Chapter Ten
T essa paused to listen to the low roll of thunder rumble over the castle.
Up in the attic, crammed under the slanting eaves where trunks and boxes had been shoved away years ago, she could hear every nuance of the storm that had engulfed the castle in an unbearably gray, cold, and—she cocked her head to listen to the pouring patter on the roof just above her head— very rainy day. Which made it a perfect afternoon for her to sort through the old trunks, to separate what had belonged to Eleanor from the other antiques that had been stored up here for generations.
But being alone in the shadow-filled attic was giving her nervous chills.
She wasn’t usually bothered by attics and cellars and other dark recesses of old houses, but this attic bothered her, most likely because it was in this old house. The same one where Eleanor had lived and was still full of her personal tastes and presence, that had been left mostly empty of for the past two years and given over to dust, bats, and mice, and that made Tessa jump at every strange noise and shifting shadow. And there were a lot of noises and shifting shadows. So many, in fact, since arriving here that she had spent more of her nights awake than asleep, and a large part of those waking hours foolishly wondering if ghosts might truly exist after all.
She cast a glance at the two candle lanterns she’d set on the floor beside the trunks and reassured herself that both flames seemed to be glowing perfectly. Yes, having both lanterns would give her plenty of light to see to work…but she also brought an extra one because she was more afraid of accidentally extinguishing a single flame and plunging herself into total darkness than not seeing what she was doing.
Oh, she should have made Winnie come up here with her. But that might have been even worse than being alone with the shadows. Her sister was already throwing a fit at being stuck inside due to the bad weather instead of out riding horses and learning archery. Poor Bates! The man had outdone himself by being the girl’s companion, even turning the old orangery into an indoor pall mall lawn to keep her entertained. Forcing Winnie into the attic would have been simply miserable—for both of them.
The same with Lady Bentley. The woman was ensconced in the round salon, up to her eyeballs in plans for closing up the gardens and aviary…and most likely issuing invitations to everyone she’d ever met in her life to visit her at the castle. She was nothing if not predictable.
Surely, Chase regretted inviting them all here. Even now, he was probably hiding in his study or in his dressing room—or on horseback halfway to Weymouth in flight—to avoid being stuck inside the house on a rainy day with the women. If he had any doubts that the three of them weren’t bedlamites…
“Don’t you dare go out,” she ordered the candle lanterns with a stern shake of her finger at them, as if they could understand her.
She rolled her eyes. Well, those doubts had most likely flown right out the window already.
“This place is driving us all mad,” she muttered and turned toward the first trunk.
All Tessa could do to keep the peace was finish packing as soon as possible so she could move the three of them back to Weymouth. But that also meant that Chase would leave, and the thought of losing him again was too much to even consider.
They’d grown closer during the past few weeks than they had ever been, sharing stories and secrets they never would have dared to do before, and once again, Tessa felt the old pull of attraction to him that had once made her so jealous of Eleanor. She couldn’t help it. His charming smiles made butterflies swarm in her belly, and their quiet conversations were just as exciting, if in a completely different way. She had even come to understand why he wanted to return to Spain and start a new life there, although she didn’t agree with him, and with that knowledge, the tarnished image she’d had of him from three years ago had started to shine again. The more she listened to his stories about his friends, Devlin, Lucien, and Shay, and saw him interact with Winnie—and his enduring patience with Lady Bentley—the more she realized what a good man he truly was…and the more puzzled she became over why Eleanor had never loved him, why their marriage had been so strained.
Yet she also couldn’t help but think that part of her growing confusion came from her dissipating guilt at being so very envious of what her cousin had once possessed. All of it, including Chase. The more time she spent with him, the less guilt she felt, and the last time she’d been in his arms, when he’d helped her fire the pistol, there had been no guilt at all. All she’d felt was how good it was to be in his arms, and how much she wanted to be there again.
A gust of wind howled through the rafters, and she jumped in surprise. Goosebumps rose on her arms as a chill of fright raced through her, and her heart leapt into her throat, pounding wildly.
She took a steadying breath and rolled her eyes at herself. Listening to Winnie’s talk of ghosts had set her on edge. For heaven’s sake, she was now jumping at things that weren’t even there.
