he was covered.
“I should like to go fishing whilst I’m in St. Ives,” he said with a shrug. And I plan to ask your father for permission to court you. To marry you.
And after that, he wasn’t sure what he would do. Henderson was still committed to helping those starving in India, but he wasn’t certain he would be able to leave Alice behind even for a few months. He would never make that mistake again. Once she was his…God, that was a beautiful thought.
Feeling as if the steel band that had been surrounding his heart for four years had loosened, Henderson started lightly whistling a Gilbert and Sullivan song, and Alice cast him a small smile. Apparently he had been forgiven.
“My mother will likely insist you stay at Tregrennar, you know.”
Henderson instantly decided that would be a bad idea. It was difficult enough to be in the same town as Alice; living in the same house would be far too dangerous. No doubt Alice would want to continue their talks in the library, but he was not a young man anymore and she was not fifteen. She was a woman and he wanted her more with every breath he took. Sitting in the library, late at night, with her in her night rail—oh God, he was not strong enough to resist trying to touch her, not now, now when he knew how responsive she was. He would have to talk to her father immediately, for it suddenly became imperative that he stake his claim on her now before she went and got herself engaged again.
Just then, they left the path and there it was, Tregrennar, looking gloriously familiar. “The old girl looks exactly the same,” he said, hearing the wistful note in his own voice. No, he could not stay at Tregrennar, not with echoes of Joseph still there. His heart tore as if it were only yesterday when he’d heard the terrible news that Joseph was dead.
That night, after he’d left Joseph to find other amusements between the soft thighs of a local widow, he hadn’t given his friend another thought. He’d spent a pleasant evening with Mrs. Patterson, slaking his lust in the way only a young man can—with enthusiasm and little finesse. He was on his way back to Tregrennar when he decided to stop in the White Hart for a pint before making the rest of the walk back, and was surprised to find one of the lads Joseph had been planning to see that evening sitting at a table.
When Gerald Grant had looked up, Henderson knew immediately that something was wrong. His friend’s eyes were red-rimmed, the hands that held the tin mug in front him shaking as he took a sip. Worse still, Gerald could not look him in the eye. “Where’s Joseph?” he asked, and somehow knew before he answered that something terrible had happened to his friend.
Gerald motioned for him to sit, and Henderson pulled out a chair, lowering himself into it cautiously, as if taking care with such a mundane movement would somehow make whatever he was about to tell him untrue.
“He’s dead, Henderson,” Gerald said, his voice breaking. “Fell off the damned stable roof.”
“My God.” Henderson sat back, stunned, a burning lead ball growing in his chest. It couldn’t be true. He’d just seen Joseph. He wanted to tell him about his evening, about how Mrs. Patterson’s cat had leapt on the bed just as things were getting exciting. They were supposed to have laughed about it, and then Joseph was supposed to have looked at him with disappointment and a little bit of disgust for having sex with the pretty widow.
“He didn’t just fall,” Gerald had said, his eyes bleak as he stared unseeingly at his pint.
“What are you saying? What happened?”
Gerald looked about to speak, but then shook his head, unable to say a word as his throat convulsed. “Damn it, Gerald, what happened?” Henderson had asked, trying not to reach over the table and shake the other man.
“I’m not really sure what happened. We were having a grand time. It was Joseph’s idea to get on the stable roof. Said he wanted to see the stars better. So I hauled out a ladder and we all climbed up. You know the place, where it’s flat, the overhang where we bring the cattle in. We all sat there, talking about nothing. And then Joseph got up and started climbing. We all laughed.” He paused and stared at Henderson for a long moment. “He was always doing things like that. We thought it was a lark. Then he stood at the very end, at the peak, and turned toward us.” Gerald swallowed heavily. “We told him to come down, we did. It was bloody dark and all we could see was his silhouette and that roof is steep. Stupid, bloody idiot.” He choked down a sob and banged a fist lightly against the worn wood of the table.
“What happened?” Henderson could feel his eyes burning, his throat aching, his heart tearing in his chest. It couldn’t be true, it could not. His mind rebelled and his heart felt as if it had been ripped from his chest. Nothing had ever felt like this, nothing had hurt him to the point of agony. He could still hear Joseph begging him to go with him. Come on, you can see your widow any old night. I really want you there.
