Lady Farquhar's Butterfly Page 9

  Closing her eyes against the intensity of his look, she swayed. She felt dangerously exposed, afraid of revealing more than she could afford.

  When he broke the silence his words carried an edge of frustration.

  ‘You say you owe The Reverend Kirkman your hand in marriage. Can you really do that, Olivia, when you know it means sacrificing your life’s happiness?’

  When still she did not speak, could not, he went on, ‘My guess is that Lucien made you feel so worthless you don’t believe you deserve happiness.’

  She flinched, forcing herself to meet his eye. ‘I am no better than Lucien painted me,’ she said, weakly. ‘When you discovered the truth you’d hate me.’

  With a grunt of irritation he shook her gently. ‘You are no longer a wilful debutante or an innocent pushed reluctantly into marriage, Olivia,’ he said. ‘You are a grown woman with experience of the world and a will of your own.’

  Silence stretched between them. When he spoke again, his voice was steady, matter-of fact. ‘You delight me, Olivia.’ He smiled as if he truly thought her the most exquisite thing he’d laid eyes upon. ‘Every moment I am with you fills me with pleasure. We can make a wonderful future together – you, me and Julian.’ He waited, his smile refusing to fade as the silence grew.

  She knew she need only nod and it would be enough. She turned her head away, watching Julian in the distance as he played in the late April snow, her heart knotted with pain and self disgust as Max tried one final gambit, ‘If you thought to send me away with tales of your shocking past and your misplaced sense of duty towards a man who did what any decent man would do, Olivia, you’ve failed.’

  How dearly she wanted to accept his offer and step into his arms.

  They rested at his sides but she knew she need take only one small step and he’d wrap her up in them, and her life would be just the way she wanted it. Everything she could ever desire would be hers. If only …

  ‘Oh Max,’ she said, at last, brokenly, her misery threatening to crush her. ‘If only I could explain.’

  ‘No, my dear.’ He stepped back, his look curiously empty as he avoided her outstretched hands. ‘If you cannot give me your love, I do not want your sympathy.’ Formally, he offered her his arm. ‘Let us fetch Julian and return to the house.’

  Dinner was a lacklustre affair. Only Nathaniel seemed to enjoy himself. He’d imbibed more wine than usual and had taken control of the conversation. Even Aunt Catherine, his greatest admirer, seemed to be losing interest in his learned dissertations.

  Halfway through pudding she twisted in her chair to raise the curtain hem so she could look out of the casement.

  ‘Gracious, I do believe it’s still snowing.’

  ‘Surely not.’ Aunt Eunice pushed back her chair and went to the window. ‘The wind has picked up,’ she said. Unnoticed above the babble of conversation it could now be heard howling through the treetops.

  ‘It’s a veritable storm.’ Aunt Catherine’s voice was tinged with concern. ‘I’m only glad you’re not caught up in it during your journey home, Mr Atherton,’ she said, before frowning and looking at Nathaniel. ‘You’ll have to stay until it subsides, Reverend.’

  Olivia felt the dismay rise within her. The idea of being incarcerated with both Max and Nathaniel for any length of time was more than she could endure.

  ‘How wild it is.’ Even as Aunt Catherine spoke the keening of the wind seemed to rise in pitch. A dreadful crash sounded in the distance and Olivia jumped.

  ‘Just a tree branch, my dear.’ Nathaniel patted her arm and Olivia tried not to recoil at his touch. Was it only just now, since she had met Max, that he evinced such a reaction? He had comforted her plenty of times in the face of Lucien’s treatment.

  She closed her eyes, squirming at the idea of having him under the same roof and realizing how paradoxical was the sentiment since she would soon commit herself to him, body and soul, for the rest of her life.

  Max offered her a bolstering smile. She smiled in return, blushing at the sharp look Nathaniel directed at her.

  Carefully she put her knife and fork together and leaned back to allow Dorcas to remove her plate. Her cheeks still felt hot.

