Louise Allen Historical Collection Read online

  Someone burst into tears. Meg could hear her father spluttering, but all she could see was Ross’s smile, the passion in his eyes, the utter truth of what he said, written on his face.

  ‘Oh, yes. Yes, I will marry you, Ross Brandon. I love you too much not to.’

  He came to his feet, her hand still in his, and drew it through his arm. ‘Then you have made me far happier than I ever deserve to be.’ He turned them both to face the vicar. ‘Do you wish to be married by your father?’

  She looked across at her father, hoping against hope for the slightest softening, at least the faintest hint of approval or forgiveness, but there was nothing. ‘No,’ she said after a moment. She could not go back, only forwards. ‘I would like to go home. Home to Cornwall. And I would like to be married in our little church by dear Mr Hawkins, with Miss Hawkins playing the organ out of tune, with Lily as my bridesmaid and old Billy to give me away.’

  ‘And William can be best man.’ Ross laughed, his rare, rich, laugh that made her want to laugh too. ‘We will go home tomorrow, my love.’ He looked round the church. ‘Thank you, my friends. If you can help my fiancée, we will be in your debt.’

  Chapter Twenty-One

  ‘All it amounts to is that Bella was seen weeping in the woods, in a place known as The Dell, on a Saturday and came to church the next day looking wan and not her usual self and that was the last anyone saw of her. Oh yes, and was wearing no bonnet when she was seen crying,’ Meg said. ‘And everyone was adamant that there was no man courting Lina.’ She looked at the sheet of notes in Ross’s surprisingly neat handwriting that lay on the table in the corner of the inn’s public tap room.

  They had been there all afternoon, where they could be easily found, had eaten their luncheon there, spoken to the parishioners who slipped in, mostly by the back entrance to avoid the vicar’s eye. It had been many hours, hours when she could not kiss him, touch him, ask him how he had found her or how his mistrust had turned to love. But they could exchange looks and the anticipation was sweet.

  ‘I think we must give up, my love,’ Ross said as he gathered up the sheets of paper. ‘I will leave our direction with the landlord and promise a good reward for any more news he can gather. Here he comes now, with word of our dinner and the parlour I asked him for, I hope.’

  It was snug and private and she went straight into Ross’s arms as the door closed behind them. ‘Oh, Ross. You truly love me? After what happened in London? After what you found out about me?’

  ‘Let me kiss you.’ He bent his head and took her mouth gently, passionately, a slow, lingering caress. ‘I feared I would never be able to do that again.’

  Meg curled her arms around his neck and looked up into his face. His dark, smiling face. ‘When did you realise you loved me?’

  ‘When I thought I had lost you.’ Behind Ross the door opened, banged into his back. ‘That must be our dinner.’ Meg disentangled herself and went to sit at the table, trying to look as though she was not tingling from head to toe with his kiss. Jenny Wilkins bustled in and out until the table was laden and then stood back, gazed at them, gave a gusty sigh and took herself off.

  ‘Oh, Ross, Everyone is enjoying this so much, bless them.’ All except her father, of course. At least he could congratulate himself on being entirely correct about her. First she eloped with a married man and then she made a disgraceful scene in church.

  ‘But not as much as I am.’ Ross carved the chicken while he talked. ‘I thought I had lost you and I did not understand why I felt so bad. It wasn’t anger at you keeping your secret, it was a sensation I had never experienced before. And then I realised why I had been feeling like that for weeks.’

  ‘Weeks?’ Meg helped him to vegetables, feeling ridiculously wifely as she did so. She wanted to be in his arms and in his bed, but first they must talk, and she was content to wait and anticipate.

  ‘Weeks. I just thought it was part of the confusion of coming back home again. Home,’ he repeated, savouring the word. ‘You made it a home for me, Meg.’

  ‘I changed a few pictures, picked a few flowers,’ she protested as he poured her wine.

