Under the Kissing Bough (11 page)

She would not ask for a lover. No. She most likely wanted some silly thing.

Still, he decided, as he swung from the saddle in the stable yard. He was damn well going to ask for that card. Now. Before another day went past. So he could stop fretting about it and they could settle into a bearable arrangement.

* * *

"We forgot something," Emma said, coming into the drawing room her face flushed and her curls in charming disarray.

Eleanor glanced up. She had been sitting with Elizabeth, working on a pair of embroidered slippers that were to be a joint present to their father. Evelyn's roses on the top looked more like pink blotches, however, and Eleanor and Elizabeth were trying to figure out something that might be done to make them more presentable. No matter how they looked, their father would be kind and smile, but Eleanor did so hope he would actually be pleased when he wore them.

Emma came in and sank down upon the couch opposite her sisters. She had pine needles upon her sleeves and the sharp scene of pine and rosemary clung to her. She and Evelyn had taken it upon themselves to finish up the last rooms that were to be decorated this week, dragooning Andrew and Patrick Westerley into offering their reluctant aid.

Lady Rushton had smiled upon such schemes—it kept the younger girls from mischief, and she had confessed a hope to Eleanor that perhaps another Westerley son might find a Glover girl quite charming. However, Eleanor had seen how Patrick and Emma could not seem to be in a room together without some clash between them. And Evelyn was far too young to fix her affections upon any man.

"What did we forget?" Elizabeth said, setting aside the slippers into the embroidery basket.

"We have forgotten the mistletoe," Emma said. She pushed back a curl that had fallen forward.

Eleanor smiled. The house already could almost pass for a forest for all the red-berried holly and pine boughs and bay branches that wrapped around banisters and hung from mantles and graced the top of picture frames and doorways.

"I do not think anyone will notice if it is missing," she said.

Emma turned an astonished stare on her. "Not notice? But of course everyone will note if there is no kissing bough!"

"She is right," Elizabeth said.

"Yes, I am," Emma added. "So would you be a dear, Eleanor, and go fetch some?"

Eleanor stared at her sister a moment. She gave a small laugh. "You are jesting? It looks apt to snow again, and it will be dark in an hour or so, and…"

"And really, Ellie. This is supposed to be the giving season, and I am only asking for this one small favor."

"But could not one of the Mr. Westerleys..."

"Patrick and Andrew are helping Evelyn finish with the dining room—it is the last, you know. Lord Staines has gone out. Father is napping in the library with a book over his face. Mother is writing a letter, and Elizabeth..."

"I must finish these slippers," Elizabeth said, picking one up and studying the embroidery closely.

Eleanor frowned. She enjoyed making herself useful, but she did not like this feeling of being pushed.

"Please, Ellie. Please," Emma added, her voice wistful. "You know you do not really mind, and the servants are all ever so busy just now, but I hear there is a fine crop of mistletoe not far from the stables, and..."

"Oh, very well," Eleanor said and rose with a sigh. She frowned again as a conspiratorial look passed between Emma and Elizabeth, but she could only give an inward shrug. In truth, while the day was growing dark, it would be nice to get a breath of fresh air. And she would not mind a stretch of her legs. Time, of late, had seemed to drag, for he was all too aware that Lord Staines had been avoiding her.

She must learn not to mind that. He would expect a wife to be patient and capable of amusing herself. He wanted a sensible arrangement, after all. He was simply starting off as he meant to continue with her, and she ought to feel pleased not to be pestered by his attentions.

If she told herself that enough times she might begin to believe it.

So she told Emma not to fret, and went upstairs to change into a peach, cashmere-lined day dress, her warmest gown. She put on her walking boots, then took up a gray cloak and then went back to her wardrobe for a heavy velvet muff that would keep her hands warm. The muff would also do well enough to carry the mistletoe inside its lining. Then she ran down the stairs and let herself out of the house.

Stepping carefully across the icy patches, she headed for the stables. She stopped long enough to pet Schomberg, who had traveled with them to Westerly, and to steal an extra handful of hay for him from another manger. And then she made for the woods behind the stables.

Ice and a light frosting of snow held the world silent. Wise animals huddled in their burrows, or kept to the shelter of the scattered pines. The beeches lay bare and stark, oddly attractive with their twisting branches reaching to the gray sky. While ancient, gnarled oak twisted up to the leaden skies like ancient priests reaching for the praise of forgotten gods.

Lifting her face to the cold air, Eleanor took a deep breath. The air seemed sharp as spring water and more intoxicating than champagne. It stung her cheeks and gave her a heady sense of freedom.

