Halfway Home, page 28
Well, at least he didn’t gamble and smoke stinking cigars and wear flowered satin waistcoats and call every lady he met darling. Sara liked Rafe, she truly did, for he was an entertaining scoundrel, and he’d been a good friend. But when it came to choosing a husband, she would take a man like Jericho over a dozen Rafes.
She managed to force down a few bites of her supper, not because she was hungry but because she suspected Jericho was being far too extravagant. And while she didn’t want to encourage it, neither did she want him to think she didn’t appreciate it.
Jericho ate because he was hungry, which wasn’t particularly romantic, but then, he was not a romantic man. What he was, was a big man who had gone without his breakfast because Sara had already been seated at the table, her face still flushed with sleep. One look and he’d gone stiff as a poker, so he’d headed out to split wood before riding over to Moyer’s place.
He had gone without his midday meal because she’d been there when he’d come in through the back door, with her hair down and her damp gown clinging like a second skin. Sitting at the table looking so damned fetching, he’d wanted to devour her instead of his ham-bone soup.
Damnit, a man had to eat if he wanted to keep up his strength.
Jericho waited for her to rise, and then he stood, stretched, and yawned widely. “If you’d care for a hot bath before you go to bed, madam, I can send for some hot water.”
“I’d like that.” Her voice came out high and squeaky.
“Stiffens a body up, driving in the rain.”
“I do believe you’re right. Not that ours isn’t a fine carriage.” It wasn’t a carriage at all, but only a two-seater. Sara happened to know Jericho had ordered a spanking new carriage, but it had yet to be delivered.
He said something that sounded like mumph. Or maybe humph.
“What did you say?”
“I said, madam, that if we’re to get any sleep at all tonight, I’d best send for that water.”
The word “sleep” seemed to vibrate throughout the room. Sara busied herself with stacking the plates on the heavy serving tray. What on earth was happening to her? You would think she had never shared a room with a man before. Mercy, she had slept in so many rooms with so many different men lately she should be used to it by now.
But this was different. This was Jericho, and for once, neither of them was an invalid. There was nothing in the world to keep them from . . .
And certainly no reason why they shouldn’t . . .
She dropped a fork and knelt to pick it up at the same time Jericho bent to retrieve it. Their shoulders bumped. He reached out to steady her with a hand on her arm, and she half expected to see smoke rising from the place where he touched her.
Oh, for heaven’s sake, Sara Rebecca, whatever happened to your good sense? The man is your husband, not some mysterious dark stranger set on having his way with you!
While Jericho left to make arrangements for the hot water, Sara made a deliberate effort to compose herself. By the time he returned, she had succeeded quite well.
“Thank you. I do believe I’ll sleep better for a nice hot bath. Shall I leave the water for you, or would you rather go first?”
There. That sounded sensible enough. They could probably command enough hot water for two separate baths, but it would take forever to empty the tub, and she didn’t fancy having a parade of potboys trooping in and out of the room all night.
While the tub was being filled, Sarah stood at the window, seeing in the dark glass a reflection of Jericho sprawled in one of the two sky blue velvet armchairs. In his black suit, with his dark, angular features, he looked utterly predatory. She knew he wasn’t. Not really. All the same, the notion played havoc with her heartbeat.
When the tub was filled, he dismissed the boys with a word of thanks and a few coins, then turned and regarded her from under the shelf of his level brows. His eyes glittered. He looked flushed.
“Rico, you never answered my question. Are you coming down with something?”
Somewhat surprised by her concern—although by now, he should have been used to it—Jericho nearly told her just what it was he was coming down with, but it was still too new to him. This peculiar muddle of tenderness and protectiveness and desperate sexual hunger. He couldn’t have been any more at sea if he’d been set down in the middle of a North Atlantic storm without a compass, a chart, or a spare set of sails, How did she do it? He could have sworn she was as guileless as a day old chick.
