“I shall take you one day, so you can experience it yourself,” he told her, impassioned. “I’ll take you with me like Grandfather took Grandmother. You must sail the ocean too, Charles.”
“Do not make promises you cannot keep, Roland.” Charles swallowed her pain. “I beg you, don’t.”
***
“And why should I not keep my promise?” Wells was hurt by her words. She perplexed him anew, this woman. She forever surprised.
“Because you cannot, and we both know it.” Charles sounded sad but by no means angry. “Take me with you now instead, my lord. Hold me in your arms and whisper in my ear stories from your travels, your adventures. Let me experience those wonders through your words, Roland. Take me with you, please,” she begged.
And the look in her eyes so beseeched, he’d not have denied her for the world. He gazed at her with such tenderness he made her look away, as if she were embarrassed by his feeling. He settled his mistress deep into his arms and began to regale her with stories of daring and despair, of longing and loss. Of tempests and tall ships marooned and tossed.
She softened in his arms as Wells minced no words. He’d no reason to lie and so told her everything now: the sorrow, the pain, and the terror alongside moments of awe and joy. He even told her of his vow to his men made deep in the East Indies that day they’d threatened to mutiny. He’d ordered the ship straight into danger to rescue a royal lady—and as a result, now suffered their taunts as ‘their grace.’
Charles listened rapt; she did not interrupt or interject. At times he heard her gasp in surprise, but mostly, his mistress soaked up his words. He felt as though he could tell her anything, anything at all now, and she would accept him no matter what devilry he revealed. He wished, suddenly, to reveal everything about himself to her—every last cowardly act or heroic feat. She was like a raft upon which he might be buoyed and saved.
That night in the shell room he did indeed wish to whisk Charles away to sail off to some far-flung island where they would be no longer master and maid, but simply Adam and Evein God’s garden: two halves of one whole, without shame or reproach. Free from scrutiny.
Wells wished to keep Charles all to himself—tobea better, more noble self. If only he knew how.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
John imagined things could be worse. After all, the gale had trapped him with Eleanor Merrinan for Christmas, not some snow bank somewhere he’d like as not freeze to death. He was used to storms at sea but this was something else entirely. He’d never seen so much snow in all his life. He wondered, briefly, how Lord Wells was faring at the Abbey and then promptly forgot about him; his grace’s housekeeping mistress was competent enough to see the Abbey through both holiday and snow.
He snuck another peek at Eleanor, who was busy unraveling a moth-eaten wool shawl he held stretched between his thick hands. She worried her lip while she worked, making him want to kiss the pretty pout so badly he’d nearly dropped the shawl a few times already. He constantly had to keep himself in check, in the presence of this lady. For he still thought of her as one, even though she waited on him the same way she served her father. He wasn’t used to such attention. He wasn’t used to being alone in a small space with a woman either, forever bumping into her. Of course her old man was with them too, but the sad fellow existed on such a wholly different plane it felt to John as ifMerrinan himself were but furniture and he were in truth alone with Miss Eleanor, unchaperoned.
Except, that is, when Merrinan had one of his fits, yelling and flailing and gnashing his teeth. It was on those occasions when he relived his wife’s death that he acted so out of character. John had seen it twice now and felt deeply for poor Eleanor, who managed her father as best she could during these episodes. Once, his wild gestures had knocked her flat to floor and John had barely stopped himself from throttling the old man. He’d forcibly removed him from her presence and locked him in his bedroom, yet by the time he’d returned she was back on her feet, dismissive of the incident. She may not have her sister’s temper, but Eleanor was no lightweight. She couldn’t be, to live alone with her father as she did.
“John.” He thought he heard her voice. “John.”
“Beg pardon, miss.” He looked up. “Lost in thought I s’pose.”
“And just what thought might that be, sir?” Her wide brown eyes were luminous in the firelight—eyes a man could get lost in.
“Oi, naught what needs concern yerself, miss.” He might have blushed; he did not wish to reveal the nature of his thoughtsorfeelings to her.
She frowned. “I should thinkImay be the judge of that, sir. You needn’t treat me like a child, you know.”
“Why, I . . .” John was distraught. “I meant no offense, miss, truly. ’Twas only work at the Abbey I were mullin’, and surely ’tis borin’ t’ one such as yerself.”
She cast him an earnest look. “Nothingis boring to me, John, absolutely nothing. You see how I live out here with Papa. Can you tell me, honestly, that I should ever be bored by anything you might say?”
He’d not thought of it that way. Come to think of it, she was always making him think of things in new ways.
“I beg yer pardon, Miss Merrinan, for assumin’ anythin’ at all, you’re right. Only I’d rather speak o’ things other’n work when I’m with you, miss. Finer, better things.”
“Like what, John?” She smiled again, more warmly still, and his heart wrenched to see her face light up. “And I must insist you call me Ellie, please, as there is surely no need for formality here.”
It was his turn to frown. “No miss, I won’t. Lord Wells—not t’ mention yer sister—wouldn’t stand for such behavior, and I’ll not?—”
Her hand snaked out to grip his warmly as he glanced down at it in alarm.
“John Cuthbert, look about you, sir. Neither Lord Wellesley nor Charles is here right now, and I have given you permission to call me by my name. Now will you or won’t you be man enough to do so?”
He stared at her in shock, seeing yet another side to this woman who with each passing day revealed she was not one to trifle with. “Very well, Ellie,” he grumbled, looking away. “Only I still don’t think it’s right t’—”
“WellIthink it is perfectly right, and it pleases me to hear you say my name, John.” She squeezed his hand. “Now sit closer, I beg, that you might block the draft from the door with your great hulking frame, please.”
Her eyes twinkled with mirth, for it had become their running joke in the storm that Cuthbert keep her and her father warm by simply standing his bulky self in front of drafty windows.