Gerald paused, giving Henderson a tortured look, and Henderson wanted to bash his head against the table so he would just finish the story.
“He stood there for the longest time, and then he said…God, Henderson, I’m so sorry. He said ‘Tell Southie I’m sorry.’ And then he fell back, just like that, the way you would if you were falling back onto a feather mattress. Not a sound, nothing, until he hit.”
That night had been the worst of his life, for his dearest friend had died.
Now, he had to live not only with the knowledge that Joseph had taken his own life, but also the memory that Henderson had promised never to touch Alice. Well, it was too bloody late for that, and now he’d have to live with the guilt of happily breaking that promise. As they walked toward Tregrennar, memories assailed him; it was almost cruel how he felt as if he were coming home.
* * *
The first time he’d gone to Tregrennar, he and Joseph were just nineteen, freshly graduated from Eton and looking forward to Oxford.
“My parents won’t mind, really. I’ve written them and it’s all set. And you don’t want to spend a dreary summer dodging your mother, do you?” Joseph gave Henderson’s shoulder a nudge. “We have the best trout stream in Cornwall running right through our property.”
Henderson stared at his suitcase, stuffed full of what he’d need for his summer holiday, and felt a longing in his stomach so strong he nearly felt ill from it. No, he did not want to go home to Chelmsford and spend his entire summer with his grandparents and mother. He’d written dutifully to his mother and she’d responded with the same apathy he’d been subject to his entire life. Indeed, he was surprised she’d responded at all, for he’d written many letters over the years that had been ignored.
Eton had been his haven, a place he could be with chaps his own age, who liked an adventure as much as he did, who somehow overlooked the fact he was illegitimate—overlooked because Joseph had insisted they all do so.
And it was so blasted, bloody boring in Chelmsford.
Cornwall was the warm sea, trout fishing, and living in a home with a family, a lively, boisterous family, if the stories Joseph told him were true. Joseph had been begging him to spend the summer with his family for years. Now that they had graduated from Eton and were heading to university next year, it might be the very last time he’d get a chance.
“I’ll go,” he said, suddenly feeling a weight lifted from him. His mother would not even notice his absence. She hardly acknowledged him when he was home. The last few summers, he’d thought he might go out of his head from boredom.
“Excellent. I only hope you don’t mind my little sisters, Alice and Christina. They’re both tolerable, I supposed, but Alice can be a bit of a rascal. She’s not too bad once you get to know her.”
“She’s twelve?”
Joseph paused. “Good God, she’s fifteen. Cripes, didn’t realize. She’ll be coming out in just three years, two if she has her way. I keep thinking about her as if she was a little girl. You’ll like my sisters, though. Everyone does.”
Truth be told, Henderson was a bit nervous about spending any time with a girl. He’d grown up quite alone and spent most of his time at school. He could hardly even recall having a conversation with a female his own age. To him, they were a foreign and beautiful mystery. All that hair and lace and creamy skin.
“Come on, then, the carriage is waiting,” Joseph said, hauling up his overstuffed bag. He stopped, his brown eyes shining with excitement. “This is going to be the best summer.”
* * *
Henderson had been given the room next to Joseph and one that overlooked the garden. Through the trees at the edge of the property, he could see the brilliant blue-green of the sea. It had touched him that they had put him in the family wing rather than where guests might normally stay. The Hubbards puzzled him, to be honest, welcoming a complete stranger into their home. Richard was the son of a duke, thus the reason he was called “Lord” Hubbard instead of “Mr.” Hubbard, and they were part of a world Henderson had never even hoped to have a glimpse of, never mind be welcomed into as if part of the family. His own mother detested him, though his grandparents did try to make up for that with their love. Both Hubbard boys insisted he stay in the family wing, saying he was more a brother to them than anything else. Indeed, the Hubbards and their easy ways had immediately made him feel comfortable.
