Perhaps this was not such a good idea after all.
Mary huddled on the carriage seat, wrapped in a pelisse and a cloak, the fur-lined hood drawn around her face. Yet still the cold wind bit at her skin. The sky, a purplish-grey bruised colour, seemed to lower around them every minute. The clouds looked ready to unleash a fury of rain at any moment.
When they found Ginny at last she would have to shout at the girl until they were both senseless for putting them through this! Then she would sit by a warm fire the rest of the winter.
She peeked at Dominick, who sat silently at her side. She could barely see him, wrapped as he was in a greatcoat and hat, a scarf muffled around his lower face as he urged the horses onward. He had hardly said a word since they had set out, but every once in a while he would reach out and tug the lap robe closer around her.
She stared out at the road again, at the hedgerows and trees concealed in the mist. They seemed to be the only two people in all the world. Everyone else was sensibly tucked up at home by their fires, leaving them all alone. It felt almost like a fairy story—two people on a magical quest.
Except she did not feel magical in the least. She felt cold, tired, and distinctly unsettled to be so near Dominick and yet still so far away.
She shifted on the seat, tucking her hands deeper into her muff. The hot brick at her feet had long gone chilly, but she pressed her feet closer to it anyway.
‘Are you all right?’ Dominick asked her, his voice muffled.
Mary was startled by the sudden sound in the midst of all that silence. ‘Yes. Just cold.’
He nodded. ‘It will be nightfall soon. We’ll find an inn to stop at for a few hours.’
An inn, where there was sure to be a fire and warm things to drink. It sounded wonderful, but … ‘If we stop, they will get even further ahead of us, yes?’
‘They can’t travel at night, either,’ he said sensibly. ‘My cousin might be a romantic young puppy, but I’m sure he would never put your sister in danger. Just as I won’t put you in danger. Besides, we should enquire if they’ve been seen along here. We’ll set out again at first light, and try to make it to my Aunt Beatrice’s home by tomorrow night. Perhaps she’s heard something of our runaways.’
‘Aunt Beatrice?’ Mary asked, seeking conversational distraction from the damp cold. ‘You have an aunt?’
Dominick laughed. ‘I’m not so solitary as all that, Mary. I do have some family.’
‘I know you do—everyone does.’ She had just seldom thought of Dominick in such ordinary terms as having kinsmen and obligations, as she did. When she was young he had seemed like a golden prince, complete in himself. Now she was not sure what she thought of him. ‘Tell me about your aunt.’
‘She is the Dowager Lady Amesby—the widow of my uncle. Sadly, it was the deaths of her husband and son that made me the heir. My father was her husband’s younger brother.’
‘And Captain Heelis?’
‘He is the son of their younger sister. Unfortunately Aunt Kate was always a flighty sort. She lives in Ireland now, so she can’t talk any sense into her son’s head.’
Mary laughed. ‘I’m sure I should be glad to meet Lady Amesby, then, especially if her house has lots of fireplaces. My own father’s sister, my Aunt Hester, always tried to save on expenses by lighting just one tiny fire in her own sitting room and severely restricting candles. She did not like children to laugh or talk too loudly, either, and had my sisters and I quite terrified of her. We hated to visit her, but our father made us go there every year.’
‘No fear of talking too loudly in Aunt Beatrice’s house. She is rather deaf. Luckily for me, that means she hasn’t heard any of the gossip about me, and thus thinks I am still an upstanding fellow.’
Mary was beginning to think he was not so bad herself. No one with a completely black heart would go with her in the dead of winter to chase after her eloping sister. But she could not forget Lady Newcombe, or the blonde woman at the museum. Dominick, you naughty man … The ladies did still flock to Dominick, as they always had. He would never look twice at her now.
She shivered, and Dominick shifted the reins to one gloved hand, putting his arm around her shoulders and drawing her close. ‘We will stop soon, I promise.’
Mary couldn’t help herself. She rested her head on his shoulder, leaning into him as the carriage lurched on through the wind. ‘I suppose searching for an inn under inauspicious circumstances is appropriate for Christmas.’
‘Perhaps so,’ he answered. ‘But I can think of better ways to celebrate.’
She closed her eyes, relishing the warmth of him through all their layers of wool, linen and fur. ‘I can, too. When I was a girl, my sisters and I used to go out and gather greenery. We made wreaths and swags for all the mantels and picture frames, and tied enormous red and gold bows around everything we could find. We didn’t have much pin money, but we would save up and buy each other books and drawing pencils and lacy handkerchiefs, and hide them until Christmas Day.’
‘And did you have a great feast on the day?’
‘Oh, yes.’ Mary smiled at the memory. ‘Roast goose, baked ham and plum pudding. After church, all my parents’ friends would come home with us for dinner. Then there was music and dancing. It was—wonderful.’
