Free Christian Regency Romantic Suspense
This post is part of my serialized novel, The Spinster’s Christmas.If you’re new, you can begin with the summary and complete chapter list on the Intro Page.
Chapter 11
December 27th
After Miranda had put the children to bed after dinner, she entered the drawing room and immediately saw Gerard in the far corner. It seemed she could always find him in a crowded room, which was why she had noticed that he had seemed preoccupied all day.
It was more than the seriousness of the situation, or frustration that the men who had attacked them had not yet been found. There was a deadness in his eyes, and an increased tension along his jaw, which made her concerned about him. It was as though he was in deep pain, but not from his body.
Tonight, he sat with his mother while a large number of the party played at Charades in front of the roaring fire. His mother watched the players and laughed at their wild antics, but Gerard barely looked at them. He was not stiff, but he was stern. His mother occasionally spoke to him, but it was obvious to Miranda that they were both irritated, although perhaps for different reasons.
Miranda had never seen Gerard like this, but she imagined this would be his expression as he stood on board his ship, the implacable captain.
She sailed across the room. “Mrs. Foremont, I know how much you enjoy music. Wouldn't you like to join the glee that is forming?” Several of the older members of the party were gathering around the pianoforte for singing. “I should be happy to sit with Gerard.”
“I do not need a nursery-maid,” he snapped.
“I fear I know not how else to behave since I am a nursery-maid,” Miranda said sweetly.
He glared at her, but with a touch less irritation than before.
His mother’s mouth had fallen open as she looked first at Miranda, then at Gerard. Her surprise only lasted a moment, however, before she said, “There is no need, Miranda. My son is my responsibility.”
Her cold words made him look away.
Mrs. Foremont had never before been unfriendly to Miranda, but perhaps it was her resistance to allowing Miranda to accompany Ellie that made her seem more aloof. Yet whatever the cause, and whatever the outcome, Miranda could not bear to allow Gerard to wallow in his foul temper. Just as she had felt compelled to interfere with him yesterday, she wished to see him smile today.
“Mrs. Foremont, do leave your curmudgeonly son to me,” Miranda urged. “Although he needs a good clout to the head to knock him out of his ill mood, I shall do my best with rousing conversation.”
“I should like to see you try,” he growled.
“The clout or the rousing conversation?”
He glowered at her.
Mrs. Foremont’s eyebrows rose as she regarded the two of them.
“Gerard, it is of no purpose for us to be at loggerheads, because I always win.” Miranda gave him a superior smile.
Gerard grunted and put his chin on his fist.
Strangely, his mother looked stricken, as if by a thought that surprised her. But there was also a touch of meekness as she nodded to Miranda. “I leave you to your fate, Miranda.” Then she added with a saucy gleam in her eye, “If only to keep from laughing in front of my son and putting him even more out of sorts.”
Yes, there was the Mrs. Foremont Miranda was used to. Gerard’s mother swept away and Miranda took her seat. “There, did that make you feel better?” she asked Gerard cheerfully.
“I am not a child.”
“No, you are not. But you were upsetting your mother.”
“It was not my behaviour that was upsetting my mother,” he said in a low voice.
“What do you mean?”
He shook his head, but she reached out to touch the back of his hand briefly, where it lay on the arm of the chair. “You look as though you have been abandoned,” she said.
“I am hardly abandoned. On the contrary, I am never left alone.”
“Not physically abandoned, but perhaps emotionally.”
He moved his hand from hers. “You are mistaken.”
But she knew she was not. She recognized that expression because she had felt it herself for so many years. “While my parents were alive, I knew I was very different from them, and they could not understand me. So they stopped trying. And I felt abandoned.”
A muscle in his neck spasmed once, then stilled.
“I know they loved me,” she said, “and yet they were apart from me.”
He was silent, and she said nothing. She had never confessed that to anyone, and yet she had just spoken as if spilling a glass of wine into his lap.
When he spoke, she could barely hear him over the glee singers at the pianoforte and the rowdy yelling of the Charades players.
“They think I may have done something unsavoury.”
She had hardly expected that. “Of course you did nothing of the sort.”
He looked at her, but she could not read his expression. “You believe me.”
“I always believe you.” She said it without thinking.
Then he smiled. She took a short breath, and then calmed herself.
“My mother asked what I had done to cause those men to attack me.”
“Oh, Gerard.”
“Lately, my mother and I are constantly at daggers drawn. But I had not expected her to know me so little that she would ask that.”
“You have been away from your family for many years. And then you were in their company for your convalescence. You are no longer their little boy. You have changed—you can hardly help having changed—and perhaps it frightens them because you are now a man, and they are uncertain of who you are.”
“You did not change.”
“You are wrong. I am very different.” She was no longer that schoolgirl, and yet she felt her woman's heart reaching out to him again as she had done when she was twelve.
Their eyes met, and held. He seemed frozen, but not surprised. He reached out, and while he did not quite cup her cheek, his fingertips trailed from her cheekbone down to her jaw. He touched her as if she were a delicate flower, the centrepiece of an arrangement. Except that she was nothing of the sort. She was Miranda, who had just blurted to him that she felt abandoned.
She turned her head away, and his hand dropped.
