The Taste of Innocence (6 page)

He glanced up at the façade beside them. “You must know this house nearly as well as I.”

“I doubt anyone knows this house as well as you. Perhaps Jeremy…” She shook her head. “No, not even he. You grew up here; it’s your home, and you always knew you would inherit it. It’s Jeremy’s home, but it isn’t his in the same way. I’d wager you know every corner of every attic.” Head tilted, she caught his eye.

He grinned. “You’re right. I used to poke into every distant corner—and yes, I always knew it would be mine.”

Halting before another set of French doors, he opened one, then stood back and waved her in.

“The library. I haven’t been in here for years.” Stepping over the threshold, she looked around. “You’ve redecorated.”

He nodded. “This was Alathea’s domain until she married, then it became mine. For some reason my father rarely came here.”

She slowly pirouetted, absorbing the changes—the masculine atmosphere imparted by deeply padded armchairs covered in dark brown leather, the heavy forest-green velvet curtains framing the windows, the lack of delicate vases and lamps, the ornaments she’d grown accustomed to seeing scattered about the room during Alathea’s tenure. But the sense of luxury, of pervasive wealth, was still there, carried in the rich hues in the portrait of some ancestor hanging above the fireplace, in the clean lines of the crystal decanter on the tantalus, in the large urn by the door with its transparent antiquity.

“The desk’s the same.” She studied the massive, wonderfully carved piece that sat across one end of the room. Its surface was lovingly polished, but the stacked papers, pens and pencils upon it bore mute witness that the space was in use.

Charlie had closed the French doors on the chill air outside. At the other end of the room a fire leapt and crackled beneath the old, carved stone mantelpiece, shedding warmth and light onto the Aubusson carpet—a new one in shades of deep greens and browns. Firelight flickered over myriad leather-bound tomes crowding the shelves lining the inner and end walls, striking glints from the gold-embossed titles.

Sarah drank it all in, then turned to where Charlie had halted before the middle of the three sets of French doors facing the terrace, the south lawn, and, in the distance, an arm of the lake. He was looking out. She moved to join him.

Turning his head, he caught her eyes, held her gaze for a moment, then asked, his voice deep, quiet, “Wouldn’t you like to be mistress of all this?”

He meant the house, the grounds, the estate. His home. But she wanted to be mistress of so much more.

She searched his eyes, their regard unwavering. Inwardly she quivered in reaction to his tone, and to his question. The answer rang clearly in her mind, but how to voice it?

“Yes.” Lifting her head, she stiffened her resistance against the temptation being this close to him posed. “But…that’s not enough.”

He frowned. “What—”

“What I want…” She blinked, suddenly seeing a way to explain. “Consider—when you invest, you require both the risky and challenging as well as the safe and secure to feel satisfied, to feel fulfilled. When it comes to marriage, I want the same.” She held his gaze. “Not just the conventional, the mundane—the safe and sure—but…”

She ran out of words, had no words, not ones that would do the concept justice. In the end, she simply said, “I want the excitement, the thrills, to take the risk and grasp the satisfaction. I want to experience the glory.”

Thanks to years of maintaining an unreadable expression while engaged in business dealings, Charlie kept all trace of surprise from his face. She was an innocent twenty-three, untouched; he knew that to his bones. Yet unless his ears had failed him, she’d just stipulated that were she to marry him, in order for her to be satisfied, their marriage would need to be a passionate one.

And, by extension, if that point was influencing her decision, then presumably part of her “getting to know him better” involved assessing whether a liaison between them would spark such passion, resulting in the glory she sought.

He hadn’t been expecting such a tack, but he certainly wasn’t about to argue. He let his lips curve. “I see no impediment in that.”

She frowned. “You don’t?”

He assumed the question derived from lack of self-confidence, from lack of conviction that she—her fair self—could fire his passions in that way.

Given his reputation, all of it entirely deserved, that wasn’t, perhaps, such a nonsensical uncertainty.

It was, however, as he was perfectly—indeed painfully—aware, entirely groundless.