The first morning he took his cup of strong, black coffee and stepped out onto the balcony to greet the day. Sunlight streamed into his room, and when he swung open the French doors, a strong scent of the sea rushed in, carrying with it the sounds of summer—birds, a gardener clipping shrubbery, a squirrel chattering angrily at a massive tabby cat that sat beneath a tree. God, he loved it here.
He’d taken his first sip when he spied a woman in the gardens below him, and he paused, the cup held suspended, as he watched her. Though he hadn’t been exposed to many women in his nineteen years, he realized he was staring at pure female perfection. Had anyone been standing next to him, it would have been painfully obvious that he’d become almost instantly smitten. She was the loveliest thing he’d ever seen. She was strolling in the garden, wearing a wide-brimmed hat trimmed with sky-blue ribbon and a dress that matched the ribbon perfectly. His eyes drifted down her form, stopping briefly at the swell of her breasts, the curve of her waist. As he watched, she bent to take a closer look at a rose and the smile that came to her face made him feel a rush of lust so strong, he found himself gripping the railing, his knuckles white from the strain, and he let out a small sound.
Straightening suddenly, she whirled about and looked up directly at him, one hand shielding her eyes from the bright sun. “Hello. You must be Henderson.”
Odd, how would she know—Oh, God. No.
Walking toward the house, a breeze causing a few stray strands of her light hair to escape her hat, she looked up and smiled. “I’m Alice, Joseph’s sister.” He stood there, mute, horrified. “Don’t tell me Joseph didn’t tell you he had a sister. Two, actually, though Christina is off with Aunt Gladys this summer. It would be something he would do just to vex me.” She laughed, as if the idea of her brother pulling such a trick was great fun.
“No. I, that is to say, Joseph told me he had a sister. Two sisters.” Alice was supposed to be a fifteen-year-old child. Not this…this woman who stood before him, all luscious curves and sparkling eyes.
Henderson shook his head and let out a near-silent chuckle, frankly horrified that his body had such a violent reaction to Joseph’s little sister. God, he was depraved. Then again, he hadn’t known he was looking at Alice. In his mind, she was a child.
She seemed disappointed to learn he had known of her existence and a bit uncertain what to say.
“I’ll see you at breakfast, then,” she said cheerfully.
“Oh, yes. Breakfast.”
“It’s a meal in the morning where one breaks one’s fast.” She smiled and tilted her head, then turned around, her skirts flying about, and headed back to the garden.
“Yes, I’ll see you there,” Henderson called out, feeling foolish.
She didn’t turn around again, merely waved her hand in acknowledgment, which made him feel as if he were a gauche boy, not a man about to enter university.
Giving himself a mental shake, he returned to his room, wishing with all his being that he had known whom he was looking at before seeing her in the garden. Joseph’s sister might look like a woman, have a woman’s curves, but she was still just fifteen. Swallowing heavily, he made a promise to himself to stay away from Alice, to never let her know where his thoughts had gone.
A quiet knock on the door pulled him away from his thoughts. “Enter.” Joseph’s valet came into the room and wished him a brisk good morning.
“Lord Hubbard has asked that you meet him for breakfast after your shave, sir.”
Henderson laughed, bringing his hand up to touch his jaw, which was covered with three days’ growth. Shaving was one of his least favorite activities, even under the care of an excellent valet. If it were up to him, he would let his beard grow, but neither his mother nor Joseph would allow it. “You look like an American mountain man,” Joseph had said more than once. Henderson didn’t much care how he looked, so he forced himself to shave if only to shut Joseph up.
“If you insist, Mr. Boxter.”
“I do, sir.”
Once he was freshly shaved and his cravat straightened rather forcefully by Boxter, Henderson headed down the stairs, already feeling quite at home in the grand old place. Joseph’s parents and younger brother had met Henderson enthusiastically, claiming they had heard so much about him from Joseph they felt they knew him already. With them, he hadn’t experienced the awkwardness he usually did when dining with strangers. Now, though, ready to face the third Hubbard sibling, Henderson felt his stomach twist with nervousness. He hadn’t thought much about her absence thus far, assuming she was off visiting a relative or some such thing.