  ‘No, I mean that by being there you made it a home. You brought life and warmth and love.’ His face was shadowed by more than the curtain across the window. ‘You accepted William. You cared, you took me out of my nightmares and made me stop thinking of death and killing and pain.’

  ‘When I saw you first,’ she admitted, ‘I thought you were Death. You looked so dark, so implacable, so utterly without hope to have or to give. And then you saved that child and you sheltered me and I knew I was wrong.’

  ‘I had lost hope.’ Ross cradled his wine glass in his hand and stared into the red depths. ‘All I could see was duty and guilt and living the reality of memories that haunted me and spending the rest of my life as a cripple.’

  ‘You left it all in the hands of Fate?’

  ‘And Fate turned out to be five foot five inches of brown-haired, grey-eyed female with a sharp tongue and a kiss that tastes of fresh raspberries.’ He looked up from his wine and his eyes were smiling. ‘And there I was picturing her as a wicked old hag with no teeth and a rusty pair of scissors waiting to snip the thread of my life at the worst possible moment.’

  The silence was good between them, companionable and healing. They would never have to make conversation, chatter of nothings, to break it. It was enough to be together, enjoying this honest food and drink.

  But there were things that had to be said. ‘I did not tell you about James and our marriage that was no marriage because, at first, it hurt too much. No one ever asked me for the truth about it, how it had felt to run away with him, how our marriage had been. So I hugged that inside me and the more time passed, the harder it was to speak of it. I called myself Mrs Halgate because otherwise, who was I? Those five years had been…nothing.’ It was harder to say than she had imagined, even to Ross, who sat watching her face, his eyes soft with an emotion that made it hard not to cry.

  ‘It never occurred to me anyone would know who I was, down there in Cornwall. We met no one with army connections. I thought, as your housekeeper, I was safe.’

  ‘And then I asked you to marry me.’

  ‘And London—anyone might know the story there. And you are hardly nobody, despite your pretence of being just a country squire. One day you would want to take your seat in the Lords, do something that would make me an embarrassment to you.’ Realisation hit her. ‘What am I thinking of, saying yes? Nothing has happened that makes the scandal any less.’

  ‘Nothing except that I had hoped I had convinced you that I do not care that my romantic love once eloped and was misled by the man she trusted. I was angry and shocked by the story and I should have mastered those feelings before I spoke to you. Forgive me. Meg, with your permission I will see that the story is spread far and wide. You were young, impetuous and entirely innocent. Anyone who shuns us because of that, we can live without. Anyone who criticises you will have to deal with me. I will be open, you will hold your head up and the gossips will see there is no sport to be had from us.’

  ‘You truly do not mind?’ His shoulders were reassuringly broad and strong when she got up and wrapped her arms around them from the back. His neck, where she nuzzled her mouth, needing the comfort of the scent and taste of him, was warm and his over-long hair tickled her nose.

  ‘I confess that were Lieutenant Halgate alive, poor devil, I would kick his sorry backside from here to Oporto. But, no, I do not mind.’ Ross twisted in his seat so she ended up on his lap. ‘Are you by any chance making advances to me, madam? With our dinner half-eaten and in broad daylight?’

  ‘You do not want to wait until we are married?’ The very thought was agonising. The proof that he would find it difficult indeed was reassuringly evident as she wriggled round on his lap to regard him anxiously.

  ‘It will be at least a month, six weeks, will it not? I would like a proper country wedding and that will take some pl
anning. And you have your bride clothes to buy. I think we should be celibate, don’t you, Meg?’

  He said it so solemnly that she was quite taken in for a moment, then the teasing sparkle in his eyes gave him away. ‘Ross Brandon, you are a very wicked man.’

  ‘I could be,’ he admitted. The room swooped and swayed as he got to his feet with her in his arms. ‘Shall we go and be wicked together?’

  ‘Yes, please.’ It was ridiculous how feminine and fragile he made her feel, carrying her up those stairs, even when he bumped his head on the low beams and swore as he clouted his elbow on the rail. They were both laughing when he dropped her on the bed and went to turn the lock in the door, but as he turned back the laughter died away and she saw the same aching need in him that filled her own chest and made her throat dry.

