AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Chapter Fifteen
Warrington marched inside the doorway. Broomer gave them both a deferential nod and he had the expression of a perfectly trained butler. But the hair standing up on his head gave him the look of just having rolled from bed and he smelled of lilacs. When he took Warrington’s coat, a lopsided grin broke out on the servant’s face.
Melina moved up the stairs and Warrington followed. In the sitting room, he stopped, staring at the harpoon. He moved his eyes to the mantel, the room tinged with evening’s shadows. ‘Let me see how your painting looks there, Melina.’
She stared at the art in her hands. At first he didn’t think she would agree. Then she placed the picture against the mantel long enough to take down the other one and exchange them.
An explosion of conflicting emotions rushed through his veins, taking him by surprise. Such a simple act she’d performed and it caused an ache in him. And ache for a woman’s care in his world. For completion of the ephemeral dream he’d once had of having a helpmate. A woman who was another part of himself.
He could not let the feelings take hold in himself again. But when he saw Melina stand back from the fireplace and look at the likeness of her family, he ached inside. It was too late. He wanted the dark-haired beauty. But now he had enough control he could keep himself from folly.
‘Warrington.’ Melina strode to his side. ‘You are not concerned that I am alone in your house and you’ve invited people who might see me?’
He let out a slow breath. ‘No. Daphne knows of my trials. We’ve shared letters. Before Cass died, Daphne visited Whitegate to help Cassandra’s spirits when she was going to have a third child. This one mine. Only the sisters seemed at cross purposes with each other. They argued. Cassandra locked herself in her bedchamber and refused to speak to us. Daphne left and Cassandra died a few days later. Daphne wrote to me of the sadness she felt because their last words had been unpleasant.’ He huffed out a breath. ‘I think my wife awaited the third birth with the same joy I had of the second.’
‘Daphne was caught between loyalties,’ Melina said.
‘She tried to warn me before I even proposed to Cass. I perceived Daphne jealous then. I believed Cass wanted to marry me, not my title.’ He turned to Melina and shrugged. ‘Titles are handy things—if you don’t expect too much of them.’
He moved close to the wall and touched the harpoon. ‘Like this, I suppose. Nice to have at rare times. Completely useless in daily life.’ He turned to her. ‘And I have a child in my house. A child who means nothing to me but a memory of betrayal. My illness. My father’s death. All seem tied in the little one’s face when I see her.’
‘Even your father’s death? You jest?’ She stepped within reach of him.
‘No. I am tall enough that if I walk into a hovel, I will have to bend my head, but an imp no higher than my knee has conquered me, her innocent face a trumpet blaring the past. She makes me remember—when all I want is a new beginning.’ He raised his brows and shook his head at the same time. ‘I cannot return to Whitegate because of the child Cass left behind. When my wife was alive, I pretended the little girl didn’t exist. But I can’t now. And she reminds me of everything bad of my old life. And the suspicion I have that I still don’t know everything that happened under my roof.’
‘You tell me your wife had a child by another man. What more could there be?’ She took his hand.
At first, he ignored her question. Instead, he pulled her fingers to his lips to brush a light kiss against her wrist. He caught the scent of her soap and his mind flashed back to the memory of childhood innocence and the sweetness of his youth. Before his mother died and his father remarried. When his life had held the promise of every difficulty being no higher than his knee. Before he realised the littlest-sized hurdle could be the biggest to overcome.
He shook his head. ‘I tell myself I’m wrong—and perhaps I am.’ He took her arms and moved her aside so he could leave. ‘But I believe I’d not even suspected the evilness in my home until now. I believe Cass had a secret that died with her.’
‘What?’ Melina stood so close. He would not have had to take a step to pull her against him for comfort. But he couldn’t.
He had brought Cassandra into his life. And the part that still confused him was that he didn’t think she’d loved him, but she’d not hated him, either. He felt certain she’d not hated him.
