Chapter 29 #2
“Still, I loved him like a father. Finding out I had been sired by another man didn’t change my feelings for him.
Why couldn’t he love me, Nathaniel? Even if I was not a child of his body, surely I deserved some affection?
People raise other people’s children all the time.
Just look at the duke and duchess of Aycliffe.
I’ve visited them a couple of times after I brought them the twins, and it’s clear they love the babies already.
But my father—Mr. Finch—he raised me for twenty years, and couldn’t… I did not inspire love.”
Nathaniel stood and came to her, his hands grabbed her shoulders, turning her to him. “That was his deficiency. Not yours.”
She just shook her head. “I no longer want to discuss Mr. Finch.” His abandonment when she had still believed him to be her father had hurt too much. “I don’t even know why I told you all this. It’s water under the bridge.”
“There’s no such thing. Even water erodes and shapes the landscape through which it runs. Leaving clues. Etching patterns.”
The way Nathaniel studied her as if he wanted to read into her soul unsettled her. So she turned away and bent to take the pies out of the oven. “Here, eat. Do you want some wine?”
He nodded, and she busied herself pouring the wine, but if she thought he would let go of the subject, he soon disabused her of that idea.
“At some point, you are going to have to let me in, Alice.” He studied her over the rim of the glass as he took a sip of wine.
“I don’t know what you mean. I’ve let you into my life, my body, my heart—”
Her sentence was cut short as he snatched her by the waist and positioned her on his lap.
One arm wrapped around her waist, his free hand curled behind her neck, his thumb caressing her cheek.
“I want into your mind, your deepest fears, your secrets. Your soul. To see past the mask to the truth beneath—that is what ciphers are. Masks. And you. You are the most intricate puzzle I’ve ever encountered.
You keep so much locked inside. Sometimes you reveal a bit, like now, only to retreat again.
But I won’t rest. I am patient. And I won’t give up until there’s absolutely nothing between us. ”
“You are not making sense. I keep no secrets from you. We had some misunderstandings, yes, but now you know everything there’s to know about me.”
“Hmm, I doubt that.” He nuzzled her neck, sending a shiver down her spine. “Once, I thought I knew you. But it’s obvious there were hidden layers I had not glimpsed. Layers that are now separating us. You are a puzzle I intend to solve.”
No! She had already shown him enough of her flawed self. He already knew too much. It was probably only the mystery that kept him interested in her, but she was no puzzle to solve.
“Nonsense. There are no secrets or layers between us. Now tell me, what did those documents say?” Better to move the subject to safer topics.
He exhaled loudly, examining her with too much understanding. At last, he ran a hand through his hair and looked away. A reprieve. She took the opportunity to scramble from his lap.
“Names and secrets. Mostly important people in government and their heirs. It seemed to be a compilation of all the people they planned to blackmail or maybe were already blackmailing along with their ‘sins’. And all the others they plotted to gain the upper hand over. Dalton’s name was on the list. Although he had no listed secrets.
Next to his name, they only wrote the word ‘wife’.
I don’t know what that means, but Dalton seems to know more. ”
“And what did he say? What’s the next step?”
“Nothing. He said the investigation is concluded for now, and we should return to our normal lives.”
“Concluded! It’s certainly not concluded.” Something akin to panic clawed at her insides,“We still don’t know the identity of Lord A. We haven’t apprehended anyone involved. There’s much to do.”
“Nevertheless, those were Dalton’s orders.”
No, they couldn’t yank the investigation out of her hands. Not yet. She needed this mission to keep working with Nathaniel. To work through her feelings. What was she going to do now?
“Humph! And why did the two of you decide that behind my back? You should have taken me with you when you visited Dalton. You left me out on purpose, and now the two of you have decided to wrap up the investigation and have left me out of the decisions.”
“That’s not true,” he bristled. “First of all, it was not a joint decision. Dalton decided, I just followed orders. It was not my intention to leave you out of anything. I had been working on that damn cipher for days. The moment I broke it, I just wanted to take it to Dalton and be done with it. I gave him the decoded documents and came to you straightaway. Now we are free to focus our minds and energy on us.”
That’s exactly what she couldn’t do. Desperate, she lashed out.
“That’s why you took me off the case. To seduce me to your will.”
“Bloody hell, Alice!” He stood abruptly, frowning ferociously. “You make it sound as if I’m scheming against you. Is it wrong to want my wife back?”
“What you want is to domesticate me. To turn me into your perfect little viscountess. Your society wife, who sips tea and organizes parties. What about what I want?”
“We can’t always have everything we want, exactly in the way we want it. Life and love are about compromise. About making choices. I had to. So I ask you, Alice, what do you want the most? Me or your spy work?”
