“But it would be easier to sleep if one were an unfeeling monster,” he said.

She had never thought to wonder if men’s minds were permanently damaged by the atrocities of war. She had always considered that Englishmen fought for right and justice and so would have nothing on their consciences.

“If I am thankful for one thing,” he said, “it is that you and my mother and grandmother and those children in the nursery have never been in the path of warring armies. I am grateful for that, at least.”

She opened her eyes and turned her head to smile at him. It was time to change the subject, she thought, time to lighten the gloom, to make it possible for him to return to the house and sleep dreamlessly.

“What a delight the children are, Kit,” she said. “I have not encountered many since I was a child myself. I was a happy child, you know. Were you?”

“Yes.” He smiled back.

“That is something we have in common, then,” she said. “It is rare, I believe. I do not often think back to my childhood, but there were so many happy times. I was fortunate to have Gwen and Neville for companions, and there were cousins too that we used to see quite frequently.”

They began exchanging stories of their childhoods, as she had intended. Stories full of humor and adventure and nostalgia—and of mischief on his side. At first their stories alternated with no pause between. But eventually Lauren put her head back and closed her eyes again, and when the pauses between stories grew longer, they were not at all uncomfortable, but were filled with warm thoughts and a cozy companionship that had no need of words. The fire, which he had built up once, burned down again, spitting and crackling a little as it did so. The rocker squeaked with slowing rhythm.

Yes, she had had a happy childhood, which she might not have had if her mother and stepfather had returned from their wedding trip and taken her off somewhere to live alone with them, away from her adopted brother and sister. Yet she had spent much of her childhood pining secretly for the mother whose face she could not even remember. Strange!

She sighed deeply.


Kit was still sitting upright on the side of the bed, even though he had been growing sleepier by the minute. The squeaking of the rocker on the old chair should have been annoying but was not. It was lulling him before it stopped altogether.

Lauren, he guessed, had fallen asleep. She had not spoken for several minutes, and she had not responded to the last story he had told.

He had stopped thinking of his childhood during the past few years. There were almost no memories that did not include Jerome and Syd, and very few that did not involve the Bedwyns. But tonight he had opened up the memories again and had found them pleasant, surprisingly free of pain or bitterness. Despite all that had happened three years ago, those had been happy years. The friendships and the brotherly love had shaped him, nurtured him, made him the man he was now, he supposed.

Lauren’s head had tipped to the side. It was an endearing pose, so different from her usual disciplined dignity. He should wake her up and take her back to the house. He rather thought he would sleep peacefully himself for what remained of the night. Indeed, he could nod off right now if he allowed himself to. The thought of the walk back was daunting.

She had done that deliberately, he thought, gazing at her. She had allowed him to talk about his nightmares, but she had not let him wallow in them. She had changed the subject. She had done it so deftly that he could not recall now how they had suddenly found themselves talking about their childhoods. What had created the link from his talk of war and killing? He could not remember, but he was convinced that she had done it deliberately and skillfully. So that his spirits would be lifted, so that his thoughts would be softer, brighter, more conducive to sleep.

He yawned widely.

If he did not wake her soon, she was going to have a sore neck. He got to his feet and reached out a hand to shake her shoulder—and then returned it to his side without touching her. He looked at the bed and then pulled back the two remaining blankets. They were alone together in the middle of the night in a room with a bed—a potentially dangerous situation if ever he had heard of one. Though strangely enough the thought of seduction had not once crossed his mind since they had come inside the hut. And even now the desire he knew he could feel for her was not dominating his mind.

He turned back to the rocking chair, bent down, and scooped her up gently into his arms. She woke up, of course, but she was too sleepy for resistance. He set her down on the bed, as far to the inside as he could. He removed her shoes and then his boots and lay down beside her. He drew the blankets up over both of them. She watched him sleepily the whole while. It was not a wide bed. It was impossible to leave any gap between them.

“Go back to sleep,” he said.

He thought she might already have been asleep before he spoke. He could smell that fragrant soap smell of her hair again. He could feel the soft contours of her body all down his right side, and her body heat. Strangely, although he was half aroused, it was merely a pleasant, easily controlled feeling. He did not want to desire her any more urgently. He did not want this to be turned into a sexual orgy.

It was too precious for that.

She was too precious.

She had worked her way into the affections of his mother and grandmother—he believed Grandmama adored her, in fact. She had won the respectful regard of his father. And all of it with quiet dignity. His own life here had been immeasurably more comfortable since her arrival—somehow he was finding it easier to relate to his family again, except for Syd, of course.

He had taught Lauren to be a little more outgoing. He had taught her to bathe in the lake and to climb trees. He had coaxed her into unbending enough to smile and even laugh. But it was not just the changes in her that were precious to him. It was the insight she had allowed him into the person behind the cool faзade. The person who did not demand much for herself but worked quietly and tirelessly for everyone else’s comfort.

He was surprised most of all, perhaps, by the fact that such a woman—apparently without any great charisma—attracted him.

She did attract him.

He turned his head, rubbed his face against her soft curls, and kissed the top of her head.

He was asleep within moments while the lamp burned itself out on the table and the last embers of the fire faded.


For just the merest moment when she awoke, Lauren did not know where she was. But then she remembered that she was still inside the hut in the woods where she and Kit had talked last night. She had been sitting in the rocking chair, growing more and more sleepy, finding it harder and harder to concentrate upon what he was saying. And then . . .

She was lying on the bed, she realized without opening her eyes. The pillow beneath her neck was warm and comfortable. She was lying on her side pressed against something equally cozy. One of her legs was wedged between . . .

She was not alone on the bed, she realized in a flash. She was in Kit’s arms. She could hear his heart beating. She could smell his cologne. For a moment she stiffened in alarm, and indeed a tentative wiggling of the toes on her free foot told her that she was without her shoes. But when she moved a hand slowly to touch herself on one hip, it was to the reassuring discovery that she was fully clothed. She was on the inside of the bed. There would be no wriggling her way out without waking him.

But did she want to? Wriggle her way out, that was?

What on earth would they think at the house?

Whatever had she done?

She had done nothing, that was what. Nothing to be ashamed of. She had talked with Kit, and they had comforted each other and made it possible to sleep peacefully. This was just one more incident in her summer to tuck away for future memories. How she would remember this night!

“You are awake?” he asked softly.

She opened her eyes, tipped back her head—it had been wedged between his shoulder and neck—and looked at him in the faint early morning light beaming through the hut’s one small window.

“Did I fall asleep in the middle of one of your stories?” she asked.

“The very best of them.” He shook his head in apparent sorrow.

“Kit,” she asked, suddenly anxious despite herself, “did—”

“No,” he said firmly. “This was one occasion on which I was the perfect gentleman. Well, almost perfect. I would have woken you and taken you back to the house to be quite perfect, I suppose. I could not face the walk back.”

“Did you sleep?” she asked him.

“Like a baby.” She saw the flash of his grin in the near-darkness. “Thank you, Lauren. Both for listening and for . . . being here.”

He was a man who needed to be listened to, she thought. He was not the uncomplicated, carefree man she had judged him to be on first acquaintance.

“However are we to get back to the house without being seen?” She could feel herself flush.

“Why would we arouse suspicion by even trying to creep in unseen?” he asked her. “We will walk boldly up the driveway, and anyone who sees us will assume we have been out for an early walk.”

He withdrew his arm from beneath her head and rolled away to sit on the edge of the narrow bed, his back to her. He set his elbows on his knees and pushed the fingers of both hands through his hair. He looked rumpled and . . . undeniably attractive.