A/N: Short and sweet, because the chapter isn't. You are the best readers a girl could ask for. ***Rating jumps to M***
xx,
~ejb~
Just as he predicted, Isobel receives the highest score of all the candidates who took the nursing exam. The hospital board are glad of it; she was already a fortuitous acquisition, and this achievement is seen as yet another feather in their collective caps.
Isobel herself is relieved to have it all behind her. The kudos from the Dean and the board are all well and good, but she can see through them. It isn't her personal success they're interested in at all. She is weary of the politics of hospital administration, of putting on the smile and accepting the half-sincere platitudes. The system has been this way for years and shows no signs of changing its stripes despite the advancing times. She accepts it, but it's that side of medicine she detests, and there's not a small degree of self-loathing in it. She was, after all, a card-carrying member of that very bureaucracy not so many years ago.
Richard knows all of this because she has confided in him. He had feared that their evenings together would come to an end after she sat the exams, but he needn't have done. In fact they've been together more than apart in the days since their last night of revisions. Indeed, she has been true to her word about his being hard pressed to keep her away from his place.
He is astonished by it, but so very, very happy. He'd put a great number of hours, much sweat and a considerable sum of money into the house until it reflected the image of his lifelong imaginings. Still it was always lacking an intangible something he could never quite put a finger on.
It wants for nothing now. Even when she isn't here —she works opposite hours from him sometimes, and shops, and stays at the guesthouse— the signs of her are everywhere: bouquets of flowers he'd never had any use for on his own; the way she folds his tea towels in precise thirds. The pair of readers beside the lamp on the table next to the couch, resting atop a stack of her own books. Her lavender shortbread in the biscuit tin. Whether she is aware of her impact or not, she has made the house a home.
They are enjoying one another's company immensely, their friendship going from strength to strength. They bond over meals shared together in the pub or at his; they argue about how best to treat patients. A case could easily be made for their being the best of friends once again.
Their association doesn't end at friendship, but it's hard to define precisely what they are. They kiss with regularity. It's usually a quick one-two on the cheeks by way of a greeting or farewell, but when she's feeling bold, she will step close and take his chin in her hand and kiss his lips. He gives back as good as he gets, but he's not been the one to initiate it, not since he kissed her by the doorpost on the night before her exams. It's sweet and irresistible and it's not about either of them pushing the boundaries of friendship, but they've neither of them said the words; she not since the day of their reunion and he not directly at all yet. The sentiment is palpable, yet they remain precariously balanced on the knife edge. He had rightly articulated it: the both of them need to decide what they're willing to risk. And as yet neither one has dared to chance disturbing the delicate thing they've created.
She hasn't said so, but he can tell from the smile on her face as she puts a tray of scones in to bake, the way she hums under her breath whilst fixing tea, that she has missed working in a kitchen. He still doesn't want to dwell on it, but he has suspicions that it's been longer than the few months staying at the guesthouse since she's enjoyed the opportunity. So when she offers to fix dinner for him by way of a thank you for helping her get through the nursing exams, he readily accepts. She never was keen on having servants back at Crawley House, and accordingly she'd often given her cook evenings off with pay (financed out of her own money, not the Granthams'). As such he has sampled her cooking on many occasions and knows he's in for a treat.
The atmosphere is … different between them from the moment he hangs up his white coat and she her apron and they walk out of the hospital together after morning rounds. As they go into town, first to the wine merchant's and then on to the butcher and greengrocer, there is an air of expectancy, unspoken but so intense as to seem almost tangible. He can't explain how he knows it, but as they step over his threshold together he is certain that neither of them will be the same after this day.
He is shattered, having been on call last night, so after a lunch of cheese and onion toasties she sends him off to bed (with a kiss on the cheek), telling him she'll wake him in time for dinner if he's not already up. As tired as he is, he's that much more aware of the fact that she is here, downstairs, in his kitchen. That she will be here when he wakes; the tiniest microcosm of a lifelong dream. He listens to the rhythmic sounds of her working and gradually he is lulled into a deep sleep.
He awakens when the sun is giving its last golden gasp before its descent into twilight. It even smells like home, is his first conscious thought. She'd told him she would fix anything he fancied, and he had requested cottage pie. A peculiar look had come over her face when he told her, and she had explained it away as nostalgia; that was the dish most often requested by both Reginald and Matthew. He thinks it was on the tip of her tongue to call him "adorable," or something in that vein, but she'd kept it back.
He plumps for a quick wash and a shave, donning fresh clothes before he ventures downstairs.
He stops when he gets to the kitchen doorpost. The pie is on the side and Isobel is bent over taking something —fresh bread, it would appear— out of the AGA. She, too, has changed clothes —well, her blouse, anyway. He wonders if she knows how he favours the plum-coloured one she has on now. She can't possibly know that he thinks she cuts a fine figure in that skirt, (particularly the way that the fabric stretches across her bum as she retrieves the bread), so it must be a personal favourite. She seems, in all truth, utterly oblivious to her own beauty and its effects on him. At any rate, he appreciates the gesture. And the view, though of course he won't say so. Perhaps, one day.
It's so easy, with her here before him, and all that her presence adds to his concept of home, to think that the time may be coming when he can share with her, freely, just what she means to him. If he let his guard down, he could let it slip easily without even realising. But his conscience nags him incessantly to exercise caution. It is that internal battle, more than any twelve-hour shift or midnight callout, that exhausts him. Her reappearance in his life has his head spinning round faster than The Whip at Blackpool and he's lost his equilibrium. Something has got to give.
For the moment, however, he can watch her, unguarded and lovely, at home in his home as she moves about with fluid grace, softly singing to herself. A heavenly being descended to earth.
Eventually he makes his presence known —it wouldn't do for her to catch him staring. "It smells delectable," he tells her as he enters the kitchen.
She turns to face him, smiling brightly. "Glad to hear it. Are you hungry?"
He nods. "Famished. You seem to have everything well in hand, but is there anything I can do to help?"
"You can pour the wine, if you like. I know you usually eat off a tray, but I've set the table for tonight if that's alright."
Indeed she has done, complete with a vase full of flowers. There are candles at each end of the table as well, though as yet she hasn't lit them. He wonders if, like him, she senses a change in the atmosphere but doesn't dare get ahead of it, lest the twig they are perched upon snap under the strain. It's silly, really; they are both leaders —he reluctantly so and she more enthusiastically— but neither of them seems willing, where the two of them are concerned, to make a decisive move.
