Four
Rose leaned on the door to her room, her palms flat against the wood. She was not panting. These quick breaths might seem like panting, but they were not and could not be. Panting would signify unsuitable emotions that she was not feeling. She was simply… She had no idea.
She heard Gavin’s footsteps retreat down the stairs.
What was so unsettling about Gavin Keighley being kind and listening to her and cordially conversing? Despite the criticisms and complaints from her parents, she’d known he wasn’t an ogre. He was a good landlord and had been a staunch friend to some mutual acquaintances. His mother… Well, Lady Keighley was a difficult person. His twin sisters, just turned eighteen, not an age when admiration was automatic, revered him. He was widely respected. It was just that he had constantly argued with her.
If he stopped… He had stopped. Or begun to stop. What would they do instead?
Rose recalled the warmth in his gray eyes in the corridor just now. He’d made a joke. He’d asked about her brother. She hadn’t known when she proposed their treaty that she would like the change so much. When this visit was over, and they went back to feuding…
She didn’t wish to think about that.
She’d come upstairs for a shawl. The duchess would be wondering what had become of her. Rose fetched her wrap, pulled it around her like a shield, and left her bedchamber.
At the bottom of the steps she came upon the young footman she’d brought along to Yerndon. “Hello, Ian,” she said. “Are you getting on all right?” Rose was aware of the rivalry between her servants and Gavin’s. She’d done her best to discourage it, but she knew that subtle jostling went on.
The tall blond lad nodded. “I have been learning a good deal from the duchess’s staff. They’re prime.” He frowned. “A long sight better than the Keighley lot.”
“Just do your best to—”
“What’s that fellow Phelps even doing here?” Ian interrupted.
He must be upset to do that, Rose acknowledged.
“He doesn’t do any work,” the footman continued. “Not even for Sir Gavin. He hangs about the stables or wanders off onto the moor. Says he might bag a rabbit or two, but he never does. What’s he up to?”
Rose didn’t know. And repeating Gavin’s remarks about the man would only enflame matters. “Just ignore him,” she said. “And get along with everyone else.”
To her surprise, Ian blushed crimson. “But there’s the other one,” he said.
“Other?”
“That flibbertigibbet maid that came along.”
“With Sir Gavin, you mean?”
Ian nodded.
“I hadn’t seen her before. What is her name?”
“Lucy Trent,” the footman replied in a constrained tone.
Rose didn’t know any local family by that name. “Has she made difficulties for you?”
“Not to say difficulties, beyond a few silly tricks. It’s just…” Ian shuffled his feet. “I never seen anyone like her before. She’s full of daft notions, grand as you please, for all she’s only a housemaid.”
“What sort of notions?” This didn’t sound like the kind of servant Lady Keighley would hire.
“Speeches out of Shakes-pear. They go on and on. You can’t understand half of it.” He shook his head, looking puzzled and perhaps a bit admiring. “I don’t know how she remembers it all.”
Definitely not Lady Keighley’s sort of servant. Rose wondered if Gavin’s mother had sent the girl here to be rid of her. “Well, just let her be.”
“Oh, I let her be. But what will she do, eh? Pester the life out of me, belike.” Ian turned and made his distracted way to the kitchen door, more uncharacteristic behavior.
His reaction was so striking that Rose consulted her maid as she was dressing for dinner that evening. “Is Ian having some trouble here?”
“Oh, him,” replied Sue. She shook her head as she fastened Rose’s auburn hair into a knot on top of her head, letting curls fall at the sides. “He’s all right. He’s just never been anywhere but home.”
Neither had Sue, Rose noted, though she was taking the tone of a world traveler. “He said something about the housemaid Lucy Trent.”
Sue grinned. “Lucy’s an odd one, no mistake. She could talk the birds out of the trees.” She held out Rose’s pearl earrings, and Rose put them on. “She’s taken to teasing Ian. He’s an easy mark, miss. And nobody else pays much heed to Lucy. Which she don’t like.”
“If she’s bothering him, I could speak to Sir Gavin.” Rose didn’t really want to undertake that conversation, but she would if there was unpleasantness in the household.