When he entered the breakfast room, a warm place with sun streaming through floor-to-ceiling windows, every member of the Hubbard family but for Christina was already there—including the elder daughter. Alice looked up and gave him a little smile, as if the two of them shared some sort of grand secret.
“Good morning,” he said, before going to the sideboard and filling his plate until it was heavy in his hand. Henderson had always had a healthy appetite, and since he was naturally lean, he never bothered to limit his meals. He sat next to Joseph, who was nearly done with his meal, and looked across to Alice, who eyed his plate with unreserved amusement.
Joseph reached over and stole a scone.
“Joseph, that’s rude,” his mother, Elda, said, but Henderson could tell she wasn’t truly angry.
Joseph immediately put the scone, minus one large bite, back on his plate and apologized exuberantly to his mother, who looked as if she was on the verge of laughter. It was this sort of simple exchange that Henderson so loved about this family and had been missing for his entire life. Family dinners were subdued and, looking back, rather miserable affairs, with his mother pointedly not engaging with him. There had been no laughter or joy in his house and he realized now that a soul needed laughter and joy.
“What are you two up to today?” Lord Hubbard asked.
“Thaddeus’s bitch just had a litter and I thought we could take a look.” Before his father could object, he added, “I’m not getting one, Father, just looking.”
Lord Hubbard sighed and looked at his wife. “Do we have room for another dog, Ellie?”
“Only if he’s got a lovely pup, Father,” Joseph had said. “Fritz is getting a bit old and—”
“Fritz is only three, Joseph,” Alice said. “And I don’t think he’d care for another dog running about.”
“It’d be a friend to him,” Joseph said. “And to me. Fritz is your dog. And Scat is yours too.” He turned to Henderson. “That’s the big tom you’ve seen about the house. Menace to all our song birds.”
“He can’t help it if he’s a good hunter,” Alice said. “He’s merely doing what cats do.”
“Tell that to Cook. She found a half-eaten sparrow on the back step yesterday.”
Alice grinned. “A present.”
“At any rate, I’ll be home this summer and I’ll have time to make him mine.”
“I thought you just told your father you weren’t getting a puppy,” Elda said. “And you know you wouldn’t be able to bring him to university. It’ll be left to us to care for him.”
Henderson thought the banter was all in good fun until he noticed how fiercely Joseph was digging his hands into his leg. “I just want something of my own,” he said.
“He’ll be home on holidays and summer.” When all eyes turned toward Henderson, he could feel his face heat.
His lordship threw down his napkin, symbolically throwing in the towel. “Very well, Joseph, you may have your pup.”
“Oh, Richard, really?” Elda’s expression was a mixture of love and disbelief.
“Really. That’s settled, then.” With those words, Lord Hubbard rose from the table and left the room, but not before putting a hand on his older son’s shoulder and giving it a squeeze.
“You always were his favorite. Oldest and heir and all that,” Alice said, with just the smallest bit of resentment in her tone.
Joseph grinned at his younger sister. “It’s only that I know how to get my way.”
“Not all the time,” Elda said sternly, but Joseph just laughed.
“I’ve an idea. We’ll let Henderson name the pup,” Joseph said. “That way it’ll have a respectable name.” He winked at his sister and she made a face at her big brother before looking over to Henderson.
“Do you realize the import of this?” she asked, her blue eyes steady on him. “It means you’re officially one of us.”
Henderson smiled and tried not to show how ridiculously happy those words made him.
* * *
“It is out of the question that you stay in the village, Henderson. I won’t hear of it.”
Alice suppressed a smile. She’d known her mother would be adamant and would not take no for an answer. The minute she’d seen Henderson walk through the door, Elda had called to two footmen to fetch Henderson’s things from the inn. Alice recognized the moment he realized that continuing to argue would only hurt her mother’s feelings and so he relented, giving her a look of resigned bemusement. Inside, her stomach was a tight swirl of happiness followed quickly by almost nauseating trepidation.