Dark clouds robbed the day of the last of its brightness, making the hour uncertain. Still, it was glorious to be out. To be alone. Lifting her face to the sky, she closed her eyes.

A spatter of icy rain made her open her eyes at once. She frowned and could not help but think of the late Countess who had died from a chill she had contracted. Eleanor gave a deep sigh. She did not think she would ever be so lucky. No, she was horribly healthy and sturdy, despite her fragile appearance. She would live a very long time. Unloved. Alone in a house that did not really belong to her. With a man who did not really want her.

* * *

Geoff stepped into the house, stamped the ice and mud from his boots and then became aware of a stare fixed upon him. He glanced to his right to find the youngest of the Glover girls watching him, her hands behind her back as she stood beside the hall fire.

She looked as if she had been waiting for him—or someone—and her immediate words confirmed this.

"You are back at last. Eleanor went out to fetch some mistletoe, and Elizabeth and Emma have just begun to worry for she has been gone for ever so long."

"How long?" he asked, frowning.

Before he could answer, Patrick came into the hall. "There you are, you minx. I thought you were to help us finish decking out the dining room. Hallo, Geoff. Come and hang some holly."

Geoff glanced from Evelyn to his brother. He gave a small shake of his head. "Thank you, but it seems I have another task."

Frowning, Patrick started to say something, but Geoff cut him off with by saying that he would not be long.

He gave one more glance to the young Evelyn. He had no idea why she wanted him to go after her sister, but it suited his purpose quite well to do so. With a bow, he excused himself, leaving his brother to deal with this Glover. He had one of his own to find so that he could at last discover just what she wanted from this marriage of theirs.

* * *

Eleanor wandered in the woods, distracted by their beauty. A squirrel chattered at her, scolding her from the bare branches of an apple tree. She had smiled up at it and followed it as it flitted from branch to branch.

Rabbit tracks caught her eye and led her to a burrow, but no one seemed at home. She had seen a fox as well, poised on the raw, cold ground, one paw lifted, its red fur glowing with life and vitality, its whiskers twitching as it scented the wind. But she turned away, unable to bear the thought that such a beautiful creature would soon find itself hunted by baying hounds and thundering horses.

Hurrying now, her toes growing cold and drafts of frigid air slipping up her skirts to chill her legs, she walked between the patches of snow, wondering if it would snow again soon. How lovely that would it. It might make hunting impossible. It might also delay the wedding. And the insidious wish crawled loose in her that if it did, perhaps it would give Lord Staines time to fall in love with her.

But he would not. And she ought not to indulge such dangerous dreams. She might start to depend on them too much. Better to have others depending upon her. Which, she reminded herself, Emma was just now, and if she did not hurry she would have to disappoint someone she loved. She never, ever wanted to do that.

* * *

Eleanor's tracks dotted the snow, then disappeared on bare ground, but gave him trail enough to follow. He had hunted this land as a boy and he knew how to stalk his quarry. With his hat pulled low against the cold, his hands dug into his pocket, he followed her, alternately wondering if Eleanor's sister was right to worry, and a little cross with Eleanor for going out on such a raw day. The light was fading fast and the clouds would make a cold, moonless night.

Just as he began to think that he ought to return to the house and send out every servant to search for her, he rounded a turn in the path she had taken and there she was.

She stood in a clearing, under an ancient oak—the tree that he and Andrew and Patrick had played under a dozen or more years ago. This clearing, now frosted and barren, had once been their Robin Hood hideaway, their castle, their fort, the seat of all their childish dreams. Now it was just a patch of bare ground and an ancient and twisting oak, its branches made heavy by age and climbing vines.

She looked like some forest creature herself, clad in a soft gray cloak that almost blended into the barren trees and the winter-stark ground.

Standing with her back to him, she had not seen him. She had her head tilted so far back that the hood of her cloak had fallen off, leaving her hair to glint with faint gold in the fading light. As he watched, she jumped lightly up, her hand snatching at a patch of pale, green vine that hung from the oak. She jumped again, her fingers a foot away still from the branch she tried to catch.

Without waiting for her third attempt, he came forward, his boots crunching on the dead leaves and the ice that made for slippery footing. "You need a ladder—or someone with a longer reach."

She turned as he spoke, a rush of color on her cheeks. Foolish to think it could be a flush of pleasure at seeing him. The cold and her jumping around like that had brought the warmth to her face. Her seal brown hair had started to come loose from the cream ribbon that held it in place, and he almost reached out to brush one straying strand back from her forehead.

