Page 17 of A Sense of Paradise
Amethyst was fresh, and keen to stretch his legs. Flora covered the now familiar distance quickly, hoping that the breeze against her face as they galloped along would help to clear her mind of the crippling fear that gripped it. Her father was like a wounded animal, stripped of his dignity and boxed into a corner. That made him dangerous, even if she was unsure what he could do to harm a man of Archie’s stature.
She reached Felsham Hall and left Amethyst in the care of Archie’s head groom. She entered the house by the side door from the stables and was surprised when Draper, Archie’s butler, didn’t appear. Not that she needed him to announce her or show her the way. She knew that she was likely to find Archie in his library and headed in that direction. She heard voices coming from inside, recognising both Archie’s and Pawson’s.
With a perfunctory knock, she turned the handle without waiting to be invited to enter and stopped dead in her tracks, blinking to clear her vision, thinking her eyes had to be deceiving her.
‘What on earth…?’
Chapter Five
Eloise breathed an unmitigated sigh of relief when Archie agreed to receive her. Despite what they had once been to one another, she had been unsure whether he would actually take the time, suspecting her of deviousness or outright deception. This was his world and she was not a part of it. She never had been, not even in France when he had depended upon her to keep him distracted from his pain and boredom.
Her entire concern should be for Maurice. She really was terribly worried about her brother, but since setting foot on English soil the prospect of seeing Archie had kept her in a permanent state of excited anticipation. Did he miss her? Did he think about her? Had separation given him the opportunity to regret giving her up? Was there still a chance to rekindle what they had once had? She longed to ask him all of those questions but never would. His non-response to her letters and his ignoring her outside of the church gave her all the answers she would ever need.
‘My goodness!’ She looked with awe upon the massive mansion that was Felsham Hall as Louis drove her along the winding path that led to it and she finally saw the place he had described a hundred times at close quarters. ‘It is magnificent! I had no idea.’
Archie had constantly talked about his ancestral home during those long evenings they had spent together in France, his hands lazily roving over her body as his gaze turned wistful and she knew that his mind was far away in this corner of England. Now she saw it for herself, bathed in sunshine, looking proud and impregnable, and she understood why he had berated himself for allowing his affair with a woman married to a vengeful man to mar his future.
Oh, Archie!
‘Don’t be nervous,’ Louis advised, in tune with her thoughts as always. ‘He is just one man, despite his wealth, and owes you an audience at the very least.’
‘Yes, I know, and finding Maurice is all that signifies.’
A liveried footman directed Louis to drive into the stable yard. No entry through the front door for Eloise, she realised, wondering if that was normal procedure or intended as a deliberate slight. Archie would not be that petty, surely?
‘I want to see him alone,’ Eloise said as she alighted from the carriage, expecting Louis to object.
‘I thought that is what you would say.’ He looked sad but managed a brief smile. ‘I will wait for you here.’
She touched his hand, then stood on her toes and kissed her cheek. ‘Merci, mon ami.’
A butler materialised to show her into the house. He was young but treated her with formality, no signs of recognition evident in his expression. He led her past a bewildering number of rooms, the interiors of which she caught brief glimpses of through open doors. They all looked gloomy to Eloise, overdue for renovation. It was like a mausoleum, she thought, wondering how one man could use so much space. It needed to be filled with love, and laughter and children. Lots and lots of children.
Their children.
And yet, she reminded herself, she had never borne Archie’s child. He had been careful in that regard but there was only so much he could do to prevent himself from impregnating her. Had he done so…well, perhaps things would have turned out differently. Perhaps he thought she was barren. Perhaps she was. The possibility depressed her almost as much as knowing that bearing him a son would have been the only way to secure his ring on her finger.
The butler paused outside of a massive drawing room. Pawson emerged from the shadows and smiled at her. She was so grateful for this small act of recognition that she almost kissed him.
‘It is good to see you,’ Pawson said simply. ‘Come this way. His lordship is in his library.’
His lordship? Goodness, Eloise had always been aware of his rank but had never thought of him in such formal terms. He had always been Archie; damaged, highly intelligent—her lover, companion and friend. Pawson’s deliberate use of his title was probably intended to set the tone; a reminder of the chasm that now separated them.
She swallowed as she hesitated on the threshold of Archie’s library. She felt her pulse accelerate and was suddenly afraid to enter his lair, unsure if she would be able to conceal her true feelings for the master of this extensive estate when she did so.
‘It will be all right,’ Pawson told her as he opened the door and ushered her through it.
She walked into the room with its book-lined walls and comfortable arrangement of well-worn chairs, and there Archie was, looking sombre, handsome, authoritative and totally out of her league. It had been a mistake to come. Her heart was swamped with emotion that she struggled to keep in check as she forced his name past the lump in her throat. She watched him, hoping to see the old flame reignite in his eyes as he looked at her, but there was nothing other than wary resignation in his expression.
‘Why are you here, Eloise? Did you forget our agreement?’
She wanted to tell him that she had not agreed to anything. He had laid out his terms and simply assumed that she would accept them. And she had, because she had no choice in the matter and because her pride wouldn’t permit her to plead her case, or to throw herself at his feet and declare her undying love for him. She lifted her chin and took the chair that he indicated with as much elegance as she could muster.
Don’t let him see that he broke your heart.
Eloise dragged her mind away from Archie’s physical attributes, abundantly apparent despite his disability, and suppressed a different sort of emotion as she told him about Maurice. She could see that he felt guilty for having encouraged her brother to hang on his every word. She knew that hadn’t been Archie’s intention but couldn’t entirely forgive him for so effortlessly impressing the boy that Maurice had been at the time.
Thankfully, she also knew that he would help her, but was mortified when she was unable to hold tears of relief at bay. He stood then and took her in his arms and she inhaled the familiar masculine aroma that had lived on in her dreams. His arms were so strong, the man himself so very capable, so reassuringly solid that she felt safe in a situation that was rife with danger.
