“Good needs,” Sara said. “If only for the near term.”
“Your hands are cold.” Beck covered hers with his own where it rested on her thigh. “I should shoo you back into the house, Sara. You haven’t the luxury of the periodic cold or sniffle.”
“I won’t go back to sleep until you tell me the little one is nursing. And what if you hadn’t been here? North is worn out, and Polly and I wouldn’t have known what to do. How would we have managed?”
His question exactly. “Nature usually knows what to do, but you and Polly need more help here.”
Beside him, Sara pokered up but didn’t move away. “Without family in residence, there’s no reason for hiring more staff.”
“There is every reason to,” Beck said, sitting up to watch as the filly tried to thrash to her feet. “The estate needs the help, even if you don’t.”
“Should we help her?” Sara started to rise, but Beck tugged her back beside him.
“She has to figure out where her feet go,” he said softly. “If she struggles so long she’s getting too weak to stand, then we’ll intervene, but give her a chance to work it out for herself first.”
“That’s a very difficult part of parenting.” Sara sighed as she settled against him and brushed her nose near the jacket lapel, where the fabric would carry his scent. He resettled his arm across her shoulders and took a whiff of her hair.
“Difficult? Watching a child’s first steps?” Beck folded her hand in his again, and again, Sara made no protest.
“That, and the whole business of letting them struggle, letting them find their own balance. I am protective of Allie, sometimes I think not protective enough.”
As if worrying about her very livelihood and the entire manor house wasn’t enough?
“What’s the worst that can happen to her? Short of a tragic accident or illness, such as might befall anybody?”
Sara was silent for a moment; then she tugged his jacket more closely around her.
“She might meet the wrong type of man,” she said, “and let him take her from all she’s ever known, fill her head with silly fancies about fame and art and wealth, and discard her when her usefulness is over.”
Beck heard the bitterness and the bewilderment too.
“We all have the occasional unwise attachment,” Beck said gently, for it wasn’t Allie whom Sara was discussing. “And nobody chooses a perfect fit.”
“Was your wife a good fit?”
Well, of course. He should have known Sara Hunt, quiet, serious, and observant, might ask such a thing. The sense of… rootlessness in his belly grew as he considered an honest answer.
“We were not married long enough to assess such a thing.” A version of the truth. “We were both eager for the union, and our families approved.”
“How old were you?”
“Not old enough. Not nearly old enough.”
“I’m sorry for your loss. I have been grateful, on occasion, that Reynard lived long enough for me to see his true colors, to hate him. I cannot imagine losing a spouse with whom there was potential for a lifetime of happiness.”
What did it say, that a woman professed to be grateful to hate her own spouse? Beck’s arm over Sarah’s shoulders became less casual and more protective.
“I would have been grateful for a few years of contentment,” Beck said. “It wasn’t meant to be.” And what a useless, true platitude that was.
“How long were you married?”
“Little more than a summer. At the time, it seemed like forever, and then she was gone, and forever took on a very different meaning.”
“I was married for nearly a decade. That was a forever too.”
A decade was forever to grieve, forever to carry guilt and rage and remorse by the barge load. “So how do you manage now? What sustains you?”
“Allie,” Sara replied immediately. “Polly.”
“But what sustains you?” Beck pressed. “Allie will grow up, sooner rather than later, and Polly could well bring Mr. North up to scratch. Five years hence, Sara Hunt, will it be enough to polish silver, beat rugs, and mix vinegar to shine the windows?”
Would it be enough for Beckman to spend most of his year traveling, to hear more foreign tongues than English, and to be always planning the next journey, even as he turned his steps for home?
Sara was quiet, and Beck regretted the question.
He squeezed her fingers. “Don’t answer. I am feeling philosophical because my father is at his last prayers, and he was always such a robust man. I am aware that any day I could be summoned to his side, and you’ll no longer be plagued by my larking about here.”
“You are on good terms with your father?”
How to answer? “Such good terms, he sent me down here, rather than allow me at his bedside.”
“You’re hurt by this,” Sara concluded. “You mustn’t be. Men are proud, and they can’t admit when they need to draw comfort from others.”
He did not want comfort, he wanted to go home and have his father be there. He wanted…
What he wanted astonished him and made perfect sense. “What of you, Sarabande Adagio? Can you admit you might need to draw some comfort from another?”
She made no answer but didn’t protest when he shifted on the trunk, untangled their hands, and used his free hand to turn her toward him.
“Would you let me give you some comfort, Sarabande?”
Beckman was going to kiss her, and she was going to let him. Sara felt heat not just radiating from him but welling up inside her body, filling the tired, lonely depths she’d learned to ignore. His lips brushed over hers, and then again, a soft, warm hint of pressure behind the caress.
This kiss was different from the last one, more personal. Sara liked it better and returned his initial gesture, dragging her lips over his as her fingers burrowed into the silky hair at his nape. On a soft groan, he lifted her to straddle his lap, again placing her slightly higher than him and giving her an advantage of sorts.
A control or the fiction of it, even as he so casually demonstrated his superior strength.
Balanced on her knees, Sara was free to explore his body with her hands, to stroke over the breadth of his shoulders, and learn the curious curves and textures of his ears. His hands roamed too, slowly, carefully, tracing the shape of her elbows, the span of her hips, and the bones of her back.
“Settle,” he whispered, urging her to let him have her weight in his lap. She sank onto him, feeling the tumescence of his arousal against her sex. She knew what that was, knew what it meant, and rather than feel embarrassed, she was reassured.
Somebody—a man she esteemed and desired—could feel desire for her, even at her great age. Even though she was mother to a growing girl, measuring her days on some forlorn, neglected estate, she was still desirable.
And—even better—she could still feel desire. Reynard hadn’t taken that from her after all, not permanently. She smiled against Beck’s mouth, the joy of that realization fueling the warmth inside her.
“What?” Beck pulled back and traced her lips with his finger. “Am I amusing you?”
“Not amusing. This isn’t funny.” She curled down against him and felt his hand trace down her spine.
“But you smiled, Sara,” Beck said, his other hand cradling the back of her head. “I like that I can make you smile.”
“This is wicked.” Lest he think she condoned her own behavior—except in a sense she did. His behavior too.
“To find a little comfort isn’t wicked.” Beck kissed her check. “Though it is wicked to take a lady unawares. I can’t offer you much, Sara. I don’t know how long I’ll be here, and I don’t intend you any disrespect. You can decline my advances, and I’ll understand you aren’t interested in what I’m offering. But while I’m here, I can… share pleasure with you, if you’d like.”