"I...I came out to fetch some...some greenery. For Emma," she said in a rush.

He raised his eyebrows at that hasty explanation. So, it was not the cold that had stained her cheeks. She seemed embarrassment. But over what?

He glanced up at the clump of soft green that dangled above her reach, its white, waxy berries now visible to him. A smile edged his mouth as he realized why she blushed.

"Greenery? A general sort of greenery, or did you have something specific in mind?" he asked, unable to resist teasing. She deserved some sort of punishment for worrying him by going out on her own. She did not know the area and might easily have gotten lost.

Her face reddened even more, but her chin shot up. "Mistletoe, actually. Emma swears we cannot have a proper Christmas without it. She sent me out to find some."

She said it as if daring him to even suggest that it had been her idea to search for a kissing bough. And he knew then that she deserved far more punishment than a mere teasing.

A smile lifted the corner of his mouth and warmed his blue eyes, and Eleanor wished she could turn to wood and grow roots. He looked as if were humoring her. As if he believed that she had made up the story that Emma had sent her out, as if she was the one who wished for a kissing bough. Drat Emma!

He pulled off his gloves and reached up, stretching only a little to easily pluck down the clump of mistletoe that twined around the oak in its ancient mating of vine to tree. Then he offered it to her—only when he put it into her hand, he did not let go of it, but stared down at her, an odd light in his eyes.

"The old way is that a man should pluck a berry when he kisses a girl under a kissing bough. And when the berry is gone, there should be no more kissing."

Fascinated by the sparkling light in his eyes which shone like sunlight off a lake, she stared up at him, her lips parted and dry, and her heart thudding.

She watched his long, deft fingers pluck a berry from the clump of mistletoe that lay in her hands. He rolled the white berry between those elegant fingers and his thumb.

"We ought to keep the old customs alive, don't you think?" he said, and then he swept off his hat with his other hand and lowered his mouth to hers.

Before she could move his lips touched hers, swift and sure. The soft brush of his mouth sparked a tingling heat inside her that spread from lips to face and then sank deeper, under her skin, through her heart, into her soul. Her eyes fluttered closed and the world narrowed to the taste of him, the touch of him, the scent of him that stirred her senses and whirled her mind.

And then his lips left hers. His breath whispered across her cheek, and cold slapped into its place as he pulled away.

She stood utterly still a moment, her lips parted as if the words to beg him to kiss her again would tumble out on their own. Blinking open her eyes, she looked up at him, trembling desire still quivering inside her, startling her for its unfamiliar intensity.

He stared down at her and some fleeting emotion flashed in his blue eyes before all else fled, leaving his eyes as cold as an iced lake. He laid the berry he had plucked into her hands, settling it next to the mistletoe bough, and he asked, his tone flat and indifferent, "Shall we go back now?"

A lump tightened in her throat and disappointment settled inside her even colder than the winter's day.
Fool. Fool. Little Fool!

The secret she had hidden—even from herself—stood before her, stark and bare as the trees around them. What dangerous dreams she had nurtured in her deepest heart. She had thought that when they kissed, it would change him. She had no beauty, no great charm, but she had thought her love could touch him.

She had been wrong.

Now, she looked into his eyes and saw what it really meant to make an arranged marriage. He would kiss her dutifully. He would touch her only to fulfill their bargain and get a child—or two, or three, or however many he wanted. And when he had all the progeny he required, he—and she as well—would seek their desires elsewhere.

It would all be terribly civilized.

It would all be chillingly kind.

It would all be quite acceptable if she did not love him and long for his love in return.

Too late, she saw the disaster Lady Terrance had spoken of. Arranged marriages had no room for hearts and passion. Only for duty and indifference.

It was all too clear. It was all too late.

That kiss had not changed him—it had changed her. It had sparked a fire that had illuminated the truth. She loved him. Loved him more than was wise. Loved him more than he wanted. And she would love him even if he never loved her in return.

Still, her mind balked at the reality of her choices now. Desperation wrapped around her chest as she tried to think of some other option. But she had none.

If she rejected this bargain now, she would never have his touch upon her again. They would part and that would be an end. And she could not bear that. The kisses last only as long as the berry lasts, he had said. And then he gave her that berry back, as if he could not wait for it to be gone. But she wanted it to last—she ached for it to last forever.

Ah, he would have been wise indeed to choose a sensible miss. Instead, he had gotten a silly dreamer who wanted too much from him. But she would not tell him of his mistake. No, she wanted him too much to tell him that.

