Chapter 19
Sin’s bare chest lay beneath her cheek, their naked limbs entwined in a fervid tangle like sweet pea tendrils. His heart thumped in a steady counterpoint to his soft raspy snore.
A smile of utter contentment curved Verity’s lips and she pressed them into the mat of hair covering her husband’s chest.
Her husband. Truly. At last.
She’d thought she’d understood how intimacy between a man and a woman should be when she and Vic and Angel had discovered the diaries hidden behind other books on the top shelf of Pennington’s library.
But neither words nor pictures could do justice to the reality, the intensity, the immense power of what she’d shared with Sin this afternoon.
And yet the opposite could also be true. Little shudders of horror rippled down her spine when she recalled how cheated she’d felt that first time. How empty and cold.
The difference was love. And trust.
He’d offered both. Demanded both.
Trust. Trust herself and the unaccountable knowing. Trust Sin.
Liberty would not recognize the woman her baby sister had become—when she finally came home. For she would come.
It was a dream with the potential of a nightmare.
But it was the kind of nightmare she was willing to live through in order to have Libby home again.
Although her parents would likely not agree, knowing the scandal Libby’s return would cause.
And yet it would happen. The knowing was as deep and solid as it had ever been.
Verity closed her eyes tight and sucked air into her struggling lungs.
She did not doubt. She would trust in the power she’d been gifted.
Just as she should have trusted in the Universe’s plan for her and Sin.
A warm mouth pressed against hers.
Sinner.
Verity opened her eyes to find his smoky grey gaze only a nose away from her own.
‘What are you thinking about?’
‘Secrets,’ Verity sighed.
‘No, we’re not doing secrets. Remember?’
‘Not a secret. I was thinking about the secret. Libby. And what a scandal it will be when she comes home. And how—I know—she will. Just not yet.’
‘You don’t want us to go and look for her?’
‘No. The time’s not right. There are—things—that still have to happen. Hugh must come home perhaps. I’m not sure. But it’s not yet.’
Sin sat up and leaned back against the pillows, but he never took his gaze from Verity’s.
‘Does it bother you? The knowing?’
‘Sometimes,’ she said, pulling herself up to lean in against his chest. ‘It definitely bothered me when I looked at you and saw us saying our vows before Vicar Coutts.’
‘Why?
‘Because you were you. More mature, experienced. Cynical. And I was—immature, na?ve and clinging to the childhood I’d long outgrown. Could any two people appear more mismatched?’
‘Do you still think that?’
Was that insecurity she heard in his voice?
‘No,’ she breathed on a little hiccup of amusement. ‘I’ve realized while I’ve been resting here all snuggled into your manly perfection that I will never doubt the Universe again. The Universe always knows what is right. Although we would both have argued vehemently to the contrary at the outset, you and I are right. And you still have some explaining to do. Starting with your son.’
‘He was never mine, Very, my love. However, if Alfred and Edith cannot—do not—keep him safe, I will retrieve the lad and take care of him myself. Alfred knows this and I can predict there will be a panic-stricken epistle in the next mail to arrive from India.
‘Alfred Fontaine, Edith”s husband, is our partner handling the Indian interests of the Princess Line in Calcutta. He, Anik and I started in the shipping business together. We all met at Oxford and Alfred and I went back to India with Anik once we all graduated. We were both second sons with a small amount of money to invest. With Nik’s contacts in Calcutta, we were very successful.
‘But the point of the story is that Alfred does not enjoy women, as normal men do, which occasionally causes strife for him. So, when Edith arrived in India in response to a conscienceless bastard who advertised for a wife, only to find the bounder had already married someone else and she was left with no way to support herself, Alfred offered marriage. Edith has an impetuous nature, as we have seen.
‘What I don”t think any of us foresaw was Alfred discovering a desire to become a father. By that time, it had become obvious we would all become extremely wealthy and he wanted an heir. He confided this to me one night when we were both deep in our cups. Told me he couldn”t—or wouldn”t—sire the child himself, but I could. I”d forgotten about it when we sobered up, but he hadn”t. He”d obviously talked to Edith, and she began trying to seduce me. If I”m truthful, it probably wasn”t all that hard. I was a typical cynical rake, but self-aware enough to know I could not watch them bring up my child. It would mean me leaving India. That was not so difficult. I was ready to return to England anyway. Calcutta was exotic, smelly and dirty. London is no better, but it”s—English and I prefer the cooler climes.
‘The moment Edith confirmed she was pregnant I made arrangements to transport my life back to England. I handle our warehouses here in London and all the shipments coming in and sometimes Nik convinces me to take a voyage with him. I do enjoy being at sea, but I”m a land lover at heart. Questions, my love?’
