With This Kiss Part 2

Four.

August 1834 On the way to Arbor House Fred snorted. "If you don't fall for Lily, you'll be the only man for miles around who hasn't."

"She can't be sixteen," Colin said, raising an eyebrow.

"She's fifteen, the same as I am. She was swanning about Bath in July, flirting with anyone in breeches."

"Are you hoping she'll wait for you?"

Fred scowled. "She's still a horror, if you ask me. I like Grace better, but she's older than me."

The sun slanting low through the carriage windows caught Fred's cheekbones and his wildly curling hair, and Colin thought that his brother-especially after he grew into his ears-would be as likely to cause swooning as Lily.

Not that Fred cared. He wanted to be an astronomer, and because their parents were quite unconventional in insisting their children learn more than how to dance a reel, Fred spent his time studying planetary motions and the like.

"So what else has changed at home?" Colin asked, settling back into his corner of the carriage. He felt a bone-deep sense of happiness at the idea of spending a few days at Arbor House.

"Nothing," Fred said, turning a page. "Alastair made a fool of himself over Lily in December, not that she paid him any mind. He's had a hopeless infatuation for years now. It was embarra.s.sing to watch."

"I find the idea of Lily as a heartbreaker extremely hard to imagine," Colin said.

"She's the biggest flirt in five counties, that's what Father says. Though he likes her."

"He does?"

"Everyone does." Fred thought about it for a moment and then offered, "I think because she's so pretty, but at the same time, she makes you feel comfortable to be talking to her."

"A very wise a.s.sessment. Is that enough to make every young man in her vicinity fall in love?"

Fred rolled his eyes. "She's the daughter of a duke; everyone knows she has pots of pirate gold for her dowry; and she's bigger in the front than most girls her age."

"That would do it."

"She'll love you. She's up for a challenge."

"What do you mean?"

"Just that. At an a.s.sembly, she likes to line up all the eligible men and knock them down like ninepins. You weren't around this year, so she hasn't knocked you over yet. I'd say that you'll be desperately in love with her by the end of the first day."

"Why should I be at risk, since you aren't?"

"It depends on whether you remember what she's really like. I shall never forget."

"And that is?"

"Horrid. Frogsp.a.w.n horrid."

Colin nodded. "She might well have changed, though."

"You never know who you're really talking to," Fred said darkly. "You wait. Lily looks as sweet as pie. But underneath? Frogsp.a.w.n."

"Are you truly only fifteen years old?" Colin asked, a few minutes after being charmed by an utterly engaging young lady, who had her mother's elegance and her father's looks. "And are you sure that you are Lily?"

She threw him a sparkling glance. But as a dashing young lieutenant encounters many a sparkling young lady, Colin just grinned back at every minxlike look she gave him from under her lashes, until she burst into laughter.

"Yes, do give up," he said, answering her unspoken comment. "I know that you have ambitions to be the most hotly sought-after young lady on the marriage mart, but I'm not available."

Lily's face lit with honest laughter was so much more seductive than her flirtatious glances that Colin actually felt a flash of attraction. "I shall be," she confided. "Mother only allowed me to go to select events this year, but next spring I shall make a proper debut."

"In London?"

"Of course. Grace will be coming as well as she hasn't debuted yet. Mother is throwing the town house open and there will be a ball held in our honor . . ." She chattered on and on, but Colin didn't listen. He just relaxed into the tinkling prettiness of English conversation. It felt so far from the powdery, acrid smell of cannon smoke. The way bright red blood falls to the deck and seeps between the boards.

With a start, he pulled himself back together. This year, for some reason, he was having trouble leaving the fighting behind on board ship, where it belonged. He needed to buck up and be a man.

"All right," Lily said, tucking her hand through his arm. "I can tell that you're not listening."

"Forgive me," he said, wondering what he had missed. Her smile was so impish and yet delightful that he smiled back, despite himself.

"You are finding me utterly tedious, and why shouldn't you?"

"I find you delightful."

"Pshaw!" she said, laughing. "You would have been my first beau in uniform, but I suppose I shall meet some others in the spring. A lieutenant! We're all so impressed, Colin. Father said that he thinks you'll be an admiral before you reach thirty, at this rate."

Colin made himself smile. "I don't see Grace anywhere. Will she be joining us?"

"Oh, she'll be down by the lake," Lily said. "Probably writing you a letter. Do go see her."

Grace was indeed down at the lake, sitting under a willow and working on a portrait of her brother, Brandon. She had heard a "halloo" and a lot of shouting behind her, up the hill toward the house, but she didn't move. With so many children milling about, there was always some sort of excitement brewing.

She had discovered that putting tiny flecks of red where someone didn't expect to see them gave depth to a piece of clothing, no matter how tiny. She realized it after putting her face as close as possible to a portrait by Hans Holbein in the ducal gallery.

Holbein's portrait was of one of her ancestors, a stuffy, bejeweled duke. Hers was of a naughty boy, but the effect was the same.

She was so intent on painting that she was unaware someone was approaching until a hand came down on her shoulder, and a big body came between her and the water glinting on the lake.

It was Colin.

She looked up at him without a word, cataloguing-the way she always did-the curl of his eyelashes, the deep blue of his eyes, his high cheekbones. The way his thigh muscles bulged as he squatted before her. The way his shoulders seemed much wider than they had been the last time she saw him. Just like that, her heart began beating so quickly that she felt a bit dizzy.

