The Escape by Mary Balogh
17
Samantha set her shoes and stockings on the rock where she had left them the day before. Her dress, bonnet, and shift were her only remaining garments. She felt very daring and really quite wicked. But there was no point in walking down onto the beach clad in all the usual finery of a lady. It would only have to come off again before she could swim.
The beach, she had decided yesterday on her first visit, was going to be her place of freedom, the place where nothing mattered but the moment in which she lived and the beauty with which she was surrounded.
As soon as she stepped onto it today, she left behind the heavy burden of her wealth; the disturbing glimpses she had had into her family past; the knowledge that her grandfather, who had abandoned her mother, was as rich as a nabob, to use Ben’s words, and lived in that shining mansion on the hill ironically called home. She left behind the gloom of a recent bereavement, the stern disapproval of her in-laws, the fact that she could not turn for sympathy or help or affection to any member of her father’s family. She ignored the fact that soon, probably very soon, Ben would be leaving to continue his journey and she would never see him again.
He was with her now, and that was really all that mattered.
And they were on the beach, where nothing else mattered but the freedom to enjoy the moment. Everyone should have such a retreat, she thought. How very fortunate she was.
“I have never swum in the ocean,” she said, matching her pace to his, though she would have liked to stride along and even run, and watching an ever-hopeful Tramp go galloping after gulls. “I suppose it is very different from swimming in a lake.”
“In several ways,” he said. “The water is more buoyant because it is salty. But that makes it uglier to swallow and harder on the eyes. You have to watch out for waves breaking over your head. You may wade in until you are waist deep and then swim in the same area for five minutes only to find when you put your feet down that you are chin deep or knee deep—or out of your depth.”
“What if I cannot still swim?” she asked him.
He stopped to look at her.
“Remind me,” he said, “of who it was who assured me just yesterday that one does not forget.”
She laughed at him.
All traces of the morning’s gray weather had been blown away to leave blue sky and sunshine overhead and a sea that sparkled beneath it. The tide was higher up the beach than it had been yesterday morning, almost fully in, in fact. The rock where they had sat was not far from its edge, though the dry sand about it suggested that it was above the normal high tide mark.
“We can leave our towels there,” she suggested, pointing to the rock.
He had a bag slung over his shoulder and had more in it than just a towel, she suspected. She had not brought any clothes but the ones she wore.
She set down her towel and took off her bonnet. She made sure her hair was in a tight knot at her neck and that all the pins were pushed in firmly. But Gladys had done her job thoroughly. She had also been a bit giggly when she knew that Samantha was not going to wear her stays.
“Are you just going to wear your shift in the water, Mrs. McKay?” she had asked. “I am envious, I am. It’s turned into a beautiful day, hasn’t it? And that major is going to swim too, is he? He is ever so gorgeous, isn’t he, even if he is a little bit crippled. I wouldn’t mind seeing him stripped down for a swim, I can tell you.”
“Gladys!”
“Oh, sorry, Mrs. McKay,” she had said, coloring.
Samantha smiled now at the memory. And she pulled her dress determinedly off over her head even though she felt very exposed in just her knee-length shift. One could hardly go swimming fully clothed, could one?
He had removed his hat and his coat and waistcoat and neckcloth, she saw when she turned. He had just sat down on the rock to pull off his boots and stockings. It was not easy for him to do, she could see.
“Would you like me to help?” she asked.
He looked up and shaded his eyes with one hand—and said nothing while his eyes roamed over her from head to foot.
“Sorry,” he muttered after a few lengthy moments and lowered the hand. “No, thank you. I can manage.”
She felt scorched by his glance.
It took him a while. He was so very different from Matthew, she thought as she watched. He was stubbornly independent.
There was a wicked-looking scar across the top of one of his feet, she saw when he had removed his stockings—gouged there by a stirrup, perhaps? He was fortunate that his foot had not been completely severed. He was not, she realized, going to remove his pantaloons. But he pulled his shirt free of them, crossed his arms, and hauled it off over his head.
She stood looking at him while he raised his eyes to hers. She had lain close to his naked upper body that night at the inn, but she had not seen it, and she had not explored it with her hands. There was a nasty puckered scar between his heart and his shoulder.
“A bullet?” she asked.
“I was more fortunate than Captain McKay,” he said. “The surgeon was able to dig it out.”
She winced.
His chest bore other scars, some worse than others, as did both his arms. Any one of those wounds could surely have killed him. She raised her eyes to his and licked her lips.
“You were in more than one battle?”
“Eight,” he said, “and a number of more minor skirmishes. Cavalry are always getting embroiled in skirmishes.”