Verity looked up at her husband to find him watching her from warm, storm-grey eyes.
‘You”re a good man, Sinner Wolfenden.’
‘Good?’ he spluttered. ‘Certainly not what Edith’s thinking about me right now. Or even the boy. He says I’m loud and nasty. Which is good because I don’t want him transferring his love and loyalty from Alfred. Having seen him now, seen how like me he is, it would be too easy to want to claim him. Love him.’
‘Oh Sin. I can understand. The moment I saw him I knew he was your son. Perhaps when he is a man you may get to know one another. What have you done with them?’ she asked, trailing her fingers through the soft matt of hair on Sin’s naked chest. Being close to him like this was likely to become her latest addiction.
‘Sent them to the Grosvenor until I can secure a berth for them back to India, which I hope will be within a couple of days. Alfred will be beside himself.’
Verity nodded, her cheek nuzzled against the soft whorls of hair on his chest, while her mind was already teasing at the other secret Sin still had to address. Best it was all aired so they could move on with their life together.
‘And Eloise?’
Verity glanced up as Sin groaned and closed his eyes tight. Muscles clenched along his jaw and white lines appeared around the mouth that had shown her such pleasure.
Perhaps she should not have asked, but all the shadows between them needed to be banished if they were to move forward into light and happiness—together.
‘She drowned herself in the Thames after being seduced by one of the callous, thoughtless young men I called ‘friend’ when I was at Oxford. We were a bunch of arrogant, self-serving, heedless young bloods who thought we owned the world, and the world owed us. It was all ours for the taking. Louise was the sister of one of our group and he lost his life in the duel which ensued, died by a bullet from the same unconscionable bastard who ruined an innocent young woman.
‘I named a ship after her in case I was ever in danger of forgetting what arrogant arseh—cads we were back then.’
Had his story ruptured the fragile new accord they’d found with one another?
What if she turned from him?
This. This was why he’d never allowed his heart to be compromised. If she closed him out now he wasn’t sure how he was to go on.
Looking up at him from eyes luminous with love and soul-deep compassion, she gifted him the respect due an honorable man.
Her arms tightened about his neck.
‘If only we could avoid the heedlessness of youth. If only we could take back the words we spoke in our ignorance. Take back the actions that served no one, not even ourselves in the long run. But we can’t, Sin,’ she said earnestly, tilting her head back to fix his gaze with hers. ‘We can only go on and hopefully become better people because of it. We have to remember, the folk we think our words and actions wronged also made choices. I’ve often wondered if Libby’s life would have played out differently if I’d kept my childish mouth shut the day I saw her kissing Levi at the fair. Was her subsequent disappearance from my life my own fault? It is easy to think so sometimes and to wallow in my guilt. I know it’s not the same. You feel in some measure responsible for Eloise’s death and that of her brother—because of your association with the man who was directly responsible.’
‘Thank you, my love,’ he murmured, wrapping his arms about her and holding her close. ‘I don’t know how I ever thought you a chit still in the schoolroom. In some ways you are wise beyond your years.’
She huffed in his ear, then leant back a little to hold his gaze once more.
‘No more secrets then? Can we now get on with our life?’
‘Just the one where I allowed the love of Gabe’s life to seduce me—when I was sixteen.’
‘Sinner, you didn’t?’
Her eyes flew wide, and he wasn’t sure whether it was shock or amusement that flashed in their depths.
‘Yeah, I’m afraid I did. Miss Geraldine Scott-Noble was our younger sister’s governess. She was twenty-two and Gabe eighteen. He thought he was in love, and Papa took him off to America. So she turned her attentions to me. I was definitely a rake by that time. Even at sixteen I had no illusions about a young woman who was neither a virgin nor discriminating. Willing was all I cared about then. Though I’d like to think I have matured somewhat since.’
‘Sixteen? What happened to her?’
‘Mama brokered a marriage for her with the local squire who was a widower with several motherless children. By the time Gabe came home from America she was wed and breeding. It was not a happy time, and he went off the rails for a bit with Quin, our cousin. That’s how they both ended up with a commission in the Horse Guards. And Gabe doesn’t know about my little interlude with his first love. I doubt it’d bother him now, but I think that particular sleeping dog should be left to its slumbers.’
‘Probably best,’ Verity agreed, rising up to press her mouth to his. ‘No wonder you have become such a cynical—’
Her lips nibbled along his jaw and down the sinews of his neck.
‘sinful—’
Darting a little lower, she closed her mouth over one hard, flat nipple and suckled deeply.
‘Sinner.’
‘Yours,’ he growled, gripping her head and holding her in place.
‘Mine,’ she agreed and settled to proving why her innocence was the perfect antidote for his cynicism.