Teresa Medeiros - [FairyTale 02] (33 page)
Read Teresa Medeiros - [FairyTale 02] Online
Authors: The Bride,the Beast
Before Bernard had time to ponder that question himself, Wilder’s gnarled hands closed around his wrists with surprising strength. He tugged, guiding Bernard’s hands toward his throat.
“Wouldn’t ye just love to fasten yer hands round my scrawny throat? Don’t it give ye pleasure to imagine me gaspin’ my last while ye squeeze the life out o’ me?”
Hypnotized by the old man’s singsong coaxing, Bernard gazed down at his hands as if they were the hands of a stranger. He wouldn’t even have to use his hands. He could simply press the heather-stuffed pillow over the old rogue’s smug face and hold it there until—
It was almost as if Wilder could read his thoughts. “Go on, lad,” he whispered. “Izzy won’t tell anyone. She’s eager eno’ to be free o’ me. She might even help ye convince my daughters I perished in my sleep.”
His daughters.
Gwendolyn.
Bernard shifted his gaze to Wilder’s eyes. They weren’t glittering with fear, but hope.
Shaking his head, Bernard pried himself free of the old man’s grip. “ I’m not going to help the devil do his
work. I’m afraid you’ll just have to wait until he comes to collect.”
As Bernard turned away from the bed, Wilder pounded on the tick, his eyes filling with tears of impotent rage. “I know ye still want me dead! I can see it in yer eyes! I can feel yer hatred boilin’ through yer veins like acid!”
Bernard turned at the door. “You’re not worthy of my hatred, Alastair Wilder. All I feel for you is pity.”
He strode from the room, missing the bitter twist of Wilder’s lips as the old man muttered, “Then ye’re as great a fool as ye always were, Ian MacCullough.”
He wasn’t coming.
Gwendolyn huddled between two stone merlons at the pinnacle of Castle Weyrcraig, her feet tucked beneath her, and Bernard’s plaid wrapped around her shoulders.
Every day for the past week, she’d made the arduous climb to the parapets of the castle and spent endless hours gazing out to sea. But on this, the seventh night of her vigil, there was still no sign of a ship on the horizon.
The frigid bite of the rising wind made her shiver.
Bernard might not be coming, but winter was, and she feared it was going to be the longest, coldest one of her life. In the past few days she had even dared to hope that she might spend it huddled in that decadent bed in the tower, warmed by a roaring fire and the heat in her husband’s eyes. Hugging the plaid around her, she tilted
her head back to gaze up at the stars. They glittered like shards of ice, near enough to touch yet forever out of her reach.
She had stood on this very spot and told Tupper that wrong or right, a MacCullough always stands to fight.
Well, she had fought, but she had lost, and her sense of defeat was more bitter than she had anticipated. She felt much as she had all those times when Bernard had ridden his pony beneath the oak tree without ever glancing up to see the little girl huddled in its branches. A little girl who would have given him her heart for nothing more than a smile or a kind word.
Unfolding her stiff limbs, Gwendolyn stood, stealing one last look at the sea. There wasn’t so much as a hint of light to break the inky blackness of the waves. Bowing her head, she turned toward the stairs.
Her breath caught in her throat. A man stood there, veiled in shadows. If it hadn’t been for the wind rippling his cloak, she might not have seen him at all. She had no way of knowing how long he had been watching her.
“What sort of coward would spy on a woman from the shadows?” she called out, biting her trembling lip.
“Only the worst sort, I’m afraid,” he replied, stepping into the moonlight. “ The sort who’s spent half his life running from ghosts. The ghost of his past. The ghost of his parents. Even the ghost of the boy he used to be.”
“Are you certain you weren’t running from me?” Bernard shook his head helplessly, his dark hair
whipping in the wind. “ I could never hope to escape you, because you’re here”—he touched a hand to his chest—”in my heart.”
Gwendolyn felt tears well up in her eyes. She was on the verge of running into his arms, when a ghostly white shape appeared on the stairwell.
