A Mistress for Major Bartlett Read online

  ‘Yes. So, if anyone is to blame for Justin having a relapse, it is him. Major Adam Flint,’ she hissed, curling her fingers into his shirtfront like little claws, relieving him of the bother of doing anything about its innocently seductive exploration of his chest.

  ‘He just marched in there, without a thought for the damage he’d cause, and blurted it all out. And not even the truth, either, I dare say. But his own version. Painting you as black as he could, and making out that I’ve suddenly become a...a sort of...lightskirt, or something,’ she finished indignantly. ‘When you are so ill you can hardly get out of bed, never mind get up to the kind of mischief he was implying you’d wrought.’

  That was probably true, he reflected gloomily. He’d gone dizzy just thinking about deflowering her. If he’d attempted anything even remotely strenuous, he’d probably have passed out like a light.

  ‘He’s just like Papa,’ she went on. ‘He may go by the name of Flint, but every inch of him is typical Latymor male. He throws his weight around. Barks out orders left, right and centre without a care for how anyone feels about anything. Or how it’s going to affect them.’

  ‘I don’t think that’s quite true. He just...didn’t foresee what the outcome would be.’

  ‘Don’t you take his side, Tom! Men,’ she huffed. ‘You always stick together, in the end. I suppose,’ she added morosely, ‘it comes from you being brother officers. You have great respect for him, or something.’

  ‘Well, I do, as it happens.’ He released the lock of hair he’d wound round one finger and let it slither straight to flow over his knuckles. ‘I haven’t always respected all the officers I’ve served with, in the various regiments I’ve gone through. But Major Flint is competent. Good with the men. Fair. Brave.’

  ‘Oh, don’t go on about him,’ she said sulkily. ‘The more you praise him, the more I want to wring his neck.’

  At that moment, they heard someone hammering on the street door. Since Madame le Brun had already locked up for the night, it came as a bit of a surprise when, a few moments later, they heard the sound of someone knocking on their bedroom door.

  ‘Oh, no. What now?’ Sarah got out of bed, went to the door and peered out on to the landing.

  ‘Excuse me, but it is the other one,’ panted Madame le Brun, as though she’d just run up the stairs. ‘The major with the loud voice and the angry face. Demanding to see you. But, after what we said, what you told me, am I to let him in?’

  ‘No! On no account.’

  ‘That is what I thought, mon chou. Leave him to me,’ she said, scurrying out of the room and down the stairs.

  After a moment or two, they heard the sound of booted feet marching to take a position right under their window.

  ‘Lady Sarah! Major Bartlett!’

  ‘Well,’ gasped Sarah, ‘if that doesn’t beat all! It’s as if he deliberately wants to cause a scandal.’

  She flew to the window. Threw up the sash, pushed the potted geranium to one side and leaned her head out.

  ‘Haven’t you done enough? Not content with upsetting Justin, you have to come here shouting our names out as though you want to make sure I’m ruined!’

  ‘I wouldn’t have to shout for you,’ Tom heard the infuriated voice echo up from the pavement, ‘if you’d let me in.’

  ‘I’m in bed,’ she retorted. ‘Gentlemen don’t come visiting ladies at this hour of the night. Come back in the morning at a respectable time.’

  ‘You are behaving like some Billingsgate doxy,’ Major Flint bellowed in the voice that had the power to make the hardened men under his command quake in their shoes. ‘And I have just come from leaving your brother’s coffin in the Chapel Royal.’

  Sarah gasped. Went white. And then her hands, as though seeking some way to express her rage and frustration, clenched round the potted geranium.

  ‘You...’ She inhaled sharply as she formed what was probably the worst word in her vocabulary. ‘You bastard,’ she flung at him, along with the poor unsuspecting geranium.

  Tom heard the sound of pottery shattering on the paving flags. And he grinned. At least she wouldn’t have a second head wound to tend because, knowing her, if she’d actually hit her target, she would have been mortified. Would have run down to her half-brother, dispensing tears and bandages in equal measure.