“And why must I choose between the two? Are you admitting you’d strip me of my freedom? That you would like to put me in some gilded cage for your convenience and amusement?”
He looked at her as if she had sprouted horns.
“I don’t know what’s gotten into you. But you know damn well I’ve never curtailed your freedom.
If anything, the opposite is true. I let you go, even though it nearly broke me inside.
I did it because I thought it was what you wanted.
Instead, it made us both miserable. I’m trying to correct the mistakes of the past.”
“There are several ways to correct the mistakes. Or perhaps there’s nothing to be done.”
For long moments, he studied her, saying nothing. When she thought she couldn’t stand the silence anymore, he spoke. His voice was controlled, calm. His nostrils flaring with the effort to keep it so. “You are afraid. That’s why you are fighting me. Pushing me away. What are you afraid of, Alice?”
His arrogance in daring to name her feelings, to claim to understand her motivations when she didn’t even fully understand them herself, infuriated her even more. She raised her chin.
“I am not afraid. I am not a coward. What is there to be afraid of anyway? I simply know what I want and what I don’t.”
He nodded once, brusquely. Not an agreement, but a concession. “Fine. Have it your way. That being the case, I’ll be traveling to my estate tomorrow. There are some matters I need to settle there.”
The news was like a knife sinking into her heart. He was leaving her again? So soon? For how long? Why? He kept leaving her, and she missed him so much when he was away. She wanted to beg him not to go, to stay here with her. But pride came to her rescue once more.
“Of course. Now that this mission is over, you must return to your life and your duties. Just don’t expect me to be here when you come back. Maybe I’ll take another assignment. I’ll ask Dalton—”
He moved so fast that by the time she realized his intention, she was already against the wall, his arms braced on either side of her shoulders, caging her in with his body.
The stance looked menacing, controlling, but it was neither.
She could escape, even inflict damage, very easily.
In truth, he was the one in a vulnerable position, and they both knew it.
He was covering her as an act of protection.
Leaving himself wide open for her attack.
His voice rasped in her ear. “You’ll go nowhere; you hear me? I’ll only be gone a few days. If I had my druthers, you would come with me, but I doubt you’d accept. Promise me you won’t do anything rash or put yourself in danger while I’m gone.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I can take care of myself.”
“Yes, like you took care when you followed those men by yourself and walked right into a trap.”
“I’ve already told you it won’t happen again.” Must he keep harping about that?
“I mean it, Alice. No shenanigans. Either come with me or wait for me here. We’ll talk when I come back.”
“Stop trying to order me about, Nathaniel! I’ve been taking care of myself for the past five years.”
“Damn you, Alice. Must you defy me in everything? I’m making a simple request for your safety and my peace of mind. Promise me, or I swear I’ll throw you over my shoulder and carry you off.”
The image made her lips twitch with amusement despite her anger and hurt.
She was being unreasonable.He was only concerned about her safety.
But damn it, she didn’t feel very reasonable.
She was hurt. Feeling bereft, abandoned.
And adrift. He was leaving her… But he had said she could go with him.
No. That was just another of his manipulations. A way to force her into his life.
“I promise I won’t do anything dangerous. Other than that, I can’t promise to be at your beck and call.”
“No? But you offered to be my mistress.” He bent his elbows to brace his forearms against the wall, bringing his head closer. The heat of his body was like a torch, warming her front. “That is what mistresses do, my dear.”
She wanted to kick him. Erase that smug satisfaction from his face.
She could, too. From this position, she knew several ways to strike.
His mocking eyes told her he knew she could.
And dared her to do it. To fight back. Oh, he would enjoy that, wouldn’t he?
No, she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of a tussle.
They would probably end up in bed, or wherever their entangled bodies landed.
“I did not offer to be your mistress.” She tried to sound authoritative, but the breathlessness in her voice betrayed her. “The mere idea is ridiculous. I offered a way to be together, but I am re-thinking even that offer.”
His lips hovered over hers for a few moments.
Then he gave in and captured her lips in a hard, hot kiss.
It wasn’t gentle. It didn’t ask permission.
Didn’t seduce. Instead, it demanded submission.
And she gave in. For a few glorious moments, she enjoyed it without thinking.
Her hands crawled up the sides of his torso, under his jacket, fisting on the folds of his shirt.
As soon as he tasted her surrender, he drew back.
“We’ll discuss our relationship when I come back.”
And then, with the same suddenness he had pinned her against the wall, he let her go and turned to go. She took a step, stumbled a little, caught her balance against the table.
“But you haven’t eaten!”
“Don’t worry about it,” he shouted back, not breaking his stride. “I’ll eat at home.”
Well, that answered the question she had posed before. For him, this was not his home anymore.