Chapter Seventeen

It had been a half-hour at least that she’d been standing here, at the foot of the main stairs, her candle flickering as tiny gusts of the blustery wind swept through the hall. She’d waited until she’d heard the familiar sound of Mr Brown’s door closing—waited long enough to be certain she wouldn’t be seen nor heard—before creeping out of her rooms, giving not one thought to what she intended.

She’d come thus far almost entranced, her feet carrying her with solemn purpose. And then, at the bottom of the stairs, her mind had taken control and she’d balked before the rest of the journey. All at once the questions, the doubts, had assailed her. They would not be silenced, and swirled, endlessly, in her mind.

What if she was imagining things? Finding meaning where there was none? What if Liam had underlined the words to note that they were his favourite. To share, not to express any hidden thoughts or feelings.

If she was wrong about this, it would be...

Humiliating. Disgraceful.

More than enough to warrant dismissal. The presumption. The sheer wantonness...

And if she wasn’t wrong?

There was an attraction—no denying that. Even if she had wished to chalk it up to her overactive imagination, she wouldn’t have been able to. She had seen the heat in his eyes, felt the current when they’d dared get too close. Felt the pull, the magnetism, the desire. And the kiss they’d shared—there had been a connection no one could deny.

Was it not the danger of what might happen that had given her the strength to pull away? The fear of the depths she’d succumb to, of the heartbreak and sorrow which lay therein, which had forced her to break away? And now she was actively seeking it out, seeking him out, willing and eager to explore those tempting depths? What sort of consummate fool was she?

The wanton, fallen, brazen kind...

If she did march up those stairs and offer herself, what would he think then? In the cold light of the morning, what would remain of him as master and she as housekeeper? If she bridged the fragile chasm between them, separating their worlds, what would she be condemning herself to? Would he ever be able to look at her the same way, once she’d shared his bed? Or would whatever was left of his respect be gone?

It wasn’t as if he thought her an innocent. He’d seen the tattoos, and she’d been quite thorough in her revelations, telling him all about the men she had welcomed into her bed. Was this sort of behaviour all he expected? Did he dare invite her because he thought her a woman such offers could be made to?

Yet he had seemed to understand her choices, her search for comfort. Perhaps that was all he sought, too. Which was reassuring. Wasn’t it?

Reckon you won’t answer any of those questions just standing here, getting right nithered in your nightclothes...

Two choices. Accept the consequences of offering herself up to the master, or go back to bed and wonder forever what might have been.

With a deep breath, she took hold of the banister and made her way up the stairs. If there was one thing life had taught her, it was that there was no time for regrets. If Liam did not want her, so be it. She would live with the shame. But she would not live with the regret of having let what she knew to be something special pass her by.

Her resolve got her to Liam’s door, though once she stood before it she found herself yet again paralysed. But turning back, returning to her own rooms, seemed even more impossible than going through with this. And so, her hand as steady and sure as her heart was not, Rebecca made to knock on his door.

Just as she did, it swung open. She and Liam stood there, staring at each other in shock for a long moment. There was no doubt he’d been intent on going to her, and Rebecca’s heart sank. It would have been so much easier had he not wanted her. Rejection she would have recovered from. But his own desire, she would not.

Liam backed away slowly, and Rebecca stepped into the room before she could convince herself to flee as far from him and Thornhallow as she could. He closed the door gently, leaning so close she was certain he could hear her heartbeat, pounding away against her ribs as it was. She could certainly hear it.

She could hear his shirt rustling as he moved, the gentle patter of his bare feet against the rug, the crackle of the fire in the hearth. Every sense had heightened when she’d stepped inside. The faintest of touches as Liam took the candle from her, and set it down by the door, sent an electric current through her entire body.

Rebecca took a steadying breath before she dared look at him. ‘I ask nothing of you,’ she breathed as he stood before her. ‘Not now, not ever.’

‘And I ask only that you not leave me.’

Rebecca nodded, sealing the perilous pact, and Liam, his eyes alight with molten heat as he swept her into his arms, kissed her with a hunger and a passion she’d never known.

All his restraint evaporated, and he claimed her with that kiss, his hands tethering her as close to him as he could, as if he could meld their bodies together with that simple contact. And perhaps he could, for Rebecca felt as though she was tumbling into him, with him, to the place beyond the world where only their souls existed, entwined, connected.

