She lied, of course. “Heavens, no. I hurt my wrist yesterday. Just being clumsy, I imagine. If you’ll excuse me, Lord Brandon. . .” she said, edging away.
This time he didn’t stop her. “Certainly, Mrs. Cadbury.”
“I don’t expect we shall see each other again,” she said stiffly, pleased with herself.
“Don’t you? You may have your expectations dashed.”
She jerked her head up, startled by his enigmatic statement, but there was no answer she could make. “Well. . .good evening,” she said hurriedly, awkwardly, and walked away from him so quickly it was close to a run. He probably thought she was extremely odd, but that was of little consequence. As long as she didn’t see him again she’d be safe.
She wasn’t going to consider why she thought he was dangerous. True, he looked immensely strong compared to the frail invalid she’d seen before, but he’d been a charming, gentle man back when he hadn’t even known who he was. The return of his memory, even the depredations of the Heavenly Host, couldn’t change someone that much, could they? But there’d been that moment of inchoate rage when he suspected that the vicar had hurt her.
She wasn’t going to think about him, she told herself sternly. She would never see him again. The well-planned shrubbery closed about her, putting her out of his view, and she breathed a sigh of relief as she raced on.
Chapter 4
Brandon watched her run away from him, her dull gray skirts flying, her dark hair coming loose. She was moving as if the devil were at her heels, which shouldn’t surprise him. To her he was a stranger, a scarred, ferocious former soldier who loomed over her, manhandled her as that bastard Trowbridge had.
She thought she’d escaped him, and if he had any sense at all he’d let it be, and he was, after all, a sensible man.
He could control his bodily urges, and the good widow up in the Highlands would take him gladly and ask for nothing but pleasure in return. He could close his eyes, pretend that her red hair was a silky black, that her eyes were cool and gray and then stormy as he … . . .
Hell and damnation! He had no business fantasizing about his brother’s mysterious houseguest in such a way. He waited another minute, long enough for his inconvenient hard-on to subside, and then started back to the house, trying to keep his gait even. His leg was killing him, but he had no intention of giving in to the pain, of showing any sign of weakness. He had something important to do, and he had learned from Noonan and the harsh Scottish weather never to accept any limitations. He quickened his pace with no sign of his inner grimace and went in search of the good Mr. Trowbridge.
Instead he found his older brother bearing down on him, and the dream of exacting punishment vanished. It was time to atone for his sins, and he squared his shoulders, waiting.
Everything would have gone according to plan, Emma thought, if she’d been able to sleep. It was such a simple, biological act that so many people took for granted, and it was constantly denied her. In her studies at Temple Hospital she’d done some research on the mysteries of sleep, and she had a fairly good understanding of why it eluded her.
She’d been so young when she’d first arrived in London. Fifteen years old, with no more than a sixpence tucked in her shoe, she’d managed a ride with a farm cart that had deposited her down by the docks just at dusk. It had seemed like the greatest good fortune when the grandmotherly woman had taken one look at her, recognized a lost soul, and brought her home to her fancy house. There had been other young girls there, laughing, chattering, brightly dressed, but they hadn’t spoken to her, eyeing her with a kind of pity as they went about their toilette, and Emma, exhausted and frightened, didn’t stop to wonder what kind of place she was in. She’d been given a bath and a flimsy night robe, a warm drink, then tucked into a huge, luxurious bed, where she’d immediately dropped into the last safe sleep of her life.
Only to be awakened an hour later by pawing hands and laughing voices and pain and terror as she was passed from man to man, her virgin’s blood staining the soft linen sheets beneath her. She’d been drugged, she realized, and she’d been unable to fight them, unable to say a word, slowly letting the numbness take over. She’d learned to love that numbness, anything that would take her mind away from what her body was doing.
Unfortunately, understanding why she couldn’t sleep didn’t end the problem. She should be done with it by now, she’d told herself on numerous occasions as she’d walked the floors during those endless hours between dusk and dawn. The situation had been exacerbated by the profession she found herself in—blood and death were seldom conducive to restful sleep, even if she managed to save many of her patients.
The women were the most painful to her, slashed, strangled, maimed in horrifying ways by their customers. Emma had no illusions—she was no better than any of them. By the time she’d taken control of Mother Howe’s house at the tender age of twenty, sharing in the profits and the running of the place with the other women, she’d discovered that even on nights when the house was shuttered she still couldn’t sleep. Every time she closed her eyes she’d feel the hands pawing at her, the voices taunting her, feel the pain between her legs.
Some of her friends had learned to like it, but she never had. Some of her customers had been kinder than others, but she never grew accustomed to their possession of her body, the smell, the rutting noises they made. She tolerated some men, hated others, but as far as she could tell the only decent man alive in this world today was Melisande’s devoted husband Benedick.
That explained why she was wide awake in his household at three in the morning when everyone else was safely asleep. What it didn’t explain was why she was wanting Brandon Rohan’s hand on her arm once again.
