Hester Fox - The Widow Of Pale Harbour

She bit her lip, burning under his level gaze.

“Would...would it be possible, do you think, for us to start over?” She didn’t want to be the woman whom he’d heard rumors about, nor the woman who had flown into a panic at an innocent gesture of goodwill. Most of all, she didn’t want to be pitied.

For a moment, it seemed like he would not answer. He dipped his head, rubbing at the back of his neck. When he looked up again and met her gaze, his face broke into a dazzling grin. It was glorious, lighting up his whole face and flooding her stomach with warmth. “God, yes.”

A weight lifted from her shoulders. His smile was infectious, and she found herself grinning back at him.

He stuck out his hand. “Gabriel Stone,” he said. “And you must be Mrs. Carver.”

With only a second of hesitation, she put her hand in his and shook it. This time, she did not shrink back from his touch, instead letting the warm strength of his grip envelope her. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Mr. Stone.”

It seemed silly to cling to such formal conventions when they were surrounded only by grass and open skies, but she couldn’t bring herself to ask him to call her by her given name. But oh, Lord, what would it look like spoken on those sensual lips of his?

“When I come up here I like to sit.” She pointed to a little depression in the ground that acted as a natural windbreak. “Will you join me?”

He followed her as she lowered herself to the grass, arranging her skirt and petticoats around her. In a surprisingly fluid motion, he sat down beside her, stretching out his long legs in front of him. How much more at home he seemed out here, what an easy grace he possessed when not confined by parlor walls and social orders. She envied him his ease. Where tea and polite conversation might be confining to him, to her they provided a scaffold of safety, a framework where expectations were clearly delineated. She knew where she stood, and she was Safe. But out here there were no rules, no expectations. It was both intoxicating and terrifying.

Reclining, they rested their heads on the natural pillow the earth provided and stared out over the choppy harbor. Gulls wheeled and cried, sending up the alarm for the coming rain. The familiar tableau was reassuring, but the vastness of it made room in her mind for all the bad thoughts to bubble up again.

“Someone left candles burning on my front path,” she blurted without taking her gaze from the diving gulls.

She heard his head turn on the brittle grass and felt his gaze on her. “Oh?”

Her cheeks flushed hot. Why was she telling him this? How did she know she could trust him? She had trouble reconciling this man as the minister he claimed to be, not when he seemed so unwilling to discuss his church or his philosophies. Sophronia did not trust easily, and there was something about the minister, no matter how ruggedly attractive he was, that didn’t make sense. Shouldn’t ministers be in the business of proselytizing? Shouldn’t he at the very least wish to discuss his views and ideas? He was proving a pleasant companion, but that did not make him her friend, her confidant.

She feigned casualness. “I suppose it was some mischief by local children.” She didn’t tell him about the accompanying note.

He took in a breath, as if he were about to say something else. But nothing came, and they lapsed back into silence.

She was just about to try asking him about the church again when he spoke.

“I’ve hired your friend, Fanny Gibbs.”

Sophronia pushed herself upright and looked at him, unable to keep from smiling. “You did! Oh, I’m so glad to hear that.”

He squinted one eye open and looked up at her. “You aren’t worried I’ve stolen her away from you?”

“Worried? Goodness, no. The girl is a treasure and I know she needs the work, though she won’t let me give her a dime of charity. Has she made you one of her sweet cheese buns yet?”

His lips curved up in the hint of a smile as he reached into his pocket. “Fresh from the oven this morning. Shall we?”

She’d left in such a fluster, she’d forgotten that she hadn’t eaten a bite of the meal Helen had prepared, and her stomach grumbled an unhappy reminder.

Breaking off a piece, he handed it to her and she inhaled the warm aroma of yeast and sweet cheese. It melted in her mouth, and she closed her eyes, savoring it.

When she opened her eyes again, he was regarding her with naked curiosity. “Yes?”

He hesitated. “It’s nothing.”

She expected that he wanted to ask her something about Fanny, something innocuous about where she had found such a treasure of a girl. “Oh, go on,” she said with good humor. “I can see the question practically tripping off your lips.”

“Not a question,” he said. “Only I think I begin to see why the town thinks you’re a witch.”

Sophronia’s heart seemed to stop. Wetting her suddenly dry lips with her tongue, she tried to make her voice come out light and carefree. “Oh?” Instead, it cracked.

“Mmm. You live in a castle on a hill with an old maid for company. You’re rarely, if ever, seen. And it seems you pay no mind to all the stories about you.”

Here she had thought they were sharing a pleasant view and a lighthearted conversation, and all he could think of was the petty gossip of the town. He had said he wanted to start over, yet he still seemed to be fixated on first impressions. Was her judgment with men still really so poor? When he had sat in her parlor with her, she had found it so easy to laugh about the rumors because he had seemed so different from what she had been expecting.

His graveled voice held a note of amusement, but there was nothing amusing about the suffocating life she led. Why had she thought she could share this special place with a stranger? Why had she thought he was different?

Abruptly, she sat up and brushed the dead grass from her skirts. “Indeed,” she said, her words clipped. “I do hope I’ve provided you with more fuel for the gossip mill. If you will excuse me, I promised to help Helen in the garden this afternoon and it looks like rain. Good day, Mr. Stone.”

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