Page 74 of The Hidden Heart

The room was chilly when Jessica awoke the next morning. She opened her eyes, blinking, and was immediately aware of the feel of the sheets against her bare skin. She was naked. She remembered in a rush what had happened here the night before, and color rose in her face at the memory, part embarrassment, part a surge of desire.

She turned to look at the other side of the bed. Richard was not there. He would not be, of course, she reminded herself. He was too much a gentleman to make it plain that he had spent the night with her. He would have gotten up, dressed and left long before the servants began to stir.

Jessica sat up, aware of her body as she had never been before, feeling the differences in her, the faint tenderness and soreness, the memory of pleasure lingering sensually along her skin and filling her breasts. With a groan of sheer enjoyment, she collapsed against the mattress, spreading her arms out and grinning foolishly up at the tester above her head. She felt wonderfully young and filled with experience, all at the same time. No woman, she thought, had ever been introduced so magically to love as she had been last night.

She loved Richard. She was sure of that now, had been sure of it last night before she melted in his arms. She knew she was a fallen woman now, beyond the pale of society’s standard, but, frankly, she could not find it in her to care. She could not feel shame for what they had done last night, only joy.

By seeking happiness and love in Richard’s arms, she was condemning herself to the life of a mistress. No matter how much Richard might desire her, no matter what he had told her of his marriage last night, she knew that he was still in love with Caroline. She knew now that his grief had been compounded by his guilt, but that did not change the fact that he had loved and mourned Caroline for years. If he was happier now, as she hoped, if she had removed the burden of guilt somewhat from his shoulders, it did not mean that he had stopped loving Caroline. It did not mean that he loved Jessica instead. No, she was realistic enough to know that he might never love anyone as much as he had loved Caroline.

And even if, by some miracle, he should come to love her, it did not mean that he would marry her. He was a duke, one of the highest peers in the realm. Dukes married the daughters of dukes and earls; they did not marry the niece of a baron—especially one tainted by scandal. With a lineage like his, he could not marry someone whose father had been cashiered out of the army and subsequently died in a tavern brawl, someone about whom treason had been whispered.

No, there could be no possibility of marriage. In taking him into her bed, Jessica knew that she was putting herself beyond the pale of society for the rest of her life. But that weighed little against her love for Richard. She loved him too much, wanted him too much, to deny herself that love because society would disapprove. The sin of it worried her, but Jessica found it hard to believe in her heart that the love she felt for Richard was a sin. As for the regard of society, she knew that she could live without it. And, thanks to the General’s generous gift, she could afford to ignore the opinion of the world. Even after their affair ended, she would be able to live comfortably and not have to depend on someone’s else approval of her to earn her keep—for it would end one day, she did not fool herself in that regard. Men grew tired of mistresses; desire faded. He might someday decide to marry in order to carry his line forward. And she would be cast aside.

It was not a pleasant prospect, but she did not flinch from it, either. The love she held in her heart for him—the joy of expressing that love—those made the possibility of an empty life afterward bearable.

She pushed aside the thought and rose to face the day. Whatever came, she would face it gladly.

* * *

Two hours later, Jessica was sitting in Gabriela’s room, struggling through the intricacies of algebraic equations with her, when she heard the sound of a commotion in the hall. It was one of the maids, and she was talking loudly, almost frantically.

Jessica jumped up and went into the hall, followed closely by Gabriela. She found two maids there, talking, and they turned excitedly to her.

“Oh, miss!” one of them exclaimed, as though glad to turn the problem over to someone else. “It’s the minister.”

“Reverend Radfield?” Jessica asked, anxiety gripping her. “Is there something wrong with him?”

“No. Leastways, I don’t know. But I knocked on his door with a tray of breakfast, and he din’t answer, so I pushed the door open—and he was gone. No sign of him.”

“Perhaps he got up early and went downstairs.”

“No, miss, he wasn’t with the others what ate early at the table. And he likes his breakfast in his room, he told me.” She colored faintly, and Jessica suspected the girl had formed an affection for the handsome man of the cloth. “I think somethin’s happened to him. There’s strange things goin’ on here, miss. I never seen anything like it before.”

“Let’s look in his room.” Jessica walked down the hall to Radfield’s room and knocked on the door, followed by the maids and Gabriela.

When there was no answer to her knock, she opened the door and went in. The bed was still turned down, obviously slept in, but there was no sign of personal belongings, such as brushes or shaving kit, on the dresser. Frowning, Jessica walked over to the wardrobe and opened it. No clothes hung inside.

“Do you know—had the reverend taken out any of his clothing?”

“Oh, yes, miss, he kept some things in the dresser there.”

A quick search of the dresser drawers revealed that all were empty, stripped of his belongings. Jessica glanced at the corner, where a trunk and a bag sat. “Did he have any other baggage?”

“Yes, miss, a cloth bag, smaller, like, than those.”

Clearly that piece of luggage was missing.

“I think our reverend may have scarpered,” Jessica said inelegantly, and left the room.

She found Cleybourne in his study, and when she entered the room, he looked up and a smile spread across his mouth, his eyes warming. “Jessica…”

He stood up, seeing now the little frown between her brows. “What is it? Is something the matter?”

“Reverend Radfield is not in his room. He seems to have left.”

Richard looked at her blankly. “The house? You’re saying he left the house?”

Jessica nodded. “So it appears. The maid did not find him there when she took up his breakfast this morning, and it seems that one of his bags and several items of clothing are missing. I think he ran away.”