Yours Until Dawn Read online

  “How very magnanimous,” Samantha murmured.

  Gabriel frowned. “She still didn’t entirely trust my affections. No matter how passionately I pledged my love, there was a part of her only too willing to believe I was still an irresponsible rake-hell who had inherited everything of import— my title, my wealth, my social standing.” He arched a self-mocking eyebrow, stretching his scar taut. “Even my good looks.”

  Samantha’s stomach was starting to churn. “So you set out to prove her wrong.”

  He nodded. “I joined the Royal Navy.”

  “Why the Navy? Your father could have purchased you a prestigious commission in the Army.”

  “And what would that have proved? That she was right about me? That I was incapable of achieving anything on my own merit, my own skills? If that were my intent, I could have joined the militia and simply played the part of hero. There’s nothing like starched broadcloth and a bit of shiny braid on a man’s shoulders to turn a lady’s head.”

  Samantha saw him striding into some crowded ballroom, his cocked hat tucked beneath his arm, his tawny hair gleaming beneath the glow of the chandeliers. His dashing figure would have set all of the unmarried ladies to blushing and simpering behind their fans.

  “But you knew your lady’s head would not be so easily turned,” she ventured.

  “Nor her heart so easily won. So I signed on under Nelson’s command, confident that when I returned from sea, she would be ready to become my wife. Knowing that we were to be parted for several months, I sent her one last letter, entreating her to wait for me. Promising her that I was determined to become the man—and the hero—that she deserved.” He attempted a crooked smile. “So ends Act One. There’s really no point in continuing, is there? You already know the ending.”

  “Did you ever see her again?”

  “No,” he replied without a trace of irony. “But she saw me. After I was brought back to London, she came to the hospital. I don’t know how long I’d been there. The days and nights were equally endless and equally indistinguishable.” He touched a finger to his scar. “I must have looked quite the monster with my sightless eyes and my ruin of a face. I doubt she even knew I was conscious. I didn’t yet have the strength to speak. Yet I could smell her perfume, like a breath of heaven amidst the hellish stench of camphor and rotting limbs.”

  “What did she do?” Samantha whispered.

  Gabriel clapped a hand over his heart. “Had a more sentimental playwright crafted the story, she would have no doubt thrown herself upon my chest, pledging her eternal love. As it was, she simply fled. It wasn’t necessary, you know. Under the circumstances, I never would have expected her to honor her obligation to me.”

  “Obligation?” Samantha echoed, struggling to hide her outrage. “I thought a betrothal was supposed to be a commitment between two people who love each other.”

  He laughed without humor. “Then you’re more naïve than I was. Since ours was a secret engagement, at least she was spared the humiliation and scandal of a public estrangement.”

  “How very fortunate for her.”

  Gabriel’s eyes took on a hazy look, as if the past were somehow more visible to them than the present. “Sometimes I wonder if I ever really knew her at all. Perhaps she was just a figment of my imagination. Someone I fashioned from a clever turn of phrase and the fantasy of a stolen kiss—my dream of the perfect woman.”

  “She was beautiful, I suppose?” Samantha asked, already knowing the answer.

  Although Gabriel’s jaw hardened, his voice softened. “Exquisite. Her hair was a warm honey-gold, her eyes the color of the ocean beneath a summer sky, her skin the softest—”

  Examining her own chapped hands, Samantha cleared her throat. She was hardly in the mood to sit and listen to him wax poetic over charms she did not possess. “So what became of this paragon?”

  “I assume she returned to the bosom of her family in Middlesex, where she’ll probably marry the local squire and retire to a country estate to raise a passel of practical, pudding-fed brats.”

  But none of them would have the face of one of Raphael’s angels or sea-foam-green eyes framed by gilded lashes. For that, Samantha could almost pity her. Almost.

  “She was a fool.”

  “Pardon me?” Gabriel arched an eyebrow, obviously taken aback by her matter-of-fact pronouncement.