“Papa!” she cried. “How did you get here? Where’s Izzy? “
Her father clung to the stone wall, barefoot and wearing nothing but a faded nightshirt. “I might not walk so good,” he wheezed out between gasps for air, “but I’m still man enough to sneak past a dozin’ auld woman and steal a horse.”
“He must have followed me,” Bernard said. “I stopped at the manor on my way here.”
“Why? “ Gwendolyn asked, wary of the guarded expression in his eyes. “It’s a bit late to ask for his blessing on our marriage, don’t you think?”
All her questions were forgotten as her father staggered forward and she saw the claymore in his hand.
F
OR
ONCE
HER
FATHER
’
S
HAND did not waver. It held steady and true as he glided forward, leveling the deadly blade at Bernard’s heart.
Bernard began to back toward her, spreading his cloak to make himself a larger target. “Put down the sword, old man. Your battles are long over.”
“They could’ve been over when ye came to my bedside and stood starin’ down at me with those devil’s eyes o’ yers. All ye had to do was finish it. But, no—ye chose to spit in my face instead.”
As Bernard moved within her reach, Gwendolyn clutched at the back of his cloak. “I don’t understand, Papa. What did he do to you?”
“He offered me his pity, lass, that’s what he did. As if he had the right!” A sneer twisted Alastair’s lips as he shifted his contemptuous gaze to Bernard. “I’ve no need o’ yer stinkin’ mercy, Ian. Ye may be laird o’ Clan MacCullough, but ye’re not God!”
He lunged forward, closing half the distance between them.
Bernard flung out an arm to hold Gwendolyn back, but she ducked beneath it, taking her rightful place at her husband’s side. “He’s not Ian. He’s Bernard, Ian’s son. And you mustn’t hurt him. I won’t stand for it.”
Her papa searched Bernard’s face, his rage slowly giving way to bewilderment. “Bernard? It can’t be. The lad is dead.”
“No, Papa, he survived Cumberland’s attack. And he’s grown into a fine man—strong and true and kind.” She stole a look at Bernard to find him gazing down at her, his green eyes burning with emotion. “He’s everything I always hoped he would be.”
Her father’s face crumpled. The sword slipped from his hand to land on the stones with a dull clank. “I suppose I’ll have to take yer word for it, lass.” A sad little smile touched his lips as he shook his head at her, his eyes gleaming in one of their rare moments of lucidity. “Ye’re a good girl, Gwennie. Ye always have been.”
His eyes remained clear when he turned them on Bernard. “I may be a daft auld man, lad, but I was right about one thing. Only God can offer me mercy.”
He turned, but instead of limping toward the stairs as they expected him to do, he went lurching for the parapet. Gwendolyn froze, rooted to the stones. For a fraction of an eternity Bernard didn’t move a muscle, but after taking one look at her stricken face, he bit off an oath and went barreling toward her father.
He caught her father’s calves just as the old man sought to fling himself between two of the merlons. The struggle should have been an easy one, but her father’s desperation to end the life that had brought him so much misery seemed to imbue his wiry limbs with inhuman strength. As the two men grappled at the edge of the wall, Bernard’s cloak billowed around them, caught in the relentless grip of the wind.
They teetered there, balanced between the past and the future.
Her spell of terror broken, Gwendolyn lunged for them, terrified that they were both going over. She grabbed for Bernard’s cloak, tugging with all her might. But the wind tugged back, seeking to rip the heavy fabric from her hands.
Her father slipped over the edge. The muscles in Bernard’s throat corded with the effort as he sought to keep the elderly man from plummeting into the churning sea.
Bernard began to slide after Alastair, no longer able to battle both the wind and the dead weight. Gwendolyn clawed for his back, but she was afraid to loosen her grip on the cloak.
Blinding panic assailed her. All Bernard had to do to save himself was let go of her father. If he didn’t, she was going to lose them both.
Her strength was nearly spent when a massive arm banded with muscle from a lifetime of wrestling with iron pots and heavy washtubs shot past her, wrapping
itself around Bernard’s shoulders. Before Gwendolyn could catch her breath, Izzy had hauled them all to safety.