“Hot water don’t stay hot forever, madam. If you’re going to use it, you’d better step to it.” His voice was so gruff you’d have thought she was some raw hand being hauled up before the mast. “That is, if you’re a mind to,” he said, apology in his tone, if not his words.
Without a word Sara went behind the screen, where she proceeded to undress. Not until she had eased herself into the deep warm water did she remember her soap. She’d been in such a rush to pack she’d forgotten to bring it.
As if reading her mind, Jericho asked if she needed soap. “Yes, but I’m already in the tub.”
“Then close your eyes.”
Obediently, she squeezed them shut, then popped them wide again. He was standing before her in his shirtsleeves, grinning broadly, a chunk of Hester’s best bayberry soap held out in his extended hand.
“Jericho, you’re a terrible tease.” She was tempted to laugh, but amusement wasn’t all she felt. He was still looming over her like a great bird of prey, fists planted on his hips, feet spread apart.
“You look a lot better out of that brown thing than in it.”
“You shouldn’t be here, and you certainly shouldn’t say things like that,” she scolded, not meaning a word of it.
“You’re my wife, Sara. It’s not like I’ve never seen your body before.”
Lowering her head to her bent knees, she groaned. “Yes, well—this is different. I—I want you to leave.”
“No, you don’t.”
No, she didn’t. She wanted him to stay. But first she wanted him to say something to break the painful bonds of shyness that afflicted her. She was still pressing her forehead to her wet knees when she felt something slide along her back.
“Shift forward, Sara.” With one hand on her shoulders and the other one on her back, he eased her forward on the slick bottom of the tub.
“What are you doing?” she hissed.
“Fixing to take a bath.”
“But I’m in here!”
“Yes, ma’am, I know you are. I did take note of that.” His tone was grave, but his voice carried an undercurrent of laughter. She could well imagine the devilment lurking in those wicked black eyes of his. A sober man, he didn’t laugh often. When he did, it was usually at her expense.
But then he was settling his body down behind hers, easing one long limb on either side of her hips, and laughter was the very last thing on her mind.
“There now, we fit right fair, wouldn’t you say so?”
They fit more than fair, they fit perfectly. But it was all Sara could do to breathe. Speaking was out of the question.
“Don’t go sliding under the water, um—darling. I’ve done with hauling you ashore.”
Darling. He had called her darling. Merciful saints, what was he trying to do to her? Finding her voice, she asked him just that.
“As to that, I reckon I’m trying to court you.” The soft rumble of his voice sent vibrations coursing through her all the way to the tips of her toes.
He was trying to court her. Sara thought her heart would surely swell up and burst right out of her bosom. “Rico, you don’t have to do that,” she whispered.
“I’m not doing it because I have to. I’m doing it because I want to. Because you deserve it, only I’m not very good at it.” His hands began circling slow and lazy over her skin just above her waist. To Sara’s way of thinking, he was very, very good at it.
She was clutching the chunk of bayberry soap as if it were a life raft. When it squirted from her fingers, Jericho retrieved it. With slow, soapy strokes, he massaged her sides, her arms and shoulders, and then her stomach. And then his hands slipped to her belly, and she caught her breath at the startling sensations that quivered in her most private parts.
“Rico, I-I’m not sure . . .” she gasped. She wasn’t sure of anything except that if he stopped what he was doing, she might die.
She squirmed, aware of the rapidly changing configuration of that portion of his body that was pressed so closely to her own. She knew what it meant. Oh, yes, she did know that much.
“Rico,” she murmured at the same time he whispered her name.
And then one of his hands moved up to cover her breast as the other one slipped lower. Her limbs trembled and parted to his gentle urging, and her head fell back onto his shoulder. If the house had been burning down around them, she wouldn’t have noticed.
With one last glimmer of sanity, Jericho wondered just where courting left off and rutting began. He suspected he had crossed the line the minute he’d dipped a toe into her bathtub.
Hell, he had probably crossed it the first time he had decided to protect her from the ruffians back at the Halfway Hotel.
