His and Hers Read online

  Time to push the issue.

  She worked to form a single word on her tongue, which seemed to have found new muscle strength. At last, she freed it. "James," she burst out.

  "Yes?" He turned to look at her.

  Intense concentration. More tongue gyrations. "I feel a… chill." Too bad this much exercise didn't work off any calories.

  One brow lifted. "Indeed?"

  So, okay, the day was pleasant, with no cold front moving in. Still, he didn't have to look as though he didn't believe her. Then, as she watched, trying to drag some sort of meaningful signal into her eyes, she saw the gentleman in him take over. "You must allow me to offer my jacket." He shrugged his arms out of the sleeves. "I shall lay it over your… cloak." He did, but with less certainty than she would have liked.

  She sucked in a breath. This next suggestion was going to take all she had. "Perhaps," she said, "your arm, placed around my shoulders, would better serve to warm…" She focused her energy on her left foot, managing to make it take a step toward him, though that meant she dragged the more reluctant right foot behind it like a deadened limb. Probably not the most romantic picture.

  Wow. Mary was strong.

  Alarm crossed James's face. "Jane," was all he managed to say before the invisible hand released and the shoulders of both of them sagged. Neither said anything for a couple of minutes, following that unspoken pact that meant they waited, quietly, until the author chose to again pick up her pen.

  Then James raised his palms, pivoting on his heel. "Are my affections to be challenged in such a manner?" he implored. "This cannot be." He faced her once again, directing a question at her with no small degree of horror. "Are you, Miss Ellingson, now shown to be a—a cripple?"

  She laughed. Couldn't help it. Tried, but she couldn't help it. His reaction was so over-the-top ridiculous, how could anyone take him seriously?

  Oh. Mary did. And the anger that now spread over James's features told her that was an obstacle to be surmounted. "Am I to understand that you find amusement," he inquired with tightly drawn lips, "in this turn of events?"

  Real Jane would shout out a yes. Book Jane, the one who followed a straighter path, wouldn't dream of it She turned up her own two palms and glanced at them. It was a choice, at least at this minute. She lifted first one hand and then the other, weighing the alternatives.

  "Miss Ellingson," he demanded in the most formal of tones.

  She let her hands drop to her sides. "James. I need to talk with you."

  "Undoubtedly." He clasped his hands behind his back and raised his chin. "I stand prepared to accept your apology for making light of a serious matter."

  "My apolo—? No. That's not it."

  "Not it?" The emphasis he placed on that Last word had to have hurt him.

  "Well, no. I can't apologize for laughing when it was just because you…" Her voice trailed off. He looked so offended. "Obviously there's nothing wrong with my leg. Mary and I were only having a difference of opinion. She was trying to have me say one thing and I wanted to say another and—" She broke off at the sight of the storm clouds gathering in his face. This line of reasoning wasn't getting her anywhere. "I mean, I'm sorry." He blinked hard. "You questioned our author?"

  "I think you were doing that, just a minute ago. When you thought I was crippled." She waited for him to say it She knew it was coming…

  "I am the hero. Entrusted with certain responsibilities." And there it was. "You alone can argue with her?"

  "I carry a great deal upon my shoulders." Good thing they were padded. Jane began pacing back and forth before him, the words coming out fester than she could control them. "Mary doesn't know what to do here. It doesn't look as though she has much experience with a woman being swept off her feet. We have to help her."

  "As indeed I have beseeched you to do. Helping our author is far different than fighting her."

  She made a sound of frustration. "James. Listen to me."

  "If only you would deign to follow the lead I have so capably set, you would at last allow yourself to feel the true extent of your feelings. This alone would assist Miss Bellingham in bringing the story to a most satisfying conclusion. I tell you, Jane, I have had far more experience in matters of the heart. You must trust that I know best."

  Facing him with her hands on her hips, Jane tapped a toe. As she replayed each of his words in her mind, her toe tapped harder. And harder. Far more experience. True extent of her feelings. So far they only extended to: What the hell are you going to do here? Wait until we're married ten years to kiss me?