He heads for middle ground. "Shall I light these?"
She gives him a nod and a look of … is that relief? Perhaps she thinks that, given their past, she has no right to presume anything. He can't blame her; he's been reticent at best and bitter at the worst and if the tables were turned he doubts his own thought process would be different. Still, he doesn't want her to be afraid of him.
"If you don't think it's too much," she adds, and her eyes confirm his suspicions. There's hope there; expectancy, but preeminent above anything else, there is fear.
"I think it's nice," he tells her softly. In truth, "nice" doesn't even come close, but he doesn't want to go overboard. He does add, however, "I enjoy having you here, seeing you happy."
She casts her eyes downwards a moment, her cheeks taking on a beguiling pink hue. "I don't think I'd realised how much I've missed this sort of thing," she admits. "Domesticity. And …" She hesitates again, and how he wishes she wouldn't! But what reason has she not to?
"Please tell me." He hopes that he conveys to her the earnestness he feels.
"I was going to say that I always felt more at home in your cottage than ever I did at Crawley House. And also how delighted I am to find that hasn't changed."
"You're not the only one." For a moment their eyes meet, and the conversation they have without words is profound:
-I'm afraid, Richard.
-So am I, Isobel.
-I want you to let me get close again.
-I want the same thing. Give me time.
He thinks the exchange makes as much of an impact on her as him. She gasps, then covers it by saying, "Let me get dinner on the table while it's still warm."
He helps her carry in the serving dishes, pulls her chair out for her and pushes it in when she sits. She has seated them across from one another and he's going to have a task not getting caught up in her eyes, the animated expressions on her face when she speaks.
"I hope I've done alright with this," she says. "It's been a while."
He takes the first bite, and then another. "I mean this as the highest form of a compliment: this tastes just like my mam's. In fact … " He lowers his voice conspiratorially, "Don't tell anyone I said this, but yours is even better."
She chuckles, clasping her hands in front of her, folding her fingers together. "What a relief! I shan't say a word. I'd like to have met your mother."
"Aye, she'd have taken a fancy to you as well. A woman before her time, my mother was. Ran my father's surgery like a general. I think it's safe to say she knew as much about medicine as Da by the time he retired. What about your mam?"
"Oh, she was much the same. And Scottish."
This surprises him. "No! How is it we've known each other all this time and you never told me?"
"Haven't I? Oh yes, she was a MacAlister. Glaswegian by way of Fair Isle, some generations back. She was a spitfire, the apple of my father's eye. And she was the glue that held me together when Reginald died. Tough as nails but with a heart of gold." She smiles fondly.
"Sounds rather like someone I know," he tells her.
"Oh, I don't know about that, but if there's any good in me, it was her doing. Hers and Daddy's, truly."
"Well, as I recall you were no slouch as a mother yourself." He questions the words as they are leaving his mouth. As well as he knows her, still he cannot predict how she'll take it.
She gives him a soft smile, sad but grateful. "That's very kind of you to say. I miss him, Richard. It hasn't got any easier. All my running only put it off."
He is surprised by her forthright turn, but he wants her to feel safe expressing her true feelings; if she'd done so in the first place, that entire Dickie Grey business likely never would have happened.
"However much it hurts, you know, you are successfully working through it now. I don't think you're meant to be unaffected by the loss of him at any point in your life. It only means that you love him."
"I suppose you have a point," she concedes. "Anyway, this is meant to be a happy occasion. What am I doing bringing it down?"
"If I can speak freely, I welcome this kind of discussion. It was fear of upsetting the balance that brought us trouble before, and where did that lead? Nowhere good. I'm still here. I can take it, so long as we agree to be honest. Even if honesty is saying, 'I want to run from this right now.'"
She is quiet, twisting her napkin in her hands. "It makes a change from what I've had," she finally concedes.
He is relieved by the barriers finally crumbling between them, but it's going to be a long and delicate process. On the heels of a big admission it's only natural that the desire to retreat will follow. He lightens the subject matter without changing course entirely.
"Tell me about Master George. He'll be back in Yorkshire for the summer break, surely?"
She looks at him with gratitude, her face breaking into a full and beautiful smile at the mention of her grandson. "Yes, he's coming home next week. I rather hoped —assuming Mary would permit it, of course— that I could bring him round the hospital; let him shadow us for a day, seeing as he's set his mind on medicine."
It's not been done before, but she looks so hopeful; how could he refuse her? "I'd have to float it to the board of course, but I see no reason why not. He'd have to stay out from underfoot, but I expect his manners and decorum are those of a little lord anyway, so it shouldn't be a problem."
"He does have a streak of the devil in him from time to time —which I love— but yes, he can be the proper little gentleman when called upon."
"And do you think his mother will be agreeable?"
Her brows knit together momentarily. "Mary remains as aloof as ever. She loves George; I know she does. She's devoted no shortage of time and hardship to securing his future. But she's not close with him. Not in the way that Matthew and I were close. And Mr. Talbot, well …" she trails off.
"Alright if I have more of this? I don't want to seem brutish."
That earns him another earnest smile. "Don't be ridiculous. I fixed it for you to enjoy, and besides, your manners are finer than those of any lord I've known."
He grins. "Well, my mam did insist."
"See, you're the sort of man …" she starts to say, then claps her hand over her mouth to stop herself.
"We weren't going to do that anymore, remember? Look, I'm not saying this to hurt you, so please don't hear it that way, but given our recent past, there's hardly anything you could say that would do more harm than has already been done. So please don't censor yourself on my account."
"Well, that was direct."
"I learned from the best."
She huffs and looks like she might actually be miffed, and it tickles him. Once upon a time they were on the kind of terms where he could wind her up a little and she would play along. Thrust and parry was the name of their game. He's pleased that they seem to be heading that way again.
"Touché," she says. She waits a beat and then, "What I was going to say is that you're the kind of male influence that George needs. Henry, you see, only has daughters."
"Wait … daughters, plural? Lady Mary's had another child, then?"
