clad still in his greatcoat and topboots. His hat and whip were in his hands. His hair was disheveled, his face rosy with cold. He looked impossibly handsome.
'My lord,' she said breathlessly, 'I do not know how you have found me here. But I will not be harassed any longer. I have left your father's house and your grandmother's. I am on my way to a new situation. I want nothing more to do with you. I thought I had made that plain. And I seem to recall that you promised just last night that you would leave me alone. Please go away.'
'Jess,' he said, 'let me in. Let us not entertain a whole inn with our quarrel. No, you are quite safe.' He said this as he stepped inside, closed the door behind him, and threw his hat and whip onto the bed. 'I have promised not to touch you.'
Jessica watched him warily and backed between the wall and the bed down toward the washstand.
'You must come back,' he said. 'This flight into Yorkshire and return to a life of service is madness, Jess. And totally unnecessary. You do not belong in such a life.'
'Your tune has changed drastically within a few weeks,' Jessica said. She was beginning to feel more in command of herself. 'Until you discovered my grandfather, this was exactly the life in which I belonged.'
'No,' he said. 'You forget that I offered you a very different life even before I discovered that you are Heddingly's granddaughter.'
'My life is none of your concern anyway, my lord,' she said. 'If I choose to take a situation as a governess, that is my business only. I do not owe you an explanation.'
'No, you do not,' he agreed. 'You owe me nothing,
Jess. Nothing at all. It is not for myself I plead. It is for you. I do not believe that you can be happy with such a life. And I have reason to believe that you are returning to it because of what I have said to you. But it is not true, Jess. It is not true that your reputation is ruined. You do not have to flee from society.'
She looked at him, amazed. 'Flee from society?' she said. 'How absurd! Do you think I care what other people say of me?'
'Yes, I think you do,' he said gently. 'But other people are saying nothing, Jess. I made the situation sound very bleak yesterday morning, did I not, when I was trying to persuade you to accept my offer. I wished you to believe that you had no choice, that marriage to me was your only way of avoiding great scandal. But it is not so at all. I lied.'
'Why?' she asked. She had moved around to the foot of the bed and held on to one of the bedposts.
He shrugged and smiled somewhat apologetically. 'I don't know,' he said. 'I suppose I considered it a sure way of getting you to agree. Not very honorable, was it? And foolish, as it turned out.'
'You should have been relieved that I released you from having to do the honorable thing,' Jessica said.
'Relieved?' He laughed. 'But it does not matter how I felt or feel, does it? That is not the question here. The point is, Jess, that you are running away from a situation that does not exist. And you belong back there. You belong with your grandfather, stubborn and wrongheaded as he can be. You need to marry and have a family with someone of your own class. Not this, Jess. Oh, not this shapeless gray dress, dear, and the severe hairstyle. And not the demure look, eyes cast down, that I saw at the Barries'. Not that, Jess. Please.'
'Life was tranquil until just a couple of months ago,' Jessica said. 'It is only since that it has been full of feelings that have torn me apart. I have not been happy. And there is nothing to go back to. Only emptiness and heartache.' She had laid her forehead against the bedpost and closed her eyes. 'I want to be at peace again.
She was aware of him throwing his greatcoat impatiently onto the mattress. He strode around the bed toward her but stopped a short distance away.
'I have promised not to touch you,' he said. 'Don't be so unhappy, Jess. Can you not see that I have been responsible for all your misery? I insulted you and harassed you when I first knew you, and I have pestered you with unwelcome attentions and with offers that you did not want. And the last one was unforgivable because I enlisted the help of a man whose wishes I thought you could not resist and used arguments that I thought would crumble all your resistance. Wherever you have turned, you have found me. And I now know that you have not wanted me in your life at all.'
Jessica put one hand between her forehead and the bedpost so that he would not see her face.
'I am sorry,' he said gently. 'Love can make one very selfish and very blind. In my love for you, I was unconscious of the misery I was causing you. But the point is, dear, that it is a matter that can be put right. Once I have escorted you back to London-and I shall hire a carriage for you, Jess; I wil not ride with you- then I shall leave as I promised you last evening. And I shall not renege on my promise to leave the country in the spring and stay away for a few years. You will be happy once I am gone, Jess. I promise you will.'
She was crying into her hand. But she could not move or say a word without betraying the fact to him.
'Would you prefer that I left now and sent someone else to accompany you tomorrow?' he asked. 'Aubrey would come, or Godfrey, I know. Or would you prefer me to ask someone not connected with my family at all? Just promise me that you will stay here and not run away while I am gone.'
Jessica was concentrating all her energies on not allowing a sob to escape her.
'Jess,' he said suddenly. He sounded closer, though he still did not touch her. 'You are not crying, are you?'
She felt a light, hesitant hand on her hair when she still did not answer.
'Don't cry,' he said. 'Please don't cry, dear. I can't bear to see how miserable I have made you. Please, Jess.'
She turned away from him and reached for a handkerchief in her pocket. She scrubbed at her eyes and blew her nose.
'You must not blame yourself,' she said. 'You have not been entirely the villain of this piece, you know.'
'You will come back?' he asked.
She stared down at her hands, her back toward him, for a long moment. 'Yes,' she said, 'I will come back.'
He did not move. 'With me?' he asked. 'Or shall I send someone else?'
'With you,' she said.
'Thank you.' The tension had gone from his voice. 'Thank you for trusting me, Jess. You have made the right decision, you will see. You will be happy once I am gone. For tonight I will not risk scandal. There is another inn two miles farther north. I shall stay there for the night and return for you in the morning. I shall hire a carriage for you. All you have to do is wait here. You will wait, Jess?' There was a note of anxiety in his voice again.
'No.' She shook her head and turned to face him. 'Don't leave.'
'There is no room left here,' he said. 'I should have to sleep in the taproom. Not that that would matter. But we must not stay at the same inn. Tattlemongers might make something of that if word were to get out.'
'There is a room,' she said. 'Here. I want you to stay here.'
'What are you saying?' He watched her intently, a frown between his eyes.
She swallowed and flushed. 'Do you still want me?' she asked. 'You used to want me. I am offering myself to you.'
He did not move or change his expression. 'I have not asked for anything, Jess,' he said. 'I have made no demands on you. I have come so that I might take you where you belong and set you free. I want you to be free, dear. You owe me nothing.'
'Am I free to offer myself to you?' she asked. Her flush had deepened. Her hands twisted nervously against the sides of her woolen dress. 'I do not feel constrained. I make the offer because I wish to do so.'
'Jess?' He frowned and gazed at her uncertainly.
She took a deep breath and let it out raggedly. Then she stepped forward, laid a trembling hand against his coat, and lifted the other hand to join it. She unbuttoned the coat and then proceeded to do the same with his waistcoat. She spread her hands over the silk of his shirt and looked up into his eyes.
He had not moved, but he looked down at her in wonder.
'Don't you want me?' she asked, her eyes slipping from his.
'Don't I want you!' He caught her to him suddenly in a bruising hug and rocked her from side to side. 'But I don't understand, Jess. I don't understand.'
She raised her head from its position against his shoulder and found his eyes with hers once more. 'Make love to me,' she whispered. 'Make love to me, my lord.'
