Page 5 of The Untamed Heart

Eustacia held up the little sketchbook and graphite pencil that always filled her reticule. “I am an artist, Colonel. I never stir a step out of doors without the means of recording something of interest.”

“All the same, I—”

“Every second you delay is a second in which you put my reputation at risk, sir,” Eustacia said mournfully.

He glowered. “Miss Foxworthy, I do not believe you give a tinker’s cuss for your wretched reputation but being a man of honour—besmirched as that article may be—I do.”

“I know,” she said with genuine sympathy.

He sighed and gestured impatiently at her. “Well, come along, then. If we must, we must.”

Eustacia hid her amusement as he bustled her out of the house and practically frogmarched her across the promenade and down to the beach.

She hurried beside him, having to hold up her skirts to lengthen her stride so she could keep pace with him.

“Colonel Hamilton, I did not have a route march in mind, more a stroll to find somewhere we could sit.”

He stopped so abruptly that she almost stumbled but found herself standing far too close as he turned to look at her. She took a hasty step back.

“Oh. Quite so. Forgive me. Still, you’d have not marched for long. I can’t keep up that kind of pace anymore.”

The words were bitter, and she could already hear the slight rasp of his breathing.

“Do the doctors believe things will improve?” she asked cautiously. It was clear he hated speaking about his infirmity, and she suspected he only spoke of it himself—and using such self-deprecating language—to avoid anyone making the lamentable mistake of offering him sympathy.

He shrugged. “Given time and patience and a tediously precise regime of daily exercise I am supposed to stick to diligently, I may see improvement,” he said in disgust.

“And have you been diligent? Or are you forcing the issue by doing too much too quickly?” she suggested blandly, aware she would provoke him, but really, someone had to say it, didn’t they? Of course she had no right whatsoever to stick her nose in, but she could not help but worry for him.

He shot her a glare of pure impatience and then relented with a huff. “What do you think?”

Eustacia smiled at him. “I think you have spent your entire life believing yourself nigh on invincible and never allowing yourself proper rest. Now you are being forced to take notice. I imagine it chafes horribly, but if you give yourself a little leeway, you may find you are rewarded for your efforts.”

“You sound like one of those bloody quacks,” he grumbled.

“Imagine! And me, a mere female,” she said with a snort of laughter.

He slanted a curious glance at her. “I do not believe anyone would be mad enough to consider you a mere anything, Miss Foxworthy.”

Eustacia flushed, so surprised by what sounded remarkably like a compliment, if a rather backhanded one, that she did not know what to say. Flustered, she looked up and saw, to her relief, that they were approaching the rocks. The sea was out, and out in these parts that meant it was nigh on invisible, glistening miles of wet sand lying between them and the water glinting on the horizon.

“We’ll find somewhere to sit out of the wind there,” she said, gesturing ahead of her.

Hamilton nodded, and they walked on until they found a little sheltered nook that was relatively private but not so hidden as to suggest a tryst.

The colonel looked around, finding a flat expanse of rock to sit on. He took out his handkerchief, swept the rock clean of sand with brisk efficiency and offered it to her before finding a perch for himself. “I shall sit there, does that suit?” he asked, gesturing to a spot at an angle to the one he had provided for her.

Eustacia nodded. It would allow her to sketch his profile, which was a wonderfully strong one. His face seemed to reflect the rocks he sat upon, stubborn and immutable, with a hard, square jaw and deeply etched lines. His skin had been darkened to a rich bronze by years under foreign skies in all weathers. He was handsome, but not classically so. The starkly rugged and romantic vista around her, with its cliffs and broad expanse of windswept beach, seemed the perfect backdrop against which to study him. Bleak and beautiful on a chilly morning, intriguing and as unforgiving as the wild sea. They were all descriptions that could easily apply to both landscape and man.

Taking out her sketchpad and pencils, Eustacia regarded Colonel Hamilton with an amused smile. He sat rigidly erect and unmoving. She might as well sketch the seaweed-scattered boulder, for the only aspects of his character she could read were those he wished her to see.

A soldier, a hard-used, tough man. A survivor. A man used to keeping his feelings hidden.

Well, she had to start somewhere.

“Tell me about your career, Colonel Hamilton.”

He glanced at her, a flicker of impatience in his eyes. “Surely that cannot interest you?”