Bewitched by His Kiss (May Day Mischief) (7 page)

She tramped grimly back to the Priory, wondering if she’d imagined the mossy glade or failed to notice a likely clearing. Maybe she hadn’t searched far enough. Perhaps, whilst in the heat of passion, one didn’t notice such inconveniences as pebbles and twigs digging into one’s back.

Perhaps she was making excuses, but she still couldn’t allow herself to believe.

She arrived home to find the vicar’s wife and daughter taking tea with Peony and Aunt Edna. A pang of remorse struck her at abandoning Peony, because she’d promised to support her at the social occasions her shy cousin so disliked. After indulging in tedious speculation about Lord Elderwood and coy questions about when Lucasta would finally marry Sir Alexis, they left at last.

Then the squire’s family came to dinner. Alexis caused a furor by asking to spend the night in the haunted room, at which David laughed so hard she thought he might asphyxiate himself.

Her heart leaped watching him laugh. When had she fallen in love with him? She wrenched her gaze away.

What was the use of loving him when they could never agree? And besides that, he hadn’t said a word to her and showed no sign of wanting to. Did disgust override love, just like that?

* * *

Alexis duly retired to the haunted room. David didn’t fear for him; Alexis was made of sterner stuff than most men. Not only that, Peony loved him, so the ghosts and bogies might take that into consideration. Or might not.He didn’t particularly care.

That morning, he’d watched as Lucasta paced in the knot garden, no doubt discussing him with Alexis. It didn’t seem to have done any good. She hadn’t spoken to him or even looked at him today.

He didn’t blame her. He’d tried to force her to become something she wasn’t, and then he’d been brutally unkind, but he wasn’t as unfeeling as he’d appeared. An unmarried gentlewoman couldn’t help but view a pregnancy with horror.

Slowly, he packed his belongings. He would invent an excuse and leave early in the morning. That was rude, but he didn’t care. For Lucasta’s sake as much as his own, he should make himself scarce.

He would have Alexis keep an eye on her. Oh, hell—she would go to Alexis for help regardless. It irked him unbearably that, even if carrying his child, she would turn to Alexis instead. He couldn’t force her to marry him, but he could rightfully insist on supporting her and the child, if it came down to that. But for now, he should just...go away. As she’d asked him to do.

He buckled his valise. Outside, the wind had risen to a rattle and a howl. That might be due to magic and might not, but doubtless Alexis had more excitement than he’d bargained for upstairs. David put on his boots and a long coat, and went outdoors for a walk.

* * *

After a few miserably wakeful hours, Lucasta donned a wrapper over her nightdress and put on her slippers. She stomped on what was left of her pride, tiptoed down the dark corridor to David’s bedchamber and knocked. And knocked again, but got no response. She rapped harder. Still nothing.

To hell with propriety. She opened the door.

He wasn’t there. Even if she hadn’t already sensed the room’s emptiness, the moonlight shining in the window made it perfectly clear. No banyan and slippers by the bed, no nightshirt lying ready. His brushes and comb no longer graced the dressing table. She glanced about and spied his valise by the door, buckled shut, ready to go.

Was he leaving
now
?

Aghast, she ran down the front stairs, but the house was utterly silent, as it should be at this hour, and the door bolted as usual. She lit a candle from the lamp that always burned near the door and hastened to the kitchen, as that door led to the stables. It, too, was barred.

That left the side door, the one leading to the orchard and the wood. It was unlocked. Had he gone to the Enchanted Meadow?

Shivering in the night wind, she rounded the herb garden. Clouds covered the moon, hiding the path. She found the orchard gate, lifted her skirts and hurried through the ranks of trees, heedless of branches clawing at her face. Twice she tripped on roots that had never been in the path before, barely catching herself. The third time she fell flat on her face.

If even the orchard wanted to hinder her, she wouldn’t have a chance of getting through the wood to the meadow.

That was foolishness. It was a wood like any other, and if it wasn’t, it should let her in, because she loved David Elderwood. She must, or she wouldn’t be so miserable at the thought that he no longer loved her, and so distraught at the prospect of never seeing him again.

