Chapter Four
Seven days later, Juliana stood nervously in her bedchamber in the Dower House while Baxter pinned the circlet of silk roses atop her crown of braided hair. ‘Now, you truly look like a bride,’ the maid said proudly. ‘And such a pretty one!’
Giving her image in the pier-glass a quick glance, Juliana acknowledged that she did appear to best advantage in her newest gown, the high waist and slender skirt making her short form appear taller and the forest-green hue complementing her soft brown hair and pale skin far better than the virginal white dress her mother had tried to foist on her.
She’d have only a few more minutes to calm herself and gather her thoughts before Mama, restrained from entering her chamber by the assurance that her maid was fully competent to assist her in dressing, would burst in to escort her to the carriage that would take her and her parents to the medieval village church.
The church where, little more than a month ago, she’d first seen Rafe again, and he’d shaken her to the core and scattered her tidy assumptions about her future like spillikins flung down by an exuberant child. The church where he’d now be waiting to make her his wife.
A wave of mingled anxiety and delight sent a shiver through her.
At least there now was an anticipatory eagerness to temper the anxiety, she thought ruefully.
Thank heaven Rafe had suggested returning her to the Dower House the fraught day she accepted his proposal, removing her from what would have been a week of her mother’s commands, instructions, and remonstrations on her shortcomings she was happy to have done without.
Her father’s initial protest that the village would think it scandalous for the bride to reside on the groom’s property before the wedding she immediately squelched.
During her engagement to Ian, she reminded her parents, she’d spent several months at the Dower House with only her maid as chaperone with their blessing—including ten days after she’d informed them that Rafe had returned from the army.
Under her mother’s barrage of chatter, which alternated between expressions of delight to Rafe and cautions to her about maintaining proper behaviour, she’d escaped Edgerton Manor.
She was soon to discover another reason to be grateful about relocating to the Dower House. But initially, as she rode with Rafe back to Thornthwaite, the relief over the grim future of family servitude from which he’d rescued her slowly turned to a feeling of panic.
Had she saved herself? Or had succumbing to his proposal in a moment of weakness condemned her to a lifetime of misery of another sort, having to forever restrain her emotions to guard against a revival of the love she’d suppressed, watching every word and action to ensure she never trespassed the bounds of friendship?
Of course, they had been separated for six long years; war might have made him into a different man than the one she’d once cherished. A man far easier to resist.
That reassuring thought faded, though, as she recalled that in the ten days she’d spent immediately upon his return, helping him sort through the problems he must address at Thornthwaite, she’d seen no evidence that the individual she so admired had fundamentally changed.
Whatever the current character of the man she’d pledged to marry, her acceptance could not be undone. She would never subject Rafe to the embarrassment of being left at the altar, even if she had somewhere else to go.
Still, by the time she spied the lights of the Dower House in the distance, she was almost speechless with anxiety, alarm and regret.
After turning the horses over to a groom, Rafe took her numb hand and walked her up the entry stairs. Pausing inside the door, he said, ‘Now that we are to be wed, I can in good conscience do what I’ve been tempted to since almost the moment I first saw you at the church a month ago.’
So agitated she scarcely comprehended his words, she fumbled, ‘D-do what?’
Smiling, he drew her closer. ‘This,’ he murmured. And kissed her.
At the soft brush of his mouth against hers, shock zinged from her head to her toes, immediately followed by a blaze of warmth that had her pressing closer. Murmuring encouragement, he deepened the kiss.
The hot wet touch of his tongue, gently probing her lips, sent another blast of sensation through her. Her hands going up to clasp his neck, she opened to him.
Exquisite was her last conscious thought before her mind yielded to sheer sensual pleasure.
Heat fired from deep within as his tongue caressed her mouth and laved her tongue with his own. Starbursts of delight exploded from that contact to radiate through her body, tightening her nipples, setting a pulse throbbing at her center.
She had no idea how long he kissed her, only that she would have continued the contact forever, had he not broken away to enfold her against him.
Bedazzled, she laid her head on his chest, feeling the drumming of his heart, hearing his breaths, as uneven and gasping as her own. Her brain still incapable of producing speech, she simply leaned into his embrace, feeling she would have been content to remain there forever.