She and Bernard collapsed against the parapet. Her papa continued his fitful struggles until Izzy drew back her massive fist and slammed it into his jaw, sending him crumpling into a boneless heap.
“You should have let me do that,” Bernard said grimly, massaging his shoulder. “Although I might have enjoyed it more than was strictly necessary.”
Izzy shook her head, her hair rags bobbing like a nest of Medusa’s snakes. “Don’t think I didn’t. The daft auld rascal should’ve known better than to try to escape me.”
Still shaking her head, she heaved Alastair over her shoulder as if he weighed no more than a sack of potatoes and went marching for the stairwell.
Tears coursed down Gwendolyn’s cheeks as she struggled to absorb all that had just taken place.
Bernard had risked his own life to save her father’s.
He had chosen the future over the past.
He had chosen her.
Laughing through her tears, she gave him a fierce shake. “Damn you, Bernard MacCullough. I’m tired of you almost dying on me. If you do it again, I’m going to kill you!”
He grinned, looking exactly like the boy she had fallen in love with all those years ago. “I wasn’t afraid for a minute. Don’t you know that dragons can fly?”
“So you’re back to being M’lord Dragon, are you? “ she asked, stroking his cheek.
Bernard sobered as he gazed down into her eyes. “For the first time in my life, I know exactly who I am. I’m the man who loves you. The man who wants to spend the rest of his days making you happy.”
Instead of melting into his arms as he’d expected, Gwendolyn scowled up at him.
“Why on earth are you looking at me that way?”
“I’m trying to decide if you’d have married me if Izzy hadn’t been standing over you with that ax.”
“There’s only one way to find out.” He tenderly folded her hand into his. “Gwendolyn Wilder… um, MacCullough, would you marry me?”
She inclined her head, giving him a demure glance from beneath her lashes. “If you mean to make me your bride again, there’s something I must confess. I’m afraid I let some wicked scoundrel steal my virtue. I’m no maiden.”
“Wonderful,” he pronounced, sweeping her up in his arms. “Then I won’t feel like such a beast for carrying you back to my lair and ravishing you.”
“My beast,” she murmured, cupping his face in her hands.
As their lips met in the most enchanted of kisses, Gwendolyn would have almost sworn she heard the song of the pipes soaring above the castle on wings of joy. In the village below, several of the townsfolk sat bolt upright in their beds, listening in awe as the jubilant melody thundered through the glen.
For years after that, the sons and daughters of all who had heard that unearthly music would tell their sons and daughters of the thrilling time when a fearsome Dragon had surrendered his heart to a brave and beautiful maiden, winning a happy ending for them all.
New York Times
bestselling author TERESA MEDEIROS was recently chosen one of the Top Ten Favorite Romance Authors by
Affaire de Coeur
magazine and won the
Romantic Times
Reviewer’s Choice Award for Best Historical Love and Laughter. A former Army brat and a registered nurse, she wrote her first novel at the age of twenty-one and has since gone on to win the hearts of critics and readers alike. The author of thirteen novels, Teresa makes her home in Kentucky with her husband and two cats. Readers can visit her website at
www.teresamedeiros.com
.
Be sure to look for
Teresa Medeiros’s splendid romance
A Kiss
to Remember.
On sale now.
Read on for a preview….
The devil had come to Devonbrooke Hall.
He hadn’t come in a coach drawn by four black horses, nor in a blast of brimstone, but in the honey-gold hair and angelic countenance of Sterling Harlow, the seventh duke of Devonbrooke. He strode through the marble corridors of the palatial mansion he had called home for the past twenty-one years, two brindle mastiffs padding at his heels with a leonine grace that matched his own.
He stayed the dogs with a negligent flick of one hand, then pushed open the study door and leaned against the frame, wondering just how long his cousin would pretend not to notice that he was there.
Her pen continued to scratch its way across the ledger for several minutes until a particularly violent/-crossing left an ugly splotch of ink on the page. Sighing with defeat, she glared at him over the top of her wire-rimmed spectacles. “I can see that Napoleon failed to teach you any manners at all.”