No pathway opened into the wood, but she fought her way through the undergrowth, stumbling over fallen logs, cursing at the brambles, hissing when she lurched into a holly. It began to rain, slowly at first and then in a downpour that sluiced down her neck and bosom. Still she pressed on. She would get to the meadow. She would find it because she loved him.

She struggled through rain and wind and a wall of trees, refusing to believe the wood had malignant intentions toward her.”It shouldn’t matter,” she shouted. “I shouldn’t have to believe in magic. I should only have to love him.”

* * *

His walk cut short by the rain, David had reached the side door when her cry came to him on the wind. He traversed the orchard at a run and spied her not twenty feet into the wood. “Love should be enough,” she cried, striking at branches before her when a step to the side would have avoided them. Her voice was a bitter tremble. “Let me go to him. Let me
through
.”

“Lucasta?”

She turned with a gasp of relief. “Oh, thank God.” She hurried toward him, clumsy in her haste. What had she just said about love? For a hopeful moment, he thought she would cast herself on his chest.

But no, she stopped a few yards short, cloaked in darkness and slicing rain.

Tentatively, aching to hold her, he said, “You were looking for me?”

“I had to speak to you,” she said. “To—to apologize before you leave.”

Good Lord, she wore nothing but her nightclothes. She had run out to find him without even getting dressed. “About what?”

“For accusing you of rape. That was unpardonable.” She took a quivering breath. All at once the rain slowed and the wind dropped. “For being so prejudiced against your belief in magic that I ignored your many excellent qualities.”

He blew out a breath. “I should like to apologize, as well. Believe it or not, I appreciate the difficulties you would face if you found yourself increasing. I know you would not willingly kill a child.”

“Thank you,” she whispered. “I poured the rest of the tisane out the window.”

Because of him? Astonished, he said, “My offer of marriage remains open, Lucasta.”

“Thank you, David,” she said, “but I—I don’t know what to do.”

He held out his hands to her. “Shall we discuss it?”

She went to him then, shutting her eyes as he closed his arms about her. She was wet and shivering. Blood trickled from a scrape on her cheek. “Dear heart,” he said, “you’re bleeding.” He wiped the blood away with his thumb and kissed her there.

“The branches,” she said. “They seemed to attack me. I thought you would be in the Enchanted Meadow, but I couldn’t find my way through the wood.” She paused, but because he loved her, he refrained from telling her magic was at work again. “I barely made it through the orchard.” She shivered harder, and he held his peace. “But...”

“But what?”

“But I can’t attribute it to magic. Even if I wanted to, I don’t
dare
. I’m too afraid.”

* * *

There, she’d admitted the worst. Cool, composed, ever-in-control Lucasta was frightened and had been for years. She shook in his arms. She was soaked through and so very cold, but the fear chilled her more.

“Afraid of what?”

“Of superstition. Of not knowing for sure. Of imagining things and acting on them when they don’t exist.” She huddled against his warmth. “And of madness. My mother believed in fairies. She left them gifts of milk and bread, and even sewed tiny suits of clothing. My father put up with it, although he thought it foolish. It didn’t seem to matter much until he died.”

“And then?”

“She refused to believe that he was dead. She—she thought the fairies had stolen him.”

“An older man?” he said. “Not likely. Usually it’s—But you probably know more about this than I.”

How extraordinarily kind of him, and most likely untrue. “I know it makes no sense.” With difficulty, she added, “Whether or not one believes in fairies.” There, she’d conceded a little, and it wasn’t as painful as she’d expected. “But grief had completely unhinged her. She wandered the Downs in her nightclothes, searching for him, and got lost in the rain. A few days later, she died of an inflammation of the lungs.”

“I won’t let that happen to you.” He swept her off her feet and headed toward the house with great, purposeful strides.

“Oh, G-God,” she said, as realization struck. Her teeth began to chatter. “I’ve gone and done exactly the same as my mother.”

