Leave a Widow Wanting More by Charlie Lane

Chapter 27

Henry stared, once more, at the letter from Jackson and Miss Smith. Jackson’s even lines and narrow swoops mingled with Miss Smith’s impatient scratches and blots. He missed the two of them, but he’d see them soon. Sooner than he’d planned, too. The letter brought unwelcome news. Lord Birmingham, that ass, claimed his next article in the Journal of Antiquities would make all of Henry’s research irrelevant. He blabbered about it everywhere he went, apparently. Poppycock, of course. Henry’s books, old though they were, contained true information from true sources. Birmingham worked from hearsay and secondhand accounts colored by hateful propaganda.

Henry couldn’t ignore the challenge. And even if he regretted how the world had reacted to his books, the research itself was solid, compassionate, true. He wouldn’t have some ass who’d never left home and thought himself superior to the rest of the world proclaim otherwise.

Besides, life at Cavendish Manor ran on without him. On Sarah’s insistence, he’d tried to run along with it. But Ada’s face when he’d left her a few hours ago had been pale, drawn; she was done with him. He’d given her just what she wanted—Stonefield—but it hadn’t been enough.

He’d not dared to glance at Sarah before leaving the sitting room. He’d heard her steps behind him briefly, had welcomed her approach.

But then the steps had stopped, and Henry had retreated to his library alone.

He poured another glass of brandy but didn’t drink it. They’d all been pretending for the last week, but cracks appeared in their charade. Nora spoke too often, too brightly, as if making up for Ada’s silence. Pansy watched him with wary eyes, and the twins ignored him completely as if he wasn’t worth their time.

Only Sarah and James had easy smiles for him. He’d continued riding lessons with his stepson, and Sarah had pulled Henry into family games, outings, and dinners. She’d beckoned him with her eyes every night, inviting him without words back to her bed. He’d denied her. Denied himself.

Henry scoffed and tossed the letter on the table.

Tomorrow he left Cavendish Manor. Jackson and Miss Smith itched to leave England. Their impatience vibrated through every word they wrote. Henry itched to leave, too. Didn’t he?

He shook his head. Odd question. Wrong one. Symptoms of his old age, of old bones that wanted to settle.

He took a drink, letting the liquid warm his chest. Settle? No thank you. And old? Really? He’d not felt old this afternoon, carrying Sarah across the room and tossing her onto the settee.

He’d leave with the morning’s first light, gone before she awoke.

He waited for the spark of joy travel usually ignited. It didn’t come. Not the way it had flared to life seeing his family emptying the stable to ride out to the Coldrum Stones. Watching Nora put any other marksman he’d ever seen to shame. He’d even appreciated, on some level, Ada bolding calling him a bully, stating that she wanted him to leave … He couldn’t be hurt by her words. They were true.

He would oblige her tomorrow. But tonight, he would oblige himself. In Sarah’s arms if she would have him.

There! Finally. That spark of joy.

He snuffed it out.

You’re leaving tomorrow, old man, he reminded himself.

But he still had one more night. The thought pulled him from the library, up the stairs, and to his bedroom, Sarah’s bedroom since their marriage. The last time he’d stepped through the door, she’d lain naked, waiting for him, reading a book. His blood burned at the memory then turned cold. Idiot. He could have had her naked and willing in his bed every night for the past week, but he’d been a coward.

He didn’t have to be, though. As she’d pointed out this afternoon, there were more ways than one to play at pleasure. He tried the door. Unlocked. He opened it slowly, praying for a repeat of his favorite memory.

He felt only slightly disappointed to find her only almost naked instead of entirely so. She wore a shift, and her hair loosely plaited, hung over her shoulder. She frowned at a slim book she held in her hands until she realized she had company. “Henry!” A flurry of emotions shifted across her face. What would she say? Would he receive a lecture about parenting or the sort of invitation she’d issued him earlier in the day? Her mouth settled into a contented smile. “Hello.”

After the day he’d had, the simple greeting soothed him. It blew across him like a spring breeze. They could start anew in this moment, in this place. “Learning Latin?”

