For an instant, he kissed her back. Then suddenly, he grabbed her hands and pulled them away from his neck. “No, no, Hallie, I will not dishonor you nor will I-Never mind, you’re a lady.” He paled, something akin to terror dilating his beautiful eyes, turned on his heel and left the house, nearly at a dead run.

It began to rain, hard.

After dinner, their final evening at Northcliffe Hall, Hallie found Corrie in the nursery, softly singing a lullaby to the twins, who lay like two small spoons, front to back. Hallie watched her lean down and kiss both of them, then pull a light cover over them. She straightened to see Hallie at her elbow. “Goodness, I didn’t hear you. What are you doing here, Hallie? Ah, aren’t they absolute loves?”

Hallie said, “I’ve been watching them. Their fingers fell out of their mouths when they fell asleep.”

“Yes, that’s always the giveaway. They’ve tried to fool me into thinking they’re asleep, but it’s the fingers that do them in. James will be here in a moment. What is it? There’s nothing wrong, is there?”

“Oh no. Well, perhaps. Could I speak to you for a moment, Corrie?”

Now, this was interesting, Corrie thought, as she motioned Hallie into a small sitting room down the corridor that overlooked the spectacular back gardens. They heard a man’s step in the corridor. “That’s James. He’ll probably pick both boys up and rock them. They always smile at him in their sleep when he rocks them. Now, tell me what this is all about.”

Hallie sat forward in her chair, realized she wasn’t certain how to introduce the subject of Jason and what exactly had happened five years before. What came out of her mouth was, “Jason said the statue where the man is kneeling between the woman’s legs is your favorite. He also said it was every married woman’s favorite so long as her husband wasn’t a clod.”

Corrie’s left eyebrow shot up. She laughed, couldn’t help it. “Well, that’s the truth. Oh, I see, forgive me. You don’t understand. But didn’t you look closely?”

“Well, no, not really. It looked to me like the woman was screaming. It looked to me as if that sort of married thing was painful for the woman.”

Corrie stared at a young woman who was only two years younger than she. Well, she’d be ignorant as dirt herself if she hadn’t married James. And thank the good Lord, James wasn’t a clod. She grinned. “No, there’s no pain involved. When you decide to marry, I promise I’ll have James make certain the man you’ve chosen knows what he’s doing. That’s all I’m going to say about it.”

Hallie sucked in a deep breath. “That isn’t really what I wanted to ask you. The thing is, well, do you think you could tell me exactly what happened five years ago? Why Jason swears he’ll never marry?”

Corrie’s face tightened, she tightened all over. She hated thinking of that awful time, and the memories were always there. She saw that Hallie wasn’t asking out of simple curiosity, that there was something else at work. But what? Corrie said, “Was it spoken of in Baltimore? What do you know?”

“In Baltimore there were rumors that Jason and James had loved the same woman and she’d chosen James.” Hallie shrugged. “He gambled too much, he angered his father, anything you can think of. People talk and gossip because they must, I suppose. All Jason told me was that the girl he loved betrayed him and he was responsible for nearly getting his father and brother killed.”

“I see.” Corrie fell silent. “I’m surprised Jason said that much to you.”

“At the time, I told him that my betrothed was with another woman. I suppose Jason told me what he did to make me feel better.”

Corrie was astonished. “You’re joking, surely. This idiot man was your future husband and he betrayed you?”

“He must have believed I was very stupid. Actually, he was right. I found out he was marrying me for my money. When I confronted him, he admitted he’d been with this other woman, though only one time, the lying worm swore to me, and then proceeded to promise it would never happen again. I’m not that foolish. It was then that I told him I knew he was a fortune hunter.”

“Did you shoot him?”

Hallie sighed. “I would have enjoyed that, perhaps right through his ear, but instead I locked myself in my bedchamber and licked my wounds.”

“What happened to him?”

“He married a rich merchant’s daughter last year. Poor girl.” She paused a moment. “And that’s why I don’t ever wish to marry.”

Corrie rose and smoothed down her skirts. “Well, that’s bad enough. I’m sorry you had to care for a man of that ilk. You never suspected?”

Hallie shook her head, saying as she did so, “Not for a moment. Goodness, I was naive. However, Jason’s experience must have been much worse than mine. But the thing is, I can’t imagine any girl betraying either James or Jason. They’re both so beautiful and, well, they both appear quite honorable.”

“Yes, they are. The fact is, I loved James from the moment I first saw him at the advanced age of three. Do you know that most people can’t tell James and Jason apart?”

Hallie shook her head. “No, that’s not possible. They’re very different from each other. Please, Corrie, tell me what happened.”

“It was a very bad time, Hallie, for all of us.” Corrie patted her shoulder. “I don’t think it’s right for me to say anything. You must ask Jason. Shall we go downstairs and play whist? Or perhaps we can waltz.”

CHAPTER 18

The move to Lyon’s Gate occupied a good three hours, an additional two to install both Martha and Petrie, who had begged Jason to allow him to be both his permanent valet and Lyon’s Gate’s butler, since Hollis had taught him everything over the past five years. Jason had to admit that occasionally he’d missed Petrie’s services in America. He agreed to Petrie continuing as his valet and Hallie agreed to Petrie as their butler. Jason knew she was accepting Petrie in all goodwill and innocence. Well, she’d find out soon enough what a misogynist he was. They hadn’t been in Lyon ’s Gate more than an hour before Petrie told Martha she was a mouthy girl with no respect for his craft and skill. Jason had seen seventeen-year-old Martha, hands on hips, chin out, tell him he was an insufferable prune-faced old tick, and he wasn’t even that old yet.

Old tick or not, it was nice to have someone looking after him again. Jason could always smack Petrie if he stepped over the line with any of the females in the house.

Good God, he’d moved into a house with a woman he hadn’t known more than two months, and Cousin Angela, whom he’d known a week. His world had turned sideways.

As for Martha, she was so excited she danced in and out of every room, saying over and over, “Our first ’ouse, er, house. Heavenly groats-ain’t-isn’t-it jest grand, Miss Hallie?”

“It’s the grandest,” Hallie agreed, and realized she was moving into a house with a man who looked like a god. In the dark hours of the night, she knew she would be quite content to drop him to the floor, hold him down, and kiss him, forever.

The house was quiet. Jason lay in his bed, the first time he and his new bed had been together. He stretched, pillowed his head on his arms, and stared up at the dark ceiling. There wasn’t much of a moon tonight, so little light came through the windows. Some minutes later, from downstairs, came twelve mellow strokes from the lovely Ledenbrun clock, a gift from his grandmother.

His first home. Hallie’s first home. Oh yes, he’d heard Martha’s excited voice, anyone who’d been in the house at the time had, much to Petrie’s tight-lipped disapproval. Yes, the house was just grand. He smiled, but it soon fell away. She’d wanted to kiss him. She’d held on until he’d jerked her arms from around his neck.

Their cook, Mrs. Millsom, so bosomy she could probably balance a vegetable or two quite nicely, had prepared them an excellent dinner-some fish and mutton, if he remembered right, but he’d been so wrapped up in sitting in the master’s chair at his own dining room table in his own dining room, that he really didn’t remember what he’d eaten. Perhaps there’d been some peas as well. He’d been aware of Cook watching him and so he’d complimented her extravagantly. Mrs. Millsom fluttered her fingers and removed herself back to the kitchen, singing if he’d not imagined it, and Hallie had said, “Oh no, not Mrs. Millsom,” but he hadn’t asked her what she’d meant by that.