A Summer to Remember

Chapter 17

He knew exactly where he would take her. It involved walking beside the lake on the house side and passing all the children and youngsters and a few adults splashing and shrieking in the water while others stood or sat on the bank watching. As he had fully expected, Freyja was in the water, swimming with strong strokes farther out than anyone else. Ralf was leaning indolently against a tree trunk, talking with Lady Muir. Both turned and lifted a hand in greeting.

Kit was surprised to discover that he had no wish to jump in and frolic with everyone else, that he felt no urge to race Freyja to some predetermined point. He had wondered—yes, indeed he had, even after two visits to Lindsey Hall. Even after the horse race. He had wondered if seeing her again would rekindle his passion for her. He had wondered it even this afternoon when she had ridden up with Ralf and Alleyne and had thrown all her considerable energy into playing cricket. He had wondered even as he had known that now he must marry Lauren.

But a strange thing had happened during the course of the match. He had thoroughly enjoyed the competition with Freyja, the bantering challenges and exchange of insults. He had felt almost as if time had regressed and he was a boy again, she a girl. He had felt for her all the exuberant camaraderie of old with none of the madness that had gripped him during those dreadful weeks three years ago. He had enjoyed the cricket match, yet all the time as he concentrated on making the game fun for the children and challenging for his older cousins, he was aware of Lauren. He was aware of her sitting cool and ladylike on the blanket, pretty in her light muslin dress and straw bonnet, watching the game. He was aware of her the moment she got to her feet and was tugged off in the direction of the swing by Sarah. He was aware of her playing there with the child and attracting other little ones into her orbit.

He had been amazed by the tenderness of his feelings for her. He was not accustomed to feeling tenderness for women. He did not quite understand the feeling. Yet he liked it. Perhaps, he thought, this was what women meant when they spoke of romance—something warm and gentle and enticing. Perhaps he was involved in a romance with Lauren Edgeworth. His first. Though of course there was more to it than just that—there had been last night.

“Are you sure you do not wish to swim with everyone else?” she asked him. “I do not mind if you do. You must not feel honor-bound to remain with me. I am dull company for someone like you, I know.”

For someone so beautiful and with such impeccable manners and breeding she had a remarkably low image of herself.

“Allow me to be the judge of that,” he said, adjusting their clasped hands so that their fingers were laced. “Lauren, did Baron Galton make no attempt to learn of the fate of your mother? Did the late Earl of Kilbourne make none to discover what happened to his brother?”

She shook her head. “How would it have been possible to discover anything?” she asked. “The world is a large place to search.”

But two members of the British aristocracy would not go unnoticed wherever they went.

“So there was no finality for any of you,” he said.

“It does not matter. I do not think of it.” A lie if ever he had heard one. She was looking down at the grass over which they walked, her face hidden behind the wide brim of her straw bonnet.

“I have connections, you know,” he said. “Men whose business it is to uncover what is hidden, to learn what is seemingly impossible to know. I could call in a few favors. I could set an inquiry afoot. Shall I do it?”

She turned her head sharply then. Her eyes were wide and very deeply violet. “You would do that,” she asked, “for me? Even though if there is anything to discover, it could not be done until long after we part?”

She had been quite adamant last night that she would not marry him even though she had lain with him. Foolishly adamant—she might be with child.

“You have done a great deal for me,” he said. “Allow me to do something in return.”

“Have I?” She had stopped walking. Her eyes were brimming with tears. “But I wish there did not have to be so much deception involved, Kit. I like your family so very much—your mother, your grandmother. Everyone.”

“There is no need for any deception at all,” he said gently. “We could announce our wedding date at Grandmama’s birthday. Not an imaginary occasion. The real thing.”

She shook her head.

“Are you so irrevocably attached to him, then?” he asked. He was beginning to be irritated no end by the Earl of Kilbourne, though he had never met the man.

She shook her head again. “It was our bargain,” she said. “A way out of a tangle for you, freedom for me. Don’t spoil everything, Kit. All I wanted of the summer was a little adventure.”

It was rather lowering to know that she would not marry him simply because she did not wish to do so. But she had never pretended otherwise. He was the fool if he was allowing himself to be beguiled by a summer romance.

He smiled at her and began walking again. “You cannot blame a gentleman for having a conscience,” he said. “We will devote ourselves to the adventure, then. You see that piece of land jutting into the lake up ahead?” He pointed toward it. “It is an island actually. Man-made, of course, as is the lake. We will go there. There is a boat.”

“Thank you,” she said.