Glancing away, she curved her fingers around the berry he had held so that she would not lose it and then she tucked the mistletoe into her muff, hiding it even as she hid her feelings. He must never know. Never. She would not have him set her aside for fear that an arranged marriage would cause her too much pain. Better pain and some love than no love at all.

Summoning her courage, she looked back and gave him her brightest smile. "Yes, please. Let us do return to a fire and something hot to drink. It is rather cold."

He frowned at her, slapped his hat back on his head, and stuffed his hands into the pockets of his greatcoat. For an instant it seemed as if he would say something, but then his frown deepened to a scowl and he turned and thrust his elbow out to her, glancing back at her as if almost daring her to take his escort.

Smile in place, she tucked her hand into the crook of his arm.

He kept his bare hands stuffed into his coat pockets, and his step shortened for her. It was the least he could do, Geoff thought, miserable and wretched. Devil take it, but he had thought to punish her—to deepen her embarrassment at being caught under a kissing bough—by giving her a kiss that would pink her cheeks. He was well served for his plans had turned on him.

The punishment was his. Not hers. He had thought that kiss would be like the ones with the women in London—all skill and pleasant sensation, and little else. But her innocent surrender had stirred treacherous feelings inside him, and now he was in a devil of a state.

He wanted her. He wanted her in a way that brought no honor to him, and which would horrify her. For he wanted her for his own selfish needs.

He wanted to bury himself in the giving she had offered. He wanted to banish the images of Cynthia twisting in his arms, pushing against him, revulsion on her face, tears streaming loose, having to slap him to pull him from his focused desires. He wanted Eleanor to obliterate those memories.

Devil take it, he wanted something that no woman could give. He was being unfair to Eleanor to even think of asking her for such an impossible thing. And the sooner he learned that the better for them both.

Thankfully, Westerley loomed up before them. They left the woods, the icy ground crunching and slippery underfoot. Eleanor clutched his arm to steady herself. He forced himself not to put his arm about her trim waist, or to brush the stray strands of hair that curled next to her cheek. He could not trust himself to stop at those simple gestures.

For the life of him, he could think of nothing to say. So he said nothing. Neither did she, and he wondered what was going through her mind.

At the top of the stone steps, he pulled away to open the door for her, and then ushered her inside. She kept her eyes downcast, and her head bowed, and he could only assume he had achieved his goal—he had embarrassed her deeply with that kiss.

Devil take himself, he thought savagely.

Inside, a passing footman glanced their way, his expression startled, but he came forward at once to take their outer garments. Geoff shed his coat and hat, then he glanced at Eleanor.

She had pulled off her bonnet and had handed her muff to the footman. The mistletoe she held in her hands. Red stung her cheeks and the color suited her, giving life to her features. She would never be beautiful, but with such glowing skin she took the eye in a pleasing way.

"You need a fire and something warm inside you," he said, and turned to order tea in the library. He took the mistletoe bough from her hands and gave it over to the footman with a request that it be given to Miss Emma. Then he led Eleanor into the library and saw her seated in a wing chair beside the fire.

He stood with his hands folded behind his back and the flames warming them. Eleanor sat still, her hands closed in her lap, her eyes downcast, saying nothing until he could no longer stand it.

"I'm sorry about...well, you may trust it won't happen again. Not unless you...damn it, Eleanor, I do not know what you want of me. Of this marriage. I only know I seem to be going about this very wrongly, and perhaps it is because we really do not suit."

She looked up, alarm in her eyes. "Oh, please. I mean, I do not think a kiss is all that much to make a fuss over." She winced and bit her lower lip. It sounded as if she thought his kisses were nothing special. "I mean, I shan't protest if you wish to kiss me."

He looked away from her, and she sank back against the cool velvet of the chair with a deep sigh.

"I am not saying any of the right things, am I? But you must excuse me on that, for I am not very practiced in saying much of anything to gentlemen. I never learned to flirt, or flatter. And my dratted tongue always gets me into trouble."

His gaze came back to her, but before he could answer her, a knock sounded upon the door and two footmen entered with a tea service upon a silver tray. The servants busied themselves arranging a table, setting out the tray, bowing themselves out.

When they had gone, Eleanor asked with a small smile of truce, "Shall I pour? That, at least, I can manage tolerable well."

His shoulders seemed to relax and he at last came closer, seating himself in the wing chair that faced hers. "What do you want, Eleanor? From this marriage? From me? I came looking for you, determined to have your answer on that damn card. And I vow I am as unskilled as you in this. Oh, you may well look surprised. I know my reputation with the fair sex. But I have not dealt much with wives, or soon-to-be wives. I have avoided them. So will you not help me? Will you not give me your desire on that card now?"

