Page 61 of A Much Maligned Miss

The first time, of course, she had been completely incapacitated through illness. But still… She could not quite believe that Gervaise had suggested they marry. His slumbering conscience must finally be catching up with him. Wicked Lord Atherton might like to think himself quite without scruples, but he had certainly taken his sweet time about ruining her! And now this…

Crossing to the small window, she looked out over the rooftops. From this vantage point she could not see the street below. Gervaise could even have gone back to his uncle’s house, she supposed. Perhaps to confess he had not married anyone at all.

His uncle would be vastly relieved no doubt. Perhaps he would even urge again that his nephew entered into an engagement with Miss Blessing. In his current state of mind, maybe Gervaise would accept the proposition. Caroline’s chest felt peculiarly constricted at the thought.

She should have been more diplomatic in rejecting him, she realized. She hoped he had not flung off in a pet. People tended to act recklessly in such situations. When Blanche Pebmarsh had thrown over her affianced, she had subsequently become engaged to a most undeserving sort, before the squire had managed to disentangle her from that connection. She hoped Gervaise would not do anything so foolhardy.

Given little choice, she returned to the sitting room, opened the first of her new books, and started to read. Remus jumped up into her chair and settled into her lap, and she finished the author’s introduction and moved on to a lively account of a sea voyage from America to England.

Gervaise had still not returned by the time she had finished the sea voyage, so closing her book, she carried her candle through to the bedroom and, taking up the tongs, threw a few more lumps of coal onto the fire, leaving the door ajar so the cats could join her when the sitting room grew cold enough for them to seek her out.

She washed with the water which had grown quite tepid, changed out of her toga into her cotton nightgown, and then dived under the bedcovers, for there was a decided chill in the air. She kept Gervaise’s socks on her feet and lay staring up at the ceiling, fruitlessly going over their disastrous conversation.

But what could she have said differently? she wondered hopelessly, thinking of his uncle’s house in Melbury Square. She tried to imagine herself living there, trying not to impose or get in anyone’s way, and shuddered slightly. The uncle would resent her, and who could blame him? She would bring neither prestige nor money to their family.

She would be unwanted and all too soon Gervaise would start to realize what a bad bargain he had made with her. After all, what would he get out of such an association? The gain was all on her part. She had practically foisted herself on him after all! Sleep did not come for a long time and when it did, she tossed and turned.

She was not sure what o’clock it was when the door creaked open and she heard a footfall too heavy for cats upon the floorboards. The bed dipped and she heard someone curse. It was Gervaise, she thought with relief, as the bed shifted and resettled. “Where are you?” he muttered, and she found herself hauled summarily into his arms.

“You’re so cold!” she gasped, more from surprise than anything. “What time is it?” He ignored this, wrapping his arms around her tight. Caroline’s heart began to pound against her ribs. Their previous closest proximity, a little light lap-sitting, did not compare to this. “Do you want your socks back?” she asked, her voice pitched a little high. “Your feet must feel like blocks of ice.”

“No,” he answered briefly, burying his face into her neck.

After a brief pause, Caroline passed her arms about his back. “Did you…go out without your coat on?” she asked breathlessly.

“Wives may bombard a man with incessant questions,” he replied. “But you, madam, have no desire to be my wife, so kindly desist from the practice.”

Caroline held her tongue. Well, she had been snubbed. She supposed she could not entirely blame him.

“If you must know,” he carried on, in tones of one severely goaded, “I went to sleep in that dormitory room opposite. There’s no fire lit in there so it’s bloody cold.”

Caroline absorbed this fact in silence. He had found the idea of a floor mattress more enticing than her. “You…you did not wish to sleep with me?”

He did not answer for moment, then he lifted his head. “I was trying to…” He breathed in and out noisily. “What you do not seem to realize, madam, is that if I continue to share a bed with you, things will occur which—”

“No, I do realize that,” she responded at once. “Of course I do!”

“I’m not sure you do, Caroline,” he said flatly. “And that’s partly my fault.”

“I can assure you that I am not a complete ignoramus, Gervaise!” she said hotly. “When you suggested such an arrangement, I knew full well what that entailed.”

“Did you, indeed?” He sounded skeptical.

“Of course!”

“So, if I told you right now to spread your legs and brace yourself you would not feel hard done by?” he demanded.

She gasped, biting back her instinctive retort. “N-no,” she denied faintly.

“No, you won’t spread them or no, you won’t feel hard done by?” he persisted.

Her face felt so hot she was sure he must feel it. Instead of trying to stammer out some embarrassing reply, Caroline widened her legs.

She heard his jagged inhalation of breath. “Oh, you little—”

Suddenly his bigger body covered hers, his breath on her face. “Very well, then, if you insist on being so audacious I will give you a taste of what you’re asking for,” he said raspily. “We both know you’re quaking where you lie. As soon as it gets too much for you, let me know, and I’ll take pity on you.”

She opened her mouth to refute his arrogant words, but her denial was cut off as Gervaise’s mouth sought out hers in a lewd approximation of a kiss that made Caroline’s toes curl. Until this point, Caroline had never had much of an opinion on kisses. Perhaps because she had never usually been a recipient, but what in heaven’s name was this?