Page 73 of Tamed By a Passionate Lady
“Did I ever tell you about the first time that I walked along this beach?” he asked suddenly, turning to face her.
She shook her head slowly. “No, my love. You have not.”
He smiled slightly. “It was when I was four years old,” he said slowly, his eyes misty. “It was a day trip, with my father and my mother.” He paused. “My mother was with child, with my brother Harold. I still remember her swollen belly beneath her dark cloak.”
Adaline smiled, feeling a warm glow, overtaking her. He had never talked about his late mother with her before. It was so wonderful that now he was able to share his life with her, the way that she had always wanted him to. She still had to pinch herself that it was real.
“We walked along this sand,” he continued. “My mother collected shells, putting them against my ear so that I could listen to the sea inside them. My father told me everything he knew about the creatures that had once lived inside them. He told me that the shells had been their houses, just like our own, back in Liverpool.”
“What a wonderful memory,” said Adaline, feeling tears prick behind her eyes.
James nodded. “It is. After she died, I often recalled it, and other times that we came here as a family. Somehow, she seemed closer to me here than at home.” He hesitated, gazing at her. “I felt like it was my fault that she died, Adaline. She fell into the Mersey river, trying to save me, when I was only five years old. The awful guilt gnawed at me for years…”
“Oh, my love,” cried Adaline, resting a hand on his shoulder, and squeezing it tightly. “You were just a child! She was only doing what any mother would have done…”
He took a deep breath. “I know that now, but it lingered all my life.” He hesitated. “I think that it is part of the reason that I became so infatuated with Lydia Hayward. She looked very similar to my mother, you see.” He laughed uncomfortably. “The same petite stature, the same colouring. I think that I was unconsciously searching for her, even then…”
Adaline squeezed his shoulder tighter. This was truly heartbreaking to hear. But she knew that it was important for James to speak about it. That it was somehow cathartic, like he was laying it all to rest.
“I know that you are probably still insecure about Lydia,” said James, gazing at her anxiously. “After all, she was the reason that I could never get close to you, for all those years. It would be hard for you to truly let go of it…”
“I have been suffering with it,” she admitted. “I keep telling myself that you are changed, and have finally let go of it, but I must admit I have been worried.” She paused. “She was so very beautiful in her portrait. And so different from me. I cannot help thinking you will always be comparing us in your mind…”
He nodded slowly. “I thought so. And that brings me to one of the reasons that I insisted we come here, now. I want to show you, once and for all, that she is dead to me. That there are no lingering regrets, or feelings, for her.” He paused. “I feel that a symbolic gesture is called for…”
To her surprise, he grabbed the blanket that Groves had placed over his lap, tossing it onto the sand. On his lap was the portrait of Lydia Hayward. The woman’s blue eyes gazed up at her, as if she was measuring her in some way.
Adaline gasped. “What…?”
But James didn’t look at her. With a deep breath, he slowly rose to his feet, clutching the portrait firmly in both hands.
She reeled back, so shocked that for a moment she could not react. He was on his feet, and he was steady. Before her stunned eyes he took a step, then another, walking towards the sea.
Her mouth dropped open. She had no idea that he was able to walk now. And it was not a hesitant, tottering walk. He seemed confident that he knew what he was doing.
She restrained the impulse to rush towards him, to support him. He looked like he was not going to stop; like he was about to wade into the ocean. But at the very edge he stopped, gripping the portrait tightly for a moment.
The next minute he hurled it, as if it was a discus, high into the air. She watched it spinning in the air before it came crashing down, into the sea. With stunned eyes she watched it as it was carried away by the waves, until it was completely gone. It was as if the sea had swallowed it entirely.
He didn’t watch where it landed. Quickly, he turned back to her. His eyes looked like the exact colour of the ocean behind him.
“She is gone,” he said quietly. “Forever. Just as she should have been, long ago.”
She cried out, then, running towards him. They embraced fiercely, hugging each other so tightly that she felt as if he was enveloping her. As if their very bones were melding into each other, and they were no longer two separate entities.
She had felt very close to him before. When they had first made love, at long last, and when he had told her his memory had been recovered. But in this moment, she felt closer to him than she ever had. For it was in this moment that she finally realised that it was all truly over.
He had thrown the portrait away. A symbolic gesture, to show her once and for all how he felt about her. The last of her insecurities unravelled, like a fraying knot, leaping into the sky.
Hedidtruly love her. He no longer felt anything for his lost love. They were finally free to begin anew.
Reuben Montgomery had been dealt with. There were no more threats to their love. Their future together stretched before them, as vast as the ocean, and just as bright.
“Thank you,” she whispered fiercely, into his chest. “Thank you for doing that. It means so much to me…”
“I would do anything for you,” he whispered back, just as fierce. “I would walk over water, if I could, for you. My love is real, and true, Adaline. It is as wide as the ocean, as high as the mountains, as endless as the sky.”
She sobbed, pulling back from him to gaze up into his face.
