Page 26 of The Banished Bride
Alex watchedher disappear into the shadows.Nice, he repeated to himself. A number of ladies had paid him far more gilded compliments, but he didn’t think any of the glittering phrases had affected him nearly as much as that simple word.
He leaned back against the cold stone, keenly aware that a twist of her silky curls no longer tickled the underneath of his chin. The emptiness there left him feeling … bereft. She had fitted into the crook of his arm like the piece of a missing puzzle.
And what adjectives might he choose to describe her? His fingers came up to rub along the line of his jaw. Mere words seemed inadequate to describe the whole of her. With a harried sigh, he realized that, if pressed, the first might have to be ‘bewitching’—too damn bewitching for his own peace of mind! From there, the list could go on to fill a ream of foolscap.
But ‘compassionate,’ ‘intelligent,’ ‘generous,’ ‘loyal’ and ‘kind’ were also among those that immediately sprung to mind. Some careful questioning had managed to coax from her a few more details about the so-called Sprague Agency for Distressed Females. Alex found himself shifting rather uncomfortably against the damp wall. He had never stopped to consider the differences between men and women except in terms of mere physical attributes. Her halting tales had opened his eyes, bothto the hardships and injustices suffered by many females and to the deeper, more complex facets of her own character.
The clues were scattered at random throughout her conversation, but he was skilled enough at deduction to have guessed at the truth, or at least part of it. He was sure that despite her show of toughness, she had been deeply wounded by the men in her life. An unfeeling father, a hopeless husband. Rejection—even by those who deserved no regard—hurt, as he knew all too well.
Most people used their own private pain as an excuse to retreat, to give up on life. Aurora Sprague had used it as a challenge. She had had refused to knuckle under to despair, nor to give in to the strictures of Society. She had fought back with rare courage, and each of her small victories had helped validate the struggle, as well as to relieve the suffering of another. And through it all, she had not become dried and bitter, but had maintained a vitality and sense of humor.
Alex had met a number of extraordinary men through the course of his soldiering, but he didn’t think he admired any of them more than he did the young lady who had fallen, quite literally, into his lap.
A glimmer of a smile flashed at the memory. Then his eyes pressed closed and lightness gave way to darkness. Would that he might remain blind to what else she had forced him to see! While the mirror of Aurora’s words had revealed a good deal about herself, they had also made him take a close look at the full reflection of his own character.
It was not an image of which he was proud.
As a soldier and a gentleman he could hold his head high. By anyone’s standards, including his own, he had not lacked for honor, integrity or courage in how he had comported himself.But as a husband?In that regard he had exhibited naught but cowardice and dereliction of duty, shirking all responsibility forhis actions. The brutal truth of it was, Aurora had made him see he was little better than any of the other louts who so casually inflicted caused pain because Society said they had the legal and moral right to do so.
Oh, his own cruelty had, of course, been more subtle than anything physical, but no less reprehensible. Why, in all the years since that fateful ceremony, he had hardly given more than a passing thought to the person who bore his name. His only concern had been for his own wants and needs. Never for a moment had he paused to wonder what her hopes, her dreams, her fears might be.
His jaw tightened. Under military law, he deserved to be shot. The real world, however, was a good deal more lenient to men of title and privilege. No, the only one who would judge his transgressions harshly was himself, and only punishment he would suffer was the shame of knowing that he deserved Aurora’s scorn rather than her admiration.
Somehow, he doubted ‘nice’ would be the adjective that came to mind if she knew the truth.
He stepped out from under the thatched eaves and held his face up to the driving rain, wishing it could wash his conscience clean. It was some time before he went back inside the cottage, dripping wet and chilled to the very marrow.
The two menrode out just after first light, one heading north toward Ayr, the other turning south in the direction of Girvan. Aurora had shaken out the rolls of bedding, washed the tin bowls and swept the earthen floor. Twice. She poked her head out the door and glowered at the leaden skies. It hardly looked promising weather for a walk, and in any case, she had been asked not to stray from the cottage, to avoid attracting any notice from the occasional passing shepherd.
