Lenore! Lierin! Lenore? Lierin? Though the face remained the same, the names blurred in his mind….
He ground his teeth and angrily tossed the cigar into the softly lapping waves. He felt an overwhelming urge to lash out at something…or someone. Malcolm preferably. But he had not yet returned. There was no one to receive his anger, only the calm, uncaring sea and the yielding sand that now bore the print of his boots and which on the morrow would be featureless again.
A slight movement caught his eye, and he peered into the darkness until he could make out the vague glow of a white-clad figure. Like an illusive wraith it moved with soundless tread toward the narrow strip of sand along the shore and there paused to gaze out toward his ship, seemingly unmindful of the encroaching waves. He scarcely breathed while the longings of his heart yielded to the quickening surge of hope. Was it…?
“Lierin!” The word was barely a whisper, taken from him by the rising wind, but in his mind it was a shout of acclamation as he recognized the pale, slender form. It was she!
He leaped across the stream, and his loneliness was banished to the far ends of the earth as he ran toward her. He saw her turn with a start as he drew near and realized she wore a nightgown and nothing else. The bottom part of it was wet where the waves had splashed up against her legs, and that which was dry was being whipped about by the wind. Her hair was loose and flying out all around her, and with the moon adding a soft luminous nimbus around her, she seemed like a fairy queen caught in alarm.
“Lierin.” The name came from his lips in a softly whispered caress and with all the pent-up longing of a man in love with a dream. It was the almost imperceptible crack in his voice that screamed with the agony of his frustration.
“Lenore,” she whispered in a desperate plea.
Though Ashton could not see her face clearly or discern the movement of her lips, he heard the choked sadness, and it wrenched his heart. “Whatever name you bear, you’re still my love.”
She raised a hand to brush the errant tresses back from her face and gazed up at him with desires of her own. The moon shone down upon him, and where the shirt gapped open, she could see the firmly muscled expanse of his broad chest. The sight evoked memories of a time when she had nestled there in love’s sated bliss and felt the tickling of his breath against her brow. Oh, what torture is love, she thought. Was she ever to find peace with it?
“I really didn’t think you were out here,” she murmured. “My father said he had seen you rowing out to your ship, and he invited the guards in for a drink.”
“One of my boatmen brought me some supplies,” Ashton replied gently. “Your father probably saw him returning.”
“Oh.” Her voice was tiny, dejected.
“Is everything all right in the house?” he asked in concern.
She took a deep breath and released it in slow degrees, trying to cool her brain and subdue the tormenting concupiscence that had made a torture rack of her bed. “I was just restless and couldn’t sleep, and I decided to take a walk.” She paused, knowing there was something else that had made her abandon her room, and she told him in a trembling voice: “I dreamed Malcolm took me and showed me your grave. I even saw a tombstone with your name chiseled into it. The wind was blowing, and it was raining. It all seemed so real, it frightened me.”
“It was nothing more than a dream, my love,” he soothed. “I don’t intend to die and leave you to him.”
The silence dragged on, and Ashton peered down at her, trying to see her face clearly. He sensed her unrest and, with a great deal of meaning in his words, rephrased his earlier question: “Is everything well with you?”
Lenore opened her mouth to deny the possibility that there might be anything wrong, then slowly closed it again. Shaking her head as she felt a rush of tears, she turned from him and began to make her way along the narrow strip of sand. She sensed rather than heard him walking beside her. Indeed, it would have been difficult to ignore him when every nerve awoke to his presence.
“You are pensive tonight, madam,” he stated with surety. “Can you tell me what’s wrong?”
Lenore resisted the urge to brush at the tears streaming down her cheeks and, facing the sea, finally relented to his probing inquiry and spoke quietly into the wind: “I’m…I’m going to have a baby.”
Ashton stepped toward her, joy snatching his heart and flinging it high, but he halted, suddenly unsure of how he stood with her. She seemed cold and distant, as if she hated telling him. He was close behind her, almost touching, and the turmoil that roiled within him made his hands shake. It was a long time before he could speak the single word: “Whose?”
The question stung. Lenore could see no need for him to ask. Wiping at the now flooding tears, she spoke over her shoulder. “Malcolm and I have not been together since I’ve been back.”
With infinite care Ashton slipped his arms about her, one to slip beneath her bosom and hug her close, while the other hand settled over her stomach. He could feel the firm flatness of it through the cotton fabric and marveled at the gift of life that in less than a year’s time would bring forth a babe. His head bent, and his lips brushed her ear as he asked, “Now will you go home with me?”
Her breath slipped from her, and it was somewhere between a moan and a wistful sigh. “The baby solves nothing, Ashton. I can’t go back not knowing who I am. There are too many things I must remember. How can I accept you as my real husband when I am haunted by visions of my being toasted as Malcolm’s wife?”
“Visions, my love, not necessarily reality. How can you be sure what you’re seeing is the truth?”
She sighed shakily. “Because Malcolm confirmed what I saw without being aware of it. He could not have seen into my mind.”
Ashton’s voice was hoarse and ragged. “You can’t expect me to stand aside and let another man claim you and my child.”
“Give me a bit more time, Ashton,” she pleaded, stroking her fingers over the hand that held her close. “This house holds so many secrets. If I leave it, I may never know who I am!”
“Then let me send Malcolm away,” Ashton suggested. “I fear for your safety being in the house with him. He shows no care for you when he loses his temper. And your father is no protection.”
“I know that, and I intend to be careful, but Malcolm has been a part of my life, too.”
“What of me?”
Staring out into the dark horizon, Lenore rolled her head upon his chest. “I don’t know, Ashton. I hope…” Her mouth quivered, and the welling tears filled her eyes. “I hope for the child’s sake that you are something more than my present. I go to bed at night, and when the lamps are out, I remember how it was with you. I feel you beside me and the touch of your hand upon me and I ache….”
“Aye, madam. I know the pain of unsated desires only too well.”
“But I must be sure of myself.” She cast a worried glance toward the lane as she heard the distant rattle of a carriage and the thudding hoofbeats of an oncoming team. “Malcolm is returning. I must go.”
Ashton caught an arm closer about her waist, delaying her. “Don’t leave me without a kiss.”
Her breath wavered in a ragged sigh as she felt his manly form pressing close against her back. “You must think I’m far stronger of will than I am.”
Reluctantly Ashton let her go, and watched until the darkness of the night consumed her. The night was lonely again, empty as if something meaningful had left it. The moon was only a pale, drab glow in the sky. The clouds hinted of rain to come, and the tide was beginning to flow, washing up on the beach and erasing all signs of their meeting.