“How is your mother?” Elda asked once they had all settled in the main parlor for tea. Henderson had just popped a cherry tart into his mouth and grimaced—not from the tart, as they were his favorite, but from the question. Though Henderson had never spoken at length about his family, Alice knew he didn’t like to discuss his home life. She sensed he loved his grandparents but his relationship with his mother was particularly strained. She had gleaned this information during one of their long talks, and it had seemed like a gift to Alice at the time, a tiny piece of Henderson that he so rarely gave away.
“I have no idea,” he said after swallowing the confection. “As far as I know, she’s still wallowing in bitter disappointment,” he said with irony. Henderson had been an only—and very lonely—child, Alice guessed, with a mother who could hardly look at him without letting her feelings of disgust show. It had been Henderson’s grandmother who had insisted they keep him rather than send him to one of the foundling homes where so many bastard children ended up. He’d often said his grandmother’s heart was too soft, but he’d been glad of it.
“And your grandparents?”
Alice gave her mother a telling look, which her mother ignored. “Well. I write to them regularly. It was my grandmother who wrote to say Miss Hubbard’s wedding was imminent. That’s when I immediately found a ship and headed home to stop the wedding.” Henderson grinned and Elda laughed.
“I thought it must be something like that,” Elda said, a twinkle in her eye that told Henderson she knew he was jesting.
“If it puts your mind at ease, I have been dutifully writing my grandparents since the day I left England, and they have dutifully responded.”
Alice had often wondered what it had been like for Henderson to grow up in such a home. Yes, he had been sent away to school since he was seven (still another thought that drew sympathy from her), but when he was younger he had been home for summers and holidays. Whom had he talked to? Played with? In the Hubbard home, there had always been someone to talk to, play a game with. Joseph had been a wonderfully indulgent brother and Alice had taken advantage of his kind heart and giving nature. He had set the tone for the Hubbard children, who loved each other and were uncommonly close. The remaining Hubbard children were still close, of course, but there was always a feeling that a large part was missing and would never be replaced, no matter how much time passed. At least she had wonderful memories of Joseph and their happy childhood. What did Henderson have?
“His mother blames Henderson for the fact she never married and—”
Her mother gave her a sharp look and nodded subtly in Christina’s direction, and Alice stopped abruptly.
“It’s all right, Mama, I know all about Mr. Southwell’s birth,” Christina said, giving Henderson an apologetic look.
“Alice, really.” Elda always seemed surprised that her daughters shared so much information. “Christina is only eighteen.”
“I knew when I was eighteen,” Alice said logically, and Elda let out a small puff of exasperation.
Henderson let out a low chuckle. “Yes, she knows about my mother and her fall from grace.”
“Do you ever wonder where your father is? If I were your grandmother, I would have hunted him down,” Christina said, grabbing up the last tart, “and made things right. Your mother must have been so hurt.”
“I doubt my mother could garner the energy to feel such strong emotion,” Henderson said, laughing lightly.
“I’m sure she feels emotion—she simply does not put it on display,” Christina argued.
“Perhaps,” he said, a hollow note in his tone.
“We love you,” Elda said.
Henderson’s eyes flickered briefly to Alice before he smiled at her mother. “That is very kind, Lady Hubbard.”
“I was not being kind, young man. I was stating a fact.”
* * *
Alice and her sister and mother gathered each evening before a fire even in the summertime, for the nights in St. Ives could be quite chilly. Unless they were attending an entertainment, the family kept early hours, dining at seven and turning in for the evening by ten. Elda was perpetually knitting socks and sending them off to a veterans’ home in London and this evening was no different. After an early supper of ham, potatoes, and beet salad, Henderson had gone back to the village to meet up with some friends he hadn’t seen in four years, promising to return before midnight.
“I suppose a house full of women isn’t much fun for a young man,” Elda said, laughing, while Alice tried not to feel too disappointed. Her thoughts of the day’s events mingled with the soft clacking of her mother’s knitting needles and the occasional rustle of a page from the book her sister was reading. A book sat on Alice’s lap as well, but it was impossible to read with her thoughts whirling about her head.
“You seem distracted this evening, Alice,” her mother said, looking up from her knitting.
She glanced down at her book. “Oh, no. Just tired.” Liar.
“It’s the fresh sea air,” Elda said. “There is something about being close to the sea that is so fatiguing.”
