Authors: Suzanne Enoch
“Can I see it?”
“
May
I see it,” Felicity corrected.
“Where?” May looked around excitedly.
“Good God.” Rafe grinned at Felicity’s amused, exasperated expression. “Didn’t your parents consider this problem when they named her?”
“Apparently not.”
May’s confused look cleared. “Oh. I understand.
May
I see your medal?”
He shook his head again. “I gave it to my mother. I think she had it put on a hat.”
May laughed. “On a hat?”
Felicity met his gaze, her expression intrigued. “So it was only your father who didn’t approve.”
“I wouldn’t exactly say my mother was pleased with my actions, but she was something of an adventurer herself when she was younger. At any rate, she understood what I was doing.” Better than he had, probably.
“That’s what I’m going to be, too. An adventurer.”
From Felicity’s expression, she wished he hadn’t mentioned that. And after her panic the other night,
the last thing he wanted to do was make her mad at him again. Rafe cleared his throat. “Yes. Well, you see, May, it came about because my mother had been quite well educated—extensively educated—and she wanted to view some of the places she’d studied.”
May noisily blew out her breath. “You’re bamming me.”
“I am not.”
She jabbed a finger at him. “You never studied all the places you say you want to go.”
Rafe lifted an eyebrow. “And how do you know that, pray tell?”
“Because you want to go places you don’t even know about yet.”
Blast the uncanny logic of eight-year-olds. “I will study about them before I go,” he countered.
“Oh, no you—”
“May,” Felicity interrupted, “you’d best go get ready for bed.”
Damn it, he should have kept his blasted mouth shut. Whether he still wanted to travel or not, Felicity didn’t need something else to worry over. Rafe sat back as he realized that over the past few weeks, something had changed. He didn’t think about traveling nearly as much as he had when he’d lived in London. And after today’s progress, staying to see his project finished seemed more exciting than tromping about some desert.
“I’m going to dream about elephants,” May decided, heading for the door. “What are you going to dream about, Rafe?”
He glanced up from his drawing again to catch Felicity gazing at him. “Your sister,” he drawled, and went back to work.
“That’s dull.”
“Well, thank you very much,” Felicity protested
with a laugh, blushing and throwing a darned stocking at her sister.
As May pulled open the door, something very big and very loud rumbled and crashed outside. “Good God,” Rafe cursed, shooting to his feet and knowing instantly what it must be. “Damn!”
“Rafe?” May, white-faced and wide-eyed, stopped in the doorway.
“Stay here, sweetling,” he said, grabbing up a lamp.
Beeks emerged from the hall leading from the kitchen and the servants’ rooms. “Master Rafael?”
“Keep an eye on May,” Rafe barked.
“Yes, sir.”
Felicity hurried behind him down the hallway. He yanked open the front door, and took the steps in one leap. Rafe rounded the near corner of the house at top speed, and then stopped short.
The skeleton of the new building looked more like an old shipwreck, listing to one side and definitely unseaworthy. “Bloody hell,” he muttered, stepping gingerly forward.
“Rafe, be careful.”
“Not much more collapsing it can do.” Still cursing, he lifted the lamp to survey the damage.
He’d certainly seen his share of disasters before, but this one hurt. He knew which piece of lumber he’d sawed, and which one he’d hammered, and the death of the structure—he couldn’t help but think of it as a living entity—was personal, and painful.
“Accidents happen,” Lis said in a soothing voice from behind him.
He glanced back at her. “This one shouldn’t have.
Damnit
. We’re going to have to start all over again.”
“At least it’s only one day’s work.”
Rafe lowered the lantern and faced her. “Except now I have to go back and figure out what in hell I did wrong. It shouldn’t have fallen. It should have stood up under a volcanic eruption.” He slammed his fist against one of the remaining supports. It didn’t even rock.
Felicity tugged on his arm. “Come on. Glowering at it all night won’t help anything.”
With a last scowl at the mess, he turned and followed her back inside. They’d lost more than a day; they’d lost a hundred quid worth of supplies and labor. And he’d be damned if he’d let it happen again.
