Drums of Autumn - Diana Gabaldon [252]
I was indeed jealous; an emotion I hadn’t felt for some years, and was appalled to feel now. I rolled onto my back and closed my eyes, trying to shut out the murmur of conversation.
Lord John had been nothing but courtesy itself to me. More than that, he had been intelligent, thoughtful—thoroughly charming, in fact. And listening to him making intelligent, thoughtful, charming conversation with Jamie knotted my insides and made me clench my hands under cover of the quilt.
You are an idiot, I told myself savagely. What is the matter with you? I tried to relax, breathing deeply through my nose, eyes closed.
Part of it was Willie, of course. Jamie was very careful, but I had seen his expression when he looked at the boy in unguarded moments. His whole body was suffused with shy joy, pride mingled with diffidence; and it smote me to the heart to see it.
He would never look at Brianna, his firstborn, that way. Would never see her at all. That was hardly his fault—and yet it seemed so unfair. At the same time, I could scarcely begrudge him his joy in his son—and didn’t, I told myself firmly. The fact that it gave me a terrible pang of longing to look at the boy, with that bold, handsome face that mirrored his sister’s, was simply my problem. Nothing to do with Jamie, or with Willie. Or with John Grey, who’d brought the boy here.
What for? That was what I’d been thinking ever since I had recovered from the first shock of their appearance, and that was still what I was thinking. What in hell was the man up to?
The story about the estate in Virginia might be true—or only an excuse. Even if it was true, it was a considerable detour to come to Fraser’s Ridge. Why had he taken so much trouble to bring the boy here? And so much risk; Willie was clearly oblivious to the resemblance that even Ian had noticed, but what if he hadn’t been? Had it been so important to Grey, to restate his claim on Jamie’s obligation to him?
I rolled onto my other side and cracked an eyelid, watching them over the chessboard, redhead and fair head, bent together in absorption. Grey moved a knight and sat back, rubbing the back of his neck, smiling to himself at the effect of his move. He was a good-looking man; slight and fine-boned, but with a strong, clear-cut face and a beautiful, sensitive mouth that many a woman had no doubt envied.
Grey was even better at guarding his face than Jamie was; I hadn’t yet seen an incriminating look from him. I’d seen one once, though, in Jamaica, and wasn’t in any doubt about the nature of his feelings for Jamie.
On the other hand, I wasn’t in any doubt about Jamie’s feelings in that regard, either. The knot under my heart eased a bit, and I took a deeper breath. No matter how late they sat up over the board, drinking and talking, it would be my bed Jamie came to.
I unclenched my fists, and it was then, as I rubbed my palms covertly against my thighs, that I realized with a shock just why Lord John affected me so strongly.
My fingernails had dug small crescents in my palms, a small line of throbbing half-moons. For years, I had rubbed away those crescents after every dinner party, every late night when Frank had “worked at the office.” For years, I had lain intermittently alone in a double bed, wide-awake in the darkness, nails digging into my hands, waiting for him to come back.
And he had. To his credit, he always did return before dawn. Sometimes to a back curled against him in cold reproach, sometimes to the furious challenge of a body thrust against him in demand, urging him wordlessly to deny it, to prove his innocence with his body—trial by combat. More often than not, he accepted the challenge. But it didn’t help.
Yet neither of us spoke of such things in the daylight. I could not; I had no right. Frank did not; he had revenge.
Sometimes it would be months—even a year or more—between episodes, and we would live in peace together. But then it would happen again; the silent phone calls, the too-excused absences, the late nights. Never anything so overt as