“On the contrary,” Sterling replied with a lazy smile. “I taught him a thing or two. They’re saying that he abdicated after Waterloo just to get away from me.”
“Now that you’re back in London, I might consider joining him in exile.”
As Sterling crossed the room, his cousin held herself as rigid as a dressmaker’s dummy. Oddly enough, Diana was probably the only woman in London who did not seem out of place behind the leather-and-mahogany-appointed splendor of the desk. As always, she eschewed the pale pastels and virginal whites favored by the current crop of belles for the stately hues of forest green and wine. Her dark hair was drawn back in a simple chignon that accentuated the elegance of her widow’s peak.
“Please don’t sulk, cousin dear,” he murmured, leaning down to kiss her cheek. “I can bear the world’s censure, but yours cuts me to the heart.”
“It might if you had one.” She tilted her face to receive his kiss, her stern mouth softening. “I heard you came back over a week ago. I suppose you’ve been staying with that rascal Thane again.”
Ignoring the leather wing chair in front of the desk, Sterling came around and propped one hip on the corner nearest his cousin. “He’s never quite forgiven you for swearing off your engagement, you know. He claims you broke his heart and cast cruel aspersions upon his character.”
Although Diana took care to keep her voice carefully neutral, a hint of color rose in her cheeks. “My problem wasn’t with your friend’s character. It was his lack of it.”
“Yet in all these years, neither one of you has ever married. I’ve always found that rather… curious.”
Diana drew off her spectacles, leveling a frosty gaze at him. “I’d rather live without a man than marry a boy.” As if realizing she’d revealed too much, she slipped her spectacles back on and busied herself with wiping the excess ink from the nib of her pen. “I’m certain that even Thane’s escapades must pale in comparison with your own. I hear you’ve been back in London long enough to have fought four duels, added the family fortunes of three unfortunate young bucks to your winnings, and broken an assortment of hearts.”
Sterling gave her a reproachful look. “When will you learn not to listen to unkind gossip? I only winged two fellows, won the ancestral home of another, and bruised a single heart, which turned out to be far less innocent than I’d been led to believe.”
Diana shook her head. “Any woman foolish enough to entrust her heart into your hands gets no more than she deserves.”
“You may mock me if you like, but now that the war is over, I’ve every intention of beginning my search for a bride in earnest.”
“That bit of news will warm the heart of every ambitious belle and matchmaking mama in the city. So tell me, what brought on this sudden yearning for home and hearth?”
“I’ll soon be requiring an heir, and unlike dear old Uncle Granville, God rest his black soul, I’ve no intention of purchasing one.”
A bone-chilling growl swelled through the room, almost as if Sterling’s mention of his uncle had invoked some unearthly presence. He peered
over the top of the desk to find the mastiffs peering beneath it, their tails quivering at attention.
Diana slowly leaned back in her chair to reveal the dainty white cat curled in her lap.
Sterling scowled. “Shouldn’t that be in the barns? You know I can’t abide the creatures.”
Giving Sterling a feline smile of her own, Diana stroked the cat beneath its fluffy chin. “Yes, I know.”
Sterling sighed. “Down, Caliban. Down, Cerberus.” As the dogs slunk over to the hearth rug to pout, he said, “I don’t know why I bothered going off to war to fight the French when I could have stayed here and fought with you.”
In truth, they both knew why he’d gone.
It hadn’t taken Sterling long to discover why his uncle wasn’t averse to a show of spirit in a lad. It was because the old wretch took such brutal pleasure in caning it out of him. Sterling had stoically endured his uncle’s attempts to mold him into the next duke until he’d reached the age of seventeen and, like his father before him, shot up eight inches in as many months.
Sterling would never forget the cold winter night he had turned and ripped the cane from his uncle’s gnarled hands. The old man had quailed before him, waiting for the blows to begin falling.
