Ghosts of Winter (25 page)

“Why, Lady Stanwell, I was certain I heard a sound from the rooms beyond this one,” Eleanor replied, flushing to feel several pairs of eyes turned in her direction.

“I am quite sure it is merely a servant about some task or other,” Lady Georgiana replied dismissively.

“Yes. Or Lord Winter, perhaps. He and the Marquess have been absent a long while.”

“Haven’t they just?” Lord Percy agreed. “Perhaps I should go and investigate what has become of them.”

“I think not, Percy dearest,” Lady Georgiana replied, placing a gentle restraining hand on her husband’s arm. “I think it is unlikely that William is lost in his own house.”

Lord Percy caught his wife’s warning look and comprehension dawned on him slowly. “Oh yes, you’re right of course, darling Georgiana.” He smiled slightly to himself. Eleanor Branton caught that vague smile and wondered what it meant. She would be pleased when Lord William returned to the room, for he was by far the handsomest man in the party, and the sole reason she had begged to accompany her brother to Winter Manor tonight. She entertained a hopeful notion, if she could put herself enough in company with Lord William, he would pay her sufficient attention to realise what a suitable wife she could make him. Her mother had urged her to do everything within her womanly power to coax him into an interest in her, and she had to confess to herself there was something about Lord William she found rather compelling. When he looked at her it was all she could do not to blush.

She listened closely again, certain she heard movement once more from the other side of the Music Room. She wondered which room was through that wall, and what on earth a servant was doing there to be making such noises. Then she noticed Lady Georgiana regarding her keenly, the look in the other woman’s eyes somehow a warning, though she could not comprehend it. Eleanor had not been much in society, and interaction with these people was at once fascinating, intimidating, and bewildering. There always seemed to be something unsaid between them, communicated in a language of glances, whispered asides, and silent expressions she could not read. Perhaps when she understood what lay beneath such mystifying communications, she would be completely accepted by these people. She longed for their acceptance. Maybe then Lord William would pay her more attention.

Eleanor sighed and left the Drawing Room, turning through the open doors of the Music Room to sit by the harpsichord. She ran her fingers slowly and gently over the keys and began to play, a slow nocturne she deemed suitable accompaniment for this advanced time of the evening.

*

The gently rising notes of the harpsichord filtered softly through the wall connecting the darkened Saloon to the Music Room. Now naked but for his loosened shirt, Lord William raised his head to listen. The Marquess reached down to stroke his hair, free of his wig. The Marquess was sprawled on his back on the chaise longue, Lord William on a cushion on the floor, his head against the Marquess’s solid naked thigh. The door was locked, but the strains of the melancholy music reminded them of the people assembled just two rooms away.

“I wish I could die now,” Lord William sighed.

The Marquess raised his head and smiled wistfully. “No you don’t, William. You have this beautiful house, a fine tailor, your father’s fortune, and excellent taste in claret. What more does a man need?”

“I need you, George.”

“As I do you, William, dearest.”

“I thought, perhaps, after tonight the need would lessen.”

“I knew it would not.”

“This won’t be enough, will it George?” Lord William felt a cold jolt of fear through his bowels. It was a paralysing horror at the idea of moving away from the Marquess now, of leaving this perfect moment, and it was a terror that knew no bounds, of the difficulty of keeping something so profound private, with the most desperate necessity. It felt like trying to fit an Indian elephant into a mouse’s hole, trying to hide something of gigantic proportions in a secret space that could not possibly confine it.

“No William, it will not be enough. But there will be other nights, other moments.”

“And recollections of tonight will sustain me.” Lord William felt the truth of his statement in the deepest recesses of his soul.

“This will always be our time, our place,” the Marquess replied. He sighed. “Do you ever worry about the sins of the fathers and all that, William?”

“What, being visited upon the sons? I have absolutely no intention of fathering any sons, George. Or daughters, for that matter.”

“But I might. And what of the generations who will inhabit your fine rooms after you? They are surely your heirs.”

“Then I hope to bequeath them a legacy of love and the most irresistible desire. I don’t believe you need to be concerned for the souls of your yet-to-be-born offspring, George. This doesn’t feel terribly sinful.”

The Marquess ran his fingers through Lord William’s hair and sighed once more. “I have to agree with you, William.”

The harpsichord music grew softer,
pianissimo
. It might as well have come from another world, a terrible nightmare world with cruel rules, whispered judgements, and frustrations yet to come. In the dark Saloon, his cheek against the Marquess’s thigh, it was almost impossible to believe such a world could exist.

But it did exist, and now they had to return to it. “Will there be other times, George, for us?”

“There will be other times, William, my love. I believe I might find reasons to travel to Winter alone in the future.”

“I have never valued my inheritance so greatly,” Lord William said with a small smile. The Marquess stooped to kiss him, before they rose to their feet, dressed, and prepared to return to the brightly lit other world. As he did so, Lord William entertained a hopeful, poetic notion that maybe love—sheltered within the walls of Winter though it would have to be—could overcome anything. If it could not, it was at least the most beautiful, profound distraction.

I woke up while the hallway was still shrouded in the blue shadows of very early dawn, an unsurprising consequence of having fallen asleep not much past eight. I opened my eyes and blinked at the now familiar shapes around me: the looming staircase, the beams of the high ceiling. But the perspective was wrong. I was on the floor, and there was a warm pressure against my left side. Anna.

I turned my head to look at her, rolled away from me in her sleep, the blanket pulled over her naked shoulders. My first emotion was a wave of disbelieving elation as the memories cleared, accompanied by a surge of heat in my groin.

