His impulse to protect people, to be a hero, was knit into his very bones. He’d put others before himself no matter the sacrifice it took. Would he regret it one day? Would he regret saving her?
If she had not agreed to marry him, he might already be on his way to France or the Netherlands or Italy or wherever he needed to go to heal his heart. He could have hired a sensible fellow to help finish the dower house, a man who would have gotten the work done and left, and then Atlas would have, too. Across the channel.
It seemed rather unfair, her entire position in his life an imposition. That was one reason she’d begun to make the chair. A sort of apology, an attempt to give comfort when she’d only ever given him more weary work.
No matter how much work they completed on the house, there remained, always, somehow, something else to do.
Somehow? She knew how. Atlas. He’d begun to play a game he thought she could not decipher.
Every time she thought she’d finished something with the house, Atlas would find some flaw that needed attention. He’d pulled down and replaced the molding three separate times. It looked fine to her. Had looked fine the three times he’d pulled it down. They’d had to slow down to add more ornamentation to the mantelpiece. The newel post was not steady enough, he claimed. And then he’d suggested the window seats could be wider because a mother and child might wish to read a book together there. And then he’d requested ornamentation for those seats. And then he’d wondered aloud if the window should be bigger or if there should be another one. And she’d had to kiss that idea right out of his head.
She’d cried at Christmas because she was keeping him where he did not wish to be, so now he pretended their job was never done. For her. To sweep away her guilt, she supposed.
She ran a hand down the chair arm, the stained wood satin beneath her fingertips. She’d copied the design from one for a library chair she’d seen in an old copy ofAckermann’sthat had fallen from Franny’s desk in her private parlor. The desk was stuffed, overflowing, and she constantly shoved more items into its overpacked, paper-wailing drawers. So many old copies ofAckermann’s, most with ink and watercolor satirical prints on their pages, drawn by a man named Sir George. Still other bits of paper that exploded from it on occasion possessed even lines and musical notes—Atlas’s songs printed by the London presses. The woman hoarded the paper bits of her children’s lives.
Clara stepped away from the chair. It was good. The modifications she’d made to the design using Sheraton’sCabinet-Makerhad elevated the piece. The square shape much bigger than those usually littering libraries and parlors, the arms sloping low from back to front to open up the space between them more fully. The padding she’d sewn into the seat, back, and sides, much thicker than usual. The seat itself wider, almost humorously wide, almost a bench, allowing a big man to adjust his body as necessary to find comfort. She’d used fabric from a set of matching chairs that had been ruined beyond saving. The upholstery had been salvageable, though, a lovely dark blue. She’d used satinwood. Expensive, to be sure. And difficult to come by on her own, but Zander had helped her procure some from London. She’d sold more of her jewelry to Frampton & Son’s to afford it. Worth every bit of trouble and expense. The wood’s warm golden glow was exactly what Atlas needed. And it accepted well the small oil paintings along the edges—musical notes.
The sky outside the window spread far in the unrelieved blue of spring, and her little labor of… of admiration and gratitude sat complete.
But where was Atlas? He should have arrived some time ago. He’d remained at the big house to help Raph erect a maypole for tomorrow. His mother, Matilda, Fiona, and several of the women from the nearby village had decorated it yesterday, painting its length with bold colors and flowers and affixing the ribbons. Alfie had helped, drawing small soldier figures in a stripe of dried scarlet paint. Clara had helped, too, adding a stripe of yellow. For sun, for life, for how Atlas made her feel—full of light.
The chair seemed to warm the air around her, make it fizz and pop. Where had Atlas got to? She found her pelisse, more for propriety’s sake than for warmth, and stuffed her arms inside it as she left the dower house. Once she buttoned it up, no one would be able to tell she wore man’s clothing. As long as she didn’t stride as fully as the pants allowed.
Beyond the garden hedge, she saw him, hands shoved into pockets, a lock of hair falling over one eye, his gait long and strong, not a single hitch. She’d been massaging his leg with oil after his baths. Mostly to care for him as no one else could, to thank him for so much sacrifice, but also because as she pressed her fingers up and down his magnificent thigh, his shaft leapt to life, and then they put it to good use. The scent of the lavender oil had begun to cling to them both.
He kissed her when he reached her, his hands somehow all over her all at once, caressing her backside, smoothing up her spine, giving her neck a gentle squeeze before threading through her hair. The other hand’s journey much shorter, cupping her cheek and staying there as if it had found a home, his thumb rubbing sparking lines up and down the length of her jaw. His hands, his touch swallowed her whole, and his mouth devoured her. No tame midday kiss, this. A revelation that left her breathless.
When he pulled away, she wavered, falling against his chest as he chuckled into her hair.
“Where have you been?” Her voice raspy with desire.
“Helping Mother. Took longer than expected. Raph got several ribbons wrapped round him, and they wouldn’t come off. He looked like a belligerent dog on a fashionable young lady’s lead.” He chuckled, nuzzled the top of her head. “I’m here now.” He tipped her chin up so he could look into her face. “Do you need my help with anything?”
The pulsing between her legs demanded his attention, but she put herself out of his arms and smoothed her skirts, tamed her rioting heart, and tugged through the garden back toward the dower house. “I’d like to show you something.”
“Have you finished a room?” A curious flatness to his tone.
“No, but?—”
“Do you hear that?”
She tugged harder. “Just wheels, an approaching cart or similar. Come.”
“Could be one of my brothers.” A smile in his voice as he pulled her around the side of the house where the road passed by. A carriage lumbered down it, black and shiny and with a golden crest painted on the side.
Clara choked on a gasp and pressed closer to Atlas’s side, her body running to numb all at once.
“I don’t think we know whoever that is,” Atlas said. “Perhaps it’s one of my father’s old friends come to?—”
“It’s Lord Tefler.” She knew the crest, a relatively new affectation of stars and stag created by Lord Tefler in his youth to elevate the family name. She ripped from Atlas’s side and ran to the back of the house. The garden offered some protection, but— “No!” She ran harder, out of the garden, her legs pumping quick toward Briarcliff.
Heavy bootsteps behind her, catching up. A strong grip around her shoulder, swinging her around.
She jerked out of his hold. “I must get to Alfie.”
“Are you… sure… it’s him?” Atlas panted between words, his long legs keeping pace with her.
“Yes!”