His arm tightened around her. ‘Did you keep such traditions when you married?’
Mary opened her eyes, suddenly cold again at the reminder of her grown-up Christmases. ‘No. My husband and his mother did not care for Christmas. We would just go to church and then spend the day reading or walking. Drew and I would sometimes sneak out and buy each other a small gift, though, and sing a Christmas carol or two when no one was about. When I had my son I tried to make it special for him, but … ‘ She couldn’t go on at the thought of those old Christmases.
Dominick said nothing, but Mary thought she felt him gently pat her shoulder through her wraps. ‘Christmas is still a few days away. You can be back in time to spend it in Town however you would like … ‘
‘Perhaps.’ Somehow she doubted it, though. Finding Ginny was like looking for a star amid the clouds.
They soon found an inn, and its proprietors were shocked to see anyone out in such weather at all.
‘Of course you and your wife are most welcome, sir,’ the innkeeper’s wife said as her husband saw to the carriage. She showed them to a parlour. ‘We have plenty of rooms to offer you, and a nice hot venison stew for supper. We didn’t expect any travellers in such unholy weather, and so near Christmas.’
‘We had some family business to see to at once, or we would not be abroad, either,’ Dominick said as Mary removed her damp cloak and bonnet and sat down by the blessedly warm fire. ‘We were very grateful to find your establishment before nightfall. But you have seen no one else for a time? Not even another couple?’
‘You’re the only guests we’ve had for two days at least,’ she answered. ‘Only a very few carriages have gone past on the road, even.’
‘Of course,’ Dominick answered. ‘Everyone sensible is at home.’
‘If there’s nothing else, sir, I will just go and see to the food and have some water heated for washing,’ she said, hurrying away and leaving them alone again.
Mary watched as Dominick laid his coat to dry by the fire and sat down beside her. Silently he reached for her hands and slowly peeled the leather gloves from her fingers. She stared down at his touch against her. It made her feel so—so strange. Warm and shivery all at the same time—taken out of herself. Not even the most passionate kisses from her husband—which had never been very passionate—had made her feel even a fraction of the way this simple touch did.
And when the landlady had called her Dominick’s wife— she definitely did not want to consider the thrill that one word had given her!
That was surely a very dangerous sign indeed. She knew she should pull away from him, but she just couldn’t. She loved the way he made her feel again, after so long in the frozen dream of sadness.
‘Your hands are so cold,’ he muttered, gently rubbing at them, bringing her skin to tingling life.
‘So are yours,’ she whispered.
‘You should have let me come on this journey alone. Then you would be tucked up by your own fire at home.’
‘And endlessly worrying about Ginny.’ And worrying about Dominick, too, on this search all by himself. ‘I couldn’t bear that. It’s much better that I be at least somewhat useful. Besides, this fire is just as cosy.’
He let go of her, and turned to stare into the crackling flames. She wished she knew his thoughts, but he seemed very far away from her.
‘Did you have grand plans for Christmas?’ she asked. She propped her feet on the hearth, wriggling her toes in her boots as they slowly came back to life.
‘Not as grand as roast goose, plum pudding and dancing,’ he said. ‘My friend Lord Archibald is having a party. Perhaps I would have gone to that.’
‘Indeed?’ Lord Archibald was a notorious rake. She could just imagine the sort of party he would have. There would surely be women like the one Dominick had been with in the museum, just ready to give him a wonderful time. A time full of the fun she had almost forgotten.
Dominick gave her a crooked smile, as if he read her thoughts. ‘Or perhaps I would have stayed home and finished unpacking those crates of new books.’
There was no time to ask him anything else, for a line of servants bustled in with their supper and more fuel for the fire. By the time they had finished eating and retired to their adjoining but separate rooms, Mary was deeply tired.
Yet she found she could not sleep. She lay under the quilts, listening to freezing rain beat against the window.
And listening to the sounds of Dominick moving around in the room next door. It seemed her ears were intently sensitive to every noise—the splashing of water as he washed, the creak of floorboards as he walked, the rustle of cloth as he changed clothes. The sigh of the mattress as he laid down.
She closed her eyes tightly, but that did not help. She just saw him in her mind, lying in that bed so very close to her own, listening to the same rain. Did he lie awake, too? What did he think about?
And what did he wear to bed? A nightshirt and cap, as William had? Or—nothing?
Oh, blast it all. Now there was a new image in her mind, an image of his lean, bronzed body bare against white sheets, his golden hair rumpled on the pillows. Surely it was the landlady’s assumption that she was Dominick’s wife that made her think such things? Made her imagine his touch, his kisses.
She rolled over, pressing her hot face into the bedclothes. Go away, go away, she told the images, and slowly they faded away. But she still could not sleep.