  Fortunately for all concerned, Major Flint beat a hasty retreat. No doubt rueing the day he’d attempted to cross swords with his doughty little half-sister.

  His grin faded when he caught sight of Sarah’s face, though. She looked stricken as she gazed after the Major’s retreating figure.

  And then it hit him. Major Flint had brought her the intelligence she’d been seeking ever since coming to Brussels.

  The location of her brother’s body.

  Which meant her quest was at an end.

  Or very soon would be. Right now, she was too shattered by the skirmish with Major Flint to think about the future. But once she’d recovered from the initial shock, once she’d realised he wasn’t ill enough to need constant nursing, there would be nothing to keep her here.

  This could be the last night he spent with her.

  Chapter Eleven

  She cried herself to sleep.

  But at least it was in his arms.

  As he held her, watching her finally succumb to exhaustion, he resisted the pull of weariness. If this was to be his last night with her, he wasn’t about to waste it sleeping. Not when he could savour the feeling of holding her in his arms. Not when he could watch her features, softly lit by candlelight. Even when the candle guttered and went out, he couldn’t take his eyes off her. She looked even more ethereal by moonlight, the planes and hollows of her face stripped of colour. He loved the way expressions flitted across her face. The way she quieted when he smoothed her hair back from her forehead whenever a frown began to pleat it.

  If only dawn would never come. For soon after daybreak, she would wake, and get up and leave him. Oh, perhaps not altogether, not yet. But now that she knew where Gideon was, now that she could finally lay him to rest, and he was recovering, she wouldn’t have any reason to stay.

  All too soon, so far as Tom was concerned, she stirred, rubbed her eyes and stretched her arms over her head. Sat up.

  One look at her face was enough to tell him she was already, in her mind, far, far away from him.

  ‘You are going to the Chapel Royal?’

  She nodded. Got out of bed. Folded the blanket over her arm. ‘And then I will go to visit Justin. Straighten things out. Oh, don’t worry, Tom,’ she said when he must have made some movement that betrayed his despondency. ‘No matter what Justin says, I won’t leave you. After all, he has Mary nursing him, so why should he begrudge you your own nurse?’ She lifted her chin in that defiant gesture which was becoming so familiar to him. ‘It isn’t as if you have anyone else to care for you.’

  But it wasn’t the same. He had no doubt that Mary was watching over the Colonel with such devotion because she was deeply in love with him. Whereas love wasn’t even on the list of reasons Sarah had for taking her stand in this bedroom. She wanted to defy her family. She wanted to prove her own worth.

  No wonder she could so easily withstand the physical attraction that she was occasionally starting to feel for him. The last thing she wanted was to be hampered by whatever might be starting between them, just when she was finally breaking free of the hold her family exerted over her.

  She bent down and gave him a fierce hug.

  He put his arms round her and hugged her right back.

  So what if she was only using him, for any, or all, of the reasons he’d just come up with? He wasn’t the man to look a gift horse in the mouth. He inhaled the faint air of violets that still clung to her. Savoured the feel of her breasts, pressed against his upper body.

>   Memorised it all.

  ‘I shan’t be long,’ she said, straightening up.

  ‘Take all the time you need with Major Latymor. To lay him to rest. I will have Gaston wash and shave me, and try sitting out of bed for a while. But I shouldn’t be a bit surprised if I need a nap before long.’

  ‘Oh, poor Tom,’ she said, looking down at him ruefully. ‘I keep forgetting how very ill you are. You really don’t look at all well today. Is there anything I can get for you while I’m out?’

  ‘No, thank you. I will need to replace the pistols that got stolen while I was unconscious. And get some new boots. I had a spare pair in the baggage the men brought here, but now they are my only pair. But all that can wait until I’m up to visiting the boot-maker myself.’

  ‘Clothes,’ she said, suddenly looking a little shocked. ‘Oh, my goodness, I haven’t done anything about mourning. And I’m going to pay my respects to Gideon. I have only the most frivolous blue bonnet and spencer. Getting some blacks would have been the very first thing Gussie would have done.’