“It’s a good sort of fatigue. That’s why I’m living here forever,” Alice said feelingly. “There is nothing like St. Ives.”
“Alice, you cannot live here forever, you silly goose. What will you do when Mama and Papa are no longer here?” Christina cast a look of apology to their mother. “Oliver will eventually get married, for all his protestations to the contrary. And I doubt he’d like to have his sister hanging about.”
Alice hated when her younger sister was more practical than she.
“I’ll live with you.”
Christina laughed. “I’m afraid His Grace and I will not have room in our castle.”
“You’re marrying a duke, are you?”
“Why not? My grandfather is a duke,” Christina said predictably. “I don’t know why you didn’t have higher aspirations.”
Alice shot her little sister a look of disbelief. “I was engaged to marry a baron and a viscount. And a pretend earl. I hardly call that having low aspirations.”
Elda looked between her daughters, an indulgent smile on her face. “If you want to marry a duke and Alice wants to marry a baron, that’s fine with me.”
“I’m not getting married to anyone,” Alice announced, and was surprised when her mother and her sister both laughed. “I’m not,” she insisted. “Don’t you think it highly unlikely at this point that anyone will want to marry me? The bad luck bride?”
Elda furrowed her brow. “Christina, you didn’t.”
“Someone had to tell her. Really, Mother, did you think she wouldn’t find out?”
Alice quickly interjected before her mother got truly angry with Christina. “Mother, it’s far better that I know than not. This way when someone says something—and they will—I shall be prepared. Harriet told me already at any rate, so you cannot place sole blame on Christina.”
“That silly moniker will not prevent you from marrying,” Elda said firmly. “I’m certain most people have already forgotten it or haven’t read that awful piece in the first place.”
“Maybe we can bribe someone to marry her,” Christina said cheerfully. “What about Mr. Southwell?”
Alice immediately felt her face heat. “That’s just silly. He’s far too good a friend to subject him to having you as a sister-in-law.”
Christina stuck out her tongue and Elda tsked. “Girls, that is enough. No one is marrying anyone in the foreseeable future.”
“I might marry next year,” Christina said. “I’ve made a list of potential suitors already.” She giggled. “Would you like to know who is at the top of the list?”
Alice struggled not to roll her eyes. “I know very well who is at the top of your list. It might as well be Prince Edward.”
“He’s married,” Christina quipped. “And Prince Napoleon is living in England now, you know.”
“Yes, I know. It’s all you can speak of. You do know there is talk of him marrying Princess Beatrice.”
Christina made a face. “Have you seen her nose?”
“Christina!” Elda looked at her daughter, shocked.
“Well, have you?”
Alice tried her best to stifle her laughter but found it nearly impossible. “You are terrible. The princess is really a lovely person.” Christina picked up her book pointedly and began to read, effectively ending the conversation and leaving Alice to her own thoughts again, which immediately returned to the path to Tregrennar and Henderson.
And that kiss.
Forever it would be sealed in her memory. She wished it had never happened, that she hadn’t teased him about his kiss being brotherly. It would be far better to have never experienced Henderson’s skilled caresses. The thought of a man’s tongue in her mouth would have repulsed her just one day before. Truthfully, the thought of any man’s tongue other than Henderson’s made her feel slightly queasy. With that one, scorching, life-altering kiss, Henderson had completely changed the way she thought of him. While her heart had always stepped up a beat whenever he walked in a room, now it seemed ready to explode out of her body just at the thought of him. She felt odd and faint and not at all herself. And she didn’t like it one bit, because she had a terrible feeling that after he’d done kissing her and stepped back, he hadn’t given another thought to how wonderful it had been. All her friends had insisted that men felt differently about kissing than did women. For a woman to kiss, it was far more emotional, held far more meaning. Men went around kissing girls all the time if they could get away with it. Four years ago, even as sheltered as she’d been, she’d heard the rumors about Henderson being quite the ladies’ man.
For him it had been a kiss. For her it had been the kiss.
The kiss that changed her life. Now she was even more certain that she would never marry. For what man could she possibly marry who could make her forget she wasn’t in the arms of the man she loved?