“There are no such things as ghosts,” she told herself as firmly as possible, even if a pinching ache in her chest dared to disagree.
But ghosts or no, she had a job to do, and the sooner she sorted through the trunks, the sooner she could leave the creepy, old attic. And it was so very creepy. So she pulled back her shoulders in resolve and knelt in front of the trunk to peer at the forgotten items inside. Her lips formed a wide O of surprise as she pulled out a small embroidery hoop, its half-finished piece still firmly clasped within.
“I remember this,” she whispered and traced her fingertip over the uneven stitches and unintentional knots. Hours and hours spent learning to embroider, dozens and dozens of pricked fingers, and yards and yards of thread ripped out to redo mistakes…and there had been lots of mistakes. And lots of unfinished pieces, exactly like this one, despite its pencil sketches on the back of the linen to mark where flowers and hearts had yet to be created. “This was Eleanor’s. Which means…”
She peered back into the trunk, hopefully holding her breath— there . Exactly what she’d hoped. She lifted out a second hoop with its own half-finished linen square, its stitches and knots impossibly worse, and laughed at herself, because this one was hers. With a flush of memories speeding back to her, she sat down on the attic floor and studied the embroidery, afraid that if she looked closely enough she might just see traces of blood on the linen from all the needle pricks.
Soft footsteps echoed behind her on the narrow wooden backstairs leading up to the attic.
“I’m over here by the trunks,” she called out, her attention still focused on the embroidery. Not turning around as the footsteps drew up behind her, she held it up over her shoulder to show Chase. “Look what I found. Isn’t it just atrocious?” She leaned over into the trunk again. “Perhaps I can find others. We were forced to do several when…”
Her voice trailed off as an icy chill coiled down her spine. The footsteps had stopped behind her and fallen silent. There was now no sound in the dark attic except for the beating of the rain over the roof, but she felt… someone …there with her.
She swallowed hard and, too afraid to glance over her shoulders, called out softly, “Chase?”
No answer.
Sudden fear prickled the little hairs on her arms. But she was being a coward, surely. Someone had to be there. So despite the sudden leap of her pounding heart into her throat and the tingle at her nape in sudden fear, she pulled in a deep breath and slowly turned her head to look behind her.
No one was there.
Her breath strangled in her throat. All of her flashed numb, too frightened to scream. She scrambled to her feet and backed up, smacking her legs against the trunk and flinging out a flailing arm to grab for the rafters to keep from falling. Her eyes were glued on the empty floor where she’d heard the footsteps, where nothing but shadows stood in the flickering lamplight… Nothing. The embroidery dropped from her numb fingers and clattered against the floor at her feet.
“Tessa?” Chase’s deep voice called up to her from the bottom of the attic stairs.
She sagged back against the stack of trunks with overwhelming relief, yet her heart continued to thump so hard against her ribs that it pained her. “I’m up here.” But no sound emerged from her lips, her mouth having gone dry with fear.
His dark figure appeared at the top of the steps and hesitated, casting a glance around the cramped and dusty space beneath the eaves in the flickering lamplight. “Tessa?”
“Chase.” His name was a ragged whisper beneath the pain searing her chest as she gulped in deep breaths of air to calm herself. She’d never been so happy to see him in her life!
He frowned as he came toward her, his large frame filling the small space. “Are you all right?”
“No.”
He ducked under the beam to where she’d backed herself up beneath the eaves, cowering against the stack of crates among the dust layers and forest of cobwebs. Silhouetted by the lantern light behind him, his front and face were hidden in the dark shadows, but she could clearly see the concern pulling at his brow.
“What happened?” he asked.
“I heard…” Around them, the dark attic was still except for the patter of the rain that cocooned them together in a hush of soft noise. “I heard footsteps. I thought it was you, but when I turned around, you weren’t there— No one was there. It must have…” She lowered her voice to a whisper, barely louder than the rain hitting the roof, and felt like a complete cake when she admitted, “It must have been a ghost.”
“Or,” he offered, his eyes softening on her, “you heard the creaks and groans of an old house.” He tapped his hand against beam over her head. “This part of the castle dates from the sixteenth century. What you heard was the house most likely settling in the cold and damp weather, or the stairs adjusting to my weight from a story below.”