Felicity sat on the hard, smooth wood of the pew and kept her eyes on her prayer book. Beside her May kicked out her legs and fashioned her fingers into horses leaping from one knee to the other. Beyond her, Rafe leaned back and watched the vicar through half-closed eyes, looking like nothing so much as a great tawny lion sizing up a gazelle.
The parable of Daniel and the Lion’s Den dragged on and on. And it wasn’t only her own impatience that made the tale seem long beyond bearing. Two rows behind them, Mr. Jarrod snored softly.
“When will he read the banns?” May whispered.
“Hush,” Felicity chastised. “Soon enough.”
“Do you think anyone will object?”
“May, be quiet.”
Rafe stirred. “No one will object,” he murmured.
He glanced at the Earl of Deerhurst, seated across the aisle from them, and then settled back again. James had barely acknowledged their pres
ence in the parish church, a far cry from his usual friendly conversation.
Finally the lions spared Daniel, and her own lion straightened a little. The parishioners sang a hymn, and then Reverend Laskey pulled a piece of parchment from beneath his Bible and smoothed it flat. Felicity drew a nervous breath and held it. They might have purchased a license for a few guineas and avoided the public pronouncements, but she knew Rafe still had his doubts about being accepted by the local residents. So, rather than tiptoe around the issue, he chose to confront it head on.
“Three weeks hence,” Mr. Laskey announced in his carrying voice, “on the twenty-third of August, Mr. Rafael Bancroft will wed Miss Harrington. Are there any objections to this union?”
A surprised murmur ran through the sections of the church which hadn’t already heard the news. No one stood, or shouted, or fainted, and a moment later the vicar continued with his regular announcements.
Felicity closed her eyes in relief. Only two more weeks of this torture, and she could marry Rafe. She glanced over at him, settling back into his half-asleep pose again. His green eyes glinted beneath his shuttered lids, and she wondered whether he’d been hoping Deerhurst would object.
As the service ended, the parishioners trailed out of the church. With the first public announcement of their pending nuptials now made, a crowd of noisy well-wishers surrounded her and Rafe. The Earl of Deerhurst walked by without a glance, climbed up into his curricle, and drove away.
“Your perfect gentleman seems to have a chink in his armor,” Rafe noted as they finally escaped the congratulations.
“You tried to pummel him,” Felicity retorted.
She watched the married couples who left the churchyard hand in hand, and reminded herself that she wouldn’t have to pretend she didn’t long to hold Rafe’s hand or be in his arms for much longer.
Rafe lifted May onto Aristotle’s back and freed the reins. Silently he held his arm out to Felicity, and with a skipping of her pulse she slipped her hand around it. Aristotle and May in tow, they headed down the lane back to Forton.
“Rafe, am I your best man?” May asked from her high perch.
“You certainly are,” he answered, and looked sideways at Felicity.
“May, I’d hoped you would be my maid of honor,” she said, leaning a little closer against his tall strength.
“Oh, all right.”
Felicity stifled a smile at her sister’s blatant lack of enthusiasm. “Thank you, sweetling.”
“You’re welcome. Are the mercenaries coming today?”
Rafe glanced over his shoulder at her. “Just a few, to clear off the foundation so we can begin again tomorrow.”
Despite his prompt answer his mind seemed a little distant, and Felicity wondered whether he was thinking about the construction work ahead, or whether he’d mentally traveled to some exotic city where perfume and spices filled the air.
“It will go more smoothly from now on,” she stated firmly. “I’m certain of it.”
He shrugged. “It’s a war now: me against the west wing. And I don’t intend to lose.”
“The Coldstream Guards never lose,” May seconded, leaning forward along Aristotle’s neck. “Do we have a motto?”
Rafe chuckled, returning from wherever it was
that he’d been. “Of course we do.
Nulli secundus
.”
“‘Second to none,’” Felicity translated.
May looked at him skeptically. “It’s not very exciting.”
“Just be glad we’re not the Royal Scots Regiment.”
“What’s their motto?”
