Patricia Frances Rowell

by A Scandalous Situation

  The maid curtsied, eyes demurely downcast. “Lady Duncan told me I might retire. I thought I would prepare your bed before I go.”

  The glance she now cast at Rob ranked a long distance from demure. He narrowed his own eyes as he watched her finish her task. What was this about? Tending to his bed certainly constituted no part of her duties—nor did being in his bedchamber for any other reason. The answer he expected was not long in coming.

  Her task finished, she walked toward the door, pausing close beside him. “Will there be anything else, milord?”

  The languid gaze she now bestowed on him, her chin lifted, her eyes sleepy, explained the whole matter. No doubt she knew that he and Iantha had yet to share a bed. Little baggage!

  Her scent wafted up to him, and Rob’s body stirred. It had been a very long time since… He drew in a long breath. With her neatly coiled black hair and light olive skin, she reminded him for a moment of Shakti. But he had never seen that calculating look in his first wife’s gentle eyes.

  And he had no intention of tupping his wife’s maid.

  Even if his present wife thought men required variety.

  “No, I thank you.” He made his voice cold.

  Camille hesitated but a moment before curtsying again and slipping out the door.

  Rob feared he had not seen the last of her.

  He was still pondering the question of what to do about the encounter when he strolled into the sitting room he shared with Iantha. He found her on the sofa before the fireplace, reading. He poured himself a glass of brandy and went to stand by the fire.

  Iantha set her magazine aside and favored him with a cool look. A bit too cool. Rob bristled. Why was he putting out so much effort to be understanding of her, when she apparently had no understanding of him at all? Nor appeared to want any. And what was he getting in return for his effort? Very little.

  Unless he counted the offer from her maid.

  Which he had nobly refused.

  Rob did not like the way he felt. He wanted the air cleared. But where to start? Her expression gave him not the least notion. Oh, the devil with it!

  He took a fortifying sip of his drink. “Iantha, we had little time this afternoon to discuss your approach to being Lady Wisdom.”

  She cocked her head to one side. “True. Did you have a comment?”

  The icicles in her tone warned Rob that any comment he might have had best be complementary. He was not, however, in a mood to be obliging. “Not exactly. I was wondering why you have the opinion of men that you do.”

  Her delicate brow wrinkled. “I am not quite sure to what you refer.”

  “In the first place, where did you get the idea that all men are alike? That all of us hate tears? Or that we exercise no control over our desires or our temper? Or that women must simply tolerate our ‘need for variety’?” He sounded angrier than he had intended.

  “One hears things, my lord. Even I.”

  “But what things? From whom?”

  “My lord, I have a father and three brothers. I can assure you that they all abhor tears. And Mama always says, when Papa is in a temper, that we must avoid him and be careful what we say. She will not allow us to annoy him.”

  Rob grinned. “And I can assure you that your papa knows exactly when your mother is not pleased, and makes every effort to ameliorate the situation. Nor does he seek variety.”

  Iantha had to think about that. “That may be true.”

  “Of course it’s true.” Rob grimaced. “There is not a man alive who wants to live with his wife’s displeasure.”

  “If you saw and read what I do, my lord, you would not be so sure. This very magazine has an article advising women not to seem too intelligent. Men don’t care for intelligent women, it seems. I have heard that all my life.” She shook the pages in her hand, thinking of the many unhappy letters she had read. “And the questions I receive… This writer’s husband forbids her to visit her family. That one reports that her spouse strikes her if she speaks at all sharply to him. Another one—”

  “But those women write because there is a problem. They don’t represent…” He took a breath and smoothed out his frown. “I enjoy your intelligence! It is one of the things… Iantha, look at me. Not them—me! Have I failed to control my desires? Have I fled from your tears? No!”

  He began to pace. “I have urged you in vain to express your anger. You refuse to do it. Now you tell me that men will not tolerate it in women.”