  "Jane?" he inquired mildly.

  "I disagree, James," she bit out, which should have been enough to warn her that Demure, Obedient Jane had run for cover and Real Jane was about make an appearance. Too late, she tried to stop, to convince herself to keep following Mary's lead. Mary, who wielded a pen that made certain Real Jane wouldn't mess things up, for the fourteen-hundredth time. But Mary couldn't—Oh, to hell with it.

  "You wouldn't even put your arm around me when I said I was cold. Perfect opportunity, but you stare it in the face and say no, thanks. Do you think I'm going to fall hard for you when you never even touch me? When you don't take advantage of a romantic place like this to shower me with compliments, with endearments, with— I don't know—tender smiles? When you don't make it your business to get to know me, be interested in me? For who and what I am? You don't know anything about me, except that I'm supposedly fond of horses." Her chest heaved up and down. "Which, by the way, I'm not."

  "I confess I find your behavior most alarming, Jane. You are reminded who you are addressing yourself to and that you are talking about our author. Your father would surely—"

  Before he could finish, she'd closed the distance between them and reached up to hold his head between her hands.

  Startled, he drew his breath in sharply.

  Maybe he thought she was going to smack him. Furthest thing from her mind. Jane closed her mouth over his surprised lips, kissing him for all she was worth.

  Sometimes, you had to grab the bull by his horns. Or, in this case, the gentleman by his ears.

  Chapter 9

  Jane could feel alarm and surprise radiate through James, which only made her kiss him harder and with more determination. He was going to kiss her back and, in the process, discover what a truly great heroine she could be. Not because it was "the very thing to do," but because it was the only thing to do. They, together, were going to move this story along to a happy ending very, very far away from any fireplaces.

  If it killed her.

  Whoops. Too far. That's what she was trying to avoid.

  He had nice lips and a clean-shaven face, which was a plus. She'd always thought Victorian men had long sideburns and other facial hair, which she'd never particularly liked. Give her a man with a smooth face, and just a hint of bristly whiskers, any day. Only a hint, though. Who needed whisker burn? Not an attractive look on a woman.

  All right, so… kissing; Kissing hard.

  Hold on. He was kissing her, bringing his hand up to tip her head back and give him the dominant edge. Perfect. She wanted him to take charge, to make her forget about any other man she'd ever loved or hoped to love.

  To make her think only about him and his… As her fingers ran through his hair, she noticed it wasn't quite as full and thick as she had once thought… Oh, that's right. She had noticed it that one time and wondered if he would go bald early in life. Not that it mattered. That much. It's just that it was definitely thinner than, say, Curran's, which looked like a woman could run both hands through it and love the way it felt, the way it curled just a little at the ends…

  Now this could be bad. Thinking about Curran while James was doing his very best to kiss her oblivious at her invitation, no less. Something like that could take her right out of the moment, spoil the intent of this whole thing. But Curran—

  Not going to think about Curran Dempsey. Any. More. To make sure, she leaned into James with purpo
se and focused on kissing him so hard, he would forget about everything else. And then wonder how in the world he'd become so lucky as to have a heroine like Jane. So lucky.

  He pulled his lips back, a fraction of an inch, for just a second. "Now, Jane," he murmured, sounding pleased.

  Good. Very good. That was half of this happy couple reacting well. She only had to work on getting herself as into it. Again, her lips closed in on his.

  But she put a little too much of her body into that kiss, apparently. In the next instant, she lost her balance. James stumbled, too, trying to remain upright, which only made her trip over his feet and tangle both of them up until she landed squarely on top of him in a heap of skirts, her head going over his shoulder to meet the grass.

  The air went out of him when he hit the ground and he made a sound something like "Oof" that was partially drowned out by her short, sharp scream. She didn't weigh much, but with all this paraphernalia she had to wear, not to mention a corset that looked deadly even when it was off her, it seemed entirely possible she might have damaged him. Hurt something.

