A Common Scandal (15 page)

Nate’s mouth left hers, trailing kisses along her cheek to her earlobe. His tongue swiped along the soft, sensitive spot underneath it and she gasped. With one hand he still cradled her head, protecting her from the stone bench underneath her. His other hand roamed her body, sliding up her thigh, gripping her tightly cinched waist and finally moving up to cup her breast. His thumb swept over the top edge of her evening gown, to where her breast swelled above it. That small contact wasn’t nearly enough and she arched against him, willing away all the layers separating her bare skin from his.

“Dammit, Amelia, this is wrong,” he muttered against her neck before he kissed her there, a hot, openmouthed kiss that sent goose bumps racing down her body.

She fisted her hands in his hair and hauled his face up to hers again. “Shut up and kiss me, Nate.”

He did, and she could taste his anger and frustration in it as much as she could taste his raw desire. His hand returned to her knee and she felt him gathering her skirts up. The cool night air hit her ankle, then her calf and then her thigh. His palm slid up, cupping behind her knee and pulling her leg open. They’d shifted on the bench, and now he lay nearly on top of her, his long body cradled between her thighs. When she felt the rough rasp of his fingertips on the delicate skin of her inner thigh, she gasped, but he changed the angle of his kiss and smothered the sound.

His fingers continued to slide up her thigh, over her bloomers, toward a place no one had ever dared touch her. The writhing desire in her stomach threatened to overwhelm her. She needed something from him, something she had only a hazy knowledge of. But Nate’s sure handling of her body led her to believe he knew how to give it to her. When his fingers brushed against her, she froze in shock. Surely he didn’t mean to...? And then he found the slit in her bloomers and she knew exactly what he intended to do. One moment she felt him moving aside the delicate cotton and the next, his fingertips were dragging through the wet heat between her legs.

“Nate!” She arched underneath him.

“Shh,” he soothed, kissing her to swallow the sounds she made as his fingers worked back and forth. And... good God, she felt him push inside her, a finger and then two. The invasion felt wholly foreign and utterly insufficient. Even as her body stretched around him, she wanted more. She wanted all of it, everything there was to explore with him. His fingers set up a slow, pulsing rhythm, one she seemed to recognize instinctively, her body moving to match it.

“Please,” she murmured against his lips.

“I won’t ruin you, Amelia,” he rasped. “I can’t. But this...I can do this.”

His thumb rubbed against her right where she was most sensitive and she cried out, the sound muffled by his kiss. Oh, it felt so good, so right. Too much and not enough. The simmering desire she’d felt since she’d first kissed him boiled over. Heat flashed down her legs and through her belly, drawing in to the most exquisite pinpoint of pleasure right where his hand met her skin, before exploding outward again.

As Nate felt her go limp beneath him, he groaned, low and guttural, into the crook of her neck. He didn’t move as Amelia slowly came back to earth, her limbs filling with languor as she held on to him.

“Oh, Nate...”

He pushed himself up onto his hands, still hovering over her, eyes squeezed shut. “Good God, this is a disaster.”

“But—” She reached up to touch his face but he reared away, sitting up and shoving his hands through his hair.

“No, Amelia. We should not have done that. It’s inexcusable.”

Amelia sat up as well, tugging her skirt back down. “Please don’t scold me now.”

“I’m scolding both of us. This was madness. Wrong and dangerous and—”

Abruptly, she stood up. Sitting in such close proximity to him was unbearable. All the pleasure they’d shared was rapidly curdling in her stomach. She crossed her arms over her chest and glared down at him. “I never would have guessed you as one of these hidebound sticklers for propriety, Nate. You’re a man of the world. You’ve seen and done everything.”

“I’m not a stickler.”

“You could have fooled me. All this bemoaning.”

“I’m trying to
protect
you, you infuriating woman!” he said in a near shout, leaping to his feet, as well. Closing his eyes, he took a deep breath before continuing in a quieter tone. “You’re after Radwill and according to you, he’s interested. I’m trying to keep you from making a misstep that would cost you everything you say you want.”

