Bess shifted to prop her head up on one hand. With her other hand, she traced a single finger along the sloping muscle of his shoulder, around the curve of his bicep and down his arm until she could clasp his hand.
He let out the breath he’d been holding. Let her tangle their fingers together and didn’t bother to pretend he wasn’t holding on tightly.
“What sorts of things do boys get up to at those schools?” she asked. Her voice was as light as his, studiously so, but Nathaniel caught the slight tremor running under it.
She feared what he might say but wanted to give him the chance to talk about it if he wished.
“Nothing so very dire,” he said gently. “Made me offer my pudding up as tribute to the older boys, confiscated my sheets, stole my clothes and dunked them in the washbasin so I had nothing dry to wear. Silly pranks, for the most part.”
He didn’t mention that the pudding had been the least of it—that he’d spent the first two years at school subsisting on the crusts from others’ plates, a constant, gnawing pit of hunger in his belly. Or that missing bed linens in winter had meant a lot of shivering, sleepless nights on a bare mattress, and the pilfered clothes had resulted in harsh punishments from the schoolmasters for uniform infractions.
Somehow, from the fierce way she kissed his shoulder and said against his prickling skin, “But you fought back,” Nathaniel worried that she’d heard everything he didn’t say.
She was always far too perceptive for his peace of mind.
“I fought. Eventually, I won. Misery is a good teacher.”
She turned her head to press her cheek to his shoulder.
“I suppose I ought to say that those other boys were probably miserable too, in their turn. I ought to feel empathy for them. But I don’t. I hope you bloodied every nose in the school, or worse, and they all learned to keep well away from you.”
His avenging angel. Nathaniel liked it. “That is essentially what happened. And of course, I grew. By the time I left school, there was no one to challenge me. I had to look elsewhere to find a good fight.”
She’d hummed thoughtfully then, her body going lax and heavy against his side. The last thing she’d said before falling asleep was, “I wish I’d been there with you. I wish you weren’t alone.”
As unthinkable as it was to imagine lovely, loyal Bess in that cesspit of humanity masquerading as an educational institution, Nathaniel had found himself warmed by her reaction nevertheless.
Bess saw through to the heart of people, he thought.
The experience of being seen in that way—even though she didn’t know his true name—was thoroughly addictive. He would do anything to keep it. To keep her.
For the first time in his life, Nathaniel thought he could understand his own father. If this was how he’d felt around Henrietta…
Somehow, it had never previously occurred to Nathaniel that in order to do what his father had done, he must have felt something extraordinary.
Or if it had, he had discounted the idea that any mere emotion could be worth what his father had given up to have his happy life with Henrietta.
It no longer seemed such a terrible bargain.
Uneasy with the direction of his thoughts and the newfound stirrings of empathy for his father, Nathaniel had focused instead on the woman in his arms. He’d taken a deep breath of Bess’s hair, the sugared almond scent that followed her everywhere.
Bess tried to tell me, he’d mused. That night in the drawing room.
She’d said the late duke must have loved Henrietta a great deal. She’d seen directly to the heart of the matter, as she was wont to do.
She’d certainly seen more deeply into Nathaniel than he’d allowed anyone in his entire life—and she hadn’t turned away yet.
She kept coming back. For the past six nights, he’d had her. And it still wasn’t enough.
Today, Nathaniel had spent all afternoon running Lord Rumby to ground in his club, cornering the man and finally talking him round to voting for Nathaniel’s bill to fund the Foundling Hospital.
Thank God for work, or he’d be doing nothing but dwelling on the information Bess had shared about her past.
Bess was no widow. She’d never been married, though she had lost someone when they were young. Someone important to her.
On the way to White’s today, during the time he’d allotted himself to think about Bess, Nathaniel had decided it didn’t really matter whether she’d said vows in a church before losing that first love.
He could even understand why she would travel under the name Mrs. Pickford, for the protection afforded married women in the eyes of society. Even for the added respectability, when it came to passing herself off as Lucy’s chaperone.