Rather than marring his appearance, the scars somehow accentuated his masculinity. And it was very clear that he worked on his physique. His muscles were firm and well defined. He looked suddenly like a tough, even brutal soldier. Brutal in battle, that was. But magnificent as a lover?
She took a step back and turned to look at the water. There was an uncomfortable throbbing in her womb, and the sun felt hotter than it had a few minutes ago.
“The water is close,” she said. “Can you walk there without your canes if you set an arm about my shoulders?”
“You are not my servant,” he said.
“Is it such a humiliation,” she asked him, “to set your arm about me and lean on me for a short distance? Will it quite diminish your masculinity?”
His jaw was set hard when she turned back to him. But he nodded and then smiled.
“I believe it will challenge my masculinity,” he said. “I have noticed, you see, that you are scantily clad.”
So that was the reason he was reluctant to touch her?
“Are you a prude, Major Harper?” she asked him.
“Merely a normal red-blooded male, ma’am,” he said brusquely, getting to his feet with the aid of his canes and then setting them back against the rock and taking two steps without them before reaching for her. “Lead me to cold water, please. And the faster the better.”
It was amazing what a difference a few layers of clothing could make—or the lack of those layers. Yesterday she had been aware of his lean, strong physique as they walked in the water and it had attracted her. Today she could feel the power in his bare arm about her shoulders and was aware of the rippling muscles in his chest, pressed to her side. She was aware of his masculine hip, of the warmth of his skin. She was aware of his height—a few inches above her own. And she was aware of her own near nakedness next to him.
She felt as if some of her half-shriveled youth was gathering itself into bud getting ready to burst into bloom again.
She turned her face up to his as they reached the incoming water and laughed.
“It is c-c-cold,” she said, deliberately stuttering as they stepped into it. She splashed it with her feet and sent cold droplets splashing all over them. “We are going to f-freeze.”
Tramp was running along the edge of the water behind them, barking with excitement and further wetting them.
“It is too late to change your mind now,” he said, grinning back at her. “I am going in, and you must too because I need you to get from here to there.”
An incoming wave broke over their knees, and Samantha gasped.
“Whose silly idea was this?” she asked.
“I am not even going to venture an answer to that,” he said. “I am ever the gentleman.”
By the time the water reached her waist and then higher, Samantha thought the idea worse than just silly. His arm was a little less heavy about her shoulders, she noticed. And then it was gone altogether and he had ducked beneath the surface of the water. He came up, shaking his head so that she was showered with droplets, and spreading his arms along the water. And he was standing alone, she realized. His dark hair was plastered to his head. Water was beaded on his face and eyelashes.
He was all handsome, virile masculinity, and he was upright, unaided by either canes or her shoulders. Oh, how absolutely gorgeous he must once have been.
He grinned at her, and she grasped her nose between a thumb and forefinger and went under. She came up gasping and sputtering.
“Oh,” she said, “I see what you mean by buoyancy and taste. Here comes a swell.”
But they had come too far in for it to break over them in foam. Samantha lifted her feet and bobbed over it at the same time as Ben lay back on the water and floated. He was not, then, going to sink like a stone and drown.
She watched as he turned onto his front and began to swim in a slow crawl, his powerful arms doing most of the work, though his legs were moving too, propelling him along. She swam to catch up with him and realized that she had been right yesterday. She had not forgotten how. Neither had he. She would have whooped with delight if she had had the breath.
She drew level with him, and they swam side by side, stroke for stroke.
It seemed to Samantha that she had never been happier in her life. If only they could swim forever and never have to go back to shore.
Ben could have wept. Not only could he remember how to swim, but also he could swim. He could move his legs without pain.
He could move.
Without pain.
He was free.
He did not know how far he had swum before he became aware of Samantha alongside him. And that was strange since he had been aware of her with every fiber of his being ever since he set eyes upon her back at the cottage. And when she had stripped down to her shift … Well, it was difficult to find words. And then when he had stepped up beside her to set his arm about her shoulders …
Her very dark hair was plastered to her head and held in its tight knot at her neck. Two shapely bare arms came out of the water, one after the other in a steady, graceful rhythm, and slid back beneath the surface. He could see the outline of her body through the water, her shift like a second skin. Her legs, propelling her along, were long and sturdy and shapely and mostly bare. She was not slender, but she was beautifully, perfectly proportioned. She was every man’s dream of femininity.
She caught his eye and smiled. He smiled back.
She rolled onto her back and floated, her arms out to the sides. He floated beside her. There was not a cloud in the sky.