He cleared his throat. “
Nemo me impune lacessit
.”
“Goodness,” Felicity exclaimed. “That’s quite beyond me.”
“What is it?” May demanded.
Rafe turned on his heel to give May an elegant, precise salute. “‘No one provokes me with impunity.’”
“Oh, yuck. I could never shout that while charging into battle.”
Felicity grinned as she took Rafe’s arm again and they resumed their walk. “Let’s hope you never have to, dear.”
Sunday might have been a day of rest, but anyone passing by Forton Hall would have had to assume it was a weekday. Along with Rafe, still cursing under his breath with every piece of wood he had to cast aside, Mr. Greetham arrived to help, along with his two young sons. Three of the workers from Chester, eager to earn a bit of extra blunt, appeared as well.
May insisted on helping, and Felicity decided it would be more useful to help Rafe than to sit in the house and daydream about him all day. Though it was Ronald’s day off, he appeared an hour or so later. And when Beeks, wearing an old shirt, floppy hat, and work gloves, emerged from the house a short time later, Felicity could only marvel at the lot of them.
By late afternoon only the scaffolding around the
construction area remained, and she was tired, sore, and dirty. Rafe spent a long time examining the boards, joints, nails, and beams, and making notations on various scraps of paper. Felicity wished he could accept the collapse as a simple accident, but he seemed determined to pursue the cause to the most minute detail. The next version of Forton’s new wing would stand for ten thousand years, if he had anything to say about it.
In the morning the entire crew arrived, and they started all over again. Felicity didn’t think Rafe had slept at all, because she fell asleep watching him work at the dining room table, and when she awoke, stiff and cramped, he was still altering his drawings.
“You’re allowed to rest once in awhile,” she finally said, coming up behind him as he helped haul one of the heavy crossbeams aloft at the end of a sturdy rope.
“It keeps me out of trouble,” he grunted, flashing her a quick grin.
The word “trouble” inspired a sudden, unladylike urge to run her hands along his sweat-slicked body. Giving in to a delicious shudder and then removing herself from temptation, Felicity retreated to the far end of the construction site until Rafe called a halt to the day’s work just before sunset. She’d begun to think he intended them to work straight through the night, and stretched her tired back in relief as he whistled for the men up on the scaffolds to descend.
“Bancroft, look out!”
Alarmed, Felicity spun around as a stack of lumber tumbled off the scaffolding. Rafe stood directly beneath the framework, and she screamed as he dove sideways.
“Rafe!”
“I’m all right,” he said, standing again as she reached him. He looked up, his expression dark and angry. “What in damnation happened this time?”
One of the Chester workers, Lawrence Gillingham, squatted down at the edge of the platform. “My fault, Bancroft. I tripped. You all right?”
Rafe scowled. “Another accident and you’re fired. We have little ones running about.”
“Aye, sir. Won’t happen again. You have my word.”
Rafe dusted off his shirt and turned to Felicity. “I’m beginning to think I was not meant to be an architect. Or a carpenter.”
“Don’t be silly. You’re grand at it.”
“You’re only saying that because you want the rest of a roof over your head.”
She put her hands on her hips. “I am not,” she stated. “I’m saying it because it’s true. And that was a spectacular dive. It’s a shame May missed it.”
He put his arm around her shoulders. “Be thankful. She’d be diving under the furniture, and we’d never be able to find her.”
“She already disemboweled Ronald twice this morning with the kitchen broom.”
“My protegee should be completely lethal by the time she turns ten.”
Felicity laughed, grateful that his good spirits remained intact. “I’ll be so proud of her.”
“I
t’s actually beginning to look like something.” Rafe folded his arms across his chest and looked up at the new wing from the vantage point of the pond’s shoreline.
“You sound surprised,” Felicity commented, admiring the view from beside him.
He looked over at her, admiring that view even more. “I didn’t expect it to be so pleasant looking.”
Felicity tilted her head, obviously trying to decipher his expression. “Why not? You’ve worked hard enough on it.”
Rafe shrugged. “Because I did it, I suppose.”
