Chapter 23
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Aurelia quietly fumed as she guided the servants into laying tables filled with simple food—bread and cheese and stew. She swallowed her ire as she welcomed the villagers into their home, smiling generously and organizing blankets to be brought and the fires to be piled high.
Village opinion had dramatically shifted toward Sebastian.
She glanced at the way he sat, easy, having changed into new dry clothes, and entertained some of the men. They, in turn, didn’t view him with nearly as much suspicion and anger any longer. A few families still kept to the periphery, taking only what hunger demanded, but they were far outnumbered.
She was glad for it. Truly. But while he'd been out there earning their trust, she'd been trapped here, pacing and useless, with no way of knowing if he was alive or drowned in some ditch.
She could have helped! Should have been beside him, supporting the people who needed them both.
Instead, she'd been left behind like a child sent to her room, denied the chance to be useful and robbed of any certainty he was safe.
All she ever wanted was for him to be safe.
A village woman stopped beside her, a sleeping girl in her arms. “Thank you for your generosity, Your Grace.”
Aurelia replaced her scowl with a sincere smile. “It is our pleasure.”
“I don’t know what I would have done if it weren’t for His Grace.
” The woman looked across at Sebastian, something soft in her eyes.
“He pulled my little Sarah from the water, you know. If he hadn’t been there, I shudder to think what might have happened.
” She glanced back at Aurelia. “It strikes me we haven’t been very welcoming to Your Graces, but that should change. It’s our prejudices, really.”
“Rumor can be a powerful thing,” Aurelia nodded.
“Truly, it can.” She shifted her daughter on her hip. The girl would have been four or five at most, with dirty blond hair and a pale, dirty face. The mother, too, seemed to have fallen on harder times, her stringy hair slipping from her bun, and her hard face angular from not enough meals.
Instead of anger, Aurelia felt pity—and relief that the girl had been spared. Her mother did not have to grieve her death. That was something worth celebrating.
“He did it because it was the right thing to do,” Aurelia said, smiling at the woman. “And I’m certain he feels just the same about it.”
“Well, I hope so. Mrs. Qualley, by the by.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Qualley.”
“Our family runs the butcher's in the village,” she offered, a touch of awkwardness in her voice. “I know His Grace has had to… send away for his meat and such, but if there's anything you or your husband need, we’d be happy to serve you.”
“We’ll be sure to ask,” Aurelia replied kindly. Mrs. Qualley nodded and smiled before returning to the food table for more bread and cheese.
She wondered if the butchers had survived. Perhaps not if their daughter was washed down the street. The Qualleys likely had nothing, and yet out of gratitude, they were offering what little they had at her disposal.
Her throat closed. There was no one as generous as those who had nothing.
She resolved to speak to Cook and arrange for food deliveries to be made in the village. If they brought some food into the inn, perhaps, and provided hand-outs for those who needed it, that would go a long way to helping rebuild lives.
For the remainder of the evening, Aurelia kept her smile close on her face, only letting it slip when they retired for the night, allowing the villagers some privacy in their makeshift beds.
Both they and the servants had originally balked at taking up some of the manor’s grand bedrooms. The servants, she knew, suspected the villagers of having light fingers—and perhaps that was true.
And perhaps, having grown up in near poverty, the villagers were intimidated by the opulence.
If Aurelia hadn’t been exposed to it from an early age, perhaps she might have been, too. Certainly, it had been overwhelming to think herself mistress of it.
How quickly that had changed.
Sebastian followed on her heels, and she waited until they were firmly in their private chambers before whirling with a brandished finger.
He held up both his hands in defense. “I needed to help, Aurelia.”
“I am not disputing that. These people needed help, and you saved a girl today—for that, I’m extremely proud of you.” She took a moment to gather her thoughts and string them together in a cohesive sentence. “But you left me behind today.”
Sebastian frowned. “What was I supposed to have done? Brought you with me?”
“Yes,” she snapped. “That is precisely what you ought to have done. Do you know what it was like to wait here, listening to the sounds of the storm, watching lightning flash and hearing trees topple, while never knowing if you were alive or dead?”
Sebastian stared at her as though he had never seen her before. He scraped one hand through his hair, letting it flop darkly back on his forehead. “Aurelia…” he started.