  “The girl was a fool,” Samantha repeated with even more conviction. “And you’re an even greater fool for wasting your time mooning over some frivolous creature who probably cared more for her pretty ball gowns and her phaeton rides in the park than she did for you.” Rising, Samantha crossed to him and slapped the letters against the back of his hand. “If you don’t want anyone else stumbling across your sentimental treasures, I suggest you sleep with them beneath your pillow.”

  Gabriel made no move to take the letters. He simply stared straight ahead, his jaw taut. His nostrils flared, but she couldn’t tell if it was in anger or to drink in the cloud of rich, floral scent that wafted up from the perfumed stationery. She was beginning to wonder if she’d gone too far when he abruptly pushed the letters away.

  “Perhaps you’re right, Miss Wickersham. After all, letters are of little enough use to a blind man. Why don’t you take them?”

  Samantha recoiled. “Me? What on earth am I supposed to do with them?”

  Gabriel rose, towering over her. “Why should I care? Toss them in the dustbin or burn them if you like. Just get them”—a rueful smile curled one corner of his mouth before he finished gently— “out of my sight.”

  Samantha sat on the edge of her bed in her faded cotton nightdress, gazing down at the packet of letters in her hands. Outside her window, the night had gone dark as pitch. Rain lashed at the windowpanes, as if driven by the wind to punish everyone who defied its reach. Despite the cozy fire crackling on her hearth, Samantha still felt chilled to the bone.

  Her fingers toyed with the frayed ends of the ribbon binding the letters. Gabriel had trusted her to dispose of them. It would be wrong of her to betray that trust.

  She gave the ribbon a tug. The silk unfurled, spilling the letters into her lap. Drawing off her spectacles, she unfolded the one on top, her hands trembling. A woman’s practiced script flowed across the linen stationery. The letter was dated September 20, 1804, nearly one year before Trafalgar. Despite its flowery elegance, there was a no-nonsense slant to the words.

  My dearest Lord Sheffield,

  In your last rather impertinent missive, you claimed to love me for my “luscious lips” and “smoky blue eyes.” Yet I am driven to ask, “Will you still love me when those lips are puckered not in passion, but with age? Will you love me when my eyes are faded, but my affections for you undimmed?”

  I can almost hear you chuckling as you stride about your town house, ordering your servants about in that high-handed manner I find both so insufferable and irresistible. No doubt you will waste your evening fashioning some witty response designed to both charm and disarm me.

  Keep this letter close to your heart, my lord, as you are ever close to mine.

  Yours,

  Miss Cecily March

  Cecily was unable to resist signing her name with a flourish that betrayed her youth. Samantha crumpled the letter in her fist. She felt no pity for the girl, only contempt. Her teasing promises came at too high a price. She was no better than some medieval damsel who tied her silken favor around a knight’s arm before sending him into battle to face certain death.

  Gathering up the letters, Samantha rose and strode to the hearth. She wanted nothing more than to burn them to ash as they deserved, to pretend that callow, arrogant girl had never existed. But as she prepared to feed them to the leaping flames, something stayed her hand.

  She thought of the long months Gabriel had hoarded them, the passion with which he had guarded them against her prying eyes, the helpless hunger in his expression when he had inhaled their fragrance. It was almost as if destroying them would c
heapen the sacrifice he had made to win their author’s heart.

  She turned to peruse the small chamber. She’d never completely unpacked her trunk after Gabriel’s accident, finding it easier to live out of it than return everything to the towering armoire in the corner. Kneeling beside the leather-banded chest, she bundled the letters back into the ribbon and secured them with a careless knot. She shoved them into the trunk, burying them so deep that there would be no chance of anyone stumbling across them again.

  Chapter Eight

  My darling Cecily,

  I find it difficult to believe that your mother did not address your father by his Christian name until after she’d borne him five children…

  When Samantha entered Gabriel’s bedchamber the next morning, she found him sitting at the dressing table, holding a straight razor to his throat.

