their lips met. This couldn’t be wrong. It was meant to be. Ethan’s big hands slid up her sides. His thumbs grazed her breasts under the stuff gown, and Lucy heard herself groan softly. She pressed closer. One of Ethan’s hands dropped to cup her body and pull her closer still. The other continued its circling, circling, until she thought he’d drive her mad with wanting him.
Abruptly, he pulled away. A wordless sound of protest escaped her.
“Ah, Lucy.” He was breathing hard. So was she, Lucy noticed, and her knees seemed about to buckle under her. “We’d best stop before I do something I oughtn’t.” He pulled her down onto the bench, keeping hold of her hand. “Ah, Lucy,” he said again.
For a brief while they simply sat there, breathing.
“I asked about the job,” Ethan said finally. “It’ll be all right, seemingly. The cottage and all, for us to live in.”
Lucy’s mood soared and then came crashing down, weighted by all the worries his touch had erased. “That’s fine then… for you. Just what you wanted.” He’d leave London at the end of the season, and he’d never come back.
“For us.”
Tears clogged her throat. “I want to go; most all of me wants to go. Maybe I should be able to just take off… But I can’t. It’s stupid!”
“No, it isn’t. It’s the way you are.” He squeezed her hand. “Look, we all know there’s lots of servants who’re nothing but that. They come and go, and nobody cares much except those as have to find replacements. Then there’s some who’re more like family. It can’t be just them that thinks so, of course. That’ll get you into trouble, and no mistake. But your Miss Charlotte feels the same. Anyone can tell that.”
Lucy took a shaky breath. “You say that even though you want me to give notice?”
“I want you to come away and marry me and be with me all my life long. But I want you to do it freely and gladly. I want you to be happy and not regret one thing.”
Lucy’s tears escaped. He was just the man for her. Couldn’t she marry him and never look back? Shouldn’t she—and he—be happy? If she spoke to Miss Charlotte… Miss Charlotte would tell her to go and not look back. Then the Trasks would leave, and there’d be just young Tess and whatever town-bred strangers she found to take the other positions. Miss Charlotte would be unhappy—not as unhappy as she’d been this last year, maybe, but sad and alone. And she wouldn’t begrudge a bit of it.
Lucy thought of herself married to Ethan, snug in her neat country cottage. She longed for it with her whole being. But to sit at the hearth knowing Miss Charlotte was here without any tie to her old happier life in Hampshire…
She’d do it, Lucy realized. She’d go. She couldn’t give him up. But her heart would be sore at the way of it.
Ethan’s arm had gone round her shoulders. “Don’t cry, Lucy. I can’t stand it. Look… I have an idea how things might all come out right.”
She sniffed, looking up at him. “What do you mean?”
“I’m thinking… that is, I have a notion that Sir Alexander is… fond of Miss Charlotte. Interested in her, like.”
Lucy frowned, trying to take this in.
“And maybe she likes him as well. If they was to get together…”
“Marry, you mean? Miss Charlotte’s just got out of a horrible marriage. She won’t be wanting another one.”
“Now, who’s to say that? Sir Alexander is nothing like this Henry Wylde seems to have been.”
“No…”
“He’s well-liked in the servants’ hall and at home among the tenants. He’s right good to his sisters. According to Jennings, he’s a prime match as well.”
“Are you selling him to me then?” asked Lucy, a thread of amusement running through her.
“Just saying he’s a different kettle of fish entirely from his uncle.”
“Maybe so.” Lucy thoughts ran back over the last few weeks. Was Miss Charlotte sweet on Ethan’s master? It might explain some oddities she’d noticed. It was possible. Then again… was she just being swayed by selfish hopes? “Even if there is some… something between them, what’s it to do with us?”
“Well, we could… encourage it, like.”
“How?” Before he could answer, she added, “Anyway, we’ve got no right to interfere.”
“We wouldn’t be interfering. Just helping things along.”
“I don’t know.” As Lucy tried to state her doubts, the lamplight went off in a basement window.