“That sounds like something your father might say.”
“Oh, so you’ve met him,” he said dryly, unable to explain that the work toward a goal had always interested and occupied him. The goal itself had never been of much importance, and he rarely stayed around to do more than acknowledge it.
This, though, was different. The further the west wing progressed, the more he liked and enjoyed it. He wanted to see it finished, to know that he had made it, and to live within its walls and windows.
“I’d like to meet His Grace. He sounds as
though he might benefit from number twenty-eight.”
“You’d need something harder than a tea kettle. Besides, it would ruin our streak of good luck. No accidents for a week.” He took her hand, and lifting it to his lips, gently kissed her knuckles. “And only one more Sunday of publishing the banns.”
She blushed. “How much longer will we have Beeks in residence?”
“I should think another few weeks at most. His Grace will want to return to Bancroft House to finish up his affairs for the year before they winter at Highbarrow Castle.”
“I’ll miss him.” She smiled, turning her hand to twine her fingers with his. “I almost think he’s beginning to grow fond of the place.”
“He still refuses to accept a position here, though; he says I’m too unpredictable.”
Lis brushed a lock of hair off his forehead. “I’m beginning to appreciate that about you.”
The sun began to sink below the trees, and the edges of the few clouds to the west turned pink and then crimson. They watched the turning colors of the sky until they faded to gray.
“Are the sunsets in Africa as beautiful?” Felicity asked.
He stirred. “Hm? Oh. They’re different. The heat rises from the ground in waves.” He motioned with his hand. “The lower the sun gets, the more the horizon seems to ripple and move, like it’s alive. It’s mesmerizing.”
She freed her fingers and started back toward the house. “I’m sorry all Cheshire sunsets have to offer are pretty colors.”
Rafe watched her retreating backside, tired of the tension between them, and tired of the way he couldn’t mention anything farther away than Pel
ford without upsetting her—even when she lured him into the conversation, as though to test his interest. “Lis, stop that.”
She turned and looked at him. “Then stop preferring everywhere else in the world above Forton Hall.”
He narrowed his eyes. “I will, if you’ll stop preferring Forton Hall above all the rest of damned creation.”
Felicity opened her mouth, shut it again, and with a swish of her green skirt continued toward the house. For a long moment Rafe glared after her, torn between wanting to shake some sense into her and wanting to kiss her until all her worries vanished. He wished again that he’d paid more attention when Quin had tried to explain about love. He didn’t seem to be very good at it himself.
He knew that he did love Felicity; even the thought of not seeing her again was enough to send him into a near panic. But he had come to love Forton Hall, too—which at least made standing in its shadow tolerable. By now he felt as though he knew every stone and piece of wood and layer of paint in the manor. Forton Hall already belonged to him; inexorably, Forton Hall was becoming part of him.
Rafe sighed and strolled toward the west wing, to take one more look for the night. Since the collapse he’d been jittery, even with the accidents and any bad luck they’d conjured apparently gone.
Something moved at the edge of his vision, and he stopped in the deep shadows of the main house. A moment later he caught it again, moving among the uprights of the skeletal wing. It might have been a deer or a fox, but given the noise the construction created every day, he didn’t think a wild animal would venture so close.
Then his eyes caught the orange glow. With a silent curse he sprinted forward. Felicity and May were inside. If the house burned, so would they.
The saboteur didn’t even hear him approaching until Rafe had already launched himself at the man. Gillingham from Chester, Rafe registered as he threw himself forward. He hit hard, and they rolled, colliding with one of the main upright supports. A bucket of lamp oil spilled, splashing the nearest beams.
Gillingham lashed out. Rafe ducked beneath the blow and smashed his fist into the man’s stomach, and he crumpled with a breathless wheeze. Panting, and angrier than he could ever remember being in his life, Rafe grabbed Gillingham by the collar and shoved him backward.
“Why?” he snarled.
Gillingham spat at him.
Rafe hit him again, knocking him into the dirt. “Why?” he repeated.
“The blunt,” the man rasped.
