Out of the Blue (A Regency Time Travel Romance) (13 page)

“Cassandra, I—” he began, only to have her
cut him off.

“I think I’d be wise to stick with anger,
don’t you? Otherwise”—her voice broke—“otherwise I’ll have to think
about how I only landed here because I broke the rules. That would
take care of the guilt, of course, but then all that I’d have left
is the grief. Acceptance is completely out of the question, because
I can never accept the idea that I might be trapped here forever. I
can’t accept that. I just can’t!”

She looked away, off into the middle
distance, then back to him, her violet eyes shimmering with tears.
“I didn’t want to do this. I promised myself I wouldn’t fall apart,
but—oh, God, Marcus, hold me. I’m scared. I’m so damned
scared.”

Abandoning any thoughts as to the right or
the wrong of the thing, Marcus sat beside Cassandra on the side of
the bed and, gathering her close against his chest, allowed her to
cry all over his pristine cravat.

She sobbed for several minutes, her slim
shoulders shaking under the strain of her grief, her fear. He
didn’t talk, didn’t try to dissuade her from giving in to her
emotions, but only continued to hold her, gently stroking her back,
pressing his chin against the top of her head, rocking slowly,
absorbing as much of her pain as he could.

At last, her head still pressed tightly
against him, she mumbled a request for a handkerchief, which he
gratefully produced, hoping the worst was over. He might consider
himself to be a man of the world, but he’d had precious little
contact with weeping women. Now he knew why. Weeping women made him
nervous. Cassandra made him nervous. She made him feel inadequate,
because he knew he could do nothing to help her. And he wanted to
help her more than he wanted anything else in this world. He wanted
to ease her pain, calm her fears, share his strength with her, gift
her with his protection.

He also wanted to get out of Georgina’s
bedchamber, Cassandra’s bedchamber, the bedchamber of a single,
unattached female, just as quickly as possible, before Aunt
Cornelia, once she had rid herself of the Reverend Mr. Austin, came
to investigate the reason behind Marcus’s prolonged absence. He had
enough on his plate without Corny barging through the door to
discover him and Cassandra locked in what only could be called a
compromising position.

“Cassandra?” he said at last, attempting to
disengage himself from her nearly painful embrace. “Are you feeling
more the thing now?”

“If by that you mean am I feeling better,
then yes, I think I am. A little,” she mumbled into his cravat, her
grip tightening on his body. “You aren’t going to leave me, are
you? I don’t want to be alone.”

He lifted his hands to her shoulders and
gently pressed her back against the mattress. “I’ll send for Rose.
She’ll stay with you.”

As he attempted to leave her she reached up,
grabbing his forearms with a strength that surprised him, and
pulled him down beside her. He could see the apprehension that
lingered in her eyes.

“No! I don’t want Rose. You should have seen
her face this morning when she saw my bra—my undergarments—before I
could hide them. I want you. I can speak freely in front of you.
You’re the only one who understands. Please, Marcus.
Please
don’t leave me.”

“Cassandra,” he began reasonably, “as you
told me yesterday, you know enough about this time in history to be
aware that you are in dire peril of being compromised, don’t you? I
shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t have been here.” Even as he
delivered this very proper speech, even as he used it to remind
himself that he was not behaving in Cassandra’s best interests,
Marcus already knew he wasn’t going anywhere. He was going to
continue to lie here, his body pressed, neck to knees, against this
beautiful, vulnerable, trusting, yet disturbingly
forward
young woman for as long as she wished. Maybe longer.

“Oh, all right, madam. You win.” Shifting his
position so that he was lying on his side, his head braced by one
bent arm, he used the tip of one finger to trace the tracks of
still-wet tears on Cassandra’s cheeks. “Rest now, Cassandra. I
won’t leave you until you’ve fallen asleep, all right?”

“Promise?” Cassandra’s bottom lip quivered as
she asked this question, and it struck the marquess that it was
remarkable how much stronger she appeared to him when she allowed
her weakness to show. She might have done all that she could to
impress him with her independence, with her frank speech, with that
business about living alone and working for her daily bread. But
now that her veneer of bravado had been scraped away, he could see
that no matter how much women might have changed over the years,
some things remained the same. They still had the power to bring
any man to his knees with their tears.

