Chapter Eleven #2
Montague saw to his astonishment that Sarah’s hand was still in his. It felt so…so right.
But then sense caught up with him and he let go swiftly, as though they had finished fencing and needed to step away from each other. All this intimacy…it could lead nowhere.
“Writing is easy.”
Montague gave a bitter laugh. “Perhaps for you. I…”
His voice trailed away. He had shared much with this woman—more than he should, and not nearly as much as he wished—but that he would not reveal.
“Montague Lancaster, Duke of Caelfall,” Sarah murmured. “You’re keeping something from me.”
More than one thing, he thought. She didn’t know about the debt his father had sunk into the estate, or that he was essentially hiding in Oxford, hoping none of his acquaintances heard he was in England or asked why there were strangers living in Caelfall Place.
But there was no avoiding that attentive eye. Montague sighed. “Writing, reading…I find them difficult.”
Sarah blinked. “You mean you can’t read?”
“I can read, it’s just damned difficult,” Montague retorted. He had known it was a mistake to tell her! “Forget I said anything, it’s just—”
“No, I am sorry, I—”
“No one understands when I try to explain—”
“I want to understand.”
Montague hesitated. There was such sweetness, such eagerness in her voice. He could truly believe her.
His stomach twisted horribly, but he pushed past the discomfort, forcing himself to say the words he had never voiced with another. Other than his governess, of course. She had merely laughed.
“Whenever I look at a page, when I try to see each word, they…” Damn, this is difficult. He could not fail to see the irony. “It’s like they move, or quiver, slipping out of view just as I am about to get hold of them.”
Sarah waited quietly.
“And I want to reply to Chetnole’s letter, I do, but it’s taken me near damn an hour to read the wretched thing,” Montague said, irritation sparking.
“And he won’t know, he’ll be waiting for a reply in France, and I don’t even know what I would say even if I could write, and…
” His stomach was starting to calm, but that only made his heart beat faster.
Hell’s bells. “So, there you go. I find it hard to read. You can laugh now.”
“Why on earth would I laugh?” Sarah asked incredulously.
Montague shrugged, shame pouring through him, freeing from the dam he had attempted to hide it behind. “I just…thought you would.”
He could hear the ridiculousness of his statement, but Sarah did not laugh. She did not even smile. Instead, she opened her reticule and pulled out her pocketbook.
Montague groaned. “Truly? I have just bared my soul, and you’re going to write—”
“You are going to write,” Sarah cut across him. “Or at least, you are going to tell me what you want to write, and I’ll inscribe it for you. See?”
He stared as her words settled into his brain, making little sense.
She was going to write for him?
“Writing is easy,” she said.
Montague snorted. “For you.”
“For both of us, if we work together. Come, there are five components to a good letter and I will talk you through them,” she said in a business-like manner.
It was difficult not to smile. “I thought I was the teacher here?”
Sarah grinned. “Perhaps when it comes to waving a sword—”
“Foil, Sarah, foil!”
“Whatever, one of those around,” she continued doggedly, opening her pocketbook to a fresh page. “But when it comes to the pen, I am the expert. Right. First, pleasantries.”
Montague looked at her with suspicious eyes. “Erm. Well. You look remarkably well this afternoon, Sarah. Your gown is—”
“Not me!”
He was pleased to see a flush tinge her cheeks, her gaze dropping to her pocketbook. Declaim all she wanted, she had liked the compliment.
“I meant to your friend!”
“Oh, right,” said Montague, still delighted he had made her blush. “Right. Well. He’s an all right sort of chap—”
“Montague Lancaster, Duke of Caelfall, I see what you mean,” Sarah muttered. “You are not a writer. Come on, speak to me as you would write a letter.”
Montague stared blankly. Did she not understand? He was a duke! He had people for that!
She held his gaze firmly and his heart skipped a beat as affection blossomed. No one had ever done anything like this for him before. No one had bothered. No one had asked.
True, Montague thought, he had never asked for help. But with Sarah, he had not needed to. She had offered. And she was still waiting, pencil poised.
He cleared his throat. “Fine. Dear Chetnole. Thank you for your letter.”
After a brief scribbling, Sarah looked up and nodded in encouragement.
A splinter of warm desire entered Montague’s heart. “It was good to hear from you, and the illustration at the bottom was…most informative.”
“What illustration?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said hastily.
There was absolutely no possibility of him showing Sarah Lockwood that scribble, Montague thought with a shudder. Not if he was going to hold his head up in society.
“I am pleased to hear the French are being taught their lessons, and I…I am glad to hear from you.”
It all sounded so foolish when he said it aloud.
But Sarah was nodding. “Good. Now the second part of the letter is to answer any questions or comments in the one you’ve received. Anything?”
Montague sighed. He did not need to look at the letter to recall the pointed questions Chetnole had not asked. “Tell him—right. I am pleased to report Lady Romeril has not taken over Caelfall Place, and any hosting is of my own free will.”
His gaze flickered over Sarah as his manhood twitched. Blast. He wished to goodness his bed was not a few feet behind him.
“Good, that’s good,” Sarah said, concentrating on scribbling in that notebook of hers. “And now, the third section. Any news.”
Heat blossomed up Montague’s chest, thankfully covered by his shirt and waistcoat.
What on earth could he possibly say? I have met a woman that makes me feel more alive than I ever have? I am teaching this woman fencing, which is leaving me alone with her for hours at a time? Whenever I kiss her—
“The weather here is fine,” he said, pushing that nonsense aside. “Though I do not believe I will be as tanned as you. I am…am teaching fencing to a most impressive student.”
Sarah’s cheeks flushed.
Confidence crept into his chest. “Terrible footwork, but a true passion for the sport.”
“I am not going to put that in.”
“It’s my letter!” Montague protested.
Sarah was smiling, albeit with still flushed cheeks. “And it’s my pocketbook. Go on.”
Oh, this teasing was delightful. “No invitations have made their way to me, but I can assure you I am spending my days in the best of company.”
Now she was more than flushed; she was turning red. “You cannot put that in there.”
Montague spread his arms wide. “Is this my letter we’re writing, to my friend, or—”
“Fine, fine, I’ll include it,” said Sarah. “Though we should probably move onto the fourth part of any letter. Any questions or concerns you have for the recipient.”
Montague’s mouth went dry. Dear lord, he could barely contain them. Stay safe. Stay well. Come back to England safely, with everyone we know out there. Don’t let a bullet—
“Say…tell him…” He cleared his throat. “How about this? It should not be long before I am back, healed and ready to take on the French alongside you. Have you heard whether they are still looking for officers in your regiment? One with a cane if—no, don’t include that last bit.”
Sarah nodded as she wrote swiftly. “And then the final part. The sign off.”
Montague shrugged. “Caelfall. That’s all.”
She finished with a flourish. It certainly should not have made Montague’s stomach churn to see her write his own name.
“There,” she said with triumph. “You see how easy it is? With that framework, you can say anything that you want.”
Sarah’s gaze met his eyes and her blush descended to her throat and décolletage.
Montague swallowed. You can say anything that you want.
Except there were a great number of things he wished he could say to Sarah Lockwood, none of which he would ever permit to escape from his lips.