Authors: Danelle Harmon
"But this is just too extraordinary, I
cannot believe —"
Juliet was gazing out the window into the
darkness again. "He told you about me, then?"
"
Told
us? His letters home were
filled with nothing but declarations of love for his 'colonial
maiden,' his 'fair Juliet' — he said he was going to marry you. I
... you ... dear God, you have shocked my poor brain into
speechlessness, Miss Paige. I do not believe you are here, in the
flesh!"
"Believe it," she said, miserably. "If
Charles had lived, you and I would have been brother and sister.
Don't die, Lord Gareth. I have no wish to see yet another de
Montforte brother into an early grave."
He settled back against her arm and flung
one bloodstained wrist across his eyes, his body shaking. For a
moment she thought the shock of her revelation had killed him. But
no. Beneath the lace of his sleeve she could see his gleaming grin,
and Juliet realized that he was not dying but convulsing with
giddy, helpless mirth.
For the life of her, she did not see what
was so funny.
"Then this baby —" he managed, sliding his
wrist up his brow to peer up at her with gleaming eyes — "this baby
—"
"Is your niece."
Chapter 4
My niece!
But at that very moment Perry whipped up the
team, sending them charging through Blackheath's great gates and
down the long drive of crushed stone at breakneck speed. Further
conversation was impossible. Just outside the broken window Chilcot
now galloped alongside, his coattails flying. "Hold on, Gareth!" he
shouted. "Almost there now!"
Gareth closed his eyes and held the baby,
letting his head rock and sway on Juliet Paige's lap. He was still
grinning; he couldn't help it. The girl probably thought him
insane. But armed with what she'd just told him, he had no
intention of succumbing to the blissful lure of unconsciousness —
or whatever lay beyond it. There was no way in hell he was going to
die. Oh, no. He wouldn't miss the impending events for the
world....
Or the look on Lucien's face when he learned
that the virtuous, never-do-anything-wrong Charles had sired a
bastard babe.
Looking up, Gareth could just see the
outline of Juliet's jaw, her firm, determined chin and the sweet
curve of one cheek. He knew the moment she caught her first glimpse
of the castle for her eyes grew huge, and she leaned close to the
window for a better look, giving him a better chance to furtively
study her. Ah, yes. She was a lovely creature, just as Charles had
described. Her skin was as white as snowdrops and set off by dark,
upswept hair. Her face was enchanting, with a delicate nose and
fine, dark eyes set beneath daintily arched brows. Physically, she
was diminutive and graceful — yet despite her small size, there was
something about her that conveyed courage, resilience, and
fortitude. It was easy to see why his brother had fallen for her.
But where was the
joie de vivre
, the innocent naiveté that
Charles had so praised? This woman seemed older than her years, as
though her spirit had been crushed beneath the weight of sorrow and
hardship.
By God, if he lived, he'd remedy
that
. She was far too young — and pretty — to embrace age
before its time!
He closed his eyes, content to let his head
sway in her lap, content to feel her tightening up the curve of her
arm so that he wasn't jostled so. To think that she, Charles's
betrothed, was here in England. And to think that this infant whose
tiny body was so near to his, whose heart beat so close to his own,
was his brother's little girl....
"Whoa!" Perry was pulling the team up. "Whoa
there!"
Juliet put her arms around Lord Gareth so
that they all wouldn't spill from the seat with the sudden, jolting
halt. The coach hadn't even come to a stop before his friends were
wrenching the door open. Gusts of rain and wind swept in and
Juliet, hastily picking up Charlotte, felt him tense as they leaped
inside, sliding their hands beneath his body and trying not to
jostle him too much as they lifted him from her blood-soaked
skirts.
"Here, I've got his shoulders."
"I've got his legs."
"Easy with him, now! Gareth? Gareth, we're
going to have to move you. Bear up there, man!"
They carried him out. Immediately, Charlotte
started crying again. Her heart pounding, her hand patting the
little baby's back, Juliet watched as Gareth's friends rushed him
toward the great, medieval doors of Blackheath Castle. As they
spirited him away, he lifted his hand to her. Whether the gesture
was meant to convey a last goodbye, undying gratitude, or amusement
at the sort of treatment everyone was falling over themselves to
give him, she did not know.
