Love in the Afternoon (The Hathaways #5)(52)

“But those were your orders. They were the enemy.”

“I don’t give a damn. They were men. They were loved by someone. I could never make myself forget that. You don’t know what it looks like, when a man is shot. You’ve never heard wounded men on the battlefield, begging for water, or for someone to finish what the enemy started—”

Rolling away, he sat up and lowered his head. “I have rages,” came his muffled voice. “I tried to attack one of my own footmen yesterday, did they tell you that? Christ, I’m no better than Albert. I can never share a bed with a woman again—I might kill her in her sleep, and not realize what I’m doing until afterward.”

Beatrix sat up as well. “You wouldn’t do that.”

“You don’t know that. You’re so innocent.” Christopher broke off and drew in a shivering breath. “God. I can’t crawl out from under this. And I can’t live with it.”

“With what?” she asked softly, realizing that something in particular was tormenting him, some intolerable memory.

Christopher didn’t acknowledge her. His mind was in another place, watching shadows. When she began to move closer to him, he lifted his arm as if in self-defense, palm turned outward. The broken gesture, made with such a strong hand, cut straight to Beatrix’s heart.

She felt an overwhelming need to physically draw him closer, as if to ease him away from a precipice. Instead she kept her hands in her lap, and stared at the place where the ends of his hair rested on his sun-browned neck. The muscles of his back were bunched. If only she could smooth her palm over that hard, rippled surface. If only she could soothe him. But he had to find his own way out.

“A friend of mine died at Inkerman,” Christopher finally said, his voice halting and raw. “One of my lieutenants. His name was Mark Bennett. He was the best soldier in the regiment. He was always honest. He joked at the wrong times. If you asked him to do something, no matter how difficult or dangerous, it would be done. He would have risked his life for any of us.

“The Russians had set up rifle pits in caverns and old stone huts built in the side of a hill. They were firing directly into our siege batteries—the general decided the Russian position had to be taken. Three companies of Rifles were chosen.

“A company of Hussars was ordered to ride against the enemy if they tried to flank us. They were led by a man I hated. Lieutenant Colonel Fenwick. Everyone hated him. He commanded the same cavalry regiment I had started in when I bought my first commission.”

Christopher fell silent, lost in memory. His half-lowered lashes sent spikes of shadow over his cheeks.

“Why was he so hated?” Beatrix eventually prompted.

“Fenwick was often cruel for no reason. Fond of punishment for its own sake. He ordered floggings and deprivations for the most minor infractions. And when he invented excuses to discipline the men, I intervened. He accused me of insubordination, and I was nearly brought up on charges.” Christopher let out a slow, uneven breath. “Fenwick was the main reason I agreed to be transferred to the Rifle Brigade. And then at Inkerman I found out I would have to depend on his cavalry support.

“Before the riflemen got to the trenches, we stopped in a ravine where there was shelter from stray shots. Night was coming. We formed into three groups. We opened fire, the Russians returned it, and we pinpointed the positions we had to take. We advanced with guns . . . took out as many as we could . . . then it turned into hand-to-hand combat. I was separated from Bennett in the fighting. The Russians drove us back when their support came . . . and then shell and grape started raining down. It wouldn’t stop. Men around me were falling . . . their bodies opening up, wounds breaking out. My arms and back were burning with shrapnel. I couldn’t find Bennett. It was dark, and we had to fall back.

“I’d left Albert waiting in the ravine. I called for him, and he came. Through all that hellfire, against every natural instinct . . . Albert came out with me to find wounded men in the dark. He led me to two men lying at the base of the hill. One of them was Bennett.”

Beatrix closed her eyes sickly as she drew an accurate conclusion. “And the other was Colonel Fenwick,” she said.

Christopher nodded grimly. “Fenwick had been unseated. His horse was gone. One of his legs was broken . . . a bullet wound in the side . . . there was a good chance he would live. But Bennett . . . his front had been ripped open. He was barely conscious. Dying by degrees. I wanted it to be me, it should have been. I was always taking chances. Bennett was the careful one. He wanted to go back to his family, and to the woman he cared for. I don’t know why it wasn’t me. That’s the hell of battle—it’s all chance, you never know if you’ll be next. You can try to hide, and a shell will find you. You can run straight at the enemy, and a bullet might jam in a rifle, and you’re spared. It’s all luck.” He clenched his jaw against a tremor of emotion. “I wanted to take them both to safety, but there was no one to help. And I couldn’t leave Fenwick there. If he was captured, the enemy would get crucial intelligence from him. He’d had access to all the general’s dispatches, knew all about strategies and supplies . . . everything.”

Beatrix stared at his partially averted profile. “You had to save Colonel Fenwick first,” she whispered, her chest aching with compassion and pity as she finally understood. “Before you could save your friend.”