  ‘Yes, but you’ve been sitting over me night and day. So don’t you go condemning yourself for thinking more about saving a life than what you should be wearing to do it!’

  ‘You don’t really mind what I look like, do you, Tom?’ she said thoughtfully.

  ‘You always look utterly beautiful to me,’ he said staunchly.

  She blushed. And lowered her eyes.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said quietly. And then stood completely still for a moment or two, as though contemplating adding something else.

  But in the end, she simply shot him a brief smile, before darting out of the door.

  * * *

  It took next to no time to walk to the Chapel Royal. Sarah could scarcely believe that Gideon could have been so close to her and she’d not felt anything.

  But he wasn’t really here, was he? Not in that coffin. That was only his earthly remains. His soul was... Her breath stuck in her throat.

  Somewhere else. Of course. That was why she could sense nothing of him here.

  Only, when she reached further, with all her being, only a massive great nothing echoed back.

  Nothing.

  Her heart started beating so wildly she found it hard to breathe. She had to get outside. Out of this cold, empty chapel and into the sunshine.

  She stumbled into the nearest shop and tried to concentrate on kitting herself out in black.

  But it was all a blur. All that seemed real was her deep inner cry of No. No, Gideon couldn’t be gone. No, she didn’t want to be alone. So alone.

  She’d been filling her days with activity, with purpose, all to silence that No.

  She’d ridden to Brussels, spent the night curled up in a stable with Castor and Ben, braved Mary’s hostility, even gone on to the very battlefield where she feared he had fallen and finally grabbed at the chance to save one poor wretch from the grinding jaws of death, in a vain attempt to silence that deep, instinctive denial.

  But none of it had worked.

  Except it wasn’t exactly the same kind of No, any more. It wasn’t a refusal to accept the truth.

  It was a No of anger. Of protest.

  All of a sudden she came to herself to find she was standing outside the door to her lodgings in the Rue de Regence. She had no idea how she’d come here, when her plan had been to visit Justin.

  But it was a foolish plan, she decided, going inside. She wasn’t strong enough to face Justin. And she would have to be very strong indeed to stand up to him, particularly when he was so ill and she so filled with remorse for being a cause of it.

  Right now, she just needed...she needed...

  She ran up the stairs to their room. Tom. She needed Tom.

  He was sitting on top of the bed, clad in breeches as well as a clean linen shirt and waistcoat. He took one look at her, and held out his arms.

  She flew to him. Buried her face in his shoulder, and just sobbed. With grief. With some gratitude, too, because she hadn’t had to say a word. One look at her face and Tom knew what she needed most.

  ‘He wasn’t th-there,’ she hiccupped, when she eventually grew calm enough to be able to form words. ‘Nothing of him at all. I couldn’t...couldn’t feel him any more. He’s gone, Tom. Really gone.’

  ‘Shhh.’ He rubbed his hands up and down her back soothingly. ‘From this world, perhaps, but he will always live in your heart.’

  ‘Memories,’ she said scornfully. ‘I don’t want them! I want him! I want my brother back. I need him. He was the only one who understood me. The only one who gave a damn...’

  He tensed. ‘That’s not true any longer. I—’ he took a deep breath ‘—I give a great deal more than a damn for you. In fact, I— Well, I’ve never said this to any woman before—never thought I would, either—but I think—well, I don’t know any other way to describe what I feel for you. So it must be love.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I think,’ said Tom gravely, ‘that I love you, Sarah.’

  She felt her jaw gape open.

  ‘I suppose this wasn’t the best time to make a declaration of that sort, was it? For a seasoned rake, I seem to have lost my touch. To have put a look like that on your face.’ He ran one finger along her jaw, with a rueful smile. ‘But I couldn’t just sit here and listen to you say that nobody loves you any more, when it simply isn’t true.’

  ‘But you can’t!’

  ‘Why can’t I?’

  ‘Because I’m not pretty.’

  ‘I told you that I don’t care about that. And this morning, I thought you looked as though you believed it. To me, you are beautiful. And it has nothing to do with the way you look.’

