Chapter 34

Mrs. Hughes was balancing household accounts when she was interrupted by a familiar knock at the door. She smiled as she put down her pen. "Yes?"

Mr. Carson's face peered round the door. "I'm not interrupting, am I?"

"Not at all." She rolled her chair back from her desk. "Is there something I can do for you?"

Yes, yes, there is something you can do for me. But not here. I shouldn't be here either. This is madness. "Not especially, Mrs. Hughes."

"Not especially?" She smiled intently at him. "I wonder if you're here for information."

Gods, no. I couldn't care less about household matters. I'm here for you, only you. "Information? What sort of information?"

"I thought you might be interested in the details of my meeting with her Ladyship."

Charles cleared his throat gruffly. "I'd forgotten. I do apologize."

"No need for apologies, Mr. Carson. You've quite enough on your plate without worrying over a routine meeting with her Ladyship."

"Routine? I thought you were discussing our living arrangements?"

"We were."

"And has it all been decided?"

"It has."

"We are to have two rooms in the East Wing?"

"We are."

"And the furnishings you selected?"

"Everything has been approved by her Ladyship."

"Very good."

Elsie rose from her chair and walked toward him. "Her Ladyship was very kind, Charles, very kind indeed. She had hoped to obtain one night away for us."

"One night away? From the Abbey? Whatever for?"

Elsie rolled her eyes. "Our wedding night, Charles. That's whatever for."

"Oh. Oh, I see. Yes. Well. Very thoughtful, but surely unnecessary."

Elsie's eyebrows raised in shock. "Unnecessary?" Surely he wasn't so obtuse?

"I only mean, well, being on the East Wing, it's very secluded, isn't it? I mean, no one will be about. Well, close, at any rate." He took her hands in his. "I only meant we should have our privacy."

Elsie nodded her head thoughtfully. "Yes, we'll have our privacy, though it would have been nice to have had a bit of time away, to ourselves, I mean." She bit her lip. "It will be very different."

"How do you mean?"

She exhaled. "I mean that after the wedding breakfast, we'll return to our duties. It will be ages before…" She stopped and wrung her hands together, looking anywhere else but Charles.

His heart clenched. So she had been thinking of their wedding night as well? A dark, secret part of him thrilled at the thought. Perhaps he wasn't the only one who was eager for the wedding to take place. "Before we can be alone?"

Elsie nodded, afraid to look at his face, though the tone of his voice was gentle. She didn't want him to think of her as too forward, someone like…like Theda Bara. But the plain truth was she was as anxious as he seemed to be for the wedding to take place.

He leaned in closer to her ear and whispered. "Should you like to be alone with me, Elsie?" She nodded; his hot breath tickled her ear. "I should like very much to be alone with you. All that afternoon and evening, I'll be thinking of you, just as I do now." She looked up at him in surprise. "Of course I think of you, dearest, loveliest Elisabeth." His fingers brushed along her cheek and he cursed himself for leaving the door to her sitting room open. He kissed her quickly, then walked to the door and shut it.

She watched him close the door to her sitting room feeling both alarmed and thrilled. They shouldn't be secreted away together, especially now. She drew in a breath to admonish him, but it caught in her throat. The look in his eyes was proprietary; no man had ever looked at her like that, with so much purpose and want. Oh, she wanted him, so much it made her tremble. He reached her in two swift strides and gathered her in his arms, moving his hands in steady, rhythmic circles along her back and sides. Again he marveled at how small she was in his arms, how soft and sweet smelling. He buried his face in her neck and kissed her neck, the shell of her ear, her hair.

"You're so beautiful, Elsie."

She turned away from him. "It's kind of you to say, Charles, but-"

He grasped her by the shoulders and turned her so that she had to look into his eyes. "You are beautiful, Elsie. So very beautiful, and not just to me. You must know that." She bit her bottom lip and he was lost to her. He pulled her flush against him and kissed her passionately. He teased her lips with his tongue and he felt her shudder in his arms. He ran his hands down her sides and caressed her hips, willing himself not to cup her bottom. She opened her mouth and curled her tongue experimentally against his and he felt himself rise to her again. This would never do, and yet how could he stop kissing her? How could he relinquish her from his arms? He groaned and pulled her to him even more closely.

"Mrs. Hughes, could I-Oh, oh dear me. Well, I'll just…I didn't really. I'm terribly sorry. I don't need anything at the moment. I'll just come back. Another time. When you're not otherwise occupied." Mrs. Patmore had recovered her wits enough to smirk, the pair of them looking for all the world like guilty young lovers caught out. She didn't think she'd ever seen Mr. Carson move quite so fast; he'd sprung away from Mrs. Hughes as though she was a burning stove he'd accidentally put his hand on. Had she not come in, they might both have been burned. Good thing the wedding was only a few days off.

Mrs. Hughes was the first to recover. "I can assure you, Mrs. Patmore, that I am quite capable of providing any assistance you require."

Charles looked at her admiringly. He could feel his face burning, but fortunately, the sound of Mrs. Patmore's voice had eliminated any other visible signs of his…well, his desire, he supposed. I simply cannot believe this. I'm over sixty years old, and if we'd not been interrupted, who knows what might have happened? He was torn between shock and pride. Get hold of yourself man, and thank the gods it was only Mrs. Patmore who'd walked in on you! He cleared his throat officiously. "Yes, well then, I'll leave you to it." He walked to the door and nodded. "Mrs. Patmore."

Mrs. Patmore watched him leave, then entered Mrs. Hughes' office and quietly shut the door behind her. "What are you about, girl? My goodness! Anyone could have walked in on you. You're just lucky it were me this time!"

"I realize that, Mrs. Patmore." Mrs. Hughes wrung her hands. "We just…we just got carried away."

"I could see that! Good lord! Looked like the man was trying to swallow you whole!"

"Mrs. Patmore, really."

"Oh come on! It's not that I'm not happy for the both of you, ecstatic, really, but honestly, girl. You must take better care. Course, you've only got a few more days."

"Four more."

"Counting down the days are you?"

Mrs. Hughes drew herself up sternly. "That's quite enough, Mrs. Patmore. Now, what was it you needed?"

"I only needed to visit the store cupboard. By the look of Mr. Carson, he'll be needing a cold bath!" She laughed uproariously. "Oh, come now, Mrs. Hughes. It's only a bit of teasing. I'm done now, I promise."

Mrs. Hughes looked at her shrewdly. "Done for now?"

"For now," replied Mrs. Patmore enigmatically.

"Then for heaven's sake let's get on to the store cupboard."

"As you wish."

Mrs. Patmore followed Mrs. Hughes out of her office, chuckling softly to herself. She'd always suspected something between them, and it was gratifying to be proved right after all these years, but she'd never, never in her wildest dreams, suspected Charles Carson capable of the passion she'd seen between them. Well, good on them, she thought. They've been dancing around each other for donkey's years. They deserve to live a little. She smiled wickedly as she thought of the various ways she could tease Mr. Carson over the next few days.