To Have and to Hold (11 page)
Read To Have and to Hold Online
Authors: Rebecca King
Isobel sighed
with impatience and glared at him.
Her
voice rose to a high squeak as she glared up at him defiantly.
“Of course, I am sure!
What do you take me for?
She told me she had received word from a
friend in London, who had been – somewhere.”
Isobel paused with a frown but couldn’t locate the name in her
memory.
“She said the source was
reliable and had revealed that a few weeks after leaving
Willowbrook
you had travelled to your father’s estate in Berkshire and wed your betrothed
in the family chapel.”
Exhausted, Isobel
slumped back against the pillow, her breath coming in shallow pants.
Misery swelled once again in her chest as the
familiar feeling of devastating loss swept through her.
Pride prevented her from allowing him to
witness just how miserable losing him had made her.
She desperately
wanted to cry.
To rail at him and beat
his chest for his callous disregard of her.
If only she had the strength to do so.
Instead, she lay there and cursed her weakness for once again, despite
everything she found herself at the mercy of a man who had cruelly hurt her.
“Isobel.”
There was something in the tone of his voice
that commanded her attention. Determined not to let her tears flow in his
presence, she raised a frosty brow in his direction and waited.
“I.”
He leant over her menacingly.
“Am.”
He placed a
hand on either side of her head. “Not.”
His gaze locked upon hers.
He
slowly lowered his head until his lips were mere inches from hers.
“Married.”
He whispered as he placed a gentle kiss upon
her stunned lips. His mouth captured the soft cry she couldn’t withhold.
His gentle fingers swept away her tears as
his lips worshipped her tenderly while she absorbed his words.
Could it be
true?
He was not wed to another?
When he did eventually raise his head to
allow her to breathe, his eyes were full of tender reproach.
“How could you believe that I have such
little regard for you?”
“There is no
baby?”
Isobel whispered shakily, unable
to believe her aunt could have been so wrong.
Was she in cohorts with Rupert?
“There may be a
baby when we are wed my darling,” He teased with a gentle smile as he sat
beside her upon the bed.
“But until then
however, I can assure you that to my certain knowledge, there is no wife and no
child.”
Silence settled between them for
mere seconds before his final words dropped like lead between them.
“Not for me, at least.”
In her fogged
state it took a few moments for the import of his words to sink in and she
looked at him with a frown.
“What do you
mean?”
He could think
of no gentle way to raise the question that was burning inside him.
“Did you marry Bertram
DeLisle
?”
He couldn’t allow her to see just how much
her answer meant and ignoring her startled look moved to stand before the
window with his back towards her.
His
gaze roamed over the landscaped gardens blankly.
All of his senses locked on her lying so
temptingly on his bed, behind him.
His
nerves were stretched taut as he waited for her answer.
“Dominic, I
promised I would wait for you.”
Isobel
murmured as she eyed his tall frame highlighted so starkly by the sunlight
shining through the window.
The
surrounding halo of light emphasised his broad shoulders and lean limbs to
stunning perfection.
“Nothing Rupert or
DeLisle
could threaten me with could coerce me into
marriage to anyone.”
Her voice sank to a
whisper as the last vestiges of her strength began to wane.
She desperately didn’t want to sleep.
She needed to continue the conversation.
There was much to say, so much to discover,
but somehow it became so incredibly difficult simply to keep her eyes
open.
“Dominic.”
She whispered softly as sleep began to pull
her down.
“I wouldn’t marry anyone
else.”
She was vaguely
aware of him approaching the bed.
Her
eyes were already closed as she felt the bed dip beneath his weight as he sat
beside her.
Her hand was clasped firmly
between his.
“I’m so very tired.” Her
whisper trailing away as she settled once again into slumber feeling more
secure than she had felt in a very long time.
“Rest on my
love. We have all the time in the world.”
Dominic murmured not sure if she had heard him.
He surreptitiously wiped away the single tear
that had gathered in the corner of his eye as he gazed down at her for several
moments.
She was indeed free.
“Thank God.”
Dominic murmured softly placing a tender kiss upon her brow.
“We will be together.”
He promised as he moved to sit beside her,
easing her slumbering form gently into his arms.
Staring out of the window, he watched the
soft flurry of snowflakes gently drift past and began to plan.
Sometime during
the night he was awoken by a strange noise.
Wincing at the sharp jolts of discomfort in his stiff muscles as he sat
upright, he warily glanced around the room trying to place the noise.
It was strange, almost like a rattling,
whispery noise.
Something he had not
heard before.