She moved slightly and mumbled something incoherent. The recollection came out of nowhere: Francesca used to talk in her sleep too. My stomach plummeted, though I fought the wave of sudden anxiety. Francesca was the last person I wanted to think about in that moment. Just one night with Anna had proved what I had already suspected, I was capable of far greater levels of passion than Francesca had ever aroused in me. Now, more than ever, I knew I’d made the right decision in leaving her.

But Francesca had appeared perfect to me once. What was to say a relationship with Anna would be any more successful? I willed my doubts not to encroach on what should have been one of the most perfect mornings of my life, but once the thoughts began, the sinking feeling was inescapable. I knew it was a direct reaction to how wonderful the night had been. Looking at Anna now, as she still slept peacefully, I could barely believe just how close to perfection those hours had been. I recalled the feel of her hands on my body, the taste of her on my tongue, and knew I wanted her again. Too badly. I couldn’t risk falling in love with Anna, lured by her captivating, hidden sensuality. The events of the past months were still too fresh to risk new pain. Besides, I had nothing to offer her. Not only was she beautiful and talented, her life was in order, it was stable. I craved the sort of stability Anna maintained, and did not want to risk undermining hers, as I found myself still hurting and vaguely bewildered by life. There was no way I could believe she saw this as more than a passing diversion. I knew I wouldn’t be able to live with that, especially not at this point in my life, longing for certainty as I was.

Feeling panic creeping from the pit of my stomach to wrap itself crushingly around my heart, I stared at the back of Anna’s neck, the tendrils of her golden hair. I wanted to reach out and touch them, so badly my fingers trembled.

As though she had pushed me, I jolted away from Anna’s side and sat up. My bare leg brushed the cold tiles of the floor and sent a chill through my whole body. I stood up, found my clothes from the evening before, and dressed quickly. I saw the evidence of our pleasures: the empty bottle lying on its side, the half-consumed box of chocolates, and the discarded clump of mistletoe. They stirred a recollection of warmth, which I suppressed fiercely.

I sat on a chair and stared at Anna as she slept. She was so perfect. Stunningly attractive, intelligent and witty, and with the promise there would always be something new to discover about her. I had no doubt I was half in love with her already. That was why I had to stop this. I’d been carried away the day before. The occasion of Christmas had made me weak, her sudden arrival caught me by surprise. Now I needed to be strong and sensible. I wasn’t anywhere near ready for another relationship, even if that was really what she wanted. And that was by no means certain anyway. Did Anna want a full-blown relationship? With the views she’d aired over the compromise of her personal freedom, were our ideas of what such a relationship involved in any way compatible? There had been a real darkness in her expression when we’d talked of relationships before. That surely didn’t bode well.

Besides, even if—unlikely though it seemed—Anna had developed real feelings for me, I had to stop leading her on. She knew nothing of me. She didn’t know that my mother’s death had terrified me with a reminder of my own mortality and made my turning thirty seem a dreadful occasion. I’d not told her I’d had only one serious relationship, and as a result of its failure, I was now questioning all of my assumptions about love, contentment, and desire. She didn’t know how thoroughly confused by life I was and how blindly I’d been seeking a new direction before Winter was presented to me.

I’d shown Anna only the side of me I wanted her to see, the Ros who could talk about architecture and history, could flirt and tease as well as she could, was enthusiastic about the renovation of Winter, and was optimistic about the future. That might be the woman I wanted to be, but it was not my truth in this moment. Anna knew nothing of me at all. I didn’t have enough certainties myself to be able to enlighten her much further. That was no way to begin a relationship. Having seen the perfection of what it could be, I knew it was too much to hope for. It was better to end it now, before things went too far.

As though she felt me watching her, Anna stirred and turned, opening her eyes to look directly at me. She’d removed her glasses as we’d begun to doze the night before, and without their hard lines, her eyes heavy with sleep, she was girlish and vulnerable. It made the prospect of disappointing her horrific, for I sensed at that moment she was not as resilient as she gave the impression of being. I knew her eyesight was bad enough she couldn’t see me clearly without her glasses and watched as she found them and put them on, waiting until she could see me properly before I said anything.

As soon as she focused, she smiled. “Good morning,” she said. She looked more closely at my expression, and her smile faded. “Or is it not such a good morning?”

“It’s not about last night.” I made my face as emotionless as I could manage, when I actually wanted to cry. “Last night was…was…so close to damn perfect I don’t have the words.” My voice wavered.

“Then what is it?” Her expression grew increasingly concerned.

“The perfection is the problem,” I said softly.

“What on earth do you mean, Ros?”

“You need to leave.” My words sounded cold, even as I spoke them. In the blue early morning, in the sparsely furnished hallway, they echoed and grew colder still.

“What?” She sounded somewhere between offended and angry in her confusion.

“You need to leave. We can’t do this—or, I mean, I can’t do this.”

“Why the hell not?”

“I just can’t.” I wasn’t sure I could sustain this resolution for long, if she didn’t leave soon. Just looking into her blue eyes, even growing increasingly hostile as they were, stirred emotions deep inside me and made me grow hungry for her once more.

“So what was last night then?”

“A perfect, wonderful mistake. Something I wanted very badly, but really shouldn’t have done.”

“It didn’t feel like a mistake. And if you wanted it, then why the hell is it a mistake?” She made my argument sound as weak as it was. But I had to be resolute.

“You don’t know me at all, Anna.”

“Is that the problem? Well you don’t know me either, Ros. I think we can remedy that quite easily. It’s called getting to know each other. It’s what happens when people like each other.” A biting sarcasm crept into her tone now.

“That’s not the problem,” I said. “At least, it’s not that we don’t know each other well enough. If you knew me better, you’d think less of me.”

“Are you a closet psychopath or something? Are you going to strangle me in my sleep as you’ve done to a whole host of women before me and bury me under the floorboards?” Her gaze challenged me to laugh and allow the situation to resolve itself. I clenched my teeth together and did not.