Chapter Fourteen
He was fully dressed and she wore almost nothing, yet Eleanor understood the truth of all that she had imagined. Her legs opened and his hand rested in the junction of her thighs before slipping lower, into the place that was hidden and wet with her want of him.
He looked at her without blinking, the movement of his fingers deepening and quickening, like a maestro or a magician, and she pressed back into the patched quilt and only felt. The rush of lust, the dislocation of time, the wet warmth of her and the thick need of him.
Higher and higher she went as he came on to the bed above her, his swollen manhood replacing his fingers, the smooth sheath of it penetrating deep and then deeper.
Filling up the loneliness and despair.
When he tilted her with one arm beneath her waist her eyes flew open and she kept him there tight with her muscles, regulating movement, in wildness and in ecstasy. When he changed the rhythm of it there was a loosening, the spiralling lack of control sliding over an edge into the realm where everything impossible could happen, where life was changed into before and after, where her whole body jolted to the beat of the music he made. There was no question in it but certainty, clawed together in the chant of a melody that was eternal, a fine unbearable pain cleaving them into another world, as she reached for all that was offered.
She felt the waves of release and rode them, on and on into the nothingness and the light, her heart beating along with his, their breath melded in the heat. Bound by something neither of them could forget.
Afterwards they lay together on the bed and listened to the crackle of the fire and the wind at the shutters and the rain on the glass. Her head was tucked into his shoulders and his arm lay heavy across her, the smell of sex and sweat in the air and exhilaration, too, a memory that had not been faulty, a known pleasure that filled her heart with joy.
‘It was just like the last time...?’
His half-question was filled with such awe it made her heart’s blood sing.
Her reply held the same wonder. ‘Almost, but even better.’
The counterpane was across them now, the stitchery rough and frayed. Like their lives, patched from bits, making a new whole pattern from all the pieces of what had been.
She smiled and his eyebrows raised up.
‘What are you thinking?’
‘I was wondering where this quilt came from.’
‘Remember I told you of the reverend in Boston?’ He waited until she nodded. ‘His wife made this for me and it represented hope for a long while after. But now...’ His voice tailed off into the silence and he began again. ‘Now my hope is here with you.’
He pulled her across him, his bare chest tickling her. He had removed her stockings and the remainder of his own clothes after they had made love and settled her against him so that they might understand more of each other in the closeness.
‘If you had not returned, Nicholas...’
He stopped her. ‘I am here and I shall never go again.’
‘You promise?’
He lifted his hand and removed his signet ring, the gold of it heavy in the light.
‘For you, my love, in troth.’ He fitted it across her thumb and the crest of the Bromleys was easily seen in the fire flame. She covered the piece with her other hand so that it was tucked into warmth.
But the magic had seeped in again between them, the enchantment and the need as he sat her above him and came into her centre, without warning, watching her all the time.
‘I like looking at you when you are breathless and I like the way your hair hangs like a curtain hiding us from the world.’
‘Can we stay here for ever? Just the two of us? Like this.’
He’d begun to push in further, lifting her with the movement, her knees on each side of him steadying balance and his hand tightening around one breast.
‘Come with me, sweetheart. Come with me to the edge of reason and beyond.’
She laughed at that, though the sound was not simple. Rather it was layered with lust and passion and desire.
* * *
Later she awoke to hear bells pealing out the hour of three, soft in the winds of winter.
Nicholas was not in the bed. He was sitting at the window with a blanket about his nakedness and his long hair loose, one curtain drawn back so that he might look out into the night.
A fierce night, she thought, with the raindrops hitting hard against glass and the stripped branches of bare-leaved trees swaying in the force of breeze.
The fire was banked now, only embers, small flares of occasional orange banishing back darkness. Suddenly she was afraid for them both, unreasonably and forcibly.
As if he knew what she was feeling, he turned, the scar on his cheek in the moonlight raised in a relief so that the shadow of the wound enveloped the whole of one side of his face.
* * *
He had remembered other things in the night as he sat at the window, darker things and less ordered. He recalled feeling full of shame and regret the first time they had made love because he knew that he was not worthy of Eleanor and yet he had taken her virginity without a backward glance. She made him hopeful and foolish for things that might never come to pass, good things, proper things in a lifetime that had been remarkably dissolute and disordered.
Once he’d had nothing much to forfeit, but now...
‘If I ever lost you again, Eleanor...’ He stopped, unable to carry on. He did not hold back his honesty though he wished there was more warmth to his words instead of a bleakness, empty of belonging, devoid of hope.
He had never had someone stay in his life. Not since his mother had kissed him goodbye and told him she would be home before he knew it, the mis-truth in her words still there in his mind. Love did not conquer fear at all, it amplified it and made it stronger, the loss a hundred thousand times worse because the promise had sounded so very sweet.
Eleanor had risen, the quilt draped about her. ‘You won’t. You won’t lose me again.’
His heart was beating so fast at her words he wondered if she might hear it and when she came against him he opened the blanket and she sat upon his knee, all warmth and softness and violets. He pulled the quilt tightly in about her, banishing any drafts. She felt the tension in him, rippling through his body.