Rebecca felt her dressing gown drop from her shoulders, and felt herself sweep away Liam’s. They were moving, moving away from the door towards his bed, neither willing to break the kiss that heated their blood and tied them together. Rebecca felt the same hunger she sensed in Liam rise within her. Desperate, unyielding and destructive desire which could never be satisfied. Not in a thousand years.

Liam broke away with a gasp, long enough only to send her nightdress flying into a crumpled mess across the room along with his shirt. Rebecca’s breath caught in her throat when she glimpsed him in the firelight, a sculpted paragon of male beauty, a god or an angel of light. Even his skin seemed to glow with the same magnetic pulse that shone in his eyes, drawing her to him with everything he was.

Her hands had a life of their own as they swept across his chest and abdomen, her fingers greedily mapping every inch of him as he took her mouth again. Their initial hunger sated, now they savoured each other, feasting slowly on what the other gave. Gently, fiercely, tenderly. Each touch was a breath, giving life in a way air could never.

Rebecca’s heart soared and felt as though it had leapt from her own chest into his. She pulled herself closer, so that she could feel his chest against hers, feel his breast against hers.

A low growl sounded in Liam’s throat and then his hands were on her hips, pulling the rest of her against him. She felt his desire pressing against her inner thigh, and her body decided it wanted more of him. All of him. Her hands found their way to his neck, then to his face, her fingers trailing along the lines of his jaw, his brow, his cheek, until they were running through his hair and she was entwined around him.

He lifted her, wrapping her legs around his hips, and carried her the last few steps to the bed. He laid them down together gently, his weight upon her, and the feel of him within her arms reassuring. A promise of all that he gave. He broke away and gazed down at her with such adoration and appreciation Rebecca’s heart skipped a beat. His thumb brushed her cheek before his fingers found their way to her long auburn tresses and fanned them out around her head like a crown.

His eyes swept across her face, simultaneously mapping and feasting, as Rebecca’s did. She wanted to commit every detail of him to eternal memory.

You will be the end of me, William Reid, she thought as he silently asked the question she could not in a million years say no to. She had already said yes, a thousand times since she’d first seen him.

So she slid her hands down, unlaced his breeches, and within seconds they and his drawers had joined the other garments on the floor.

And then he was trailing kisses everywhere. From the corners of her lips, along the line of her jaw, down her neck, to her shoulders and clavicle. Reverently, he explored every inch of skin bared to him, searching, listening to the shifts in her breathing, to the tiny moans escaping from her throat, finding those places which responded most to his touch.

Rebecca’s hands took over, guiding him, searching for his own secret places.

His mouth found her nipples and she arched back, the rush of scorching, glowing energy through her veins a jolt of life. He kissed and suckled gently, trailing a path of kisses across her chest as he moved from one to the next. His hands roamed across her belly and her hips, brushing as lightly as feathers, igniting every inch of skin beneath until they found their ultimate purpose.

Rebecca knew where he would touch her next and she guided his mouth back to hers, needing to quench her sudden thirst. Needing to fall into him again as his fingers slid along secret silken folds, as calescent as the core which awaited him there, slick and eager and welcoming. She gasped as he slowly explored her, and she felt him smile against her lips, his tongue trailing across her bottom lip. She bucked and arched, still drinking from him as he deepened his exploration, teasing, retreating, faster, slower, driving her to the edge she thought she knew.

‘Come with me,’ she told him, wrapping her legs around him again, begging him to take her fully, to complete their journey.

‘Rebecca,’ Liam whispered hesitantly. ‘What if—?’

‘I know how to ensure there are no consequences.’

He studied her for a long moment, and she knew how much trust she asked of him. She willed her promise to shine in her eyes, the promise that she would keep them safe.

‘Come with me,’ she repeated softly.

And so he did, unable to resist her entreaty, sliding himself into her with one sure thrust.

Rebecca cried out, and he brushed his hand soothingly against her forehead, asking if he’d hurt her. She opened her eyes and smiled, her eyes so dark with passion there was no doubt it had been sheer pleasure and not pain which had driven the cry from her lips.

So he kissed her again, and again, punctuating each movement inside her until once again she neared the edge. Then, cradling her, he rolled them over. Few men she had ever encountered preferred this way, yet somehow Rebecca was not surprised he would trust her, ask her to share the control, the drive.