“No need. Lucy’s not bothering exactly. More confusing young Ian.” Sue’s grin widened. “She’s a pretty lass, you see. And not one Ian has known all his life.”
“Ah.”
“Yes, miss.” Sue straightened the folds of a sleeve. “This blue becomes you. It’s a fine gown.”
Rose surveyed her reflection in the dressing table mirror. She did look rather well. There was a flattering color in her cheeks, and her expression seemed more at ease than those she sometimes glimpsed in mirrors at home. Which was odd. “My dress is nothing compared to the duchess’s toilettes,” she had to say.
“Ah, well she’s something else again. Paris fashions, I’ll be bound. And no expense spared.”
As well as wholly polished, Rose thought. And yet the duchess was not at all toplofty. She didn’t flaunt her beauty. Because of that, Rose could be amused at being consigned to a lesser category, not to be compared with her flawless hostess.
“Edith Gorne’s gone,” Sue added as if this followed from her previous remarks. “The tale is, her sister’s ill and needs help, but nobody believes it. They’re letting her say that so as not to admit being dismissed.” The maid shook her head. “There were mouse nests in the pantry. A regular village of them, running right under your feet.”
Mrs. Gorne had been a lax housekeeper, though it was true she’d had no help, Rose noted.
“Saying there was nothing to be done about them.” Sue made a disgusted sound. “She might have gotten a cat. Or two.” Sue put a shawl around Rose’s shoulders and stepped back, finished. “She took her great lump of a son along with her.”
Mrs. Gorne had liked living alone and not really exerting herself, Rose thought. She hadn’t been pleased when the house filled up and had been sour and discouraging whenever Rose encountered her. She wouldn’t be missed. “Does that leave Phelps in charge of the stables?” Rose asked.
Sue shrugged. “Not him. There’s the duke’s coachman and the grooms who brought his riding horses. I don’t know what Phelps finds to do.”
No one seemed to, Rose thought. It wasn’t really her affair, though she still wondered about Gavin’s characterization of the man. Good with a gun indeed.
Downstairs, she found there was to be another guest at dinner. Richard Milsome had called to welcome the Terefords to the neighborhood and been invited to stay. A gentleman of fifty, he had an estate some miles north of Yerndon, of middling size but very well managed. Gavin came into the parlor as she was greeting him.
“Miss Denholme,” Milsome replied with a bow. “And Sir Gavin.” His tone suggested that this was a surprising combination.
He couldn’t be blamed for that, Rose thought. Denholmes and Keighleys were not invited anywhere together. The risk of upsets was too high. Most recently, there had been a public argument between Rose’s father and Gavin’s mother in the village—raised voices in the churchyard, rude gestures and cutting insults exchanged. A spectacle for all to see. And yet here she and Gavin were. It was no wonder the visitor looked brightly curious.
“Hello, Milsome,” said Gavin. He liked the man. Milsome had pleasant manners and a genial line of conversation. Tonight though, his eyes were lit with interested amusement as he looked from Gavin to Rose. Anyone who hadn’t heard about their unprecedented visit soon would, Gavin thought. It would be a wonder to the whole area. The Terefords had upset the apple cart for good and all.
They went in to dinner and were presented with another savory meal. The duchess’s cook really was first-rate. Milsome complimented the food, and Gavin agreed. The group chatted about the weather and the market for wool. And all the while Milsome observed the scene like someone waiting for a play to begin. Finally, it seemed he didn’t wish to wait any longer. “I hope your parents are well,” he said to Rose.
“Very well, thank you,” she replied.
“And your mother, Keighley?”
“Also well.” Mention of both naturally recalled the shouting match in the churchyard. Gavin frowned at him. The Terefords knew nothing about that. He hoped Milsome would refrain from mentioning it.
Milsome gave a half shrug, half smile, as if he could barely resist. “All pleased about this visit, are they?”
“How could it be otherwise?” asked Gavin.
“Rebellion in the lower ranks?” murmured Milsome with a sly, sidelong glance.
Rose’s musical laugh startled Gavin. “I didn’t know you were such a humorist, Mr. Milsome.” She spoke lightly, but Gavin caught the spark in her usually mild blue eyes.
