But when she touched her mouth to his...again...
Hell.
It was absurd that he’d remembered the feel of her mouth after eight years when he could barely remember Dora’s or most of the women who shared his bed since. Succumbing to curiosity and kissing Sam again had been a mistake.
He clenched his jaw as the same fire surged through him as had possessed him on the hill last night. He hated this. Had hated it then. Hated it last night, hated it now.
Once he found Rafe he fully intended to return to the life he’d built after Jacob’s death—it was comfortable there on his emotional plateau, confining all his flights of fancy to his writing. It might be as drab and boring as Sam accused him of being, but he’d been content.
Damn Rafe.
Blast Sam.
No, it was wrong to blame her for his misstep yesterday, just as it was wrong to resent her for sowing the first seeds of doubt about his marriage. He could not blame his and Dora’s failures on that encounter with Sam eight years ago. It had been a catalyst, not a cause. It wasn’t Sam’s fault he realised there was little he found of interest beyond Dora’s vivid beauty and charm and it certainly wasn’t Sam’s fault Dora discovered she had nothing in common with what lay behind the façade of the wealthy war hero Captain Lord Edward Edgerton.
He’d still hoped that once they had children they would find a common ground and grow together. What a young, naïve fool he’d been. Jacob’s birth and illness had only weakened Dora, encouraged by her overprotective mother with her love of ailments real and imagined, and he’d done very little to help. He’d found it hard to watch her apathy to their beautiful son and his joy in the babe only seemed to make her more fretful. So he hadn’t truly objected when her mother whisked Dora away to recover in Bath after her difficult birth. He’d wished her well and settled in to enjoy his son.
When Jacob fell ill he’d waited for her to return, but once again Dora had given way to her mother’s decree that she wasn’t strong enough to expose herself to the fever. When the fever passed, leaving Jacob damaged for life and the doctors shaking their heads over the chances of Jacob’s surviving into adulthood, Edge had hoped that Dora and her mother, both so very fascinated by their own ailments, would be empathetic to Jacob’s, but he’d been as wrong as wrong could be.
He’d finally insisted she return to Chesham, but that brief visit had been a disaster. Dora had been devastated by her one encounter with Jacob and Mrs Wadham had taken her away that very week. The final straw came swiftly in the form of a letter from his father saying Mrs Wadham and Lady Edward had called at Greybourne on their way to Bath and that it was felt it best to send Jacob to be cared for elsewhere if Lady Edward was to return to Chesham and try to produce a healthy heir.
Rafe had been staying at Chesham during these challenging months and Edge had handed him that letter, then tossed it in the fire and never spoke another word with Dora or his parents. It was Rafe who sent word to them when Jacob finally died and Rafe who first received word that Dora had died of influenza two years later in Bath.
Edge walked out of the temple into the blazing sun, tilting his head back, hoping it would eclipse the heat and confusion inside him.
His eyes flew open as something came between him and the sun and stared in shock as a figure moved up the dune on the side of the temple. For a moment he thought it was a desert sarab conjured by his libido and conscience. But the rivulets of sand slipping down from the roof as she came to stand on its rim were not typical of desert illusions. His memory chimed in happily with the memory of her standing on another temple long ago, him reaching up...and finding himself flat on his back with an armful of warm...
Hell.
‘Sam! What the devil are you doing here? Come down at once!’ he demanded.
‘You can see the whole desert from here,’ she replied with a happy sigh and that only made it worse. ‘My goodness! What are those? They look like giant mushrooms.’
‘They are rocks. Now get down before you break something.’
She touched the tip of her boot to the long stone lintel that covered the entranceway.
‘It feels solid to me. Clearly Senusret was worthy of his reputation as a master builder.’
‘I meant your bones, not the blasted temple.’
‘Edge!’ Her eyes widened, her mouth curving into a smile that was far more old Sam than new. Or more young Sam than old. Or just more annoying Sam than the proper one whose emergence he’d so foolishly worried about. She must have loved her husband deeply to empty herself so brutally of life and laughter and to be filled with the grief she’d shown at the Howling Cliffs. He’d heard about the dashing Lord Ricardo Carruthers—it wasn’t surprising Sam still hadn’t recovered from her loss. It was wrong, though. Sam should be as she was now—with that glimmer of mischief lighting her inner flame, laughing at him. He’d always felt both comforted and uncomfortable when her impish humour targeted him. Right now it felt like a benediction; proof there was hope yet for this world.