Page 12 of How to Tempt An Earl (Wed Within a Year #2)

B eing on the road in good weather made it easy to forget there was a world outside this journey. For Celeste, the days took on a pleasant rhythm all of their own. They fell into a routine of stopping, setting up camp, washing off the dust of the day, and preparing and eating an evening meal. All this amid stories of other journeys and other roads these men had travelled together and falling asleep beside Kieran while he told her tales of growing up at Willow Park, the stars keeping watch.

They’d not repeated the intimacy of the forest, which was both a comfort and a concern. They knew better now just how consuming their passion would be if unleashed. But that did not mean desire had subsided. It was still there, pushing hard against their defences, unwilling to be ignored or denied. It crept in, crawling closer with each story like an incoming tide, with each look, each touch, until it became a permanent presence between them with every day spent on the road.

They were not racing to their destination, but they were being deliberate and discreet in their route, staying off the main thoroughfares and choosing country roads instead, eschewing inns and villages. There’d been no sign of Roan or Vincent, or much of anyone. Cheshire, Kieran informed her, was a rural area devoted to cattle, cheese, salt and, most interestingly to her, silk.

‘The best way to understand a place is to get off the beaten path,’ he murmured in her ear late in the afternoon as they rode through the quiet countryside.

She thought the same could be said of people as well—get them out of their ballrooms and social cages, get them out into the country where there was nothing to do but talk to pass the time, and who knew what might be revealed? Talk built its own kind of intimacy, and its own kind of risk. It created a sense of knowing someone perhaps better than one truly did—a caution she’d best keep in mind.

‘It’s the lull before the storm,’ Kieran commented as they passed a field of wheat, ripe and ready. ‘The harvest is not far off. It’s good we’re passing through now. Next week, these fields will be full of workers, roads full of threshing crews. We would have been noted.’

‘I like it the way it is now. It’s as if we’re the only people in the world, and that there’s nothing to do but simply exist, eat, sleep and enjoy being in company with one another. It’s a reminder that perhaps we complicate our lives unnecessarily. We need so little when we’re on the road.’ That had been true even when she’d fled Roan. It was amazing how portable her life had become in the last month.

Kieran laughed. She felt his chest rumble against her back, the chest she slept against each night. ‘You may be disappointed to know that we should be in Wrexham tomorrow night.’ Wrexham—the end of this journey and the beginning of another. The beginning of the end. They’d not talked about Wrexham. Perhaps it was a tacit rule of the Horsemen not to plan too far into the future out of a need to focus on the moment at hand. ‘You’ll have hot water, a bed to sleep in and a warm meal,’ he cajoled her when she remained silent.

‘I have those things now.’ She had so much more. She had this man beside her, and while they were out here she could pretend he was hers; that they were partners and equals. She could ignore the contradiction of wanting him while also wanting her freedom.

In Wrexham, she’d start to lose her power. She’d have to surrender the first half of the list. She’d have to remember that men stole a woman’s freedom, that marriage stole a woman’s freedom; that the things she treasured—home and family—could only be had at great personal sacrifice. Those things had killed her mother. In the long term, it would be best to let Kieran go before she gave him too much power.

‘Let’: that was a ridiculous word to use with Kieran. He was not a man who ‘let’ people decide anything for him. Letting him go was as much a fantasy as it was to assume he wanted her to stay or that he sought anything permanent. He didn’t. Which made her own thoughts all the more ridiculous, too, and all this unnecessary worry that she’d have to decide to go or stay, to choose Kieran or her freedom. He’d not even asked that of her. He’d not spoken of a future that involved them together.

Wasn’t that one of the reasons she felt safe enough with him to allow the intimacy—because he expected nothing in return, only the moment? No, her freedom was securely intact. Wrexham would end the journey but it would not end her bid for freedom. She ought to feel relief at the knowledge that she’d been arming herself for a battle she’d not have to fight, but there was only emptiness when she thought of leaving Kieran and that he’d let her go when the time came. It was not the reaction she’d expected.

‘I see that life on the road has you in its thrall.’ Kieran shifted in the saddle behind her, perhaps picking up on her unsettled mood. ‘The road has a certain magic, but it’s only been a few days. It does get old.’

‘Out here, we can be whoever and whatever we choose.’ She could lie beside this man, could walk into the woods and seek pleasure with him beneath an oak tree, sit beside him for the evening meal and lean against his knee. No one condemned her. ‘But the moment we step back into civilisation, into even the most meagre village, our actions will be called into question.’