“No?” Milsome replied.
“Nor did I,” said Gavin. His tone was a bit too sharp. Rose did irony better. He tended more toward smoldering ire, which was less effective. Rose could carry the flag on this sally. He felt an odd flash of happiness. It was the first time he and Rose had made common cause since they’d stood side by side defending a moorland redoubt as children. He’d forgotten the…pleasure of it.
“Who doesn’t appreciate a good joke?” Milsome seemed to imply that they didn’t.
“Indeed,” said Rose. “Good ones are a rare treat.” Gavin gave her a silent bravo and, when she looked at him, a private wink.
The duchess, who clearly missed no nuance, changed the subject. “I understand you were a friend of Charleton Cantrell’s, Mr. Milsome.”
The guest turned to her with a smile, relinquishing his probe without obvious regret. “‘Friend’ is probably too strong a word. I did spend an evening with him now and then in his last years.”
Gavin realized that Milsome was the only one among them who’d known the former owner of Yerndon. Charleton Cantrell had died when Gavin was ten years old. And the man had not been fond of youngsters. He’d called their group vermin once when he ordered them off his property.
“How did you meet?” their hostess asked. “I understood that he was rather a recluse.”
“At the village blacksmith’s,” answered Milsome. He enjoyed the group’s surprised reaction before going on. “By chance, each of our horses had thrown a shoe while we were out riding. We talked as we waited for repairs. He seemed an interesting old fellow, and I was new to this neighborhood. And so we scraped an acquaintance.”
“Interesting?” Gavin had only heard Cantrell described as spiteful and venomous.
“In a chat on the street or over a glass of wine,” replied Milsome. “We had no…issues to resolve. And so he was amiable enough. He could be quite crusty when provoked.”
“Most people can, I suppose,” said the duke.
“And Cantrell endured quite a bit of it,” said the guest with another of his sidelong glances at Gavin and Rose.
Gavin felt his temper rising. “He did some provoking himself.”
“It’s a trial having hostile neighbors,” replied Milsome.
“Or sneaking, vengeful…” Gavin stopped and gritted his teeth. He did not want to descend into that old argument in front of the Terefords. He was here to win them over. And more, he had an agreement with Rose. He would not break his word. He wrestled with a spate of angry objections. What had Rose said about her grandmother’s methods? The idea seemed silly, but he had no other.
So. How could this situation be worse? Well, Milsome could be staying here with them, a constant irritation. But he was not. He’d be leaving soon, while the moon still lighted his path home. He could have told the story of the churchyard altercation, made a real drama of it. But he had not, though it had clearly been tempting. Gavin could have railed at him here at the dinner table, a travesty of hospitality. That would have been well worse. But he had managed not to let fly, a satisfying success. Surprisingly, Gavin felt his temper begin to subside.
“You live near Haworth, Mr. Milsome,” said Rose. “Have you met the Bront?s?”
She was following the duchess’s example in turning the subject, Gavin noted.
“The new curate?” Milsome nodded. “Yes. He seems an odd mixture of stiff manners and oversensitivity.”
“How so?” asked the duke.
“Well, I called on him because, as you say, I live nearby. The family has just arrived in the neighborhood, you know, and I thought to help make them welcome. But Bront? didn’t appreciate my visit in the least. I caught him in the throes of creation, he said, writing a poem. He made me feel like a dashed inconvenience.” Milsome frowned. “‘Throes,’ what sort of word is that? And he’s the curate of St. Michael’s. A reverend is meant to be available to his parishioners, isn’t he?”
It was a fair point, Gavin thought.
“I begged his pardon,” Milsome continued. “Though it went against the grain. I started to leave, and then he sat me down and told me how very ill his wife is. Unable to rise from her bed, the poor lady. And what was he to do? Apparently they have a packet of children.”
“Six,” said Rose. “We met most of them on the moor.”
“Six! Good lord.” Milsome shook his head. “I suggested he get some relative to come and help, and he liked the idea. Said he’d ask his wife’s sister. I felt as if I was the parson making sick visits.”