The covers were on the floor, and she kicked them out of the way with her cold, bare feet. She’d forgotten to bring slippers, and her toes were freezing. Of course, she couldn’t sleep with cold feet, she reminded herself. What she needed was a warm brick and a not-too-exciting book. Those two remedies had always proven marginally successful, at least, and she knew from past visits how to acquire both things without bothering the servants. Benedick’s study was always unlocked, and he had any number of boring tomes. Bricks were in the kitchen, and she was self-sufficient enough to warm one herself—she didn’t need one of the harried maids to lose what little sleep they had just to wait on her.
She knew full well that laudanum would have done the trick. She had never serviced a man without the blessed, dulling effects of the drug, and more than anyone she’d understood Brandon’s craving when he’d been so lost. But it was vicious stuff, one needed more and more, and it had cost more than one young woman her life. Young Meggy’s death had changed everything—Emma had taken over the brothel, now floundering under the haphazard direction of Mother Howard’s truculent sister, and personally thrown all the laudanum into the filthy waters of the Thames. There would be some happy fish, she thought cynically, watching it dissolve. There would be unhappy women back at the house, including herself.
They’d gotten through it, all of them working together, and even if she stayed awake for weeks on end she would never touch the stuff again. She handled it and opium often enough in the hospital, and she viewed it impassively. She knew what it could and couldn’t do, how it felt, but by some unexpected grace she no longer wanted it. She avoided alcohol as well, just to be safe, but nights like this, when she hadn’t slept for what seemed like centuries, she found herself wishing she could try it.
Perhaps she could deal with the precipitous reappearance of Brandon Rohan the same way she’d dealt with the laudanum. Not by drowning him in the Thames, she thought with a quiet laugh, but simply by forswearing any time with him, any thought about him. Sooner or later the cravings would cease, wouldn’t they?
Cravings? What an absurd word for her strange affinity for the man. She’d worked it all out in her brain during the last three years—her quiet relationship with the broken young soldier had been untainted by the lif
e she had led. They hadn’t known anything about each other—he had forgotten everything, and she had chosen not to share. He called her Harpy, she’d called him “sir” in defiantly polite tones that belied the warmth of the connection they were forming. It had been like she was a child again, her relationship clean and simple, everything a possibility.
But it had been an illusion, a dream, and there was no way she could ever live that life again. Her world at the hospital was dark and squalid, enemies and obstruction all around her, but at least there she was helping. She simply had to keep at it and put the dream of Brandon out of her mind.
The night was silent. The sprawling country house wasn’t quite full, though Melisande had assembled a respectable house party to celebrate Alexandra’s christening. Emma knew most of them, and there wasn’t a ramshackle member in the bunch. No one would be wandering around in the wee hours, getting up to mischief. They’d all been here before, and they’d been well behaved. She’d be fine if she slipped out of her room in the middle of the night.
Idiot, she told herself. Everyone had been here before but Brandon Rohan. There was no guarantee that he would be safely tucked in bed. She was a fool if she didn’t consider that possibility.
But what was the likelihood? She could stay in her room, edgy and sleepless, and possibly too weary the next day to extricate herself from Melisande’s loving clutches, or she could take a chance and go in search of surcease.
No, she would venture out, and she could be phlegmatic about it, a gift that had gotten her through life. If she were meant to see him one more time, then she would deal with it. What she couldn’t deal with was another sleepless night.
She wrapped a shawl around her shoulders and stepped, barefoot, into the silent, empty corridor. She made her way down the side stairs kept for the family’s use, making her way down two more flights to the main floor.
One of the footmen was in a chair by the stairs, sound asleep, and Emma slipped past, a smile on her face. Servants were treated very well at Starlings Manor—she had no doubt they were even encouraged to sleep while on duty in the dark of night. She moved through the halls like a ghost, down to the ground floor, and headed to the library.
The heavy door was open a crack, just a faint glow of firelight filtering out, and she hesitated a moment, suddenly unsure. It was highly unlikely Benedick would still be awake—he usually ended his evenings early, in bed with his wife by his side, but there would probably still be coals, and her feet were freezing. She pushed open the door, letting the delicious warmth surround her, and stepped inside, closing it behind her.
There were times when Brandon preferred darkness to candlelight, disappearing into the shadows, and tonight was one of them. He sat back, unseen, his feet on Benedick’s desk, a cup of tea in one hand, his bad mood momentarily distracted. His leg was bothering him even more than his forced immersion into society, with the polite social questions that somehow felt like a vast intrusion into his life. There was nothing he could do about it but drink tea and try to think about something else. Sleep was an impossibility, and it wasn’t just the pain that was ripping it away.
He’d planned to get the hell away from Starlings Manor as soon as he could. He was going to mend fences with his brother and sister-in-law, force himself to be polite and well-mannered, and run back to Scotland like the coward he was.
He still planned to. For some reason he wasn’t quite as eager to go, and he wasn’t sure if it had anything to do with Melisande’s eccentric friend. Whoever heard of a woman surgeon? Her manner was odd as well, strangely hostile when he was pulling out any charm he still had buried beneath his scarred hide in an attempt at courtesy.
