Chapter 9
CHAPTER NINE
Moses saw Chloe’s lips part in a gasp of surprise, and his blood started to heat at the mere sight of her. Oh, that he could have explained in his own home, at Wandorne, where he had always felt safe.
“Oh!” She had stopped dead in her tracks, hand to her mouth, and Moses saw another fine and beautiful woman emerge out of the carriage.
Without thinking, without considering what all those around him were thinking, Moses took a hesitant step forward, and then another.
The startled look increased in Chloe’s eyes as he watched her.
“It – it is you!”
Moses tried to hear positive and joyful recognition in those tones, but his heart sank as he saw a little crease appear between her brows.
His voice felt hoarse, but he managed, “Yes, it is me.”
“Who is “me”?” The woman said staring between him and Chloe. “Miss Vaughn, who is this gentleman?”
But as Moses stepped towards the woman that he now knew he loved, he kept the gaze between them, and neither looked away. The panting of his horse, having galloped at twenty miles an hour, seemed to drift into a hazy background.
Instead, all he could hear was Chloe’s murmur, “You … you are here.”
And now he was standing before her, and he nodded slowly. “For the first time in a year, I have left the grounds of Wandorne. To see you.”
If Chloe had been going to reply to that, Moses would never know. She opened her mouth but was interrupted by a woman that he was sure now was Lady Kathryn.
“My good man, who are you?” She said brightly with a smile, but Moses was not entirely fooled. She stepped slightly ahead of Chloe, as if to shelter her with her body. “And how are you acquainted with Miss Vaughn?”
Moses swallowed. He could do this the complicated way; the way that society would prefer him to, with many polite niceties that would be adored by this Lady Kathryn but would take forever.
Or there was the simple way.
“I must apologise, my lady,” he said brusquely, “but I need a private word with Miss Vaughn as a matter of urgency. I am sure that you will forgive me.”
Without waiting to hear if Lady Kathryn approved of his words, for he was entirely sure that she would not, Moses took the unresisting hand of Chloe Vaughn and started to walk away from the carriage.
She did not resist, Moses thought darkly, but she hardly seemed willing.
Her feet seemed to drag, and it was all he could do not to tug at her arm too hard.
But no one seemed to care that he, a stranger to the house and to the family, was pulling away a guest of the house towards a grove of silver birches.
As he stepped under their dappled shade, they seemed to calm him and bring him back to his senses. The hurried ride, made as swiftly as he could, had not given him much time to prepare any sort of speech or declaration. His heart thumped painfully as he dropped Chloe’s arm and turned to face her.
Was this a good idea? Could he ever explain himself to Chloe? Even when the misunderstanding about Lady Olivia was resolved, could she ever trust him again? How could he live alone again in that house, knowing what it was like to experience passion with Chloe Vaughn?
The same Chloe Vaughn was glaring at him, her back to a tall and thick silver birch tree. “And what do you want?”
Moses’ eyes took in her tangled hair, the gown that he had loaned her, and the flush of her cheeks. Anger, passion, fury, confusion?
“I hardly know,” he muttered in a low voice. “Even now I am unsure whether following you here was a clever idea. All I knew was that I would never be able to live with myself without knowing exactly what Chloe Vaughn thought of me.”
She blanched at the sound her of her name on his lips, and her eyes flickered across his face as though attempting to discern a secret meaning.
A song thrush started warbling above them, and a light breeze ruffled the leaves around them, sounding like waves on a lake.
Moses swallowed. “This reminds me of the lake at Wandorne. There you were, beached on my shores, looking for shelter.”
“I have no wish to speak with you,” she said fiercely. “Why do you not go back to your fiancée Lady Olivia, Sir Moses. I am sure she is confused about where you are.”
“To hell with Olivia,” Moses growled, taking a step towards her. She attempted to mirror him by taking a step back, but she was stopped short by the silver birch tree behind her.
“You … you are frightening me, Sir Moses.”
“Good,” snapped Moses, but he softened slightly as he beheld her. “Because I am frightened too. But I would rather be frightened with you by my side than without you, at any price.”
She was so beautiful, and yet she was so fiery. Despite her fear, confusion, and anger, she had not run away from him. She did not cower under his fierce gaze, but she met it, determined to face him.
