Once A Soldier Part 6

"Did I say that?" he said with a slow smile that lit his whole face. "I'm neither blind nor stupid, so of course I would love to lie with you. I've wanted to kiss you since the moment we met. But anything that might be between us is separate from what must be done in San Gabriel."

Her return smile was sad. "How can there be anything between us when you'll be gone so soon? You're anxious to return home, while I am committed to staying here indefinitely. I'm no innocent just emerged from the schoolroom, but I'm nowhere near reckless and worldly enough to lie with a virtual stranger. We haven't the time for more than the first levels of friends.h.i.+p."

"That is . . . not necessarily true." His gaze held hers, his gray eyes turning serious. "Though I yearn for my home, some things are more important. Becoming better acquainted with you is one such thing."

She stared at him. "You're a most unusual man, Major Masterson."

"I've been told that before," he said sadly. "It's never a compliment."

She had to smile. "Now I know you're teasing."

"Possibly," he agreed; his expression sober, but his eyes amused. "If I'm forgiven for the kiss, will you call me Will again? I prefer to be on first name terms with you."

"Very well, Will." She preferred that as well. "For whatever time you're here, we can be friends. After you leave . . ." She shrugged. "In my experience, men are not such good letter writers as women, and it's a long way from San Gabriel to Oxfords.h.i.+re."

"I'm a rather decent letter writer, actually." His gaze intensified. "Friends. And who knows? Perhaps we can become more than friends."

She felt as if the breath had been knocked out of her. He could not possibly mean what he seemed to be implying. Returning to irony, she said, "What are the relations.h.i.+p possibilities?" She held up her left hand and ticked off one finger. "Friends.h.i.+p is the broadest category and can range from mild acquaintance to deep, enduring loyalty. I think we are already mild friends?"

"If we weren't more than mild friends already, we wouldn't be having this extremely interesting discussion," he agreed.

She ticked off another finger. "We could become enemies."

"I will not allow that," he said firmly. "I have had enough of enemies."

"One does not always have a choice." She tapped her middle finger. "The opposite of love or hate, which is indifference."

"It is much too late for indifference," Will said seriously. "I believe I mentioned my immediate interest in kissing you."

"Do you always want to kiss women who aim rifles at you?" she asked curiously.

"No, you're the only one," he said. "Though if the truth be known, women seldom greet me with weaponry."

"I'm glad to hear that." She studied her hand. "Two fingers left for listing relations.h.i.+ps, and those remaining are deeply implausible."

"But these are the most interesting possibilities!" he exclaimed.

"'Interesting' doesn't mean good." She ticked her ring finger. "We could have an affair. That will not happen for any number of reasons, most of which you can imagine."

"Which leaves another possibility," he said, his voice soft.

She closed her hand into a fist. "You can't possibly be interested in marriage! You scarcely know me."

"That's true, as is the reverse. If we get to know each other better, one or both of us might decide we'd never suit."

She stared at him, feeling as if time had stopped. She was sharply aware of the sweeping valley and mild breeze, the suns.h.i.+ne warming them both, his tanned complexion.

The bleak impossibility of what he was saying. "Forgive me if I'm misunderstanding, but are you actually proposing courts.h.i.+p?"

"Indeed I am. A courts.h.i.+p of two wary but wise adults." He hesitated before continuing, "It's possible I am too old and jaded to ever be fit for marriage again."

"You're not that old," she said firmly.

He smiled a little. "Perhaps not. But I have seen too much of the world and made too many mistakes."

"I often feel the same," she said. "Perhaps that is why I interest you?"

"Very likely. I have trouble imagining myself making conversation with the typical well-bred young lady back in England."

"No more than I could converse with an English country gentleman, the sort who cherishes delicate females," she said wryly. "Which is one of several reasons I've sworn never to marry."

"'Never' is a very long time. We change with age. Things that seemed implausible can come to seem desirable."

"True in theory, but I'm settling happily into eccentric spinsterhood," she retorted. "I doubt I'd change my mind."

"But you do concede the possibility of changing your mind." He smiled. "I can work with that."

She couldn't resist smiling back. "You're very persistent, Will. But you haven't much time to change my mind."

