Mary Balogh - One Night for Love

"Come walking?" he asked.

She nodded.

"We must take everyone with us," he said, leading her back to the box. "But with a little ingenuity, Lily, I believe we can lose them before we have gone too far."

She did not voice any objection.

***

She had not been mistaken. Oh, she had not . He had married her out of a sense of obligation. He had treated her with kindness after her arrival in England because he was a kind man. He had made love to her because he would make the best of any situation in which he found himself. He had offered for her again even after he knew they were not legally married because he had felt obligated, honor-bound to do so. There had been some love too, of course—he had said so, and she had not doubted him.

But now it was love pure and simple. There was no obligation left. She had freed him, and since then she had made a life for herself and learned the skills that would help her to live independently of anyone's charity and earn her own living.

He was wooing her now—simply because he loved her.

She would no longer entertain even a vestige of doubt. And she would no longer erect obstacles between them that just did not need to be there. She might never be his equal in the eyes of the world, but she knew now that she could live in his world with some comfort and with a good deal of self-respect. The thought of Newbury Abbey no longer filled her with despair.

She was going to allow it to happen.

And so when they strolled along the tree-lined, lantern-lighted avenue with the marquess and Lady Selina, she made no protest at the almost comical maneuverings of both gentlemen to arrange matters that the two couples part company. Neither did Lady Selina.

"You see, Lily," Neville said after the two of them had turned down one of the narrower, darker, quieter paths, "there are these areas that were made for lovers."

"Yes," she said. "How wonderfully convenient."

"And they were made narrow enough," he said, "that two people must walk single file or else with their arms about each other."

"We cannot talk if we walk single file," she said, smiling at the darkness ahead.

"Precisely." He set an arm about her shoulders and drew her close to his side. There was nowhere to put her arm then except about his waist. And then she found that her head was most comfortable against his shoulder.

There was a strange feeling of seclusion even while the sounds of the orchestra and of voices shouting and laughing were still quite audible. There was an occasional lantern in a tree, but in the main the path was lighted by moonlight. If it was romance she had been hoping for, Lily thought, then she had surely found it in abundance.

Their footsteps inevitably lagged when they had walked a distance along the path, and then they stopped altogether. He turned her, and she found her back resting comfortably against the broad trunk of a tree.

"Lily," he said, bracketing her head with his hands pressed against the trunk, "you must say no now, my dear, if you want this to go no farther."

She reached up one hand and traced his facial scar with one fingertip. "I am not saying no," she whispered to him.

He kissed her, touching her at first only with his mouth. It was a kiss of love, she thought before setting her hands on his shoulders and then sliding her arms about his neck.

There could be no other motive on either side. Just love. She parted her lips and kissed him back with love.

He lifted his head as his arms came about her and arched her in against him. She could scarcely see his face with the moonlight behind him, but she thought he was smiling.

"This," he said, his lips brushing hers as he spoke, "was meant to be, Lily, from the very first moment."

She did not ask to what first moment he referred—the moment they had first met? The moment she had walked into the church at Newbury? The first moment of time at the dawn of the world? Perhaps he meant all those moments. And he was right. This had always been meant to be.

He kissed her mouth, her eyes, her temples. He feathered kisses along her jaw to her chin. He kissed her throat. And he kissed her mouth again, murmuring endearments.

The sense of romance faded. She could feel the familiar hard planes of his body pressed against her own. She could smell his cologne and the male essence of him. She could taste the wine he had drunk earlier on his lips and his tongue, inside his mouth. She could hear his breath quicken and could feel his growingly urgent desire pressing against her abdomen. Her own body responded—had done since the first touch of his lips. There was a throbbing ache in her womb and down along her inner thighs as she pressed herself to him in a blind urge to be close—closer. Neville. She wanted him. She wanted him there. Here. Now .

But suddenly he lifted his head and his arms about her stiffened. He held his head in a listening attitude. Even in the darkness she could see the frown on his face.

Lily was never sure afterward if she heard a sound herself—a sound other than the distant noise of revelry. But certainly she was suddenly awash in that terrible dread again as he turned away from her to gaze into the trees at the other side of the path. She was not even sure afterward if she saw anything. She was not quite sure she had seen a figure in a dark cloak with a pointed pistol. Everything happened too fast.

Neville suddenly spun back toward her and whisked her around behind the tree, his own body between her and danger. The sound seemed to come after. The bullet had missed her, she thought as he pressed her painfully against the other side of the tree, his back against her, shielding her. But the noise of it still rang in her ears.

She felt suffocated. His hands were spread behind him, on either side of her body. She could scarcely breathe. Even so she welcomed the shield he had provided for her. Without it, she would disintegrate into mindless terror.

She could hear him breathing in heavy gasps that she knew he was trying to silence so that he would not betray their whereabouts. And she knew that she was an impediment to him. Without the necessity of protecting her, he could move, go in search of their assailant instead of waiting for him to find them.

It seemed that they stood there in unbearable tension for five minutes, even ten—probably, she thought afterward, it had been no longer than a minute or two. And then there was the sound of laughter fairly close and drawing closer and she knew with knee-weakening relief that someone was coming along the path—more than one person, in fact.

Actually it was four. As they came up to the tree and then passed it, Neville took her firmly by the hand and drew her out onto the path. They walked down it behind the two couples, who were so merrily foxed that they did not appear to notice that their numbers had been swelled.

"I am taking you back to Elizabeth," Neville said, setting one arm about her when they reached the main avenue. "And then I am going back to find the bast—" He cut off the word in time. He was breathing noisily.

But Lily, setting an arm firmly about his waist, fearing that she would collapse, suddenly became aware of something—something warm and wet and sticky.

"You have been hit," she said. And then in utter panic: "Neville, you have been shot !"

"It is nothing," he said through teeth she knew he had gritted together. And he increased their pace.

But as they approached the box, he released his hold on her and half pushed her into a startled Elizabeth, who was standing outside the box with the Duke of Portfrey.

"Take her," Neville said harshly. "Get her out of here. Take her home."

And he collapsed on the ground at their feet.

Chapter 22