Chapter One #3
Would she still smell the same if he buried his nose in her hair?
he wondered. Would she still melt into his arms if he kissed her, the way she’d used to before everything had fallen apart?
He wanted to know all these things and more, and yet her veil stood between them as more than a mere wisp of lace.
She hid her face from him and her feelings too, both things she had once allowed him to appreciate so intimately, and although everything in him longed to look into her eyes once more, he knew better than to ask.
‘My mother wanted me to deliver this,’ he said hoarsely, holding up the note as if to prove his presence on her doorstep wasn’t his idea.
‘She’s extremely sorry she wasn’t at the funeral.
She’s currently recovering from a bout of influenza, otherwise she would certainly have been there.
I know she and your great-aunt had been friends for a long time. ’
Jane took the note from him. Her hand was bare, he saw, her fingers just as dainty as he remembered, and he wasn’t sure if the tremor in them was due to the cold air or something else.
She didn’t unfold the paper, although she did incline her head again in another ambiguous nod. ‘Please assure her I wasn’t offended. To tell the truth, I was so in a world of my own I hardly noticed who was in attendance and who wasn’t.’
‘That’s understandable.’
Duncan shifted slightly, aware he ought to say something more.
Jane’s countenance might be hidden but the quake in her voice was telling and the knowledge that she was hurting was like a knife between his ribs.
It was as though the time apart had been nothing at all, all the years and miles between them vanishing—for him, at least—into a meaningless void.
Even during their separation, no other woman had managed to challenge the hold she had on him.
His fellow officers had tried repeatedly to introduce him to young ladies they encountered between voyages, each determined to win a smile from the grave lieutenant who had left his heart behind in England, but none had succeeded.
He’d only wanted a wife if that wife was Jane, and as that was an impossibility he’d seen no point in being anything other than distantly civil to the pretty misses dangled under his nose.
His love had been given and could not be taken back, and he knew it would be cruel to make anyone else Mrs Fitzjames when his affections already belonged elsewhere.
Every woman deserved to be her husband’s first choice and that wasn’t a promise he could make, resolved instead to remain alone after Jane’s rejection rather than settle for someone who would surely want more than he could give.
His throat felt constricted, as if he’d tied his cravat too tightly. ‘Please accept my deepest sympathies for your loss. I know you held Mrs Franklin in the highest regard.’
‘Yes. I did.’
Jane’s black-sleeved arms moved to wrap around herself. Probably she was freezing, standing in the open doorway, but she spoke again before he could suggest she go back inside.
‘So,’ she went on, with the definite air of one trying to change the subject. ‘You’re to have a pleasant Christmas with your mother, just the two of you. How agreeable.’
Duncan took the hint. ‘It’s not quite just the two of us. My three nieces are staying with my mother while my sister and her husband are away for his health. With them in the house, the atmosphere is…lively.’
The black bonnet tilted slightly. ‘You have three nieces now?’
‘Georgiana was blessed with twins. If blessed is indeed the right word for one who looks so continually harassed.’
A breath of wry amusement came from behind the lace, the hint of a laugh reminding him of how comfortable they’d used to be together.
‘And you? What are your plans for Christmas?’
Jane seemed to hug herself more tightly.
‘I shall stay here until the snow clears enough for me to return to Bristol,’ she said quietly.
‘My cousin Franklin has kindly allowed me until the day after Boxing Day to gather my effects, after which he will come to take possession of the house and everything in it.’
‘Everything? Your great-aunt didn’t make any provision for you?’
The bonnet shook from side to side. ‘She couldn’t.
A condition of her late husband’s will. She was allowed to enjoy everything the estate had to offer during her lifetime, but nothing ever truly belonged to her.
It was always my great-uncle’s intention that their son would inherit everything, right down to the last silver fork. ’
‘I see.’ Duncan just managed to stop himself from frowning. He didn’t have the advantage of a veil to hide his expression and he imagined she wouldn’t want to see his poor opinion of the Franklin men reflected in his eyes.
She had lived there for six years, devoting herself to Deborah, and this was how she was to be treated?
He knew John Franklin was unpleasant—everyone in Wilton was aware of his greedy, self-interested nature—but to think of him turfing Jane out of what had been her home was beyond the pale.
Deborah had been at her son’s mercy and now it seemed Jane was too, and although he tried to remind himself that her welfare was no longer any of his business, it was still a hard pill to choke down.
‘So, you intend to stay here alone until Franklin comes?’
‘Yes. I’ll have no trouble bearing the solitude.
’ She spoke decisively and yet somehow, he suspected she was trying to convince herself as well as him.
‘The time to myself will be useful. I can finish packing and of course I shall help the servants to ready the house. I’ll be so busy I doubt I’ll even notice it’s Christmas at all. It’s what Auntie would have wanted.’
He wasn’t sure he believed her. Deborah had been fiercely protective of her great-niece and would surely have been horrified by the bleak picture Jane had just painted.
The old lady would have wanted Jane’s happiness, not for her to be lonely and abandoned at Christmas of all times, but yet again he had to remind himself of his place.
She didn’t want him, he told himself as he watched her rub the cold black silk of her arms. Any connection they’d once shared had died on the day she had turned him away and he had no right to intrude, even if seeing her again made him want to catch her up and kiss away the sorrow she was trying so hard to keep from her voice.
He cleared his dry throat. ‘You’ve had a difficult day. I won’t detain you any longer when I imagine you must want to be alone.’
He half wanted her to ask him to stay, and he couldn’t deny a pang of disappointment when instead she nodded. ‘Thank you. And thank you for bringing the note.’
‘You’re welcome. With my mother ill and most of her servants busy wrangling my nieces, I think I may have to fill the role of postmaster for some time yet.’
Jane stepped back, retreating closer to the open door. The house behind her was perfectly still and silent as a tomb, no movement stirring anywhere other than the slight ripple of her veil in the December breeze.
There was a pause. By the subtle upward angle of her head, he thought she must have been looking into his face, and not for the first time he wished he could do the same to her.
‘You look very well, Duncan,’ she said softly, the words almost lost amid her swathe of black lace. ‘It’s a pleasure to see it…and you.’
Duncan swallowed painfully. Did she mean that?
She sounded so sad and tired but pretending not to be and it caught him in the vulnerable place seeing her again had torn open like an unhealed wound.
Every feeling he’d had for her three years ago rose up, trying to burst their banks, and turning away with a hurried bow took almost all the strength he had left.
I shouldn’t do this again, he thought severely as he made himself walk back down the path he’d never intended to revisit, determined not to look over his shoulder.
I think it’s best that I stay away from her for the short time I’m here.
Anything else will just make things worse—for me, if not for her.