‘You are cold?’
‘No, not cold, but fearful.’
‘For us?’ she questioned and he nodded, because her confession of love was still ringing in his blood.
‘If anything happens to you because of me...’
Her hands came around him, sealing off the loneliness. He felt a finger reach out and take his nipple in a hard grasp and with a start he leaned back.
‘I liked it when you did this. Is it the same with you?’
Her other finger flicked the opposite nipple and it was suddenly harder to concentrate on the yawning desolation inside him.
‘If we have only now, Nicholas, we should use it wisely.’
There was a tone in her voice he had never heard there before, the tone of a courtesan, perhaps, who knew that even a moment of pleasure took care of every other doubt.
‘Wisely?’
Her hand trailed downwards and she cradled his growing hardness between her fingers.
‘You are ready and so am I.’
‘For an untutored lover, Eleanor, you are surprisingly bold.’
‘When you have society’s very best teacher, is there any wonder to it?’
He laughed then and the sadness was pushed back further, quick desire left in its place.
‘This time let me show you another way of loving.’ He removed the quilt and the blanket and stood her before him, kneeling in front of her and parting her thighs, pleased as the skin he could see rose up into goosebumps of delight.
* * *
She could not believe such a thing was possible, his lips against her femininity and his tongue penetrating the place between her legs.
She’d wanted to give him comfort and instead... Every thought flew from her mind as other feelings began to build and her hands moved down to hold him there.
‘Don’t stop.’ Her voice was harsh as she opened to him further. ‘Don’t ever stop.’
She was wicked and wanton and shameless as she called his name and rose again over the top of pleasure and into the realms of the gods Eros and Aphrodite, their voices calling only for her.
When it was finished he stood, his mouth coming over her own and she tasted herself on his tongue and liked it. Musky. Salty. Sweet. All the hues of desire and wanting and needing.
‘Love me, Nicholas. Love me for ever.’
‘I do, Eleanor. And I will.’
* * *
She was dressed when he awoke next and she insisted on going home alone before the dawn broke properly and London awoke into a new day.
‘Lucy will know I am missing if I stay and I don’t want her to think...’
‘Her mother has spent the night loving her father?’ His question broke over her words, but there was a warm note of teasing in his voice. ‘Meet me again tonight. Here.’
When she nodded it was as if everything in his world was right and he kissed her, softly this time and with intent.
‘Don’t come down with me, Nicholas. Let me remember you here, warm from sleep and naked.’
Without his clothes on he could do nothing but watch her open the door.
‘You asked for the Westmoor carriage to come back for you at this hour?’
‘I did.’
He smiled because the arrangement was so much like her, unusual and different.
‘Tell your brother I will call on him at one o’clock in the afternoon.’
She nodded and then she was gone.
* * *
The note came to the Bromley town house at nine-thirty in the morning and was delivered by Browne.
‘This came especially by one of the Duke of Westmoor’s servants, my lord. The message accompanying it stressed the fact that the Duke thought it might be important and you were to be made aware of it immediately.’
‘Thank you.’
When Nicholas looked at the writing on the missive he knew a momentary failing of hope. The same hand as the spymaster in the docklands. A new lead. Another pressing difficulty.
Meet me at noon. I have some new information that will interest you. Come alone.
The game had begun again then, he thought. It was just as it always had been in the Americas. Let your guard down for a moment and the demons would pounce.
They had in Boston and in Philadelphia and in Richmond. They had here in London, too, after the New Year’s dinner at Jacob’s when his carriage had been attacked.
Had someone been watching the house? Could they have seen Eleanor leave? Had they been observing him as he had visited Gunter’s and Lackington’s and the Bullock’s Museum with her at his side, laughing, listening.
Could they learn about Lucy, too? An innocent five-year-old child whose only crime was that she was his daughter.
The world began to spin and Nick sat down, trying with all his might to remember what had happened after he had been hit on the head in the alley behind Vitium et Virtus for any clue that might aid him. He’d already ruled out his uncle’s involvement, but having his full memory return was of utmost importance to Nick. If he could remember this part of his past then it might unlock other memories.
Two men had been waiting, crouched in the bushes just in the place his ring was found. They’d said something of collecting a gambling debt, he remembered that, as they had bashed him across his head. He had gone down heavily before getting up again to try to fight his way out of it. But the dizziness had been all consuming and although he managed a few more punches it had not been long until those who wanted him hurt had got the upper hand.
He remembered the moment he had twisted his ring off and thrown it into the bushes, a slow motioned arc that was then cut short by another heavy thud of wood over his head.
Then all he knew was water and running and the shout of voices, the dark of night and a boat turning on an outward tide, a gangplank, a ship’s captain who took him to a small dank cabin and left him there.
All these thoughts turned in the chaos.
He had run himself, away from a life he could no longer fathom, reasoning that safety lay in the need for flight.
Instinctive. Elemental. Spontaneous.
The deep chasm of his life flowed in again, the danger, the shadows, the people who had been hurt in the Americas only because they knew him.
* * *
The ringmaster was already there this time even as some church bells chimed twelve. There were two ales on the table and beside him a thin dark man sat.
