Come Near Me (12 page)

“But I didn’t,” she told him, stepping back a pace.
“And, now that I think of it, my lord, neither did you.”

“I didn’t? Well, I will. Tomorrow. Tomorrow, and
tomorrow, and the tomorrow after that. I’ll ask until you give me
an answer.”

“Because—because you kissed me?”

“Because I kissed you. Because I want to go on
kissing you, Miss Victor, until the last star dies in the heavens
over our heads. Is that too silly and poetic?” he ended, knowing
that she—dear, honest princess that she was—would answer him
truthfully.

“No,” she said slowly, backing away yet another
step. “I think it’s quite lovely, actually. Um... I think I hear my
papa calling to me. He likes to be in bed before nine, you know, so
that he can be up with the boys. I—I have to go now, my lord.” She
shook her head, then looked at him as if he was quite the most odd,
yet interesting creature she’d ever seen. “I mean, I haven’t heard
a thing Papa’s said in years if I don’t absolutely have to, but I
really
must
go now. Please?”

“Meet me at the stream tomorrow?” Adam asked—pleaded
may have been a better word. “At noon? I’ll bring a basket from our
kitchens.”

She bit her bottom lip for a moment, then nodded,
the action alerting her to the fact that her hair, once so
carefully piled on top of her head, was now hanging loose over her
shoulders. “Mary warned it wouldn’t last,” she mumbled quietly,
pushing at the curls.

“This will,” Adam told her, stepping forward,
tipping up her chin with his fingertip, and placing a long, lazy
kiss against her mouth, a kiss she returned with endearing
enthusiasm if not expertise. “At least until tomorrow.”

He watched, feeling inordinately pleased with
himself, as Miss Charlotte Victor—his own dear Sherry—picked up her
skirts and went running back through the garden, toward the house.
He followed after her, slowly, stopping to pick a single blush pink
bloom from one of the bushes, breathing in its fragrance, tucking
it into the buttonhole of his jacket.

Just like any other silly, lovestruck boy.

After...

He is always right who

suspects that he makes mistakes.

— Spanish Proverb

A
dam opened his eyes
slowly, carefully, aware that he was not alone in his bedchamber.
As his valet never entered until he was summoned, Adam’s heart
leapt for a moment, believing that Sherry might have come to
him.

Which was ridiculous. Sherry was gone. Gone
from this chamber, gone from his life even as she physically
remained in this house. He’d made certain of that with his blind,
bullheaded stupidity.

“Who’s there?” he asked, sitting up, then
grabbing at his head, which was definitely in danger of falling
off. When would he learn that drinking half the night away did
nothing more than destroy half a morning?

“Took a mighty fall off the water wagon, did
you then, boyo?” Chollie asked from somewhere in the chamber—there,
there he is, Adam decided, as his bleary eyes made out the shape of
his friend, sitting in a leather chair beside the fire. “You could
have at least sent round a note, saying you weren’t going to meet
Edmund and me for dinner last night. Bloody bad manners, I
say.”

“So would I, Chollie,” Adam agreed, slowly
slipping his legs off the side of the bed, realizing that he was
still clad in his shirt and pantaloons. “My apologies to you both.
As I’m sure you’ll apologize for breaking into my bedchamber.”

“You’d have a long wait believing that,
boyo,” Chollie said, standing up and going to give the bellpull a
hearty tug. “I’ve ordered up a bracing breakfast for you. I had
mine already. With Geoff and Edmund. And it’s a funny thing about
that, you know. Nobody told me Geoff had been injured. Now why, do
you suppose, hadn’t I heard that?”

Adam scrubbed at his face with both hands,
feeling the roughness of his beard, then all but grinding the grit
of sleep from his eyes. “Hell’s bells, Chollie, give me a moment,
will you? I think something crawled inside my head and died
there.”

“According to that new butler of yours—I
don’t much like him, by the way—a mighty measure of brandy found
its way inside your skull. You’ve never been a drinking man, boyo,
much is the pity, so you probably don’t know brandy’s the very
devil on the head. Better to stick to strong ale if you’ve got
serious drinking to do, and don’t you know.”

