Chapter Fourteen
When Lucy, the love of his life and the woman with whom he wanted to spend the rest of his life, initially made the suggestion, Bernard had to be careful not to throw a chair across the room.
“Absolutely not,” was the response he went with instead.
Which, as far as he was concerned, was relatively restrained.
Lucy, on the other hand, raised both of her eyebrows at him across the card game they were playing. “I would have thought you’d be all for it. Another chance to see me without any clothes on.”
It had turned out to be far more difficult to spend that sort of time together than Bernard had hoped for.
Lord Percy, clearly feeling remorseful that he had permitted his sister one entire evening alone with a man—especially if it was, in his eyes, a low-born criminal—had stuck to the pair of them like glue.
Trying not to chuckle at his lover’s attempts to circumvent her chaperone had been difficult.
Bernard had been forced to falsify a sneeze on at least three occasions to cover up words that the daughter of the house should absolutely not have been saying, which had then led Lord Percy to offer him a foul-tasting cough drop, which had made Lucy giggle in turn.
But the evening had drawn in and the three of them had consumed a very good dinner, Bernard trying not to think about what he and Lucy had gotten up to in the same room just four and twenty hours before, and they’d played cards as a trio, a difficult thing, for at least an hour.
Five minutes ago, Lord Percy had yawned, declared himself exhausted, and had gone to bed.
Four minutes ago, Lucy had made her ridiculous suggestion.
“There won’t be anyone out on the beach,” she wheedled, throwing him a smile that was highly suggestive and made parts of Bernard stiffen. “I thought it would be a pleasant thing to do.”
Absolutely not. “No.”
“But I would adore a swim, and this heat has been unbearable.”
Not happening. “No.”
“And Percy said that it was remarkably pleasant. He went last night with some chums and had a lovely time.”
When hell freezes over. “No.”
Lucy sighed, her breasts swelling with the movement in a way that made Bernard drop one of his cards. “Such a shame. When was the last time you went swimming in the ocean, Bernard?”
Do not think about it, Bernard told herself sternly, but it was too late. The images had returned, washing through his numbed brain like poison, seeping into every good thing about this moment and taking him back to—
“Bernard—Bernard, don’t go in!”
Bernard swallowed. “I don’t swim.”
Lucy blinked, evidently surprised. “You don’t?”
He had to change the topic of conversation somehow. “When are your parents due back? I know they said they might only stay a week, but—”
“Bernard Dixon, what aren’t you telling me?”
Strange. It was only now they had consummated their love, Bernard thought wistfully, that he truly wished she knew his real name. That she would call him by it. That she would know that final, last part of him.
But not yet. Not until Hovell returned and it was all confirmed that he was leaving the service of Her Majesty’s service forever.
“Bernard.”
He looked down. Lucy had taken his cards from his unresisting hands and was gazing steadily into his eyes with all the concern and interest that the Prison Reform Society usually captured from her.
Bernard swallowed. “I… I don’t swim.”
“But it’s more than that, isn’t it?” Lucy said gently, and the room became warmer as her obvious care for him filled it. “You can tell me anything, you know. I want to hear it.”
And she spoke the truth, Bernard knew—but he couldn’t tell her. He couldn’t speak of it; he had never spoken about it with anyone. But she had caught wind of something, and if there was one thing he knew about Lucy, it was that she was relentless in the pursuit of what she wanted.
He still had the sore wrist to prove it.
After writing all those letters. Obviously.
Bernard sighed. That meant there was only one way to ward off the questions. Damn it all to hell. “Fine. Let’s go swimming.”
Her squeal of delight continued as she raced upstairs to pull towels from the linen cupboard, then carefully slipped out of the side door with Bernard, Lucy telling him to hush when he bumped his head on the gate.
“For it would be a true scandal if we were caught,” she said unnecessarily. “You know what would happen then!”
Yes, Bernard knew, not entirely sure that it would be so bad. A wedding.
It was a thought that stirred him in ways he had not expected. A wedding—marriage, to Lucy.
Obviously, it was what he wanted, but so many things had to be resolved before that could even be a dream.
He needed to find Hovell. He needed to get the man to agree to the end of his service as a spy.
He needed to go back to Moray, claim his title before some distant cousin got it in his absence, organize all the nonsense that came with such a thing.