“Trying to protect me, or trying to protect your own mercenary self-interests? After all, what would the elegant Lady Julia say if she saw you out here with me?”

“Leave her out of this.”

She scoffed to cover the pain seeping through her heart. She’d forgotten in the midst of what had transpired, that he was pursuing some other woman. This extraordinary thing that had passed between them, what he’d done to her—was nothing. Not to him. “Of course. Because she’s the fair, untouched girl you mean to marry. I’m just the old acquaintance with loose morals who’s good for a quick tussle in the garden.”

“That’s not fair. You started this.”

Those words landed like a blow. She fell back a step, gripping her elbows with her hands to hold herself together. The chill of the night finally settled in and she felt cold to her bones. She was shaking with it. Forcing a smile she didn’t feel, she chuckled. “Why, yes I did. How very like me, right, Nate? Throwing myself at one man in the garden while I pursue a different man in the parlor. Exactly what everyone expects of me.”

“Stop it. You know that’s not what I think of you.”

“Do I? All you do is scold me for my bad behavior.”

Nate said nothing, dropping his head forward and planting his hands on his hips. That was worse. At least when he fought back, it felt like they still shared some connection. His silence, his defeat, felt like a judgment. Here he was, trying to move on and up in the world, and here she was, still the wild little hoyden she’d been as a child, taunting him until she got them both into trouble.

“You used to like my bad behavior,” she said softly, too tired to summon any more anger.

“We were children, Amelia.”

This had to end. He was about to marry another woman and still, she couldn’t stay away from him, no matter how many times he told her to. Because she loved him, of course. It was clear to her now, and in a way, it felt inevitable. Of course it would be Nate she fell in love with. He’d captured her heart as a little girl and he still held it, now when she was a woman. He probably always would, no matter who she married, no matter who he married. Oh, love was terrible.

“Yes, and as you keep reminding me, we’re not anymore.” She reached into the edge of her bodice to retrieve the thing she’d been wearing near her heart all week—his sea glass. Stupid, sentimental girl, clinging to something that meant nothing to him anymore. “Here. I’ve been meaning to return this to you for ages.”

She tossed it at him, aiming for his face, but even in the dark, his reflexes were too quick, and he snatched it out of the air. Turning it over in his long fingers, he examined it, wonder overtaking his features.

“I can’t believe you kept this.”

“Yes, well, I always was very silly. But as we’re not in a position to continue any sort of friendship, I shouldn’t keep it.”

He raised his head. “Amelia—”

She continued, as if she hadn’t heard him, hadn’t heard the note of raw longing in his voice. Good. She hoped it hurt. Loving him hurt, and she wanted him to hurt as much as she did. In her pain, she lashed out blindly. “I don’t think we have anything more to say to one another. I’d appreciate it if you stayed away from me for the remainder of the week. Good night, Mr. Smythe.”

Somehow the pain of uttering those words was greater than what she’d intended to inflict on him. She turned and started down the path toward the house, determined not to look back. His voice carried to her nonetheless, quiet and meant only for her ears. “Goodbye, Amelia.”

Chapter Thirteen

When Nate made it downstairs for breakfast the next morning, no one was looking anyone in the eye, a sure sign more than one pair had been caught out in flagrante the night before. Tony Batchelder had more swagger in his step than usual and Evelyn was uncharacteristically quiet. Perhaps Amelia had been right and things between them had progressed further than Evelyn had intended. Amelia was also right about Tony. Evelyn had better watch herself with him. Kitty showed none of Evelyn’s regrets. She was positively slavering over Will Thistlethwaite as the man steadfastly sipped his coffee, read the racing forms and ignored her. Across the table, a subdued Amelia sat with Radwill, listening to him talk, refusing to look at Nate whenever he attempted to catch her eye.

