by Lara Temple
She had taken off her robe and her gallabiyah hung loosely about her, but now he could see her throat and collarbone, paler than her hands, just the hint of a silver chain disappearing beneath the fabric. The image of it lying against her skin, with that tangle of metal and vivid green stone nestling between her generous breasts... He tried to stop the downward spiral of his thoughts and blood, but with a sense of fatality he felt his body clench with anticipation of following those thoughts with touch...with taste...
He gathered himself, pushing away his libido’s wholly inappropriate response. It was not as if she was making any effort at all to be seductive. In fact, she was one of the least artful women he had ever met. For all he knew, all those years playacting a boy meant she was unaware of her attractions and, as far as he was concerned, it was best to keep it that way.
She laid her folded scarf on the boulder and took another sip of her tea, closing her eyes, her tongue brushing across her lower lip as if to gather every drop of the beverage. Again there was absolutely no reason for his body to lurch like a poleaxed camel, but it did.
‘Don’t do that.’ The words were out of him before he could think them into silence and she straightened in surprise.
‘Don’t do what?’
‘W-wet your lips.’ Hell—was he stammering? He hurried on. ‘It will only dry your lips further. I will fetch more tea. And food. I’m starving.’
He strode off, relieved to put some distance between them. Perhaps the desert thirst had caught him and this strange, sensitised heat was the outcome. Or perhaps this land of ancient gods and strange tales was affecting him more than he wished to admit.
Another complaint to set at his brother’s door.
Chapter Five
Birdie and Gamal were preparing flat loafs of charred bread on stones set on the fire and the earthy scent mingled with the smoke. Rafe’s stomach growled in anticipation even as his mind moaned.
‘I need a decent meal soon, Birdie. I’ll waste away on this regime of bread and cheese.’
‘You’ve gone soft these years, Colonel. A little hardship won’t hurt you.’
‘Devil take you, Birdie. I don’t need any “It will be good for you” advice. I shall turn thirty-seven soon.’
‘Huh. I was forty-six last month, young ’un.’
Rafe tried to school his smile.
‘Forty-eight. And we celebrated in full style on board Chris’s pleasure ship.’
Birdie’s crooked teeth reflected the flickering firelight.
‘Did we? I don’t recollect much. The mead that rascally Catalan of his brewed would have been useful against the French. Hopefully we can celebrate yours on board there as well after we bring the young miss back home. She’ll be safe there?’
Rafe brushed the sand from his hands.
‘I don’t know. I don’t think so. We may have to improvise something.’
‘Hmmm...’
‘What does that mean?’
‘It means, my fine buck, that you have found another way to avoid coming to terms with your future.’
Rafe stilled.
‘Birdie, we do not discuss this.’
‘You don’t. Nothing stopping me from doing so. Only a few months ago you said now the old Duke is dead you had no choice but to return. Then you concoct this plan to bring Edge back from Brazil by counterfeiting your death...’
‘You know why I did that. The stubborn idiot wouldn’t have moved otherwise.’
‘Aye, but don’t tell me you weren’t considering turning that fiction into something permanent and having your brother assume the title.’
‘I considered it for all of two minutes. I wouldn’t do anything which meant I could no longer see Edge.’
Birdie’s face softened.
‘I know. Those two years you spent with him and his son were your best. All the more reason why you should have your own children. And that means going back to England, putting your hand on what’s rightfully yours and settling down. I’m not saying you shouldn’t help Miss Cleopatra reach Cairo, but after that it’s time to go home. No more lost souls.’
Rafe shifted uneasily.
‘I don’t want the damn Duchy; all I have of Greybourne are bad memories. That place will sap my soul. I enjoy what we do, Birdie.’
‘You enjoy solving other people’s problems and you were a fine officer. I dare say having a few hundred people under you as the Duke of Greybourne won’t be much different. You’ll make your own memories to chase away the old. I’ve never seen you dragged down by fate, Rafe. Not when you stomped into barracks twenty-odd years ago and demanded I take you on and not when you near lost your life when you pulled McAllister and Cates from the fire at Los Piños.’
Rafe instinctively rubbed at the marbled skin of his neck. He might have saved two of his men from the fire at the gunpowder depot, but it had been Birdie who’d saved his life and nursed him back to health. Another on a long, long list of debts he owed him.
‘Don’t talk rot, Birdie. Fate not only dragged me down, but stomped me into a pulp when Jacob died.’
‘I know you loved your nephew like your own, Rafe. I was there with you at Chesham those two years, remember?’ Birdie answered softly. ‘Fate dealt you and Edge a vicious blow, but it didn’t fell you. You saved your brother from drowning in grief and you’re still trying to save him, but at some point you will have to stop trying to save others and do something about yourself.’
‘What the devil is wrong with me? I like my life, Birdie.’
Birdie shrugged, which only made Rafe angrier.
‘You’re a fine one to talk. You’ve no more roots than I do.’
‘That’s true, but I’m coming to regret it, Colonel, and it may be well too late for me. You’ve made me a rich man, but I told you when we began this voyage it would likely be my last.’
‘You’ve said that a dozen times before.’
