Jane Porter – The Spaniard's Passion (страница 5)

Sophie wondered how Lon could possibly keep a straight face. Ten years ago Lon would have never listened to Louisa’s dull stories.

But then, ten years ago Louisa wouldn’t have talked to Lon.

They’d all changed so much in the past ten years. No, make that the past five years. Losing Clive had changed everything for them.

Lon looked up and his gaze met hers. She could have sworn he knew what she was thinking, and he looked at her with so much warmth, and hunger, Sophie felt breathless with curiosity.

Would he ever kiss her again?

Would he—could he—make her feel what she’d once felt when she was eighteen and still so excited about life?

The Countess rattled her cup as she returned it to the saucer. “Have you had enough dessert, my dear?” Her question was addressed to Lon.

“Yes, Louisa. Thank you.”

“Then you’ll join me in the library,” Louisa stated, pushing away from the table even as Sophie rose and began stacking the dishes.

“Why don’t I stay and help Sophie clear the table?”

The Countess waved her hand. “Nonsense. Sophie’s fine.” Louisa sailed forward and took Lon’s arm as if he were the last man alive. “Aren’t you, Sophie?”

“I’m fine,” she agreed, not because she couldn’t use the help in the kitchen, but because she needed a few minutes alone to pull herself together.

Seeing Lon—talking to Lon—discussing the past, had thrown her into a tailspin. She was supposed to be concentrating on her trip to Brazil. Instead at the moment all she could think about was Lon, and the way it’d once been between them.

But wasn’t this how she’d always felt around him? Dazed. Nervous? Hopelessly excited?

“I’m fine,” she repeated more firmly, this time for her sake, not his. She wasn’t a teenager anymore. She’d become a woman. A wife. And now a widow. If she could handle all those life changes, she could certainly handle an evening with Alonso. “I’ll join you as soon as I’m done.”

Sophie was elbow deep in soap bubbles when a long arm covered in fine black cashmere stretched past her, and picked up a dish towel.

“What are you doing?” she asked, turning to get a glimpse of Lon.

He’d pushed up his sleeves and was applying the dish towel to one of the rinsed dinner plates. “Helping you finish.”

“The Countess won’t like it.”

“The Countess doesn’t know. She thinks I’m in the lavatory.” He grinned, and his smile was so boyish, so much like the Lon she remembered from their summer holiday, that Sophie’s heart tightened, too full of memories and pain.

“You haven’t really changed,” she said, shooting him a dark glance.

“No. And you wouldn’t want me to. Now hand me the next plate.” Again his arm reached past her and she felt a tingle of pleasure as he brushed her hip with his own.

“How long have you been staying with the Countess?” he asked.

Her whole body felt far too sensitive. “A little over a year now,” she answered hoarsely. “Ever since Humphrey House was closed.” Humphrey House had been the house Clive took her to as a bride. “I couldn’t manage the maintenance and repairs anymore.”

“What’s it like living with her?”

“Interesting.”

“But you two must be getting along to survive a year?”

“I haven’t had much choice though, have I?” And then she shrugged. “But things are fine. I’m fine. I’m lucky she’s opened her home to me.”

“But?”

“There’s no but. England’s not South America. It’ll never be South America.”

He reached for the last plate. “So you think about Colombia?”

She smiled. “All the time.” Her voice dropped, and she stared into the sudsy water for a long moment. “They were the best years of my life.”

That was telling, Lon thought. She’d been an outcast at Elmshurst. There were two other Americans at the elite girls boarding school, but they were both very wealthy, and very connected. Sophie was neither. “What do you remember when you think about Columbia?”

“Buenaventura.”

The school holiday at the Wilkins beach house. Clive had managed to convince his father to invite both Lon and Sophie that summer.

Dishes done, Sophie pulled the plug on the sink. “It was an amazing holiday.”

Lon’s chest felt tight. She sounded so wistful. So alone. Did she even know how lonely she was? “Come home with me for Christmas,” he said impulsively, thinking she’d be happier—and safer—with him. He needed to keep her away from Federico, needed to make sure she wouldn’t do anything foolish over the holidays. “My mother would be pleased to have you join us. It’d be a quiet Christmas—”

“I can’t leave Louisa here alone,” Sophie interrupted.

“She can come.”

“She won’t.”

“Then that’s her choice, but you shouldn’t let her decisions influence you.”

She hesitated. Her expression grew pensive. “How is your mother and Boyd these days?”

“Learning to peacefully coexist.”

“It’s been nearly twenty years.”

“It took her a long time to stop comparing Boyd to my father.”

“Poor Boyd!”

“He knew my mother was marrying him on the rebound. He knew theirs wasn’t a love match.” Lon was smiling as he leaned against the counter but Sophie felt a quiet menace in him. “You never did like my mother, did you?”

Sophie wished this topic had never come up. She didn’t know how to extract herself gracefully. She and Lon had known each other too long to lie. “I’ve never understood her.”

His eyes narrowed fractionally. “What’s there to understand?”

“You were the one that told me she’d had an affair with a married man for years.”

“The affair was with my father.”

Sophie swallowed. She heard the steely note in Lon’s voice and knew she’d touched a nerve. “I just don’t understand how she could put you through that…you were just a little boy…”

“He loved her. She loved him—”

“He was married! What about his wife’s feelings? What about his other children’s feelings? How could your mother not see how hurtful it was for you to only see your father now and then? To never have a father there at Christmas, or on your birthday?”

Lon’s jaw hardened. “He sent cards, and gifts.”

“Cards. Gifts.” Anger burned in her. “And gifts were supposed to make up for a selfish, absentee father, a depressed mother, and a broken home?”

“It was her heart, her life—”

“No! It was your heart. Your life. Her choices impacted you, too!” She spat the words at him, and suddenly Sophie saw her own home, and her own family. She wasn’t just upset for Lon. She was upset for herself. She’d lived through such loneliness as a little girl. She knew what it was like to have an absentee parent. Her mother had walked out on them when she was small and her father had spent the rest of his life struggling to make things okay.

Okay.

As if anything would ever really be okay again.

But Lon didn’t know that Sophie’s hostility was directed at her own mother as well as his and he’d taken another step away from her. “I had no idea how much you disliked my mother.”

“I don’t—”

“She doesn’t need you judging her. She doesn’t need anyone judging her. She’s allowed to make her own mistakes, just as you’ve made yours.”

“What mistakes?”

“Still playing ostrich, aren’t you?” he retorted, dropping the damp dish towel on the counter and walking out.