Page 18 of Yielding to Love

“My word, Camellia, I don’t know what to think. Are you sure he isn’t abducting you?”

Why on earth would he? “Don’t think, Marianne. Just help me pack.”

Less than half an hour later, Major Taverston was handing her back into the carriage. Just before closing the door, he startled her by pressing a brown-paper-wrapped parcel into her hands.

“If the colonel is sleeping and you’re bored…at least as long as there is light enough.”

She peeled open the paper of Major Taverston’s gift a little warily. The last book slipped to her had been the one from Marianne, a “secret” novel that Philip had given her as a wedding gift, The School of Venus: or, The Ladies Delight, reduced into Rules of Practice. A rather eye-opening instruction manual. She’d read it then gave it right back. Her hands had felt scorched.

But this! Sense and Sensibility. Her vision blurred. She’d never met anyone so thoughtful.

Yet as the carriage began moving, her mind shifted to the practical. No one was that thoughtful. She didn’t believe the major had nothing better to do than to jaunt to Tonbridge. And he had to have bought this book with the intention of gifting it to her. What was he doing? And why?

*

Camellia read until it was too dark to see the words on the page. Then she drifted off to sleep despite the jolting of the carriage. She woke to a flash of lightning and a deafening boom of thunder. Rain spattered against the roof and windows. She pulled back the curtains but could see nothing but a wet blur. Inside, everything was shadowy. Neville coughed.

“You’re awake?” she asked.

He grunted. “I’ve been awake for a while.”

“Major Taverston is out there.” She let the curtain fall closed. “Should we signal the driver to stop?”

“Stop? Why?”

“So that the major can come into the carriage.”

Neville didn’t say anything, but she felt his scrutiny.

“Neville, he is being so generous, and he’ll catch his death—”

“He’s a soldier. He has ridden in rain before.”

His uncaring tone shocked her. “We are not on campaign. He—”

“Camellia, let me tell you two things about Major Taverston. Two things you need to remember.”

She couldn’t make out the expression on his face, but he sounded so dour, she quieted, fidgeting uncomfortably with the blanket on her lap. “What are they?”

“First, he is married to the army. He’s on half-pay now, but he’ll go back. Mark my words. He is a soldier to the marrow.”

She understood what “married to the army” meant. Before Neville returned to London injured, she had seen her brother just three times in her life. She knew him only through correspondence. She’d written to him religiously, and he’d responded, but she could have passed him on the street and not known him.

So Major Taverston was cut from the same cloth. The war with France was over, but there was still India, Ireland, America, the West Indies… Neville was trying to protect her.

“What is the second thing?”

“He is a rake.” He shot the words like a bullet into her heart.

“A rake?”

“If there was a brothel within ten miles of his billet, he would sniff it out and be first in line.”

“Neville!” Her throat closed and she felt hot with shame. “That’s indecent! You shouldn’t speak of—”

“You aren’t a child, Camellia. And the world is indecent. I don’t believe in keeping ladies in ignorance. Ignorance is dangerous.” He grunted. “I am not concerned about Major Taverston. He will behave as a gentleman toward you. But that does not change the fact that he is a rake at his core.”

He didn’t fit Camellia’s image of a rake. But then, she had never met one before. She felt a twinge of disquiet. Or curiosity. She couldn’t tell which.

“I need my laudanum again, damn it. Camellia, give me another dose.”