The Merchant and the Clergyman (14 page)

Declan wondered what James wanted to say
other than
thank you
, but clearly the topic of his own
appearance made him uncomfortable. Instead, Declan said, “Have you
ever seen Jack Darnley behave like a brute?”

“Never.” James leaned down and pushed a log
farther into the flames. “The squire is greatly admired hereabouts.
He enjoys the reputation of a good landlord and a fair-minded
justice of the peace.”

“Enjoys it? Quite a good description. He is
all bonhomie and a jolly good fellow and likes playing host to the
neighborhood.” Declan chewed the side of his thumb, trying to
dredge up memories. “I recall flashes of his bad temper, nothing
serious, when I was young. Sarcastic comments, usually directed at
my aunt.”

“Perhaps he is worried about the upcoming
wedding?”

“Hmm,” Declan agreed. “He’s obviously low on
funds. The hall looks shabby, there are fewer servants, and the
grounds are not as neat as they have been. Surely you’ve
noticed?”

James shook his head. “Perhaps I don’t know
the hall as well as you do, or I’m not as perceptive as you. Both
of those facts and, well, I’m not used to fine surroundings.” He
slumped back in his chair. “I admit I’m rather in awe when I enter
the hall.”

“That place?” Declan felt at home in anything
from small mud huts to palaces. He didn’t consider the hall neither
huge nor tiny—in other words, not worthy of note. “Why do you look
so unhappy?”

James had slid far down the chair and stared
at him as if he might see the answer on Declan’s face. “Perhaps
because one of my besetting sins is resentment.”

“Because you wish you could live there?”

He hesitated for a long while. “I dislike how
intimidated I feel when I walk through the front entrance. I
suppose I’m also envious, although I think this cottage suits me
better.”

Declan shook his head. “Reverend Fletcher,
you are a rustic, no doubt about it.”

Now James didn’t smile or meet his eyes.
“Yes, and also there was a time when I thought I cared about the
hall.”

“What do you mean?”

“I was idiot enough to think Kip and I shared
something.” James rose to his feet and began arranging the logs on
the fire again. “The rain has started. You must be in a hurry to
go.”

“Are you so eager to get rid of me?” Declan
felt perversely uninterested in leaving before he got to the bottom
of why James seemed discontented.

James stopped fiddling with the fire tongs.
“Not at all.” He sounded sincere.

“You don’t regret what we’ve done, do
you?”

“No. And I hope I never do.”

“All right. I think I know what’s wrong. It’s
stupid Kip’s abusive treatment of you when you cared so much for
him.”

At last, James smiled—he actually laughed.
“There was also the matter of my stupid response to him. Once when
I was home for a holiday, I went to the hall and felt something
like reverence. I was besotted by that charming, cruel lad. I was
an utter fool.”

“Possibly, yes, most young men are. But
you’re a loving person, I think, and there’s nothing wrong with
affection.” He spoke briskly, hoping to banish all sentimentality
from the words. Declan rose to his feet. No more tarrying with
James. “I do wish Kip was a better person so you’d have been in
love with someone worthy of you.”

Only the crackle and hiss of the fire filled
the room.

“You are too kind,” James said slowly. “No,
truly, you are. Thank you for everything. I shall treasure this
evening.”

Ah-ha. James apparently thought they were
finished, and he offered a dignified farewell. He gracefully
released Declan from the possibility of sticky webs that another
man might attempt to form around a wealthy patron. In his past,
Declan had managed to avoid such traps—composed of needy affection
or mild blackmail or both. Then again, he’d never felt the urge to
buy a bedmate a horse.

He should be glad that this adventure with
James would end so cleanly. Then why didn’t he feel any delight
with this easy solution?

“Good night, then,” Declan said and buttoned
his waistcoat. He grabbed his jacket and headed for the door. He’d
be thoroughly soaked, but that wouldn’t bother him. His thoughts
would distract him, for he suddenly decided he hadn’t seen enough
of the curate after all. “I shall be here until after the wedding,
so I’ll see you again, James Fletcher. That’s a promise.”

