Vermillion (The Hundred Days Series Book 1) (34 page)

“Doctor Eckman was so calm about it.
We were five months along!” He massaged a throbbing right temple. “I really
wanted to injure him just to provoke a response, so that I did not feel as
alone. Of course there was nothing to be done, but I was desperate. We had
begun treating one another with kindness, and something like respect. The
moment our baby was lost, I feared Caroline and I would be divided for good and
all.”

“It is very lucky,
was
very
lucky,” she corrected gravely, “That she did not die from complications.”

He had thought so too, at the time.
“I think she nearly did. For months afterward, she was ill. Weak, sometimes
fevered. In every way I struggled to be attentive and to dote on her. Reading
to her, bringing flowers from the hothouse, seeing that anything she desired
was bedside when she woke. Sometimes we just lay on the bed together with our
hands joined.” He pushed away the optimism his younger self had treasured so
eagerly, despising those few months of hope more than all the misery to follow.

“It was working; I was so certain.
She needed me. Our marriage was on the mend as much as her body. At some point
Doctor Eckman suggested she go out for air, short walks. I don't recall one
specific day, but she was just suddenly coming and going like she used to.
Little by little the good will and affection drained away.”

“She had gone back to Pitt,” Kate
added sagely, squeezing her arms more tightly.

“We never stepped out together. We
were strangers in our house, and I was not welcome in her bed.” A bitter taste
parched the back of his mouth. “It was full enough, with Major Pitt's return
from the Peninsula.”

Kate stiffened against his side,
sounding furious in a strangely touching way. “He waited until you'd patched
her up, then took his sport again.”

He nodded. “And that was the end.
When she lost the baby, I think Caroline formed some doubt in her mind. I don't
know what finally settled it, but a wall went up between us and there was no
breaching it.”

Wriggling away, Kate studied his
face, looking more upset over the memory than he was. “She has stayed all this
time. You don't think perhaps she loves you, just a little?”

So like her, to try and find the
good in someone. He had no doubt in that moment that, had he expressed even a
bit of uncertainty where Caroline was concerned, he could have confided in
Kate. She would have murdered him after, he chuckled, but she would have heard
him out first.

“I am useful, nothing more. She
lives in perpetual fear of being poor, and worse, unpopular. Major Pitt is diverting,
but lacks a title and income.” He swallowed, struggling with his words to form
a realization he had only just come to. “My love and loyalty were cultivated
into a bridle, for her to keep me in-hand. I'm certain, after all these years,
she never imagined my leaving.” He got to his knees, leaned forward and pressed
a kiss to Kate's temple. “She did not count on you.”

Tucking knees to her chest inside
the wrapper, Kate chewed at her bottom lip. “I'm not comfortable in the role of
'other woman'.”

He leaned down, stroking a thumb
over her cheek. “I won't ask it of you. Tell me that you wish to wait until
I've secured a divorce, and I'll not object.”

Kate stretched out a stocking-clad
leg and brushed her toes from his knee to his thigh, stirring his body. “You
know by now that I'm incapable of saying such a thing.”

He grinned. “Odd. Running contrary
to my wishes has always seemed to come naturally for you.”

Kate spaced her thumb and finger
apart, holding them up for him. “That was before you planted your little
vermillion flag on me.”

“Not so bad when the redcoats win,
now is it?” he prodded.

“I'll never admit it!” Her
exclamation was drowned by a wide yawn, and she smiled. “I should go. You're
hardly getting sleep as it is.”

He glanced around the tent, warring
over what to say next. She
should
go, but there was not an ounce of
self-discipline to make him part with her. He got up, went to the trunk behind
his wash stand and dug out his spare gray blanket.

“What are you about?” Kate arched
up, craning her neck to spy on him.

Smiling, he reached out a hand.
“Clear out for a moment. You'll see.”

“Hmm.”

He hauled Kate up beside him,
snapping the blanket and spreading it over the floor. Stretching out along its
length, he grabbed a fistful of her wrapper, tugging her down beside him.

She fit herself against his side,
one slender arm draping across his bare chest. “We are doing the very thing we
both agreed not to.”

He shrugged. “In a few days we'll
leave for Brussels, where no one particularly cares about the sort of
relationship we share. And when you return to the regiment, in whatever
capacity, it will be under very different circumstances than we face now. At the
rear or along the front, no man has idle time enough in battle to contemplate
his officer's, or
doctor's
private dealings.”

“In other words, you do not give a
fig,” she laughed.

