The sun had begun to set, casting a golden late-afternoon light over the courtyard as they strolled past the mews and turned to walk along a dirt lane that wound past an open field of wildflowers where the calming scent of lavender poppies filled the air.
She paused to take in the sight, and to inhale the familiar smells of grass and wildflowers and of the verdant hills that stretched beyond the meadow. “It is so good to finally be home.”
Will turned to face her, his eyes meeting hers. “Helena is a friend who warmed my bed from time to time because you were not there,” he said quietly. “I do not intend to see her again.”
She felt weak with relief. “It’s wrong, I know, but I hate her because she’s had you to herself for all these years.”
“It was a matter of mutual convenience, and friendship perhaps, but little more.” He paused, as though struggling to put words to his thoughts. “These past few days in your company have been among the happiest of my life.”
“Mine as well.”
“I have always held you in very high esteem, particularly so in these last days we’ve spent together.”
Warmth stirred in her belly as she remembered the intensity of their lovemaking as they’d sailed for home, the gently rocking boat and Will rising over her, his delicious weight pressing into her.
He took both of her hands into his. The setting sun illuminated the determined angle of his jaw and golden tones in his soft green eyes. “Once we settle this business of Duret and the letters, I hope you will give me leave to court you properly.”
She blinked. “But I thought you intended never to marry.”
“I took that vow when I thought you were forever lost to me because you are the only woman I could ever imagine taking to wife.” A muscle in his cheek worked. “However, you are still the daughter of a marquess and I remain a by-blow—”
“I don’t care—”
He held up a staying hand. “Allow me to finish. Although the circumstances of our births have not changed, you are now a woman grown. If you make the choice to become my wife, I would be honored.”
Joy kindled in her heart, but it was quickly extinguished by a blanket of guilt. “There are things you don’t know about me.”
He brought her hand to his mouth and pressed a kiss on her knuckles with soft, firm lips. “I know everything I need to know.”
She forced the painful words out. “I am an unnatural person.”
He frowned. “How do you mean?”
She pulled her hand away. “What kind of mother wouldn’t know her child was alive?” She turned away from him. “Susanna is almost six years old, and she’s never known a mother’s love.”
“You were deceived.” He placed a gentle hand on her shoulder to turn her back to face him. “Surely you don’t blame yourself for that.”
Her gaze traced the rawboned lines of his beloved face, the high forehead and serious gaze, the not-quite-straight nose. “I fear I lack the maternal instincts that come naturally to other women.”
Will smiled. “Nonsense. You challenged France’s most ruthless general in order to ensure your daughter’s safety. I would say your maternal instincts are quite well honed.”
She’d never thought of it quite like that. “Any mother in my place would do the same.”
“Mine would not.”
She felt a swelling of indignation in her chest. “She’s a fool, then, and it is her great loss that she doesn’t know what a rare and honorable gentleman her son is.”
He took her into his arms. “Rare and honorable enough for you to consider my suit?”
Conflicting emotions twisted her insides. She should tell him about his daughter, but this was not the place to have that kind of conversation. “Once we arrive at Langtry and everything is…apparent…if you still want to take me to wife, that would make me the happiest woman in England.”
He laughed, a low, rumbling sound of unencumbered delight she had not heard from him since they’d become reacquainted, perhaps not since the summers when he’d visited Langtry so long ago. He closed his strong arms around her and their lips met in a sweet, gentle, excruciatingly intimate kiss. He touched his forehead to hers. “I have something for you.”
“What is it?” she asked, breathless from his kiss.
“A betrothal gift.”
Her eyes widened. “How did you manage to buy me a gift?”
He reached into the pocket of his tailcoat and withdrew a coin. “I thought you might like to have a complete set.”
She stared at the metal disk he dropped into her open palm. The lines of Cleopatra’s aquiline profile were familiar to her, but the identity of the curly-haired man with strong features on the opposite side of the coin eluded her. “This is not Caesar,” she said, more to herself than to him.
“No, that is Marc Antony,” he said softly. “It’s known as a lover’s coin. I thought you might like to see them reunited for all time.”
Tears stung her eyes. He’d recalled her interest in Cleopatra and her wistful admiration of the great love she’d shared with Caesar’s ally. “Where did you get this? When?”
“In Paris, a couple of weeks ago. I acquired the piece because it made me think of you. And now, it seems fitting that you should have it.”
She turned the coin over, running a finger over the uneven edges and greenish film. “I cannot believe you remembered.”
“I did. I also recall your saying a love like theirs could not exist today, but I think you must be wrong.” His voice grew husky. “I cannot imagine any man caring for a woman more than I love you.”
