Page 23

L eo waited until the rain stopped before he returned to the house.

It was a solid two hours spent leaning against the tree, but he stayed there.

When she’d run away, he’d nearly followed her, but then he’d noticed the tremor in his hands.

Best to stay put. If he saw her again, he didn’t know what he would do.

He hadn’t intended to let it go as far as it had.

Had been willing to let her have her kiss and then keep his hands to himself.

Then she had pulled him closer and before he knew it, he was kissing her like a man possessed.

Until the day he died he’d never forget the feel of her in his arms, her mouth innocent but hungry, her body lush and eager.

He had always suspected that there was more she kept hidden, but he hadn’t expected it to sweep through him like a wildfire, leaving him aching and shaken.

There was so much passion and energy she kept hidden under that pragmatism.

All for the sake of an alliance she didn’t even want.

She was so beautiful and clever, fiery and brave, an utter waste on a sniveling little cretin like Harrison.

She knew that. He’d been looking for a sign that she wanted him, and the argument could have been made that he had received one.

But there was another nipping at the edges of his mind.

A woman like Regina never capitulated. Even her determination to marry Harrison was a chess move, a calculation with an immense cost but the potential for a meaningful gain.

What if this was another stratagem, seemingly offering everything with one hand while safeguarding one thing for herself?

One last chance to be Rajani before she locked half of herself away forever behind a mask fashioned by England.

He wouldn’t fault her for it, even if it was true.

What he needed to know was what the fuck it meant.

He knew what he felt for her. There was no point in pretending the exhilarating hell in his chest was anything other than love, or something very near it.

But Regina Mason was anything but an open book.

Did she feel something for him, or was he simply a more pleasant option for her fiancé?

Was a chance to be her hero enough for him to take that title?

Did she even need saving? Was that more wishful thinking?

He’d had one question before their meeting and now he was left with several more. What few answers he’d gleaned offered no clarity whatsoever.

*

She couldn’t meet her father’s eyes in the interminable carriage ride back to their home, no matter how hard he stared at her.

She didn’t know what he knew or suspected and she could barely bring herself to speak let alone explain why she’d chosen to walk in the rain rather than seek shelter.

She would never breathe to a soul what she had done.

That fantasy, that eyes closed wish had somehow manifested itself into being on a rainy summer day in Mayfair.

Leo . He couldn’t be Mr. Kingston any longer.

Not after that kiss. She had kissed Leo Kingston.

In broad daylight. In the moment, it had felt like liberation, the keenest pleasure she had even known.

For those brief minutes she’d allowed herself to feel everything that she was capable of and the power of it was devastating.

She would never have imagined how hard it would be to walk away from him.

Even now she could still feel the pressure of his mouth, taste his coffee, smell his scent.

For one moment, under a willow tree in the rain, she’d lived her life without apology and kissed a man among men.

It was a memory to keep close to her heart, to remind herself in the years to come that she was a woman instead of a machine.

Years that now seemed endless with the memory of his body against her still so vivid.

She couldn’t bring herself to wish that remembrance away.

A desolation was taking up residence in her heart with a swiftness that stole her breath.

This was the horrible secret her mother meant to keep.

It was why she’s insisted she learned to dance but never let her participate at balls.

Why she limited her social outings and watched the media she consumed like a hawk.

Knowledge was a terrible thing to one who couldn’t act on it.

This little rebellion was going to torture her with awareness she was never meant to have until she went numb, or mad. Whichever came first.

The carriage came to a halt outside their home and Regina let her father out first before she followed. She only needed to get back to her room. If she could avoid her mother that long, she would have enough time to wrestle her senses back into submission.

But as she came through the door, her mother was standing there like she knew something had happened. “Regina.”

Regina. Why was it so strange to hear that name? Leo had only said her name once and now hearing anything else grated. “Aai?”

“What on earth happened to you?” She walked up to her and took one of her hands in hers. “Your dress.”

