Chapter Twenty-Four
December 15th, 1808
Whiteoaks, Wiltshire
They left Whiteoaks close to noon and stopped for the night at a posting inn just south of Grovely Wood. The post-chaise—spacious, clean, well-sprung—was a vast improvement on the mail coaches Tom had spent the last three days in, but in every other respect the journey was disappointing.
Lucas’s words yesterday had given him hope: Smollet sent on ahead, just the two of them in the post-chaise. He’d imagined them kissing, touching, maybe indulging in some hasty s*x—but he’d known within half a minute of climbing into the carriage that there would be no kisses, and definitely no s*x. Lucas was tense, radiating Don’t touch me as strongly as if he’d said the words aloud.
Tom sat alongside Lucas for thirty miles and stewed with f
