Leaning back, she hugged herself. “You’ll see, soon enough. I’m not a good person, Bacchus. Master Merton—”
“We are not discussing something you have already been acquitted for.”
“You’re not my judge.” The carriage turned. “You can’t acquit me. If they knew—if that magistrate knew—I would be shown no mercy, and you know it. I just . . . There’s something about me, Bacchus. Something unlovable.”
“You are not unlovable.”
“You are not listening.”
“No, you are not listening.” Frustration weighed his voice, and he flung out a hand toward the opposite window. “Do you think I did this just to save you? That I’m some gallant prince from a fairy tale, selflessly trying to save the young maiden from certain doom? No. I did not expect your arrest or this magistrate’s games. They merely sped up the process. And I have spent hour after blasted hour, day after day, trying to find a way to convince you that I am genuine in my affections, but it’s like throwing darts at a stone wall.”
Elsie simply shook her head at his attempts to reassure her, too miserable to examine them closely.
“Am I so untrustworthy?” he asked, and he might as well have stabbed her through the heart with a kitchen knife. “Do my actions seem so completely false to you?”
“No.” A tear slid down her cheek. “It’s not you. You are wonderful and perfect. You have been nothing but wonderful and perfect. But I’m a regret waiting to happen.” She fumbled to open her reticule, seeking a handkerchief. “I only want to save you, Bacchus. I only want you to be happy.”
“You are a foolish woman.”
She nodded, found her handkerchief. Looked up to apologize. “I—”
But Bacchus was there, so close to her, risen off his seat. She barely had time to register his closeness before his hand slipped around her neck and he gruffly pulled her toward him, his lips finding hers.
A storm burst out of Elsie, electrifying her limbs, sending her heart into her throat. She gasped, and Bacchus took advantage of it, tilting his head and claiming her fully. His lips were warm and moist and demanding. He called her very soul out of her body, and it flew up to meet him, dancing beneath his touch, sending shivers across every inch of her skin.
And then her hands were in his hair, his beautiful, thick hair, tangling with the waves as she kissed him back with enough passion to put even her favorite novel reader to shame. The carriage fell away, and she was floating, utterly enraptured by his touch, his taste, the way he smelled like oranges and rain. Heat crawled across her tongue and down her throat, warming her from the inside out, growing hotter until it was a fire. She took his bottom lip for her own, and thought she heard the faintest moan trapped between their mouths. It awoke something utterly enticing within her, a spell in a class all its own.
This wasn’t happening. But she certainly could not deny that is was, most definitely, happening.
Alfred had never kissed her like this.
And then the bolt shifted on the door beside them. Bacchus pulled away, leaving Elsie dizzy and longing, only barely aware that the carriage had indeed stopped, that they’d reached their destination, and that their driver was half a second away from discovering them in a very compromising position.
Bacchus wisely grabbed the handle and beat the man to it, making it look like he had left his seat merely to open the door. “Thank you,” he said, forgetting to paste on his English dialect. “If you would knock on the door and inform Master Hill, I’ll see to my trunk.”
The driver nodded and sprinted toward the looming house across the drive, a few of its windows still alight.
Bacchus put one foot out on the step, but the other remained planted in the carriage.
Struggling for her voice, her wits, and her composure, Elsie managed to say through tingling lips, “Is that how all Bajan men kiss?”
He smirked, the insolent man. “I wouldn’t know. I’ve never kissed any of them.”
Elsie laughed, and it hurt, yet relieved the pressure building in her chest.
Reaching a hand up, Bacchus pushed away that same soggy curl from earlier before cupping the side of her face. “I want you to trust me, Elsie.”
She nodded against his hand. “I do.”
He looked like he might kiss her again, and Elsie’s entire body thrilled at the prospect, but the driver was already running back to the carriage. So Bacchus dropped his hand to hers, squeezed it, and said, “Write me,” before stepping out into the rain.
Elsie barely noticed the ride back to Brookley, the storm and the bumps. She had completely forgotten the debacle at Seven Oaks, as well as the articles waiting for her at the stonemasonry shop.
She arrived home as though in a dream, and found she had the most intense craving for oranges.
CHAPTER 11
Master Ruth Hill was surprised to see Bacchus on her doorstep, but she accepted him into her home with the utmost generosity. He was upfront about the situation revolving around his arrival, at least as far as the Duke of Kent was concerned. He’d been concerned that Master Hill might sympathize with the duke—after all, Bacchus was a healthy, strong individual who certainly had some vitality to spare—but she did not. She had a room ready for him within the hour, and he poured as much gratitude upon her as the woman could take without drowning in it.
Bacchus rode with Master Hill to the London Physical Atheneum the following morning, though they parted ways almost immediately upon entering the large stone fortress. Bacchus had not written ahead; the assembly was not meeting today, as far as he knew. But he didn’t need the assembly so much as he needed Master Phillips, and Master Hill had told Bacchus exactly where the man’s office was located.
The guards posted throughout the atheneum didn’t stop him, though a couple looked ready to try. The golden pin affixed to his lapel—a token of his mastership—halted their steps. He traipsed through hallways and up stairs to Master Phillips’s office. It was strange to think that, only a month ago, such a trek would have wearied him. If not for Elsie, it still would.
He couldn’t stop the smug smile that came to his lips as he took a winding set of stairs to the third floor, slipping by a maid carrying an empty bucket and mop. Perfect, was he? Granted, he hadn’t meant to bring the woman to tears, but Elsie was so attached to this bizarre concept that she was worthless, tears seemed inevitable. He felt fairly confident that he had begun to prove her wrong about that. And he’d happily show her again and again, as many times as she needed the reminder.
Indeed, as Bacchus approached the door at the end of the corridor, he found himself very much looking forward to his nuptials. But for now, he had to put thoughts of Elsie aside and deal with the matter at hand.
He knocked loudly on the heavy wooden door, hard enough for it to shudder on its hinges.
After several seconds, an annoyed voice said, “Come.”
Bacchus shouldered open the door and stepped inside. Master Phillips’s office was just like the rest of the atheneum, built of ancient stone, but hickory wood had been laid over the floor. A single window let in sunlight from the outside, while large glass baubles in each corner of the ceiling glowed with enchanted light to brighten the space. Master Phillips’s large desk sat atop an Indian rug, and a large tapestry depicting running horses occupied the wall behind him.
The spellmaker did not appear pleased to see him. Setting down his quill from a letter he’d been drafting, Master Phillips tugged his sleeves down and leaned back in his chair. “Mr. Kelsey. No, it’s Master now, isn’t it? You are aware I take meetings only by appointment.”