At length, with a broken chuckle, he gently pulled away from her. ‘Well…that was quite a revelation. I was going to ask if my kiss pleased rather than alarmed you, but I suppose there’s no need, is there?’
Still speechless, she shook her head.
He gazed intently at her for a moment, then shook his head wonderingly. ‘Mouse, Mouse,’ he murmured, bringing one of her hands up to kiss. ‘I think we are going to deal very well together.’
‘Will you kiss me again?’ she asked, finally finding her voice.
He uttered a sound somewhere between a laugh and a groan. ‘No, minx, I will not! Kiss me like that again, and bishop’s license or no, I’d be hard-pressed to keep myself from carrying you to your chamber and claiming you as my bride this very night!’
She smiled shyly. ‘Would that be…so awful?’
‘Don’t tempt me! No, Mouse, Ian did badly enough by you. I shall wait until we are well and truly wed before I make you my wife.’ He smiled. ‘An event I now anticipate with even greater eagerness.’
‘So there can be no more kissing until the wedding?’ she protested.
‘Well… I won’t promise that.’ Touching the tip of his finger to her nose, he whispered, ‘One kiss per day. Just one. To remember. And anticipate.’
‘I will hold you to that.’
‘Until tomorrow, then. I’ll stop to see you before I set off for the bishop’s.
While I’m gone, consult with Baxter and Mrs Henderson about any changes you want to make in the household.
I’m afraid funds won’t permit taking you away for a wedding trip, but I’d like you to feel at home at Thornthwaite from the very first day. ’
She shook her head. ‘I wouldn’t want to go anywhere else.’
‘Good. Until tomorrow.’
He leaned towards her, and for a moment she thought he might kiss her again despite his avowal. But even as she leaned towards him eagerly, he drew back, shaking his head again.
‘No, I shall be prudent. Goodnight, my almost-wife.’
He left her then, standing still bemused in the entryway. She watched him ride away, feeling energy, vitality and comfort leave with him.
Only then did she realize that while she’d been kissing him, she’d been aware of nothing but the intense delight of his nearness. Wholly consumed by delicious sensation, driven only by the imperative to get closer, kiss deeper, her whole body charged with a compulsion to touch and caress him.
There had been no fear, no worry, no anxiety. No upswelling of emotion—only sheer physical response.
And Rafe…had seemed pleased by that response.
She realized in that moment, with an upsurge of relief and anticipation, that physical desire might be the answer to the dilemma of wedding him.
If Rafe were in fact still the man she’d once adored, by offering the passionate lovemaking he seemed to actually want from her, she could forestall any resurgence of passionate devotion.
He’d made it only too clear when he asked her to marry him that, having recovered from his “grand passion,” he had no interest in experiencing such intense feelings again. Discovering she harbored any such emotion for him would doubtless cause him chagrin and dismay.
Had he truly recovered from his passion? For an instant after she mentioned Thalia’s name, his face had gone blank and his body trembled. Despite what he’d assured her, it seemed not all the pain had dissipated.
All the more reason for her to concentrate on enjoying his caresses and closeness, so she might avoid emotion altogether, letting any feelings be buried beneath the overwhelming pressure of desire.
If occasionally those feelings tried to bubble up again when he was not near enough to distract her, she’d just push them down and concentrate on the tasks at hand. It would take much diligent work to fully restore Thornthwaite to what it had been, a task she was eager to help him with.
Her resolve strengthened by those reflections, she gave her image in the pier-glass mirror one last glance and put out of mind the lingering doubt.
She’d focus on the delights ahead—the quiet ceremony in the church, the enjoyment of celebrating their lord’s nuptials with the estate’s tenants and then…
best, most delicious of all, being able to give herself fully into Rafe’s skillful hands.
A wave of warmth tingled through her at the thought.
She could do this, as she’d reassured herself that first night.
Even if he still was every inch the man of her girlhood dreams, she could become Rafe’s wife without ruining their friendship or causing heartache or distress to either of them.
Hadn’t she already tested that hypothesis when Rafe returned after obtaining the marriage license, claiming one kiss each of the last four days before the wedding?
Each one more exquisite, longer, more intense than the last.