Page 44 of How to Start a Scandal

Think of Violet. Think of that kiss.

He brought it forefront in his mind and immediately the knots in his upper back melted. Her mouth, sweet and soft, that delicious moan that spoke of passion hidden beneath her reserved exterior. It had been torture to stop. But he knew if he kept going, he wouldn’t be able to control where his hands went. How he’d longed to learn the body he’d dreamt of for so long, eliciting more of those breathless little whimpers of pleasure.

A knock came at the door. An unwelcome interruption. He’d told Bennet he didn’t wish to be disturbed, but clearly the old valet wouldn’t be so easily put off.

Startled from his fantasies, he shifted his focus to the ornamental carving on the corner of the fireplace. It was a medallion with a corner chipped off and repainted with the same white paint as the other. He’d never noticed it until now. The house was full of these old wounds that had been polished over with paint, with stucco. Even with the fresh covering, the old wounds were still there beneath, pocked and chipped and broken.

A knock came again.

He scrubbed a hand over his face. The urge to roar at his intruder gripped him. He didn’t want this disturbance to ruin the solace his aching head so sorely needed.

The knocking finally stopped. The reprieve, however, was short lived and followed by the soft click of the doorknob.

‘Leave me,’ he said from the cradle of his hands where he held his face.

‘Seth.’ The quiet, feminine voice was tender and painfully familiar.

He didn’t want her to see him, not like this. ‘Please, Caroline.’

The rustle of her skirts whispered across the room and carried with it the gentle scent of lilacs as she sank on to the floor in front of him.

‘You left the ball early.’ Her tone was absent of accusation. ‘Bennet told us you were unwell.’

‘I am and I’d very much like to be left alone.’ He kept his hands over his face, desperate to be rid of her. To be rid of all people. He wanted nothing more than the press of solace, without questions, without concern or probing glances.

He’d left the ball almost as soon as he’d arrived. And even those few moments had been unbearable. The woman he’d been speaking with, a marquess’s daughter who had just been introduced to him and whose name he couldn’t recall, had prattled on, her shrill voice like sharp-edged pins in his ears, her cloying perfume suffocating. He had been rude, no doubt.

He didn’t care.

He couldn’t care.

There was so little of himself left to worry over it.

‘Seth, what troubles you so?’ She put her hands over his and carefully lowered them. ‘You haven’t been the same since you’ve returned. We used to talk.’

He kept his gaze fixed on the floor, not wanting to respond, not bothering to look up. Not when it took so much energy to do so.

He used to tell her everything long ago. When life was simple. When the worst weight on his conscience had been infuriating their mother or staying out until dawn. Long before he’d spent years fighting one battle after another, watching men die in front of him, facing down death with each new fight. Waterloo. His chest went tight.

‘Seth.’ Caroline raised his face to look at her. ‘Do you remember how we used to talk late into the night?’

He nodded, unable to speak around the ache knotting at the back of his throat. What would it be like to tell her, to share the burden of memories slowly crushing beyond the armour of his ribs and squeezing his heart, his lungs?

Could he truly tell her how every time he closed his eyes, he saw that cannonball hit Brent? Could he tell her how social engagements with the crush of bodies and rise of a collective body heat was enough to put him back in the centre of that terrible battle on Mont-Saint-Jean?

Even thinking of saying these things aloud brought the stinging threat of tears to his eyes. He slid his gaze from hers lest she see his shame, his cowardice. He was a soldier, a man who led others into battle, not some weeping ninny.

‘Is it because of the man you mentioned?’ Caroline asked. ‘Your soldier who...’ Her words trailed off, as though she couldn’t bring herself to repeat what he’d shared.

His mother had scarcely spoken to him since that incident, so appalled by the details he had so crassly thrown at her in spite. The reminder of what he’d said summoned him back to his senses.

He had not returned to London and assumed the earldom to be Caroline’s confidant. No, he was here as man of the house to care for her and Lady Dalton. To be their pillar of strength. He could not let them know how terribly he crumbled beneath his polished exterior.

She didn’t need to know that his skull was etched deep inside with horrors, or how he dreaded sleep and the awful terrors the night brought, or how simple memories could make his heart race, his breath pant.

He cleared his throat, breaking through the hurt.

Be a man, damn it.