"True," he said thoughtfully. "Are you willing to experiment? My brother's wife is full of interesting thoughts and theories. She said that courting couples meet under such artificial circ.u.mstances and see so little of each other that it's far too easy to choose one's life partner very badly."

"Was she mistaken in your brother?" Athena asked, surprised.

"No, but they didn't meet under artificial social conditions," Will explained. "Kiri met Mac after she'd narrowly escaped engaging herself to a man she met conventionally. It would have been a very bad match for her, so she now advocates avoiding conventional courts.h.i.+ps."

"In what unconventional way did she meet your brother?" Athena asked curiously.

"He rescued her after she'd been kidnapped by smugglers." Will grinned. "So they skipped superficial chat and went straight to deeper issues."

"Kidnapped by smugglers. Of course! I should have remembered that's the very best way to meet a husband," Athena said with mock seriousness. "She sounds like an interesting woman."

"You'll like her," Will promised as if a future meeting was inevitable. "But the two relations.h.i.+ps, the wrong one and then the right one, inspired Kiri's theory of how to quickly learn a great deal about a potential partner."

"What is her suggested method?" Athena asked, reluctantly interested.

"To ask each other difficult questions, the kind that makes one reveal oneself," he explained. "It isn't easy, but the process is far more useful than exchanging pleasantries over tea and cakes or trying to converse in a noisy ballroom."

She frowned. "That sounds deucedly uncomfortable. What if one party flatly refuses to partic.i.p.ate?"

"Doesn't that tell you something important right there?"

"It says that the prospective mate is uncomfortable with emotion and intimacy," Athena said thoughtfully. "Most people are uncomfortable with revealing too much, of course, but one would hope for more from a possible mate."

"Are you game for a few questions now?" he asked, his gaze intent. "If we don't immediately alienate each other, we can continue to ask a question or two a day."

She studied Will's strong, honest face. She'd long since given up the idea that she'd ever marry and she doubted she'd change her mind, no matter how persuasive he might be. Even though he was the most appealing man she'd met in years. "I don't think you'll change my mind, Will. Is it worth the effort when I'm such a recalcitrant female?"

"I won't regret the effort if you're willing to try," he said seriously. "I will regret it if you flatly refuse to make the attempt."

When she hesitated, he continued, "It's also a good way to build a deeper friends.h.i.+p, and we're already on our way to achieving that."

"What if a question is something one of us can't bear to discuss?"

"Then it doesn't get answered," he said promptly. "This is all voluntary. A tool to improve our acquaintance, not a bludgeon."

"Very well, I'll try." She smiled ruefully. "I've always had far too much curiosity. I'll ask the first question so you can be the one alarmed and discomforted."

"That's only fair. Ask away!" he replied. "I suspect that any one question will probably lead into related questions. We'll see."

Where to start? Not with anything too difficult, she decided. "You identified yourself as from Oxfords.h.i.+re as soon as we met, so your home is important to you. Tell me about it, not just what your home looks like, but how you feel about it."

"Describing the house is easy. The oldest section of Hayden Hall goes back to Tudor times and bits and pieces have been added ever since. An architectural purist would shudder, but I find it-welcoming. As eccentric and charming as a favorite aunt." He smiled with fond reminiscence. "Oxfords.h.i.+re is lovely, with rolling hills and streams and fertile fields. It's not far to Oxford, one of the most beautiful little cities in Europe. And London is also convenient when one is in the mood for city life."

"You were a farmer, a landed gentleman, before you entered the army?"

He nodded. "I'll have much to learn when I return, but I have a good and patient steward to teach me. I look forward to it. There is something very sane about growing crops and raising livestock."

Beginning to understand the value of this exercise, she asked, "Why did you leave a comfortable life in a home you love? Was it youthful restlessness?"

A shadow crossed his face and he looked away from her. "I couldn't bear to stay there after Lily died," he said haltingly. "Whenever I entered a room, I felt as if she'd just stepped out, and if I looked hard enough, I'd find her. It was madness. I . . . I felt that if I stayed, I'd end up shooting myself."

Yes, this kind of questioning was not easy. "So you chose to let the French do the shooting," she said quietly.

"I thought at least I'd die doing something worthwhile." He grimaced. "I didn't realize that soldiers are more likely to die of fevers than bullets."