“Perhaps not the time for poetic composition,” murmured Rose very softly.
The duchess heard. Gavin saw her throw Rose a speaking look. He didn’t think the others noticed.
After the meal, they moved from the dining room to the front parlor. Milsome didn’t stay long, as he had a distance to ride before the moon set. When he had gone, the duchess declared she was tired, and the duke gave her an arm up to bed. Rose followed. Gavin, not quite ready to retire, stayed on, considering the evening. It had been quite pleasant, one of the most enjoyable he could recall. The Terefords were very good at setting a festive mood and encouraging conversation. But Rose had done her part too. He was feeling…mellow, not a familiar state. He liked it, he realized.
Upstairs, Rose had removed her ornaments and started to unbutton her gown when she realized that she’d left her book in the parlor earlier in the day. She was not sleepy and wanted to read. Before she put on her nightdress, she must slip downstairs to fetch it.
The hallway was silent, the stairs empty. The parlor was dim and quiet, still warmed by the dying fire. Rose was walking across to the table where her book lay when a voice from the shadows made her start.
“I beg your pardon,” said Gavin. “I thought you hadn’t seen me, and I wanted to let you know I was here.”
She turned, lifted her candlestick, and found his dark figure in a chair by the hearth. “Why are you sitting in the dark?”
“I don’t know. I felt like putting out the candles.”
“Is something wrong?”
“No. It just seemed peaceful.”
Rose stared. This was not a Gavin sort of word. And he sprawled, looking utterly relaxed, in a not-Gavin sort of way. There was her book. She picked it up. She should hurry off now. Her mother would disapprove of these circumstances—alone with a man in the dimness, no trace of a chaperone. With Gavin Keighley of all people! But she was curious.
“We got on well when we were young, Rose. Didn’t we?”
“Umm.” Her fingers tightened on the book as her heart sped up. She started to say that they had—casually, as he’d sounded—but she couldn’t get the words out. She’d been ambushed by a memory.
On a hot summer’s day when she was sixteen, Rose had been out on the moors alone. She was not supposed to tramp those beloved paths on her own, an unaccompanied young lady. That had been forbidden for a while. Not quite since she’d been told, at twelve, that she was too old to roam on her pony with the gang of local children, but soon after. She’d been terrified to feel her world constricting. It had made her into a sneak.
That day she had muddy patches on the front of her gown. She hadn’t noticed the dampness when she’d knelt to peer into a crevice of rock. A grasping briar had caught her hair and pulled out the braid. Wisps stuck to her cheeks. Her mother would say she looked a fright if she was caught when she returned home. Her specimen box was full, though. As was her spirit. She’d found a hidden nook well off the path, taken off her shoes and stockings, settled on a dry rock, and thrust her naked feet under a tiny waterfall. It felt wonderful.
She hadn’t worried when she heard voices and the clop of hooves. No one could see her through the thicket. She was very careful about things like that, lest someone tell her parents they’d spotted her. She knew this landscape. She could hide like the shyest wild creature. There was no angle from which she could be spied. Branches arched over her head too.
“You must be bored silly in this place,” said a young male not far away.
“I am never bored on the moor,” replied another. Rose recognized Gavin Keighley’s voice.
“You can’t say you prefer it to Leeds?”
“I can and do.”
Sounds indicated that they had paused at a place farther down the tiny stream to let their horses drink. Rose stayed still and silent. She’d heard that Gavin had a school friend visiting. Neighborhood gossip said he was the son of a wealthy merchant and “divinely handsome.” Some girls expressed hopes of attaching him even though he was only nineteen.
“And the females,” said the stranger. “What a pack of country dowds! Gawky, no conversation. I’d hardly call any of them pretty.”
Rose had become more conscious of her dishevelment, her bare feet in the water. And glad to be invisible. She’d thought it unfair that she hadn’t met the visitor because of their family dispute. Now it seemed no great loss.
“You haven’t met the prettiest,” said Gavin.
“Aha! And why not? Are you keeping her from me?”
“Our families are at odds.”
Rose’s mouth had dropped open, there on the stream bank. Only one local family was at odds with the Keighleys.
