A Bloom in Winter (22 page)

A cheering startled her and she looked up to find that Martha had brought a basket of meat pies into the room. Victoria glanced at the clock. She had been working for three hours.

She asked Martha and the others about their thoughts as they ate.

“Of course it’s a war,” said one woman from East London. “In order to change society, we have to be able to vote for people who care about the things women care about.”

“I dare you to find a man who does,” Lottie put in.

“My father did,” Victoria said. “Many of his friends do.”

Lottie tossed her head. “No offense, Miss Buxton, but where are those friends now? The number of men who will actually go
against their fellow men in our favor is almost nil. I’m sure they exist, but they are damned sure quiet about it.”

“What we need is more women willing and able to do the hard work necessary to get their attention, if you know what I mean.” The woman from East London gave a grim smile.

Victoria wondered what the woman meant as she made her way to her aunt’s house. Emily Davison had given her life for the cause. Could Victoria ever go that far, be that committed, that selfless, for the cause? Or was she merely going through the motions, secure in the fact that she was a wealthy aristocrat with free time and connections to lend to the movement?

H
ow did this get so completely out of control?
Rowena thought as Aunt Charlotte and Lady Edith launched into another round of bickering over wedding details. Rowena had never been more grateful for her relative independence than when Sebastian’s mother joined them for their trip to London, purportedly to buy a few last-minute garments and accessories for the season. But Rowena suspected that she mostly wanted to ensure that no wedding decisions be made without her input.

Though Rowena and Sebastian had refused to give their families a firm wedding date—which they had assumed would keep the preparations to a minimum, allowing time to plot their eventual breakup—it seemed that nothing could stop this train now that it was in motion. Both she and Sebastian were trying to figure out a way to break off the engagement without creating a scandal, but so far both had come up empty-handed.

Now, as a tug-of-war over the event’s location began anew, Rowena managed to slip away with the promise that she’d meet up with her aunt in time for supper.

The fact that she could escape at will was a wonderful luxury, especially considering the note she had received just that morning.

R,

In town with D. Meet me at the needle at 2?

J

March had turned balmy and the sky gleamed blue above the Grosvenor Gardens as she walked to the Victoria Embankment.

Rowena wondered how Jon had talked Douglas into a London trip. She and Jon kept in touch through letters sent to his mother. If she thought it strange they didn’t write to each other directly, she said nothing about it, and Cristobel was always delighted to see her when she dropped by to collect the newest message from her beloved. George, on the other hand, would skulk around, glowering until his mother ordered him off, apologizing for her eldest son’s behavior. Sometimes Rowena wondered whether George was completely in his right mind.

She walked diagonally across the Cathedral Piazza, banishing George from her thoughts. She loved being back in London. Summerset was in her blood and she loved it there, but London was home. She had spent most of her life in the city with her father, Victoria, and, of course, Prudence. Her heart gave a funny little pang as it always did when she thought of her father or Prudence—two family members she had irrevocably lost. She wondered what Prudence was doing and whether she was happy. Victoria said she seemed happy when Victoria had seen her last, but Rowena wished she could see for herself. Could explain that everything had just gotten so out of control . . .

Rowena took a deep breath. She would not be unhappy today. She would not let the grayness of those lost months overcome her again. Not ever again.

Instead she forced herself to think of Jon. It had been almost three weeks since she had last been in his arms and almost four
since the last exhilarating flying lesson—he had finally given her some control, allowing her to drive the plane all over the field. Her pulse kicked up a notch as she remembered the excitement of sitting in the pilot’s seat. He had called her a natural.

Next time he was going to sit as her passenger. Then she would be able to fly on her own. Completely solo.

She smelled the river before she saw it, an odd combination of tar and rot. When she spotted the needle, she stopped the next man she saw with a watch chain draped across his waistcoat. “Excuse me, could you tell me the time, please?”

He took the watch out of his pocket and peered at it with the squint of the nearsighted. “Half past one, miss.”

“Thank you.”

She found a bench near the needle and sat, letting the sun warm her back. Pigeons cooed around her feet until they realized she had nothing to feed them and went off in search of greener fields. People crowded the square, taking advantage of the sun after a long winter—pale, squinting babies in severe black prams, equally pale children, unruly with unexpected freedom, and distinguished gentlemen taking an extralong lunch to enjoy the weather.

Her whole body crackled with excitement at the thought of seeing Jon. The last time she’d seen him, he’d kissed her behind the Martinsyde S.1 until she grew dizzy. Her eyes shut, remembering.

She swatted at a tickling feeling on the back of her neck, which quickly turned into the feeling of lips being pressed against the very top of her spine. She stopped swatting and shivered. “I certainly hope that’s my Jon scandalizing the nannies,” she said, leaning her head back.

“Who do you think?” he whispered in her ear, and she shivered again.

“Oh, Jon!” She stood as he leapt around the bench and took her into his arms.

He pressed his lips against hers until she broke away, gasping. “Stop! We’re going to be arrested for such a public display.”

“Not by any red-blooded bobby, I’ll tell you that. They would all be too jealous of me to care.”

His blue eyes twinkled and blazed at her all at the same time and she laughed out of sheer happiness. He sat with her then, one arm holding her close. Her pulse raced as the heat of his leg pressed against hers.

“I can’t believe you’re really here,” she said, leaning close and rubbing her index finger against his jaw. “However did you talk Douglas into it?”

Jon caught her finger with his free hand. “I can’t think when you do that.” He grinned down at her. “Actually, I didn’t have to. Douglas was called into meetings with some high-up muckety-mucks in the government who want to give us a contract for the Flying Alices.”

