Page 30 of The Soldier
“Thank you, Hadrian.” Her smile was gracious, but the earl, watching her closely, saw a hint of something—regret, sorrow, sadness?—in her eyes. “Bronwyn, shall we take the tray and mugs back to the kitchen?”
“Leave it,” the earl ordered, watching the vicar disappear into the woods. “I take it the vicarage is somewhere in the vicinity of your cottage?”
“Just the other side of the hill. Two vicars ago, we had a fellow here with ten children, and the little place by the church was just too modest. The old earl had the present manse built, and the house by the church is now the parish hall.”
“And Bothwell is your nearest neighbor.”Lovely.
“You are my nearest neighbor, my lord. Winnie, would you mind taking these gloves into the tack room, and I thought you were going to offer the carrots to the horses?”
“If Stevens says the horses are cool enough,” the earl added then turned his gaze back to Emmie. “Shall we get it over with?”
“I beg your pardon?” She kept her eyes on Winnie’s retreating form.
“Isn’t this where you apologize for your lamentable lapse of composure last night and I assure you it is already forgotten?”
“Is it?” She sounded hopeful. “Forgotten, I mean?”
“It is not.” He grinned unrepentantly. “The feel of a lovely woman in my arms has become too rare a treat to banish from memory. Even your hair smells luscious.”
Emmie frowned. “Why?”
“Because you use scented soap, I suppose.” His tone was admirably solemn.
“No.” Emmie shook her head and raised a serious gaze to his. “Why has the company of a pretty woman become rare? You’re handsome, wealthy, titled, well connected, and without significant faults. You even have a recipe for apple tarts and are patient with children. Why aren’t you surrounded with pretty women?”
“It’s complicated, Emmie.” He realized too late he’d used her given name but wasn’t about to apologize for it. “When you are the son of duke, you are a target for any ambitious woman. My brother’s last mistress went so far as to conceive a child with somebody who resembled him in hopes she would find herself with a ring on her finger.” And he ought to be apologizing for such a disclosure to a lady of Emmie’s gentility, except she looked intrigued more than shocked.
“My lands! Whatever became of such a creature?”
“With my brother’s prompting, the child’s father married her, and they are in anticipation of a happy event on the lovely little estate Westhaven deeded them as a wedding present. My point is that the women trying to spend time with me wanted something I was not prepared to give.”
“And what of other women?” Emmie asked, a blush suffusing her face. “The women like my aunt and my mother?”
“Coin I have to give, but the interest in such an arrangement was lacking on my part.” It was on the tip of his tongue to say what popped into his mind:I’ve seen too much of rape.
But Emmie’s gaze was downcast, and he couldn’t say those words to her. She was too good, too honest, and too innocent for him to burden her with such violent confidences, though he stored the thought away for his own consideration later.
“Come.” He rose and angled his arm out. “Let’s retrieve the prodigy and repair to the manor. If we put her in a tub full of lavender bubbles now, she might be clean enough to join us by supper time.”
“I’m not as fragile as you think,” Emmie said as they strolled along. He gazed over at her curiously, but kept walking. “I’m not as fragile, or as virtuous, or as… You could have told me, whatever you just didn’t say. You could have told me.”
He stopped but kept his eyes on the wood some distance from them. It was almost as if she considered his reticence not a courtesy but a rejection, and that he could not abide.
“Women can be victimized in ways men cannot be, as you are no doubt aware. When the victimizing is blatantly violent, it can raise the question why any woman would ever have anything to do with any man.”
“What do you mean?”
“Ah, Emmie…” He dropped her arm and paced off a few feet. “After a siege, the generals would let the troops storm a city. Those fellows whom you’ve seen parade about so smartly in their regimentals become animals, murdering, looting, and worse, until strong measures are taken to curb their behaviors. It’s tactical, as each city so abused is an inspiration for the next one to capitulate without resistance.”
“So even a man’s base urges become a weapon for the Crown. His own commanders set him up to lose his dignity, his humanity.”
“War sets him up.”
“Were you one of those so used?”
“I was not.” He shook his head and risked a glance at her over his shoulder. “I was one of the stern measures applied to bring back order when the looting, pillaging, and rapine were done, but that could be as much as several days after breaching the walls.”
Emmie’s fingers threaded through his, and he felt her head on his shoulder. “So after turning a place into hell on earth, the generals expected you to restore it to civilization.”