  Ross undressed with his eyes never leaving hers while she sat in the tangle of her skirts. She looked at his body in the evening sunlight that filtered through the thin old chintz curtains. ‘When they brought you on board and stripped your clothing off I did all the things I needed to do for a patient. You were another wounded man, a matter of damaged muscles and torn skin. And then I went to draw the sheet over your body and I found myself looking at you, shamefully aroused because you are so very male and so very beautiful. I was ashamed of myself, but I could not get the image out of my mind.’

  ‘And I fixed the feel of your body when I lifted you into bed in my memory and the heat and softness of you that night as you lay close to me,’ he confessed. ‘Undress for me, Meg.’

  It was slow and languorous to slip out of each item of clothing, to toss them aside until she was naked for him. It felt good and powerful to see the effect she had on his body and watch him as he watched her, the heat and the tenderness mingling into an expression she thought never to see on that strong, harsh face.

  She had plans for later, but she let him push her gently back on to the pillows, lay still, her hands fisted in the patchwork counterpane as he licked and kissed his way from ankle to knee, up the inside of her aching thighs to the wet, quivering, needy core of her.

  Plans fled, thought dissolved into instinct and reaction as he kissed the intimate folds, used his tongue to lash her into frenzy and soothe her into whimpering yearning. He held her with those big, calloused rifleman’s hands, open to every sinfully loving thing he did, held her until she cried out and reached for him and he came to her, sinking into the heart of her, driving her over the edge into the swirling pleasure-filled oblivion.

  He was still sheathed in her as she came to herself, still moving gently, just enough to send aftershocks of delight whipping through her. Meg tightened herself around him and he closed his eyes, off guard for a second as she twisted beneath him and came up straddling the narrow hips, her hands flat on his chest, her palms rubbing over the hard knots of his nipples.

  ‘You want to ride?’ He sounded interested, if rather breathless. He was hard as iron within her.

  Oh, yes. Meg rose and fell, slowly, by half an inch of exquisite torture. Up, down, gripping, teasing and then as the tendons in his neck became rigid and his head began to move on the pillow she rose higher, down harder, riding him, driving them both while he gripped her hips and gave her back every thrust so when she shattered again he was with her, crying out her name, pulsing his heat into her as he filled her with love and delight and promises.

  ‘For ever, Meg. For ever.’

  The sun shone as they stepped out of the granite porch into the dappled shade of the churchyard. The waves in the creek lapped at the mossy edge of the greensward and the ancient tombstones that lined every path that wound down the little valley to the church spoke of ages of families and community and love in this place.

  And the community of their times was there in force, lining the paths, throwing rose petals and rice, clapping their hands and calling their names. At the point where one path led off to the ancient sacred springs there were girls with roses in their hair and garlands in their hands.

  Meg paused and turned, one hand fast in Ross’s grip, and smiled at the guests following them. William, as smart as any London gentleman, bursting with pride as best man, Lily, serene and lovely with tears in her eyes and old Billy, startlingly clean and besuited with his dog at his side, its collar tied with flowers.

  ‘Our family, Lady Brandon,’ Ross murmured. Together they glanced up to where Giles lay under the flowery turf, then she turned again and threw her flowers up and over her head, aiming for Lily, thinking of rumours that she was courting. ‘Your sisters are with you in spirit. We’ll never give up on them.’

  ‘Not quite all of our family,’ she murmured back, bringing his hand down to rest on her belly. ‘Just all the ones you can see.’

  ‘Meg? A baby?’

  ‘Yes, I think so.’ She tucked her hand more securely into the crook of his arm as he stared at her, an incredulous smile spreading over his face.

  ‘Then let us go home and start filling that old house with love for her to come home to.’

  ‘Or for him,’ Meg pointed out as they began to climb to where the carriages waited.