James had followed him to the door, but he
stopped now. He shook his head and seemed ready to protest.

Declan shook a finger at him. “Ah-ha, I know
how to stop your objections. It is increasingly clear to me I must
arrange something about my aunt. I hope you’ll help me.”

James promptly responded, “Of course I will
help.”

Declan stuck out a hand. James reached for
it, and Declan pulled him close for a hug. “You were going to say
no to seeing me again, weren’t you?” he murmured in James’s ear. “I
have learned your ways, see? I can control you outside of the
bedroom as well.”

James pushed against Declan’s chest, freeing
himself. His frown seemed real, or close enough. “I was wrong
earlier. You are not such a good person,” he said.

“No matter.” Declan reached for the door.
“You are good enough for the both of us.”

Chapter Thirteen

The sun rose the next morning. The day
passed. James might as well have been floating in a dream he paid
so little heed to it. Generally when parishioners spoke to him, he
listened carefully, not just pretending to be interested. Their
welfare meant a lot to him. They
were
his flock in every
sense of the word. But that day he could barely make sense of the
simplest comments about the weather, let alone gossip, worries, and
troubles brought to him in confidence. Nothing could stop his mind
from returning again and again to the previous night.

He was Saul traveling the road to Jericho.
He’d seen the light, tumbled off his ass, and landed on his arse on
the ground—born anew. That was how fresh and open-eyed he felt
after a night of tawdry coupling with Declan Shaw. It was so wrong
to feel that way, and to use a biblical reference to conversion,
for heaven’s sake. But nevertheless, it was what he felt, as if
he’d come fully alive. Opened like a flower to the sun, to use a
poet’s stock phrase.

And he wanted to do it all over again. Ah,
there was the trouble with sins of the flesh, or with any delicious
treat—one taste only made a man wish for more.

James managed smiles and kind words to
everyone he encountered as he performed his duties that day, but he
prayed for nightfall and hoped for Declan to knock at his door.
Surely any minute now
, he thought again and again as hours
crawled past. But Declan didn’t come that evening, and well past
midnight, James finally gave up and went to bed.

Perhaps tomorrow he’d see Declan again. After
all, James had promised to help come up with a solution to make
certain Mrs. Darnley was properly cared for before Declan left, so
at the very least they must discuss that. Unless—and here was where
late-night doubts and fears crept in—unless Declan didn’t want to
see James again and made certain he didn’t.

Perhaps all the glowing feelings James
experienced were on his side only. Declan was much more experienced
and worldly, and such an encounter might be quite common for him.
He could enjoy the sins of the flesh with no entanglements. Feeling
the sticky tendrils of James’s too-emotional attachment already
latching on to him, Declan may have brushed them off like so many
cobwebs. He might not return.

He would not return.

James might see him at the wedding, but then
Declan would return to his business concerns. If he ever came back
to Bishop’s Hartfeld, it could be years from now. And foolish,
needy James would be left with a hunger he could never feed. Yet,
lying sleepless in his bed, James knew if Declan came knocking,
even now just before cock’s crow, he would welcome him with open
arms. He’d fallen under a spell again, such as he’d suffered during
his school days when Kip held sway over him. Except this felt like
much more than that schoolboy crush. If James allowed it, his
feelings would grow deeper, stiller, more real than anything he’d
ever felt before. Therefore, he
wouldn’t
allow it.

A second sun rose, and he got out of bed. He
washed and dressed with much less vigor than the previous day and
took one look at his breakfast before pushing it aside. How the
yearning of unfulfilled passion dulled the pangs of actual
hunger.

He was leaving his cottage for his first task
of the day when Kip’s sweet little fiancée, Emily Parker, greeted
him from the road.

“I’m off to meet with the ladies’ guild,” he
called out as he walked to meet her.

“That group of matronly biddies.” She sounded
uncharacteristically sour.

“That might describe you in a few years,” he
began but stopped teasing when her lips quivered and she turned her
face away. “What is wrong, Miss Parker?”

She shrugged as if she were a small girl.

He looked around and saw no sign of the
ladies. “Do you wish to talk about it?”