His breath was coming hard and heavy, just like the rest of him. He didn’t want to rush her, but he wasn’t sure just how long he could keep up this pace. He’d never taken a woman in a bathtub before, but there had to be a way.
He eased one leg forward. His foot struck the end. He shifted, wondering if he could slide her up onto his lap, and then his elbow struck the rolled rim a painful blow.
“Sara? Do you reckon we’d better get out before the water gets any colder?”
“Colder?” At the rate they were going, Sara thought, the water would soon be steaming.
He stood and carefully lifted her out. She felt boneless. When he released her just long enough to wrap one of the hotel’s huge towels around her, she nearly slithered to the floor.
Jericho swept her up into his arms, murmuring things like, Easy does it, and Steady as she goes. Which weren’t particularly romantic, but which sounded wonderfully romantic to Sara’s prejudiced ears.
*
That night Sara became a wife in the fullest sense of the word. With a lover who was both thrilling and tender, she learned things about her own body she would never in this world have dreamed possible.
And then she insisted on knowing all about his body. About whether or not he felt the same things she did, and why. About the stunning effects of touching in a certain way, in a certain place. Together, they explored all the possibilities and invented a few of their own. Sara grew shockingly bold, delighting Jericho, who grew increasingly tender. They laughed together, and once Sara even cried.
No real reason. She simply couldn’t contain her happiness, and some of it overflowed in tears.
Jericho was devastated until she reassured him. Which she did, in the most direct way she could think of.
They woke just before morning, starving, and breakfasted on cold biscuits and stale ginger cake from the supper tray that had yet to be collected. They talked about things each considered important, such as those few things from Sara’s mother’s dresser that represented home to her. Such as the thin volume of improving verses Jericho had long since retrieved from the attic at Wilde Oaks, but still hadn’t read.
They made love again and again, and early the next afternoon, just before they set out for home, Jericho bought Sara three pairs of kid slippers, two with ribbons, and two pairs of high-lows, which he said were far more practical for country wear. Just as if she had grown up in the city wearing Roman sandals and silk stockings.
He promised to drive her all the way to Norfolk to visit all the drapers and rug merchants and furniture makers. “Might as well do it up right while you’re at it.”
“Oh, but you don’t have to do that,” she had said, overcome by his generosity.
“I know that, Sara. I’d like to, though.”
She nearly wept again. He made her feel as if she were the most precious thing in the world, and all without a word of love being spoken.
Sara thought it, though. A hundred times she had stopped just short of telling him what was in her heart. The words ached to be spoken, but she just couldn’t bring herself to say it when she wasn’t sure he felt the same way.
Oh, he liked her well enough, she did know that. And she did know how to please him in bed, but love was more than that. Love was . . .
Well. Love wasn’t learned in a day. She would simply have to be patient.
The sky had cleared off nicely, and the air was crisp, not really cold. The smell of peat smoke was hardly noticeable. Sara was pleasantly sore, pleasantly tired, and excited by the bustle of shops and traffic. Ships by the score sailed through the narrows, some anchoring in the local harbor, some bound elsewhere through the canal.
On the way home, Jericho offered to teach her to drive.
“Teach me,” she crowed. “I’ve driven a dogcart, a mule cart and once I even drove a team halfway down the lane before Papa caught me and threatened to skin me alive.”
She laughed, and he laughed, and Sara thought she had never in -her entire life felt so close to another person. It was wonderful.
She drove for the last few miles home. They passed the hedgerow that divided Rafe’s place from their own, and Sara asked what had happened to Ivadelle. “I know he didn’t really kidnap her. Not even Rafe would go that far.”
“As to that, I reckon he might, if he wanted something enough.” He sent her an odd look, which Sara missed entirely as she was concentrating on managing the headstrong gelding. “They came to an understanding.”
“An understanding! Those two? They spat at one another like two tomcats in a tote sack every time he was over here.” Jericho eased the reins from her hands, and Sara flexed her fingers. The gelding was harder to manage than old Blossom.