  ‘Olivia, surely you still have some of Lucien’s clothes packed.’ Nathaniel in Lucien’s clothes? She didn’t know whether to laugh or gasp. All eyes were on her and for the second time in as many minutes she felt the heat burning her bosom upwards.

  ‘Of course,’ she managed, unable to stop her glance sweeping the man beside her from head to foot.

  ‘Perhaps I can be of assistance,’ Max offered. ‘I brought several changes of clothing which may help lessen Olivia’s distress.’

  Olivia cut through the sympathetic tut-tutting. Nathaniel dressed in something belonging to Max was even worse to contemplate. No, she told them, she had a whole trunk of Lucien’s nightshirts and other elegant items of apparel. If Nathaniel was happy to be seen wearing shirt points from two seasons ago he could have them all.

  ‘I’ll see what I can find, Nathaniel,’ she said smoothly, as dinner was cleared away. Rising, she nodded to the gentlemen as she and her aunts left them to enjoy their port.

  It was a relief to be out of the room. Clearly the wind was not going to abate. Clearly Nathaniel had no choice but to remain.

  In her dressing room she rummaged in one of the large trunks by the window only to realize she had packed all Lucien’s things in the attic. She’d never thought to look at them again. Had sworn she never would.

  Taking a candle, she followed the corridor which led to the nursery. At the doorway she stopped to gaze in pained wonderment at Julian’s sleeping face. Her beautiful boy. The child she had cradled at her bosom and cared for until Lucien had decided she was no longer fit to rear him. Now he was hers again and Olivia was the guardian of his future. His happiness. She clenched her fists. She would fight for him to the death. Choking on a sob, she turned away. She would sacrifice even her greatest happiness if it ensured Julian’s future.

  At the end of the passageway a narrow staircase – more of a ladder, really – rose steeply to the attic. It was a relief to climb beyond reach of Aunt Eunice’s hectoring, Aunt Catherine’s quizzing and Nathaniel’s unnerving presence.

  And she would be far more composed if Max were not there, either.

  In the darkness above she set the candle down on a horizontal beam. If her fears were not so earthly her heart would be leaping about as erratically as the candle flame, she thought, as she settled herself on a large tin trunk and stared at the ghostly shadows that danced by the flickering light.

  She had never been a nervous girl. Skittish, in her way, but determined and stubborn. When she’d run off with Lucien it would have taken a hurricane to have pushed her back. No amount of reasoning or threatening from anyone would have had any impact on her decision to go with him. He was London’s catch of the season and she, penniless Miss Templestowe, had whisked him from under the noses of every other designing miss competing for his affections.

  But she had never enjoyed his affections.

  She cupped her chin in her hands and stared at a large painting of Lucien as a child. She’d consigned it to the attic after he’d died. He must have been about three for he was still dressed in petticoats with a blue sash about his middle, his arms wrapped around the neck of a King Charles Spaniel. How angelic the pair looked posing beneath a cherry tree. She could imagine it was Julian with Max’s dog, Pansy. The young Lucien’s hair was dark and curling, his eyes blue, like Julian’s. It was fortunate Julian had the same colouring, she reflected. The thought caused another pang. He was the reason she could never be with Max but how could she regret the past when her little boy had given her life’s greatest joy – and pain.

  She rose, the floorboards creaking beneath her feet, as she bent to open the trunk.

  ‘Make sure the nightcap matches.’ The whisper startled her and she leapt back, heart pounding, a scream dying in her throat before she realized it w
as him.

  ‘Max!’

  His head appeared through the gap in the floor, ‘You dare not risk his ire if he’s not turned out fit to face a congregation.’

  ‘I think Nathaniel is a little less concerned with his appearance than Lucien was.’ She was more relieved that Max’s good humour had returned than afraid of being alone with him. ‘Lucien, as you can imagine, was not best pleased if his valet’s taste in matching waistcoats did not accord with his own. I think he went through valets faster than clean shirts.’

  Max leant against a cross beam, watching her as she rummaged through Lucien’s clothes.