She knew all the reasons he would not choose her. She was impoverished and his family would not wish him to marry a fortune-hunter. He would not consider the complication of a relationship with any woman while his leg had not yet healed.
She knew all the reasons she should not feel this way. Too many people in her life had failed her, and she was not willing to take the risk with someone like Gerard, who could have any woman he wanted as his wife. She could never believe he could ever love her. She had always thought that perhaps something was broken inside of her, which prevented people from caring about her.
Which prevented her from being able to open herself to anyone.
And yet she could not stop herself from wanting him as she had always wanted him. He had always been brave and kind, and he was all that still, but the experiences of his life had given him a depth and understanding that had not been there before.
And she was falling in love with him all over again. She could not stop herself.
“Miranda?”
She had been drowning in her thoughts for too long. She forced a smile. “When will you return to Foremont Lacy?”
“It has been let because I was away at sea when I inherited it from my grandmother.”
“You used to talk about what you would do when you inherited it, the improvements to the house and farm.”
“Those were the boastings of a foolish boy.” He gave a half-smile. “I know now that I know nothing of farm management.”
“You can learn from your father. Isn't it like ordering your men aboard ship?”
“I suppose, but I would need to know the orders to give, else I would make the men completely bewildered.” His gaze drifted to his knee. “I had thought I would do all this when I was older.”
“Perhaps it is better to learn while you are young, and your father is young.” She hesitated, then said, “I know you are unhappy on shore, but I think you could come to enjoy it.”
“I shall have to, or life will be intolerable.” His voice was sad and only slightly tinged with bitterness.
“You have always risen to challenges. This will be as great a challenge as any you have faced on board your ship. Are you averse to running the farm at Foremont Lacy?”
“Not at all. I always expected to do so, and eventually take over my father's farm, too.” His gaze fell on his knee again. “Perhaps you are right. I will be able to ride a horse soon and can follow my father and his steward.”
She hadn't realized how tense her shoulders had become until they relaxed. She’d had no illusions that she would cheer him up immediately, but she’d hoped that the thought of Foremont Lacy as a place for him to escape would comfort him, especially now when he was hurting from the suspicions of his parents. “Or perhaps you will bowl along in a dogcart like Squire Bigsby used to do.”
“Good old Squire Bigsby. I would need a dog as mangy as his.”
“There is a litter in the stables. If you ask him, I am certain Cecil will give you the runt.”
“I would expect no less from Cecil.”
A roar of laughter from the Charades players filled the room. However, when the noise had died, Gerard turned to her with an uncomfortable set to his shoulders. “Miranda, I know you did not wish to speak of this, but we must.”
She knew what he wanted to speak about, and the flash of remembrance of his arms around her, his lips pressed to hers, involuntarily sent a tremble of joy through her. She did not expect to be kissed again in her lifetime, and Gerard's kiss would be her brightest memory. “We must forget it happened.”
“We cannot hide in the closet like we used to do and let the world pass by outside,” he said. “My actions have bound me to you. I will do the honourable thing.”
It was her escape from Cecil and from the Beattys, and yet she wanted to be honourable as well. It would be wrong to trap him into marriage, a man who did not love her, who would resent her. A marriage of convenience would be all her convenience and none of his. He had no need of a wife, no desire for one.
And even aside from that, she didn't want the honourable thing from him. She wanted passion and a friendship deeper than any other. And yet perversely, she could not take that step to open herself up to anyone. She had simply been alone for too long. “Gerard, do you love me?”
She thought she knew what she would see in his eyes, and had steeled herself for it. But she hadn't expected the warmth of his surprise. He was speechless, and so she rushed forward. “Of course you do not. I will not shackle you to a woman you do not love. It is not what I wish.”
“Miranda—”
“And Gerard, if you married me, your family would call me a fortune-hunter. Your mother would be so distressed.”
“Miranda—”
“So I have refused your proposal. You are free.”
He gave her a dry look. “I did not actually propose.”
“Oh. Well, I have saved you the trouble.”
“If you would allow me to put in a word edgewise, I would say—”
Some of the Charades players suddenly called his name, and Miss Church-Pratton crossed the room to tug playfully at his arm. “Come join us, Captain, do, for we believe the next clue has something to do with water.”
Miss Church-Pratton, of course, did not acknowledge Miranda's presence, and Gerard rose from his chair in response to her entreaties and those of the other family members. However, he surprised Miranda by leaning close to tell her, “We have not finished discussing this, Miranda.”
He collected his crutches and made his way to the Charades players. Miranda rose to leave the room, but he glanced at her as she paused in the doorway. It was as though he had reached out to touch her across that distance. Her heart pulsed faster.
She took a deep breath and then exited the room, almost running up the stairs.
Why couldn't her girlhood infatuation have simply withered away? Why must he be so noble, and she so fearful?
Because yes, she was afraid of him. She was afraid of opening herself up to him. She was afraid that Gerard's fondness for her would dry up into a brittle embrace like that of her parents.
She would be grateful to him and the Foremonts if they would allow her to stay with them, but she could not stay for long. Once Ellie was comfortable, once Lady Wynwood was able to take her, she would go. She would find a position far away. She would never see him again, until he was old and married.
She stifled the sob that caught painfully in her throat, and hurried up to the nursery.
Chapter 12
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