Looking into his clear hazel eyes, she ran her knuckles along the high angle of his cheek, relishing the scratchy warmth of his skin, and couldn’t fathom a love more intense than the one that wrung her heart every time she looked at him. “I was wrong.” She searched his face. “Are you certain that this is what you want? You’ve said more than once that marriage is not for you.”
He turned his face into her hand and pressed his lips into her palm. “Don’t you understand the true reason I’ve never taken a wife?” he asked. “It’s because, in my soul, I’ve been wed to you since the evening of your eighteenth birthday. My heart has never been free to give to another.”
Her chest ached with feeling for him. He was the sun glowing warm on her face; he was the air she breathed. He was everything. “I’ve always been yours.” She kissed each of his eyelids, his cheeks and then, softly, his beautiful lips. “Always.”
Something like a growl sounded from deep in his throat. He took control of the intimacy, deepened it, widened his mouth over hers, tasting her with long drugging kisses, finally truly claiming what had always been his to take. The sinewy contours of his lean form pressed against her body, the scent of his skin and shaving soap filling her nostrils. Without breaking their connection, she pulled him down into the field with her among the lavender poppies.
He pulled away to survey the pasture around them. Darkness was beginning to fall, casting gray shadows around them, robbing the poppies of their colorful vitality. “Not here, Elle,” he said, breathing heavily. “Someone could come upon us.”
She began to fumble with the placket of his breeches. “I think this is the perfect place to consecrate our love. Here and now.” She couldn’t think of a more fitting place to make love with her future husband than in this gently waving field of wildflowers. She pressed her hand against his burgeoning erection. “Out here under the stars, just like it was the first time.”
Desire darkened his face, and she knew he was remembering the first time they’d made love. He came down over her, pushing her skirts out of the way, pressing her onto her back, the grass cool against her skin. She felt him nudging at her entrance followed by the sumptuous sensation of him sliding inside her, warm and hard.
He kissed her with tender passion. “It is different somehow,” he whispered.
“What?” she asked against his lips.
“Making love to you has always been a sublime experience.” He stroked deep, filling her with his love, encasing her in his masculine strength. “But lying with my future wife is the most extraordinary experience of all.”
Later that evening, Will stepped out of the chamber to give her privacy while she took a bath, leaving one of the maids at the inn to attend her.
He took the mysterious packet of letters with him, and she assumed it had something to do with his clandestine work. Her body flushed with arousal at the thought of Will engaging in cloak-and-sword pursuits. She’d always thought herself attracted to bookish academics, but the idea of a swashbuckling spymaster appealed to her adventurous side. Or perhaps Will, with his quick, agile form and keen mind, appealed to her in all of his various facets.
Contentment filled her as she soaked in the warm water. She and Will were so close to attaining the future she’d always dreamed of. He wanted to marry her—and not because it was the honorable thing to do—but because he loved her. She smiled to herself. There was now no impediment to telling him about their daughter. He would no longer view having a wife and child as a burden to be borne.
She pondered whether to wait until they were all together at Langtry to reveal the truth. Maybe he needed to become accustomed to the idea of taking a wife first. Will had forged his path alone for so long, it might be better to ease him into the reality that he already had a family.
When the water became too cool for her comfort, she rose and dressed in a coarse cotton night rail the tavern wench had procured for her. Although she was accustomed to finer things, a clean gown felt heavenly after the long days on the road in the same dress. She sat before the fire, combing her hair dry as she waited for Will.
An hour later, she paced restlessly across the creaking floorboard, turning her new coin, her gift from Will, over and over again in her hand. Where was he? Tension banded behind her shoulders as a terrible thought formed in her mind. What if Duret’s men had found him? Perhaps they’d taken him and at this very moment were doing horrible things to force him to confess where he’d hidden the stolen missives.
The door creaked open behind her, and relief flooded her when Will entered the room, closing the door behind him with a firm click.
She fled to his side. “There you are. I was so worried. Where were you? What were you doing?”
“I was reading my letters.” He stared at her with cold eyes.
“Is it very terrible news?” Terror stretched in her chest. “Is it about Susanna? Is my daughter hurt?”
“Don’t you mean to say, ‘Is our daughter hurt’?”
She froze, reflexively stumbling back from him as if he had struck her.
“Did you ever plan to inform me of my child’s existence?” He advanced on her, his words vibrating with cold fury. “Or did you hope to pass her off as a vicomte’s daughter forever?”
She shook her head against the words. “Of course, I was going to tell you.”
“I suppose it was preferable to pretend she was Laurent’s than to reveal to the world that you’d born the daughter of a bastard.”