Actually, that was not entirely correct—Jack had asked her, while Alex had simply barked a curt command to stay put.
Hmmph! As if it had been necessary to add the last little bit about trying not to get into any mischief that might jeopardize the mission! The nerve of the insufferable man! As ifshehad been the one to accost the wrong suspect, or swoon so that they had to put up at an inn where one of the enemy might find them. With another sniff of indignation, she banged the door shut and stalked across the room to fetch her reticule. Perhaps she might find a piece of embroidery or clutch of knitting buried in its depths, she thought rather acidly, so that she might be seen to be engaged in a proper feminine pursuit when he returned!
And pigs might fly!
It was as if the words and the warmth that had passed between them last night had been no more than a fleeting dream. Alex had been brusque over tea and toast, his eyes studiously avoiding any contact with hers. There had been no invitation to participate in the brief strategy session, only a series of terse orders that had sent Jack scurrying for the door.
Had he regretted revealing that a soldier was not all steel, grit and a blaze of scarlet and polished brass? Did he think that his humanity made him somehow too vulnerable? Or perhaps on further reflection, he had simply taken a disgust of her and her radical ideas and actions. No doubt, if he were to choose an ideal female, she would be obedient, sweet-tempered and enchantingly incapable of lifting a finger to do anything save summoning her maid.
Men!If all of them were so blasted quixotic in their moods, perhaps she was better off without one.
Her own mood turning even sourer, Aurora sat down at the table and began to pick out the shards of broken glass from her reticule. The tedious task was nearly done when her fingers brushed up against the spine of a book. She fished it out andregarded the gilt stamped title. It was not one of her own choices, so Robbie must have taken it into her head to add one of those horrid novels she so favored to the bag. Well, it promised to be a long day, so she might as well take a peek.
Several hours later, as the last page was turned, Aurora shifted to ease the crick in her neck. Well, that wasn’t quite as silly as she had imagined, even though the heroine was a bit too flighty for her taste and the hero lacked a dash of …
A dash of what?She looked up from the book and propped her hand in her chin, giving the question her full attention. The gentleman in the story had no more depth to him than the paper of printed page, she decided. He was so flat and one-dimensional that she imagined in the space of a short time, his charm would wear rather thin.
No, the sort of man able to bring the heat to her cheeks would need a good deal more substance to him. More mystery, more complexity, more surprises. She paused as a small voice in the back of head added that a shock of raven hair and sparkling sapphire eyes would be not be amiss, either.
The cover of the novel closed with a decided snap. The notion that Alex Woodmore might cause any warmth to stir within her was only because the thought of him was, at the moment, making her blood boil. Oh, there was no denying that he was sinfully attractive, and that his kiss had ignited all sorts of strange sparks inside her that refused to die out. But he was also arrogant, overbearing and altogether infuriating, she reminded herself.
Hardly the stuff of storybook heroes.
Fingering the cording of the slim leather spine, she heaved a sigh and glanced around the room. It would still be some time before the two men could be expected home so she supposed there was nothing to do but fetch some other reading material from her valise.
Then her eyes fell on the battered canvas sack in the corner. Earlier in the morning, as she had straightened up the Alex’s things, she had noticed the corner of a book sticking out from among his belongings. She couldn’t help but be curious about what sort of writings he would favor. Homer? Virgil? The poetry of Wordsworth? Surely he wouldn’t mind if she took a quick peek. Of course, it might only turn out to be some dry treatise on military theory, but anything would help to relieve the tedium of confinement.
The binding was frayed, noted Aurora as she drew the slim volume out of the sack, its faded cloth dusty and faintly discolored with spatters of rain and salt spray. There was no printing of any kind on the front or the spine. It wasn’t until she opened to the first page that the title appeared, the letters large and bold in a strange, sinuous typeface.The Kama Sutra. Underneath, in smaller print was written, A Manual on the Divine Mysteries of Love from the Continent of India.