  Oh, dear. Now he sounded angry. Iantha hastened to make amends. “I…I’m sorry, my lord. I did not mean to imply…”

  “It isn’t just your anger, Iantha. It is all your feelings. You rarely let yourself laugh. You apologize for weeping. You don’t even know when you are getting cold. How do you expect ever to…”

  “I don’t expect it, my lord.” Iantha felt the flood of indignation rise in her chest. “I told you how it was with me, but you were so sure…”

  “You have to try. You will not even make the attempt to feel anything, but rather you make every attempt to restrain—”

  “You are unjust, Lord Duncan! I have tried. I have kissed you. I have…” The anger grew stronger. She must flee, or else she might… “If you will excuse me…” She rose and made for the door.

  He beat her to it and barred her way. “No. We will finish this discussion.”

  She stopped a foot away from him. “I cannot, my lord. Please get out of my way.”

  He crossed his arms and held his ground, his mouth a grim line. Before she could stop herself, Iantha’s hands came up, and she gave him a hard push.

  He didn’t budge.

  She began to feel panicky. “Please, my lord. Look what I have done! I do not wish to resort to violence. I must leave before…”

  “Before what? What will happen if you don’t leave?” He watched her implacably.

  “I…I don’t know.”

  “I do. You will act and speak in anger. Is that so terrible?”

  “Yes! Yes, it is!” She wrapped her arms around herself and held on tightly.

  His face softened. “Why, Iantha? You haven’t the strength to harm me physically. What can happen that is so bad?”

  She dropped her arms and looked at him helplessly.

  “I will go mad.”

  Chapter Eleven

  God knew he wanted to deny it, to comfort her, to tell her she would not lose her mind no matter how angry she felt. But he could not do it.

  Who was he to say she wouldn’t?

  When he remembered the days of his own fury, he could not be sure that he had been quite sane. But he had not lost his reason altogether. After a time his rage had abated. He began to see for himself what he was doing. He became able to stop doing it.

  But last night all Rob could do was mutter a reassurance and let her pass. This morning he felt disappointed that he had not made better use of the opportunity. Earlier he had planned to make her angry at him. Well, he had accomplished that! His own irritation had fueled hers. But she still had not been able to express it.

  He put aside these thoughts when the library door opened and the subject of his reverie came into the room. She looked as subdued as he felt. In her hand she carried two letters.

  “I found these in the post.” She laid them on the desk. “I did not open mine. I think they are…more of the same.”

  Rob opened the note addressed to him, then crumpled it in his fist. “Aye. That is what they are.” He started for the fire, and then thought better of it. He examined the writing carefully. “But this seems to be yet another writer. How many of the bastards—” He broke off as he realized how difficult the question might be for her. “I’m sorry. I…”

  Iantha shook her head. “It’s all right. But I don’t know the answer. They all wore identical masks, so I don’t know if any of them…”

  Rob crumpled the paper again, shaking it in his fist. “They should be hung, and if I could but identify them, I’d see them hung if I had to do it myse
lf. Is there anything at all you remember about them?”

  “I try very hard not to remember.” She stared at her clenched fists.

  Feeling like the greatest brute in nature, Rob persisted. “I can only imagine how harrowing this is for you, but even the smallest detail might help identify them. Were they all young?”

  “Again, I can’t be sure.” She gazed into the fire thoughtfully. Rob didn’t rush her. Finally she said, “It is very hard for me to think about it. But I do believe most of them were probably young. They all seemed…very…” Her chin quivered, and she set her jaw. “Very strong.”

  Could she stand another question? He must know everything in order to stop this horror. Perhaps one more. “What about their clothes, their horses?”

  Iantha shrugged, withdrew into herself. “I don’t know. They weren’t ruffians.” She whirled toward him. “Please, Rob, I can’t…”

  Rob walked around the desk and put his hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry. I know it is painful for you.”