He did not know for what he was being thanked. But he was content to stroll onward in companionable silence and to look forward to relaxing on the island with her. The boat was still in its accustomed place, he discovered when they arrived at the little boathouse, and it was in good repair. The pile of towels that had always been kept on a shelf was still there too, and they looked fresh and clean. He took two of them. He rowed the short distance across the water while Lauren sat, relaxed and elegant on the narrow bench opposite him, one hand on the side of the boat for balance. He helped her out on the other side and dragged the boat clear of the water.

On the side of the island farthest from the house there was a wide bank, almost like a small meadow, sloping gently to the water’s edge. It was grass-covered and carpeted with daisies and buttercups and clover. They waded ankle-deep through the wildflowers, and Lauren sat down in the midst of them, clasped her arms about her knees, and gazed about her.

“I was never really fond of the outdoors,” she said with a contented sigh.

“But now you are?”

“Yes.” Her eyes squinted at the bright water.

Kit did not sit down. It was a hot afternoon. He had engaged in an energetic game of cricket, they had walked some distance, and he had just rowed the boat across the lake. He peeled his shirt off over his head, dragged off his boots, and pulled off his pantaloons. He hesitated only a moment before removing his drawers too. Lauren watched him lazily. Just a few days ago, he thought, she would have been bristling with embarrassment and outrage.

“You are very beautiful,” she surprised him by saying.

He chuckled. “Despite all the scars?”

“Yes,” she said.

He splashed into the water and immersed himself. It felt deliciously cool against his hot, naked flesh. He swam several strokes underwater and then surfaced and shook the drops from his eyes. She was still sitting among the flowers, as pretty as any picture, looking cool and unruffled, her face shaded by the wide brim of her bonnet. But she untied the ribbons beneath her chin even as he watched, and let the hat fall backward to the grass while she shook out her dark curls.

He had swum out beyond his depth. He trod water, his arms spread to the sides, watching her take off her shoes and stockings and then get to her feet to unbutton and remove her dress. Her shift clung to her slender curves. He gazed appreciatively at her, marveling that today there was none of the maidenly modesty that had had her undressing inside the folly and then huddling under a blanket to the very water’s edge on the two mornings they had bathed.

And then his lips pursed in sudden shock as she crossed her arms and drew the shift off over her head before dropping it onto the small pile of her other clothing. Naked, she was perfection itself—youthfully taut flesh and muscles; firm, uptilted breasts; long, slender legs, dark hair at their apex. She came down the bank and waded into the water, her eyes on it rather than on him, though she made no attempt to cover herself. Her flesh was pure alabaster in the bright sunlight. He felt his mouth turn dry and moistened his lips before diving under again and surfacing beside her.

He did not touch her. She did not touch him. They smiled at each other and she closed her eyes and lay back on the water. She floated easily and kicked her feet lazily to propel herself backward. He swam a slow crawl at her side.

Did she realize, he wondered, how much she had changed during the short time she had spent at Alvesley? How far she had stepped out from behind her ice maiden mask? Lauren Edgeworth bathing naked in broad daylight with a naked man? Her friends and his would not believe it possible. Could it really be true that she wanted this for only a brief summer out of her life, that she would freely choose to return to her old self as soon as it was over?

“If I try to put my feet down,” she asked, turning her head to look at him after a few minutes, “will I be able to?”

He gauged their distance from the bank. “Probably not,” he said. “But don’t be afraid. You will not sink unless you choose to do so. And I will rescue you even if you do.”

“I am not afraid,” she said. “Kit, teach me to swim like that. Let me try again.”

He turned her over onto her front, his hands skimming sleek, cool flesh. It was as if she moved in that charmed, magic world she had been spinning for the children. This afternoon she could put her face in the water without panicking and breathe without gulping in water instead of air. And today she could kick her feet close to the surface so that her efforts to move forward were not in vain. She learned the arm motions for a crawl in a trice. Within ten minutes she was actually swimming—in water that was at least eight feet deep.

“At this speed,” he said, swimming beside her, “you could probably make it across to the main bank in twenty-four hours. Twenty-three if you did not stop for a rest halfway.”

“Mock on,” she said breathlessly. She probably had more to say, but she needed all her breath and concentration for the task at hand.

He turned her onto her back again after a while, and they floated side by side, her hand in his. He could not remember feeling so relaxed, so contented, so filled with a sense of well-being since . . . Well, perhaps he had never felt this way.

He closed his eyes and soaked up the warmth of the sun on his face and its brightness on his eyelids.

“Some moments,” he said, “should be made to last forever.”

“Mmmm,” she agreed.

But the moments and the truant hour would pass all too quickly, of course. Although their status as a newly betrothed couple gave them much license to spend time alone together, there were limits. Soon enough they must return to the house and all the busy merriment of the house party.

The air felt cool against wet flesh when they came out of the water and climbed the bank. Cool but not cold. The heat of the sun would dry them in no time at all. He spread their towels on the grass and lay down on one. He expected that now she no longer had the water for cover Lauren would wrap the towel about herself and perhaps sit a little apart from him, prim and self-conscious again. He half expected that she would dress as quickly as possible and want to return to the boat.

