CHAPTER NINE #4
It was only then, once she'd withdrawn her hand and relaxed back against the bed, that she looked at Isabel again.
Her lover's mouth was half-open, her eyes burning, her face flushed.
Under other circumstances, Constance would have taken her into her arms and kissed her just then, for everything about her expression indicated that she was ready to go again.
But this wasn't the time. She'd already ventured far beyond what she'd thought herself capable of; she didn't need to be pushed.
Instead, Constance gathered Isabel in her arms, letting her head come to rest on her breasts as she kissed her cheeks and her forehead and her hair.
Isabel let out a quiet sigh, curling herself around Constance like a limpet.
Constance thought of pulling the blankets up to cover them – the afternoon was not cold, but there was no fire in the room to warm them, and the sweat cooling on both their bodies would chill them before long – but was so filled with lassitude from her climax that she decided against it.
They'd just have to warm each other with their touch.
She would have been quite content to pass the rest of the afternoon like that – Isabel's eyelids were drooping, she noticed, and she had no objection to a midday nap herself – but it was not to be.
After a few moments, the church bells chimed vespers, and Isabel stirred in her arms. "It'll be suppertime soon," she said, and sat up, extricating herself from Constance.
Constance let her go with a pang of regret.
"And I must have Walter home before then.
Hilda won't keep a plate for us if we're late. "
"It's a shame you can't bring him back to sup here.
" Constance propped herself up on one elbow to watch Isabel as she went to the washbasin to clean herself and set her clothing to rights.
"You're both always welcome." More welcome than they were at home, she did not say.
Another matter not to be pressed just now.
"It wouldn't be worth the trouble I'd have when I did go back," Isabel said.
Her back was to Constance as she spoke, and Constance was grateful for it: it meant Isabel didn't see the split second her face fell before she managed to school her features.
She hadn't meant anything by it, and Constance knew that.
It was only an old injury that twinged when pressed on, however inadvertently.
She sat up, swinging her legs over the side of the bed as she pulled her own shift and kirtle back up.
She made no attempt at smoothing her hair back into place: it hardly mattered, as no one would be coming to the shop to see her at this time of day.
She went to Isabel and lightly touched her back.
"You'll return tomorrow?" she asked. It sounded pitiful even as she said it, but if Isabel thought the same, she gave no sign.
"If I can." She turned and bent to kiss Constance swiftly. Constance deepened the kiss, and Isabel leaned into it for a moment before pulling herself away with a rueful laugh. "I really must –"
"I know, I know." Constance walked Isabel to the door, giving her hand a final squeeze in parting.
Isabel turned back to smile at her as she went, and the sight of her silhouetted against the late afternoon sun was nearly enough to make Constance weep.
She stayed there, leaning against the doorframe until Isabel turned a corner and disappeared from view.
Constance stayed in place, rubbing both hands over her face.
Alone for the first time all day, she found herself exhausted and – worse – alone with the thoughts she had pushed away while Isabel had been there to occupy her attention.
She was not accustomed to such discomfort with her own company, but rarely before had she had any cause for it.
Had she really come so close to saying "I love you?
" It was an unpardonable lapse: she knew better, both for Isabel's sake and for her own.
She had learned that lesson before, with Cecily and then again with Emmeline.
All she would accomplish if she spoke was to frighten Isabel away for good – and just when they'd truly begun to enjoy each other. What would be the use of that?
Except – the thought crept in on silent feet, settling in uninvited and unwanted – they'd already been enjoying each other.
They'd been enjoying each other for weeks.
In their afternoons at the mill-pond and their talks over the sewing table and the quiet confidences they'd shared before Constance had ever supposed Isabel's interest in her extended to the carnal.
They might have agreed to an arrangement that was purely physical, but that did not encompass the whole of their relationship any more than their work on Leah's dress did.
Under other circumstances – if her feelings burned less brightly – Constance would have called it simple friendship. Now, however . . .
It didn't matter. Isabel was offering her all that she had to give, and Constance had known that from the beginning.
She had no right to grasp at more like a child whose eyes were bigger than their stomach.
She had so much already – things that Isabel herself, in her lonely house and unhappy marriage, had always been denied.
She had a family that loved her, a home of her own, and the ability to enjoy the pleasures of the bedchamber without fear or inhibition.
And now she had Isabel; and if it wasn't precisely in the way she would have chosen, she would simply have to learn to live with that disappointment.
All the same, as she turned to go back into the house, her heart ached and her eyes burned with unshed tears.
"Stop that," she said out loud, pinching her wrist to emphasize the point.
The pinprick burst of pain had a settling effect, and the sensation in her eyes abated.
All the same, though, the door swinging shut behind her felt far more like the fall of an axe than she would have liked.