“Yes, imp, I promise,” he told her, his hand
now stroking her dark, silky curls, much in the way he would
comfort a child, although he was very much aware that Cassandra was
no child—and that his feelings were not in the least paternal.

She seemed to relax slowly, her body curving
toward his as if seeking his warmth, his strength. “You’re a nice
man, Marcus,” she told him, reaching out a hand and tugging at his
badly compromised cravat. “I told Aunt Cornelia as much, you know,
but I think I mean it more now than I did before. You’re a nice,
kind, caring man—not exactly Alan Alda—but a good man. A man a
woman instinctively trusts.”

Looking down to where her fingers were
tangling in the folds of his cravat, he was mesmerized by her
informality, her seeming ease with this unusual intimacy.
“Who—er—who is Alan Alda?” he asked, hating himself for having to
know. “Is he one of your
beaux?
”

Cassandra’s laugh was low, husky, and, he
could tell, entirely at his expense. “No, Marcus, I don’t even know
the man. He’s—he’s an actor. Women in my time think he’s
‘sensitive.’”

Marcus frowned, unable to understand.
“Sensitive? That doesn’t sound in the least attractive to me. What
is he sensitive about, Cassandra? His looks? His performances? Why
would women be attracted to a man who is so thin-skinned?”

The fingers were still moving along his
chest, her fingertips tracing the line of his waistcoat. “He’s
sensitive to a woman’s feelings, silly,” he heard her say through
the roar of his own blood pounding in his ears. “He plays
characters who really care about how a woman feels, who aren’t
afraid to show their own feelings. Even cry.”

Marcus’s upper lip curled in disdain. “Cry?
First you inform me that women of your time want to be like men,
and then you tell me that you want the men of your time to be like
women. Tell me this, do men in your time wear skirts and carry
reticules?”

Cassandra’s throaty laugh accelerated into an
out-and-out giggle. “Some of them, yes. And earrings. And women
wear slacks—pantaloons. Oh, Marcus, it’s really very normal. It’s
only when I see my time through your eyes that it all seems so
ludicrous, so backward.”

“Yes, of course,” Marcus answered, still
confused and rather embarrassed for the men of the twentieth
century. But at least his questions seemed to have taken
Cassandra’s mind off her predicament. He didn’t think he’d like it
if she turned into a watering pot on him again. Why, he might then
be pushed to take her completely in his arms and kiss her. And then
where would he be? Where would they both be?

Cassandra was quiet for some moments, her
hand stilling in its travels over his chest, so that he could feel
the tension growing between them in the nearly dark chamber. There
were only a few small candles burning in a holder across the room
and he was becoming increasingly aware of their intimate
positioning on the bed. This wasn’t right. Nothing about this was
right. Cassandra might not be a virgin, but she was no strumpet
either, by her standards or his. Reluctantly, yet knowing he had no
choice, he began to disentangle himself, preparing to rise.

“Marcus?”

“Yes, Cassandra?” He didn’t like the tone of
her voice. It was too low, too tremulous. Too inviting.

The hand was back on his cravat. He could
feel the heat of her through to his skin. “Could you do me a
favor?”

“A favor?”

“Well, not
exactly
a favor, actually.
Could you make me a promise?”

A promise? A bargain? A commitment? At this
moment he would offer her anything, if only she would stop touching
him; if only she would go on touching him. “Of course, Cassandra,”
he answered, inwardly praying she wouldn’t ask him to allow her to
treat him like an older brother, or an uncle—protecting her from
the world.

“Thank you Marcus,” she answered, looking up
into his eyes, her own eyes twinkling with a mischief so alien to
the fear he had seen there earlier that if he were a more prudent
man, it should have sent him running from the room. “You’re not
only nice—you’re very trusting. Maybe too trusting, considering the
fact that you don’t know what I’m going to ask. Marcus”—she
hesitated for a moment, a lifetime during which he became
excruciatingly aware of the soft curve of her full lips, the
extreme delicacy of her complexion—“will you promise to always
treat me as an equal? I don’t know how long I’ll be here. I could
be gone by tomorrow morning, I suppose, or I might be here forever.
But one thing will never change. I’ve had twenty-five years to
become my own person, and I know I’ll never be able to sit quietly
and embroider handkerchiefs, or water paint, or wait for someone to
speak before saying anything, or be told how to dress or how to sit
or what to eat or drink. I just can’t. If I have to be on my best
behavior seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day, I’ll probably
explode. I need you to allow me to be me. I’ll need to have time
alone with you, to let my hair down, to say what’s on my mind—to
blow off steam. We could go riding—I do ride, you know—or go out
walking, or stay up late and talk in your study. Otherwise, this
business with the vicar tonight is going to end up looking like a
walk in the park next to what I might do in the future.”