She trailed kisses across his skin now...along his neck, which he bared to her, a wolf trusting her with his life. Across his shoulders, down his arms, down his chest. She, too, covered his nipples with her mouth, tasting, sampling, sending waves of pleasure coursing through him. He moaned and growled as she paid homage to every inch of incandescent skin.

She straightened herself upon him then, and his hands came to rest upon her hips, steadying her, guiding her as much as she did him. The dark hunger was in his eyes again—she could see it there, beneath the hooded lids, edging her ever onwards, matching her own. And behind it, the same resignation, an acceptance of what they had given in to.

It was wrong, improper, unacceptable, forbidden by the laws of God and man alike. Though together as one, as they were, neither could think this was anything but what should be. What had to be.

Liam rose, encircling her with his arms, begging her to stay close. Comfort, need, desire, all mingled when he kissed her again. Their eyes would not close, locked into each other’s, steadying, securing the invisible thread between them as they rocked and rose and moved with silent complicity.

Nothing Rebecca had ever experienced before with any man came remotely close to what she felt then, as they climbed ever higher together. Her heart beating in time with his, a calm surrender of everything that she was, had been and would ever be. She had been born for this, to love him and only him. She had been made for him, and he for her.

Overwhelming fear and regret rose to swirl inside her breast along with the sweet pleasure and love she felt.

Love. Impossible, heart-wrenching, desperate love. God help me...

And then they were rolling upwards towards the peak of their pleasure together, their cries mingling in the dusky haze of firelight and darkness. A kiss, to seal it. The promise of an eternal bond and connection that would be tried and tested, but never broken. His mouth declaring all his words could not, and her own screaming the words she could never say out loud.

I love you. I am yours. Always have been. Always will be.

Still she stayed cradled in his arms, her body refusing to part from his lest this all be naught but a dream. They remained entwined thus for a long time, until slowly they came to lie beside each other, their gazes still locked.

My love. My light.

‘Stay,’ he’d said, when she’d crawled from the tangle of his body, and from the soft blankets and sheets which had witnessed their coupling again a short while before. ‘Please,’ he had whispered, his hand outstretched when she’d finally found the strength to do what she must. Leave him. ‘Stay with me...’

And so she had.

Lying in his arms as she was now was dangerous, even more so than what they’d done before. Everything else she could dismiss as madness. Unbridled passion. She could convince herself it had been inevitably primal, nothing more, even though every inch of her body, heart and soul screamed out in denial. But this, this infinite tenderness in the safety of his own private world, this was far more threatening to her peace of mind, and heart, and soul.

Still, she lay there, her head rising and falling with every one of his breaths, her fingers trailing the lines of his body. She should not speak. She should not ask. She should not share anything more with him. And yet she could not stop herself.

‘Will you tell me, my lord—?’

‘Liam,’ he whispered. ‘Please.’

‘Liam,’ Rebecca repeated softly, trying not to enjoy the sound and taste of it. ‘Will you tell me what really happened here?’

She heard his heartbeat quicken and thought, as the silence thickened, that he would refuse. Ask her to leave.

‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t ask.’

‘No,’ he said with a heavy sigh, stroking her hair gently. ‘I have thought many times I should tell you. How I would like you to know. Now, perhaps, it is too late to shy away from bearing secrets.’

Rebecca’s hand came to rest on his belly, steadying him for the painful tale. The secret to his soul, to who he’d become.

‘My sister, Halcyon, Hal, she was... God, how I loved her. She was the most beautiful, the kindest creature to ever walk the earth. Not even our father could break her generous spirit. She was younger than me by ten years, and I think he resented her, blamed her for our mother’s descent into madness and death. It was easier than to admit it was he who caused her demise.’

‘Mrs Ffoulkes... She said he was a hard man.’

‘An understatement of infinite proportions,’ Liam said bitterly. ‘He was cruel, and cold. I didn’t know my grandfather, so I do not know if I may lay blame at his door for what my father was. Oh, my father never raised a hand to any of us,’ Liam told her, spotting the question in her eyes. ‘He didn’t need to. His words, his cutting reproach, his disgust and disapproval—they were enough. He hated for anyone in this house to feel pleasure. To feel...anything but fear. Hal, her horses, that tower... Despite all the resentment he felt towards her, somehow he allowed her those things. Perhaps because no matter what he said or did, it did not seem to change her. Hal was...so full of life nothing could touch her. I would have fetched her the moon had she asked. But then...’