“The blunt?” Rafe stared at him. “Whose blunt?”
“Go to hell.”
“I’ll see you hanged for this, so help me God.”
Gillingham glanced past him, and Rafe tensed, readying for a second attack. At the smell of burning wood he whipped around. The fire had caught onto one of the side beams, and was eating its way upward. If it spread across the top beams, or if flames touched the spreading lamp oil, the whole structure—and in all likelihood the rest of the house—would be lost. Yanking off his coat, Rafe wrapped it around the beam, slapping and smothering the flames.
When he finally stepped back, breathing hard and smoke stinging his eyes, Gillingham was gone.
To be certain the fire was out, Rafe filled buckets with water from the stable pump and doused all the surrounding lumber.
His anger, though, continued to seethe. Someone had paid to have Forton burned. And now that he thought about it, most of the accidents had centered around the workers from Chester. He could think of only one man who both wanted him gone from Cheshire, and had the money to hire help to see it done.
“Deerhurst,” he snarled.
Rafe burst into the morning room. Felicity delayed looking up, steeling herself for another argument. If only he would understand that Forton was in her blood, that she’d been looking after it for her entire life and couldn’t stop now, no matter how much and how desperately she loved him.
“Rafe, what happened?” May asked, her voice alarmed.
Felicity looked at him, and gasped. “Rafe!”
Soot and ashes blackened his face, and the rest of him was filthy and wet. He smelled of smoke and lamp oil. His coat was completely missing, and so was the lower half of his right shirt sleeve. And the fury in his light green eyes chilled her.
“Someone just tried to burn us out,” he snarled.
Felicity shot to her feet. “Forton is on fire?”
He looked at her. “No. I put it out.”
“Thank God,” she exclaimed. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” he said shortly.
If he hadn’t looked so angry, she would have flung herself on him. She badly wanted to touch him, to be certain he really was all right, but at the moment he looked as though he would only push her away.
“Did you see who did it?” May asked, wide-eyed.
“I did. Gillingham.”
“One of our own workers? Why?”
“I didn’t like him,” May declared. “He would never let me help him.”
Rafe’s eyes remained steadily on Felicity, even as he paced to the window and back. “He said he did it for the blunt.”
“The blunt? Whose?”
“I can guess,” Rafe answered coldly, coming to a stop before her. “Can’t you?”
She stared at him. “You’re mad! Where is this Gillingham? We’ll take him to the constable in Chester and find out what’s going on.”
“He got away from me,” Rafe growled. “Think about it, Lis. How many of our accidents involved workers from Chester? And who went into Chester to tell anyone we were hiring?”
“No! May and I were with him. He did no such thing.”
Rafe took a step closer. “You were never apart? Not for one moment?”
“Lord Deerhurst went to buy cigars while we were in the candy shop,” May piped in.
“Ha! You see? And then the accidents started.”
“You’re accusing the Earl of Deerhurst of trying to sabotage Forton Hall? That’s absurd! They were just accidents!”
He narrowed his eyes. “And the fire? Gillingham
accidentally
brought a lantern and lamp oil and set the building on fire?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t like Gillingham, either. Perhaps he’s simply mad.”
“Damnit, Lis, why won’t you—”
“Or perhaps you misunderstood him,” she said frantically. “You said yourself, nothing exciting
has happened for better than a week.”
Rafe glared at her, open-mouthed. “
You think I’m making this up?
Look at me!”
“I think it’s absurd to accuse my lifelong friend and neighbor of something so dreadful with only one stranger’s mutterings for proof!”
“You’re so blind that you can’t even consider that that snake might wish us harm?”
“He is our neighbor! Don’t call him that.”
“He
is
a snake!” May seconded.
“May, go to your room!” Felicity ordered angrily.
“No!”
“Why can’t you believe me?” Rafe snarled. “Why can’t you trust me for one damned minute?”
She hesitated at the deep hurt in his voice. “Rafe—”
“Forget it!” Rafe turned on his heel and left the room.