“Aunt Cornelia won’t understand, Cassandra,”
he pointed out reasonably, “even if I can convince her that you’ve
traveled here from another time—and I dread that conversation more
than you could understand. I know Corny, and she’ll give short
shrift to any notion that the two of us should be allowed to go off
on our own. She’ll insist on chaperoning us.”

“I already thought of that. But you know
something, Marcus? I’ll bet there’s a way around her—if we just put
our minds to it.” He felt her fingertips on his chin, tracing the
line of his jaw. The minx! He knew, just knew, that she was totally
aware of what she was doing, aware of her effect on him. In fact,
she looked so innocent that he was sure she was about to say
something totally outrageous.

“I know about the rules of Regency Society,
Marcus,” she said, somehow inching her body even closer to his.
“But the rules are a little more relaxed for engaged couples.
Betrothed couples are allowed to be alone, aren’t they?”

“Betrothed couples?” Yes, she had definitely
said something outrageous. Sometimes Marcus wished he wasn’t always
right. He felt a shiver run down his spine, his instinctive
reaction to the threat she had just proposed. What maggot had the
girl taken into her head now? Yes, he had mentioned the word
compromise
to her, had reminded her that what they were
doing—what she was doing—was not only dangerous but unacceptable,
but it was a giant leap from that innocent observation to a
betrothal. “Cassandra, you can’t mean—”

“Can’t I?” Suddenly she was gone, jackknifing
into a sitting position and then slipping from the bed, leaving him
lying there alone feeling and, he was sure, looking ridiculous. Her
face, her entire body, were so animated, that he was sure she
believed she had come up with what, to her at least, was a
near-divine inspiration, a remarkably wonderful solution to her
problem.

Her next words proved his worst fears. “It
would be like something straight out of one of my authors’
plots—only not as permanent. Think about it, Marcus. As Perry’s
American cousin I am vulnerable to all sorts of trouble—most
especially Aunt Cornelia’s determined matchmaking. Trust me,
Marcus, she was building up a real head of steam about it
downstairs. Can you imagine the trouble I could cause on what you
people call the Marriage Mart? But as your affianced, why, there is
nothing I could do that wouldn’t be forgiven. Even the Reverend Mr.
Austin would have to keep his big mouth shut. You’re a marquess,
for crying out loud. You’re rich, and powerful, and probably very,
very important. Nobody would dare to say a word. And, as I already
said, it would only be temporary. I’m
not
staying,
remember?”

Marcus sat up, scratching behind one ear as
he considered the matter. “It might be a workable solution,” he
said, then frowned at his own stupidity. What was he thinking? “No.
No, it won’t suit. It won’t suit at all.”

Cassandra jammed her fists on her hips—a
distastefully mannish mannerism that he would have to rid her of
during their lessons. “And why not, Marcus? Chicken? It’s not like
I’d really expect you to marry me.”

“And that, my dear termagant, is exactly what
is wrong with your plan,” he said, tapping the tip of her straight
little nose as he walked past her to seat himself in a small
slipper chair. “Think about it a moment, if you please. If I am to
announce our betrothal—which would shock all of London, as we have
just met, but which would be a nine-days’ wonder, lasting only
until another scandal rears its head, which in London is
depressingly often—and then you were to disappear without warning,
what would happen then, I ask you? Will I be hanged for your
murder? And if we could explain your absence, would I be destined
to become a laughingstock, having been thrown over by a mere slip
of an American? And, to take this forward to the next logical step,
what if you were to remain locked in my time—what then? Would we
have to marry, no matter what our separate feelings in the matter?
Would you jilt me, or would I have to play the cad?”