He reached for her, careful not to seize, not to give her nerves reason to leap too much; sliding his hands around her waist, he encouraged her nearer.

She came, hesitantly. What he sensed in her…his instincts saw her as wild, skittish, untamed—unused to a man’s hand. Untouched in the truest sense. And he wanted her, desired her with a passion remarkable in its sharpness, unique in its strength.

Ruthlessly he held it down, concealed it, suppressed it. He held her gaze. “What ever you want in that regard, I’m willing to give you.”

She searched his eyes. Moistened her lips. “I—”

“But of course you want to ascertain the prospect before you agree.” He had to fight to keep his gaze from fixing on her sheening lips.

Her eyes widened; relief slid through them. “Yes.”

Smiling, he lowered his head. “As I said before, I see no impediment in that. None at all.” He breathed the last words over her lips.

Her lids fluttered, then fell. He brushed her lips with his, lightly, tantalizingly, then swooped and took them in a long, easy, unthreatening kiss, a caress specifically designed to ease her trepidations, to calm any maidenly fears. To gently, so gently she wouldn’t notice it, sweep her away.

He tempted, lured, and she came, hesitant but willing, following his lead as fraction by tiniest fraction he deepened the caress. Her lips were as pliant, as delicate as he remembered; he held his breath as with the tip of his tongue he traced the lower, then gently probed…her lips parted on a sigh and she let him in.

Let him slide his tongue into the warm haven of her mouth, find hers and stroke.

Tantalized, fascinated, enthralled.

Her, yes, but him, too; despite his experience he wasn’t immune to the moment. Wasn’t above feeling a shiver of excitement as she oh-so-tentatively returned the caress.

Sarah’s head was spinning, her wits waltzing to a luxurious, decadent beat, one built on plea sure. It swelled and burgeoned and grew more demanding as the kiss lengthened, deepened, as he and his seductive magic slid under her skin and stroked.

Her senses purred.

The taste of him spread through her, intoxicatingly male, dangerous yet tempting. Her lips felt warm as she returned his kisses, increasingly bold, increasingly sure.

Increasingly convinced that through this, she would find her answer.

She was hovering on the brink of stretching her arms up, twining them about his neck and stepping into him, wanting to touch, oddly urgent to feel the hard length of him against her, when he broke the kiss.

Not as if he wished to; when she lifted her strangely weighted lids, she sensed as much as saw his sudden alertness as he looked over her head out of the window.

Then his lovely, mobile lips tightened. Under his breath, he swore.

He looked at her, met her eyes. “Our sisters.”

Disgust dripped from the words. She glanced toward the lake, and grimaced, her emotions matching his. Having circumnavigated the lake, the three girls were marching steadily nearer—heading for the terrace alongside the library. Any minute one of them would look ahead…

“Come.” Charlie lowered his arms.

She felt oddly bereft.

His hand at her elbow, he turned her deeper into the library. “We’ll have to go back.”

He guided her to the door to the corridor; for one instant she considered suggesting they adjourn to some less visible room, but…she sighed. “You’re right. If we don’t, they’ll come searching.”

3

Neatly garbed in her apple-green riding habit, Sarah trotted down the manor drive on the back of her chestnut, Blacktail, so named because of the glorious appendage that swished in expectation as she passed through the gates and turned north along the road.

The day was fine, the sun shining weakly, the air cool but still. She was about to urge Blacktail into a canter when the sound of hoofbeats approaching from the south reached her.

Along with a hail. “Sarah!”

Reining in, she turned in the saddle; she smiled as Charlie cantered up. He was once again on his raking gray hunter; the horse’s deep chest and heavy hindquarters made Blacktail, an average-sized hack, look delicate. As always, Charlie managed the powerful gray with absentminded ease; he drew up alongside her.

His gaze swept her face, lingered on her lips for an instant, then rose to her eyes. “Perfect—I was thinking of riding to the bridge over the falls. I was wondering if you’d like to come with me.”