But she lay down naked on the towel beside him, covered her eyes with one arm, and raised one leg to set her foot flat on the ground, an inviting pose that was undoubtedly unconscious. He turned his head and then raised himself on one elbow for a better look. All the mistresses he had ever had and all the casual amours had been voluptuously built—it was one criterion by which he had chosen them. Generous curves and full, heavy breasts aroused him sexually—and of course mistresses were for sex.

Lauren Edgeworth was slender and long-limbed. When she lay on her back her breasts appeared even smaller than usual, though they were nicely shaped and rose-tipped. Her abdomen was flat. Her legs were slim and shapely. He felt a pleasurable tightening in his groin and realized with rueful humor that if she removed her arm from her eyes she would surely understand her danger in a moment.

She was without a doubt one of the loveliest women he had ever set eyes upon. But he had known that even as far back as Lady Mannering’s ball—no, farther back. In Hyde Park, despite the fact that he had had only one functioning eye, he had noticed and appreciated her extraordinary beauty.

But she was more than beautiful. She was . . . sexy. Was there such a word? If there was not, there should be. Without any of the obvious allure of a courtesan, her body nevertheless invited a man to sex. Yet there was nothing erotic about either her body itself or her character. What was it?

Was he the privileged witness to long-repressed womanhood blossoming forth into glorious femininity? Was he the instrument through which it was happening? Did he have that honor? He knew for a certainty that she had never done anything remotely resembling this ever before. Even if he had been in any doubt of that fact—though he had not—he had encountered the proof of it last night. She had been a virgin.

His eyes moved down her slim, quite unvoluptuous, sexy body. He desired her every bit as much as he had ever desired a woman. Perhaps more. But she would not marry him. She did not want to. He must not . . . He had already endangered her once last night. He must not trap her into losing the freedom she clearly prized. He must not be that selfish, that undisciplined.

She moved her arm away from her eyes and turned her head to smile up at him.

“Kit,” she said, her lovely eyes warm and dreamy, “ this is what I meant at Vauxhall. Just this, though I did not even know it myself at the time. This—the sunlight on my face. I have never allowed it there before—it might ruin my complexion. The sounds of water and birds and insects—thousands of them chirping and droning away. Sometimes I forget that the world is alive. Sometimes I think there are only humans here and maybe horses and cows and sheep. And the smell of water and grass and flowers. The flowers, Kit. They are weeds—daisies and clover and buttercups. But they are more lovely than anything else in the universe. And . . . and myself a part of it all. I have always been a spectator of life, you know, never a participant. Never. But now I am. Today I am, and I am awed and deliriously happy. This is the adventure I asked for, the adventure I am having. I will be forever grateful to you.”

He swallowed. He felt absurdly close to tears. He fought his arousal and hoped she had not noticed. She had spoken the simple truth. He could tell that just by looking into her eyes and seeing her as part of her surroundings. She was a part of it all, one with the sunshine and water, with the grass and flowers, with the birds and the chirping insects. Like a wood nymph or a water nymph. Like a sprite or a goddess.

He knew beyond all doubt that this was one of life’s precious moments and that it would remain with him for the rest of his life. It was one treasure that his memory would hoard for future comfort. He must do nothing to spoil it.

“Kit.” She reached up a hand and touched his cheek with light, cool fingertips. “Do what you did to me last night. I want it again. Just one more time, here among the flowers, under the summer sun. It would be lovely here, would it not? If you want to, that is. Perhaps you do not.”

He leaned over her and set his lips to hers. She tasted of cool lake water and warm summertime. She tasted of innocence and awakened womanhood. She tasted of the enchanted land beyond the treetops. He ought to remind her of reality—of the fact that women were frequently impregnated during the act of sex. That pregnant women must marry their seducers even if they loved elsewhere, even if they craved freedom.

But that enchanted land beckoned him too. Indeed, he was already immersed in it, in flower-dappled grass and clover fragrance and warm summer sunshine and bee-song. This was what she had meant. This was what she had yearned for. Just this fleeting, magic moment—to be grasped or to be lost forever. He raised his head an inch or two above hers and she smiled dreamily at him. He smiled back.

Last night had been for him. He had poured out all his deepest pain to her, telling her Syd’s story and his, and then he had reached out to her for physical comfort, which she had given generously, warmly, unstintingly, gifting him with her very self. This afternoon would be for her.