“I doubt she can compare to Miss Williamson.”
“I think she could,” said Gavin.
“What, match the toast of Leeds? You must show me this paragon.”
“I don’t think I will.”
They’d laughed and moved on. Rose had lost herself in whirl of fantasy. But the next time she’d encountered Gavin, a number of mooning months after the incident, he’d been curt and distant. She’d decided he’d been joking. Or merely making himself interesting to his friend. He hadn’t meant it at all. He’d been rude to her at every opportunity since.
“Rose?” Gavin frowned at her in the dim dancing light of her single candle.
The memory had flashed by, but she had been silent too long. “We got on as children,” she said in answer to his earlier question.
“This Yerndon dispute has worsened since we were young.” He spoke slowly, as if he was just noticing this.
“Like a cart rolling downhill,” replied Rose. “Gaining momentum.”
He nodded. “But why?”
It was easier to ask the question, and to observe the change, here, away from their homes, which was ironic since they were at Yerndon itself. The answer was more obscure.
“The positions haven’t changed for years,” Gavin added. “But the intensity…”
It was true. Rose found she had sat down. She placed her book and candlestick on a small table.
“I suppose the disputes have become a habit,” Gavin went on. “What Denholmes and Keighleys talk about. And then time goes on and the annoyance of never getting anywhere grates on people.”
“Never convincing the opponent that you are right,” said Rose. “Everybody seems to want that. And when they can’t, they curse them.” It occurred to her that his mother was the one who mostly fanned the flames. Not that her parents didn’t leap upon every provocation Lady Keighley offered.
Gavin leaned forward in his chair. “Yerndon belongs to Tereford. Legally willed away. There’s really no question about that. We are all helpless.”
“Not a comfortable state.”
“I’ve never cared for it.”
“No, you go to great lengths to find a way forward. I remember you spent weeks charting a path through the Grimsden mire.”
He smiled. It gave Rose a sense of unreality. She was sitting here with Gavin Keighley, in the cozy dimness, and he was smiling at her. “I did, didn’t I? I became rather obsessed with it.”
“And constantly muddy.”
Gavin laughed, lightly and freely. It was a deep, warm sound that seemed to caress Rose’s skin. “The focus of a fourteen-year-old boy.”
“You managed it though.” Their little gang had used that secret path to astonish several adult moorland residents.
“I did.” Gavin’s smile faded. He looked puzzled. “But to keep on doing a useless thing, like flogging this property dispute. More and more fiercely. That is stupidity.”
“Like shouting at someone who doesn’t speak English,” Rose agreed. “Thinking that higher volume will get your meaning across.”
He looked at her. “I’d forgotten how quick you are, Rose.”
She didn’t feel quick. Quite the opposite. The atmosphere in the room seemed thick and dizzying.
“It seems that being away from home changes one’s…perspective.” Gavin gazed at the coals of the fire.
Rose watched the strong planes of his face. She’d known the boy. She didn’t really know the man. Yet the one was the foundation for the other.
“What I’ve always hated was the neglect,” he said contemplatively. “That was the real sticking point for me. A fine old place falling into ruin right next door to me. Nothing I could do. It drove me mad.”
“But the duke is remedying that,” said Rose.
“Yes.”
“What issue does that leave?”
“What indeed?” He paused again, for several long moments. “Do you remember our last summer holiday out on the moors?”
Of course she did. It was after she’d been warned it was time to become a “young lady,” and she’d clung to every moment of that precious time. “I’d been told I couldn’t go out with the group any more when the summer ended.”
“I was off to school then.”
“We built the castle.” They and their friends had chosen a hillock and shifted an impressive number of stones into a wall around the top with a sort of platform in the middle.
“Our last-ditch redoubt,” said Gavin.
It had felt that way to Rose, the collapse of her life of freedom. They’d all spun tales of heroism for each other. They’d hurled spears over the wall at imaginary invaders. Romans, Saxons, Picts, Danes, depending on the story. They’d triumphed again and again. Until the holiday ended, and they’d separated for what turned out to be the last time.
“It must be there still,” said Gavin. His eyes lit. “We should go and see.”