“I’ll remember that,” Adam said as he
directed his head toward the dressing-room washbasin and willed his
feet to carry the rest of him there. He bent in front of the basin
and poured the ice-cold contents of the pitcher straight over his
hair and shoulders, the shock of the frigid water pulling an
involuntary yowl of pain from him before he buried his face in the
towel Chollie handed him.

He staggered back to the bedchamber and
stripped out of his soggy shirt as Chollie obligingly built up the
dying fire. He slid his arms into a midnight blue dressing gown
before joining his friend, who was once more sitting at his ease in
one of the two leather chairs.

“Run your fingers through your hair a time or
two, boyo,” Chollie recommended. “You look like you’ve had that
black mop of yours combed with a rake. Devilishly unbecoming. Ah,
that’s better. Now, where would you like me to hit you, I’m asking?
A solid body punch, or a clear shot to your jaw? I’m thinking the
body punch, as your gut must be doing a fine jig already, with all
that brandy sloshing around inside, you understand.”

Adam pushed at his still-damp hair, looking
at his friend. “I was going to tell you, Chollie.”

“And sure you were, boyo. You weren’t going
to let me just come tripping in here, calling out for Geoff, asking
him if he’d like to go wenching with Edmund and me this evening—and
find him sitting in that chair, a rug over his knees. When was it
you were going to tell me, boyo? St. Tibb’s Eve, the last night
before Judgment Day? No. That can’t be it, can it? Because you’ve
already
made
all your judgments, haven’t you? And don’t you
be going all black-faced on me, boyo. Geoff told me the whole of it
just now, after Edmund was gone. Shame on you, Adam Dagenham.
Bloody shame on you.”

Adam pressed his head against the high back
of the chair. “Kill me slowly, Chollie. I deserve every moment of
the pain.”

“Oh, no. Oh, no, you don’t! Don’t go making
me feel sorry for you, boyo. Not when I’m just building up to a
fine tirade. That sweet, dear colleen. Thinking she could have—that
she’d... well, words fail me, boyo. That they do.”

“I was wrong, Chollie,” Adam said quietly,
opening his eyes because, when he closed them, all he could see was
Sherry standing in front of him, telling him she no longer loved
him. “I’ve taken the most beautiful thing in the world, the best
thing that ever happened to me, and I’ve destroyed it. I couldn’t
believe it, felt I was living a dream, and when I saw her that
day... Christ! How could I have been so blind?”

“You do penance very well, boyo,” Chollie
said, as Adam looked at him through slitted, heavy eyes. “I could
go about finding you a hair shirt, but I don’t think you need it.
What you
need,
boyo, is to be telling that wife of yours
that you’re sorry. Not me. Me, I’m more than a bit put out that I
can’t beat you into flinders without thinking I’d be striking a man
already down. What happened here last night, boyo? Because
something did, and no mistake. Something not even Geoff knows
about, and there’s a boy who’d tell you all lie knows at the drop
of a hint, and then make up the rest.”

Adam needed a drink. He needed a half dozen
drinks. And a month of sleep. “I believed her Chollie. After weeks,
months, of not believing her I finally listened. But it’s too late.
She doesn’t love me anymore.”

“You can be unlovable,” Chollie said,
standing up and beginning to pace. “There is that. Did you hurt
her?”

Closing his eyes, Adam saw Sherry’s pinched
white, expressionless face, heard her speak again in that
frightening monotone, telling him that she couldn’t
feel
anymore. “I hurt her, Chollie. I did more than hurt her. I’ve lost
her.”

“Then Geoff’s right? You never really loved
her?”

“Geoff said that, did he?” Adam dropped his
chin onto his chest and rubbed at his forehead with both hands. “I
thought I did, Chollie. I truly believed I loved her. But I didn’t,
did I? I wanted her. I possessed her. I made her into a dream of
what I thought I wanted, what I believed I needed. I took her
innocence, then distrusted her because she let me have it, gave me
all of herself. And then I waited, I just waited, until she proved
that she didn’t really deserve my love. And all of that time, all
the time we were happy, through all these last wretched months, it
was I who didn’t deserve her.”

He looked up at his friend through his tears,
not the first tears he’d shed since last night.
Good God, am I
still half-drunk? How else can I be so willing to make such a
damning confession?
“I’ve ruined everything, destroyed
everything. I love Sherry so much, but she’ll never believe that.
Not now. Not after what I’ve done. Oh, Christ. What do I do now,
Chollie? What do I do now?”