  Her heart leapt in her own throat. “Don’t do it, my lord. I’ll let you out of the bed today. I promise I will.”

  Gabriel swiveled toward the sound of her voice, still brandishing the razor. “Do you know one of the chief advantages of being blind?” he asked cheerfully. “You no longer require a mirror for shaving.”

  He might not require a mirror, but that didn’t stop the polished surface above the dressing table from lingering lovingly over his reflection. As usual, he hadn’t bothered to fasten the studs of his shirt. The ivory linen hung open, revealing a generous slice of gilt-dusted chest and well-muscled abdomen.

  Samantha marched across the room and closed her small hand over his large one, stilling the razor before he could lift it back to his jaw. “Give me that before you cut your throat. Again.”

  He refused to relinquish his grip. “And why should I believe you’d be any less inclined to do the honors for me?”

  “If I cut your throat, your father might cut my wages.”

  “Or he might double them.”

  She tugged until Gabriel reluctantly surrendered the pearl-handled razor into her grip.

  Gently skirting his bandage, Samantha used a matching brush to dab juniper-scented shaving soap over his three-day growth of beard. Under her practiced touch, the blade glided easily through the golden stubble, revealing the rugged jaw beneath. His skin was smooth yet firm, so utterly different from her own. To reach the hollow beneath his ear, she was forced to lean over him. Her breast brushed his shoulder.

  “Why this sudden interest in grooming?” she asked, keeping her voice light to hide her sudden breathlessness. “Have you a secret ambition to become the next Beau Brummell?”

  “Beckwith just brought word from my father. The team of physicians he hired has returned from Europe. They want to meet with me this afternoon.”

  His expressive face had gone utterly still. In an effort to help him hide his hope, Samantha plucked up a towel and swiped the stray daubs of shaving soap from his face. “If you can’t win them over with your good looks, perhaps you can charm them as you did me with your hospitality and fine manners.”

  “Give me that!” Gabriel sputtered as she briskly scrubbed at his mouth and nose. “What are you trying to do? Smother me?”

  Just as she leaned forward, he reached over his shoulder. But instead of grabbing the towel, his hand closed neatly over the softness of her breast.

  Hearing Samantha’s breath hitch in a startled squeak, Gabriel froze. But the surge of raw heat coursing from his heart to his groin quickly thawed him. Although he would have thought it impossible, he could feel a schoolboy blush creeping up his jaw.

  He’d caressed much more generous breasts in his day, but none that fit his hand so perfectly. His fingers curled around its plush softness as if they’d been molded there. Although he didn’t dare move even one of those fingers, he felt her nipple stiffen against his palm through the ruched fabric of her bodice.

  “Oh, my,” he said softly. “That’s not the towel, is it?”

  She swallowed audibly, her husky voice suddenly very close to his ear. “No, my lord. I fear it’s not.”

  He had no idea how long they might have remained that way had Beckwith not come bumbling through the door. “I wasn’t sure which shirt you wanted, my lord,” he said, his voice muffled by what Gabriel assumed was a towering pile of shirts, “so I had Meg launder them all.”

  As the butler’s brisk footsteps crossed the floor, heading toward the dressing room, Gabriel and Samantha sprang apart as if they’d been caught in flagrante delicto.

  “Very good, Beckwith,” Gabriel said, knocking several jangling items to the floor as he leapt to his feet.

  He would have given a decade off his life to see his nurse’s expression in that moment. Had he finally succeeded in ruffling her composure? Was the color high in those downy cheeks of hers? And if so, was it the result of embarrassment…or desire?

  He could hear her moving away from him, backing toward the door. “If you’ll excuse me, my lord, there are some things I really must attend to…downstairs, you know…so I’ll leave you to your undressing…I mean, your dressing!” There was a faint thump as if someone had run into a door, a muffled “Ow!,” then the sound of that same door opening and closing.

  By that time, Beckwith had emerged from the dressing room. “How very odd,” the butler murmured.

  “What is it?”