“But Gavin.”
He turned to look at her.
“We’ve been sent here to battle each other,” said Rose. The memory of that youthful fortress had brought it back. Had he forgotten they were opponents? “You can’t tell me you weren’t ordered to make your family’s case to Tereford. Against mine. And to win.”
His gaze was steady.
“I certainly was,” Rose added. “My parents expect…unreasonable things.”
“Single combat warriors,” he said. “Sent out to resolve the war? But if it is left to us…”
“Us.” Rose repeated the word because of the way he’d emphasized it.
“What would our solution be?”
The room couldn’t be hot. The fire was down to embers. But Rose felt flushed all over. He’d never spoken to her in that soft tone before. It was…seductive. Had she ever truly understood that word? His voice reached inside her and…stirred. What would he say next? What would she do? Rose felt the need to stand up. Sitting in a chair, as if she was awaiting events, seemed unsupportable. She very much wanted… What?
Gavin mirrored her. He stepped closer. He was tall, powerful. Of course she knew that. Candlelight flickered on his rough-hewn features. There was the scar on his cheekbone, small but more noticeable with the way light slanted across his face. Their friend Collin had caught the skin with a cast fishhook when he and Gavin were fifteen. The wound had bled all down Gavin’s shirt. Collin had been horrified, but Gavin shrugged it off. As he tended to do. That scar was matched now by a scratch caused by the duke’s signet ring during their fistfight. Without conscious thought, Rose’s hand came up to touch the first scar.
The skin was warm, a little rough under her fingertips. Somehow, they drifted down his cheek. It was smoother there, near his lips. Which parted.
“Rose,” he breathed, a nearly inaudible question.
The obvious answer was to lean closer. So that she could…
The kiss started out slight, barely there. It trembled on the brink of ending, a sheer impossibility. Unthinkable. But once again Rose’s body acted without consulting her mind. Her arms went around his neck, and her mouth yielded to his. In the next instant, she was crushed against him and swept away.
Rose was pliant and fragrant in Gavin’s arms. She kissed as wholeheartedly as she did everything. He felt as if he’d been dipped in fire. Between them the kiss grew deeper, more urgent. His head spun. He was losing himself in longing.
And then she pulled away and gazed up at him with wide, wild eyes.
“Rose,” he repeated hoarsely.
“You… I… Kissed.”
“We did.”
“How could we do that?”
He had no answer. They had done it, and it had been stunning. But with all that lay between them, it made no sense.
“It’s been years since we exchanged a pleasant word.”
That was true. He couldn’t deny it. Why did it seem to make no difference? No, that wasn’t right. Their troubled history had made the kiss more intense.
Rose blinked at him. She seemed dazed. She pushed at his chest. Gavin took a reluctant step away from her.
“We were pretending to get along,” he began.
“And were carried away by the pretense?” she asked skeptically. “Are we complete fools?”
Gavin struggled with a muddle of emotion. His youth, the recent past, the astonishing present whirled together in a great snarl. Memory, enmity, desire. He could make no sense of it. “I suppose circumstances…” He trailed off, not knowing how to finish that sentence.
“Circumstances?”
“A dark room, no one about…” This sounded idiotic.
“Do you kiss any woman you find alone in a dark room?” Her voice had sharpened.
“No, of course not. I haven’t been in…”
“I hadn’t thought that the chaperones were right about such things.” She’d gone acerbic. “But perhaps they are.”
“You kissed me,” Gavin said, and immediately knew it was a mistake.
“You’re saying I thrust myself on you?” Her tone was icy this time. Enough to freeze a man to his bones.
“I didn’t mind. I mean… No!” He should have shut his mouth, Gavin thought. But he went blundering on like a goaded ox. “Only that I didn’t…”
“Really wish to kiss me?” she cut in.
“No. It wasn’t like…”
“Allow me to beg your pardon, Sir Gavin. Rest assured it will never happen again.” Rose snatched up her candlestick and her book and rushed out, leaving Gavin in the darkness. The seething darkness, he thought. The aching darkness. The unfathomable darkness. What the hell had he done?