Chapter Fifty-Five
Nathaniel returned to Sutton House only long enough to change his clothes while they saddled his horse, then he was off in pursuit of his wife.
A man on horseback was faster than a carriage, as she’d most likely stopped for the night at an inn, and would hopefully do the same at Lark Estate on the way to her sister’s.
He stopped at Lotham to switch horses, then continued with the singular purpose of reaching Frances before she reached her sister’s.
It was arbitrary, but Nathaniel held on to the belief that if he got to her first, it would somehow give him a fighting chance to mend what he’d broken.
He’d wanted Frances to stick up for herself, not to settle, to find someone who treated her the way she deserved to be treated and loved her more than life itself…
he just needed to prove to her that he was that someone.
A steady rain had settled as he got closer to Lark Estate, but the weather was still warm.
Anticipation was building in his chest, until he encountered a carriage on the side of the road.
A familiar terror overcame him as he recognized it as his own carriage, hanging over a ditch, its occupants all standing outside, but his wife nowhere to be seen.
“Lady Lark, where is she?”
He jumped off his horse and was about to lift the carriage with his bare hands when Audrey answered him. “She went for a walk while they replace the wheel, my lord.”
She was perfectly calm, if a little nervous due to his concern, but his heart was racing and he had yet to catch his breath.
“Alone?”
“She saw a flower and said she wanted to be alone, so I went to fetch her a shawl, as you instructed, but she—”
Nathaniel didn’t wait for the woman to finish, he got back on his horse and headed off in the direction the lady’s maid had pointed.
Two footmen approached him as he reached a clearing and saw Frances.
“You may continue to Lark Estate, I will accompany Lady Lark.”
“It’s quite a distance—”
“There’s a cabin beyond those trees. We’ll take shelter.”
Or so he hoped, but there was a strong possibility Frances would want nothing to do with him.
Nathaniel had rehearsed different things he would say once he found her, all of them apologies, but when he reached Frances who was huddled under a tree, in a thunderstorm, having wandered off on her own in an area of the property mostly used for hunting, all he managed was “What in God’s name do you think you’re doing? ”
He jumped off his horse without even bringing it to a full stop.
“Why do you even care?” Her words were like venom, but so defeated, her voice raw like she’d been sobbing. He wanted to take her into his arms, but saw from the way she flinched as he got close that she wouldn’t allow it.
“You’re going to catch your death,” he said instead, removing his layers of jackets and putting them around her, lingering until she bristled. The top one was soaked through, but the bottom one was warm.
“It’s raining, which is why I took shelter under here instead of trying to find my way back. And again, I don’t see why you would care, as you had no intentions of marrying me until my father coerced you.”
“I said I had no intentions of marrying anyone,” he argued. “Which was wrong.”
“Much better to leave me in the dark.”
“I was wrong, not in telling you, but—” He couldn’t concentrate when she was shivering, when her hair was dripping. “Can you please just get on the horse, and I can explain everything once we’re home?”
“I don’t have a home anymore, Nathaniel.”
Her words broke him, but she looked up at him with a fierce determination, even as tears mixed with the rain on her cheeks.
“I’ve betrayed you most egregiously.”
“You have.”
“But I need you to come inside with me.”
“You need? What do I care what you—”
“Yes, Frances, I need you to come inside, because you are shivering and I want to tell you everything, but I can’t watch the woman I love catch a cold and die. Again.” He kept his anger in check, but the fear was clenching his chest just as tightly as the heartbreak.
His words gave her pause, but then she shook her head.
“You say love, but—”
“You are my heart, Frances. I know I’m not perfect, that I have hurt you more times than I can count, and I hate myself for that, but I love you.
More than I thought I ever could love another person.
I love you so much it scares me, and makes it hard to breathe when you’re near me, but worse when you’re not. I can’t lose you.”
Once they got to the old cabin on the property, Nathaniel busied himself with a fire while she wrapped a quilt around herself.
She watched him stir the flames, feeling its warmth grow, transfixed by the dancing shadows on the wall, until he started talking.
“She was supposed to spend the day with Lizzie.”
“Sarah?” she asked, wondering if this had derailed yet another one of Sarah’s days off.
“Jo.” He sighed, but all Frances could hear was pain.
“She’d just accepted my proposal and wanted to celebrate with my sister, but I was so excited, so proud that she would be mine, that I convinced her to stay with me a little longer.
To spend the afternoon roaming her gardens, planning our future, though the weather was far from appropriate.
We only went inside because I insisted, when she was cold even with my jacket.
