Chapter 12
That Lancashire barn had been half a lifetime and thousands of miles away. He’d been a young fool not to recognize how disastrous their impulsive actions could be. And he was the damned fool who had suggested that they run away together.
He drew a deep, slow breath as he peeled off his heavy, saturated coat and dropped it on the floor in a soggy pile. Then he caught Callie’s hand and drew her toward a soft, fragrant pile of hay. “Let’s see if American hay is as comfortable as the British variety.”
She went willingly, exhausted by the day and the danger. He lay on his side, studying her face. The dim light emphasized the delicacy of her features. Her hat had vanished as his had, and her long braid of red-gold hair had darkened with the rain.
“You look like a drowned rat,” he said affectionately. “A very pretty drowned rat. Thank you for pulling me out of the water.”
He bent his head, meaning to brush a light thank-you kiss on her mouth, but her lips moved under his and he found he couldn’t stop because she was kissing him back. His mind became as turbulent as the roaring waters that had almost drowned him. He moved closer and her arms came around him as she gave a breathy little sigh.
Callie, Callie . . . His hand slid down to cup the soft breast concealed under her wet, baggy shirt. She was sweet and strong and deeply feminine, a woman like no other. . . .
Abruptly she pulled away, crushing the hay and releasing a fresh clover scent. “No! I need you as a friend, Richard! I don’t have room in my life for anything else!”
He wanted to kiss her again and change her mind, but he’d learned a few things over the years. “Sorry! That was a grateful impulse gone awry. It shouldn’t have happened.”
He rolled onto his back, his gaze fixed on the dim patterns of light from the ventilation holes. “I didn’t mean anything more than a thank-you kiss, but you have an . . . unfortunate effect on my common sense. I keep forgetting that I’m here to help you, not make your life more complicated.”
“More complicated, but better.” She drew a deep breath, and he was pleased to see that he was affecting her also. “Much of the blame is mine. I shouldn’t have kissed you back, but for a few moments there, it . . . seemed like a good idea.”
He’d thought it a splendid idea. But . . . “You terrify me, Callie.”
“Me?” She blinked at him. “I’m not even armed at the moment!”
He laughed and the tension eased. “I’m reasonably sure I could beat you in a fair fight, though probably not an unfair one.”
“The only kind I would attempt,” she said promptly. “Why fight fair with someone twice my size?”
“That’s my girl.” He took her hand, making no attempt to move closer. “You’re terrifying because—” He hesitated as he thought about it. “Over the years I’ve had my share of friends and enemies, but . . . I haven’t been really close to anyone since I was a boy. And it was you then, too.”
“I’m sorry,” she said softly. “I can see why that would be disconcerting.” After a long silence, she said, “I’ve been close to others, particularly the children and Sarah and Josh. But my friendship with you was a different kind of closeness. A kind I haven’t known since our ways parted.”
“Who could have guessed how far our lives would diverge given that we started in such similar places? I’m finding it very interesting.” He squeezed her hand briefly. “Rest now, Catkin. I think the rain is letting up some. When it ends, we’ll walk the last distance to Tucker Hall.”
She exhaled roughly. “That’s a good idea. Rain on the roof is much more soothing than rain beating down on one’s head.”
She closed her eyes and her breathing slowed. Still holding his hand, she rolled on her side so she was facing him, her features peaceful.
With sudden pain, he realized why Callie terrified him. It wasn’t just that he’d not been close to anyone for fifteen years, but that he was no longer capable of such closeness. He’d survived by cultivating cool, ironic detachment.
He was capable of enjoying life and other people, but never so much that he couldn’t leave without looking back. The capacity to feel deep emotional connection had died when he’d been convicted of theft and kidnapping and shoved onto a hell ship bound for the far side of the world.
On the whole, he thought he’d adapted well to the new life that had been forced on him. He’d survived and, while he’d done things he wasn’t proud of, he hadn’t become evil. But somewhere along the way, he’d lost his youthful capacity for hope and deep feeling.
Not the capacity for desire. That was alive and well, and he desired Callie with embarrassing intensity. But he cared for her enough not to want to do any damage. She’d suffered enough. She needed a friend.
He could manage that. She didn’t need the complications of an affair, and he didn’t need his life to be shattered again. Desire was a different matter, and he could control that. They’d be friends.
Forever friends.
* * *
He dozed as well, coming awake when he realized the rain was falling more gently and there were no more rumbles of thunder. He hadn’t slept long, less than an hour, but he felt recovered from his most recent escape from death. The darkness in the barn had lessened as the storm passed, and when he opened his eyes he saw that Callie was also awake and watching him with thoughtful hazel eyes.
He smiled at her. “Hello, Catkin.”
“I should call you Lion,” she murmured. “Larger than a cat, but of the same nature. And the courage of a lion.”
“Richard the Lionheart?” he asked with a chuckle.
“You have the tawny coloring for it.”
“More or less. Didn’t the Lionheart spend years kicking around the Holy Land getting into trouble rather than staying home in England and taking care of his responsibilities?”
She grinned. “The resemblance grows stronger.”
He laughed. “The difference being that I’m not king of England and I have no responsibilities to the nation.”