Quickly, he rose and
crossed to the window, cursing fluidly at the heavy snowfall drifting past the
windowpane.
They were well and truly
snowed in.
Drawing the
curtains closed he crossed to the fireplace and stoked the fire, shivering at
the howling winds outside.
The storm was
indeed a fierce one.
He didn’t envy
anybody caught outside on such a night.
Squatting before
the fireplace he paused and considered just what implications a storm such as
this would have had on Isobel had he not discovered her.
Already she was seriously ill, without the
freezing temperatures and dampness of the snowfall.
She would have most certainly succumbed, even
if she had managed to find a warm enough place to wait out the storm, what
then?
“Sweet
Jesus.”
Dominic whispered
,
his voice laced with horror as he took in her alabaster features.
Placing a palm against her cheek, his concern
rose alarmingly as his fingers touched her skin.
It was like cold, damp marble.
She had indeed been sweating but now was so
very cold, despite the warmth of the room.
“Isobel?”
Tugging several
times upon the bell pull he paused only briefly to light more candles before
returning to the bed.
“Isobel,
darling?
If you can hear me, open
your eyes.” He hated to acknowledge the fact, but he had witnessed a complexion
like hers many times on the battlefields.
Soldiers mortally injured had become pale and unresponsive moments
before succumbing to the great Lord.
Frantically grabbing her shoulders, he sought to awaken her.
He desperately needed to see her beautiful
blue gaze once more.
“Isobel!”
Shaking her shoulders far harder than he
ought, he watched as her head fell back helplessly against the soft mound of
pillow behind her.
“Isobel,
please?”
His voice was pleading
as he carefully lay her back down before placing his hand in the hollow between
her breasts.
It took several moments
before his panic eased enough for him to feel her faint heartbeat.
“Thank God!”
It was weak but still there.
Seconds later
there was a soft knock upon the door, and
Manvers
appeared.
“My Lord?”
His face was stark.
“Go and fetch
Mrs Holcombe.
Isobel’s taken a turn for
the worse!”
Dominic’s voice was
brusque.
“Quickly
man!”
He snapped carefully
tugging the blankets around Isobel and sitting beside her on the bed.
He didn’t quite know what he expected Mrs
Holcombe to do, but she was wise and had readily helped tend to Isobel since
her arrival with a calm matter of fact manner that had instantly allayed
Dominic’s fears.
Mrs Holcombe would know
what to do.
Whenever anyone was ill in
the house, family or staff, Mrs Holcombe always had a remedy to set them on to
the road to recovery.
Certainly, they
would not be able to send someone to fetch the Doctor until the snow eased and
if the increasing winds rattling the window panes were any indication, that
wouldn’t be any time soon!
Moments later a
dishevelled Mrs Holcombe appeared beside him.
“Please Mrs
Holcombe, what do we do?”
He hated
sounding so helpless but was at a loss.
Being beside a mortally wounded soldier on the battlefields as he met
his maker was different to sitting beside someone you loved and watching them
give up their fight for life.
“Sir, we shall
bathe her and change her clothes.
We
need to warm the room up.” She failed to add she didn’t like the sound of the
faint breaths that were coming from the unfortunate young girl who had such a
claim on the Master’s heart.
Dominic nodded
and stood back, desperately running a hand through his hair as he watched and
waited.
Over the past two weeks, Mrs
Holcombe had become used to the Master’s unconventional manner towards the
young Miss and had given up arguing for him to leave to preserve the young
lady’s modesty.
Whatever happened, she
was well and truly ruined the first night she appeared in the house, after such
a prolonged illness it would indeed be a blessing if she were still here at the
end of the ordeal.
Isobel was
quickly changed into a warm, dry nightgown and the sheets around her swapped
for clean dry ones.
The fire was stoked
almost constantly until Dominic felt sweat break out on his brow as the temperature
rose.
Isobel convulsed into wracking
coughs the like of which he had never heard before.
On and on they went until Dominic thought he
would go quietly mad.
Unable to bear
sitting
beside
her doing nothing he sat beside her
upon the bed and carefully pulled her into his embrace.
“Please darling
you need to try to relax.”
He murmured
softly kissing the damp tendrils of hair at her forehead.
He nodded in thanks to Mrs Holcombe as he
took the tincture left by the Doctor.
“If you can hear me my love you need to drink this.”
He waited until the coughs eased enough to
slip the spoon into her mouth, wincing as she coughed and spluttered against
the liquid intrusion.
Briefly, he
wondered if she would throw up again, but after several moments she subsided
once again into a fitful slumber.