Anne O'Brien (32 page)

‘Not exactly—or I would never have put your life in danger by allowing you to be there.’

‘Thank you for telling me.’ He watched her as she worried at the ruffled edging on her cuffs, as the knowledge sank in.

‘Does it…does the knowledge disgust you? Shock you?’ He had to know.

‘No. I do not know why you did not tell me before!’ Her gaze was clear and direct, no trace of distrust there. ‘But what now? Can I be honest? I do not know if I can live a life where I fear for your safety every minute of every day.’

Relief at her calm acceptance of his past flooded through him. As for the future… ‘There will be no need for that,’ he assured her.

‘You mean that you will stay here, and I will go back to London?’ Her heart, all her hopes plummeted. How could he condemn her to such a bleak existence?

‘Sarah…no. I did not mean that. I am coming home with you, tomorrow. After all, I have a wife and a daughter and a son.’ He noted Sarah’s catch of breath at this with satisfaction. ‘And my wife does not seem to understand that I care for her more than anything else.’

‘No. I do not know it!’ Her mind was suddenly in turmoil.

‘I have severed my ties, Sarah. My employment in the service of government espionage is at an end.’

‘But at what cost?’

‘None. There is no cost. From this moment I am my own master, to live my life as I choose.’

‘Oh.’

‘I had discovered that the conflicts in my life were becoming more than I could bear.’

‘I see.’ But she still did not.

She waited for him to touch her, the slightest brush of his fingers, to give her some indication of his thoughts. He had not done so since he had walked into the room. And still he did not. Instead, on a sudden decision, Joshua stood and walked over to the table where rested the leather satchel of documents which
Nicholas had brought with him to Calais. Opened the flap and riffled through the contents.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Looking for these.’ He produced a number of folded sheets of paper.

‘Our contracts?’ She recognised them immediately, although not his purpose, which caused her to rise to her feet in a sudden ripple of panic. Did he intend to destroy them? ‘I did not know you had them with you.’

‘I travel with all my important documents.’ Joshua smoothed them out.

‘What are you going to do?’

He had set himself to discover pens and a pot of ink in a little escritoire. ‘It seems to me, my love, that you have a lamentable tendency to desire everything to be stated in black and white. You seem, for some inexplicable reason, to be more certain of my intentions—and even your own—when you see them written on a page. That is what we are going to do. Come here.’

She did, reluctantly. Took the offered sheet—her own—and the pen that he held out.

‘Sit there.’ She did, at the little writing desk. ‘Now.’ His voice was suddenly deadly serious. ‘You entered into this marriage with a man of soiled reputation, guilty, so rumour had it, of all manner of vice, on the strength of this contract. We have come a long way, Sarah, since you put your hand in mine and allowed me to give you my name. I think things have changed between us. So now we will update your expectations—and mine.’

Her eyes narrowed with suspicion. ‘Why?’

‘Do you distrust my motives still? They are entirely innocent, I do assure you. All I would ask is that you write, at the end, your heart’s desire from this marriage. And I will do the same.’

He could read every emotion as it flitted across her expressive face. Fear and hope in equal measure. A desire to trust him. The instinct to throw caution to the winds and tell him the truth. Despair that he might not wish to hear the truth from her
heart. Perhaps he knew her better than she knew herself. He wanted nothing more than to enfold her in his arms and reassure her that all would be well.

‘Write what you truly want, Sarah. Whatever the consequences.’ He must gamble everything on this one final throw, risking everything on the words she had whispered when she had tumbled into sleep, held fast in his arms. Otherwise their marriage would founder on the rocks of pride and distrust.

Sarah felt her breath back up in her lungs, a tight band around her chest. ‘Even an end to it?’ She did not know what made her ask, but she did. Perhaps she needed to know if he would rather tear up the documents and have done. Give them both their freedom.

‘If that is what you wish.’ He hid the quick thrust of pain at this unexpected question, but his eyes silvered with fear. He had not expected this, but would accept it if he must. He managed a stiff smile, but his eyes were bleak indeed. ‘In God’s name, you have suffered enough at my hands. I could not blame you. I have been far from honest with you. But I would wish for a different outcome.’ He reached across the little desk to capture her hand. Raised it to his lips which were cold as ice. Fierce silver eyes locked with troubled blue. ‘Swear to me that you will be honest. That is all I ask.’