"Oh, yes. There's Victoria Violet. She was the baby Mary was expecting before … well … everything," she explains, and he nods. "She's four years old, and then little Cece —her given name is Cora Cecilia— is two. They're lovely children, but they're not my granddaughters. Cora knows what it is to lose a child, and she's tried her best to make me feel included. The girls call me 'Nana.' But Henry is altogether different with George to the way he is with his daughters. Very hands-off; very distant. I can't imagine you really want to hear all of this …"
"I told you to stop that," he reminds her.
"Right. Sorry. I just feel I'm talking too much. I suppose it's that there's been no one to say it to in such a long time …" Another glimpse into her life as Lady Merton, and once again his suspicions were correct. "Anyway, Cora really tries to be present for the grandchildren, so George has got two grandmothers with whom he has a warm relationship. But I worry that he wants for a solid male figure to learn from. Heaven knows Cousin Robert isn't it. Tom Branson makes an effort. He went back to Boston, but he brings young Sybil home in the summertime, when her school breaks up for the year. When he's around, he spends a lot of time with George. But that's only once a year for a couple of months."
"I see. You think the lad needs to see a man get his hands dirty, so to speak."
"Well, yes, amongst other things."
He can suddenly see in his mind's eye all sorts of scenarios: taking the boy out fishing; teaching him how to chop wood and build a fire. How to relate to a woman. Each one of these scenes assumes that he and Isobel are not only together, but living under the same roof. It's not as if George could come to York and stay with his grandmother at the guesthouse, and he can't imagine the youngster's mother and stepfather allowing their son to come and stay at his house, unless Isobel were there as well. And as far as that is concerned, there is optimism, and then there's putting the cart before the horse.
He opts to tell her, "Perhaps it's best to start with bringing Master George to the hospital for a day. If that goes well, then we can think about the next steps."
His answer seems to satisfy her, and she goes on:
"All of that to say that I don't get many opportunities to act in my capacity as grandmother, and it makes me feel Matthew's absence all the more. I always just assumed I'd be highly involved; my own gran was such a huge part of my life, and my mum and Matthew were two peas in a pod. But without Matthew here to promote it …"
"It hurts," he surmises. "I'm sorry, Isobel. It's not what I want for you."
"I had feared that talking about it would make the pain that much worse, but I feel … lighter now, having told you."
That's what I tried to tell you at the time, he wants to say. He hopes that she truly has learned she needn't do absolutely everything the hardest way possible. But what he says is, "I'll always listen to anything you want to tell me."
There is cherry pie for dessert; brandy, too, and he feels well and properly spoilt by the end of the meal. He tells her he will wash up, and she's about to protest when a huge yawn comes over her out of the blue.
"Oh! I'm so sorry! It's not the company, I promise."
He grins. "It's the hours we keep. No, I know it. Come on, you go and sit down where it's comfortable. Washing up is the least I can do after all this." She fixes him with a look and he adds, "I'm asking nicely. Don't make me insist."
She raises her hands in mock surrender. "Alright, alright, I give!"
Before she walks away, he catches her by the hand. "Dinner was lovely. Thank you for everything." He lifts her hand to his lips and presses a swift kiss to the back of it.
Words he said to her ages ago suddenly come back to him, and she must have had the same thought. She looks at him knowingly, telling him, "I hope we can do it again. Soon."
oOo
After the washing up is finished, he puts the kettle on, fixes tea for them both. As he carries the tray into the sitting room, he is met by a sight that makes his heart clench. Isobel, tucked into the corner of the couch, is asleep, her elbow propped on the arm and her cheek resting in her palm.
He reaches for the rug and covers her with it, causing her to stir.
"Hmm?" she mumbles, her eyes fluttering slowly open.
"Shh," he soothes, "it's alright. You're shattered. Rest awhile."
"Darling," she slurs, "stay?"
His heart lurches. Surely she can't be aware of herself, what she's said.
He reaches out and lightly runs the tips of his fingers across her forehead, telling himself it's only to check she's not cold. Her eyes are closed again, but she sighs at his touch.
"Richard …" It rings of supplication and relief and he wants so very much to give in.
"Isobel, you don't know what you're saying, love." Love? Well, doesn't that trip easily off the tongue? "We've both of us had an awful lot to drink. Rest now, and in a little while I'll drive you back to the guesthouse."
"Please." A single syllable, soft and solemn. Her eyes blink open slowly, revealing hope and fear. And love. It cannot be mistaken for anything else.
Still standing, he folds his arms across his chest, increasing the physical distance between them. "Do you realise what you're asking?" He has enjoyed the evening so very much, laughing and talking with her just like old times. Don't let's spoil it now, he pleads silently.
She fixes her gaze on him, now thoroughly lucid. "Oh, I've known for nearly twenty years." She lets her words hang there, never breaking eye contact with him. "Come here. Hold me." Her gaze wavers for just a second, a ragged breath betraying her nerves. Whether by accident or intention, her next words come as a question:
"Kiss me?"
He closes his eyes, willing himself to be kind but stand firm. "Isobel," he warns. He sits down on the arm of the couch, turning his head towards her whilst angling the rest of his body away. It's been such a lovely evening; groundbreaking, really, and he can't believe she's throwing down the gauntlet now. If she's going to push, he'll have to push back. Atmosphere be damned.
"You say that this is what you want, that we are what you want, yet you are his widow. You can put it down to madness; you can call it whatever you like, but the fact remains that you knew I loved you, and still you married him." He loosens his tie and unbuttons his collar; suddenly he feels as if he's suffocating. "When we are together, I see the woman I fell in love with, and it would be so easy to fall again. But you see, I let you destroy me once. I won't do that again."
"I know," she tells him brokenly. "It's the reason I steered a wide path of you after we ran into one another that day. I had hoped you'd see that I realise what I've done and that I know what it cost you. Loving you has never been about me. It's …" She pauses to look him over, and he gets the feeling that she is really seeing him now, not merely trying to persuade him. "It's who you are, how you move through the world. I don't pretend I've anything to offer you, but I do know that you're the very best of men, and that I'm better for knowing you." She turns fully towards him and looks him in the eyes. "I should very much like the opportunity to prove my love, if you ever found it in you to let me try."
Doesn't everyone deserve a second chance? he thinks as he takes in the pain written across her features, the contrition, the sincerity.