“No, I do not.” They had been bound
together, well before either of them had stopped squabbling long enough to
realize it. Everyone else would have to wrap their minds around it eventually.
For now, being called up to Brussels solved most of their problems.

She leaned farther over him, poking
fingers at the hard ground under their blanket. “Are you certain you want to
pass the night this way? I think you're a little old to be comfortable sleeping
on the floor.”

He played at being wounded. “I am
thirty-four, not sixty-four!”

“And I am twenty-three, but Belgian
tree roots still bruise the same as any other.” Kate punctuated her giggle with
a pinch to his ribs.

“There is no limit to what I would
endure to keep you beside me,” he confessed.

Her head bobbed at the crook of his
arm, nodding in agreement. “It is hard enough, being only beside you.”

“What do you mean?” He raised up on
an elbow, tipping his head and trying to get a glimpse of her expression. Kate
wriggled up his chest, draped over him, and traced his lower lip with her
finger. “Even when I am against you like this, I feel the space between us. An
absence,
really, that's only filled when you are inside me. Not lust, not
pleasure...” She shook her head.

“As though you've found a bit of
yourself.”

“Yes! That's it exactly.” Kate
rewarded him, brushing her mouth over his.

He cradled her face in his palms,
pulling Kate away to meet her eyes. “You’ve got into my blood. Even
arm's-length is nearly unbearable.” He drew her back, exploiting her lips with
a pressure that made it impossible for him to think of sleep.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Brussels did not suit her in any
fashion. At least, not today.

On her last visit, she'd had purpose
in caring for Matthew's mother. What had she expected this time? There were no
patients, very little Matthew, and plenty of time to simmer in the heat.

Kate brushed back the lace curtain
that obscured her view and picked through the crowd for Matthew. For his
quarters, he was billeted in a house occupying a busy corner one street over
from the main square. With white plaster and a high, flat-topped, slope-sided
roof she always thought of as inherently French, the building was pretty but
not ostentatious like its neighbors. Elaborate iron balconies decorated each
floor like yards of black lace, a lovely contrast against the pale facade. She
had already made use of the second-floor vantage point. It offered a
kitty-corner view across the Grand Place, and more immediate enjoyment of her
little street.

A flower girl almost directly
beneath her perch displayed a cart overflowing with crimson poppies and roses,
simple daisies, candy pink tulips, and hand-tied bouquets of delicate violets.
Her straw bonnet bobbed with every curtsy, and occasionally a passerby –
gentlemen, mostly – happily traded coin for some lovely arrangement. Now and
then an intoxicating floral aroma lifted to Kate on the breeze, and she leaned
on the rail, eyes closed, drinking it in.

Depriving herself the sense of sight
had magnified her hearing, introducing the repetitive, baritone call of a man
somewhere down the lane. His boast rang out cheerfully, and no wonder. From
what little Dutch she could piece together, he offered the best sausages in the
city. The sounds of trade were inescapable. Brussels was a city fed by the
grand port of Antwerp, and some of the finest buildings in the main square,
Matthew had explained, belonged to brewmasters and guild halls.

She had itched all afternoon to go
out and explore but had not dared to leave the house, knowing Matthew could
return at any moment. It was not so bad, being inside. The rooms were on the
whole small and very comfortable, decorated in soft, printed cottons. The
furnishings were handsome despite being well-used. Whoever owned the house
originally had preferred white; chairs, tables, and cabinets were all brushed
with milk-paint. Even the curtains were pale Brussels lace or light-hued
prints. There was no gold-gilt in sight, and where there was wood, it remained
refreshingly natural.

Perhaps, she admitted, the city was
not so terrible after all.

Matthew had allowed her first choice
of rooms, not that there had been much competition. The ground floor housed all
the public rooms, and many of the first floor bed chambers were spartan,
masculine in design. Those spaces were the obvious retreat of Matthew and, on
occasion, of Colonel McKinnon who slept, took meals and tended his
correspondence when not haring off over the country.

Left with free reign of the second
floor, she had no trouble making her choice. It was the largest of the rooms,
but that was not what had swayed her. Windows high as the balcony's French
doors lined one entire wall, giving a view across the rooftops all the way to
the Gothic spires of the city's ancient cathedral. The scene was breathtaking
now, and Kate could hardly wait to gaze across the scene at night.