“Yes, that must have been it.” Because the alternative… impossible . So why didn’t that ease the relentless pounding of her heart in fear, the horrible ache of adrenaline in her limbs?
“No ghosts in the castle.” With a reassuring smile, he reached to pluck a cobweb from her hair. “At least not the otherworldly kind.”
She nodded stiffly, forcing herself to breathe calmly. But she couldn’t help looking at the attic floor behind him, in a feeble attempt to convince herself that no one—and no ghost —was there.
“It must be the storm getting to my nerves,” she said quietly, forcing a bravado she didn’t feel. “All this rainy weather…”
“And prowling about alone in dark attics.”
When she turned back to give him a flippant response, she froze beneath his gaze, her lips parting in soft surprise.
He was studying her face in the shadows, and Tessa was struck by a jolting awareness that he was seeing her in a whole new way since the night he returned to Weymouth and danced with her at the ball. Not as Eleanor’s cousin whose help he needed at the castle, not as the troublesome young miss she’d been when they’d first met all those years ago… No, he was seeing her for the woman she’d become, and the realization unsettled her as much as the ghostly footsteps had and kept her heart racing for a wholly different reason.
“You should have asked one of the maids to help you,” he murmured and slowly brushed the hair at her temple in a reassuring caress.
“No need to pull one away from her work,” she answered in the same low voice. And thank God she did, because she was certain her voice would have cracked had she spoken any louder. His touch was meant only to calm her after her fright, she knew, yet it had her wanting to lean into him, to let him brush his fingers deeply through her hair in caresses she knew would be anything but calming. “They have a lot more work to do with the three of us here. Besides, I wanted to go through the trunks myself.”
“You always have been independent to a fault.”
“I am my father’s daughter,” she commented, not apologetically.
“Good.” He slowly lowered his hand away with a teasing curl at his lips and pressed his fist against the small of his back. “I wouldn’t want you to be any other way.”
Her belly tightened at the loss of his touch. How could a simple caress of reassurance be so tempting? She drew in a deep breath for courage and offered, “If you want to—”
A draught rushed through the attic. One by one, the candles inside the lanterns flickered, then blew out, plunging the attic into darkness.
“Chase!” In her sudden fright, Tessa grasped desperately for him.
“It’s all right,” his voice told her from the blackness. “I’m right here.”
Then she felt his arms enclose her in his embrace. She pressed against his chest, her heart pounding and her body trembling, desperate for his strength and courage.
“The l-lanterns…t-they…” She couldn’t form the words and buried her face against his chest.
“They blew out in the draught.” His warm breath fanned against her forehead as he lowered his head to nuzzle her hair. “The rafters are anything but joined solidly, and as the castle settles, they pull at the slate roof tiles and shift them apart. The wind picked up, blew in through the cracks, and snuffed them out.”
“That’s all?”
“That’s all.” Then he muttered unhappily, “But it looks like I’ll have to add the roof to the list of estate repairs. I’m surprised it’s not raining buckets down on our heads every night at dinner.”
Tessa didn’t laugh at his grim humor. Instead, her hands tightened on the satin of his waistcoat, determined to keep him from slipping away from her in the darkness, and grumbled despite her still racing heart, “You have a rotten castle.”
His deep chuckle rumbled into her chest. “Don’t I know it.”
She closed her eyes in relief as his lips brushed against her temple, although in the darkness doing so made no difference except that closing her eyes somehow increased the strength and warmth that radiated from him.
“Don’t leave me,” she whispered.
“I won’t. I’ll help you downstairs.”
“That’s not what I meant.” Her hands flexed against the silky softness of his waistcoat. God help her, not one bit of guilt remained anywhere inside her for wanting him. “I don’t want you to lea—”
As if anticipating what she was about to say, his hand found her cheek in the darkness, and he silenced her with a brush of his thumb across her lips. Then she caught her breath as his lips caressed her jaw and trailed down to her mouth, strong yet gentle, tender, sweet…everything an ex-mercenary shouldn’t be. Just as he shouldn’t be kissing her. Yet with every thumping thud of her heart, she thanked God that he was.