“All the same,” he said calmly, “I reckon they’ll suit well enough.”
As they neared the place where the lane turned off in the direction of the overseer’s house and the tenant houses farther on, Jericho handed Sara back the reins. “Take her on home, madam.” Beloved Sara. Darling Sara. “I’ll be along directly.”
The truth was, he wasn’t ready yet to face Hester. She knew him too well. She would know right off what had happened between him and Sara, and it was too new to share.
*
Proudly, Sara tooled the neat little gig right up to the front door. She wanted Maulsie and Simon to see her. She heard Brig barking from out near the shed, which probably meant that Simon was out there.
“Stand still, sir,” she said, climbing down and looping the reins over a low stubbing post. “I’ll send Simon out directly.”
She dashed up the steps in her brand-new, two-toned high-lows. “Maul-sie! Hes-ter! I’m ho-ome!” she sang out. “Just wait’ll you hear what I did—I drove practically . . . all the way . . .”
The kitchen was empty. There was no sign of anyone at all downstairs. The dough bowl was on the floor, and flour was scattered across the table. A chair was overturned.
“Maulsie?” Sara whispered.
At a slight sound behind her, she whirled around. “No.” She shook her head in denial. “You can’t be here. You’re dead.”
Chapter Twenty-three
Sara caught at the back of a chair, nearly overturned it, and slumped weakly down at the table. “Titus, where did you—how did you get here?”
“On that miserable gelding you were so kind as to return to my mother. Overjoyed to see me, sister dear?”
He looked terrible. The bright golden curls of which he had always been so inordinately proud were matted and greasy. There were spots on his waistcoat. His face, always pale, was gray, with liverish shadows beneath his eyes.
“I thought you were dea—that is, you’ve been ill?”
“Ill. That’s it, I came down with a wild fever,” he exclaimed, clapping his hands together. The smile that had stood him in such good stead with the young ladies before they saw through it was little more than a nasty sneer.
“But the duel—that is, I understood—”
“Ah, yes, the duel. Did you know our poor dear mother was heartbroke, what with her beloved Sara running off and her precious only son getting gut-stuck by some dirty bastard off a coal barge.”
“Off a three-masted schooner,” Sara murmured distractedly, “not a coal barge.” Her mind worked frantically. Where were Maulsie and Hester? Why had Titus come after her? He could hardly believe she would go away with him, even if she weren’t already married.
“Not a coal barge!” he shrieked. “Is that all you have to say for yourself? After all you’ve done? Mama told you you were supposed to marry me! Me, not Wilde! It’s my money! Me, me, my, my, money, money, marry, marry!”
And then he clapped a hand over his mouth and giggled.
Sara’s eyes rounded with horror. He was mad. Quite, quite mad. “Titus,” she ventured cautiously, “wouldn’t you like to lie down? I expect you’re tired, what with the long ride and all.”
His ruined face, once considered the handsomest in all Norfolk County, was suspiciously guileless. “Where’s Wilde, Sara? Where’s your husband? Does he know you’re promised to me?”
“Oh, but—”
Lunging across the table, Titus caught the high neck of her gown and twisted, cutting off her supply of air. “You belong to me, damn your soul! I won’t let you cheat me out of what’s rightly mine!”
Sara clawed feebly at his hands as dark spots began to swim before her eyes. “No—Titus—can’t breathe,” she managed to gasp.
“You’re going to marry me, Sara, just as soon as I make you a widow, and then it will all be mine.” Releasing his grip on her collar, he gestured widely. Then he began to laugh. A feeling of horror crawled over her skin, and she wondered if she could manage to reach the boning knife Hester kept in the dresser drawer.
And then she saw it. The familiar silver-capped stag handle was lying within inches of Titus’s hand, the slim, curved blade half hidden under a stack of newly washed linens waiting to be folded on the end of the table.