I sent Lizzie to her when I returned to Sutton House, but she was back almost immediately, as Jo was resting. ”
Frances knew instinctively where the story was going, and that she didn’t want to hear it, but Nathaniel needed to tell it, so she let him.
“I went over the next day with flowers. I expected her to have caught a chill and be in the sitting room with an extra blanket, bundled up by the fire with a book and an adorable red nose, but otherwise unscathed.”
“You don’t have to tell me…”
“Instead, I was shown to her bedchamber, for the very first time. The doctor was there, and Jo was mumbling incoherently. She held on for days, occasionally lucid, but mostly unconscious. Everyone knew, but I didn’t resign myself to it until her father told me she was gone.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“It doesn’t excuse how I treated you, but I hope it explains why I yelled when I found you in the garden, the horror I felt at the thought that I would lose you too when you had the misfortune of sneezing.
You see, I made Jo that promise when she was unconscious, but it was mostly a promise to protect myself.
That I would never let myself fall so deeply for anyone that losing them would hurt me as much.
I don’t think she would have accepted it had she been awake, because when you love someone…
If the situations were reversed, she could have literally stabbed me in the heart to cause my demise, and I still would have wished her happiness.
I kept my promise, to the detriment of everyone who cared about me, because I was afraid.
Terrified even. If I let anyone new into my heart, I could lose them, and I would never recover from something like that. Not a second time.”
“You can’t live your life afraid of what could go wrong.” Frances was surprised her voice still worked, because the emotions were battling inside her, and it seemed they’d landed in her throat.
“I know. I had every intention of welcoming you as a beloved friend, under my care and protection, never giving you the power to wreck me. But you did. As much as I fought against it, how could I not fall in love with you? How could I not love you more with every passing day, every night spent learning your innermost thoughts, secrets, and fears?”
He looked at her in such a way that she couldn’t doubt his feelings. No one could.
“I had nearly accepted the fact that I needed you as my wife, in every sense of the word, heart, body, and soul, but then…”
“I got sick,” she guessed.
“And I was right back there, helpless, watching myself lose you when there was nothing I could do to stop it. I thought it was a punishment for breaking my promises, to her and to you, for taking advantage of your kindness when I knew I was no good for you.”
“It wasn’t kindness, Nathaniel. I knew when I married you that I loved you. That I would love you for the rest of my life, even if it was one-sided.”
“It wasn’t. Or at least it hasn’t been. For a long time.”
“The way you recoiled…I thought you must have pictured her when we were together, or that my face…”
“I love your face. Every inch of it. I saw your mark the first night I shared your chambers, and it did nothing but deepen my feelings for you.”
She didn’t know what to say to that, because he didn’t look like he was lying. Not just about having seen it so long ago, but not being repulsed by it. By her.
“Are you saying you’re not afraid anymore?”
“I’m terrified, Frances. I couldn’t survive losing you, but I can’t live without you either. And pushing you away now…I’ve been losing you long before I’d ever have to.”
“Which means…”
“I want it all with you. I don’t want separate chambers.
I don’t want secrets. I want to hold you in my arms more often than not.
I want babies with you, Frances, because you were born to be a mother, and I ache watching you with Abigail and your sister’s children.
I want you as my wife. I just want to be yours. ”
He kissed her then, filled with tenderness and care, his hand caressing the spot under her hair she’d spent her entire life hiding.
“ Marry me?” he whispered.
“We’re already—”
“I want to do it again, properly. To promise you, in front of God and witnesses, everything you deserve.”
“I’ll settle for promising each other here, in front of this fire, just the two of us.”
“I never want you to settle again,” he stated.
“I won’t.”
Nathaniel kissed her again, still tender, but with a hunger. Though her body ached to surrender, her mind was present enough to pull away, if only slightly.
“I’d rather not.” She tried to be as convincing as possible, and keep a straight face.
“You’d…what?”
“We’ve been out in the rain. I will not wake up tomorrow with a sniffle and have you decide you’ll never—”
He laughed then, such a happy, boyish laugh, she almost couldn’t believe who it was coming from.
“I’d like to assume that gardening the morning after was the culprit, not what we did the night before.”
“You can’t forbid me—”
He silenced her with a kiss.
“I wouldn’t dream of it. But our clothes are wet, so we have to remove them.
” He gently lifted the quilt off her shoulders, as well as his coats.
“And I know of no better way to warm you up.” He kissed her between words.
“I think the only solution is to keep you safe and warm, in bed with me, all day tomorrow. Just to be sure.”
“All day?” she asked, her hands exploring the soaked white fabric of his shirt, and the warm skin beneath it.
“At the very least,” he agreed.