‘I swear it.’ She laid the hand which he released on her heart in a quaint gesture. Then tore her gaze away from his to re-read the list of hopes and demands that she had written so many weeks before. And thought of Thea’s words. Tell him. Just write:
I love you. I want you to love me.
He watched her in some amusement as her mind turned over the events and emotions of the past few days. Then, in exasperation, ‘In heaven’s name, Sarah, I am not asking you to sign away your soul to the devil.’

She dipped in her pen and bent her head.

‘I will write what is in my heart, as you ask.’

‘And I will do likewise.’ Without hesitation he wrote with firm strokes at the end of his own contract. Then cast the pen aside.

And waited.

She was aware of his every movement. Very well. She would do it. Have the confidence to lay out her hopes and fears, her private dreams, in public view. Before the one man whose regard she most desired. Demand for
herself
for the first time in her life. Was it not her right after all to be loved? Thea thought so. She would grasp the future and live with the consequences.

She wrote.

He held out his hand for the sheet of paper.

Still she hesitated.

‘Coward,’ he whispered, but the word was soft and the smile on his mouth and in his eyes beckoned with such promise. And gave Sarah all the courage she needed.

‘I am not a coward. I will tell you what I have written. I will say it aloud for the whole world to hear.’ She clutched the paper against her breast, not needing to see the words written there. ‘That I love you. I have loved you from the first moment I saw you walk with such pain into the hall in Hanover Square. I
hated
the Countess of Wexford when I thought you loved her. I hated any woman who might find her way into your heart. I love you foolishly and inordinately. I would wish that you loved me.’ The torrent of words, so fierce and unexpected, so much more passionate than the simple statement she had written on the paper, dried up as quickly as they had overspilled. She looked at him aghast. ‘I cannot believe that I just said all that. I cannot believe that you could possibly love me,’ she finished on a whisper.

‘Oh, Sarah.’ He stretched out a hand, to stroke her cheek with gentle fingers, the most tender of gestures. ‘Have I not shown you the depths of my love when I took you in my arms, to my bed. Did I not prove it—that last time in Paris when we came together with such delight? I thought that you must know my love for you, in every touch, in every caress.’

‘You have never said that you loved me. I only know that you do not
object
to me—that you do not find me distasteful. You never said the words.’

‘Sarah! How on earth would I find you distasteful? Let me say the words then. You are my dearest love. And if I did not make it plain to you, even without words, then I should be taken to task. It was my fault. There were so many constraints between us. I wished to obliterate them all before I spoke with you. I dared not touch you that final morning in Paris when all I could see was the blood staining your hands and your bodice. I had to end it all first. Only then could I come to you and ask for your understanding. And your forgiveness.’

‘Joshua… Do you truly love me?’ Her lips curved, slowly blossoming into a smile of such joy, an inner radiance. At that moment she was beautiful beyond belief.

‘I love you, Sarah. Do you believe it at last?’

‘Yes. Oh, yes. I think I must. If you have turned your back on that life for me.’ He had done it for her. The magnitude of that decision took her breath away.

‘I have. And it is my pleasure and my delight. There are others to do the Prince Regent’s bidding. You are my wife. More important to me than…I cannot say. You are my very heart and soul.’

‘Joshua…’ And then as she became aware of the crumpled sheets still in her hand, a little frown of suspicion marked her brow. ‘What did you write? It seems to me unfair if you know my innermost thoughts, but you do not reveal your own!’

He laughed aloud. ‘Here, my suspicious wife. Read for yourself.’

I would surround you with my love, wrap you in its folds, hold you fast. Openly and without artifice. I would live with you until death.

‘Oh, Joshua. That is so…so beautiful. No one has ever said anything so particular to me before.’ Tears sparkled on her lashes until she brushed them away with her hand. ‘I am so happy.’