‘Aye, well, that’s my problem. I’m as scared as you.’
‘Scared.’
‘Shaking in my dusty boots. Elmira told me so and she is right.’
Rafe fell silent. He knew Birdie and the rather taciturn widowed housekeeper they employed at Tarn Cottage had an arrangement, and he was glad for Birdie, but he hadn’t realised it went beyond mutual convenience.
‘I didn’t know it was that serious, Birdie,’ he said a little weakly.
‘Well, neither did I for as long as I could ignore it. I never expected a woman to want to look at my ugly mug day in day out, but the truth is I’ve come to admit I want that. When we return... I think I will stay. I’ll be there if you need me, that will always be the case, but...’
Rafe touched Birdie’s shoulder briefly.
‘I’m happy for you.’
‘Well, don’t say that yet. She might have come to her senses and changed her mind by the time we return. But if she hasn’t... I would rather see your children born before Elmira kills me with her cooking.’
Rafe smiled, but he didn’t feel it. The sick feeling was only growing. He’d known this moment was coming since the day he’d received news of his father’s death.
Birdie had known him longer and better than anyone and yet he still could not explain to him the deep, sick sensation that rose up in him every time he thought of returning to Greybourne. He’d built a whole new life, a good life, well away from that dank pit. His brief return to it when Edge’s son was born had only provided more proof of precisely how dank it was.
He’d returned, expecting to find Edge and his wife Lady Edward happily celebrating the birth of their son. Instead, he’d found Edge alone with Jacob, a happy but sickly babe, while Lady Edward had been whisked away to Bath by her mother to recover her strength. As the doctors shook their heads in despair over Jacob’s health and Lady Edward kept extending her stay in Bath, Rafe had abandoned all thought of leaving
Edge and Jacob.
His resolve to remain had received an extra boost when a month after his arrival his father descended on Chesham unannounced, spewing his usual vitriolic concoction of doom and damnation. The Duke proclaimed the infant an abomination to God and demanded he be sent away so Edge could beget a healthy heir for Greybourne since Rafe’s seed was clearly not going to bear fruit.
That had been a day Rafe would prefer to forget. If it had not been for Birdie and the swift arrival of his mother, accompanied by the ever-ready Dr Parracombe and his sedatives, he and Edge might well have committed patricide. If ever he’d needed a reminder of the poison that was Greybourne, he’d seen it that day. He wanted nothing to do with it. He would do his duty by the estate and the welfare of his tenants and not a hair’s breadth more.
‘I think you’d best look elsewhere for someone to dandle on your knee, Birdie. But you are right that I must at least make provisions for the management of the estate. It will be damned strange going back there. It feels as though I’m willingly stepping into a pit full of vipers.’
‘There’ll be naught but old snake skins by now.’
Rafe wasn’t at all certain of that, but he shoved that thought aside.
‘That is just as unappetising an image. Speaking of which, isn’t that ready? I am so hungry I could eat your cooking.’
Birdie tipped the plate he was in the process of extending and Rafe rescued it before its contents slid into the fire.
‘Now, now, Birdie. I thought you had a tougher hide than that.’
‘I need one with you about. Go feed the young lady before she blows away. And watch yourself over there.’
Rafe took the plate and shot a look at his friend.
‘What is that supposed to mean?’
‘She might come to like you all too well if you go on as you are and then you’ll be sorry.’
‘What the devil do you think I was doing?’
‘Making her smile. And laugh. And liking it.’
‘I was making her tell me the truth, which is rather necessary under the circumstances. That is all.’
‘If you say so. Now go feed her. That is necessary.’
* * *
Cleo watched the two men talking by the fire. The contrast between them could not have been more marked. Even with his scars, Mr Grey was a splendid specimen of a man. His size and patrician features only served to accentuate Birdie’s squat ugliness. But as she watched the easy, smiling communication between the two it was evident that contrast was lost on them.
‘Love looks not with the eyes but with the mind...’
She shoved the foolish quote away and shifted her gaze to the hills once more.
Perhaps she had been too honest with Mr Grey. In his rough and sardonic way, he’d charmed the truth out of her. He’d cleverly made her relax her caution, lean into his warmth that made the world sag a little in his direction. She hadn’t even noticed it until he’d moved away. For those brief moments she’d felt utterly natural sitting here with him. Unthinking, un-calculating, just...herself. It was so rare a feeling she only recognised it when it was withdrawn.
She shook her head. The events of the past weeks must be addling her brain.
It was a little mad to allow someone else to assume custody over her fate. She’d never done it before, but in truth it was a wondrous sensation.
A dangerous one, too. All she knew with certainty was that this handsome, scarred giant was a walking deception. He instilled confidence, made her lower her guard, yet she knew he could be ruthless. It was obvious in the way he watched the world, the ease with which he’d faced al-Mizan and dismissed him and then orchestrated their departure with a minimum of fuss. The way he accepted the change in their plans and the annoyances it must bring without any sign of discomfiture. It was as if he expected life to be full of rocky shoals and murky pits. It was unfair that he should convey such an air of calm and humour when he was no doubt eternally alert beneath. His was the behaviour of a man who did not rest, who did not trust.