She glanced down at the book. “Worse. Fashion. I really wish you’d warned me before I accepted your proposal that I’d have to launch two girls into society. Three, eventually.”

He joined her on the bed, stretching his legs out and bumping his shoulder into hers. “You’ll bring society to its knees.” He waited for her to pull away, expected her to.

When she huffed and leaned her head against his shoulder, he exhaled in bone-deep relief.

“I’ve always enjoyed looking at fashionable clothes,” she said, “but I had no idea the entire concept was so complex!”

He grunted and pulled the book away from her face with his index finger. He wanted her attention, all of it, in the time they had left. He kissed her, and she kissed back, but her mind wandered. He thought he knew where. He sighed and pulled away.

“Something is troubling you. Is it fashion or me?”

Sarah laughed. “Both. Though I’m not sure if I’d classify the problem as solely you or you and Ada.”

“Ah. Of course. Go on, tell me about it.”

“Nora and Ada will need entirely new wardrobes for their season.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Oh? But it is the more pressing problem. Their gowns must be all white, too.” Sarah’s frown deepened. “How they are to keep clean, is what I want to know. It’s the height of hubris to wear white in London.”

“I think that’s the point. You wear white because you can afford to ruin a gown and buy a new one.”

She shook her head. “Wasteful.”

“You can afford it now,” he reminded her.

“I suppose. Still …”

Henry ran a finger down the column of her neck. “Shall all your gowns be white, too?”

Sarah shivered at his touch. “No. I’m married. I may wear what colors I wish.”

He whispered in her ear, “Wear any color you like when I’m gone, but only blue when I’m home.”

Sarah closed the book and tossed it to the floor. Her hands found his, and she tucked her legs underneath her to look him squarely in the face. “I’m so confused, Henry.”

“Fashion, it seems, is a perplexing subject.”

She shook her head, and wisps of hair escaped her loose braid. “I’m confused about you. What did you tell Lord Stonefield? What did he say to you? Why are you allowing him to court Ada?”

Henry soothed a rogue curl behind her ear. “I told Stonefield he may court her but may not propose until after her first season.”

“That’s … smart. This way she can retain her relationship with him, whatever that may be, and have her season, too. You are clever, Henry.”

“Do you wish to have a conversation, Sarah? If you continue looking up at me like that, I’ll not be able to talk. It’s been too long since I’ve had you.” He pulled the bodice of her shift low, revealing the creamy slope of one shoulder. “And I’m—”

“Eight days.”

“What?”

“It’s been eight days, Henry. Precisely.”

“Ah. My apologies. I’m not good at counting when I’m lust-addled.”

“Nor talking?”

“No. Yes. See?”

She shrugged the nightshift back onto her shoulder. Shame. He missed that shoulder already. Just imagine how he’d feel a week from now.

Best not to imagine that, actually.

He sighed. “I allowed Stonefield to court Ada for more reasons than one.”

“Of course you did. You’re never without multiple reasons.”

“The second reason is that he is, quite obviously, a fool of the first order.”

Sarah sighed now. “You always do leap away from me. Why in Gutenberg’s good name would you allow a fool to court your daughter?”

He smiled, slowly.

“Oh my. There’s that crocodile smile.”

“Excuse me?”

“Never mind. Please enlighten me, Henry.”

What Ada called his crocodile smile remained. “Ada is smart. Much smarter than Stonefield. She’ll figure out, with enough contact, just how much she wants to marry him.”

“Which, you’re assuming, is not at all.”

“Correct.”

“For your sake, I hope your plan doesn’t backfire. If it helps, I don’t think she loves him so much as pities him. He’s lost so much. She has, too. She feels a connection to him because of it.”

Henry nodded. Understanding settled on him like an entire mountain falling down around his shoulders. He felt tired. So tired.

Sarah’s fingers crept across his chest and over his shoulders. “You leave tomorrow.”

“Yes.”

She heaved a breath, her chest rising then falling in dramatic fashion. “Fine, then. But I have a request.”

“Another one?” he teased.