She nodded but didn’t speak.

He felt a clench of fear at her misery but
managed a cheerful, “Such a pleasant morning. Shall we walk on the
path behind the churchyard?”

They reached the trees rather quickly, in an
unspoken agreement to be out of sight as soon as possible,

“Miss Parker?” he asked, and that was enough
to start her talking.

“I don’t think Kip, that is to say Mr.
Darnley, truly loves me.”

He wanted to agree, to gather her close in a
hug and tell her Kip was a horrific creature, that she was better
off without him and deserved far better. But he was a curate now,
not a close friend. He only said, “Oh?” because he knew her well
enough to realize she didn’t need more encouragement.

Between sniffles and choked sobs came a story
of Kip bellowing at a servant and then snapping at Emily when she
expressed her disapproval.

He listened and handed her a handkerchief
when her own dainty one seemed sodden. She took it and wiped her
eyes.

“It’s not only that he may not love me,” she
said slowly. “It is that I…I might have been mistaken about his
character. And I don’t… Silly nonsense. But of course I do love
him. We’re going to be married. We are always to have been married.
Forever. And if we don’t, what could I do instead? Perhaps enduring
love is not so important.” She looked as if she’d been stunned by a
blow to the head.

“It might not be to other people, but it
seems to be important to you.”

Her face crumpled as if she would cry again,
but she pulled herself together almost at once. She stood in the
path and drew her shawl, a confection of white lace, tight around
her shoulders as if it might comfort her. “Oh dear. The ladies will
be waiting. You must go.”

“This is more important.”

“More important than a ladies’ guild meeting?
Horrors. You are a blasphemer, Mr. Fletcher. Nothing is more
important than that.”

He laughed. “I think no matter what you
decide to do, you will be all right eventually, even if you make a
difficult choice.”

“So you think I should call off the wedding?
At this late date? What will people say?”

“I can’t…” His turn to hesitate and stutter.
“That is, Miss Parker… I don’t know. You must do what you think is
best for your own future, no matter if society might gossip.”
Yes, yes, jilt Kip
. Did he dare tell her his suspicions:
that Kip preferred men and perhaps always would, and that he would
be a thoughtless husband?

But what if James was wrong and Kip’s nature
might change because of the influence of the lovely Emily? A fairy
tale, Declan would tell him, but James had seen love transform
people before—though not always for the better, he reminded
himself.
Look at your sick devotion to Kip and how it tore you
apart.
However, when the object of one’s affections was the
right one…

The image of Declan in James’s mind was
almost as clear as if the man stood next to them now. For all his
preaching of love and acceptance, James had only now met a version
of it custom-made for his special proclivities. Not love. Not so
soon. But he’d had more than a glimpse.

Gracious, he’d become as self-absorbed as any
lover. He commanded himself to pay heed to Emily, who needed his
attention.

Emily said, “Poor Kip, perhaps I do him an
injustice. He could be suffering from nerves as well, and that is
how he shows them.” She watched James, obviously hoping he would
agree.

He didn’t.

“You have known him as long as I have, and
better than I do,” she began slowly. “You are frowning, Mr.
Fletcher. And you look almost as odd as he does when he speaks of
you. As if you’re enemies at the same time as you are close
friends. When I ask him why he’s so insistent that you perform the
ceremony, he says it is something he’s imagined for years. Do you
know why?”

He could only shake his head. Could it be
some sort of fantasy or an act of maliciousness? Perhaps it was a
joke for Kip, who did seem to have an odd sense of humor. “I’m not
sure what goes on in his head.”

She stopped walking. “I wish you would tell
me what you are thinking.”

He sighed and abandoned diplomacy. “Kip
Darnley was never my friend. If I were your father or brother, I
would say no, don’t marry him. He is not a kind man to those he
considers weaker than himself.”

Her quizzical frown turned angry. “I do
believe you’re jealous of him. He’s outgoing and wealthy and has
the good opinion of everyone. You sound envious.”

He could only shrug. “Perhaps you are
right.”

She began to walk again, quickly, tugging
hard at the lacy shawl. He strode after her.