That didn’t sound right.
Court scratched idly at his beard. “I thought that his name was Philips.”
Her lips pinched before she answered crisply. “Did you not receive word from Sterling in your travels? Shipley is the head gardener now. I’m afraid that Philips died.”
Just like Percy had. The knowledge lay between them, heavy and unspoken. Percy’s death was what had brought them together, but it was also what had torn them apart.
“Truly, a peaceful walk would be wonderfully restorative after the bustle of the train yesterday,” Lady Clementine interrupted the silence. “I will see you both this afternoon, I hope.”
With that, she scurried away down the path, in the direction of Honoré.
“Do take care when approaching the fiendish swan,” he called after her. “He likes to bite.”
“Forewarned is forearmed,” Lady Clementine called over her shoulder with a little wiggle of her fingers.
Vivi sighed heavily, gaze trained on her friend’s retreat. “I hope Honoré bit you as hard as he could.”
* * *
Vivi watched dejectedly asher dear friend’s elegant form disappeared around a bend in the lake just beyond Honoré, swallowed up by lush green foliage. So much for loyalty and sisterhood, she thought grimly. Clementine would certainly hear from her later.
For now, she was once again where she decidedly did not want to be.
Alone with Court.
Court, who was even more handsome in his country tweed than he had been yesterday in his more formal clothes.
“That is hardly wifely of you, Vivi,” he said, his tone one of mock chastisement.
Once, his teasing would have been welcomed. She would have teased him in return. They would have laughed together. But there was the gaping hole of the last year between them, and she was no longer the woman she had been when he had left her, nor was he the same man she had for so long adored.
“I don’t feel like a wife,” she told him, reluctantly turning her attention back to him.
He was still idly stroking his neatly trimmed beard. The very whiskers that had lightly abraded her skin when he had kissed her in the library. She had liked it. And worse, she longed for his mouth on hers again, despite everything he had done. Sleeping in her chamber with him one door away had been a terrible temptation, for part of her had wanted quite desperately to bridge the distance and go to him. Her pride and the broken heart she had so diligently been trying to repair had prevented her, however.
“I could make you feel like a wife again,” he suggested, his voice low and laden with sensual implication.
Again.She did not miss that lone word. She could not deny that once, he had made her feel every inch his wife. He had shown her passion she hadn’t known possible. Had made her body his in every way, drowning her in pleasure.
But she wouldn’t think of that now.
She swallowed hard against a rush of longing. “If you’re implying you will share my bed, think again. For I’ll not welcome you there.”
All the teasing fled his countenance, and his eyes burned into hers with remembered desire. “We haven’t always needed a bed, have we, Vivi?”
She inhaled harshly, shocked that he would dredge up such a memory now, when he had only just returned the day before and she was feeling so very raw.
“I don’t know what you’re speaking of,” she lied just to spite him, twisting her fingers in her skirts in her agitation.
But Court did not relent. Nor did he give her the space she so desperately needed. Instead, he came closer, until her gown brushed his trousers. Until the wide brim of her picture hat nearly collided with his chin.
He canted his head, dipping it so that their faces were even. “You remember the boathouse, do you not?”
The boathouse.
Her eyes slid closed as memories washed over her.
How could she have forgotten that night, when she had shattered in his arms on the coat he had laid over the old planked floor? Court had come to Edmonds House for Percy’s funeral, which had been held after futile weeks of hoping his earthly remains would wash ashore following the sinking of theMarguerite.