Feeling a bit lost, she raised herself off
the seat, shaking the wrinkles out of her blood-drenched skirts and
wondering if she should follow the others inside or wait in the
coach for someone to come for her and Charlotte.
But the decision was made for her. A man was
there at the door, extending a hand inside to her. "Madam?"
Perry. He had remained behind, still the
cool-headed gentleman in a storm of confusion.
Juliet smiled her thanks and, hastily
bundling Charlotte up, allowed him to help them down from the
coach. She stood for a moment on the drive, the rain on her face,
the wind tugging at her hair and tangling her skirts around her
legs. Then Perry offered his arm and escorted her toward the
castle, not saying a word.
Blackheath was much grander than Charles had
described it. Juliet stared at it, awestruck, as it rose up out of
the darkness before her. High above her head, twin, crenelated
towers held up the night, older, it seemed, than time itself. She
could just see the dim outline of a flagpole above one of them, its
pennant snapping against the black and moody sky with each gust of
wind. It was a magnificent palace of a place. A place that made
Juliet feel daunted, lost, and very much like a creature out of its
element.
Her courage nearly faltered at the thought
of facing its duke. This grand castle with its own flag so far
above, the village through which they'd just come, the countryside
for miles upon miles around — it all belonged to one single man,
who might or might not feel like being charitable. Back in Boston,
the thought of going to Blackheath to seek his help had not fazed
her. But now, in the face of such imposing, intimidating
magnificence, it seemed presumptuous to throw herself and Charlotte
on his mercy — even though he
would
have been family in
happier circumstances, and Charles had bade her to do just
that.
Stop being so foolish.
She was here
in England, with Charles's family, and she would not turn back now.
But as the towering stone walls of the castle loomed closer and
closer, Juliet almost wished she had never come here, never bought
passage on the Loyalist-owned ship that had been part of the mass
evacuation when the British had abandoned the town last month.
Not that you were spoiled for choice
,
she reminded herself. Her stepfather, Zachariah, had died in
January, and she'd had nowhere else to go. As a suspected Loyalist,
her life had been in danger in Boston. As an unwed mother whose
baby's father was rumored to be a hated British officer, she'd been
scorned, snubbed, ostracized, threatened. Like it or not, she'd
done what she had to do. If not for Charles, then for his
daughter.
Be strong. He would have wanted you to
be.
They were at the foot of the stone steps
now. At their head, the ancient oak door through which Lord Gareth
had been carried stood open, spilling light out onto the lawn. The
door appeared to be some two feet thick and was banded by heavy
strips of iron, each one studded with heavy bolts. Perry, obviously
a frequent and welcomed visitor here, hustled her up the steps,
past two liveried footmen who stood to attention on either side of
the door, and into a huge medieval hall, where Juliet stood gaping
up at the carved, vaulted stone ceiling that rose some two stories
above her head. The room was so big that the fine house in which
she and Zachariah had lived back in Boston could easily have fit
within it.
"Wait here," Perry ordered and hurried off,
following the drops of blood that meandered across the polished
marble floor. He tore open a set of doors at which the trail
stopped and was gone.
And Juliet was alone.
~~~~
"Gareth! 'Sdeath, man, don't die! Hugh rode
for the doctor, he'll be here any moment. Hang on, just hang
on!"
Gareth cursed the saints, the devil, and his
well-meaning friends as they rushed him through Blackheath's stone
passageways and corridors. Every jarring jolt, every skidding turn,
brought him agony. He set his teeth and pressed a hand to his side.
Through half-closed eyes he caught glimpses of sconces flickering
orange against walls, of a chambermaid's startled face, of the row
of portraits in the West Corridor, all of which blurred into a
graying haze as he fought gamely to hold on to consciousness.
Pain jarred him back to reality when Chilcot
stumbled, nearly breaking Gareth's spine in two.
"Damn you, Chilcot, if you're going to trip
over the blasted rug, at least have the decency to let go of
me!"
And then a door crashed open and he saw the
plush rugs of his own apartments, the massive bed of dark, carved
oak and the leaded windows that looked out over the downs. Servants
ran to and fro, scurrying to turn back the sheets, but Gareth knew
nothing but pain as Neil Chilcot and Tom Audlett set him down on
the bed.