  “Yes.” She looked down at her tightly clasped hands. “When I let myself remember, it all comes back and…and I become very agitated.” She dropped her face into her hands. “I don’t know what I might do.”

  “Look at me, Iantha.” Rob gently moved her hands and lifted her chin. “I cannot tell you that you will not go mad from fear and anger. All I can say is that I did not. And I don’t think I would ever have recovered from my grief and bitterness without acting on that anger.” He smiled. “And I think it likely that I did a great deal more damage than you possibly could.”

  “I don’t know about that. Sometimes I believe that I would be capable of anything. I don’t want to hurt you…or anyone….”

  He brushed his lips across her forehead.

  “I think that highly unlikely.”

  He would be careful not to let her.

  Iantha burst from sleep with a scream in her throat. She clapped her hands over her mouth and refused to allow it birth. When she was sure it would not emerge, she sat up and covered her face with her hands. This was the third night in a row that the events of that terrible night had come back to haunt her dreams—the cold, the masks, the pain. She could no longer shut them out. In hearing that hated laugh, in knowing that some of them had been in the house with her, in answering Rob’s questions about her attackers, she had been forced to remember. It had opened Pandora’s box.

  And now she could not close it.

  For three days, whenever she had shut her eyes, images of grotesque, bloodred masks leapt up behind her eyelids. Animal sounds assaulted her ears. The smell of spirits sent a lash of panic through her. But she could not tell Rob that.

  She could not tell him anything.

  He had shattered her control. He made her laugh. He made her weep. She had danced with him, kissed him. His vigor, his manliness assailed her senses and started feelings in her body that she feared to allow expression.

  She stayed in her bedchamber during the days, but her brain refused to consider answers to the letters she received from La Belle Assemblée. The endeavor to put her confusion into poetry died aborning. The painting she had attempted devolved into a dark, swirling mass. Iantha had cast it into the fire.

  She got up and walked to the window. A hard wind was blowing, but no snow fell. Just like that other night.

  And now she again felt the cold.

  Iantha climbed back into bed and pulled the down-filled quilts up under her chin.

  And lay there, awake and shivering, until dawn.

  Just like that other night.

  He did not know what to do for her. Rob had watched her tired face and trembling hands all through dinner. She hardly ate at all. Clearly, her fear had gotten worse. When asked how she was, she simply said that she had not slept well. When he put an arm around her shoulders, she froze so completely that now he was afraid to touch her.

  When Rob came into the sitting room that night, he found a shivering Iantha huddled on the sofa, wrapped in several shawls, her arms hugging her body.

  “Are you that cold, Iantha?” Rob crossed to her and placed a hand on her forehead, expecting to find her feverish. Instead her forehead felt chilled and clammy. “Do you feel ill?”

  She shook her head. “No, just cold. I haven’t been able to get warm for several days.”

  Rob studied the dark hollows under her eyes. “You’re sure?”

  She nodded, but did not speak.

  Kneeling by the fireplace, he set another log on the blaze and reached for a second. The one he picked up had the remnants of a small branch sticking out at an awkward angle. It might keep the log from lying securely on the pile. Rob laid it on the hearth, pulled his knife from his boot top and attacked the projection.

  Suddenly, from behind him he heard a strangled, “No!”

  He turned to find his wife standing by the sofa, the shawls in a pile around her feet. “What is it, Iantha?”

  “No, no, no.” He took a step toward her, only to have her back away, the scarves tangling with her feet.

  “Be careful! You will fall.” He reached for her, and she uttered a muffled scream. What? And then he remembered. The knife. The first time he had met her.

  He tossed the blade aside, but she continued to stumble back, kicking at the shawls and trying to turn, all the while muttering, “No, no.”

  Her eyes were wide and wild, and he thought she did not really see him. He reached for her again, but as his hand closed on her arm, she tried to jerk away and fell. His own feet now in the scarves, he lost his balance and followed her down to the floor, one arm across her body.

  She pushed at him frantically. “No! Get away!”