  ‘For all of us,’ Ross said and stopped and took her face between his palms and kissed her until the cheers of the guests sent the jackdaws spiralling into the sky in panic and Meg’s happy tears ran over his fingers like soft Cornish rain.

  Afterword

  Readers who know the Roseland Peninsula will guess that the lovely St Just in Roseland has been very loosely disguised as the church that Meg and Ross marry in. Trevarras Court and all the parishioners are, however, entirely imaginary.

  Vicar’s Daughter To Viscount’s Lady

  Louise Allen

  DEDICATION

  For the Romantic Novelists’ Association

  in their 50th Anniversary year

  Prologue

  12 February 1814

  If James truly loves you, means to marry you—then I’ll help, somehow. It was over five years since Arabella Shelley had said those words to her sister Meg and helped her to elope with her childhood sweetheart, James Halgate, the local squire’s son.

  It was nine months since she had hugged her weeping younger sister Celina and assured her that, if she could, she would help her run away from home too, away from the oppression and tyranny of their puritanical father who was convinced that all women were the vessels of sin and must be controlled and guarded against the slightest temptation.

  Dreamy Meg and sensitive Lina had wilted miserably under this treatment, pining for laughter and music, flowers and books. And love. Oh, yes, they had all pined for love, Bella thought, grounding the watering can she had been using to fill up the pewter jugs of greenery set around the font. Flowers were permitted only grudgingly in the Reverend Shelley’s Suffolk church, but ivy and sombre foliage would help remind the congregation of the graveyard that awaited them all, sinners that they were.

  Bella sat down in the nearest pew, ignored the cold that soaked into her booted feet from the stone floor and wrestled with guilt once again over her failure to realise what Lina had intended. Without any help from Bella she had run away, leaving only a scrap of a letter from a sister of their dead mother, an aunt none of them had known existed until Lina had found her hidden letter.

  The vicar blacked out Lina’s name in the family Bible, as he had Meg’s. If her sisters wrote, then their father intercepted the letters and destroyed them. Bella clung to the hope that if either of them had died, he would not have been able to conceal his knowledge of the bad end they had come to, but sometimes it was hard to hold on to the hope that they were still well and happy.

  Bella rubbed her aching back and tried to push away the memory of Lina’s sobs after she had been reprimanded for speaking to the curate. He said I was a trollop, and wicked and leading Mr Perkins astray! How are we ever supposed to find husbands and get married if we may not even speak to Papa’s curate?

  Goodness knows, had to be the answer to that question. But Bella knew that her own d
estiny was already ordained. At the age of twenty-five her fate was to be Papa’s support in his old age. He had told her that often enough, with the certainty that an elder daughter should expect nothing more than to do her duty to her parent.

  A lovable parent would be one thing, a sanctimonious, aggressively puritanical vicar, which was what the Reverend Shelley was, quite another. She had cherished hopes that dull Mr Perkins the curate would find one of them attractive enough to offer for, but after the confrontation following Lina’s few words with him she did not deceive herself that he would risk alienating his vicar for the sake of either of them.

  Her two younger sisters could not cope with the oppression, the carping, the sheer drabness of life at the vicarage. It was better that they had gone, for she, the sensible sister, was the one who could best cope with Papa who was becoming more suspicious and ill tempered as the years went by. Now she had no younger sisters to protect—only to worry about. It was time to accept finally that her life would be bound by the vicarage walls, and by her duty as the vicar’s plain spinster daughter.

  Something tickled her lip and she licked it, tasting salt. Sitting here weeping would not accomplish anything, except to put her behind with her duties, and besides, she never cried. What was the point?

  Bella wiped her eyes and looked at the note tablets suspended from the old-fashioned chatelaine that hung from her waist. Complain to butcher re: mutton; mend surplice; assemble sewing for Ladies’ Circle; turn sheets side to middle. Church greenery—that could be crossed off. Another tear trickled down and splashed on to the thin ivory. She dabbed it off, smudging the pencil marks, and bit down on her lower lip until she felt more under control.