“It wasn’t like that at all.” She struggled to find the words that would make him understand. “I tried to find you, but you disappeared.”
“Yes, I am aware.” He threw something on the bed. “Your letters explain it all.”
Puzzled, she picked the bundle up. It took her a moment to realize what she held: the letters she’d sent him six years ago, informing him that she carried his child. Her breathing hitched. “Where did you find these?”
“My brother sent them. It seems my father deliberately mislaid them so they never reached me.”
“But how did you come to have them now?”
“Once you informed me of their existence back in Paris, I sent a message to my brother asking him to look into the matter. He found them among my late father’s things.”
She frowned, her thoughts askew. “Your father deliberately kept these from you.”
“From what Giles tells me, my father desired a match between you and his rightful heir, not his bastard son.”
She remembered the way the old earl had attempted to draw her interest away from Will and toward Giles. “He hid the letters hoping I would turn to your brother.”
“It seems so.”
“It’s monstrous for him to have kept the letters from you.”
“The old earl felt strongly that a by-blow should know his place.”
“Do you think he knew about the baby?”
His manner was cold, distant. “No, the letters were unopened when I received them.”
She exhaled the breath she’d been holding. “We’ve both been terribly deceived.”
“Some of us more than others.”
But now that they both knew the truth, they could move forward. She placed a hand on his arm. “It relieves me greatly that you finally know of the child.”
He moved away, allowing her hand to drop. “Which is no thanks to you.” He turned to face her. “Tell me, when you claimed you wanted no more secrets between us, is this what you meant?”
Panic turned over in her stomach. “I always wanted you to know. The letters are clear.” Desperation rose in her voice. “I couldn’t wait forever. My situation was beginning to become apparent for all to see. I was young and desperate and terrified at the thought of bringing shame to my father’s name.”
“I’m not talking about some old letters,” he said sharply. “I refer to these past few days when you’ve shared my bed. We were planning our future and still you neglected to mention that you’d birthed a child of my blood.”
“I swear I was going to tell you as soon—”
He interrupted her. “Did Laurent know about your condition when he agreed to marry you or did you deceive him as well?”
She inhaled a painful breath. “He knew everything.”
“He was a vicomte,” he said with a frown. “How could he risk his title going to a child who wasn’t his? If you’d given birth to a boy, he would have inherited Laurent’s title.”
“All titles had been abolished in France, and he believed the aristocracy was dead.” She forced the words out through the terrible pressure bearing down on her chest. “He said it wouldn’t matter. I would never lie to him about such a thing.”
“But it was acceptable to obfuscate where I was concerned.” A muscle twitched in his jaw. “Even after all we’ve meant to each other these past few days.”
“No.” Panic filled her lungs. “I was going to tell you as soon as we reached Langtry. I swear it. You deserved to know.”
“Yes, I did. It was not your right to withhold this kind of information. What if something had happened to us along the road? I would have died without ever knowing I had a daughter. What if something had happened to you? I’d have watched Cosmo raising my daughter, never knowing she was mine.” Bitter anger seasoned the words. “You had no right.”
“You must understand.” She felt like she was falling off a cliff. “I was confused and afraid. Once I realized you’d never received my letters I knew I had to tell you.”
“You learned about the letters several days ago, and yet you continued to withhold the truth.”
“You said you didn’t want a family. I didn’t want to be a burden to you. I couldn’t bear the thought of knowing you felt forced into marrying me for honor’s sake.”
He stared at her, his features pinched with contempt. “And if I hadn’t wanted to marry you, then what? You would have let me unknowingly walk away from my own child, my blood?”
“No! Never.” The pressure of unshed tears pressed on her eyes. “I was going to tell you, in any event, once we reached Langtry. I swear it. Please believe me.”
“That’s just it. How can I possibly believe anything you say? I don’t even know who you are anymore. I cannot fathom ever being able to trust you again.” He turned to go. “Bolt the door after I leave.”
“Where are you going?” Panic filled her. “You’re not leaving.”
“I’ll return for you in the morning. At which time we shall take a carriage to Langtry to my daughter.”
“Don’t behave like this, Will.” She clutched his arm, feeling their future happiness evaporating like a puddle of water on a hot summer day. She had to make him understand. “Stay and talk to me. Let us resolve this.”
“Do you not understand the way of things? There is nothing to resolve.” He stared down at where her hand grasped his arm. “All these years I thought I wasn’t good enough. All these years I honestly believed I was beneath your touch.”
“No.” A tear rolled down her cheek. “You never were. Never.”
“In that, you are correct.” Pulling the door open, he shrugged off her arm. “Because it is you, my dear, who is beneath even a bastard’s touch.”