Unless she belonged to that man. Beneath the pomp and pageantry of courtships and weddings, that was what marriage was—the transfer of a woman’s ownership from one man to another. She hated that. Ownership and guardianship were just polite words for enslavement. She’d had a large enough taste of that with Roan to last her a lifetime. Perhaps that reminder would make it easier to leave Wrexham and Kieran when the time came.

She could feel Kieran smiling. ‘Who are you out here, Celeste?’

‘A woman who can claim her passion. Who doesn’t need society’s permission to claim it, or censure her if she does.’ She gave a toss of her head. ‘Who are you out here, Kieran?’ It was a fanciful question to ask. He was who he always was. A man could do and be whatever he wanted whenever and wherever he wanted.

‘Don’t you know?’ His mouth was close to her ear. She would miss that little intimacy—the way his voice lowered, the way he might press the tiniest of kisses behind her ear as he spoke. ‘Out here, I am yours. Yours to command.’

The words sent a jolt of awareness through her—awareness of him; awareness of her own power. He did indeed allow her to set the tone between them. He’d not pressed her for more since the oak tree. He’d been content to sleep beside her and to offer her the comfort of his body without requiring sex in exchange unless she desired it. She did desire it, but not yet, not when the boundaries between them were still unformed and still shifting; the relationship was still too new. They were still learning about one another. She’d rushed in too soon with David and she’d suffered for it. Yet each night when she’d lain down beside Kieran, the temptation had whispered that she could trust him with her body, that he would be different, and each night she’d got closer to giving in.

‘Eric’s back.’ Kieran gestured to a growing speck in the distance. She’d hardly noticed it. Eric had left after lunch to ride ahead. Now, he came galloping back to give a report.

‘There’s a village up ahead.’ Eric drew his horse alongside Tambor and the two animals touched noses. ‘They’re having a fair. There’s games and booths, food, ale and lots of people,’ he hinted broadly. ‘We would hardly be noticed, and we’re only a few miles from the border.’

‘We are running low on food,’ Celeste mused out loud. ‘There’s only enough left for either supper tonight or breakfast in the morning.’ Although, it wasn’t much of a worry. They’d be in Wrexham by supper tomorrow. They weren’t going to starve. Still, the idea of a fair to celebrate their last night held some appeal. ‘I think we’ve earned a bit of pleasure.’

‘You heard the lady, Eric.’ Kieran laughed. ‘She wants to go to the fair. Tell the others.’

‘Thank you,’ she whispered as Eric galloped off.

‘As I said, I am yours to command.’

* * *

An hour later, the horses had been put up at a livery, rooms arranged at an inn and she was strolling the booths on the common with Kieran beside her, excitement buoying her step.

‘One would think you’d never been to a fair,’ Kieran laughed as they passed a leather worker’s stall showing exquisite sheathes and bridles.

She turned her green gaze on him, her smile wide. ‘I haven’t,’ she said, and laughed at the look of surprise he gave her.

‘Not ever ?’ he asked in disbelief.

‘No. There were fairs near some of the schools I attended. There was a frost fair on the Neva River in St Petersburg. We could see it from the school windows, but fairs were deemed too dangerous for boarding-school girls.’

‘I’ll be sure to keep you close,’ he teased, but she felt him tuck her arm more securely through his. ‘The headmistress wasn’t entirely wrong to worry. Pickpockets do abound at such events, and there are some charlatans among the legitimate vendors.’

‘That sounds exciting. Who do you think is a charlatan?’ She looked around the grounds, eyeing each booth, and he laughed.

Kieran discreetly nodded towards a booth selling ‘Dr Graham’s Medicinal Tonic’. ‘There’s one—that tonic likely doesn’t lessen anything but one’s purse.’

She tugged at him. ‘I want to go and see him.’

They stood a little distance from the booth, listening to the respectably dressed, middle-aged man behind the counter in a dark suit profess the magical properties of the tonic. ‘It’ll cure female complaints, it’ll soothe a teething baby, relieve headaches, muscle aches and so much more for just five shillings for the small bottle and eight shillings for the large. Then there’s my special liver rejuvenator, made from the purest ingredients, only found high in the Alps…’

She watched, enrapt, caught up in the story. She turned towards Kieran for a moment. ‘The gentleman is quite good. I like the part about the Swiss milk thistle.’

‘A good story is central to selling the product,’ Kieran murmured, his tone suggesting that, while she enjoyed watching Dr Graham, he was enjoying watching her, a thought that set something hot and wild loose within her.

