If anyone thought it odd to be discussing the dishes on the large table with the trio of male servants all lined up in a row, as stiff as Blücher’s Prussian soldiers, no one remarked upon it until much later that evening, when Caroline eased off North’s chest, up onto her elbows, saying, “I love the taste of you more than anything Polgrain could prepare.”
“Is it the maturity of my flesh?”
She smiled as she kissed his shoulder, his throat, his chin, and finally his mouth. “A dash of salt overlaying the taste of damp exerted man,” she said, and kissed him again. “Ah, North, are you already asleep?”
“Yes,” he said, and pulled her down into his arms. “This business about talking after lovemaking, Caroline, it’s difficult. You nearly kill me with your enthusiasm and then you want me to discuss philosophy with you.”
“No, I just want to know where you went this afternoon. Was it about Mrs. Pelforth? And why didn’t you tell me about Dr. Treath knowing her? Why didn’t you tell me that our locals are wondering if you’re some sort of madman?”
“No, it wasn’t about Mrs. Pelforth. I went to see Timmy the maid’s father.”
She reared up, staring down at him, her thick hair dropping like a curtain on either side of his face. It was dark and erotic, the feel of her hair. “Why did you do that?”
“So Timmy wouldn’t accidentally kill the drunken bugger.”
“But I told you I’d teach him, work with him—”
“His father had just struck Timmy’s mother when I walked into their cottage in Goonbell. I pulled him off her, dragged him by the scruff of his neck outside, and you won’t believe this—Timmy’s mother was running after me, shouting not to hurt her husband, all the while wiping the blood off her mouth. The three little girls were yelling their heads off.
“I told her to go back into the cottage and I sounded as mean as I could. Then I had a talk with Jeb Peckly.”
“Peckly. Timmy the maid Peckly? That’s quite an ugly name, North. Well, what happened? What did he say?”
“Not much of anything until I had his full attention.” He unconsciously rubbed his knuckles.
She was smiling down at him as if he were the lord of the world. He’d never had someone look at him like that. He was suddenly embarrassed and mumbled, “I just made sure he understood what would happen if he ever hit anyone again. The thing was, Caroline, if old Jeb was really drunk and he went after them and Timmy got out that pistol, it would make his father go right over the edge. Someone could easily get killed. I couldn’t let that happen.”
“Oh, North, you’re wonderful. There can’t be another man as wonderful as you are in the whole of Cornwall or even the whole of Britain. I am the luckiest woman. Goodness, I love you so much.” She was kissing him, laughing, stroking his shoulders and arms, the palm of her hand then on his belly, caressing him, and not a moment later, he came into her, moaning deeply into her mouth as she took him even deeper.
Then he stopped cold. He was balanced above her on his hands, panting like one of his old hounds, Cardaloo, after he’d run across Tyburth Moor. “What did you say?”
“I said you’re wonderful, more than wonderful. Actually, you’re quite the grandest man—”
“Then what?”
“I said ‘goodness.
’ I don’t remember anything else.”
He realized then that she was afraid to tell him she loved him again because it would be like being the dangling white handkerchief in front of the enemy. No, no, surely he wasn’t the enemy. Perhaps she’d just forgotten, or hadn’t meant it. He took her mouth, tasting her, nipping her lower lip, all the while feeling the pleasure begin to flood through him. He pulled back, his back arching, his throat working madly, and he knew she was looking at him when his release hit him, holding him there for an endless moment of the most exquisite pleasure he’d ever felt in his life. She whispered into his neck again that she loved him. Then she whispered, “I love to see you in the throes of your release, North. It excites me and pleases me.”
She drew him down on top of her, her hands stroking over his back as she lightly kissed his shoulders and arms. He fell asleep before he came out of her and that feeling was the sweetest he’d ever known in his life.
Caroline tried to be philosophical, she truly did. All right, so she’d blurted it right out there and all he’d ever said to her was that she was a good sort and he liked her. Actually she’d told him twice that she loved him. It was all right.
There was nothing wrong with being a good sort. It was quite nice to be liked by the man she adored more than any other human being in the world. Surely a good sort was a fine thing to be for the next month or so, perhaps even for the next year or so.
She couldn’t help it that she wanted to sing and dance and shout to the world that North Nightingale was a hero, that dour, dark, menacing—and all those odd things he’d believed himself to be—were nonsense. He was a hero and he was hers and she would do anything for him. It was that simple and that final. Caroline kissed his shoulder and he reared up just a bit, stared down at her with vague satisfied eyes. “That was very satisfactory,” he said, leaned his head down, kissed her mouth, then rolled off her. She drew the covers over them, spooned herself against his back, and smiled into the darkness.
She wasn’t smiling the following morning. Evelyn woke her up just after dawn. Alice was sick. She was vomiting in her chamber pot, her hair hanging in wet skinny ropes around her pale face.
She sent Timmy the maid for Dr. Treath.
She went back to her bedchamber and quickly dressed. When she returned to Alice’s room, North was holding Alice, wiping her face with a wet cloth. She was shuddering with the force of the spasms racking her thin body. Caroline wondered if Alice even realized that a man was holding her.
Bess Treath was on her brother’s heels as she always seemed to be. She shooed them all away as her brother examined Alice. Evelyn was standing in the shadows wringing her hands. “My poor baby, I heard her crying, then she cried out. When I got to her, she was vomiting, looking like death. My poor little Alice.”
Owen came running into the bedchamber. “My God, what’s going on here? Alice is sick? Oh no! I just knew something was wrong, I just knew it. When I saw Dr. Treath coming out of his house, I knew he was coming here.”