He loved her slowly with his hands and with his mouth, using all the expertise learned over the years with other women, but adapting it all just for her. She was not a woman of wild passion—not yet, at least. She was a woman who needed tenderness and gentleness. He gave her both as his hands and mouth roamed her body, feathering, stroking, lightly scratching and pinching, licking, sucking, gently biting—choosing the erotic spots that would give her most pleasure. Her hands roamed his shoulders, his back, his chest—gently, inexpertly. He was accustomed to women who knew unerringly how to heighten and satisfy his passion. Lauren knew not a single one of their many tricks. But her very inexpertness brought him to full-blown, almost painful arousal.

He loved her with almost desperate tenderness. He kissed her mouth with soft, deep kisses, licking warmly inside while the fingers of one of his hands explored the moist heat between her legs, parting folds, seeking, penetrating, feeling her muscles close about him. With his thumb he found the secret part of her womanhood and stroked her there until she whispered a surprised exhalation into his mouth and shuddered into a spasm of pleasure.

“Do you want me inside?” he murmured to her.

“Yes.” She circled him with her arms. “Oh, yes. Do it to me—like last night.”

“Not quite like last night.” The long grass and nodding flowers might give the appearance of a soft carpet, but they would make a hard mattress for a woman in the act of love. “Come.” He lifted her over him and parted her legs to straddle his own. “Kneel up on the grass. Trust me.”

“Yes.” She kneeled astride him and braced herself with her hands on either side of his head. She looked down at him and smiled, her eyes heavy with desire.

He raised his knees and set his feet flat. He positioned her carefully, nestling himself against her opening before bracing his hands over her hips and guiding her down onto him. He watched her eyes close as she first frowned and then relaxed. Her muscles tightened about him as he held deep in her for a few moments to allow her time to adjust. She was hot and wet and exquisitely feminine. He drew a few steadying breaths. He was unaccustomed to having to impose control on himself after making his mount. It was the point at which, after long minutes of vigorous foreplay, he usually gave himself up to a frenzied climax.

Except last night. But then last night had not really been about sex at all.

Neither was this afternoon. This was not sex—not as he knew sex, anyway. This was . . . what was it? A warm, intimate, tender sharing of—of what?

He raised her a little with his hands and began to pump slowly, smoothly, in and out of her. She held still, though her inner muscles picked up his rhythm, responded inexpertly at first, and then matched it. The sensation was delicious and painful both at once. He wanted to prolong the pleasure indefinitely. He wanted to give in and explode into her right now.

Most of all, he wanted to give her all the pleasure twenty-six years of living had denied her. He wanted this to be for her. Not for himself but for Lauren. He wanted to see her totally, utterly happy.

He stroked her with smooth, deep strokes for many minutes, not attempting to hasten the ending, as he might easily have done by touching her again in that small, secret place. He could see from her closed eyes and parted lips and look of concentration that all her attention was focused in the passage that he worked, and that she was greatly enjoying the sensations. Perhaps that was all she would experience, but he would not shatter it until he could sense that she was ready.

Then she frowned again and her eyes clenched more tightly shut and she drew her lower lip between her teeth. She lost rhythm and tightened hard about him. She opened her mouth and gasped.

“Relax now,” he told her. “Relax those muscles and let yourself go.” He tightened his hands over her hips and worked her with harder, faster thrusts. “Let it all come. Trust me.”

But there was no need for instruction, no need for him to coach her to climax. She cried out and shattered about him and collapsed her weight onto him. He wrapped both arms protectively about her. She was still pulsing and trembling.

“Let it all go,” he murmured against her ear. “Let it all come.”

He had never had to concern himself with feminine orgasms. He was usually too intent upon his own.

She finally lay still and hot and damp on him. Now, finally, he was free to complete his own pleasure. He moved his hands back to her hips and braced his feet more firmly against the ground—and paused a moment, gritting his teeth.

Then he lifted her off him and turned to set her gently on the towel beside him.

“Mmmm.” The sound was a satisfied purr from deep in her throat as she rolled onto her side and curled in against him and promptly fell asleep.

Kit lay back down and breathed deeply and evenly, clenching and unclenching his hand on the side farthest from her. Several minutes of sheer agony passed before his erection began to subside. He chuckled ruefully when the worst of it was over. In her innocence she doubtless was quite unaware that she was the only one who had completed the act.

As probably he had been last night.

He might well have impregnated her last night. Only time would tell. But if she had escaped during that encounter, then she was still safe today. She would still have choices left when the house party ended. She would still be free to leave him.

He set one arm over his eyes and sought and found her hand with his other. This must not happen again. They were not really betrothed—by her choice. And Lauren Edgeworth was not the sort of woman with whom one indulged in an illicit affair.

Last night she had given to him in his need.

This afternoon he had returned the favor.

That was all. It was completed, this unexpected physical bond forged of both their needs.

Yes, it was completed.

He drew in a slow lungful of clover-fragrant air and let it out on an almost audible sigh.