"h.e.l.lo there," he said, smiling at her. "How's the best correspondent in the world?"

Grace felt her cheeks flood with color. "I'm fine. I'm so happy to see you home safe, Colin." She looked him over. "Without an injury. It's just marvelous!"

"Yes, well," he said, with an odd flatness in his voice. "I'm lucky enough to have all fingers and toes accounted for. What are you painting?"

"I'm making a portrait of Brandon." She frowned down at her paints as she tried to figure out what was wrong with Colin's voice. Surely it was a good thing not to be injured?

"Brandon is not my favorite ducal progeny," Colin said. "You are, darling girl, with all those wonderful letters. There were times when I would have gone stark mad but for thinking about the stories you told me."

"Are you still blockading the slaver ships?" she asked, wishing that she could think of something clever and funny to say.

Colin sat down next to her. "That I am, Grace. That I am."

They sat for a while and looked out at the lake.

"And do you still hate the fighting part?"

"Your letters help."

"Do you ever read poetry?" she offered. "Maybe that would help as well."

He threw her a glance that warmed her down to her toes. "You're overestimating me, Grace. I'm no good with words. I try to write you back, you know. I sit there and I can't think of anything to say because it's all-" He stopped.

"If you hate it that much," she said, after a moment, "you must leave the navy."

His jaw tightened. "I can't give it up. It's the only thing I know how to do."

"You could learn something else. There's no point in doing something you loathe so much."

There was silence.

"You do loathe it, don't you?"

He said nothing. Colin answered her letters so rarely that she found herself reading the few lines he wrote over and over. Yet it felt to her as if his anguish stretched all the way from the coast of Africa to England.

"Does your friend Philip Drummond hate it as much as you do?"

"No."

"What's Philip like?"

"Much more cheerful than I am," Colin said, shooting her a glance from under his lashes. "He likes excitement." A little shudder went through him.

Grace saw that with a sinking heart. "You must resign your commission, Colin. Sir Griffin could get you out."

"There's no way out, Grace. Not without dishonor."

"Dishonor is better than death," she insisted. Rather than look at him, she stared at the drying paint on her brush.

There was more silence, the only sound the lapping of lake water. "They've all died around me," he said, finally. "Everyone but myself and Philip. They call us the golden twins, because no matter what happens on board, we walk off without a scratch." He reached out his hand before them. "Not even a scratch, Grace. Do you see that?"

She thought it was the most beautiful hand she'd ever seen: large and indubitably male, a strong hand. It bore no resemblance to the pampered hands of the aristocratic boys she'd met. "I am glad to see you haven't injuries," she said, giving it emphasis.

"It's a curse."

A big black swan drifted up to sh.o.r.e. "Don't look him in the eyes," Grace warned. "He's cross most of the time. Your father says he's a devil in disguise. If you meet his eye, he'll get out of the water in order to snap at our toes."

"As you told me in a letter," Colin said, smiling his lopsided smile. "I take it this is Bub, short for Beelzebub, the Prince of Darkness himself?"

"Why is it like a curse to walk out of a battle unwounded?" Grace asked. It had to be asked, even though her stomach clenched into knots at the idea of Colin's being wounded.

"There's all this smoke, and when it clears, the men are dead. All around you. Or crying." His voice was hollow and utterly calm. "Dying men cry for their mothers, Grace. They do. There's nothing you can do for them, but make promises you can't keep."

"That's awful," she whispered.

"You must wonder why I don't write you more often. I'm not good with words. I use up all I have, writing those mothers."

"I'm sorry," she said. And then she came up on her knees, put her palette to the side, and pulled at him until her arms could go around his shoulders. "I'm so sorry."

He resisted for one moment, and then gave in, arms going around her waist, holding her tightly against his big body.

It was a moment Grace never forgot. The sun was hot on her back, and because she was on her knees, and he was seated, her head was slightly above his. She tried not to think about the fact that his shoulders and his back were muscled, because he was hurting. Even if there weren't any wounds on the outside, he was injured.

After a while he pulled away and looked at her. His eyes were the dark blue of the ocean just at twilight. "You are quite special," he said, his voice deep and low. He put a finger on her lips.

Grace felt that touch to the bottom of her toes.

Then he stood. "Would you like to return to the house now, Lady Grace?" He held out a hand to her.

She accepted his help and stood, trying to figure out what it all meant. She loved him. She felt it in every part of her being. It would break her heart if he died; she might never recover.

But she couldn't say that to him, and he didn't seem to share her feelings.

"I understand that you and your sister are to debut next season?" Colin's voice had turned coolly pleasant, the voice of a family friend.

Did he like her? Did he care at all?

When he left a few days later, she still had no idea.

So she took up her pen and began a letter to him, about the escapades of the two youngest Barrys, who had decided to run away from home.

She wrote nothing about herself, or the golden twins, or the curse.

He didn't reply to her next two letters, and sent only a note after the third. From the cursory letters he sent, she had the feeling that he skimmed hers and tossed them aside. And yet, stupidly, she couldn't stop writing and rewriting her descriptions, sometimes staying up all night working on a miniature watercolor to slip into a packet.

She had always signed her letters, From Ryburn, or From Arbor House . . . Lady Grace. But one night in a fit of rebellion, she changed her signature. Your friend, Lady Grace.

He sent one of his infrequent replies to that one. It was only three lines long, but she took it as a sign he approved.