  Wouldn't that be her luck when she let Real Jane come out and play. To damage the hero beyond repair. What would Mary do about that?

  She shoved the cap thing that had dropped over her eyes back up on her head so that she could look at him, and spit out the pieces of grass that had managed to attach themselves to her mouth. "Are you okay?"

  His expression moved from disbelief to anger and back again. "Are you quite mad?" he asked, sounding as though he already knew the answer.

  "No, I—'"

  "Kindly remove yourself from my person." With each word, his tone grew more vehement.

  She would have to forgive the fact that it wasn't the most romantic thing to say. She had, after all, just pushed him onto the ground. "We could laugh about this?" she suggested hopefully. "Roll around in the grass a little?" Yeah. Even she wouldn't want to go for that. It was so hard trying to clean up after the Jane-isms that were a part of her everyday life. She'd thought she could be safe from them here.

  She sighed.

  He frowned. "Have you finished?"

  "Oh. Sorry." She put her palms against his chest and pushed against him to lift herself up. As she did, she felt a vibration coming from the ground. A moment later, a sound. She turned her head to look. Not far away, a horse and rider, coming closer.

  James heard it, too, and struggled to get up, brushing grass and dirt from his clothing. Jane stumbled backward but managed to right herself and shove the cap farther up on her head, puffing at a piece of hair that seemed determined to position itself only in the middle of her face.

  James had just straightened his shoulders and given a tug on his jacket when the horse and rider arrived in a flurry of hooves, drawing to a stop. She heard the horse's neigh and saw a flash of his eyes before she realized who was riding him.

  A tall figure all in black. Curran.

  Scowling mightily.

  She didn't know why. She was only doing what they had agreed on, wasn't she? Making this story move along, romantically speaking. Given that James was looking out of breath and rumpled, with bits of grass clinging to his hair, a person might think she was doing exactly that.

  Curran's gaze moved from James to her and back again. "Your presence is required at the house," was all he said, in that low, rumbling voice of his that would make anyone who heard it stop whatever they were doing to pay attention.

  James seemed to think it important to challenge his half brother. He glared. "I shall be there presently."

  "Mary Bellingham has arisen and breakfasted. From the worsening condition of our father, it appears she may make his demise her next endeavor."

  "I anticipated as much."

  Jane cast a sidelong gaze at James. He had folded his arms across his chest.

  "Then you already knew you would be needed at the house." Curran's gaze swept pointedly over his brother's grass-stained clothing.

  "I shall be there presently," James repeated, this time barely moving his lips.

  With no visible sign, Curran urged his horse to go, taking off in an impressive show of hooves, man and sheer power.

  Dirt clods kicked up by the horse landed on James's jacket. He brushed them off with sharp jerks of his hands. "Now you have done it," he huffed.

  "Done what?" she asked. Always good to have clarification of how much trouble you were really in.

  "Because of this—this situation, I was not at leisure to hear Mary Bellingham as she awoke, to know that she again sought to write. That my presence would be needed." His hands stabbed at the air, punctuating his words. "I do not understand, Jane, how you could choose to take this tale into your own hands with so little regard for the possibility that you will ruin us all with your insufferable meddling."

  "Meddling?" She yanked at the tie on her bonnet, pulling until the hat came off her head. "That's what you call it?"

  "You would find another term more apt? I confess I would doubt it." A twig had lodged itself in his sandy hair sticking straight up.

  "Tell me that you didn't enjoy our interlude there a little more than our last few scenes together that Mary wrote." She folded her own arms across her chest. "Go ahead, James. Tell me. But remember that I was there. I felt the way you kissed me back."

  "Our author will take the story in the direction it is meant to go."

  Straight to a chaste wedding. And a tasteful, subdued marriage. She decided to soften her approach, venturing a playful smile. "You haven't answered me."

  He took a step toward her, putting his hands on her elbows. "I found it pleasurable. You enjoyed my kiss."

  She tried to remember. "Just promise me you'll also help Mary when she writes the romantic scenes. We could have more kisses like that, with her writing them."