He still couldn’t say whether it was contempt for his uncle or for himself that had driven him to snap the cane in two, hurl it at his uncle’s feet, and walk away. The old man had never laid a hand on
him again. A few short months later, Sterling had left Devonbrooke Hall, rejecting the grand tour his uncle had planned in favor of a ten-year tour of Napoleon’s battlefields. His stellar military career was punctuated by frequent visits to London, during which he played as hard as he had fought.
“You might consider coming home to stay,” Diana said. “My father’s been dead for over six years now.”
Sterling shook his head, his smile laced with regret. “Some ghosts can never be laid to rest.”
“As well I know,” she replied, her eyes distant.
His uncle had never once caned her. As a female, she wasn’t worthy of even that much of his attention.
Sterling reached for her hand, but she was already drawing a folded, cream-colored piece of stationery from beneath the blotter. “This came in the post over four months ago. I would have had it forwarded to your regiment, but…” Her graceful shrug spoke volumes.
Proving her judgment sound, Sterling slid open a drawer and prepared to toss the missive onto a thick stack of identical letters—all addressed to Sterling Harlow, Lord Devonbrooke, and all unopened. But something stilled his hand. Although the fragrance of orange blossoms still clung to the stationery, the handwriting was not the gently looping script he had come to expect. A strange frisson, as subtle as a woman’s breath, lifted the hairs on his nape.
“Open it,” he commanded, pressing the letter back into Diana’s hand.
Diana swallowed. “Are you certain?” He nodded curtly.
Her hand trembled as she slid an ivory-handled letter opener beneath the wax seal and unfolded the missive. “ ‘Dear Lord Devonbrooke,’ “ she read softly. “ ‘I regret to inform you that your mother has passed from this world to a much kinder one.’ “ Diana hesitated, then continued with obvious reluctance. “ ‘Although you chose to ignore her repeated pleas for reconciliation over the past few years, she died with your name on her lips. I trust the news will not cause you any undue distress. Ever your humble servant, Miss Laura Fairleigh.’ “
Diana slowly lowered the letter to the desk and drew off her spectacles. “Oh, Sterling, I’m so sorry.”
A muscle in his jaw twitched once, then was still. Without a word, he took the letter from Diana’s hands, dropped it in the drawer, and slid the drawer shut, leaving the fragrance of orange blossoms lingering in the air.
A smile curved his lips, deepening the dimple in his right cheek that always struck dread in his opponents, whether gazing at him across the gaming tables or the battlefield. “This Miss Fairleigh sounds less than humble to me. Just who is this cheeky chit who dares to reproach the all-powerful duke of Devonbrooke?”
He waited while Diana consulted a leather-bound ledger. His cousin kept meticulous records
on all the properties that had once belonged to her father but now belonged to him.
“She’s a rector’s daughter. An orphan, I believe. Your mother took her in, along with her young brother and sister, seven years ago, after their parents were killed in an unfortunate fire that destroyed the estate’s rectory.”
“How very charitable of her.” Sterling shook his head wryly. “A rector’s daughter. I should have known. There’s nothing quite like the righteous indignation of some poor deluded fool who fancies she has God fighting on her side.” He whipped a sheet of stationery from a teakwood tray and slid it in front of Diana. “Pen a missive at once. Inform this Miss Fairleigh that the duke of Devonbrooke will be arriving in Hertfordshire in a month’s time to take full possession of his property.”
Diana gaped at him, letting the ledger fall shut. “You can’t be serious.”
“And why not? Both my parents are dead now. That would make Arden Manor mine, would it not?”
“And just what do you plan to do with the orphans? Cast them into the street?”
He stroked his chin. “I’ll have my solicitor seek out situations for them. They’ll probably thank me for my largesse. After all, three children left too long to their own devices can only arrive at mischief.”
“Miss Fairleigh is no longer a child,” Diana reminded him. “She’s a woman grown.”
Sterling shrugged. “Then I’ll find her a hus
band—some enlisted man or law clerk who won’t mind taking a cheeky chit to bride to curry my favor.”