He sits down next to her and gently touches her forearm. "I want to believe you," he tells her, accepting it when she slips her hand into his own. He has avoided the words for as long as he can. "I do know that I love you, in spite of all that's passed. That has never changed. I know it's not enough, but it's the best I can do."
Her eyes are wet with unshed tears, and her face breaks into a beatific smile. "It's all I can ask," she whispers, "and so much more than I deserve."
He doesn't resist when she closes the distance between them. She takes both of his hands in her own and he feels the way they tremble. He watches her stare at his lips. For a moment he feels suspended in time; it is his last opportunity to back away. The love he has held in his heart for so long wars with his instinct to self-protect; his heart races.
And then her lips brush his, so gently that they barely make contact. His breath catches. She lets go a cry of relief, a gasp of his name which he feels.
The first time he kissed her, he could scarcely get past thinking My God, this is happening. This time he is focused entirely in the moment as he returns her kiss, increasing the pressure. She opens to him and he runs the tip of his tongue across the inside of her lower lip. She mewls into his mouth and he cups her face in his hands, his thumbs caressing her cheeks.
"Yes," she whispers against his lips. Yes, and his name, and God's. More and please are sprinkled throughout as well, and she clings to him, fingers twisting in his shirtfront, worrying the fabric as if she fears he'll disappear.
He pulls back a little, gentling his kiss. "Isobel," he murmurs. "There now. Steady." He says it as much for his own edification as hers. "Tell me exactly what it is you want. I need to hear you say it." He holds her hand, caresses each of her fingers, admires the intricate pattern of blue veins crisscrossing her delicate skin.
"I want this," she tells him easily. "I want you. Us. Loving one another as it always should have been. Learning from past mistakes and finding a way forward. Together."
It's music to his ears, but he hasn't been hurt just a little. She crushed his spirit, broke him down so that he'd had only ashes from which to rebuild. "I want that, too." He tucks a tendril of hair behind her ear. "Isobel, I can't withstand another heartbreak. I want to trust you more than you know, but …" He pauses, searching for the right words. "If we do this, I can't go back." Please understand what that means. His eyes fix on her own.
In answer she holds his gaze as she lowers her head and presses her lips over his heart. "I'll never ask you to. I'm so sorry," she whispers, laying her palm over the place where her lips have just been. "I love you so much."
He lets her kiss him again, slow and so achingly sweet. He reckons it was a good job he hadn't known until recently that she could kiss like this, that she was so beautifully responsive, or else the longing may truly have killed him. And then a far more sinister notion steals over him: was she ever with Dickie Grey like this?
He knows that her marriage to Reginald Crawley was a very happy one, and somehow the knowledge that she had once been in his arms and in his bed doesn't faze him. He didn't know her then, for one, and by all accounts she and Dr. Crawley had been sweet on one another from childhood.
But to think of her in the arms of that man —the one who stole her from him— makes bile rise, searing the back of his throat. He jerks away from her abruptly.
"I can't do this!" he spits, getting to his feet.
"Richard!" she cries, following after him, concern written all over her face. She reaches out to touch his arm and he recoils as if from a hot iron.
"Don't touch me!" he says through gritted teeth.
She crosses her arms over her chest and steps back from him, tears filling her eyes. "I don't understand," she says weakly. "Do you not … want me?"
He laughs bitterly.
"Richard, please talk to me! We were having a wonderful evening. I don't know what changed." She watches him, the way his chest heaves with heavy, anxious breaths. He is like a rabbit in a snare, desperate to flee.
"Well, isn't that ironic!" he seethes. He studies her. She looks as though she hasn't the faintest idea what he's on about. It makes him furious. She turns her face away from him, her hands coming up to swipe at fugitive tears.
"I can't …" he begins, and just as quickly pauses, shaking his head, "... be with you, knowing that you've …" For Chrissakes, he is a doctor! Why can't he say the bloody words?! "... That you and Dickie Grey—"
She goes to him, her hands curling around his biceps, pulling him close. "Oh, Richard, no!" she cries as understanding washes over her. "No, my love. It wasn't … We didn't." She beseeches him to look at her. When his eyes meet hers, she lifts her hand to brush the backs of her fingers tenderly across his cheek.
"He never was well enough, you see," she tells him quietly, "and even if he had been, I couldn't have …" It's hard for her to admit, and he encourages her with a nod to continue.
"He wasn't Reginald," she confesses, "and he wasn't you. I never …" She cups his face in her hands. "Never."
With great relief, they find their way back into each other's arms. He holds her waist loosely; her palms rest on his shoulders. He leans his forehead against hers.
"It's alright," she soothes him. It's too little, too late, really; things he needed from her years ago, before the great chasm opened up between them. But she's saying them now, doing them now. And somehow it is, therefore, alright.
"Thank you," he whispers, at a loss for what more to say. Their fate rests squarely on his shoulders; he must either take a long leap of faith, forgiving the unforgivable, or else kiss her goodbye forever.
"Talk to me, Richard," she implores him. "What do you want?"
He draws a deep, shaky breath. "I should telephone the guesthouse," comes his reply. "Advise the proprietress you're staying the night with a friend, lest she wait up and worry."
oOo
He washes up the tea things whilst she makes her telephone call, and when he no longer hears her voice in the distance he sets down the tea towel and turns to find her stood by the kitchen doorpost. Her hands are folded in front of her and she's making quite a study of them as he calls her name.
She looks up at him, apprehension in her eyes and her bottom lip caught between her teeth. There has been for him a kind of security in regarding her from behind the fortress of disgust at her actions. But if he is to love her, he has no choice but to leave judgement behind, straightaway and for all time.
He moves towards her, a smile on his lips. "It's alright," he tells her softly; his turn to soothe. As his arms enfold her, she throws her own arms round his shoulders. He begins to sway as he holds her, soothing them both, and she turns her face into the curve of his neck. "Isobel, it's alright."
It's a long time they stay there, the soft waves of her hair tickling his neck, her breath warm on his skin when she rests her head on his shoulder. As he runs his knuckles up and down the length of her spine he can feel her heart beating, the rise and fall of her chest with each breath. How long has he wondered about this, dreamt of it? It was never going to be reality; she was always unattainable.
But she isn't, his inner voice supplies. She's here, and she's real. She's real; she can wound and she can heal. Just like you. And with this epiphany the last of the bricks in his façade crumble to dust.