  His chin lifted high in the air. "It is with my help that Miss Bellingham possesses the ability to write at all. I am the reason she picks up her pen."

  Self-esteem was great, but this might be taking it a little far. She reached out to pluck the twig from his hair. "But what happens between the two of us is the only reason she has a story."

  He stared at the twig in her hand and then exhaled, looking down at the ground.

  "Please just try to give her the benefit of your… experience," Jane went on. "Don't wait for her to think of something touching and affectionate to say or do. She might not be able to. Help her come up with it."

  Slowly, James raised his gaze to meet hers. "I dwell in her memory. A living, breathing enactment of the man she once knew. Whose image and manner she can never forget and indeed would never choose to. She would sooner cast me out altogether than allow me to behave in a way she has not herself had occasion to witness."

  "But she's writing fiction."

  "Ah, but fiction is only the writer's particular view of facts."

  A slam against imagination and creativity, if she'd ever heard it. And if what he said about dwelling in her memory was true, this was great. Just great. Mary Bellingham was writing a hero she knew. Probably the one who had thrown her over for another woman. Mary wasn't going to write him as anything but the way she remembered or she wouldn't have a true sense of satisfaction at ending up with him. Even if it was just on paper. So now Jane didn't just have to contend with an author's imagination. She had to overcome the author's truth.

  One thing she could say for sure. Fictional characters earned their keep.

  Jane opened her eyes to the sound of sniffling and the writer's firm grip on her rigid spine.

  "I hear he grows so weak," said her aunt, standing next to her, "that he can hardly lift his head from the pillow." She honked loudly into her handkerchief and then waved the balled-up white fabric in front of her face. "Yet he is determined that guests should be entreated to stay. That all should go on as it has."

  "Mr. Benton Dempsey is the most unselfish of men," Jane agreed. "To think only of his guests and his son and daughter, when he is himself ill."

  "You
would be fortunate to marry into such a family," Mrs. Hathaway said, dabbing at her eyes. "For I know they would treat you well and you would be the happiest girl alive."

  "And you would send for your sister to visit you often," piped up Anne, from Jane's other side. "For you would miss her most dreadfully."

  "Indeed I would, "Jane heard herself say. "And now, my dear sister, how have you been occupying yourself? For I have seen little of you."

  A guilty look crossed Anne's face and she looked away.

  "How has she been occupying herself?" Mrs. Hathaway grumbled. "By making a most dreadful nuisance, that is all I can say about the matter."

  "Anne," Jane said with gentle reproach. "You must tell me that you have only been a helpful, obedient girl, for I would wish to know nothing else."

  Her sister's eyes widened in innocence.

  "Wandering about the grounds of Afton House by herself," said Mrs. Hathaway, both chins bobbing, "until I have to send the servants to search for her. Quite unconscionable. I cannot imagine what thought your father must have had in his head to allow her to accompany us."

  Jane turned to Anne with a smile. "My father knew that I would miss my sister and long for her company." She received a shy smile from the girl in return. "But now, Anne, you must promise you will give Aunt Hathaway not another moment of worry. This dear lady has been through quite enough." Dear lady. Not exactly the term Real Jane would use to describe the woman. But she liked Anne, who had a glint of something that didn't look like Victorian obedience in her eye.

  "I can only hope that will be so," wailed Mrs. Hathaway, "for I am nearly at my wits' end with the girl."

  The end wouldn't be that far to go was the thought that occurred to Real Jane as Book Jane bestowed on her aunt a look that felt suspiciously like sympathy.

  "Mr. Dempsey!" cried her aunt.

  Jane whirled to look, suppressing an irrational sense of disappointment at the sight of James. Who did she expect, Benton himself? Curran? She shoved that thought away as quickly as it appeared.

  James's clothing was in its usual pristine condition, without any sign of the tumble they'd taken in the grass by the lake earlier. Come to think of it, if she could just look down to see if hers … No luck. Mary held a tight grip on both her head and the pleased look Jane turned on James.