  “It’s most peculiar, my lord. I’ve never seen Miss Wickersham look quite so flushed or flustered. Do you think she could be taking a fever?”

  “I certainly hope not,” Gabriel replied grimly. “Given how much time I’ve been spending in her company, I fear I might fall prey to the very same malady.”

  An innocent mistake.

  That was all it had been. At least that’s what Samantha kept telling herself as she paced the foyer, waiting for Gabriel to make his appearance. The physicians had arrived from London nearly half an hour ago and were waiting in the library to meet with him. Samantha hadn’t been able to gather a single clue about the news they’d come to deliver from their polite nods and guarded expressions.

  An innocent mistake, she repeated to herself, stopping just short of trampling the mirrored hall tree. But there had been nothing innocent about the way both her breath and her body had quickened beneath Gabriel’s touch. Nothing innocent about the tension that had thickened between them, as if the air had suddenly become charged with summer lightning.

  Hearing a footstep behind her, she turned. Gabriel was descending the stairs, one hand gliding firmly over the gleaming mahogany banister. If she hadn’t known he was blind, she might never have guessed. His step was confident and his head held high. Beckwith descended behind him, beaming proudly.

  Samantha’s heart seemed to turn over in her chest. The raging savage Gabriel had been when she had arrived at Fairchild Park had been replaced by an older, more world-weary twin to the man in the portrait. The somber black of his trousers and tailcoat perfectly offset the snowy white of his shirt, cravat, and cuffs. He’d even bound the unruly strands of his hair with a velvet queue. If not for the unforgiving slash down his left cheek, he could have been any country gentleman descending the steps to greet his lady.

  In some strange way, the scar only accentuated his masculine beauty, giving it depth where before it had only skimmed the surface of the man.

  When Samantha heard a startled gasp behind her, she realized she wasn’t the only one who had witnessed his transformation. Several of the other servants were peeping out of alcoves and doorways, hoping to steal a look at their master. Young Phillip had even gone so far as to hang over the gallery on the third floor. Peter gave the tail of his twin’s coat a yank before he could go toppling over the banister onto Gabriel’s head.

  Without quite knowing how she got there, Samantha was waiting for him when he reached the foot of the stairs.

  With that uncanny awareness of her presence, he stopped exactly a foot short of charging right over her and sketched her a formal bow. “Good afternoon, Miss Wickersham. I hope my attire meets with your approval.”

  “You look quite t
he proper gentleman. Brummell himself would swoon with envy.” She reached up to gently tweak a crooked fold of his cravat before realizing how wifely the gesture was. She hastily lowered her hand. It was not her place. Or her right. Stepping away from him, she said with stilted formality, “Your guests have already arrived, my lord. They’re waiting for you in the library.”

  Gabriel turned in a half circle, betraying his first hint of uncertainty. Beckwith caught him by the elbow and angled him toward the library door.

  To Samantha, he looked terribly alone, marching into the unknown with nothing but his hope to guide him. She started after him, only to have Beckwith’s hand come down, gently but firmly, on her shoulder. “However dark, Miss Wickersham,” he murmured as Gabriel disappeared into the library, “there are some paths a man must travel alone.”

  Time crept by, measured by the brass hands of the long-case clock on the landing. Their graceful sweep around the full moon of its face seemed to have slowed to fitful jerks, suitable only for ticking off decades instead of minutes.

  Every time Samantha came up with a new excuse to pass through the foyer, she found half a dozen servants already there ahead of her. When she was on her way to the kitchens for a glass of milk, she found Elsie and Hannah waxing the balusters of the staircase as if their lives depended on it, while Millie stood on a tall stepladder, dusting each crystal teardrop of the chandelier with a feather duster. When she was returning the empty glass to the kitchens, she found Peter and Phillip down on hands and knees, polishing the marble floor. It seemed the servants had been hiding their hope from Gabriel just as diligently as he’d been hiding his hope from them. Although they were all craning their necks and ears toward the library, not so much as a muffled murmur escaped its thick mahogany doors.