‘So why are you weeping, my foolish love?’ He took the paper and pen carefully from her hands, encircled her wrists with firm fingers and lifted her to her feet. His arms slid
smoothly around her waist to draw her close against him. ‘I do not know what more I can do to make you certain. I shall have to tell you every day so that you are in no doubt. Or perhaps buy a parrot and train it to repeat
I love you
on the hour when I am not beside you.’

‘John would like that.’ She chuckled, her face turned against his shoulder as she absorbed the heat and strength of him. The wonder of his word and his closeness.

‘I expect he would. Look up, Sarah.’ She did. ‘We have made an uneasy start together. We can do better.’

‘Then show me.’

‘It will be my pleasure. One thing I would ask. You painted a portrait of John, I think, when you gave me Beth’s likeness. Will you give it to me?’

‘Why, yes—if you wish it.’ He could read the surprise in her voice, in the tilt of her head.

‘I do. The two portraits should be together.’ Joshua had made the decision, thought of the matter deeply and at length, so he would say what was in his heart and pray that his wife would grant him this ultimate symbol of her trust. ‘Sarah—this is what I would ask—will you give me your son to bring up as my own? So that he would be mine as much as Beth is yours, in the eyes of the world. I would not wish it to be a betrayal of John Russell’s claim, but—it would be my desire to give him legal recognition and for him to take my name. To love him and care for him as you would for my daughter. And as I love and care for you. Will you allow it?’

He waited, giving her a little space to contemplate his words. To decide on the debt she might yet owe to Captain John Russell. Unaware that Sarah’s heart leapt with joy that Joshua Faringdon should accept and love both of them.

‘I will. I will give you my son.’ Her promise was as firm as the day when she had married him. ‘I can think of nothing better than that you should be father to my son.’

‘You have all my gratitude.’ Joshua bent his head to touch
his lips to hers. Softly. A promise and a benediction. Then to her cheeks, her eyelids, the tender skin at her temples. A subtle reacquaintance with the face that now haunted his dreams. Then on, a delicious journey along the curve of her throat to where the pulse beat hard, the flutter of a caged bird beneath his mouth. To return once more to those lips that sighed under his. Sarah tightened her fingers in the cloth of his coat as if she would never release him.

‘You are mine and I love you.’ He murmured against her spun-silk curls.

At her reply his heart shattered. ‘I have always loved you. I have waited for you my whole life.’

His fingers released her hair to fall in pale gold to her shoulders, so that he could wind his hand through it, holding her as he wished so that his mouth could fit more perfectly over hers. Drowning in her sweetness, in her ready compliance as he took the kiss deeper, more intimate still. Rediscovering the dark intoxication until she shivered in his arms. A soft sound of acceptance in her throat, which struck him with a desire to take her now and show her the depths of his love so that she might never doubt, never forget. She was his wife and belonged to him. For all time.

But he put her from him with careful hands. For one more moment before he allowed passion to rule. Took a deep breath.

‘Before I take you to bed, I would wish to make one statement in my defence. I am no saint, but my reputation was never quite what you were led to believe. It was a cover—against anyone prying too closely into my private affairs. No one would expect a man without integrity to be involved in national security. So the Polite World in London views me with contempt. But as a matter of pride, I would like you to think that I have some degree of honour and principle.’

Sarah touched a hand to his lips to silence him, her heart a little sore. She understood that need for integrity very well. Had not her own life been overshadowed by her willingness to obey
the vicious demands of her brother? ‘Are you hoping to be accepted back with a new and bright reputation?’ Her smile could not hide the sadness.

His lips twisted in wry acceptance. ‘The
ton
will never believe it now. I shall have to live with it. There will always be the suspicion that I seduced innocent virgins or murdered poor Marianne. Can you still love me with all the lingering clouds of scandal?’

She tilted her head, a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. Anything to dispel this harsh moment of reality and its attendant pain. ‘I think that I can. You can be a reformed rake, of course. Saved from your sins at the eleventh hour.’ She reached up to kiss his mouth, still an impulsive gesture for Sarah that delighted him and did more than she would ever know to soothe the regrets of the past.