“It’s nothing,” Regina muttered pulling her hand back. There was a pressure within her threatening to shatter her into raged pieces or crush her heart into dust. She couldn’t look at her. There was too much fighting to escape and nowhere for her to hide.

“Did this happen on the way back?” she asked.

“It did not,” came her father’s terse reply.

“Not at the tea party. In front of her new relations?”

“She claims she got caught in the rain.”

“I did,” her voice sounded weak, even to her. What had she done to herself?

“You could have found shelter instead of wondering around like a lunatic.”

“Aai, please.”

“You didn’t look as though you had gotten caught in the rain.” Captain Mason said, watching her hard. “You looked like something had driven you out into it. Like you were running away from something.”

She shook her head and sank down into a chair. She felt weak, ill, like every ounce of her strength was being spent holding up this crumbling facade. “I wasn’t feeling well. I just went for a walk and the rain caught me. There was nothing strange about it. This is England.”

“Baronesses do not wander around in the elements. What are people going to say?”

“I’m sorry, aai,” she leaned forward pressing her forehead to her clasped hands.

She was unraveling, she could feel it. Years of swallowing everything back had poisoned her past the point of no return.

How was she supposed to bear knowing what true passion felt like, of what it was to be desired by a man for who she was body and soul?

“This is because of the influence of that Elodia girl. The wild one,” her mother continued, standing over her fiddling with Regina’s hair, trying to lift her head to see her face.

“This has nothing to do with Ellie.”

“Miss Hawthorne was inside with the rest of us, as dry as tinder,” her father said, sitting down heavily on the couch with a heavy sigh.

“Then it is your fault,” her mother turned an accusatory eye at her father.

“Me?” He looked at her almost offended.

“I told you to watch her. You spoil her too much, letting her do too much with the fencing—”

“Spending time with my daughter is not spoiling her, Madhavi—”

“—and sending her to that school—”

“—That school is a fine institution and allowed her to befriend the daughter of a viscount.”

“Yes, and that viscount’s daughter took Regina all the way to Gretna Green—”

“—for the sake of a friend who is now happily married to the son of a viscount—”

“—And where is Regina now? Soaking wet in our living room after she shamed herself in front of her future in laws. I said it time and again, a young girl needs to be home with her family. Now she is rebelling at every turn with that bonnet and those dresses, running around in the rain like a peasant exposing herself to gossip and ridicule. What is her fiancé to think?”

It was the closest they’d come to arguing in front of her. The most they’d ever disagreed in her life, and it was her fault. She had given into her weakness and already it was tearing her family apart.

She glanced up at her father and saw him watching her mother with visible frustration, his jaw tight and his chest rising and falling rapidly. Then he shook his head and looked away. “She needs to go change.” He turned to Regina. “Go upstairs.”

Regina nodded silently and rose to her feet hobbling her way to the door. Her hands were shaking. She was freezing. It was summer, why was she so cold? Her entire body ached as if her bones themselves were exhausted with the weight of her.

“Change?” her mother snapped, “Yes, she does. Into a grateful and respectful daughter!”

“Grateful?” That word shocked her out of her stupor.

“Yes! After all the efforts your father and I have made on your behalf to prepare you for this opportunity.”

Her father stood and took a step forward. “Madhavi.”

“No, it’s the limit now.” Her mother rounded on her, her eyes flashing. “Do you think it has been easy? All we have done for you, and you can’t even bring yourself to sit still. ”

“For me?” She knew she needed to keep quiet, but the words kept slipping out unbidden.

“We left India and came to this godforsaken country for you. We invested thousands if not millions of pounds into you so that when the time came you could soar into the brightest future, and you don’t even have the intelligence to be sensible of the fact.”

Her brain was filling with steam like an overheated machine as it struggled to comprehend the words coming out of her mother’s mouth. For her? Her?

“Look at her face! I don’t know what I did to deserve a daughter like you.”

This isn’t for me. She couldn’t imagine how that narrative had taken hold. For her! As if she wanted to be married to that monster. As if she had wanted or asked for any of this.