Diana clapped a hand to her breast, glaring at him. “You’re such a romantic. It warms my heart.”
“And you’re an incorrigible scold,” Sterling retorted, tweaking her patrician nose.
He rose, the casual motion bringing the mastiffs to attention. Diana waited until he’d crossed to the door, the dogs at his heels, before saying softly, “I still don’t understand, Sterling. Arden is nothing but a humble country manor, little more than a cottage. Why would you wish to claim it for your own when you have a dozen vast estates you’ve never even bothered to visit?”
He hesitated, his eyes touched by bleak humor. “My parents sold my soul to obtain the deed to it. Perhaps I just want to decide for myself if it was worth the cost.”
After sketching her a flawless bow, he closed the door behind him, leaving her to stroke the cat in her lap, her brow furrowed in a pensive frown.
“Soulless devil! Odious toad! Truffle-snorting man-pig! Oh, the wretched nerve of him!”
George and Lottie watched Laura storm back and forth across the drawing room in slack-jawed amazement. They’d never before seen their even-tempered sister in such an impressive rage. Even the rich brown hair that had been gathered in a tidy knot at the crown of her head quivered with indignation.
Laura spun around, waving the letter in her hand. The expensive stationery was woefully crumpled from having been wadded up in her fist numerous times since it had arrived in the morning post. “He didn’t even have the common decency to pen the letter himself. He had his cousin write it! I can just see the heartless ogre now. He’s probably rubbing his fat little hands together in greedy glee as he contemplates snatching the very roof from over our heads. It’s no wonder they call him the Devil of Devonbrooke!”
“But Lady Eleanor died over five months ago,” George said. “Why did he wait so long to contact us?”
“According to this letter, he’s been abroad for the last several months,” Laura replied. “Probably off on some Continental tour, no doubt, gorging himself on the shameless pleasures of any overindulged libertine.”
“I’ll bet he’s a dwarf,” Lottie ventured.
“Or a humpbacked troll with broken teeth and an insatiable appetite for ten-year-old brats.” George curled his hands into claws and went lurching at Lottie, eliciting a squeal shrill enough to send the kittens napping beneath her petticoats scattering across the threadbare rug. Lottie never went anywhere without a herd of kittens trailing behind her. There were times when Laura would have sworn her little sister was spawning them herself.
Laura was forced to make an awkward hop to keep from tripping over one of them. Rather than
darting for safety, the yellow tabby plopped down on its hindquarters and began to lick one paw with disdain, as if their near collision was solely Laura’s fault.
“You needn’t look so smug,” she informed the little cat. “If we get evicted, you’ll soon be gobbling down barn mice instead of those nice juicy kippers you fancy.”
Sobering, George sank down beside Lottie on the settee. “Can he really evict us? And if he does, what’s to become of us?”
Laura’s laugh held little amusement. “Oh, we’ve nothing to worry about. Listen to this: ‘Lord Devonbrooke begs your forgiveness,’ “ she read with contempt. “ ‘He sincerely regrets having been lax in his duties for so long. As the new master of Arden Manor, he will gladly shoulder the responsibility of finding new situations for you.’ “ She crumpled the letter again. “Situations indeed! He probably plans to cast us into the workhouse.”
“I’ve never cared much for work. I do believe I’d prefer to be cast into the streets,” Lottie said thoughtfully. “I’d make a rather fetching beggar, don’t you think? Can’t you just see me standing on a snowy street corner clutching a tin cup in my frostbitten fingers?” She heaved a sigh. “I’d grow paler and thinner with each passing day, until I finally expired of consumption in the arms of some handsome but aloof stranger.” She illustrated her words by swooning onto the settee and pressing the back of one plump little hand to her brow.
“The only thing you’re likely to expire of,” George muttered, “is eating too many of Cookie’s teacakes.”
Reviving herself, Lottie stuck out her tongue at him.
George sprang to his feet, raking his sandy hair out of his hazel eyes. “I know! I’ll challenge the blackguard to a duel! He won’t dare refuse me. Why, I’ll be thirteen in December—nearly a man.”