Confused, excited voices penetrated the haze
in which he lay. Someone removed his shoes. His breeches and what
remained of his shirt were cut away, and someone sponged his
nettle-stung cheek with blessedly cold water. Gareth lay unmoving.
And now Perry, good old Perry, was lifting his head, supporting it
so that Chilcot could dump more of that wonderful Irish whiskey
into him. It burned a path down his throat and into his stomach,
spreading numbing tentacles of warmth out through his limbs, into
his very fingertips and toes.
Gareth closed his eyes, his brain
comfortably fuzzy. "More," he whispered.
"Bloody hell, Gareth, stop grinning like a
damned fool," Chilcot was saying, putting the flask to his lips
once more. "This isn't funny!"
Gareth only made an obscene gesture with one
hand and drank.
Audlett commented, "Good thing that girl was
quick-witted enough to pack his side with this rag. Hang on there,
Gareth. Dr. Highworth's just arriving now."
Gareth pushed away the flask before he
reached the point of no return. "See to her," he gasped, gripping
Chilcot's wrist. "Don't leave her out there to face Lucien
alone."
"But —"
"
Go!
"
And then they all heard it. The sound of
footfalls coming down the hall, echoing off the stone walls and
approaching with relentless, unhurried calm. Chilcot froze. Audlett
held his breath. And every servant in the room went still as the
footsteps stopped just inside the room.
And continued forward.
Lucien.
Gareth didn't need to open his eyes to know
his brother was there, gazing down at him with his black stare that
was severe enough to freeze the Devil in his lair of fire. And he
didn't need to see Lucien's stark face to know what he would read
there: blatant disapproval. Fury.
He felt Lucien's cool hand on his cheek.
"Ah, Gareth," the duke said blandly, in a tone that didn't fool
anyone in the room. "Another scrape you've got yourself into, I
see. What is it this time, eh? No, let me guess. You were posing as
a target and taking bets that none of your friends could hit you.
Or perhaps you got so foxed that you fell from Crusader and impaled
yourself on a fence? Do tell, dear boy. I have all night."
"Go to hell, Luce."
"I'm sure I will, but I'll have an
explanation from you first."
Bastard.
Gareth refused to respond to
the mocking taunts. Instead, he reached up, his fingers closing
around Lucien's immaculate velvet sleeve. "Don't send her away,
Luce. She's here. She needs us.... We owe it to Charles to take
care of her and the baby."
Footsteps came running down the hall, into
the room. "Over here, Dr. Highworth!" Chilcot cried, suddenly.
Lucien never moved. "Take care of
whom
, Gareth?" he inquired, with deadly menace.
Weakly, Gareth turned his head on the pillow
and looked up at his brother through a swirling fog of pain and
alcohol. "Juliet Paige," he whispered, meeting Lucien's cool,
veiled gaze. "The woman Charles was to marry ... she's here ...
downstairs ... with his baby. Don't send her away, Lucien. I swear
I'll kill you if you do."
"My dear boy," Lucien murmured, with a
chilling little smile, "I would not dream of it."
But he had straightened up and was already
moving toward the door.
Gareth raised himself on one elbow even as
the doctor tried to hold him down. "Lucien ... damn you,
don't
!"
The duke kept walking.
"
Lucien!
" With the last of his
strength, Gareth lunged from the bed, but the effort — and the
Irish whiskey — did him in at last. As his feet hit the rug, his
legs gave out beneath him, and he crashed heavily to the floor in a
dead faint.
Doctor, servants, and friends all rushed to
his assistance.
The duke never looked back.
~~~~
Juliet, still alone in the great hall, gazed
about her in disbelief and wonder. She — raised in the woods of
Maine, grown to maturity in Boston's comparative rusticity — had
never seen, nor been able to imagine, anything quite like this room
in her life. Stone staircases spiraled off to her right and left,
presumably leading up to the massive turrets she'd seen from
outside. An ancient tapestry depicting a hunting scene covered an
entire wall. Huge mullioned windows rose from floor to ceiling,
black against the night and reflecting the twinkling flames of a
chandelier suspended above her head and containing what had to be
at least a hundred candles. Such grandeur. Such
waste
! She
made a half-turn. Notches in the stone wall held suits of medieval
armor, the slitted visors ominous, the space between each suit hung
with heraldic shields, battle axes, and other primitive weapons of
war.