She hadn’t meant what she’d said, had she? Not wanting to speak to him again? It was exactly the sort of sensible plan they should both embrace, but when he thought of their angry confrontation in the garden being the last time he’d ever speak to Amelia, a cold fist of dread closed around his heart.

He hated how they’d left things last night. Yes, it had been a mistake, but he was hard-pressed to feel sorry for it. For anything that had occurred between them. He wanted her. Even though he couldn’t have her and she was out of his reach, he wanted her anyway. It was more than want, though. Much more.

He could
not
love her. It was impossible.

But it was true. He loved her.

All through his sleepless night, as he’d fingered her bloody piece of sea glass and waited for regret to seize him, instead, love had crept in and made itself known. It had been there the whole time, rattling its chains every time they argued and fought, every time they crashed together in a forbidden explosion of lust. It was love. And now it had stretched out, taking over every cold corner of his soul, making him ache with everything he couldn’t have. Well, he’d dealt with loss and pain before. Somehow he’d do it again, because this was an emotion he could not indulge in.

Nate made conversation with the older gentlemen of the table and while a few of them—Lord Spalding and Lord Watting—seemed to be warming to him, Lord Hyde still looked right through him. In the bright light of morning, with Amelia sitting in frosty silence across the breakfast table, he was finding it hard to care about Lord Hyde, or the business that had driven him to pursue the man’s daughter.

Julia, seated on her father’s right, had plenty of conversation for Nate. As usual, she peppered him with questions about his business ventures and past achievements. Their betrothal was all but done. Wasn’t that how they’d left things in the garden the night before? They had an understanding. And what Julia understood was that a proposal of marriage would soon be forthcoming. He’d raised her expectations, done it purposefully and enthusiastically. Now he was obliged to carry it through, no matter that his heart was in revolt. What a bloody mess he’d made of things.

“What shall we do today, Evelyn?” Kitty’s loud question startled him out of the morass of his thoughts.

Evelyn jumped, clearly caught daydreaming, too. “Oh...I thought we might walk to the lake and go rowing.”

“Won’t the lake be cold?” Kitty protested.

“Oh, come on,” her brother interjected. “It’s only September. The sun is shining and the wind is calm. Boating is a capital idea.”

“But what if I’m chilled?”

Robert looked impatient. “Grab a shawl. Don’t be a stick-in-the-mud, Kitty. No one’s going to toss you into the lake.”

It was the right thing to say to get Kitty to capitulate, as she’d been accused of precisely that in the past.

Tony threw in with the plan, as did Will and Julia. Since Radwill needed to return some correspondence and begged off, Nate thought Amelia might as well. But when Julia asked her very sweetly if she wouldn’t choose to come, she reluctantly said yes. Nate did as well, telling himself as forcefully as possible that he did so for Julia’s sake.

Cheadle was professing to love sailing and already making plans to captain a boat for himself and Amelia when the morning mail was delivered. A letter was set before him and Cheadle went still. His eyes locked on the unassuming cream envelope and the color leeched from his face. Nate had to admit, Cheadle seemed to be up to his neck in something unpleasant, although he suspected it was nothing more tedious than gambling debts or unpaid bills, whatever mystery Amelia chose to see in it.

Cheadle excused himself from the table and they didn’t see him again before everyone was assembled for the walk to the lake. Nate walked with Amelia and Julia. Amelia managed to engineer it so Julia was between them, and she maintained a brittle silence for the entire walk, unless Julia addressed her directly. She was right. It was for the best.

It was right, but it didn’t mean he had to like it. Hearing her polite answers to Julia’s questions, seeing the way she steadfastly avoided looking anywhere in his direction, as if she was attempting to erase him from her world, he found he didn’t like it at all.

* * *

Robbie Ponsoy might be a mannerless ass but he’d been right about the weather. With fall beginning to hint at the edges and sunshine warming the air, it was a glorious day. But no amount of sunshine or soft breezes could warm Amelia. Her heart seemed to have frozen solid the moment she walked away from Nate last night, and now it sat there in her chest, chilling her to her bones.