Backing up from her just a little, he takes her face in his hands. "You are a beautiful woman," he tells her.
He walks her back against the doorpost, leaning in as he kisses her. She opens for him, and when his tongue touches hers she makes a sound in the back of her throat goes straight to his groin. A niggling thought runs through his mind that he needs to show some restraint, but it is swiftly chased away by the knowledge that he has wanted this forever. As, apparently, has she.
She licks his upper lip and it brings him back to the present. Her hands roam his chest; his, which have been resting on her hips, slide to her bottom. He pulls her lower body flush against his own.
"Jesus!" she gasps against his mouth, breaking their kiss when she feels him hard against her hipbone.
Dammit! He knew he should have held himself in check.
She moves against him, rolling her hips, her hands clutching at his bum.
"Yes?" he whispers, pulling back enough to see her face.
She smiles, looking up at him through dark lashes. "Richard, I don't know how many more ways I can say it." She touches the tip of her index finger to his lips. "Yes. And don't be fooled; I'm every bit as terrified as you are."
He kisses the digit. "Are you?"
In answer she takes his hand and presses his palm to her heart. "Feel this."
Her pulse is wild. Their eyes meet, and both are watching as his hand moves to cup her breast through her blouse.
"Ohh," she sighs, sucking in a breath, holding it. He moulds his hand to the shape of her and she presses her flesh into his palm, breathing a single word:
"Closer."
"Come to bed with me." He cannot believe he got his mouth to work, to form the words.
She slips her hand inside of his. "Lead the way."
oOo
It feels like forever as they ascend, like the staircase sprouted new ones to spite him. Real, he reminds himself once again as he climbs. This is real. She is real, and she's here. And we're going to …
Just as they reach the landing, she tugs on his hand, stopping him short of the bedroom door. He turns to face her fully, meeting with a knowing look and a beautiful smile, her eyes wide with anticipation and full of love. "Still with me?"
He has the briefest flash of her goodbye, that day that she'd brought Merton to see him at the surgery, speaking of the two of them as we and us. A stab of pain in his chest, and then she squeezes his hand again and brings him back. The past is gone now, over and done. A glance into her dark eyes. The future is love.
"Always," he answers, and reaches for the doorknob.
He closes the door behind them and they stand awkwardly beside the bed. Neither one is sure of the next move. He touches her shoulder and she turns to face him. She fingers the buttons on his shirtfront, looks down shyly and giggles.
"I feel like it's my wedding night all over again."
He grins and smooths his hands along the length of her arms. "Do you?" Catching her her hands in his he brings them to his lips and presses a kiss to the centre of each of her palms.
"Mm," she affirms, closing her eyes at the touch of his lips. "The first one, I mean." Her expression turns sad a moment; regretful.
He catches her jawbone in his hand. "Hey. It's alright. I knew what you meant. It's over with, Isobel. No more 'sorries.'" She smiles softly and nods, and he kisses the tip of her nose. "We're here now."
"I love you," she tells him, her eyes wet; bright; shining.
For the first time, he doesn't object, doesn't tag her proclamation with a sarcastic snort or clipped repudiation. His eyes drift shut, her words washing over him. Love. Here. Now. He touches the soft skin at the base of her neck. "I love you," he answers, finding freedom in the speaking of it. Cradling the back of her head in his palm, he draws her to his mouth, kisses her with all of the passion he's held inside for the better part of two decades.
She answers his fervour with her own, pressing as close as she can, as if she were trying to get inside of him.
The thought brings forth a low growl from the back of his throat and he kisses her neck, the u-shaped depression between the proximal ends of her collarbones. He fingers the topmost button of her blouse and feels her nod, her hands dropping down by her sides in surrender.
Her chest rises and falls as he works each button free. Her nipples stand out in sharp relief against the lace of her brassiere in response to the chill of the air, the heat of his gaze. He pushes the open blouse off her shoulders and fingers the strap of the thin garment separating him from her flesh.
"No corset," he marvels, pressing his lips to her bare shoulder.
She shakes her head. "Not since the War." It takes courage, he knows, to stand before him like this, her hands repeatedly balling into fists at her sides; clench, release, clench.
"I knew it," he says, not quite knowing why. "Felt it when I held you." Catches her eyes. "It's quite another thing to see it for myself however." He watches her seeing his eyes on her body, and she gasps when he ducks his head to kiss the curve of her breast. When he trails the tip of his tongue over the lace to kiss her nipple, she yelps.
He straightens, his face gone stark white. "Too forward?"
She laughs, full and fair and musical, fingering his lapels. "No, you fool! Oh, Richard, it's wonderful. Only it's twenty-five years I've been without Reginald, and nothing in all that time. I'm … well … starved for it, I suppose." Her cheeks flush beetroot; clearly she's mortified.
He hugs her to himself. "You're beautiful. Perfect, like this. And it's nearly that long for me, too."
"Truly?" She meet his eyes again and presses her lips to his heart. "Shall I?"
He nods. "Please."
His tie hangs loose on his collar; she pulls it off and lets it drop to the floor beside her discarded blouse. "I've always wanted …" she breathes, and her lips touch the skin exposed at the base of his throat, sucking gently.
"Isobel," he murmurs. She must be able to feel the reverberation.
She is swift in opening his buttons, lifting each wrist to her lips as she undoes the cuffs. But she stops short of removing his vest; tucked into the waist of his trousers as it is, she'll have to unfasten them first.
Sensing her hesitation, he takes her hands in his and moves them to his flies. He knows there's no chance of her missing his desire for her as she works open the fastenings. Much as he longs to feel her touch him there, he is glad of it when she lifts his vest free instead, her warm palms flat on his abdomen, rucking up the hem.
In fact, it is his undoing: her hands on his skin. A sob breaks free from his chest, choking him. Year upon painful year of knowing I can't have her and now … and now! And he'd be feeling right daft, but for her bidding him lift his arms and peeling the vest off. She rids him of his trousers and herself of her skirt and lays him down, wrapping him in her embrace.
He clears his throat and wipes his eyes. "Sorry, love. It got to me—"
"Shh." She pecks his lips. "This is what you should have had all along." She kisses him again, hands in his hair, tasting his skin. She blesses his scar, the bullet wound he earned at Mafeking, the rib he was forced to forfeit in exchange for his life. It isn't like a first time at all; it is sacred and knowing, unhurried as they lie atop the sheets, kissing and touching. She looks at him and says, "This is how I always meant to love you."