Sarah grinned. “Yes. Sorry, I can’t seem to help making requests of you.”

“I’ll grant them all.” As far as he could, anyway. “Well?”

“Write to the girls more often than you do. And before you leave London, take James back to Harrow?” She frowned, thinking. “It’s too soon for him to travel with you tomorrow. I’ll send him to you before you leave the country. I think his standing with the boys will improve if he returns with the famous Lord Eaden as his father.”

“You ask nothing for yourself?”

She wiggled and dropped her gaze to his bare neck. She placed one searing kiss at the base of his throat. “I want you, just for tonight.”

She asked for no more than he’d planned on giving her. He reached for her. Finding her hips, he rolled her over until her body lay flush against his, and he felt every sensuous curve. Tonight, he’d teach her everything he’d avoided in the last eight days. He’d stretch out every single moment as if they had all the time in the world. Because they didn’t.

He kissed her softly, drinking her in, memorizing the taste and feel of her.

Her hands tangled in his hair. His Sarah wasn’t slow. She knew what he wanted, and she wanted to play. He laughed into their kiss and she laughed right back.

He’d never laughed so much while making love before. It should have killed the pleasurable chords coursing through him, between them, but it didn’t. It plucked them, made them sing.

He loved her curves, and he showed her now, caressing his palms over her shoulders, breasts, hips, ass. She’d apologized their first night for having an older woman’s body, but as far as he was concerned, there was no better body in England, or outside of England for that matter. Hers was the only body he wanted, hers the only heart beating frantically next to his.

He squeezed her ass, and she moaned into his mouth then wiggled against him.

“Zeus, Sarah!”

She answered by wrapping her silky fingers around his tool and pulling him until they were fully joined.

He shuddered with pleasure. “Slowly, Sarah-mine.” He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and pulled until her heart rested next to his. “Tomorrow I—” The words caught in his throat. He swallowed. “Tomorrow I leave for London, then back to France. Let’s take tonight slow. I want to make it last.” He wrapped his arms tighter, dropping his face into her neck. Her scent again—new books and warm tea. His favorite things. No. She was his favorite thing. From now on, books and tea would smell like Sarah.

Sarah sat up, and he groaned at the space between them. Her eyes, warm and sure, met his. “Slow? No. Fast. So we can make love a thousand times over again before the sun rises.” Then she rode him up and down, tracing her fingers down his chest, her head flung back on her neck. And right before he climaxed, she pulled away and rolled him on top of her, letting him spill on her belly.

Before his brain had resumed full functioning, he heard himself say, “You didn’t have to. We don’t have to.” The words brought him fully alert. Had he really said that? Yes. But had he really meant it? Did he care whether or not he spilled his seed inside or outside of her, whether or not she carried his child?

He left the bed.

“Henry, don’t leave. It’s all right. I don’t want another child. I have six!”

He turned around with a scowl. “I’m not leaving.” He paced to the washbasin and found a cloth. He wet it and brought it to the bed, cleaning her stomach. Did everyone assume he would leave? Did they all want him to leave? What about what he wanted?

What did he want?

For starters, to climb back in bed and wrap his arms around his wife.

He did that. She snuggled against him, her hooded eyes dropping low, a startling purring sound emanating from her throat.

For another, he wanted to finish what he’d been about to do in the study before cursed Stonefield had arrived. Well, they had all night. He’d accomplish that and more.

But did he want another child? And would it even be possible? He thought of holding another baby in his arms with Sarah’s lapis lazuli eyes and the Cavendish golden hair. Or perhaps another dark-haired beauty like his other daughters. He wouldn’t mind that. If he could assure their safety.

The realization that he wanted things he’d avoided for years sent a chill through his body.

No. No, no, no. He did not want those things. They cost too much. He wanted to leave, to be alone, to not risk losing anyone else he loved.

Sarah nuzzled him and whispered in a sleepy voice. “Can we do it again?”

He peeked down at her. Zeus, she was gorgeous. A goddess. If his goddess called for a thousand times before sunrise, he would do his best to rise to the occasion.

Because tomorrow, he would leave.