“Don’t placate me! I’m not some little woman you can leave at home. When I married you, it was to be your wife, your equal—not your servant. You told them not to let me out.”
Something flashed in his eyes. “Do you recall what happened to the last wife who ventured outside in a storm?”
He approached her then, and something in his face made her step back.
“I searched for her all night, Aurelia. All night! And for what? The villagers found her washed up on the rocks like god damned driftwood!” His voice cracked at the word.
“To this day, I don’t know what happened—whether she got confused when she was walking, heading to the lighthouse as she thought it was safe, or if she was so angry with me and miserable in the life we built together that she walked to those cliffs and chose to jump! ”
Shock stole Aurelia’s breath. The lighthouse. That was why he went there, again and again. Not because Kate had loved it, but because that was where she had died.
“Sebastian, it wasn’t your fault…”
“How can you say that when I chased her out! She was my wife, and I was unable to save her.” His gaze drifted to the window.
“I—I mustn’t have looked hard enough. I was tired and angry, and I’d left it too long.
She was out there alone in the dark and the rain, and I was here, nursing my wounded pride.
" He dragged a hand over his face. “She was my wife. My responsibility. And I failed her. I didn’t protect her from the storm, from herself, from anything. I failed her, and she died for it.”
“She shouldn’t have run off,” Aurelia said, suddenly angry at this Kate, who either through stupidity or selfishness had caused Sebastian untold amounts of pain. “But we are not the same—”
“I refuse to risk it,” Sebastian cut in, his voice cold.
“I would have been with you.”
“That hadn’t kept her safe.”
“I would have stayed with you,” she repeated.
“Which is where I belong, as your wife. I could have helped. These people need help—more than merely feeding them tea and handing them blankets. I am not some timid woman.” She spread her hands, stepping closer.
“I have seen my fair share of hardship. My hands have known work. I’m not afraid of getting them dirty.
” Finally, she reached him and cradled a hand over his cheek.
“I am not Catherine. And I choose my own path. I choose you. Do not leave me behind again.”
Devastation crossed his face like a lightning strike. “I can’t risk losing you,” he murmured quietly.
“You won’t. But if you push me aside again, you will. I swear it, you indomitable thundercloud. I will not sit back and wait for you again, not like that. It was terrible.” Her lips trembled—she pressed them together so she wouldn’t fall apart. “I was so afraid—”
He cursed and crushed his mouth to hers. The kiss was savage, half-prayer and half-claim, like he’d clawed his way back from the dead just to have her one more time. She met him with the same ferocity, fingers twisting in his shirt, dragging him closer.
She had spent hours convinced she’d lost him. That he’d drowned in some flooded ditch while she paced uselessly behind locked doors. The relief of having him here now, solid and breathing and alive, was so fierce it bordered on pain. She needed his hands on her. Everywhere.
Now.
“Hurry,” she gasped against his mouth, barely recognizing the sound.
His hands went to her back. Fabric screamed as he tore the gown open, the sound obscene in the quiet room.
“Sebastian—?”
“No.” His breath was hot against her throat, his voice husky. “I’ll buy you a dozen more. A hundred. I’ll clothe you every night in the most luxurious silk just for the pleasure of ripping it off your body.”
She fumbled with his cravat, untying it and tossing it aside. They stripped one another with the same hunger in their kisses. When his palms finally met her bare skin, she nearly sobbed with relief.
“Here.” She dragged his large hand to her pale breast. He squeezed, then caught a rosy nipple and rolled it agonizingly between his fingers. The sensation shot straight between her legs, molten and demanding.
“Bed,” he said roughly.
Oh, but she had other plans.
She pushed him down onto the mattress before he could argue, then stepped between his spread thighs.
“What are you—”
“New plan,” she said breathlessly. She sank down in front of him.
For hours, she had paced and panicked, powerless. Well. Not anymore. She wanted him wild. Wanted to watch him lose that iron control until he abandoned every thought except her.
His member jutted thick and flushed. Her mouth watered.
God, she loved how he responded to her. She would make him beg.
As punishment and pleasure all at once. She knew how much he enjoyed the hot velvet of her mouth—and she understood his cues a lot more, now. Such as when he grew closer to release.
Tonight, she’d wring him dry.