Gradually her brassiere comes off, her knickers, his shorts. She lies beneath him, arching against his mouth as he learns her topography. He knows now the answers to questions he's had for ages. Her lips are soft and yielding, and her mouth tastes of Calvados, sweetly dark and altogether fitting. She is ticklish just beneath her ribs, and the sounds that she makes when his mouth is on her breasts are going to be the death of him. And the way that she touches him! Long, languorous caresses and that unspoken air of relief: Finally, you're mine.
For a long while they are drunk on the novelty of being skin-to-skin, shared heartbeats and the blessed relief found in the veritable consecration of one another's scars. She whispers to him, "You're so warm," and, "This is right, Richard," and more than once, "You're here!" as if their having got this far is as mysterious to her as it is to him.
He runs his fingers along the curve of her hip, over her belly and she shivers. He traces the crease where hip meets thigh and she urges him, "Touch me," with wide, trusting eyes and an innocence that confounds him, compels him.
He kneels before her, running his hands along her legs, easing them apart. Ghosting his fingertips across her lower abdomen, feeling the muscles jump, hearing her gasp. Gentle fingers opening her, silken damp, long slow caresses. Finding her rhythm, her spot, hips rocking, rutting against his hand. Slipping a finger inside of her; two, and Shit, she's tight, and then she's keening:
"Oh, Richard … Richard, I can't—"
He moves over her, kisses her lips. "You can, my darling. Come on."
And then she does, and he nearly weeps again: she, set free, glorious and wanton and so far above him; yet here, all wide-eyed amazement and trembling in his arms.
And lord knows what he whispers to her when she reaches for him and he gathers her up and crushes her to his body, rocking, soothing; her hairline damp with the strain of it and him, kissing it away. All the words he attributes to her, like beauty and precious; crazy, mad endearments —wonderful salacious things he'd never dare speak aloud otherwise— it all comes tumbling forth against the shell of her ear and then …
Then she is kissing him again, knelt before him, tongue in his mouth and the tips of her fingernails lightly scratching his scalp. Settling herself in his lap, legs straddling him and he could've made bank on his being the one to take her, but she's above him, the heat of her just out of reach, tormenting him and herself with it. And then, finally, touching him, Oh Jesus Christ!, teasing the tip of his erection against her folds, and him thanking God she was so happily married all those years because it's made her a siren. A temptress; enthralling dichotomy: doe-eyed innocent and heavy-lidded vixen. And she's panting; the tendons in her neck are stretched taut and he thought that he'd be touching her more if ever it came to this between them, but she grips his shoulders, her fingernails biting deliciously into his skin, and sinks the head of him inside her. A wincing gasp, silent open-mouthed cry, and she falls forward slightly.
He catches her, hands on her biceps, and speaks the first intelligible words uttered by either of them in so long that they sound loud to him:
"Easy. Just easy, Isobel. Been a long time."
She nods, her cheek against his forehead as his arms close around her, warm palms at her waist and then rubbing her back.
Eyes on his eyes, she relaxes around him and takes a little more of him, and then steadily more, until he fills her completely. "My God, I'd forgotten," she discloses, touching her forehead to his and the pads of her thumbs to his lips. Smiling brightly, she whispers, "I love you."
He holds her hips, massaging her, pressing her closer, and she wiggles a little, taking him deeper still.
"Isobel," he murmurs, incredulous. "Beauty, my beauty. Can't believe how good you feel."
For a long time they stay like that, savouring the joining.
Kissing, aching, needing.
A lifetime longing for this, thinking it had passed them by.
She begins to rock against him and they cry out in unison. Moves again and he pushes up into it, and there is their rhythm. Deep, slow, together, drawing out the moment.
He palms her bum, lifting her up and letting her sink back down on him. "S'alright?" he slurs, overcome with it: her wet heat enveloping him.
"Oh, my God!" she affirms, and does it again, surer of the movement, letting gravity draw her down.
"Oh! More of that!" he cries.
She smiles as she indulges him, leaning forwards, bracing herself with her hands on his shoulders. Her hair falls like a fragrant curtain around them. Still moving, she arches her back, and he kisses her breasts, feeling her walls begin to squeeze him.
"Come on, darling!" comes his hoarse, fevered whisper.
"Richard!" She shatters, panting, clutching at his shoulders. The strength of her orgasm triggers his own.
"I love you!" he shouts. "Isobel, I love you!"
oOo
He doesn't want to move when it's over. Doesn't want it to be over. They stay together, she in his lap and he inside her.
He brings his hands to her face, his thumbs caressing her cheekbones. "Isobel. Beautiful Isobel."
She kisses him in answer. He tastes the smile on her lips. "Richard," she whispers near his mouth. "My darling."
It's inevitable; they can't stay forever as they are, and she extricates herself from his arms long enough to turn the covers down and crawl beneath them.
He follows suit, lying on his side next to her as she lies on her back.
She groans as the blankets settle over them.
"You're not hurt?" he asks, alarm in his voice.
She shakes her head. "Mm-mm. Miss you." He hears the words she doesn't say: in me.
He echoes the sound empathetically. "Well, there had to be a first time so that there can be a next time."
She grins. "Is that a promise?"
He kisses the end of her nose. "Oh, my darling. Now that I've had you, wild horses couldn't keep me away."
She's playful now, nerves abated. "Hadn't pegged you for an equestrian."
He chuckles at her, thinking how like a child she looks with the covers pulled up to her nose. "Ah, but I am, you see." He cocks an eyebrow at her. "Or, rather, was. It's been a day or two. No, what I am is smitten. You, young lady …" She giggles at his use of the term. "You are …" He trails off, words failing to capture all she is and all that she means to him.
She pulls him close, arms around him, nudging his legs apart to rest one of hers between them. "I'm what, hmm?" she whispers.
He sinks his fingers into her hair and steals her breath when he kisses her. "Everything," he pronounces when he has her sufficiently undone.
It is impossible, they find, to stop touching one another now that they've started. The haze of afterglow carries them into sleep, limbs entangled, on a chorus of whispered I love yous.
oOo
He awakens sometime later with a start, blindly reaching over to the other side of the bed. It'll kill him to find it empty.
