Chapter Twenty-Nine #2
“Good,” she said softly. “Then you can worship me with your body in my bower of flowers please, because it’s been weeks and I’ve missed you!”
“Oh, Ava.” He rose and pulled her up with him. In a few moments of flurried removal of clothing they were down on the bed and he was worshipping with deep enthusiasm to her even deeper satisfaction.
*
They traveled by coach, four days of a kind of foggy bliss, wrapped up in each other, and Jerome tried to not think about what awaited him at Ravenshaw. But as they drew closer he found the shadows and ghosts creeping forward in his mind more and more.
Ava squeezed his hand, dragging him back to the present and said gently, “Memories?”
He nodded. “Yes, sorry—”
“Don’t! Don’t apologize. You have a lot to deal with. I understand.”
He took a breath and let it out slowly. “Thank you.”
*
When they drew up finally in the curving driveway of the large gray stone house where Jerome had been born and spent most of his childhood, he was surprised to see Kelham standing at the foot of the front steps shaking the hand of a big, dark-haired fellow, dressed in a dark-brown suit, which was clearly the fellow’s Sunday best but far from fashionable elegance.
One of the tenants or a contractor working on the house?
Repairs had continued in Jerome’s absence.
He opened the carriage door and leaped out, turning to help Ava down.
“My lord!” Kelham said coming towards him. The other fellow hung back but didn’t leave. “You couldn’t have received my letter—I only sent it yesterday.”
“You’re right, I didn’t. We left London four days ago. Ava, this is Kelham my steward, and an excellent fellow he is too. Kelham, may I introduce my wife, Lady Ravenshaw?”
Kelham flushed at his praise and bowed to Ava. “Your Ladyship, I am honored to meet you.” He turned back to Jerome. “My lord, you should have let us know you were coming. The McClellans will be at sixes and sevens with Her Ladyship here and nothing set to rights.”
“Oh, don’t mind me,” said Ava quickly. “I know the house is still under repair.”
“Your Ladyship is most gracious,” said Kelham with a another bow.
Jerome nodded at the fellow in the brown suit. Something in the cast of his features made Jerome think he should know who the man was. “Who is our guest?” he asked Kelham.
“Well, he was what I wrote to you about, my lord. You told me look into what happened to Eliza Stubbs.” Jerome felt Ava stiffen beside him.
“This fellow claims to be her son, Jeremiah Stubbs. It seems when Miss Stubbs left Ravenshaw in ’89, she was with child.
She went home to her parents and gave birth to Jeremiah. ”
Jerome put a hand out to grasp the carriage door as a wave of relief washed through him. “So he didn’t kill her after all,” he said softly.
“It seems not, my lord.”
Jerome grabbed Kelham’s hand and wrung it.
“Thank you, my dear chap. You have relieved my mind enormously.” He trod over to the other fellow, Jeremiah Stubbs, and held out his hand.
As he did so, he recognized the man’s heritage in his face.
The same dark hair, curved brows, and curl of the lips.
This man was his half-brother. The resemblance was unmistakable.
“I’m Ravenshaw,” Jerome said firmly and with a smile. “I’m pleased to make your acquaintance, brother.”
Stubbs flushed and said gruffly, “Your Lordship is kind to acknowledge me. I didn’t expect that. Mother always held to it my father was a lord, but she never told me who. Wasn’t until I got his letter,” he nodded at Kelham, “that I realized what might be in the wind.”
Jerome noted that the man’s diction was, if not precisely that of a gentleman, not rough. He began thinking immediately of what he could do for the fellow. “Come into the house, we have much to discuss,” he said. “And meet my wife, Lady Ravenshaw.” He waved Ava over and introduced them.
Ava smiled and said warmly, “I’m delighted to meet you.”
“We have an older sister, you know,” said Jerome, leading the way into the large entry hall. “McClellan, get Mrs. McClellan to send up refreshments please.”