“Rafe?” May called, but he didn’t answer. A moment later the kitchen door slammed. The little girl turned on Felicity, her small fists clenched. “You ruined it! He’ll never want to stay with us now!” With a choked sob, she ran out of the morning room and slammed the door closed behind her.
Felicity sank back into her chair and covered her face with her hands. “Oh, no,” she cried, and sobs began ripping out of her throat. “Oh, no. Rafe, don’t go.”
She’d done it. She’d pushed him too far, and he would leave her and her heart would die without him. Tears ran down her face. She should have burned the stupid place down herself. It had caused her nothing but grief and trouble her whole life. And now it had cost her Rafael.
“My lord,” Fitzroy said, stopping in the library doorway, “Mr. Rafael Bancroft is here to see you.”
“How nice.” James Burlough looked up from his book in mild surprise. Evidently his helpers had either succeeded, or failed very badly. “Send him in, Fitzroy.”
“Yes, my lord.”
Even when Bancroft strode into the library, the earl remained undecided concerning the outcome of his latest venture. “Given your…filthy appearance,” he said dryly, “I will assume this is not a social call, and I will not ask you to take a seat.”
Bancroft remained silent as he approached, only stopping when he stood directly before Deerhurst.
The earl didn’t move. He knew Bancroft’s type. He considered himself a gentleman, and unless provoked, he wouldn’t strike first. So James waited to hear whatever threats and suppositions he’d come up with.
“I intercepted your messenger this evening,” Bancroft said in a low, quiet voice, “and I want to give you a bit of advice.”
“Ah, how kind. What sort of advice?” Damn that Gillingham; if he’d confessed, things were going to become sticky very quickly.
“If you do anything—
anything
—ever again to harm May or Felicity or one piece of Forton, I will kill you. Is that clear?”
Ah, he didn’t have any proof, then. Just supposition
. “My dear Bancroft, I am quite fond of the Misses Harrington, as I believe you are well aware. I assure you, they would be much wiser to be wary of you than of me.”
Bancroft nodded, his cold expression unchanged. “Say whatever you like. Just stay away from me and mine. Is that clear?”
“Well, yes, of course. And quite unnecessary. Whatever eases your mind.”
“It would ease my mind more if I beat you senseless for what you’ve tried to do. You apparently have more intelligence, though, than I gave you credit for.”
The insolent bastard was going too far, but Deerhurst kept himself in check. Bancroft would pay. Very soon. And this moment would be all the more delicious if the fool began to doubt himself a little in the meantime. “My thanks. And despite your unbecoming behavior, if you are ever in need of assistance, monetary or otherwise, for Felicity’s sake I will do what I can.”
“Felicity’s sake is the only reason you’re still breathing,” Bancroft spat. “Don’t make me regret leaving you alive.” With one last, angry look, he turned around and left.
As soon as Fitzroy shut the front door, the earl hurried to his second floor study. He quickly grabbed his musket off the wall beside his hunting trophies, primed and loaded it, and strode to the window.
Bancroft, mounted on his big bay, was headed across the meadow toward the shallow creek crossing north of the bridge, taking the most direct route back to Forton Hall. James leaned against the side of the open window and waited. A moment later the gelding reached the thick stand of trees bordering the creek.
The earl aimed carefully, squarely at the middle of Bancroft’s back. As if by divine providence the moon broke from behind its cloud cover, filling the meadow with its silvery light. With a slight smile, the earl took a breath, held it, and pulled the trigger.
The sound of the shot echoed into the trees and
died out into the night. Bancroft lurched sideways, his head snapping back as the ball struck him. The bay vanished into the shadows of the trees and Deerhurst straightened. “Damned fine shot,” he murmured, lowering the weapon.
He took a deep, cleansing breath. Since Bancroft was the first man he’d killed, he’d thought it would have affected him more. How odd. He simply should have killed Bancroft weeks ago. With one shot he’d deflected any attention from the Forton-Bancroft deed, once more become Felicity’s only suitor, and rid himself of a damned annoying nuisance. Now he only needed to wait for Highbarrow’s arrival so he could purchase the deed.