But it isn't. She is there, still beside him. He chances opening one eye. The covers have slipped down to reveal the top of her shoulder, and the moonlight through his window casts shadows that make the waves of her hair look like a topographical map of the moors.
She is there still. Beside him. Asleep in his bed. Because they made love. He has to repeat all of this to himself several times, because it defies belief. He dares not disturb her but finds he's got to touch her, to verify it's not all just a very vivid dream.
He skims his hand over the contour of her shoulder. Her skin is like velvet. She sighs, stirs a little. There's a chill in the room; he always stacks the fireplace before bed but tonight he'd been otherwise occupied. He gets out of bed. The clothing they had cast aside in haste blocks his path and he retrieves it now, draping it over the chair by the window.
He considers his dressing gown; it seems odd to be messing about with firewood in the altogether. That realisation gives him pause. He can't remember sleeping nude in … ever. Even in the oppressive heat of August, he has always worn at least his shorts to bed. He chuckles silently, wondering if she's done this before. That thought, mere hours ago, would have led him down a rabbit hole of rage, but not now. Now he simply reasons, She was married a full third of her life. To Reginald Crawley. And finds himself glad for her.
He drapes the gown about his shoulders when Firewood is splintery flashes through his head. Christ, man, you're making up words now! He isn't like this, never giddy like this, and he knows the reason why.
She shifts in the bed, makes a little discontented sound in her sleep and reaches for his pillow. She wants to be near him. Perhaps that ought not catch him so much on the back foot, but it's so utterly opposite to everything he's known about her since the death of her son. Quickly following, however, is the knowledge of how she was, who she was in the many years he knew her before that, and the echoes of her achingly genuine, 'This is what you should have had all along. This is how I always meant to love you.'
Always. That dangerous word they'd both bandied about with surprising alacrity in the preceding hours. And the notion that had come to him minutes earlier, on pondering both of their experiences with sleeping en déshabille:
I wonder if we'll always be like this.
We. Always. He ought to feel more alarmed than he does. They've slept together! He knows now, things he puzzled about forever. The scent of her hair, the taste of the curve of her neck. The feel of her nipples scoring his palms and her heartbeat under his lips. He'd warned her there was no going backwards from here.
He is closer to her than ever he's been to anyone.
It is now, between them, as it should have been for ages. But is how it should've been once, the way it's meant to be now?
The answer lies in the most difficult decision he's ever made. He has forgiven her. He can consider no longer the pain that she caused him in his interactions with her from this point forward.
He knows her. Knows the best and worst of her. She is, in truth, the best specimen of humanity that he has ever known. He's never met another whose capacity to love can touch hers. She is headstrong, often to the benefit of many; sometimes to her own peril. She is a voice for those society has silenced; she has no tolerance for injustice. She leads with her heart despite possessing an intellect that supersedes his own, and she has a tendency to speak before considering the impact of her words. It's wonderfully refreshing, and it can sting like a punch on the nose.
His heart has set itself on her; he is powerless to do anything but obey its command.
"You're thinking dreadfully loudly, darling." She breaks through his ruminations. "Whatever are you doing?"
He can't help but smile. Her voice is husky with sleep and it does something funny to him. "I'm sorry, love, did I wake you? The fire went out and I didn't want you cold."
"It was warmer with you here," she mumbles, stretching. The covers slip down to her waist. She moves to right them.
"Don't do that," he interjects. The fire has lit the room with a flickering amber glow. "I want to see you."
She gapes at him, just for a second, until she sees the heat in his eyes. "Alright," she agrees and lies back down, still watching him. "I should ask, are you alright?"
It's uncomfortable disrobing in front of her. No; not uncomfortable, exactly. Unfamiliar. He doesn't want it to be, just as he doesn't want her to feel inhibited baring herself to him.
He drops the robe. Her eyes are warm. He climbs back into bed beside her, remembering her question (and how good it is of her to ask). "I didn't know but I'd wake up alone," he confesses quietly.
"Oh, Richard." There is empathy in her tone and her expression shows that she feels his fear. "I wish that I could take all of it back. Go back to the fair and say what was actually in my heart." She sighs; shakes her head. "The first of so many wrong turns." She is facing him, propped up on her elbow, leaning her cheek against her hand.
"I don't want you to think that I'll never get past it. I don't think of it, didn't think of it tonight. It's not that I love you in spite of it, either. I just … love you. I'm sorry it's still there at all." His voice is soft as he finishes.
She touches his face, brushing the backs of her fingers across his cheek. "You have nothing to be sorry for. I'll spend every day, as long as it takes, proving that I'm not going anywhere." She leans forwards and touches her lips to his. Her kiss is delicate but raw, and he thinks he can taste her remorse.
"I don't want that for you," he says as their lips part. "I know who you are. You're good, Isobel. But even the best of us is only human. We've all taken a step wrong at one time or another."
She smiles, looking away from him and down at the bed.
"Oi," he says, getting her to look at him. "If we're going to be together, we can't allow the past to cast a pall on our … this." He gestures to himself and her, the space between them. "Us. I won't do it. Don't you, either. This is meant to be good, beauty."
She chuckles. "Beauty."
"Well, you are." He feels his ears get hot; doubtless she can see them flushing bright red.
"I like it," she tells him. "I'm inclined to look the other direction when I hear it, is all. I figure you can't possibly mean me."
His stomach sinks. "There's no one else." He feels utterly exposed revealing the deep parts of himself and his affection for her.
"Oh, darling," she breathes. "Come here."
He'd never have seen it coming (but then that could easily be said of so many things over these last hours) but he ends up lying cradled on her chest. She is doing what she does so well: nurturing, comforting. Calming anxious thoughts. Only this time, they're his. He finds it surprisingly easy to show her his vulnerabilities when she makes it so clear that they do not diminish her love for him.
Her fingertips trail along his back, her other hand smoothing through his hair. He can feel her breath hitch and her efforts to hold it at bay for him. At last she speaks and he can feel it just as much as he can hear.
"All this talk of beauty … you are beautiful to me, Richard. I don't know why I was so afraid of this."
"Is that what it was then? At the fair, and then after Matthew?"
"Yes. I don't know as you'll understand this, but I thought … All my love is used up. Because, you see, I can never not love Reg. And Matthew …" She clears her throat and he feels her swallow hard. "He grew beneath my heart. Blood of my blood. There's not a day goes by that I don't feel as if a part of me is missing." She chokes, her voice breaking. "Because it is."