He would need to return, reintroduce himself to the Earl of Lindow as a completely different man, and ask for his daughter’s hand in marriage. Then the three weeks of waiting while the banns were read.
It was a significant process, and Bernard was not foolish enough to believe that it could be achieved in a few days.
“Oh, isn’t the night air wonderful?” Lucy whispered as the two of them walked along the empty, dark street. “Isn’t it glorious to be truly free?”
Free.
Bernard supposed he was free, or would be very soon. The life he had chosen for himself had been one apart from his family, far from the land of his people, of his name.
And now…now he felt a strange tug to return, if only to leave again and claim his bride.
His Lucy.
His Lucy was squealing with delight as they turned a corner and Brighton beach came into view. “Isn’t it gorgeous?”
Bernard had to disagree. The ocean was dangerous—deadly, did she not know that? There it lay, shifting and ever changing, untrustworthy. Even though its tides were ostensibly predictable, there was nothing dependable about the thing.
All it did was take.
Lucy was already slipping off her shoes and stockings. “Will you go in naked, do you think?”
There was a long of hunger in her eyes that sparked a little interest in Bernard, deadly sea notwithstanding. “Are you?”
“No, worse luck—just on the off chance we need to make a break for it,” said Lucy with a wink. “But I can swim in stays and my chemise and drawers. What about you?”
“I don’t swim,” Bernard said woodenly.
“But you said—”
“I said, let’s go swimming,” he said, tension burying itself between his shoulder blades. “But I didn’t mean me. Off you go.”
“But—”
“Lucy, I am not coming in with you,” Bernard snapped, pushed beyond patience and immediately regretting his tone.
Lucy halted, her gown mostly unbuttoned and her eyes filled with concern. It was the same look she had given him when they had first met, in the courtroom. She had looked at him like that because she had believed he had been guilty of a crime and likely to suffer the agonies of transportation.
And now…now she was looking at him like—
“Why, Bernard Dixon,” she said slowly, stepping over to him and placing her hands on his chest, “why didn’t you say you couldn’t swim?”
Bernard swallowed, refusing to meet her eyes, not because he did not need her, but because he was not sure what he would do if he did. “I didn’t say I couldn’t.”
“It’s as plain as the nose on your face,” Lucy said quietly, shaking her head. “I don’t know why I didn’t see it before. Did you never learn?”
“I was taught. Once.” One terrible day. A terrible day he had always wished to forget.
Lucy’s eyes were raking over his face, and she bit her lip as she said, “You don’t have to tell me about it. And you don’t have to come in with me, of course, just—just stay here. Guard my clothes.”
And it was her genuine smile, a small one that was designed to comfort, not to tempt, that finally pushed Bernard beyond all the barriers he had carefully built up over the years.
Oh, to hell with it.
“I’m not saying I’ll be in that dratted ocean for long,” Bernard said stiffly.
“I’m not saying you have to—”
“Come on, then,” he interrupted, shoving his trousers down and wrenching his shirt over his head. “Let’s get this over with.”
Every step was agony, though that was only in part because of the shingles. Every foot he grew closer to the water, Bernard felt a chill shudder through him.
“Bernard—Bernard, don’t go in!”
But the person who had uttered those words could not reach him now. Instead, Lucy was by his side, holding his hand in hers and allowing him to lead them to the water’s edge.
This was madness. He couldn’t do this. He shouldn’t do this—people died doing this.
Bernard took a long, deep breath. Then he stepped into the ocean.
It lapped at his foot, barely reaching his ankle. He let out his breath in a long, slow exhale that made him want to run back to shore, put his clothes back on, and move to Birmingham, the city in England farthest from the shore.
“Bernard?”
“It’s fine. I’m fine.” He could not have been less fine, but somehow, the presence of Lucy beside him made it possible to say such a thing, and for it to almost be true.
Bernard took another step forward. The ocean was now covering his ankle, his actual ankle.
How on earth am I doing this?
“You don’t have to go any farther if you don’t want to,” came Lucy’s voice from beside him…and simultaneously a long way off.
He turned to her, his grip on her hand tightening. “Don’t leave me.”
“I’m not going to leave you,” she said gently, her smile warm and without judgment. “I’m never going to leave you, Bernard.”
And though she spoke it with his false name, Bernard knew her heart was true. She was not going to leave him. And he was standing in the ocean, and she was here.