“I had thought,” Moses said softly, “that it would be possible to spend more than a few hours with someone without falling in love with them. How hard could it be? People do it all the time, and yet for myself, that just did not seem possible.”
Chloe’s beautiful grey green eyes widened, and her jaw dropped slightly. “In – in love with them? But Sir Moses, I never intended to disturb you. It was the rain, otherwise I would not have disturbed – ”
“I wanted to be disturbed,” Moses said, cutting across her and reaching out to take her hand, which Chloe resolutely placed behind her back.
With a wry smile, he continued, “Chloe, I needed to be disturbed – I needed to be shocked back into life! Without you, my life would have just … continued. Existed, without anything of interest.”
Astonishment covered her features, but Chloe seemed determined to cling onto any residual anger that she could. “Then you may thank me and allow me to return to the house. Lady Kathryn will undoubtedly be looking for me, and – ”
Her voice was haughty, and she took a step back towards the house, but Moses was too quick for her.
His hand reached her shoulder before she was able to take another step, and he pushed her back to lean against the tree, and as she gasped Moses felt a shiver of pleasure in taking control of the situation … and of Miss Chloe Vaughn.
“You have brought back my appetite for living,” he growled, “and given me an appetite for you.”
Bending down, he kissed her passionately, his hands on her hips keeping her pushed up against the tree.
Her lips were warm and wet, and though her hands initially pushed against his shoulders, resisting him at first, as soon as he slipped his tongue into her welcoming mouth, she melted under his touch.
Her hands, now wrapped around his neck and keeping him close, were driving Moses wild as they scratched against his skin, desperate for more pleasure, and it was all he could do to stop himself pushing himself up against her, pinned deliciously against the tree as she was.
Chloe moaned in his mouth, and Moses broke the kiss, panting slightly but keeping his head lowered to hers.
“I-I love you,” Chloe managed in soft but panting breaths. “With such a passion – oh, Moses, I did not even believe such devotion was possible!”
Moses stroked her cheek with a finger. “And I love you, Chloe. More than I have loved before, more than should be possible in such a short time. Hell, twenty four hours ago I did not know you, and yet I would lay down my life for you should it be necessary. Where is the sense in that?”
He dipped down once more and this time met her hungry and welcoming lips with his own, his hands now clutching her bottom and tightening his grip with every moment.
“It doesn’t make sense,” Chloe managed as they broke apart once more. “You are an engaged man, Moses, engaged to that woman, and it hurts me immeasurably to think that you cannot feel for me what you feel for her. Why are you here?”
Moses smiled gently at the concern and jealously tinging her cheeks pink. “Olivia and Anthony – that is, the Count of Stratham – are childhood friends of mine, Chloe. I have known the Strathams since we were babes, and it has been a jest of our parents that one day we would wed.”
Chloe’s eyelashes fluttered slightly as she tried to take in his words. “Childhood friends?”
He nodded. “It would be as disgusting as considering one’s own sister if I thought of Olivia in that way.
We have never truly thought that marriage would be the end of our friendship.
In fact, the very reason of their visit was to inform me of her betrothal – and you gave me no chance to explain before you tore yourself away from me. ”
Moses searched her eyes for understanding, and saw it dawn there, saw the realisation that he was hers and no one else’s.
“Then … you did not lie to me?”
Moses kissed her deeply before answering. “No. I only have eyes for you.”
It had not been planned, and looking back, he could never exactly pinpoint the moment when the decision had been made.
All Moses knew that as he looked into the eyes of Chloe Vaughn, glittering and sparkling with the joy of knowing that she had secured his affection, she and no one else, he knew what he wanted to do.
Moses dropped to one knee on the cool green grass, not taking his eyes from the woman before him whose eyes, if possible, grew larger.
“Miss Chloe Vaughn. This last day has been the most joy filled and pleasure filled of my existence, and you are the reason for it. I do not wish to pass another day of my life without you. Would you do me the greatest honour, and give me the greatest gift, by promising to become my wife?”
There was a pause, and to Moses’ discomfort, the pause continued. Chloe was smiling at him but had not said a word. Time passed, so slowly that his heartbeat seemed to beat the minutes.
“What keeps your tongue?” He said eventually, a little desperately. “If ‘tis so difficult to consent to be my wife, damnit, then perhaps you had better not accept!”