He moves to comfort her but she holds up a hand to halt him.
"But I met you, and by the start of the War I knew that what I felt for you was love. And I could do nothing to change it. Even after Matthew … your place in my heart was still there. It grows, and I'm powerless against it. Reg is there, and my love for him is its own living being, I think." She heaves a great sob but she's smiling. Two teardrops race their way down her cheeks and then she's breathing again, continuing:
"Matthew will always be there, and I'll always feel that missing feeling. It's ten years coming up and I know now: losing a child is not something one ever gets over. You adjust, little by little, as time goes by, but the ache …" she presses her fist to her breastbone, "... is always there. But it doesn't mean that one can't grieve and fall in love at the same time. Richard, I could no more stop loving you than stop the sun from rising. The heart decides, and we are just along for the ride."
His eyes are wet and he laughs. Of course she would have arrived at the same conclusion as he. They've had that connection from the start. "We've done it again," he tells her, reaching for her.
"Done what? Oh, have you got there ahead of me?" She smooths her index finger along the bridge of his nose.
He holds his thumb and forefinger slightly apart. "Whilst you were asleep," he explains.
"Talking of sleeping, we ought to be doing."
He shakes his head, lays her down. "Tomorrow's my day off," he tells her, "and I have a sneaking suspicion your supervising physician could probably be persuaded to give you off as well. I hear he has a weakness for headstrong chiefs of surgical nursing with Scottish mothers." He ducks his head, kisses her collarbone; little nips along the ridge of it, and she giggles. "And I know of something I need far more than sleep."
He presses her into the pillows, his hands either side of her head, holding himself up. His hips are pressed to hers; she rolls against him, whimpering. Her legs part and she's still slick, and he rubs his penis against her, hardening again.
"Isobel, what you do to me," he murmurs. Surrenders to it: her heat and her cries, her body soft beneath him, so open, so responsive. He grinds against her and they kiss endlessly. It's hot and slow and they're past inhibition, hands and mouths all over.
"Do you know what I keep thinking?" she pants, leaning up to see his face.
"Hmm?" he grunts, gliding his hand over her breast.
"I can't believe that we're doing this. I mean it in the best possible way. Like, incredulous. I thought that this had passed me by." She kisses him hard, dragging her teeth across his lower lip.
"I feel the same," he tells her, "so much the same."
"Will it always be like this, I wonder?"
He can't hold back the smile. "God, I love you."
He kisses her nipples, first one, then the other, alternating; high on the taste of her, the feel of them on his tongue, against the roof of his mouth. She's thrashing, cursing him and God and pleading with him not to stop. The friction of her centre against his erection is killing him and he doesn't want to finish before they start. "Isobel, wait, I—"
"Yes, darling?" Her chest heaves, her eyes huge and dark and wild.
"You've no idea …" he pauses, struggling for breath, "how much I want to be inside you."
She makes a funny mewling sound, a gasp she doesn't quite manage to contain, and he wonders if perhaps she's waited as long to hear those words as he's been waiting to say them. Then she reaches between them, taking him into her hand. Her eyes are fixed on his own. "Then be …" she inhales sharply as she slips him against her entrance, "... inside me."
"Woman!" he growls, and pushes deep, circling his hips, their gaze never breaking.
Her mouth falls open, her breathing rapid, tears forming at the outside corners of her eyes. He knows, he knows; it's all so much; they feel so much, it's beyond words and comprehension and the both of them combined. People fall in love every day, but there is nothing ordinary about this. He wonders whether they'll survive it, whether anyone could.
She wraps her legs around his waist; he moves, his hands beneath her bum moving her with him. She's hot and gripping him so tightly. He gets one knee under himself, thrusting hard once, twice, three times, and then she's there, squeezing his hands, straining for his mouth, kissing him as she climaxes around him, and he swallows the sound of her.
He holds her to him hard as he thrusts inside her, spilling himself with a shout of her name.
She pulls him down to her and he collapses onto his forearms. She kisses him languidly, stretching against him, the both of them moaning as tiny aftershocks of pleasure still course through their bodies.
He breathes an astonished imprecation in her ear, reaching for her hands and pinning them against the mattress, above her head.
She laughs with abandon. "I believe I just did," she tells him. "Cheeky sod. Did you kiss your mother with that mouth?"
He grins, nipping at her lips playfully. "Can you honestly blame me, when you make love like that?"
"I don't know what to say to that, only it's a relief." Her voice drops to a faint whisper, practically inaudible, as she reveals, "I wasn't altogether sure I would remember how."
He nuzzles her nose. "Oh, beauty. You remembered." He takes her lips, trying to convey all that is in his heart.
"God, I could kiss you forever," she sighs against his mouth.
"Do you promise?"
She sighs. "I think we've got an awful lot to talk through," she answers practically even as she smooths her hands down his flanks, "and much as it pains me let you go, we can't stay this way." He slips from her and they both lament the loss. She curls herself into his side. "Before anything else, we need sleep. You may think better of me come morning." It breaks his heart to hear her say it, but he cannot blame her. "And it's far too soon to be thinking like this anyway. But yes, if it were entirely up to me, I would … anything. Everything. For as long as you'll have me."
He rolls her onto her back, needs her to look at him. His thumbs trace the contours of her cheekbones as he tells her, "Hear me, Isobel. I will never think better of you. I've wanted this from the day we met. You're right to suggest we sleep before taking on Goliath, but it's as you said before: I love you. I didn't choose it, and I can't stop it, and even if I could do, I wouldn't. I loved you in Downton, and I love you now, and if I'm lucky enough to wake up beside you in the morning, I will love you then."
Holding his gaze and smiling, she lifts his hand to her lips. Kisses the back of his fingers, each knuckle. "This has been a beautiful night." Her voice quavers. "Thank you, Richard, for waiting for me, all this time." Her chest heaves with a dry sob, then two, three; half a dozen before she gets it under control. She presses a fist hard to her chest and he feels the aching lump she can't swallow: regrets and years lost and forgiveness she feels she hasn't the right to. "There aren't words for this," she chokes. "The closest I can come is 'thank you.'"
He weeps silently long after she is asleep.