  ‘And indeed, I do have plenty of nightcaps to match his nightshirts.’

  Olivia smiled wickedly as she scrutinized one of them. ‘Lucien would not have dreamed of – or in – anything else.’

  ‘A veritable slave to fashion,’ remarked Max, stepping over a pile of old shirts and peering into the trunk. ‘Why did you keep so many?’ His nearness sent tremors through her. Breathing deeply she fought the longing to sway against his side. ‘These are just the ones from the year he died. Lucien discarded everything at the end of each season.’

  ‘Good Lord,’ remarked Max, looking down at his own blue and gold-figured silk waistcoat while he fingered his shirt points. ‘I know I’m up to the mark in this rig-out, but I’m glad I don’t need to subject myself to Lucien’s scrutiny. The Lodge must have had the best-dressed servants in the village.’

  ‘Lucien didn’t believe in charity.’

  She turned her head, pretending to be unaware of the way he was looking at her. She had not meant to sound bitter. She must not play the victim and risk whipping up his chivalry. Good Lord, it was madness even to be alone with him.

  He was showing admirable restraint, but she…? She was as weak as dishwater, she knew it.

  Cautiously, she straightened. Max had seated himself on another trunk at right angles to her, his attention caught by the painting of Lucien with his parents. In the flickering light he looked devastatingly handsome, irresistibly desirable. Her heart started to hammer. How quickly the comforting feeling she had felt in response to his kindness turned to desire.

  Beware, the voice of reason chimed in her head. The ladder beckons. Leave with your dignity intact and the only possible decision open to you, unwavering.

  She closed the trunk, topping the pile of garments she had selected to lend to Nathaniel with a blue and white striped nightcap. Moving back, she had to stoop so as not to bump her head on the sloping beam above her.

  Max turned back from his study of the painting and smiled. ‘Julian looks very like his father,’ he remarked.

  ‘With your easier temperament, thank God.’

  He put his hand out and touched her wrist, saying, ‘Julian is a lovely child. There is nothing in his nature that brings Lucien to mind.’

  She felt the charged impulse travel up her arm, through her nerve endings and deliver its powerful jolt to the core of her heart. He felt it too, she could tell, just as she could tell he was equally aware of her answering reaction.

  There was a tense breathless pause, lasting less than a second as their silent communication found a mutual answer.

  She could not help herself. Could not deny the cravings of her body when he tugged her so she landed on his lap; could not stop herself responding with an ardour to match his when he took possession of her mouth, so easily plundering her useless resolve to resist him. His molten kisses consumed every last atom of resistance, sweeping away her fears of discovery, of the secrets between them. They lay in a small, unaffected part of her brain. Forgotten. For now.

  She cupped his face as she kissed him back, drinking in all the love and courage he offered, wanting to be everything he desired.

  ‘Lord in Heaven, Olivia,’ he gasped, as he branded hot kisses the length of her throat, following the low cut neckline of her dress, ‘I’ve never wanted anything, anyone, like I want you.’

  His words ignited her answering need for a love that was not tainted like Lucien’s had been, like Nathaniel’s would be.

  But reality was a whisper away.

  Oh God, Nathaniel.

  Then Max’s hand stole across the outline of her breast to stroke the sensitive skin at the hollow of her neck and Nathaniel was forgotten beneath the onslaught of Max’s redoubled ardour and in her rush of desire for him she forgot herself and whispered the truth.

  ‘I’ve never wanted anyone like I want you, Max.’

  For just an instant he stilled. ‘Prove it,’ he murmured through his kisses.

  Prove it?

  Shock banished her pleasure. She gasped and tried to wriggle out of his arms.

  As his hands fell away she straightened, her hand going to her throat. Removing the chain from around her neck she handed it to him.

  ‘The key to my heart,’ she said. She looked down at her hands, now resting in her lap. ‘Lucien gave it to me with those same words, though in truth it was the key which denied him the treasure he believed was hidden somewhere in the house. I only wish I could offer you something of substance.’ She could hear the longing in her own voice, the pained acknowledgement that this was the end of everything between them.