The Tewsmere lake was quite picturesque, reflecting the deep blue September sky and scuttling white clouds like a mirror. On the near bank, a cluster of willow trees grew, their long tendrils trailing into the water. A wicker table and two chairs sat near its base. The far bank was lined with ash trees, their leaves beginning to turn red. Three-quarters of the way across was a small, man-made island ringed with more willow trees. As they crossed the lawn toward the lake, she lagged, wishing Nate and Julia would go on without her, but they slowed whenever she did. There was no escape.

“It was all designed and built by the second Earl of Tewsbury,” Evelyn explained. “He had a passion for landscape architecture.”

“Can you land a boat on the island, Evie?” Robbie asked.

“Oh, yes. Not from this side, of course, but there’s a shallow bit on the far side where the boats can come in. My cousin sailed me out once and we went swimming.”

“Just once?” Tony said, doffing his hat and running a hand through his hair. “I’d be out here morning, noon and night if I were you, Evie. What do you say? Care for a dip?”

Evelyn flushed scarlet. “Tony! Behave.”

Tony laughed and rolled his eyes. “Fine, by all means, let’s keep things proper. Where can we find the boats?”

“The boathouse is this way,” she muttered, stomping off to the left along the shoreline.

Everyone tramped after Evelyn toward the boathouse, but Julia hung back, lingering under the willow tree. She chose one of the wicker chairs and produced a book from the pocket of her walking skirt.

“What a delightful spot,” she sighed. “I think I could spend the whole day here.”

“Don’t you want to come sailing?” Amelia asked.

“Oh, I think not. In truth, I’m a bit afraid of being on the water.”

“But...” she protested. “You seem so interested in Nate’s ships.”

“I am interested in his ships. I just don’t like to sail,” she said, as if it was the most patently obvious thing in the world. It wasn’t at all obvious to Amelia, but she didn’t feel up to arguing with her. Although she’d have to congratulate Nate, the sailor and ship owner, on choosing a bride who was afraid of the water. If she was speaking to him, which she was trying hard not to do.

“But I think everyone is going out. Shall I send Nate back to sit with you?”

Julia gave her a sunny smile. “Oh, no, I’m quite well alone. You two go on.”

No, that was a
terrible
idea. Why wasn’t Julia coming to keep Nate away from her?

“If you’re sure...”

“Absolutely.”

Reluctantly, Amelia left Julia under her tree with her book and followed the others. In the boathouse, Tony and Robbie were debating the merits of one blue rowboat over another identical blue rowboat. Kitty and Evelyn stood to the side as they decided who would take which. Nate quietly set to readying a smaller red boat, retrieving oars and cushions for the benches.

“I’ll take this one, if you don’t mind.”

“Rather a small vessel for a seaman of your repute, Smythe,” Tony drawled.

Nate smirked. “It’s not the ship, it’s the captain.”

Tony scowled and Robbie looked as if he very much wished to make a witty retort but couldn’t think of one. Nate glanced around. “Where is Julia?”

“She’s staying behind to read. It seems she’s rather afraid of the water,” Amelia said, looking out across the lake to avoid seeing Nate’s reaction to her news.

“Well, it’s Evie and Tony and Robbie in that one,” Kitty said. “And Will and me in this one. So, Amelia, you’d better go with Mr. Smythe.”

She hesitated, but realized she couldn’t refuse without drawing attention to the two of them, which was the opposite of what she was trying to accomplish.

“Very well,” she said, aiming to sound as disinterested as possible.

“Are you sure?” he asked under his breath as she approached the side of the boat.

“What’s the matter, Nate? Afraid to take me for a turn around the lake? I’m sure I’ll be able to observe the proprieties for half an hour.”

He sighed and extended his hand to her to help her into the boat. She took it, unable to help noting the warmth of his palm, the delicious scrape of his fingertips. What were Lord Radwill’s—George’s—hands like? She couldn’t remember ever noticing. Had he even laid one on her? She couldn’t recall.