"I...I..." Oh, Lord, the words hovered on her tongue ready to fall out. She bit down hard on her right cheek to stop them.
I am not going say it. I would frighten him—and myself. And he sounds too close already to calling off this engagement.

Taking a deep breath, she stood. "I shall get your card at once," she said. And she fled.

Hurrying up the stairs, she reached her room, closed the door behind her and leaned against it, eyes shut. She took three deep breaths, opened her eyes again and strode to the writing desk. Slowly, she opened her hand where she had clutched the mistletoe berry. It was whole still.

She put it away in the drawer, tucking it inside a folded slip of paper. It was silly of her to keep it. But hold it she would—not for future hopes, but for the one brief moment of bliss that it had given her.

Then she searched the drawer for his card.

It lay where she had left it, but she had forgotten about that black blot upon it.

What did she do now? Could she tell him she had lost his card? Or did that sound as if it had not really mattered to her in the least? Well, she would simply have to pretend to have changed her mind. That was true enough. Only what did she write now?
She stared at the card. She could not ask him for his love. No, he could not give her that and might well feel honor bound to withdraw from their odd agreement. But could she ask to give her love to him?

The memory of how he had pulled away from their kiss, his eyes distant, slipped into her mind at once, and the hurt sliced into her fresh, deep and sharp. No, she could not ask for that.

She strode to the window and stared out at the cold, hard world. Ah, perhaps she should give him her blank card and have done with this. Give him up and go back to a future where she would live out her days with her parents, looking after them.

Staring out the window, she wondered how the existence that she had once planned had become so unattractive?

A flash of red on the frosted ground drew her eye. She pressed her face closer to the glass and a second reddish-brown form streaked across the frosted field. Foxes. A pair of them at play. Or perhaps hunting. She smiled as they darted into view, sleek and small. One caught the other and the pair rolled across the icy ground, and then they were up and scampering away, back into the woods.

The awareness that she was smiling sank into slowly, and with it came the realization that she did not have to tie up her world in giving only to him. There was so much she would do—would love to do—here at Westerley. So very much.

In an instant, she was back at the writing desk. Her pulse quickened, her stomach fluttered and the daring of her idea left her a little breathless. Taking up the quill, she dipped it in the inkwell and then scrawled three words across the card. Well, whatever he might think, she knew with that this was something she wanted.

And it was done at last.

Peace settled inside her and she knew with utter certainty that if he could not give her this, there was no place for her at Westerley.

Still, her stomach began to flutter as she went down the stairs again. Just outside the library, she forced herself to stop. To smooth stray curls. To wet dry lips. Then she entered.

He looked up at once and rose smoothly to his feet, and his grace and burnished looks dazzled her again. They would always do so, she realized. It gave her such pleasure just to look upon him.

Closing the door, she gathered her nerve, and strode across the gold and brown carpets to hand him her card. "Here. This is what I want," she said, her voice rising only a little.

Geoff took the card and stared at it and one eyebrow rose as he stared at the black rectangle scratched across the middle as if she had crossed out something. Then he focused on the written words and he forgot all else.

Frowning, and irritated for no particular reason, he glanced at her. "No fox hunting? What the devil does that mean? You don't want to go fox hunting? You don't wish me to?"

She stared back at him, her chin lifted, her expression calm, and the pulse thudding fast as a galloping horse in her throat. "I am asking for no fox hunting across any of your properties. Ever. Not a hunt. Not a meet. Not a chase. Not for Christmas, or any other reason."

His frown deepened. "But you don't mind other hunting? For fish or foul?"

Her stare faltered and she began to tug on her left forefinger with her right hand. "Well, actually, I do, a little. But shooting a bird or catching a fish seems far less cruel than chasing after an animal until it is exhausted, and then letting it be torn to bits alive, screaming, in pain, mangled to bits, and—"

"Thank you. Your description makes the difference vividly clear." He stared at the card again, rubbed his thumb across its edge. "What was this black spot?"

Her face reddened and her stare dropped to the Turkish carpet underfoot. "That was..." She bit off her words and looked up again, her chin taking on a stubborn tilt. "That was nothing of importance. Our agreement was that I present you the card. I have. So will you grant me what I have asked for?"

He let out a frustrated sigh. "Grant you? And just how do you expect me to tell everyone in the neighborhood that there is to be no Christmas meet? Nor any other. And my father..." He broke off shaking his head, then frowned again. "You know, most hunts never even glimpse a flash of fox's tail, let alone catch one."