  As she fought to escape his arm, Rob became frightened himself. Had she, indeed, lost her mind? She obviously did not know who he was. “Iantha, it is I—Rob! Look at me.”

  Instead she turned her face away and attempted to roll out of his reach. “Leave me alone! Leave me alone!”

  But he could not leave her alone. She might hurt herself. She clearly did not know where she was or what she was doing. He tightened his grip on her, and she flung her free hand out, groping for the knife. He could not let her have that!

  Rob rolled his weight onto her, immobilizing her. She screamed again and began to beat on his face and chest, crying, “Let me go! Let me go!”

  He began to understand. Somehow her mind had returned to the night she had been raped. What should he do? He couldn’t release her, and if he continued to restrain her… When she clawed at his eyes, Rob clasped his arms around hers, pinning them to her sides. She continued to fight him, kicking and twisting, crying out and then struggling in grim silence.

  He had no idea how much time passed. Then, suddenly, her voice changed.

  In a completely different tone she said, “Please stop,” and began to cry.

  Rob rolled off of her, but he could not bring himself to take his arms from around her. Instead he pulled her to his chest and stroked her hair.

  Through a muffled sob, he heard, “Rob?”

  “Aye. It is I. I have you.”

  “Thank God.” She wept quietly now. He held her as gently as he could. At last she asked, “I was beside myself, wasn’t I?”

  “Yes. I think that would describe what happened.”

  “I have gone mad!” A sob threatened to choke off her voice.

  Rob thought for a moment. “Nay, I think not. Strong emotion often takes us outside ourselves.”

  “Did that happen to you?”

  “Not quite the same way, but there are times I can’t remember. Do you recall what just happened?”

  A long silence ensued. At last she shuddered. “Yes. I don’t want to…but I do. I was there again…with—with them. He had the knife…. It still had Nurse’s blood on it.” Another paroxysm of sobs shook her. “He cut her throat, and then he held the knife against my neck and would not let me move or cry out…not even when he… When I screamed at the pain, he cut me.”

  Behin
d her back, Rob’s fists clenched, but he kept his voice quiet. “It is all right now. You are safe here with me.”

  “He…he hissed at me.” Her voice, between sobs, sounded weak.

  “Hissed?” Rob drew back far enough to give her a puzzled look.

  “Through his teeth.” She sobbed again. “I can’t remember his voice because he hissed everything—‘Don’t move,’ ‘Silence!’ Only a few commands. He was the first.” She grasped Rob’s shirt and hid her face in it, weeping again.

  She was shivering in his arms now. Rob fumbled with his feet and finally raked one of the shawls within reach of his hand. He spread it over both of them.

  Again she choked back her sobs long enough to say, “And then another one came and another one and…I don’t know…. They cut my clothes and hit me…and one of them bit me.” Her voice broke and silent sobs racked her slight form.

  “Bloody hell!” Rob could not hold back the oath. “Killing is too easy for them.”

  He got to one knee and gathered her into his arms. After he had laid her on her bed, he wrestled off his boots and lay beside her, pulling the covers over both of them.

  Iantha drew in a long shuddering breath and looked up into his face. “Please don’t leave me.”

  Rob gazed into her tearstained face. “At this moment, not all the forces of hell could take me away from you.”

  The cold bit at her again. Iantha woke to a frosty dawn and the realization that her husband was in her bed. Oh, dear heaven! Pulling the covers tightly around her neck, she lay on her back, shivering. A few tense moments later she felt movement and heard a rustle from the other side of the bed. Without turning her head, she slid her gaze in that direction.

  Rob’s face, propped on one hand, smiled down at her.

  Iantha quickly looked back at the ceiling and clutched the quilt tighter.

  Her husband chuckled. “Don’t you find the bedding a bit redundant? You still have on your robe, and I am wearing both shirt and britches.”

  She dared another glance out of the corner of her eye. “But we are in bed.”