Stephanie Laurens - The Edge of Desire

Letitia merely nodded, wondering where he was heading with that comment-where he was trying to lead her.

He held her gaze, unhurriedly searching her eyes. “You don’t seem all that surprised that Justin should be the antithesis of his reputation.”

Ah. That was where he was heading. She smiled. “As a loving older sister, I can only rejoice at his exemplary sense.”

“Indeed. But you also know why Justin is as he really is.” He arched a brow at her. “I don’t suppose you’d care to enlighten me?”

She held his gaze, then shook her head. “Knowing that won’t help you find Justin.”

“I see.” Christian smiled easily and inclined his head. “In that case, ladies, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll return to the hunt.”

He rose, bowed to Agnes, nodded to Hermione, then looked at Letitia.

Frowning, she asked, “What are you going to do?”

He looked down at her, let his smile grow edged. Softly replied, “You knowing that won’t help me find Justin.”

Her mouth dropped open, then she shut it with a snap and glared at him.

Unperturbed, he saluted her, then turned and walked out of the room.

Entirely confident that she would work out where he was going soon enough-and that she would follow.

He set out an hour later, driving out of Grosvenor Square in his curricle with his pair of prime chestnuts between the shafts. The long drive north was very familiar, yet the necessary tacking to get out of London’s crowded streets, then threading through the traffic clogging the Great North Road-the mail coaches, the wagons and drays-commanded his attention, so that despite the length of the journey, he had little time to think.

His ultimate destination was Nunchance Priory, but he wanted to time his arrival there, so he’d decided to stop at his home, Dearne Abbey, for the night.

He pulled up in the graveled forecourt as twilight was taking hold. His staff were ecstatic to see him.

“I’ll have your room ready in a jiffy, my lord.” Mrs. Kestrel, his housekeeper, all but rubbed her hands in glee. “And Cook set a roast on the spit the instant we heard you were back.”

Christian acknowledged her enthusiasm with an easy smile, then turned to his steward, hovering hopefully at the mouth of the corridor leading to the estate office, and gave himself up to business.

Later, he dined in solitary state-there was no one else, not even a distant impecunious cousin, in residence-then he elected to climb the stairs to the long gallery to reacquaint himself with the extensive, uninterrupted views across the fens to the Wash.

The view at the best of times was a lonely one. Mile upon mile of low, flat fields with the sea a distant silver-gray glimmer on the horizon. What houses there were were cottages, built low and largely swallowed by the never-ending fields.

The abbey was built at the very edge of the fenland, on a slight rise, with its back to the limestone cliff that marked the boundary of the low lying land. The house dominated its surroundings, a large Palladian mansion of perfect proportions built on the old abbey ruins by his grandfather.

Christian stood at one long window and looked out across the fields, into the deepening twilight. He owned much of what he could see, highly fertile land that guaranteed his and his family’s financial future.

Yet the huge house around him lay empty. For the first time since returning from the Continent and properly taking up the mantle his father had bequeathed him, he felt the weight of it. Sensed in his new life, as in this house, a lack, a hollowness wrapped in elegant calm, peaceful, serene, but empty.

Barren.

Folding his arms, he leaned against the window frame and looked out as the light faded and night slowly crept across the land.

This house-his house-was waiting. Ready, in perfect condition, fully staffed with people eager to serve. Yet he’d made no move to claim a bride, to bring her there, and start a family that would-once again-fill the corridors with laughter and gaiety.

The house was made for that, for an active, bustling family. Something his aunts, Cordelia and Ermina, would certainly remember with fondness, and look forward to seeing again.

That was what lay behind their disapproval, increasingly severe, of his continuing unwed state. They’d offered to help, of course, but when he’d refused, politely but categorically, they’d been wise enough to desist; stubbornness wasn’t solely a Vaux trait.

Not surprisingly, that thought brought Letitia to mind. Into his mind, filling it.

For long moments she was with him again; she was the only woman he’d ever envisaged there-standing beside him, her arm linked with his, looking out over his fields.

She was the only woman he’d ever imagined making a life with-making a family with.

The only woman he’d ever wanted in his bed-there or at Allardyce House.