“Oh, I knew she was a good one!” Rowena exclaimed.

He squeezed her fingers. “I did, too.”

They sat in silence, their fingers intertwining over and over. She yearned toward him, wanting more than she even knew how to ask for. Her throat thickened with emotion and she could scarcely breathe for the wanting.

His fingers tightened around hers. “Douglas is in meetings for the rest of the day. We’re staying at the Parkrose, a few blocks that way.”

His blue eyes flickered over her and then away and she
caught his meaning immediately. Her chest grew tight. She could be alone with him . . . if she dared. “Is it a comfortable hotel?”

He grew still. “Comfortable enough, I believe.”

Rowena’s heart pounded and she drew even closer, and her cheeks heated with how brazenly she was behaving. “Hmm. Well, perhaps I should take a look myself. Just to make sure you’re being well taken care of there.”

He turned to her then, his eyes drinking her in. “Are you sure?” he asked, his voice husky. She wanted to run her hands through his long hair and pull him close. Her breath caught.

“I’ve never been so sure of anything in my entire life. Well,” she amended, her lips curving. “Well, other than the moment when I told you I wanted to become a pilot.”

He pulled her to her feet and pressed his lips against her cheek. Rowena knew it was a promise of things to come. He walked slowly, perhaps giving her the space to change her mind. But it wasn’t necessary. The heat of his hand on her lower back took her breath away. She would never feel this way about anyone again. If she didn’t spend this time with him now, she knew in her heart she would always regret it, no matter what might happen after.

Rowena would never remember whether they spoke or not. She couldn’t even remember how they got into his room. Had they gone up in a lift? Had the concierge watched them go? These details were gone forever.

What she remembered was the clean scent of his skin. The softness of his hair beneath her fingers. She didn’t remember the pain, but she would never forget the smoothness of the sheets as they wrapped around their legs or the roughness of his cheeks
against her neck. Impressions that would last a lifetime, so vivid, all she had to do was close her eyes and the sensory memories would come flooding back, filling her with equal parts joy and pain.

“I love you,” he told her after.

“I know,” she told him. He hit her with a pillow and she collapsed, laughing, against his chest.
Who knew
, she thought as she pressed her lips in the location of his heart,
who knew that a man’s chest would have hair and would be so delightful to lie against
. “No wonder people keep young women in the dark,” she murmured. “We would all be doing this all the time if we knew.”

“It’s for your own good,” he told her, his mouth against her hair. “You are supposed to wait for the right man.”

She raised her head. “What about men?”

He snorted. “Imagine if neither party knew what they were doing.”

She laid her head back down. “I don’t know. I think we could have figured it out.” She frowned, jealousy gnawing at her stomach. “Did the first woman you were with know what she was doing?”

“Yes. She was an older woman, a maid, actually.”

Rowena shuddered, thinking about her lecherous grandfather, who never got over his desire for maids, and of Prudence’s mother, who had to bear the burden of that lust.

“But”—he pulled her around to face him—“there has never been anyone in my heart but you.”

She searched his eyes for a moment, trying to sort out her thoughts. “And my world was meaningless until I met you. I know that sounds dramatic and I don’t mean to be, but it’s
true. I didn’t know what my purpose in life was until I went flying with you. I had given up on finding a passion . . . on finding passion, even. I only ever felt half-alive.”

His arm tightened around her and she laid her head back down on his chest. His heartbeat sounded in her ear and she could feel hers aligning with his.

“What are we going to do?” he asked quietly.

For the first time, real fear entered her heart. How could she ever let him go? She couldn’t. “We will just have to figure out a way to tell them all,” she said simply. “Your family loves me now. Well, those who really know me, in spite of my surname, so perhaps my family will accept you.”

He stiffened. “That’s just it,” he said slowly. “I don’t want your family to accept me, because I will never be able to forgive your uncle for what he did.”

She sat up and held the sheet in front of her chest. “So my family doesn’t matter then?”

He sat up, too, and already she regretted the distance between them, which seemed so much more than just a few inches. “If your father were alive, it would be different,” he told her. “I’m sure he probably knew nothing about what your uncle was doing to my family.”

“Of course he didn’t!” she cried. “He wouldn’t have done anything like that.”

“And of course, I won’t mind meeting your sister, but I have to draw the line there. In honor of my father, I draw the line there.”

She searched the hard planes of his face. She recognized the truth when she heard it and gave him a nod. “I understand,” she said.

But as she got dressed, she had to wonder about her sacrifice. She would be giving up her aunt and uncle, her cousins, and Summerset. And what if her uncle disagreed with her choice? Would she be giving up her inheritance, as well? She would have to speak with her solicitor.

His arms suddenly slipped around her. “I’ll make it up to you,” he whispered, and she smiled, everything except the feeling of his lips against her neck forgotten.

“You already have,” she whispered.

*   *   *

Kit was worried. Kit never worried. And, like everything else upside down, backward, and crazy in his life, it had everything to do with Victoria, that lovely, painful thorn in his side.

At least breakfast at his mother’s house in London was hot, plentiful, and never too early. His mother had given up their country home when his father had died to live year-round in London. Personally, Kit wondered how his father had been able to talk his mother into going to the country as often as she did. In her younger days, his mother had been considered scandalous. As she grew older, she had turned into an eccentric. Though his parents had bought themselves into the right social circles, that didn’t necessarily mean that either of them actually enjoyed it. As he grew, Kit often wondered why they bothered. He had been brought up to be a gentleman, as idle and useless as any of the real gentlemen who ran in his get. It only recently began to dawn on him that the only women who had ever remotely interested him sneered at such idleness and preferred men who were, as Victoria so maddeningly called it, industrious.