‘What do you suppose is really in it?’ she whispered as the doctor’s talk concluded and people surged forward, pressing coins into Dr Graham’s hand.

‘Alcohol, mostly—probably opium, so that it’s addictive. It creates return customers.’

‘That’s a bit dark.’ She frowned. ‘And they’ll give that to their children? Suddenly, I find this less entertaining. I feel like I should stop them. Five shillings is a lot; it’s half a week’s work in some places.’ She glanced at him, frustrated. ‘Can’t we do something?’

‘What would you have me do?’ Kieran steered her away towards other booths. ‘It’s not our choice to make. But if it makes you feel better, it angers me too to see hard-working people swindled out of their money. Still, no one’s forcing them. Dr Graham is just presenting them with a choice.’

They stopped in front of a booth selling various blades and he flashed her a smile. ‘Just as I am presenting you with a choice. I think you should have a dagger. Fairs are good places to purchase daggers, unlike elixirs.’ He grinned and directed her attention to a few of the blades on display. ‘Try this one. It’s pretty and well-made.’

He held it up for her, moving behind her and wrapping his arms around her as he put it in her hand. ‘The handle is polished camel bone; the pommel is brass. Do you feel the balance? You could throw it if you had to. Try it.’ He stepped back, giving her room to take few experimental strokes. ‘Dagger work is close work, but you don’t have to reload it.’

‘It’s beautiful, and light—much lighter than your pistols.’ And it made her feel…powerful; more in control than she’d felt with a pistol.

‘Then you should have it.’ Kieran handed over the coins. ‘I think a dagger is more portable than a pistol, especially for a woman. You can easily carry it on your person.’

She worried her lip. The dagger was beautiful but it was also deadly. ‘You are preparing me for danger,’ she said as the craftsman wrapped the blade.

‘I want you to be safe, to be able to protect yourself.’ Because he might not be there to do it; because their choices would take them in different directions and those decisions would be made soon.

‘Protection through empowerment.’ She flashed him a grateful smile. ‘Thank you, Kieran. I will cherish this blade. Hopefully, I will never have to use it.’

‘At least, not tonight.’ He took her hand. ‘Look, there’s French milled soap made with lavender from Provence. We should stock up. We don’t know what supplies will be like at the Hall.’ He was diverting her and she let him. Tonight was not for gloomy thoughts, it was for living, and perhaps even for loving.

She reached for a bar of soap and inhaled, letting the lavender soothe away the dark thoughts. ‘That smell is divine.’

‘We’ll take six bars.’ Kieran flashed her a wink. ‘Don’t say a word, Celeste. It’s your first fair and I mean to make it memorable.’

The woman working on the booth gave a knowing laugh. ‘When your man wants to spoil you, never say no.’ She leaned close to Celeste. ‘Especially when your man is as handsome as this one. He could spoil me any time he wanted, but anyone can see he only has eyes for you.’

Her man… Celeste blushed at the woman’s frankness but she liked the idea of that very much. It was a fantasy she could let herself indulge at least for the night, even if she could not for the long term. Fantasies didn’t work that way. That was why they were fantasies.

The spoiling continued in earnest after that: a fistful of hair ribbons in a rainbow of colours because Kieran couldn’t decide which colour he liked best in her hair; a pretty necklace of sea-glass, the colour of her eyes, strung on a sterling-silver chain, and silver ear-bobs to match, all expertly etched with Celtic runes. Then full darkness fell and lanterns were lit, giving the fair a festive atmosphere. They ate hot meat pasties and drank cold ale at a plank table, where Kieran laughingly licked a droplet from her lips with his tongue and turned it into a lingering kiss that fired her blood and had those around them clapping. She ought to have been shocked, she ought to have reprimanded him for such liberties, but what did it matter? No one cared and this was fun . There’d been too little of that in her life.

‘How are we doing? Is the fair living up to your expectations?’ he asked afterwards.

‘Exceeding them,’ she answered honestly as they left the plank table and began to stroll again. ‘The fair is just as I imagined it. Boarding-school girls are guarded quite closely, sheltered intensely. Our childhoods are not at all like the one you describe at Willow Park with your brothers, all of you running wild. We saw little of the outside and nothing of the real world.’