Overcome by the adrenaline from the rush of fear that had seized her earlier and now the tempting nearness of him, she softened her lips beneath his with a sigh of permission.
A low groan rose from the back of his throat as if her kiss were torturous, but he didn’t pull away. Instead, his lips increased their cajoling, becoming increasingly hungry as the kiss deepened in intensity. He took her bottom lip between his and sucked, and the pull of his mouth drew an ache through her that landed hard between her legs and made her breasts feel heavy.
Protected by the darkness, Tessa dared to return the intensity of his kiss and met each tempting taste of his lips and sweep of his tongue with one of her own. Her hands slid up to encircle his neck, both to press herself tightly against his hard front but also to tug his head down to hers. She could see nothing of him, even this close, but she could feel the cool satin of his waistcoat, the thicker kerseymere of this jacket, the flexing of his hard muscles as she dug her fingers into his shoulders in silent urging to deepen the kiss even more. And, oh, the feel of his mouth! When he finally broke the kiss and left her gasping for air, to slide his mouth down her throat, the contradiction of hungry nips of his teeth and soothing caresses of his lips nearly undid her.
But it was his hands that had her trembling with need, how they moved up and down her sides in sweeping touches as if he couldn’t stop himself, how the heat of them seeped through her dress and into her skin. A low, incoherent sound fell from her when they roamed higher and cupped the sides of her breasts, then began to massage her in provocative squeezes and caresses that caused her nipples to draw up into hard points despite the layers of clothing separating her skin from his.
She didn’t want any separation. Emboldened by the darkness and thrill of his embrace, she reached for his hand in the darkness and laced her fingers through his.
“Please,” she whispered as she brought his hand to her square neckline. She slipped his fingers beneath the lace edging to touch the top swell of her breast.
He stiffened, as if warring with himself whether to accept what she was offering. Then she felt the tension ease from him as he caressed her smooth skin with a sweep of his fingers deep beneath her bodice.
But the feather-light tease over her nipple only spiraled growing frustration through her, and her fingers clenched at his shoulders. She wanted far more than this.
“No one can see us,” she explained, her voice suddenly hoarse. The darkness somehow made their encounter all right, made it seem not quite real…as if they could do things while hidden within its protective cover they wouldn’t dare do in the light. They had this moment, together, and she didn’t want it to escape her grasp. “ Please , Chase.”
Knowing what she was asking, he lowered his shoulders in surrender, and her chest soared with triumph. She knew she shouldn’t want his touch—him of all men—but she couldn’t deny how he drew her to him the way no other man did, like a moth to a burning light, or the way she so desperately wanted him to notice her as a woman. Their relationship had always been in a state of flux, changing even at that very moment, but their shared trust and affection had never been in doubt. The intimacies they shared now only deepened that closeness.
Yet she could feel him shake his head in the darkness. “I shouldn’t.”
“I want you to.” She cupped his face between her trembling fingers, holding him still so she could give him a kiss that proved how much she desired his strength and protection, how much she wanted his embrace. Then she confessed in a breathless whisper against his lips, “I need you to touch me…and so do you.”
With a low sigh of acceptance, he slipped his hand beneath her clothes and gently freed her left breast from her stays. The cool air moving across her bare skin made her nipple pulse achingly, only for her to gasp when his warm mouth closed around it and suckled. Each gentle pull of his lips brought her breast deeper into his mouth, and when the tip of his tongue flicked teasingly across her nipple, she nearly burst from her skin.
“Chase!” Her hands grabbed the back of his head, not to stop him but to pull his mouth even tighter against her. Her breasts grew heavy and hot, and the ache between her legs stirred into a relentless throbbing that beat in time with her pounding heart. She didn’t stop to let herself think of where to draw the line, only that she desperately wanted this.
Thunder boomed overhead like cannon fire and shook the castle.
Tessa jumped back in surprise as she yanked up her bodice to cover herself, only to give a cry of fright when something smacked into her foot. Instinctively, she glanced down. In the flash of lightning that penetrated the gaps in the roof tiles, she saw it—
A child’s ball rested against her shoe. But no one was there to roll it across the floor.
Her knees buckled beneath her, and she sank down into the swirling darkness. The last sound she heard before she lost consciousness was Chase calling out her name.