Sophie clipped her garments to the line at the side of the house to dry. Her afternoon had been spent running them over the washboard to rid them of the stains that proved her innocence, and of his scent on her clothes. Fastening the last clothespin on her chemise, she ran her fingers across the tear down the front. The sound of it pulling apart in his hands this morning splintered through her memory. She ran inside and shut the door, looking around the silent house. Not a week ago, she had been sitting at the table with Mr. Farthing, laughing about their half-witted old neighbor walking three miles down the road after his escaped rooster.
David Farthing had been a kind master. She often addressed him by his first name, even. Together they had spent days working and nights sharing meals and brandy, of which David would sneak to her a glass every so often. But he always drank too much, becoming melancholy by the end of the meal and Sophie had carried him to his bed many nights. He had never touched her, and had no interest in doing so. David's lack of interest in women stayed an unspoken topic between them, just as discussion of Sophie's parentage and childhood was off limits.
They always had the most fun together alone at night, the two Ashford misfits enjoying each other's company after tending to business around the dairy farm. The townsfolk didn't like either of them: Sophie for her origin as the illegitimate daughter of the Marquess, and David for the rumors surrounding him concerning why none of the young men in town wanted to take up apprenticeship at the farm.
Sophie sat at the dining room table, remembering them singing together with her clapping in time or dancing as David played his fiddle, laughing by candlelight. But when his melancholy got the better of him and the brandy had run out he would drive off in the milk cart and finish the evening at the pub in Ashford before crawling back in the wee hours of the morning, usually just as Sophie was getting up to milk the cows. Four days before he had crawled back to bed and stayed there, never to wake again.
The happy times were gone now, and the memories were violently burned away this morning as his nephew Mr. Gardiner had taken her on this very table. She shut her eyes but couldn't escape the feel of his hands on her, his mouth suckling at her breast, and the burning path he had blazed within her that she now felt with every movement of her body.
After Mr. Gardiner left, Sophie had frantically searched the house to no avail. There was more than a verbal contract between her and David, but she wasn't going to give that information to Mr. Gardiner just yet. Sophie knew that David had written a letter to the barrister entailing the property to her, because she had watched as he started writing it. But in his often-besotted state, she doubted he had ever remembered to deliver it.
If she didn't find it soon then Mr. Gardiner would, and her chances of ever holding this land even under a trust would instantly vanish. All day she had considered running. She knew her options: the whorehouse or the workhouse; and when she had finally run out of money and fortune, and resorted to thieving just to stay alive, she would dance the Tyburn jig. She had to stay here. She had endured worse than James Gardiner in this life.
She sat with her head in her hand at the edge of the table, wearing only her spare summer chemise with the short sleeves, mourning the loss of her old life and steeling herself for her new one. Her mind wretched at the thought of Mr. Gardiner at the same time as her body ached for him to fill it once more. Sophie cursed herself. Surely she was damned for even entertaining these thoughts.
As the sun started descending over the hills, Sophie sat down to sew her torn dress and restring her bodice. She sat in the rocking chair with a needle and thread, mending the jagged tear and listening to the throng of crickets outside. Her hands shook as the needle coursed in and out of the fabric, not the neatest mending job Sophie had ever done. She shut her eyes to the vision of holding Mr. Gardiner's arms as he had pinned her to the table, thrusting in and out of her mercilessly. She let the needle drop, startled by a noise outside.
The gate swung open with a creak as a single horse and chaise lumber through over the grounds. Impossible! Why would he be back so soon? Sophie looked up from her sewing in the fading dusk to see Mr. Gardiner hop down from his carriage and guide the horse to the side of the house.
She panicked for only a moment. There was no escape from him. She had to find the letter. She needed this farm; it was her home. And if she couldn't find it, and had to make a deal with Mr. Gardiner for two years in order to make sure it rightfully passed to her, then she would. The house started darkening as the front door opened. Mr. Gardiner stepped in removing his hat and coat, then his waistcoat and cravat, placing all on the rack by the door.
He stood there in his shirt and breeches, the fire from the hearth in the other room silhouetting his black clad figure against the flames. His shadow reached toward her. Sophie thought the vision was appropriate. James grabbed a twig from the fire and lit a kerosene lamp on the table by the door. She saw his face in the flicker of the flame as he replaced the glass cover.
"You asked me to think about what you said, Mr. Gardiner," Sophie stood up, her bravery surprising him.
"So I did," he said, coming closer, the lamp in his hand, "And I want you to call me James."
"I accept your offer. I'll do... whatever it is you ask of me."
He gave her a self-satisfied smile as he spoke, "I would think that you would, considering what you're getting out of all this. Of course, it shall remain to be seen whether you can live up to your end of the bargain."
She wrinkled her brow, "What do you mean by that?"
He looked at her standing before him in the gossamer muslin chemise, the only barrier between them, a half-smile curling his lips. Sophie only realized this too late as his eyes coursed over her. She felt a shudder travel up her spine and her knees turned to jelly. As he took a step forward, she felt her body pulling toward him, like a lodestone to a branding iron.
James advanced the rest of the room until he stood in front of Sophie looking downward into the deep pools of her green eyes, as close as he could get without quite touching her. The close contact made her shiver in painful awareness of the last few inches that separated her from James, "It's not something that can be easily put into words. I would need to show you. And I intend to do so now."
James tilted her face up to his and leaned down, his lips descending over hers, pulling her into to him. Strong fingers raked through her golden hair falling in springs down her back. His hand drew around her back and brought her in close to him, her soft curves melding into the hardness of his body. James brought his free hand up the side of her to her breast, kneading her flesh and feeling its weight through the fabric. He was delighted that she had nothing on but the diaphanous fabric. Had it been any other woman, he would have figured that she had planned it. But Sophia was far too innocent to have the foresight to know how to seduce a man; he'd had proof of that this morning.
His tongue darted into her mouth, searching. She responded, their kiss deepening as her tongue started exploring his. His hand felt her nipple hardening to a point under the fabric and he brushed his thumb roughly over it, drawing a keening whimper from her.
