He had pressed his hands against her chest before realizing what he was doing, pressing down hard to expel the water that he knew must be choking her lungs. It fountained from her mouth aided by her.
He needed to inject air into her, give her body something to work with. He pinched her nose, then pressed his lips to hers while pulling her mouth open by the chin. Then he blew into her as hard as he could. Another compression of the chest. Another breath into her lungs. Julian was not thinking of the touch of hisbare, lethal hands against her pale, cold face. Or against the soft suppleness of her chest. He thought only of the need to revive her. She was clearly a victim of a robber, though what she had been doing out here, alone, he could not fathom. Alone and with a bag of coins. Unless she was an associate of the highwayman, a lure for unsuspecting riders.
Coughing.
Julian sat back as the woman’s eyes opened and she began to cough. Her long hair would reach almost to her waist, he supposed. In the harsh whiteness of the occasional moonlight, he could not tell its color. It looked dark. Which made her skin almost luminescent. She was slender and tall, judging by the length of her body, with a button nose and a well-proportioned face. A beautiful face in fact.Astonishinglybeautiful.
Julian felt a pang of regret. A stab of unrequited desire. A woman as beautiful as this was meant for other men. For husbands who would be able to touch and caress her. He could not.
Then the enormity of what he had done struck him. He raised his hands to his face, seeing their nakedness for the first time. The woman was struggling to sit up now, seeing him for the first time too. She was weak but was trying to push herself away from him, feet scrambling at the ground in her urgency. He raised his hands placatingly.
“You have nothing to fear from me. I am the… I am Julian,” he stopped himself from using his title, theDuke of Windermere.Too many in these parts knew that name and feared it. “I heard you enter the water and went in after you.”
“Julian?” the woman said in the accent of the north, “there was another man…”
“A highwayman I assume. I drove him off. He is probably still running.”
The woman put a hand to her face as though it pained her. Julian wondered if she had been struck.
“A satchel…my dowry…I was to…” the woman began.
Julian saw the faint rising up to claim her. Her words faltered and her eyes rolled up in her head.
Without thinking, he darted forward on hands and knees to catch her. Her head lolled back against his arm. Her body was soft but icy cold. For a moment, he wanted nothing more than to hold her to him. The feel of a female body was one he had not experienced before. How could he when touching another person was prohibited?
“I saved you, but have condemned you with my own thoughtlessness,” he whispered, “…forgive me, my beautiful lady.”
CHAPTER THREE
Julian summoned Rufus with a high whistle.
The horse approached out of the darkness with a jingle of harness and the muffled clop of hooves. Considering the height of the stallion for a moment, Julian proceeded to shift the weight of the woman he held onto one shoulder. Then with both hands free, he took the reins and put a foot into one stirrup. Careful to avoid touching Rufus with his bare hands, he hauled himself up, managing the slight weight of the damsel he had rescued with ease.
Julian was broad as well as tall with musculature developed on his chest and shoulders through years spent in manual labor on a farm amid the Cumbrian hills. Gently bringing the unconscious woman down to sit before him across the saddle, he steered Rufus towards home.
Carrying two, and on dark roads, no matter how well known those roads were, meant that Julian had to keep Rufus to a walk. It was an interminable time, following the southward roadtowards the village of Chigwell, until he came upon the track that would lead him into the forest itself.
A farm lay at the point where that track intersected with the Chigwell road and an awakened dog barked furiously at him from the doorway of a barn. Julian ignored it but the master of the farm must have been a light sleeper, for a light appeared in a window which subsequently opened. A grizzled, gray-bearded head appeared at the window and a voice laden with drink bellowed for quiet. Then bleary eyes saw Julian, half-illuminated by the candle the man held.
“God preserve us! It’s the Ghoul!” he screamed.
The window slammed shut and the candle was extinguished. Moments later, the sound of a bolt being shot to lock the front door of the farmhouse came, along with other voices inside. The household was being raised, warned of the passing of the dreaded Ghoul. And now witnessed with a victim in hand. An unconscious woman slung across his saddle.
Julian smiled sadly at the absurdity of fear and gossip. When a man rejected society and chose to live alone, he was vilified. People assumed there must be something terribly wrong with him. In truth, they were right, but not content to wonder at the reasons for Julian’s hermitage, they concocted reasons of their own.
The woman he held stirred at the commotion and her eyes fluttered open. “Who are you?” she whispered.
“My name is Julian Barrington,” Julian replied in equal gentleness. “I am Lord of Theydon Mount.”
“I do not know it,” the woman murmured, softly, her head lolling as though she lacked the strength to hold it up.
Julian hoped this was the effect of being without breath or heartbeat for a period of time. Better that than the curse. Still, it would take her sooner or later. Would it not be better if it was over quickly? The image of his brother’s agonized face swam up in his memory and he shuddered. He would not wish such a death on anyone.
“I am Duke of Windermere, though I now make my home here in the south of England,” Julian continued, “rest easy, I am taking you to my house where you can recuperate. You threw yourself into the lake. Why?”
But his question was in vain. She succumbed to unconsciousness once more.
Julian felt his heart beat faster at the feel of her cheek against his chest. One hand held her around her shoulders, which felt as delicate as he imagined a bird would feel. Fine-boned and fragile. The other rested on her hip. He felt the curve of her body there, shapely and enticing femininity. It made his breath catch in his throat and he forced his mind elsewhere as a distraction.