“I’d start by calling for a hot tub and
getting myself dressed and decent,” Chollie said, as the door
opened and Rimmon himself entered, carrying the breakfast tray.
“Because our friend Edmund, our most
irresistible
friend
Edmund—and the man is no braggart when he calls himself that, I can
tell you after last night—has taken your unhappy wife out for a
morning drive. Here, you’ll be taking this back downstairs,” he
said, lifting the brandy decanter off the tray as Rimmon placed it
on a table beside the fire. “His Lordship won’t be having any more
brandy. Not this morning, not ever again. You understand that, my
man?”

“I take my orders from His Lordship,” Rimmon
said, his colorless eyes seeking out Adam, who was eyeing the
brandy decanter with some hunger.

Just one more drink. Adam knew he would be
all right, if he could have just one more drink of brandy. Him, a
man who had never been one for the bottle, not in all his years.
Not until his life had fallen apart, until he’d torn it apart.
“Take it away, Rimmon,” he said at last, “and have my valet order a
tub.”

“Yes, my lord,” Rimmon said, bowing to Adam
even as he glared at Chollie. “At once, my lord.”

“Salvation seize his soul, but I definitely
don’t like that man, Adam,” Chollie said as Rimmon left the
chamber. “Where did Hoggs go, then? Liked Hoggs, I did.”

Adam lightly brushed a hand across his face,
beating away the remaining cobwebs that lingered in his mind.
“What? Oh, Hoggs. Yes, I prefer him to Rimmon, myself. But Hoggs
was called away suddenly, something about a sister in Lincolnshire
needing him for a few months, as I remember it. It was Hoggs who
suggested Rimmon as his replacement for the interim. Hoggs
suggested Emma as well, when Sherry’s maid, Mary, decided not to
come back to London with us. I doubt you’d like her, either, now
that I think about the thing. Why do you ask?”

“No reason, I suppose. Hoggs, did you say?
Strange.” Chollie looked to the closed door, then shook his head,
touched a hand to his waistcoat pocket. “Well, never mind. I guess
I’m feeling especially Irish this morning, that’s all, which just
goes to prove that I drank too much last night.”

~ ~ ~

Sherry looked around the large room rather
blankly, wondering precisely how she had ended up there, and even
why. Her mind was so dull, as if she had been sleepwalking through
the day.

She had been out driving with Mr. Burnell.
She’d been out driving, then Mr. Burnell had suggested they stop by
to visit with his aunt for a few minutes. The woman had been
complaining that no one visited her unless at the point of a
pistol—which her naughty nephew had considered to be nonsense, as
excepting for the fact that he was her nephew, he vowed he wouldn’t
visit Lady J unless that pistol was also
cocked.

Sherry had even laughed at that. She
remembered now. Sad and tired as she was, Edmund Burnell had been
able to make her laugh.

And now she was sitting in Lady Jasper’s
drawing room, her gloves in her lap, awaiting the woman, as Mr.
Burnell tended to a caller who had come to the servants’ entrance,
demanding to be seen. He hadn’t seemed happy to be summoned, but
he’d smiled, politely excused himself, and gone off, leaving her
alone.

She was so alone. So very alone.

How lost she was inside herself even as she
searched for herself, knowing the essence that was Charlotte Victor
had gone missing somewhere, leaving only this sad, unfeeling shell.
The outside of her smiled, and spoke, and had even partaken of a
very fine breakfast that morning. But Charlotte Victor was
gone.

She should go home. To Leicestershire. To her
papa. That’s what she should do. Papa wouldn’t even know she was
there, or care overmuch, unless he needed help in the kennels. But
it wasn’t necessary for her to leave London. Not physically. Her
body didn’t matter, wouldn’t much care where it sat, where it
slept. And her mind? Ah, that she carried with her no matter where
she went.

Her heart, however, had packed and left the
city sometime during the night, and she had no idea where it was
now. She’d miss it terribly, if only she could feel
anything....

“There you are, you sweet thing!”

Sherry gave herself a small mental shake,
then smiled at Lady Jasper as the elderly dame entered the room at
her usual near gallop. She had been quite the horsewoman, Sherry
remembered, and even if she hadn’t been in the saddle in a dozen
years, she still walked as if she’d had a horse under her only a
moment earlier.