To Taste Temptation (Legend of the Four Soldiers #1)(73)
Author: Elizabeth Hoyt

Their time was over.

She sighed and snuggled the blanket over her mouth. He watched the small movement greedily, drinking it in, committing it to memory. Soon. Soon now he would get up and walk to the door, leaving this room and making his way through the silent house. Let himself out into the dawn. Go back to the town house that wasn’t truly his. In two days, he would board a ship and spend over a month watching the waves as he sailed back home. And once there? Why, he’d continue his life as if he’d never met a woman named Emeline.

Except, while his life might look the same from the outside, it would be entirely different on the inside. He wouldn’t forget her, his warm lady, even if he lived for six decades more. He knew that now, sitting by her cold fire. She would be with him all the days of his life. As he walked the streets of Boston, as he conducted his business or chatted with acquaintances, she would be the ghost beside him. She would sit with him as he ate, she would lie beside him as he slept. And he knew that when his time on this earth was at an end, his last thought as he entered the void would be of her.

The scent of lemon balm would haunt him forever.

So he sat a little longer, watching her sleep. All the days of the rest of his life stretched before him, and he needed to store up these few seconds with her.

They would have to last him a lifetime.

Chapter Eighteen

The guards tied Iron Heart to a great stake and then piled thorny branches about his feet and legs. He looked around and saw his sweet wife standing by her father the king, weeping. Iron Heart closed his own eyes at the sight, and then the thorns were set alight. They quickly caught fire, and the flames leapt into the dark sky. Sparks fled upward as if seeking to join the stars, and the wicked wizard screamed with glee. But an odd thing happened. Although Iron Heart’s clothes burned, and indeed were soon reduced to ashes, his body did not. Instead, as he writhed in the flames, his iron heart could be seen beating on his strong, bare chest. An iron heart white-hot from the heat…

—from Iron Heart

Samuel was gone when she woke the next morning. A maid was clattering by the hearth, trying to light the fire. It must’ve been banked badly and gone out during the night.

Emeline closed her eyes for a moment, not wanting to face the day. Perhaps not wanting to face her life without him. And as she did so, she felt liquid seep from inside herself. She thought it was his seed, but when she looked, it proved to be a more familiar stain. Her monthly visitor had come. And this was the truly horrible part: Instead of feeling relief that nothing now stood between her and her marriage to Jasper, she was flooded with wild disappointment. How foolish! How utterly stupid, to want to be filled with Samuel’s child. To have no choice but to marry him.

Emeline caught her breath then. Her mind—her sanity—might know that a marriage to Samuel would be disastrous, but her heart was unconvinced.

“Can I get you something, my lady?” The maid was staring at Emeline, her hand raised over the still-cold fire.

She must’ve made a sound, done something to reveal her distress, for a servant girl to have noticed. Emeline sat up. “No, nothing. Thank you.”

The girl nodded and turned back to the hearth. “I’m sorry I’m taking so long today, ma’am. I can’t think why the fire should be so hard to light.”

Emeline looked over the side of the bed and found her wrap. She struggled into it while the maid’s back was still turned. “It’s probably the chill in the air. Here, let me try.”

But however many times Emeline stuck a flaming straw into the coals, they refused to light.

“Well, never mind,” she finally exclaimed crossly. “Have a hot bath brought into my sitting room. The fire’s lit there, isn’t it?”

“Yes, my lady,” the maid said.

“Then I’ll just dress in my sitting room.”

An hour later, Emeline’s bath had grown cold. Dismally, she stirred the water near her knee. Like it or not, it was past time for her to get out of the bath and face the rest of her life and the choices she’d made.

“Towel,” she said, and stood as a maid held out an enormous drying cloth.

Probably they didn’t make drying cloths so large in the Colonies. It was lucky she had rejected Samuel and wouldn’t have to put up with inferior bath accessories. Emeline stood morosely as her maids dressed her, not even interested when the new wine-red silk was presented. She’d ordered the gown several weeks ago when she’d helped prepare Rebecca’s wardrobe. Now she might have been wearing burlap and ashes.

She finally grew restive as Harris fiddled with her coiffure. “That’s fine. I won’t be receiving visitors today, anyway. I think I’ll just go walk in the garden.”

Harris glanced doubtfully at the window. “Looks like rain, my lady, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

“Oh, does it?” Emeline asked in despair.

This seemed the final straw, that the elements should conspire against her as well. She went to the window to peer out. Her sitting room overlooked the street, and as she watched, Samuel descended the steps next door and strode to a waiting horse. She caught her breath involuntarily. The unexpected sight of him sent a jab of pain into her middle, as if she’d been stabbed. Her hand trembled against the cold glass pane. He ought to have looked up then. He ought to have seen her watching him from her window above him. But rather mundanely, he did not. He mounted the horse and rode away.

Emeline let her hand drop from the window.

Behind her, Harris was still talking as if nothing had happened. “I’ll just put the new dresses away, then, my lady, unless you need me for anything else?”

“No, that’s all.” Emeline tore her gaze from the window. “No, wait.”

“My lady?”

“Fetch my cloak please. I wish to visit Miss Hartley next door.” This might be the only time she’d have to say good-bye to Rebecca. It didn’t seem right to let her sail to the American colonies without bidding the girl farewell.

Emeline swung the cloak on and hurried down the stairs, fastening the neck. She didn’t know how long Samuel would be gone, but it seemed imperative that she not meet him again. Outside, the sky was heavy and dark with impending rain. If Rebecca was in, she must remember not to stay too long or risk being trapped by a thunderstorm. Inhaling, she rapped on Samuel’s door.

The butler’s face was ever so faintly shocked when he opened the door. It was too early to be calling, but she was the daughter of an earl, after all. He bowed as she swept past him into the entry hall and then showed her to the small sitting room to wait while he fetched Rebecca. Emeline only had time to nervously glance out the windows before Rebecca came in.