EPILOGUE #2
“Do you know who else wrote to me this week?”
“Not your brother?” Gervaise pulled a face.
“No, Diana.”
“That’s the same thing. What’s wrong with them this time? A leaky roof in need of repair? Their baby has croup?”
“It has not even been born yet!”
“No? Well, when it is, I’m sure it will be just as tiresome as they are!”
“It was not about anything calamitous,” she said soothingly. “Instead, she was telling me that she had received a letter from Cynthia Jarrow. Apparently, Cynthia married an explorer and they are currently doing a tour of the British Isles. Her husband gives lectures on his discoveries.”
“Sounds tedious in the extreme,” Gervaise muttered.
“Well, anyway, they are currently in London and were the guests of a Sir Walter someone or other and who do you suppose was also at their reception dinner party?”
“I think I can hazard a guess,” Gervaise said dryly. “Our good friend Lady Sharpe? She gets everywhere.”
“Precisely. Apparently, Cynthia heard all about my dramatic escape from death and is simply desperate to get in touch with me.”
“Probably angling for an invite down here,” Gervaise remarked. “So her ghastly husband can bore all of Cornwall with his lectures. Mind you…” He twisted about to look up at her. “The idea might not be without merit.”
Caroline eyed him suspiciously. “You are just looking for a new target for your wrath!” she gasped accusingly.
“Why not? You have made me forgive everyone else.”
“Not true. You are still very cutting to Edgar and Diana, and downright rude to Mrs. Ryland!”
“It is no more than they deserve.”
“I do not even know Cynthia anymore! And she was only young at the time.”
“She was mature enough to be made head girl at your appalling school.”
“Well, I don’t think you can hold that against her.”
“I think you’ll find I can.”
“Did you dislike your own head boy?”
“Oh, on principle,” he replied at once.
“And what was his name?”
“David something or other. I think he was an honorable.”
“And was he?”
“Was he what?”
“Honorable.”
“Oh, not remotely. Neither in word nor in deed. He was in fact a rotten little sneak who spent all his time running to the masters.”
“Well, Cynthia was not like that,” she said firmly.
“I still detest her and you know why.”
“I suspect half the reason you dislike her so much is because I once admired her,” she ventured. “Sometimes I think you should like to be the sole recipient of my admiration.”
“I’m not quite that bad,” he protested. “I let you have Reg, do I not? Despite the fact he is forever dropping and blundering into things like a bull in a china shop.” Reg’s appointment as their most senior manservant had not been without incident. Several of them.
“You like Reg just as much as I do,” Caroline retorted.
“Maybe so,” he conceded. “But I also encourage you to consort with Effie and Violet, do I not? Despite the fact they are forever dragging you to most unsuitable establishments whenever we are in London.”
They had sold her father’s townhouse, which had been in a rather unfashionable quarter, along with the house in Bristol and had purchased instead the new luxurious build in Avenue Road that Gervaise had earmarked for them.
The final touches were still being installed as it was to have every modern convenience known to man.
“You are very good,” she acknowledged at once, wrapping her arms about him. “And you know we always take Reg or Jeb to lurk in the background and keep an eye over us.”
“That is the only reason I allow it.”
Caroline had stood up as bridesmaid to Effie at her and Jeb’s wedding the previous spring alongside Vi and a third bridesmaid who, funnily enough, also hailed from Penarth. She was the wife of a local innkeeper and turned out to be Jeremy’s half sister, Mina.
Caroline had recently joined a book club with Mina, Emmeline, Jeremy, and Mrs. Hannah Colfax (otherwise known as Pinky), where they consumed novels with heroines whose stories often rivalled Caroline’s for their luridness.
Gervaise pretended to be indifferent but made her tell him all about their plots at great length.
“What are you thinking about?” Gervaise demanded, reaching up to lightly tug a lock her hair.
“Book club. I haven’t read my five chapters and Jeremy can always tell when I try to bluff my way through a meeting.”
“Well, you’re not going to read them now,” he said firmly. “I have something else in mind.”
“Oh, what?” she asked, peering down at him.
“I want you again. And it’s your own damned fault, not even attempting to don a dressing robe or appear in any way decent. And this time I think we should get a little inventive.”
“In what way?” she asked with interest.
“How about I give you a good spanking?” he suggested lazily. “You know how much I admire your bottom and that most impertinently placed mole.”
Caroline did not really think his heart was in the suggestion. She thought he liked kissing it more. “No.” She frowned. “I would not find it stimulating in the least.”
“Fair enough,” he answered at once. “Let’s try something else. How about you sit on my face and pretend you’re riding to hounds. This time you can do it naked.”
“We have done that before many times,” she pointed out. “Perhaps this time I could wear my riding habit instead. That might add a certain something. Then again, it would probably be too voluminous for purpose, and you would suffocate under my skirts.”
“To my mind just boots and a riding crop would probably be more efficacious,” he replied silkily.
“A riding crop?” she repeated in some surprise, before hesitating. “Are you sure it is not you, Gervaise, that would like to be spanked?”
A flicker of surprise passed over his face. “With you as the admonisher?” he mused. “The idea is not without merit,” he admitted slowly. “You do have something of the governess about you after all.”
“Perhaps you could balk at a fence,” she suggested, earning a laugh from him.
“Shall we try it?” Caroline asked, nothing loath.
He rolled her underneath him, gazing down on her with all the adoration she had long come to expect as her due. “Absolutely,” he replied. “But first, a kiss, Lady Atherton, if you please.”
Tugging down his face, she bestowed on him a kiss that would leave him in no doubt whatsoever of her heart.
THE END