This, he thought, was one of those rare, perfect moments. He wanted to capture it and keep it and treasure it so that he could look at it from time to time and feel again what he felt now. But of course, he could do just that. It was called memory.
“You were swimming,” she said.
“So were you.”
“You were swimming, Ben.”
He turned his head to look at her. “You were right. I can swim.”
If he had been able to get down onto the beach at Penderris, perhaps he would have discovered it long ago. If he had been able to spend more time at Kenelston after leaving Penderris, perhaps he would have gone to the lake and made the discovery there. But it had never occurred to him that there was an element in which he would not be handicapped—or not completely so, anyway. So far he had tried only a very leisurely crawl. But perhaps he could build strength in the water by challenging himself to try more vigorous strokes. Perhaps he had not, after all, reached the limit of his physical capabilities.
She turned her head to look back at him. “I am right occasionally, you know.”
Their fingertips touched inadvertently as they bobbed on the water, and then they touched deliberately. He rested his hand on top of hers, and she turned it so that they were palm to palm.
“I am glad there has been this day,” she said.
“So am I.”
“Will you remember this when you have traveled far and wide and gathered enough material for ten books?” she asked him. “And become hugely famous?”
“I will remember,” he assured her. “And will you remember when you have an army of friends and admirers here and are busily involved in village and parish life? And when you have learned Welsh and have sung to help raise the roof off the church?”
She smiled. “I will remember.”
They floated for a while longer. The dog, he could see when he looked, was stretched out by the rock and the towels and their discarded clothes. The sun was warm.
There was nothing for her in England. There was nothing for him here. There was nothing there for him either unless he asserted himself at Kenelston or else set up house in London or Bath or somewhere else where he could establish some sort of routine and some sort of social life. He was not going to be a traveler. He could not bear the thought of doing it alone. And he never wanted to see a journal or a blank sheet of paper again. Perhaps he ought to try some sort of career. In business or commerce, perhaps, or the law? Or in the diplomatic service? He had never before given serious thought to actually working, except as a landowner on his own land. He did not need to work, after all, since he was in possession of a sizable fortune.
But now was not the time to consider his future.
Now was the time for now. Now was one of those rare and precious moments with which one was gifted from time to time. That was all it was. A moment. But it was one to be enjoyed to the full while it lasted and treasured for a lifetime after it was over.
“And it is not even over yet,” she said, echoing his thought.
“No.”
There was still dinner to be enjoyed at the cottage. And then …
He was not at all sure it would be wise. He could, if he chose, enumerate in his mind all the many reasons—and there were many, for both of them—why it would not be. But he was not going to think. He was going to hold on to the moment. The rest of the day would look after itself.
She had turned onto her front and had begun to swim slowly back toward the beach. He followed her.
“Stay here,” she said, when she was able to stand in the water. “I shall fetch your canes.”
The tide had ebbed a bit, he could see. It was a farther walk to the rock now than it had been when they came in.
He trod water and watched her return across the sand, his canes held in one of her hands. Her shift clung to her body, leaving virtually nothing to the imagination. Yet she seemed unself-conscious.
She was beautiful beyond belief. And desirable beyond words.
“Life is really not fair,” she cried, splashing back into the water. “It was freezing coming in, and now it is freezing getting out.” She held the canes high as she waded toward him.
“Whoever told you,” he asked her, “that life was fair?”
He took his canes from her. It was time to be earth-bound again.
The dog was prancing at the edge of the water, barking at them, impatient for them to emerge.
Ben leaned one shoulder against the rock when he had reached it and rubbed his towel over his upper body and his hair. He would change into the dry pantaloons he had brought with him if she would turn her back.
“I did not bring a dry shift,” she said, and his hand paused with the towel held to one side of his head. “I thought I would let it dry here in the sun.”
But she did not mean what he thought she meant, he realized when he saw her spread her towel on the sand. She was not about to strip it off.
“Shall we lie down and soak up some sunshine before going back to the cottage?” she suggested.
“Have you heard of a beached whale?” he asked her.
She looked at him, arrested.
“You would not be able to get up again, would you?” she said and then laughed. “I am so sorry. I did not think of that. How foolish of me.”
“Lie down,” he said. “I will sit here.”
She regarded the stone ledge on which they had sat yesterday.
“You can stretch out along it,” she said, “and relax better. You could get up from there, could you not?”
And so they lay side by side on their towels, though she was three feet below him on the beach. He shaded his eyes with one forearm.
“Are not ladies supposed to protect their complexions from the merest suggestion of sunlight?” he asked.