  ‘But you can’t love me for anything else. For heaven’s sake, Tom, I’m such a ninny! I haven’t a sensible thought in my head. No mind for study, or books. Even the very few times I’ve tried to do a good deed,’ she said, remembering her attempt to befriend and encourage Mary Endacott to become her sister-in-law, ‘it turns into a disaster. You...’ She smoothed her hand over his bruised brow. ‘You seem to have got me mixed up in your head with some creature you’ve fashioned from your imagination. Your fevered dreams.’

  ‘No. I liked the look of you before you rescued me from the battlefield and brought me to your bed. I used to watch you, riding about the place with Gideon, or a group of your admirers, and wish I was the kind of man who had the right to form part of your court.’

  ‘Did you? Did you really? Oh, Tom.’

  ‘And since we’ve been shut up together like this...talking to you, watching you move about the room, making it feel like home, when I’ve never had a home in my whole life. I’ve never talked to another person, the way I’ve talked with you, this week. Never wanted to. Never had anyone show the slightest interest, if you must know. Never known this sense of connection before. You only have to raise one eyebrow, just a fraction, and I know exactly what you’re thinking.’

  Yes, he did seem to understand her, without her going into lengthy explanations all the time. Even just now, when she’d said Gideon wasn’t in the Chapel, he hadn’t asked a lot of tiresome questions about where the coffin had gone, then, or if she’d gone to the wrong chapel, the way Gussie or Harriet would have done. Her sisters, with their very down-to-earth turns of mind, would have taken her literally.

  But Tom just knew she meant she couldn’t sense Gideon.

  They were in tune, in a way she hadn’t been with anyone.

  Not even, if she was totally honest, with Gideon.

  The world seemed to tilt crazily as she admitted it. Oh, she’d understood him, right enough. Had sensed what mood he’d been in when he’d written to her, even before she opened the letter and read its contents.

  But had he ever really cared about her to the same
extent? While he’d enjoyed talking to her, hadn’t it always been about his adventures? His ambitions?

  No! Her stomach cramped into a cold knot. He had listened to her. He had!

  But she’d had to explain what she felt. What she thought. He’d never simply known.

  Not the way Tom seemed to do, instinctively.

  Now it was her heart that seemed to lurch.

  ‘I haven’t anything to give you, Tom,’ she whispered, guilt-stricken. ‘You know how I feel about marriage.’

  ‘I’m not asking you to marry me, Sarah,’ he said with that wry grin he always used, she suddenly realised, when he was pretending something didn’t hurt him. She recognised it easily, since she was in the habit of employing meaningless, vague smiles herself.

  ‘We’ve already established that I could never be acceptable to your family. I just wanted you to know, that’s all.’

  ‘Oh.’ She sat back and looked at him. Really looked at him. If she wasn’t so set against marriage, if she didn’t think it would feel like a sort of prison, she could make a very good case, with her family, for exactly why he would make her an ideal husband.

  ‘They aren’t as high in the instep as some families are, you know,’ she said. ‘I know Mama was thrilled when Gussie married a marquis, but she was almost as happy when Harriet chose her scholarly clergyman. And even Justin doesn’t care that much about popular opinion. Otherwise he wouldn’t be so involved in the artillery, would he?

  ‘It isn’t that,’ he said, gazing at her steadily. ‘You don’t have any idea of how cruel the world can be to people who have stepped outside the bounds of respectability. I’ve lived with the stigma of being the grandson of a traitor, and the son of a bankrupt who committed suicide, all my life. The village boys used to sing a song about me, you know. Tom, Tom, the traitor’s son, Stole a cake and away did run. The cake was eat, and Tom was beat, Like as not, he’ll end in the Fleet. Which pretty much summed up my childhood,’ he said with that lopsided smile. ‘I was so miserable in my aunt’s house I would rather go into the village and steal food than go back for meals. And I was beaten regularly, as I’ve already told you. And everyone always predicted I’d come to a bad end.’