But he liked her eyes. Those gray, stubborn eyes that looked at him and didn’t see a cripple or a supposed war hero or even the depraved soul he’d been when he became involved with the Heavenly Host, and he had little doubt that as a close friend of the family she knew all the horrific details. For a secret organization it was surprisingly notorious – a group of bored and degenerate aristocrats intent on smashing every rule of decency and honor in their quest for gratification, and he would carry the shame of his involvement for the rest of his life. His descent into the madness of opium and brandy paled by comparison – at least with those compulsions he’d only hurt himself.
No, that history would be impossible for most people to overlook, particularly someone with the clear intelligence of Emma Cadbury. Trying would be a waste of his time.
He’d been hoping to make amends to his brothers and return home within a week, but Charles wasn’t here yet, and he had no intention of waiting for him. Besides, Benedick was the one he’d injured – only stuffy Charles’s rigid standards of decency had been offended by Brandon’s attempts at self-destruction. Charles could damned well get by without an apology.
There was nothing for him here, Brandon thought, nothing at all. Everything was soft and easy in the south, in ways that were no good for him. He’d found his true home in the wild and windy north, the rocky crags, the foaming surf, the mountain streams, and the scouring winds. The wild beauty of the Highlands spoke to what was left of his soul, and he needed to be back there.
Not to mention the jarring results of his conversation with his long-suffering older brother.
Indeed, it had been worth more than a week on horseback to clear the air with Benedick, to finally be able to ask his forgiveness and to have his own appalling actions be gently dismissed as an aberration. He owed Benedick so much, more than he could ever begin to repay, and his need to purge his soul had been foremost in his mind for the past three years.
It turned out there was no purging necessary. Benedick had simply pulled him into his arms, then given him a swift punch in the shoulder, and with a great deal of throat clearing they were back on solid ground.
Until Benedick mentioned their brother Charles’s Machiavellian plans.
“Why not marry?” Benedick had said. “You don’t have to be madly in love—I promise you that part is completely exhausting and far from practical. If you can avoid such passion your life will be simpler.”
Brandon had laughed at that. “You’d prefer a boring, bloodless union to your current wedded bliss?”
“Of course not. I didn’t have any choice in the matter—I can’t live without her. I assure you our situation is extremely uncommon—most husbands and wives lead separate lives of quiet contentment. You could do the same, and it would go a great way toward repairing your reputation.”
“What if I don’t wish for my reputation to be repaired?” he’d shot back.
“Have you thought about our parents’ feelings in the matter?” Benedick said gently, and the guilt had begun to roil inside Brandon once more. Of course his parents would want his name unclouded, not because they cared much for social standing but because they hated to see him at any kind of a disadvantage.
“I should marry for our parents?”
“Of course not. A solid marriage will help you return to society, give you children, which, I promise you, are a joy behind comprehension. And I’m sure Charles would never pick an unsatisfactory partner for you.”
“He’s already picked one?” Brandon had said, alarm sweeping his body.
Benedick shrugged. “You know Charles and his habit of arranging everyone’s lives to his satisfaction. I wouldn’t be surprised if he arrived with a future bride for you in tow. In fact, I would have thought he’d be here already.”
And that was when he’d decided to leave, abandoning the temptation of the mysterious Mrs. Cadbury. She would have to remain an enigma.
Stretching, he leaned back in the leather chair, loosening the tie that held his long hair back. His tea was growing cold, the fire had died back into coals, and he should make his way up to bed. It was far better than the narrow cot he used for sleeping up in Scotland, but it looked cold and empty to him, and he hadn’t been able to make himself strip off his clothes and lie down. He knew from experience there was no way to get
comfortable with his knee like this, and he leaned over and rubbed it absently. Sooner or later his eyes would grow heavy, sooner or later he’d limp his way to bed.
And then he froze. She was coming. He couldn’t hear anything—he’d been deaf in one ear since he’d been wounded, and if his head wasn’t turned in the right direction someone could sneak up on him, proving that even if he was otherwise sound of body he’d still be no good as a soldier. He was basically useless, and he’d accepted that. It was just punishment for his crimes.
Even so, he was sure who was approaching the library in the dead of night. He knew with an absolute certainty that it was the woman who’d been preying on his mind since he first saw her.
Perhaps the mysterious Mrs. Emma Cadbury was simply another trick of fate, something to tempt him that he couldn’t touch. He had no right to be around any woman, and he knew it, but. for some reason he really, really wanted to touch her.
He didn’t move, not even when the door was pushed open and she stepped inside.
The only light in the room was the glow of the fire. It was so dark he couldn’t see her clearly—just the outline of her body in. . . Damn it, she was only wearing her night rail, with a warm shawl wrapped around her. It didn’t disguise the curves that he’d somehow known were lurking behind her drab and baggy clothes, and he cursed mentally. He was already having enough trouble keeping his mind dutifully chaste.
She went straight to the fire, kneeling in front of it, and the coals illuminated her face. Her hair was down around her shoulders, a cascade of dark curls that were a far cry from the severe, tightly braided coiffure she’d sported earlier. He’d seen she was beautiful beneath her frumpy armor, but she was more than that, she was absolutely breathtaking, and she clearly didn’t want anyone to know.