  His disconcerted look was quickly replaced by a laugh, short and tinged with irony as he said, ‘The key to a chamber which will soon be occupied by someone else, it would seem.’

  He set her from him, rising and going to the picture once more.

  ‘Lucien has much to answer for,’ she heard him mutter, before she felt his light touch as the pendant was replaced, once more, around her neck.

  She glanced down, noticing it felt heavier, that the key was larger.

  ‘The key to Elmwood.’ His voice sounded almost distant behind her. ‘It is your home if you ever choose to make it so.’ He rested his hands upon her shoulders and she felt longing and pain curdle in her belly. ‘If only I believed you were the scarlet woman Lucien painted you and that you were merely toying with me, I could understand.’ His voice grew harsher when she said nothing.

  ‘My God, Olivia, I know this was more than fumbling self gratification for you.’ He came round to stand before her, looking down at where she sat.

  ‘Your feelings came from the heart. Like the encounter before. And the one before that.’ His face darkened with anger.

  She could not bear it. Not the anger, nor the thought of losing him. Oh, why had she done this? How could she have allowed herself to be so weak?

  The flickering candlelight accentuated the shadows beneath his eyes. She could conjure him into Lucien if she wished. Pretend he would beat her into submission, violate her – oh, never her face, for what would the guests think? – unless she agreed to what he wanted.

  She opened her mouth to speak. To tell him she would marry him. To lie to him so as to keep him off her back until he was gone and she could then exorcise him out of her life.

  But she could not be so dishonourable.

  ‘Then I will try to explain.’ Hunched miserably into herself she noticed his surprised hesitancy as he cocked his head.

  Yet how could she tell him? How could she explain the myriad brutalities which had resulted in those very actions which stood between them.

  Julian.

  How could she explain Julian?

  ‘I’m listening,’ he prompted after a long silence.

  She swallowed, watching the forefinger of his right hand, its silent tapping against the crossbeam the only outward sign of his agitation.

  She squeezed shut her eyes. For so long she had acted in reaction. Lucien’s brutalities had prompted so many self-preserving defences. Now, she felt exposed. Speaking the truth without it being violently torn from her seemed an impossible feat.

  All she could do was lay the groundwork and hope that by the time she reached the end he’d have more understanding.

  ‘Lucien was desperate for an heir.’ It was feeble, but it was a start.

  ‘I can hardly blame my cousin for t
hat,’ Max said, drily. ‘Most men want an heir.’

  Oh Lord, this was not going well.

  ‘Our first child died within the hour. Lucien blamed me for the fact it was not baptized.’ She swallowed, remembering his fury when he came into the bedroom to find her cradling the dead newborn. ‘It was a difficult birth,’ she went on, blocking out the pain, ‘and I’ – she turned her head away – ‘was not ready for another, but Lucien would not heed the doctor. After that there were two miscarriages. Lucien blamed me.’

  Glancing up at him she saw that his expression had lost its censure. Max settled himself beside her on the trunk and took her hands between his.

  ‘Go on,’ he said gently.

  ‘Nathaniel said it was God’s punishment on Lucien.’

  ‘I trust he informed Lucien personally of this judgement.’

  Olivia nodded. ‘It didn’t help. Lucien was even more brutal to me, though he continued to confess all his sins to Nathaniel.’

  ‘An interesting position for your intended.’

  Olivia gripped his hand and glared at him. ‘Nathaniel was the only person Lucien allowed to show me any kindness.’ Defensiveness made her hoarse. ‘It was like a game to him. He encouraged it. He’d humiliate me in front of his guests, then wait for Nathaniel to cover me up and carry me away.’ It was painful just to remember. ‘Yet if any member of the company tried secretly to come to my aid, Lucien made sure they regretted it.’ She gulped, turning to face Max once more. ‘A young man stayed with us for a time. From Bavaria …’

  She couldn’t go on. By the time Max’s arms were across her back she was hunched over, sobbing silently.