“Are you ready?” Nate asked. Amelia nodded, not meeting his eyes, and he pushed off the dock. The little boat bobbed and floated out onto the lake. Tony, Robert, Will, Evelyn and Kitty and their laughter and raucous arguments quickly receded. Amelia flushed with mild panic. What was she doing, out on the lake alone with Nate? Wasn’t this precisely the sort of situation she had sworn to avoid? Blast Radwill and his letters and Julia and her inconvenient fear of the water.

It was only a boat ride. He’d row them about once, they’d tie up at the dock again and she’d return directly to the house.

“Amelia, I’m sorry about last night,” he said at last. She winced.

“Please, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“But—”

“Nate, stirring it up again will do no good.”

“I don’t like leaving things unsettled between us.”

“Things aren’t unsettled between us,” she lied.

Nate scoffed. “You won’t even look at me today.”

Annoyed, she swung her face around and met his gaze, chin held high. “Better?”

“Amelia, are you truly going to avoid me all week?”

She looked at her hands. “I should. You know I should.”

She heard him sigh. “I know you should. But I wish you wouldn’t.”

“I don’t want to,” she confessed. Staying away from Nate was like trying to do without air. She hadn’t lasted the bloody morning.

“Then let’s declare peace. Surely we can do that?”

No
,
I’m not sure I can
, she thought.
Because I love you and I’ll lose you and when that happens
,
I’ll lose a piece of myself
,
as well.

She was tired of trying to punish him for her own wayward emotions, though. She would deal with her pain later if it meant she could be with him now, in whatever small way. “Peace.”

In the silence that followed, only the rhythmic scrape of the oars disturbed the sunny stillness of the lake. “It’s a lovely day to be on the water,” he said, a wistful note in his voice.

“I suppose you must miss it. The ocean.”

“I do. Very much. Which is funny, considering how much I didn’t want to leave Portsmouth. Do you remember?”

“The only reason you didn’t want to go was because of your family, which is understandable. But I know you, Nate. You were always bewitched by the sea.”

He smiled, his sea-colored eyes meeting hers, all formality and distance momentarily forgotten. “You think so?” His hair was windblown, falling across his forehead and glinting gold in the sun. He shook his head to get it out of his eyes.

“I know so. Every time we ran along the quay to see which ships were in harbor, you knew more than anyone. You could remember every vessel, who owned it, who captained it and which port it called home. The sea was always in your blood.”

He shrugged. “Perhaps. It’s a different thing, though, when you’re working to support a family.”

“Tell me about it,” she implored him, leaning forward and gripping the side of the boat hull. “Tell me where you went when you first left Portsmouth. I thought about you all the time in those days, and I wondered where you were and what you were seeing.”

He smirked. “You thought about me then? Not now?”

A spear of longing shot through her. She thought about him during her every waking moment, and she dreamed of him during her sleeping ones. It was not a joking matter. “Be serious.”

Nate sighed and ran a hand over his hair. “Very well. My first voyage. I went to sea on the
Arbuthnot
, under Captain Curtis. He wasn’t particularly nice, but not as bad as some I’d heard tell of. I found as long as I kept my head down and did as I was told as quickly as possible, I got away without many beatings.”

Amelia scowled, afraid her expression was rather pitying, which she knew Nate wouldn’t like.

“It wasn’t so bad,” he protested, when he saw her expression. “I could have been put to work in the shipyard and that was worse. Do you remember Peter Fickett?”

“He was positively horrid to me. How could I forget?”

“I remember you taking the stuffing out of him once when he was rude to you.”

“I remember he deserved it.”

“That he did. He died a year later. He was crushed by a ship in dry dock at Portsmouth Ship Building, where he was working.”

“Oh, no. Now I feel terrible.”

“I didn’t tell you to make you feel bad. Peter was always beastly to you. I meant at least I was at sea, and earning a decent wage for my labors. It could have been worse.”