“Aye, my lord,” said the butler with a smile.
“We do?” said Jeremiah with an odd note in his voice.
“Yes. Leticia, but we call her Letty. She’s married to the Earl DeCrecy.” Jerome clapped him on the arm. “It’ll take a bit of getting used to. But never fear, little brother. I’ll help you.”
The younger man grinned at that, because he was a few inches taller and broader than Jerome. “I’ll try to be an apt pupil, my lord.”
“Jerome,” said the Marquess of Ravenshaw firmly.
*
Ava turned to Jerome in the big bed Mrs. McClellan and the housemaids had hastily made ready for them and said, “Did you know you had a half brother?”
“No. Not an inkling. You know I thought I’d witnessed my father killing Eliza Stubbs.
It is clear from her diary that Mama thought he had too.
Perhaps he meant to and relented. I’ll never know.
My memories are fragmented and through the eyes of a child too young to comprehend what he was seeing.
I was just left with this nameless dread deep inside.
A feeling of—of inadequacy, as if I had failed at something I never understood.
I know now it drove my relentless pursuit of perfection, my desire to win at any cost. When the accident scarred my face, it brought it all up again.
I felt like my internal ugliness was there on my face for everyone to see.
That was why I was so unbearable. I was unbearable to myself. I’m so sorry.”
She stroked his cheek and murmured, “You will never be ugly to me, Jerome. For I know the best of you, and I love you so much it hurts. You have nothing to apologize for. I will always love you, even when you don’t love yourself. In fact, especially then. Because that is when you need it most.”
“Oh, Ava!” He buried his face in her neck and she felt the warmth of his breath. “I promise you, my love, that I will spend the rest of my life trying to be worthy of you.”
“Tush!” She pulled back and forced him to look at her.
“You are worthy of me! So much more than you give yourself credit for. Just because you have a moment of self-doubt that doesn’t nullify all the good things you do!
All the things you are so very good at! You have worked hard to be the best Jerome. Don’t denigrate that effort!”
He smiled, his new lopsided smile and cupped her face. “I love you, Ava.”
“I love you!” she said. “Show me how much you love me, Jerome.”
He propped himself up on his elbows and murmured, “With my body I thee worship . . .” and she stroked his scarred cheek.
Those were the words she had latched onto at the wedding.
She had been a girl when they got married.
She was a woman now and a wife. She smiled and returned his kiss with a deep one of her own, trying to wordlessly convey to him how much he meant to her, how much she would sacrifice for his happiness and peace of mind. And how very much she wanted him.
His kisses deepened, became more passionate, but with an added dimension of care and tenderness.
She felt precious and oh so loved, wrapped up in his arms. His lips traced kisses over her skin, tasting her, loving her.
She returned them as she twisted her head to find his skin to caress with her mouth, tracing patterns over his skin beneath with her hungry mouth.
His hands cupped her breasts and he bent his head to suckle the nipples with tender long pulls of his mouth and laves of his tongue.
He rolled her under him as her hands ran over his back and chest. Their mouths sought each other as he sought to join their bodies, his hand finding the right place between her legs.
“Ava!” he murmured, breathless, all his need in his voice.
“Yes, yes!” she urged him, desperate for the joining.
Their bodies came together with the ease of familiarity, and the added edge of banked desire.
She arched up into him as he bore down. And everything happened in a heated rush as they sought and found the missing piece of themselves in each other.
The rising tide of unstoppable desire took them over the edge in an explosion of passionate love that left them both floating in a haze of blissful happiness.
*
With Ava’s head resting on his chest, as he lay on his back, Jerome knew at last that the gnawing ache of inadequacy, shame, and guilt that drove him was eased by the love of the woman he adored.
It might never be fully extinguished, that sense of not being enough.
He would always want to win and be the best. But he now knew that if he didn’t always succeed, it wasn’t the end of the world. Because Ava loves me just as I am.