The interior was cozy, even without
a grand vista. Of course, the bed was her favorite bit of furniture. She had
learned the pleasure of a good bed from her mother. Her parents' had been
nearly as wide as it was high, meriting a sturdy oak two-step footstool to mount.
The mattress, firm with a cradling amount of give, embraced like a good hug.
There had been many nights when she had snuggled in with her mother, father
away overnight tending a labor or patient in another town. Her mother would
vigorously rake the glowing hot bed-pan beneath the quilt, Kate leaping in the
moment it was clear. In the earliest memories, Fann still occupied a cradle,
and so she could stretch out gangling arms and legs, wriggling into the warmth
until mother hushed her with a good-night kiss.

There was little pleasure equal to a
good bed, and Kate considered it the absolute height of luxury. Her bed now was
a perfect specimen. It was not too wide, but was wonderfully high and within
arm's-length of the firebox. The bed skirt, canopy and curtains were an
embarrassing yardage of lavender cotton trimmed with creamy lace. More
elaborate fabric would have made the effect gaudy. Instead it lent the
wonderful appearance of a deliciously frosted cake. Her first moment alone in
the room, Kate had rolled quickly onto the mattress, giving a single bounce and
being completely assured of its comfort. And perhaps its other less immediate
applications.

A gentle rapping shook the door,
breaking into her musing. Kate had discovered just after their arrival that
morning that she need not answer. Servants observed some prearranged natural
delay, then entered whether summoned or no. The household staff was attentive
but very formal. Even now her maid, thin like a willow branch, dark haired and
dark eyed, did not meet her gaze. She deposited the tea tray atop a table made
for the purpose which stood sentry at the side of a rose-velveteen arm chair.
With an efficient hand, the young woman rearranged something on the tray,
smoothed at the chair and bobbed a curtsy, never looking up. She might as well
have been pantomiming her duties to an empty room. It was not at all what Kate
was used to. Liddy and John served her family, but they were more like aunt and
uncle than servants. She experienced an unfamiliar discomfort at being waited
on with such dutiful opulence.

Opening the balcony doors, Kate
returned to the chair, settling in and doing nothing but panting for a moment.
It was June and hot as Hades, swampy with unspent rain weighing down woolly
clouds on the horizon. The house was uncomfortably humid at midday, doubly so
on the upper floors. She was not used to wearing proper clothes, let alone
proper undergarments. Being with Matthew demanded she dress with at least
moderate propriety.
And suffer for it, too
. High bodice and full
sleeves, a chemise and an ocean of starched petticoats. Drawers, for heaven's
sake! Sweat beaded in her hairline, plastering the muslin of her stays to her
torso. She did not remember missing bed time so fiercely before. At least then
she could pare down to a scandalous three layers.

She stared at the tea tray, mocking
her with its pleasant hand painted flowers as though it were not a Trojan horse
for hot water. Kate wondered who in their right mind would offer a steaming
beverage to their guest. It seemed both rude and cruel in weather nearly equal
the gates of hell. Her father had claimed that a hot drink in hot weather
cooled the body; Kate had always returned that lemonade accomplished the same
task, without the effort of boiling water. Now she would have to put his wisdom
to the test.

Kate poured the tawny liquid into
her china cup, trumpeted like a lily and just as fragile. There were a few
savories tempting her from the plate: a little cracker topped with clotted goat
cheese and a biscuit with green flecks that might have been chives. A lavender
shortbread drizzled with frosting stood apart, involuntarily drawing her
fingers to it.

A door slammed downstairs, boots
hammering at the entry hall's marble floor, and then the staircase. Her breath
caught, heart increasing tempo instantly. She knew it was Matthew because he
took the stairs two at a time,
every
time he came to her room. It was
nearly
obnoxious – Kate bit her cookie and smiled – but it was Matthew, and his
excitement at seeing her kept the din somewhere closer to endearing.

His rapping, on the other hand...She
shook her head. Like the maid, Matthew was not kept at bay by silence. He would
enter, invited or not. She had tested the theory before he went out, delighted
when he trespassed, though she had feigned disapproval.

He popped over the threshold, full
of too much enthusiasm for a man up before dawn and dusted with twenty miles of
road grit. His eyes looked her over, head to feet, earning her a lazy grin.
“You look comfortable.”

She jarred her cup against the
saucer, planting it on the table and fighting not to betray herself by
answering his smile. “Well, I'm not,” she grumbled. “I've been waiting to go
out.”

He shrugged, looking adorably
confused. “Then go out.”

“I couldn't. I had to wait for you!”