Liam stopped, the words caught in his throat. The memories of that time resurfaced with a vengeance, the pain visibly as raw as ever. He took Rebecca’s hand, entwining their fingers, anchoring himself to her.

‘I went away. Only for a couple months, to get some respite from him. I spent it drinking and gallivanting about town with the few friends I had, but I came back for the New Year, and...everything had changed. Hal, she was broken. Withering away... I didn’t understand, I tried to help her, but she wouldn’t talk to me. I woke up one morning, and I swear, I heard her calling on the wind.’

Liam’s breath was shallow now, and hot tears slid from his eyes.

‘I found her in the river. Caught between a branch, and the ice... I...I knew. What she’d done. I lifted her out, carried her home. I always wondered if I could’ve done more... If she had confided in me...’

‘You did what you could, Liam,’ Rebecca breathed. ‘I’m sure she knew you loved her.’

‘Then why did she not trust me to help her?’ he pleaded, voicing the question he had clearly spent so many years asking himself.

‘I don’t know. No one can. But I do know that she would’ve wanted you to remember her as she was before. That she would have wanted you to carry her memory with you, not fear it.’ Rebecca kissed his chest, knowing it was easier said than done, but hoping the words brought him some comfort. ‘That’s why you kept her rooms untouched. You thought...’

‘That I might understand,’ he breathed, the confession tearing at her heart. It all made sense now.

‘That I might find clues, an answer to why she’d done it. There was nothing.’

‘There was everything she created.’

Liam kissed her knuckles tenderly and nodded.

‘Why—?’ Rebecca asked after a moment.

‘Why do they say I murdered her?’ he finished with a wry smile. ‘Because I said as much. When I laid her down before my father, at the bottom of the stairs, God... I was so angry, so distraught. I felt I had killed her, with my negligence. I said things... Some of the servants heard, and, well... I refused to deny it publicly, as otherwise, soon enough the town would’ve known how she really died, and...’

‘She would’ve been denied a proper burial.’

‘Yes... The magistrate... He declared it an accident.’

‘And your father?’

‘A year after Hal died, he had an attack of the heart. I was admittedly surprised to learn he did possess one,’ Liam spat bitterly. ‘He fell down the stairs, and his head was injured. The servants who found him were convinced it was murder, either myself or Hal’s ghost, whom they swore roamed the corridors. I was long gone—I’d left the day we buried Hal—but once people have convinced themselves of something...’

‘I understand.’

‘You always knew, didn’t you?’ he asked, looking down at the figure in his arms. ‘That there was more sorrow than malevolence in this house. That I was not the monster so many make me out to be.’

‘I have known monsters,’ she said, her eyes rising to meet his. ‘And I knew from the first that you were no such thing.’

‘I never...spoke of her, before. I never...shed tears for her,’ Liam admitted. ‘Not until...’

Rebecca smiled, and squeezed his hand.

‘Never spoke of any of them. Still,’ he whispered. ‘There is a void in me, one I fear will never be filled.’

‘In time, when you are ready. The loss will never leave you, but you will live with a full heart again.’

‘In time,’ he said pensively, his eyes roaming her face. ‘Perhaps.’

Perhaps we will both live with a full heart again.

For a brief moment Rebecca’s mind conjured an image of them here together, at Thornhallow, quiet peace in their hearts, and laughter in the air on a bright summer’s day. It was a strangely vivid daydream, so vivid it seemed a vision of the future.

An impossible future.

And just like that, reality once again swept over her.

Liam saw the longing and the regret come into her eyes, matching his own. He bent down and kissed her, with gratitude and affection, to make her forget, to allow them both to forget the world they lived in.

And then he took her again, lost himself in her embrace so deeply it felt as though her essence was seeping into him, healing him, her entire being a balm for his broken soul. He found himself within her then, himself who he’d thought lost forever.

Not that he would admit it to himself once they lay together later, sated yet again, Rebecca peacefully asleep in his arms. It was a trick of the mind, of the body. Bliss, pleasure, played tricks on one’s rationality. Yes, he had found a pleasure with Rebecca that he had never before with any woman. Yes, he had revealed parts of himself to her that he’d thought he never could. Yes, he enjoyed her company, her mind, her friendship.

But that was all it was.

Two lost souls, finding solace together in this dark winter night.

Their attraction had been undeniable, inevitable, given their living situation. He would not make this out to be anything more than it was. He could not.

For here, in this room, in the dead of night, time might stop, the world might fade away, but it would not be so in the cold light of day.