She stopped to finger some fine lace, picturing it trimming a linen shift. Such delicacies didn’t belong on the road or on the run. She turned from it and continued. ‘We were told it was for our protection, but I know better now. We were valuable commodities. We couldn’t be risked at fairs or market-day shopping excursions. We were being raised for one purpose: to advance our families in marriage. We were to be beautiful, well-comported, talented and intelligent when needed so that we might appeal to a powerful man. If we should be allowed beyond the school grounds, who knows who we might meet? We might meet the wrong sort of person and, heaven forbid, fall in love with them, or rethink our purpose in life.’

‘Were the schools Roan’s idea or your father’s?’ Kieran asked.

‘I’ve come to believe they were Roan’s. If I’d lived at home, I would have been a distraction to my father. I would have kept him from doing Roan’s work. I think, too, that when I was at school I became leverage for Roan to ensure my father continued to do his bidding. It was not something I understood until after my father’s death.’

Like her father, she had not understood the depth of Roan’s control over those who were in his orbit until it had been too late to free herself.

‘It sounds like a very restrictive way to grow up.’ Kieran squeezed her hand, running his thumb over her knuckles in that soothing caress she’d come to associate with him, the one he’d used the very first day. She leaned her head against his shoulder as they walked, their pace slower now, their attention more on each other than the booths.

‘It was, but tonight I got to have a dream come to life, so perhaps it was worth it.’

She was getting drowsy. It felt good to be held against him, to have his arm about her waist. ‘I would look out of the school windows and see couples at the frost fair. I remember seeing a woman in a red scarf, and the man with her wearing a fur ushanka —you know, the hats with the ear flaps? They were ice-skating and there was this moment when she threw back her head and laughed and he swept her into his arms and spun her around. He was laughing too, and I thought to myself: I want that. I want a day where I have no cares and where there is someone who delights in me. Tonight, I got to have that.’

‘The night’s not over. Are you ready to eat again? There’s chocolate over there.’ Kieran adjusted their trajectory and they made their way to the brightly lit booth with its cases of chocolates from all over Europe. ‘What shall we get?’

‘A little of everything. Not all chocolate is the same. Trust me, I’ve been all over Europe; I know.’

Kieran slanted her a playful look. ‘I think I might put that to the test.’

They took their bag of chocolate and found a space just outside the lights where there might be privacy. He settled her on his lap. ‘Close your eyes.’ He held a piece of chocolate to her lips, his voice a seductive whisper at her ear. ‘All right, take a bite and tell me where it’s from.’

‘Mmm. This is Dutch chocolate, without a doubt. It’s smoother than other chocolate, and it’s also less bitter.’

‘And this?’ He held up a second piece, his fingers lingering at her lips this time.

‘Swiss. And, by the way, this is not fair—you’re trying to distract me.’ Although, she didn’t mind the distraction and wouldn’t mind if the distraction went a bit further than fingers on lips. Tonight was a night out of time, a night of make-believe where a fantasy had come true. Where one fantasy came to life, perhaps others might follow.

‘That’s amazing!’ Kieran laughed after she’d correctly identified a fourth piece. His eyes rested on her face and she thought, of all the chocolate in the world, she loved the chocolate of his eyes best. ‘ You’re amazing,’ he murmured, stealing a kiss, the chocolate game forgotten in the wake of another, more interesting game. ‘You taste good,’ he teased against her mouth. ‘Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Holland all rolled into one delicious kiss.’

Her arms were about his neck. ‘You taste delicious too,’ she whispered, letting her tongue flirt with his. She loved kissing him; loved the way his dark lashes lay against his cheek bones when his eyes closed; loved the way he didn’t rush, as if the kiss was important in and of itself, as though, if kissing was all they did, it would be enough. But kissing wouldn’t be enough for her, not tonight. Tomorrow would be too late. The fantasy would be gone.

The kiss deepened and she gave a little moan. ‘Take me to our rooms, Kieran. Take me there and be my man.’

‘Absolutely, my lady. I am yours to command.’ He lifted her in his arms, the obvious show of strength igniting something hot and primal within her. Her feminine core began to burn, a fire unfurling inch by slow inch.

‘Do you mean to carry me all the way there?’ She’d thought she was beyond the fairy-tale effects of such gestures. Apparently, not tonight; the flame within her only grew hotter.

‘I mean to do better than that. I mean to carry you to bed .’ Desire flared in his eyes, a naked flame of his own. Proof that what she saw in the dark depths of his eyes was desire uniquely for her , roused by her. The knowledge of it sparked something hot and wild, something untamed and unnamed within her that was potent and powerful; something that could not be stopped, only sated. Tonight, she wasn’t just going to burn. She was going to incinerate.