"Will you still be haunted by Lily when you return home?" she asked, knowing this was one of those uncomfortable questions.

His brow furrowed as he thought about it. "I don't think so. The memories of her are happy and . . . distant."

"Do you love her still?" Athena asked softly.

Will sighed. "The young man I was then loved her deeply, but he didn't survive all those muddy fields on the Peninsula. I'm not that young man anymore." He raised his eyes and studied her face. "Now it's time for me to ask a question and make you uncomfortable."

"That's only fair," she said without enthusiasm. "Ask away."

"Tell me about Lady Delilah."

She caught her breath, realizing that such a question was inevitable. Her mother had been such an important part of Athena's life that she must be discussed.

But dear Lord, how could she possibly explain her mother?

Chapter 10.

After Will asked his question, Athena stared at her interlocked fingers, her face frozen. Quietly he asked, "Should I start with something simpler?"

Athena rose from the bench in one swift movement and began prowling around beneath the overhang. "No, if we are going to be digging into each other's souls, I must speak of her. But Delilah is . . . hard to explain."

Guessing she didn't know where to start, Will asked, "Was her name really Delilah?"

"She was christened Cordelia and called Delia when she was a child." Athena crossed her arms across her waist and continued to pace. "When she left the schoolroom at sixteen and realized that she could persuade any man to do anything, she announced that she wished to be called Delilah. It was such a suitable name that soon everyone called her that."

"Even her parents?" Will asked, surprised.

"I don't suppose they did, but her father threw her out of the house when she was seventeen so the issue was moot."

"A well-born girl that young was disowned?" Will tried to imagine doing such a thing to a child of his, and couldn't. "That's appalling!"

"She was in no danger of starving," Athena said dryly. "She moved into the home of an Austrian diplomat three times her age and became his mistress. She was pampered outrageously until she decided that she was bored and left him for another man."

"So she was beautiful, like you."

Athena gave him an incredulous glance. "You're joking again. I was never more than average-looking, even as a child. One could easily see that we were related, but Delilah was stunning. Tall-but not too tall, as I am. Dazzling dark red hair, not brown like mine. Charming and outgoing-not practical and reserved, as I am."

"Except when you have a rifle in hand?"

She smiled a little. "That was practicality, not an outgoing personality."

She resumed her pacing, the divided skirt swinging provocatively around her shapely ankles. "But more than her physical beauty, she had . . . sensual allure. Even the most happily married men would stare and wonder what it would be like to bed her. You could see it in their eyes."

"She sounds like a . . . challenging parent," Will said carefully.

Athena stopped pacing and stared at the stony wall of the overhang. "I loved her more than anyone else in my life."

"I hope she loved you as much in return," Will said before he realized that might be a painful comment if her mother hadn't been a loving person.

"She did." Athena turned to face him, her arms still crossed at her waist as if her stomach hurt. "I was not an accident, but a pampered pet and companion. She told me often that more than anything in the world, she'd wanted a daughter to love. I gather her parents were cold and disapproving, so she did her best to give them much to disapprove of. That included having a b.a.s.t.a.r.d child."

It sounded monstrously selfish to Will, but he couldn't wish Athena had been unborn. Perhaps she had been an accident and her mother told her otherwise to make her feel wanted. "Being her pet and companion sounds both wonderful and terrible."

Athena smiled humorlessly. "It was both."

"Was Athena a family name?"

"She said that when I was born, I looked like a serious little owl. Since the owl is the symbol of Athena, the name suited me. Also, of course, Athena was the G.o.ddess of wisdom and she wanted me to be well educated and well traveled and wise." Athena's smile became real. "The first two are true. 'Wise' is debatable."

Will laughed. "What would she have done if you'd been a boy?"

"I'm not sure. She would have loved a son because she had a great capacity for loving. But the relations.h.i.+p would have been very different from what she and I had. I think it was better for all concerned that she had a daughter."

Certainly it was better for Will. "From what you've said, it sounds as if Delilah spent much of her time having pa.s.sionate affairs. What was she like as a mother?"

"She was a wonderful companion, always interested in new things and taking me to new places. Even when she was in the early throes of an affair, she would take time to be with me, and she would instantly break with any lover who was rude to me."