“Except that I’m alive, so you’re not allowed to die.” Nothing got in his way, not wind or rain, not branches or roots or walls of trees. Holding her close, he carried her up the side stairway and into his bedchamber.

He stripped off her wrapper and nightdress, dried her with a cloth and wrapped her in the counterpane. He deposited her on the carpet before the fireplace. Moments later, the banked fire was ablaze.

She couldn’t stop shivering. “You’re d-drenched, too.”

He stripped, dried himself and joined her inside the coverlet. He held a flask to her lips. “This will help.”

She didn’t care much for brandy, but it burned its way down, warming her from the inside. He took a swig as well, then stoppered the flask and put his arms around her. She leaned into him as the shivering subsided. How comfortable and safe.

How ridiculous. There was nothing safe about this situation. “I still don’t know what to
do
.”

“Listen to me, my darling,” he said. “Forget about believing in magic.”

She huffed. “How can I, when it’s all you think about? As a general rule, I’m in favor of the truth, but where magic is concerned, there’s always another explanation, and there’s never any real proof.”

“Precisely.” He dropped a kiss on her still-damp hair. “That’s why you get to choose what to believe.” He’d said much the same thing at dinner the night before, but she hadn’t realized the implications. “Perhaps I should explain to you why I
do
believe in magic. Unlike you, I haven’t had much choice.”

She leaned into him, willing to listen, wanting to. He deserved to be listened to properly. She owed it to him.

“I know you find it hard to believe that my mother passed fairy blood to me, but the proofs were with me from early childhood. Of everyone who dwelt in our various houses, she and I were the only ones who saw the hobgoblins and other magical creatures. Only she and I could find our way to woodland paths that others simply didn’t see.”

He’d known unerringly where the path to the meadow was, that other morning. He’d reached her in a few swift strides tonight, while she’d struggled and gotten nowhere. He’d made love to her in a mossy glade that otherwise didn’t exist.

“It wasn’t just at home, either. I made friends with the hobgoblin at Eton and stole food to leave out for him.” He chuckled. “In return, he punished the Latin master, who took particular delight in caning me for any and every infraction. If you don’t believe it, ask one of my schoolmates about the time the old bore tried to cane me for insolence. He danced about the room, shrieking with pain because the hob was pinching his legs, and eventually the cane flew out the window. My schoolmates couldn’t see the hob, but they laughed themselves silly at the master’s plight.”

The story made her smile, but...even if she asked his former schoolmates, none of them would believe anything magical had taken place. They would only remember a schoolmaster with severe leg cramps who had lost control of his cane.

“No, there’s no proof,” David said. “But I know what happened, and I owe it to the fairy creatures to believe in them. I am obliged to believe in magic...but you are not.”

She sighed. “You truly don’t mind if I can’t believe?”

“Not if you love me enough to accept me as I am, too. I didn’t understand until lately, but that’s how love works.”

He loved her, and love was something she could believe in...but was it enough? “It’s not that simple,” she said. “You’ll argue with me constantly.”

“And you’ll argue back.” He grinned at her in the friendly firelight. “And then we’ll go to bed and do something we both agree on.” He stood and lifted her, counterpane and all, and carried her to the bed. He burrowed under the covers to join her.

“Lust isn’t enough to overcome such a vast difference of opinion,” she said. That didn’t stop her from putting her arms around him, from stretching against him, from reveling in the exquisite sensations of skin to naked skin.

“But love is,” he said, nuzzling his way down her throat, fondling her breasts and seeking her core. He entered her, and they were one. Pleasure filled her, but more than that, happiness such as she’d never felt before.

He kissed her long and slowly. “Love is the greatest force in existence.”

Yes
. That, she could believe. She sighed deeply and gave herself up to love.

He smiled down at her. “And—just for the sake of argument, mind you—it’s also the greatest magic.”

* * * * *

If you liked this story, don’t miss book one of Barbara Monajem’s May Day Mischief duet, available now from Harlequin Historical UNDONE!

The
Magic
of
His
Touch