“Woman!” His bellow echoed off the
walls, mingling with her shrieks when he hauled her from the chair, his lips
cutting off any more protests. She buried herself in his embrace, not caring
that the space between them became an inferno.

He stepped back, fingers circling
her wrists. “I would love nothing more than to stay in with you, but in light
of your displeasure,” he planted a kiss at the end of her nose, “I will take
you out. What is your aim?”

She held up three fingers, watching
to see if his lips formed their usual frown at the gesture. “The book sellers,
next street over. Something for William and Henry. And for Fann, if anything
catches my eye.”

“Good God!” he bellowed. “You spend
like Parliament.”

Kate snatched her purse up from the
foot of the bed, sharply jingling the silver within. “I do not need your help,
thank you.”

He frowned again. “I thought you
said you sent all your wages home...”

“I send home all my
wages
. I
keep all my
winnings
.” She had the satisfaction of seeing his eyes
widen.

Matthew rested hands on his hips.
“Did I by chance mention that I spied a fine bit of horseflesh for sale on my
way back here...” he trailed off, grinning.

Kate finished wrapping the end of
her loose bun and jammed the last pin into place. “Buying a horse is the same
as betting on one. Never bet on horses, Matthew. It is practically giving your
money away.” She presented with her back before he could make a face, snatching
her bonnet off the back of the chair.

“Insufferable. Are you ready, or no?”

She turned, a retort perched on her
lips, then swallowed it back and just took him in. It was easy now to see why
Matthew had appeared detached, even abrasive when they had first met. He was a
fortress on the outside. Strong and guarded, built for war. Once she had
blindly stumbled inside his defenses he had so many more colors.

Something bloomed in her heart,
something planted weeks earlier.

She closed the few paces between
them, rested a hand on his shoulder and raised on tiptoes to share a kiss. Kate
wove fingers into Matthew's hair, drawing his ear close. She sucked in a
breath, wrapped her other arm around his neck, and whispered her heart. “I love
you.”

He jerked back with violence, almost
as if she'd slapped him. His face was drawn up in anxious lines and Kate had no
doubt that, had she been jesting, she would have broken him completely. “Tell
me, again.”

There was something almost dangerous
in the rough, husky way he demanded it. It was passion, Kate realized, of the
body and the soul. She pressed her palms to his jaw, cradling his face. “I
love
you.” She met his gray eyes, unblinking.

His lips worked, but no words came
out. He scrutinized her face as though his very life depended on some answer
there. He clasped her hands and brought them together at his lips. His words
came out as a ragged whisper. “Then by God, I hope to deserve you.”

Kate threw herself into him, hands
pressing at his back. She wondered how he could have any doubt.

When they finally stepped apart,
Matthew looked grave. “I must break my promise to you, Kate, and for that I am
sorry.”

She swallowed, afraid of what he
would say, and waited. His thumb brushed gently beneath her bottom lip. “I
cannot keep our secret anymore.” He grinned, offering his elbow. “I want every
man in Brussels to see you on my arm.”

*          *          *

Shopping with Kate in Brussels
piqued Matthew's curiosity for a glimpse of what it would be like to shop with
Kate in
London
. Many an English husband was heard to bemoan the ritual
of trailing behind his lady down Bond street. He was there to pick up a stray
glove or handkerchief, himself equally forgotten during hours of fittings, or
his lady's agonies over which color was vogue. He was only remembered when the
shop-keep needed payment. Kate, in true Kate fashion, bucked that trend. She
wanted to show him everything, have his opinion, and threatened to toss his
bank-book into a street drain if he took it out one more time in an attempt to
pay for her purchases.

It was, like all things with her, an
adventure. Matthew's only disappointment was that it passed so quickly.

They had started with the book
seller, but the only title she recognized was Byron's
Corsair
. She had
poked it deeper out of sight between its neighbors, grimacing, and whispered to
him what she believed to be the only acceptable use of his work. In reply, he
had questioned her on whether it was at all sanitary, taking a book into the
earth closet.

The proprietor, a lanky man with
heavy spectacles and an oscillating mustache, had conveyed stern disapproval at
Matthew's laughter, affronted that one of his serious tomes was an object of
mirth. Matthew had suspected, as he tipped his hat and filed out behind Kate,
that the man was glad to see them go.

He had hoped that Fann's and
William's presents would take an inordinate amount of time to locate.
Unfortunately, but unsurprisingly, Kate 's knowledge of her family's
preferences was touching and efficient. And frustrating, each hurried moment
robbing him of a chance to enjoy her.