Lady Farquhar's Butterfly (12 page)

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
was 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.