He’d known the truth years ago, and it still remained true. She was the one his heart and soul desired.

Unbidden, the dreams he’d had of them long ago rolled back into his mind, dreams he’d spent years embellishing, building them, clinging to them through all the long years he’d spent deeply embedded in an alien culture, an enemy land. They’d been his inner refuge, his strength.

The emotions wound into those dreams roiled through him, unexpectedly intense. Reawakened and given new life by his recent hours with her, the her who’d stood at the center of those lost dreams.

For they’d been false…as had she.

His reaction to that fact was as violent as it had ever been. He still didn’t understand how, or why, she’d done as she had.

All that mattered was that she’d married Randall.

And killed his dreams.

Lowering his arms, he went to push away from the window frame, but stopped.

Looked out across the quiet night and wondered how much he still wanted those dreams.

She was now a widow; she still responded to him as she always had.

He no longer knew what she felt for him-something, certainly, even if it wasn’t what he’d thought. She hadn’t been in love with him as he’d been with her.

But did that matter?

The truth was…

For long minutes more he stood looking out unseeing, wrestling with the question of how much he was willing to give-to bend, to forgive, to accept-to recapture a semblance of those long-ago dreams.

He bowled through the Nunchance Priory gates at mid-afternoon the next day. The long, winding drive was, he noted, in excellent repair, the trees shading it old but well-trimmed. The lawns and gardens that surrounded the house were neat, but not rigidly so, comfortable and colorful with rambling roses tumbling over walls, their perfumed blooms nodding in the warm breeze.

Beyond the changes expected of the years, all was as he remembered it.

He pulled up in the circular forecourt before the huge, rambling, late Tudor mansion. It had indeed been a priory, one linked to the abbey at Dearne; whereas the abbey hadn’t withstood the ravages of time and the various assaults visited upon it, the priory had escaped the old wars relatively unscathed, and succeeding generations of Vaux had preserved and added to its red-brick magnificence.

Leaving his curricle and horses in the care of a suitably reverent groom, Christian looked up at the long facade, at the many leaded windows that winked and blinked at him. The Allardyces and the Vaux were neighbors of sorts; while they didn’t share any boundaries, they were the two most senior families in the area and throughout the generations had been close acquaintances, if not always as close as friends.

That had been one reason both families had looked upon his and Letitia’s long-ago romance with benign approval, if not outright encouragement. No Vaux and Allardyce had married before, but once the idea bloomed, everyone had concurred that it was high time the families established a closer bond.

Then he’d gone to war, and Letitia had married Randall, and all thought of closer ties in this generation had faded. But the underlying acquaintance had not.

Climbing the shallow front steps, Christian tugged the bellpull.

When the butler, a thoroughly imposing specimen, opened the door, Christian smiled easily. “Good afternoon, Hightsbury. Is your master at home?”

Hightsbury recognized him and unbent enough to return his smile. “Indeed, my lord. Do come in. And may I say what a pleasure it is to see you here again. If you’ll wait in the drawing room, I’ll inquire as to the master’s pleasure.”

Christian consented to cool his heels in the elegant, formal drawing room; naturally, being a Vaux domain, it was also a cornucopia of rich and colorful visual and textural delights.

He barely had time to absorb their combined impact before Hightsbury returned.

“If you’ll come this way, my lord. His lordship is in the library.”

Following Hightsbury down the long, wood-paneled corridors, remembering what little Letitia had said about Justin’s falling out with their father, he considered how to approach the coming interview.

Hightsbury opened a tall door, went in, and announced, “Lord Dearne, my lord.”

“Heh?” A white-haired figure hunched over a large desk swung around to peer at the door.

Christian was momentarily taken aback; the earl appeared swathed in a dressing gown-then he realized it was a long, soft, dun-colored coat of the sort serious scholars wore to protect their clothes from ink stains.

He smiled and went forward.

The earl peered at him from under bushy white brows. His hair stood up in tufts, as if he’d tugged at it; Christian saw the odd ink stain in the tumbled locks. All in all, the earl’s reputation as an irascible, unpredictable eccentric appeared well-founded.