“I have the complexion of a Gypsy,” she said. “Even when I have not been in the sun people frown upon me because my face is not all porcelain and peaches and roses. Why bother depriving myself of feeling the heat and light of the sun on my face, then? You cannot know how irksome it was for almost four months to have to wear a black veil every time I set foot over the doorstep—when I did step outside, that was. Oh, Ben, there was not even any daylight in the house. Matilda insisted that the curtains be almost closed across every window. Sometimes, when she was not in the room with me, I used to stand in the band of daylight and breathe in gulps, as though I had been suffocating.”
“Those days are gone,” he said.
“Yes,” she agreed. “Thank God. And I am not blaspheming.”
They were probably both going to end up with some sunburn. He did not care.
“Am I horribly wicked—?”
“No,” he said, not giving her time to finish.
“Just over five months ago,” she said, “Matthew was alive.”
“And just over five months ago,” he said, “you were spending every moment of your time with him, tending him and comforting him as well as you were able.”
“It is difficult to keep the world at bay, is it not?” she said. “I swore that I would not think of a thing while we were down here except the sheer enjoyment of being here.”
Without thinking he stretched down a hand toward her, and she took it and held it.
“You can come here whenever you want for the rest of your life,” he reminded her.
“But not with you.”
He could think of no answer to that, and she did not seem to want to elaborate. They lay for a while, hand in hand. Then she got to her feet and stood looking down at him. The front of her shift had dried. It did not cling quite so provocatively.
“I shall wonder about you for the rest of my life,” she said. “I shall wonder what happened to you. I shall wonder if you found what you were looking for. I suppose I will never know.”
“Perhaps,” he said, “you will write to my sister at some time in the future, when you feel more secure here.”
“Ah, yes, of course,” she said. “She will tell me about you. And then perhaps you will learn something of me too. If you wish to do so, that is.”
He took one of her hands in his again and drew it to his lips.
“It would not work for us, Samantha,” he said.
“No,” she agreed. “A mutual attraction is not enough, is it?”
He kissed her knuckles.
“But perhaps,” she said, her eyes on their hands, “just for a day—or two or three. Perhaps for a week. Can you bear to stay a week?”
He inhaled slowly. “Your grandfather is expected home in the next few days,” he said. “I suppose he will discover that you are living here. Perhaps he will choose to ignore you. Or perhaps not. Perhaps you will choose to ignore him. However it is, I cannot bring myself to leave until … well, until things are more settled for you. I know you do not like me flexing my male muscles on your behalf. I know you can manage alone. But …”
“But you will stay anyway?”
“Yes,” he said. “For a few more days. A week.”
“Oh, Tramp.” She looked down at the dog, which was making loud lapping noises. “Is my leg salty and must be licked clean? You absurd dog.”
“He is a dog to be envied,” Ben said, and she looked back at him, startled, and laughed.
He swung his legs carefully over the edge of the rock and sat up. He pulled his shirt on over his head. He looked at her and marveled again at the realization that she was the same woman as the morbidly black-clad figure he had almost bowled over with his horse not so very long ago. She was looking disreputable and slightly disheveled now even though most of her hair was still confined in the knot at her neck. She was looking quite scandalously sun-bronzed and bright-eyed and happy. Her nose was shining.
He set his hands on either side of her waist, drew her against him between his legs, and kissed her. She tasted of salt and summer sun.
“You taste salty,” she told him. “Now I know why Tramp is enjoying licking my leg.”
They grinned at each other and kissed open-eyed.
“There is a Latin phrase,” she said. “Something about carps, though not really.”
“Carpe diem?”
“The very one,” she said. “The day flies, or the day is fleeting. Or make the most of what you have now this moment because soon it will be gone.” She rested her forehead against his.
“I am afraid of hurting you, Samantha,” he said with a sigh. “Or perhaps myself.”
“Physically?” she said. “No, you do not mean that, do you? I think I would be hurt more if you just simply … left. Is that what you want to do?”
He closed his eyes and inhaled. “No.”
“Go on back to the house,” she said. “You can change your clothes there and wash with hot water. I am going to have a run with Tramp.”
And she pulled on her dress and bonnet and dashed off along the beach with the dog in hot pursuit. Where were the stays, and the silk stockings and slippers, and the gloves and the parasol, and the mincing steps of a respectable lady of ton? He smiled after her, admiring her bare, sandy ankles and her exuberance.
She wanted him. He wondered if he would disappoint her—or worse.
But enough of that. He was not going to be offering himself for a lifetime, after all, was he? He would give as much of himself as he could for both their pleasure—and pray God there would not be too much pain the other side of the pleasure.
For he feared they were playing with fire.