‘Tell him,’ the older man instructed the stranger as Nick also took his seat. ‘Tell him what you told me and don’t you leave nothing out, mind.’
The man paled and cleared his throat, his voice shaky and nervous as he started into the tale. ‘It is said that there is a new mark out on Viscount Bromley and the bagging of the prize is rich. A hundred pound for those who can take him.’
Nicholas’s blood had frozen at his name, but in company such as this it did not pay to give too much away.
‘He is a toff. He was the one who they had followed to America, only this time he’s here in London and there is no need to cross the ocean to kill him.’
‘Who gave the orders?’
‘The secret man. No one has seen him, but the gold he deals with is real.’
‘And why are you telling me this?’ Nicholas stressed the personal pronoun with a flourish.
‘’Cos it is said that your pay is almost as good and a lot less dangerous, guv. My wife insists that I have to abide by the law from now on if I am to be any use to her, but if I can pick up a bob here or there on the way, well, whose to know the difference?’
‘Have you heard anything of a plan?’
‘It’s a snatch from what I hear, at night. Maybe at his town house or the place of his lovebird.’
‘Lovebird?’
‘That was mentioned in the note. A woman who is a lady.’
Nicholas schooled his fury and his absolute and utter shock. All he showed was the interest a thief-taker might, distant and unattached as he dug into his pocket and handed over twenty pieces of gold.
He did not hedge his bets this time. No, this time he revealed his hand in all its rich glory. Let there be no question as to whether or not he would reward well for more information along the same lines.
The ringmaster gathered the coins, allowing the thin man one third of the pieces and himself the rest. The art of intelligence was never cheap or easy, every pimp knew that.
‘Find me a name and you will be able to leave London and buy land for yourself on the reward. I promise it.’
Both men now looked at him, their jaws slack and their eyes wide, and it was he who left the room first this time, the tavern-keeper tipping his head to him as he left.
He could not visit Eleanor again. He could not be seen with her. He had to stay his distance to keep her and their daughter safe, whatever the cost.
The well-spoken lord with the gold was watching him. Watching them. Only in cunning could he outwit the fellow, but he had to start his campaign right now. This minute.
The gall stuck in his throat as he understood exactly what he must do.
* * *
Three hours after Nicholas was supposed to have been there he sent a note. Even her brother looked worried at the missive.
‘If Nick is hurt, it will serve him right for not asking any of us to help him.’
But the world had begun to fade for Eleanor, the tunnel of light darkening as she read the words, scrawled in his upright hand with black ink on white paper.
I am sorry. I can’t. Forgive me.
It was happening again, only this time he was doing it himself, without excuse.
She tried to grab at the chair beside her but the world had shrunk and with only the barest of sighs she sank down into the oblivion that was claiming her.
She came awake with both Jacob and Rose kneeling around her, their faces full of shock and disbelief.
‘If this means what I think it does, I am going to damned well knock Bartlett’s head right off his shoulders.’ Her brother’s voice was harsh and Rose was trying to calm him, but her other hand was shaking as she sought Eleanor’s.
‘There must be a mistake.’
‘No mistake. I know Nick’s writing and it is his hand.’ Jacob roared this out.
‘Did you have an argument?’ Her sister-in-law’s words were whispered, almost unhearable.
‘An argument?’ Eleanor could not understand what she meant.
‘For Viscount Bromley to break it off like this and after you returned in the early hours this morning?’
Shaking her head, Eleanor swallowed, a retch of sickness threatening at the back of her throat.
She could not believe it. She had let herself trust Nicholas Bartlett only to be abandoned summarily and completely and left to deal with the consequences all over again.
My God, how foolish could she be? How gullible? How very duped?
And yet even now, lying here with the smelling salts under her nose and sweat upon her brow, she could not understand how it was all a lie. And that was the worst of it. Her belief in him. Her never-ending absolution, the mercy of the damned.
She felt both broken and repaired even as she thought it, her own heart hardening around the softness she had admitted to him, relegating it to a lesser place, resolve filling in around the cracks.
It was over this time. She would never trust him again and she was only glad he had not become better acquainted with Lucy and that the secret between them would not now impact on the very happiness of their daughter.
‘Don’t hurt him, Jacob.’ She took his hand and held it close. ‘You have to promise me you will not hurt him.’
* * *
Much later she crept into the room of her sleeping child and sat on the chair beside the bed, simply watching her breathe. They had been on their own for years and survived, just the two of them. They had not needed another to make their lives whole and good and they most certainly did not need Nicholas’s interference confusing matters.
They would survive.
As she pulled the blankets back into place over the sleeping form, Lucy’s eyes opened, looking straight at her in that particular place that lies between sleep and wakefulness.
‘I love you, Mama, for ever and ever.’
‘Till a million years,’ Eleanor said back in the way they had done ever since she could recall.
‘And then one more,’ Lucy returned, the smile on her face fading as her eyes closed.
Always one more, Eleanor thought. Eternity and one more. One more chance. One more night in his bed. One more betrayal. The tears that she had been holding on to all evening fell then in wet runnels down her cheeks and she simply sat in the light of the banked fire and did nothing at all to stop them.