And if a man did not trust, he could not be trusted.
‘“There’s no trust, no faith, no honesty in men; all perjured, all forsworn, all naught, all dissemblers,”’ she muttered at the desert floor.
‘Well, that’s a miserable philosophy. Here. You’ll feel better once your belly is full.’
She looked up, startled. She hadn’t even heard him return. She would make a horrid mercenary.
He waved the plate at her and the flat bread slid tipsily across. She caught the plate, the warm, doughy aroma overlaid by the tangy smell of goat’s cheese. Her mouth watered and her stomach rumbled like approaching thunder. She leaned forward, embarrassment flooding her once more.
‘Who was the dismal fellow or lady who had such a poor opinion of men?’ he asked as he sat down, placing his own plate on the boulder and tearing a strip of bread.
‘Shakespeare. Juliet’s nurse speaks those words to Juliet after Romeo kills her cousin. I didn’t mean to...’ She foundered, worried he would think she had been referring to him. Which she had.
‘Shakespeare. Of course. It’s always Shakespeare that’s trotted out to bolster one’s beliefs. Still, it’s always good advice to keep your expectations low. Like expecting this bread to be inedible and then discovering it is delectable. I must be growing desperate indeed to think that.’
She relaxed once more. Flippant had its advantages.
‘“Nothing is good or bad but thinking makes it so,”’ she offered and took a bite of the hot, pungent combination of bread and cheese.
‘Shakespeare again? I don’t think I agree with him here. There is plenty that is categorically bad and no thinking otherwise could make it good.’
‘I believe he meant we can shape our perception of the world. If we always expect evil, then we will perhaps miss the good.’
‘A fair point,’ he conceded with clear reluctance.
‘Dash tells me I have a sad habit of quoting Shakespeare, but one of the few possessions we managed to always take with us were his plays and I have reread them dozens of times. I shall try to restrain myself.’
‘No, don’t. It appears you’ve had to restrain yourself far too much in your short life, Cleo-Pat. Enjoy your unfettered freedom while you can, because once you’re safely in London, you will face restraints aplenty. Now eat up. You’ll need your strength for what’s ahead.’
* * *
Unfettered freedom.
Cleo turned over on the thin pallet Gamal had placed for her by the fire and pulled her robe more tightly around her, tucking her fist under her chin. A few feet away the dying fire glittered at her. A short distance behind her was the substantial bulk of Mr Rafe Grey stretched out on another pallet.
She knew she must sleep, but she’d never felt so wide awake in her life. As if she’d swallowed a sackful of shooting stars and they were slamming about inside her like fireworks.
It made no sense. She was exhausted, weary to the marrow of her bones, her legs and back aching from the interminable ride.
And afraid she might never sleep again.
This is absurd, she told herself. Last night she had fallen asleep with her head on a table. The previous night she’d curled behind a stack of reed baskets in an empty market stall, convinced she’d wake up to the tip of a knife. Tonight she was blessed with a mattress of sorts, a blanket and a mercenary who was literally watching her back.
And she couldn’t sleep.
She needed to sleep, but his words kept bouncing about in her head, butting against her worries like a goat at a gate.
Unfettered freedom...
If all went well she would be returning to England after more than a decade away.
To what?
To a great gaping blackness, greater than the enormous night sky above them.
She breathed in and out slow
ly, trying to focus on the world around her and not the panic inside her. Over by the well a camel groaned and then came the faraway ululation of a jackal. The mercenary behind her stirred and settled. She could not tell if he was awake and was struck by an urge to turn over and check. She shifted on to her other side as quietly as she could.
Oh. Not sleeping.
His eyes looked black, the last flickers of the fire sparking them with stars. He lay on his side facing her, his head resting on his bent arm and folded coat. The moonlight stripped half his face of colour and cast the rest in shadow.
‘It’s only a jackal,’ he whispered.
‘I know,’ she whispered back. ‘They won’t come near. It isn’t that. I can’t seem to sleep.’
‘That’s not good. Surely your beloved bard had something to say about the importance of sleep. He seems to have something to say about everything short of how best to boil an egg.’
She smiled, absurdly relieved by his nonsense.
‘He says sleep is the “balm of hurt minds” and something about stealing us away from ourselves, and knitting unravelled sleeves of care, and then of course there is Hamlet’s famous—’
‘I regret asking,’ he interrupted. ‘In any case, take his advice, close your eyes and begin knitting.’
‘I am trying. I cannot stop my thoughts.’
That was more honest than she wished, but he merely raised himself on his elbow.
‘Annoying little bastards, aren’t they? Send them over here and I’ll give them a talking to.’
A laugh huffed out of her and she untucked her hand and cast an imaginary object at him.
‘Put them in a sack and drown them, please.’
‘You’re a merciless little thing. No need for such measures, I’ll just dust their jackets for you and send them back on their best behaviour.’
‘That sounds more nursemaid than mercenary.’
He did not answer immediately and she worried she’d offended him. Then a different smile tugged at his mouth. Not jesting. Warm and intimate and yet distant.
‘I will have you know I am a fine nursemaid, Cleo-Pat.’