“Oh,” she said on a gasp of horror.
“He was as broken as the rest of us,” he said. “One day one of us—I believe it was Flavian, though it might have been me—called our group the Survivors’ Club as a sort of joke. And the name stuck. The two who are not here now are Ben—Sir Benedict Harper—who lives in West Wales with his wife, and Imogen, Lady Barclay, who lives in Cornwall. Ben’s legs were crushed in a cavalry charge and he has never recovered the full use of them despite Herculean efforts on his part. Imogen’s husband died under torture in the Peninsula, and she was made to watch some of it as well as his death. We all left Penderris at the same time four years ago. It was probably the hardest thing any of us has ever had to do, though it was absolutely necessary, of course. We could not live out our lives in an artificial bubble. Now we get together for three weeks each year in the early spring, usually at Penderris, though this year we went to Middlebury Park in Gloucestershire, Vincent’s home, instead. He did not want to leave his wife so soon after her confinement.”
“He speaks with great pride and affection of his son,” she said. “How sad it is that he cannot see the baby.”
“It would be a mistake to pity Vince,” he said. “He very rarely pities himself. He considers himself well blessed and happy.”
“They mean more to you than anyone else in the world,” she said, “your fellow Survivors.”
“Yes, in a way.” He looked up at her and reached for her hand. She wondered if he had intended to do so, but he did not release it. “It is a special bond that we share, but it does not preclude other bonds. Five of us have married, all within the past year, incredible as that sounds. Three of the wives came to Middlebury Park this year. Flavian married while we were there. And now I have had my turn. Marriage creates a different sort of bond, Chloe. It is not necessarily inferior to what I have with the Survivors. Indeed, it is not.”
He set one of his hands palm to palm against hers and spread his fingers along her own.
“Do you feel threatened by them?” he asked her.
“No.” She shook her head, not sure she spoke the truth. “I have seen evidence of your physical hurts, Ralph, and I realize they were dreadful indeed. What were your other hurts? Why were you at Penderris for three years?”
Why did you leave there so changed?
And with such lifeless eyes and empty soul?
And believing yourself incapable of love?
Chloe did not ask those questions out loud.
She was terribly aware of Ralph’s hand pressed to hers, large, long fingered, darker skinned than her own, very masculine. And of his head just below the level of her own, bent over their hands. In the firelight there appeared to be gold strands in his dark hair.
Despite her initial reaction, she liked his friends, his fellow Survivors—and yes, it was a word that would need a capital S if written. The rather austere bearing of the Duke of Stanbrook was explained by his history, by the loss of his only son in battle and the suicide of his wife shortly after. But instead of allowing those two deaths to embitter or destroy him, he had concentrated his resources upon bringing healing to others who had suffered.
There was no outer sign of the injuries Lord Trentham must have sustained. He was large and seemed powerfully strong, and his face beneath the close-cropped hair looked rather forbidding, as though frowns came more easily to him than smiles. Yet when he spoke he was kindly, and it was clear he loved the small, dainty Lady Trentham, and she him. Yet he had been damaged enough by the wars to have spent three years with the others at Penderris Hall.
Viscount Darleigh’s injuries were more obvious. He was a very young man even now, perhaps even younger than Ralph. How old must he have been when . . . ? It did not bear thinking of. He had a sweet, sunny-natured temperament. And Viscount Ponsonby stammered very slightly, but that might have nothing to do with what had happened to keep him at Penderris for so long a time. He was suave and charming and witty and seemed outwardly undamaged by war or life. He was obviously very much in love with his new wife.
She liked Ralph’s friends, but . . . Ah, yes, she had felt threatened by them, for there was something quite extraordinary about the way the five men related to one another. She had even resented the fact that Lady Trentham and Lady Ponsonby did not seem to feel threatened.
Everyone now gathered at Manville Court, with the exception of her father and Lucy and Mr. Nelson, knew Ralph better than she did. Even Graham. She knew almost nothing. And so she had asked her questions even though it was late and she ought perhaps to have gone to bed instead of waiting up for him. And she ought to have allowed him to go to bed. Tomorrow was going to be both busy and emotionally draining.
He held his hand against hers and laced their fingers tightly. He kept his eyes on their hands.
Why were you at Penderris for three years? she had asked.
“I wanted to die,” he said, his voice without inflection. “It was why my father sent me to Penderris. I ranted and raved and talked of nothing else except putting an end to it all. I tried to swallow all my medication. I reached for anything that looked sharp enough to let blood. When my hands were tied to my bed with bandages, I fought like a demon to prevent my wounds from healing.”
“Your physician could give you nothing to control the pain?” she asked.
He had lowered their hands to the seat of the chair, their fingers still laced.
“I almost welcomed the physical pain,” he told her. “I lashed myself with it. I thought perhaps if it was bad enough I could atone with it.”