“But now you do have a home there,” she said softly.
Yes, he had a home in London and he was bemused by how much he wanted to return to it. “It’s a rather modest house, not a Plantagenet castle. There’s not much damage I can do to England.”
“Maybe not the nation, but just as the Lionheart was irresponsible to leave England at the mercy of his brother, now known as Bad King John, you have a bad brother, too. When the appalling Viscount Welham inherits and becomes Marquess of Kingston, he’ll be the equivalent of Bad King John.” Callie’s nose wrinkled. “He was a nasty piece of work. He regularly tried to get me alone so he could paw me.”
“What!” Gordon jerked to full wakefulness, shocked by her casual words. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I thought you might kill him,” she said flatly. “I didn’t want to see you hanged.”
“You’re probably right,” he said, trying to clamp down on his fury. He’d never liked Welham, the oldest and most bullying of the Audley brothers, but now he felt murderous. How dare that obnoxious brute try to molest Callie! “If I had killed him, I’d have been very careful to make it look like an accident.”
“I should have thought of that,” she said with a wry smile. “He might deserve killing for any number of reasons, but I prefer to think of people who wronged me the same way my nanny did.” She grinned. “She always said, ‘Get on with your business secure in the knowledge that God will get ’em eventually.’ ”
He chuckled and began to relax. “It’s a wise philosophy. These days I usually do just that, but if Welham was here, I’d beat him bloody for what he did to you. I chased him away from housemaids, but I never thought he’d go after a well-born neighbor.”
“I was good at avoiding him, so he was merely a nuisance, not a threat.” Callie’s expression changed. “You said earlier that you haven’t been really close to anyone in years. What about bedmates? I don’t imagine that you took any vows of chastity.”
The unexpected question made Gordon roll onto his back and gaze up at the rough-hewn beams. Callie said with amusement, “I assume that means you don’t want to discuss your romantic life.”
“It’s not a topic a gentleman, even a tarnished secondhand version like me, discusses with a lady.” He slanted his gaze over to her. “But you’re not a lady, you’re Callie, and we’ve always been open with each other.”
“I’ll try to look on that as a compliment,” she said. “How about if you tell me the truth, but not the whole truth? We all have our secrets.”
“That’s a good approach.” He preferred not to think about the whole truth even in the privacy of his own mind. “Unlike Welham, I never touch unwilling women.”
“That I’ve always known. You’re much nicer than you look, Richard.”
“No, I’m not,” he said wryly. “But since I grew up with a female as my best friend, how could I go on to mistreat other women?”
“So I get the credit for your treating the fair sex well? Good.”
“There’s a vast distance between not actually abusing women and always treating them well,” he said soberly. “Because I moved around a great deal, for years I chose unhappy wives as bedmates. They knew the relationship would be limited and that I would never betray them. In return, I did my best to give them pleasure so there would be some happiness in their lives for at least a brief time.” He drew a slow breath. “Then I realized that I might not mean to inflict pain, but I did.”
“Because some of those foolish women fell in love with you?”
He turned his full gaze to her. “How did you guess?”
“How could they not?” She twirled a pinch of hay absently between her fingers. “For a woman trapped in an unhappy marriage, a handsome man who treats her kindly and wishes to give her pleasure is a dream come true. Such a woman would want you always in her life, not merely as a brief, passing affair. I hope no married woman quietly murdered her husband in hopes that you’d marry her.”
He frowned. “I certainly hope not! But it took me years to realize that I was causing pain because I always moved on to some other place.”
“You implied that you changed your behavior at some point. How did that happen?” Her brows arched. “Slowly dawning maturity?”
He smiled ruefully. “By chance, I ran into a woman I’d had an affair with several years before. I was pleased because my memories of our time together were good ones. I discovered my error when she walked up and returned my greeting by punching me in the jaw. She threw a good fist, too. I asked her what I had done and she explained. I apologized for my criminal thoughtlessness and said I would do better in the future.”
“Did she believe you?”
“I don’t know, but I did change.” He glanced at the ventilation holes at the end of the barn. “It looks like the rain has stopped, so we can proceed on our way.” He stood and brushed off his damp breeches, then offered her a hand up from the hay.
She came up, wincing. “I was wrong that I wouldn’t have any bruises from coming off the horse! Nothing serious, though.”
Gordon opened the door, then retrieved his sodden coat from the floor and checked the inside pocket. “Good, the oilcloth preserved my letters of introduction. We may still need them.” He wrung as much water from the coat as he could, then tied the arms around his waist rather than wear it.
Outside, the saturated soil was steaming under the rays of the sun. The temperature had dropped with the storm, but it was still hot and as humid as any tropical country he’d ever visited. The bridge had completely vanished and the creek had overflowed its banks in some places.
“I’m glad we made it over the creek while there was still a bridge,” Callie observed. “How much farther?”
“Less than a mile, I think.” He smiled encouragingly. “Then we’re ready for the next stage of this adventure.”
“Speak for yourself, Lionheart! I don’t want an adventure. I want a thoroughly boring journey to Baltimore.”
“Where we will then await the invasion of the most powerful army in the world. That will be very boring, I’m sure,” he said dryly.
Callie laughed. “A lady can hope!”