To spend some time alone with me. Sarah understood his intention; the bridge over the falls that spilled from Will’s Neck, the highest point in the Quantocks, was a local lookout. She grimaced ruefully. “I can ride with you a little way, but Monday’s the day I spend at the orphanage. I’m on my way there. We have a committee meeting at ten o’clock that I have to attend.”

She tapped her heel to Blacktail’s side. He started to walk. Charlie’s gray kept pace while his master frowned.

“The orphanage above Crowcombe?” Charlie recalled the discussion he’d overheard between Mrs. Duncliffe and Sarah outside the church. He dragged the name from his memory. “Quilley Farm.” He glanced at Sarah. “Is that the one?”

She nodded. “Yes. I own it—the farm house and the land.”

Inwardly he frowned harder. He should have paid more attention to local happenings over the years. “I thought…wasn’t it Lady Cricklade’s?”

Sarah’s lips curved. “Yes. She was my godmother. She died three years ago and left the orphanage, house and land, as well as some funds, to me, along with the responsibility of keeping it functioning as she’d intended it should.” She shook her reins. “I’ll need to ride on or I’ll be late.”

Charlie set Storm to pace her chestnut as they shifted into a canter. “Do you mind if I come, too?” He glanced at Sarah, trying to read her face. “I should learn about the orphanage.”

She threw him an assessing, rather measuring look, then nodded. “If you wish.” Facing forward, she increased the pace.

He went with her, Storm matching the chestnut’s stride easily. “So who else is on this committee?”

“Aside from myself and my mother—she doesn’t always attend—there’s Mr. Skeggs, the solicitor from Crowcombe, and Mrs. Duncliffe. Skeggs, Mrs. Duncliffe, and I are the core committee—we oversee things week to week. Mr. Handley, the mayor of Watchet, and Mr. Kempset, the town clerk of Taunton, attend once, at the end of each year, or if we summon them.”

Charlie nodded. “How large is the orphanage?”

“We’ve thirty-one children at present, ranging from babes to a few thirteen-year-olds. Once they reach fourteen, we find employment for them in Watchet or Taunton.” Sarah glanced at him. “Most come from one or the other of those towns. There’s so many factories in Taunton these days, and therefore more accidents, leaving children without fathers and too often their mothers starve, or fall ill and die, too. And from Watchet and the coast, we get those left when fishermen and sailors are lost at sea.”

“So you’ve been involved with the orphanage for the last three years?”

“For longer than that. Lady Cricklade was one of Mama’s closest friends. Her husband died soon after they were married, and she had no children. She and Mama set up the orphanage many years ago. Lady Cricklade always intended to leave Quilley Farm to me, so she and Mama made sure I knew all about it—I’ve been going to Quilley Farm almost every Monday for as long as I can recall.”

The roofs of Crowcombe appeared ahead. The lane leading up to Quilley Farm joined the road just before the first house. They turned up the lane; it was wide enough for them to ride side by side as it climbed steadily, until eventually it gave onto the plateau that was Quilley Farm.

“How big is the farm?” Charlie asked.

Now on flat ground, they trotted toward the farm house that rose before them. Built of local red sandstone worn pink with the years, its long front façade was planted squarely east, facing the Quantocks across the valley. It boasted two stories in stone, with the attics above half-timbered. The roof was gray slate, common in those parts. The structure looked old but strong, secure, as if over the years its foundations had settled into the earth under the weight of the thick stone walls. A wide cleared space, lightly graveled, lay before the house. Fields stretched to either side.

“To the south, the farm extends to that stream.” Sarah pointed down a long slope to where a line of trees marked the banks of a small brook. “But to the north not so far, just to Squire Mack’s fields two fences over.”

She waved over the roof to the rocky hillside looming behind the house—a part of the western end of the Brendon Hills. “At the back, there are three wings, unfortunately not as solid as the main house. Beyond them, we’ve only got space for kitchen gardens and a narrow patch for animals before the hill rises too steeply even for grazing.”