Clasping her hands together before her, she turned away from where he sat and where her lantern stood, and stared into the darkness. The first few notes were hesitant—too soft and tremulous for her own liking. She closed her eyes, gave herself up to the music... listening, as her voice grew stronger, rising and falling with flawless clarity as it resonated around her. Gradually, everything fell away, including herself, until all that remained was the song.
It wasn’t until it drew to a close, dying upon her lips, that she became aware of the tears pooling behind her eyes and the ache that filled her chest—a common occurrence whenever she allowed the music to take control of her senses. A second of silence followed. She drew a breath, and then, the sound of clapping, reminding her that she wasn’t alone.
“Remarkable,” she heard him say from somewhere close behind her, informing her that he’d come toward her once more. What surprised her the most, however, was the sound of his voice. It was raw with emotion, as if he too had been brought to tears by the song.
She prepared to turn, to face him with the hope of somehow returning to some sense of normalcy. But before she could manage to do so, she felt the warmth of him against her back—the hard contour of his chest, just before his arm came around her, securing her in place. A gasp escaped from between her lips, and she instinctively stiffened against him.
“Shh...” His voice was tender against her ear. “You know that I mean you no harm.”
Her body relaxed and she allowed herself to lean back against his strength. “You should not be touching me like this.” And yet she wanted him to, even as she heard herself say, “It is not proper.”
He chuckled—a low rumble that coiled its way around her. “Indeed, it is far from it, but I cannot seem to stop myself.” He spread his fingers against her waist. “You are the light to which I am drawn.”
“And you are the darkness that lets me shine,” she whispered. His mask was cool against the side of her neck, but his body was all heat, cascading through her and making her want things she’d never wanted before. “I cannot seem to escape you.”
“Do you wish to?”
A simple question, the answer to which she sensed would direct their future. “No.” His hold on her tightened. “I wish to know you.”
Without warning, he pulled away, leaving her cold. She turned, addressing his back. “Tell me about the war, your childhood... anything that will allow me to form a clearer image of the man you are.”
He paused, considering her request before looking back at her over his shoulder. Their eyes met, and his body immediately responded, recalling how good it had felt to hold her in his arms only moments earlier. She’d been so soft and warm, perfectly molded against his firmer contours. It occurred to him that he would have liked to remain like that forever. Lord, it seemed like a lifetime since he’d been that close to a woman.
Inhaling deeply, he tried to return to a more relaxed state of being. He blamed the song for his momentary lack of propriety—that, and the beauty she exuded. And yet he’d chosen to use it against her, threatening her with her secret while she had accepted his proposal without the slightest degree of anger or even irritation. He owed her something in return. “No man, who has ever been to war, returns the way he was before he left. It changes you... affects you... in ways you cannot possibly imagine.”
A long moment of silence passed between them before she eventually asked, “Did you lose many friends?”
He turned more fully toward her. “When you witness the kind of devastation war causes, it no longer matters if they were your friends or not. All you can think of is that they were living, breathing people; fathers, brothers, sons. Their loss was unacceptable, even if I did not know them personally.”
She nodded as if she understood, even though she couldn’t. Not really.
“The truth is,” he found himself saying, “that none of us wanted to be there, even though we all pretended otherwise. At least in the beginning, before the fighting started.” The memory of what had followed pulled him back into the past, flooding his mind with images he’d rather forget.
“And then?” she prompted.
He blinked, startled by her sudden proximity. “Seeing men blown to pieces by canon fire, trampled to death by horses as they lay wounded in the mud, wandering aimlessly about with missing limbs... horrifying does not come close to describing the brutality of it.”
“I cannot imagine what it must have been like.”
“Nobody can. Not unless they were there.” A memory surfaced—blonde hair tied with blue ribbons. “There was a girl, perhaps sixteen years old. She was French.” He could still hear her screams.Laisse-moi! Je t'en supplie!“Some British soldiers—my own countrymen—had captured her during an unsanctioned raiding party in Lille. They snatched her from the street and brought her back to camp with them, almost eighty miles away from her home.”
“What did they want from her?”
He could tell from her voice that she dreaded the answer, so he decided to spare her the details. “Something they never got.”
Her eyes widened with understanding. “You fought your fellow soldiers in order to save a Frenchwoman?”
“It was the right thing to do.” He shook his head. “The war brought out the worst in those men. They deserved the beating I gave them and the dishonorable discharge issued by Wellington after I told him of their actions.” A flash of bare limbs twisted beneath the torn fabric of a gown shot through his mind. The girl had been bruised and battered by the time he’d found her, but she’d muttered an almost inaudible,merci, when he’d set her down in front of her parents’ house the following day.
“Will you tell me how you sustained your own injuries?”
Blinking, Richard focused his mind on the present and on the woman standing before him. He’d known the question would come—had suspected that she must have figured it out—and yet it still caught him off guard. His shoulders tensed and his heart rate accelerated, as was always the case when he thought back to the moment when his face had been taken from him. “I was captured,” he said, pushing the words past the knot in his throat. “It was a reconnaissance mission, ordered by the Duke of Wellington. I volunteered along with a few others, but something went wrong and...” He winced, sensing the blind rage that threatened to consume as he recalled the betrayal, forcing it back so she would not see. He took a deep breath, expelled it, aware that his nails were digging into the palms of his hands as he clenched his fists. Willing himself to relax, he told her bitterly, “The French wanted information. They decided to burn me in order to get it.”
Pain captured her features, twisting them with anguish on his behalf. “I am so sorry,” she whispered.
“You must not pity me!” The words whipped through the air, echoing around them.
“I do not,” she told him gently. “But I cannot help but feel a tremendous amount of sadness for what you have been through. Nobody should have to experience such a thing.”
