True Love

by Jude Deveraux

  Outside it was dark and raining hard. Jared had grabbed a big flashlight from a drawer and he shone it around the garden. When he came to the rose arbor, he stopped.

  The arbor, still covered in prickly stems, had fallen to the ground—and it had taken the rose bushes with it. Where there had once been a beautiful covered archway was now a mess of broken wood and uprooted plants. The ground was muddy and grassless.

  “Oh, no!” Alix shouted over the rain. “How can Izzy use that?” She looked up at Jared. “Izzy will be so disappointed. You can fix it, right?”

  With rain running down his face, Jared smiled at her. She was looking at him as though she thought he could do anything. If there was a hole in the earth, she seemed to think he could repair it. Reaching out, he put his arm around her and drew her to him. When he did, he glanced upward and saw his grandfather at the upstairs window.

  Suddenly, Jared knew without a doubt in the world that, somehow, his grandfather had done this. From getting Alix to design a chapel, to this strong, sturdy cedar arbor lying in the mud, to the wedding, he knew that Caleb Kingsley had done it all.

  “Come on,” Jared said to Alix. “Let’s get you inside. You’re wet and you don’t have on any shoes.”

  “I’m just concerned about—”

  He kissed her forehead. “I’ll fix it. Okay?”

  She nodded and they went back inside the house, while Ken went to the guesthouse to dry off.

  Once they were inside, Jared told Alix to go upstairs and fill the bathtub with hot water. “I’ll join you in a few minutes.”

  It would have been a sexy invitation except that Jared was frowning deeply.

  “Is everything all right?” she asked. Her teeth were beginning to chatter.

  “Yes,” he said. “I just need to … to get some towels. Go on, I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

  Alix wanted to ask him what was going on, but she was too cold to think clearly, and her mind was on Izzy’s wedding. What were they going to do now? Of course they’d rebuild, replant, and drape cut roses everywhere. It could be done. She ran up the stairs to her bathroom—their bathroom, she thought—and began filling the tub.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Jared went straight to the stairs that led up to the attic. He knew from experience that his grandfather was strongest at the top of the house. The large attic room was packed with trunks and boxes and old furniture, some of them containing items that had been owned by his grandfather. These earthly connections, here and in the front parlor, made Caleb more visible.

  Jared also knew that his anger would draw his grandfather to him. Sure enough, when he opened the door to the attic and pulled the string to the overhead lightbulb, there his grandfather stood, hands clasped behind his back, fully ready for the coming argument.

  “You did it, didn’t you?” Jared said, his jaw clenched. “You made the arbor collapse.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “Don’t evade my question,” Jared snapped.

  “I thought you had perfected question-evading.”

  Jared glared at him, but then his face changed. All his life he’d seen the shadowy figure of his grandfather. One of his earliest memories was of seeing him bending over his childhood crib and smiling. Jared had never thought it was strange that he could see through the man. It was years before he realized that semitransparent men weren’t part of other people’s lives.

  But right now he couldn’t see through his grandfather. At least not totally. He was clearer than Jared had ever seen him before. “What’s going on?” The anger was gone from his voice.

  “What do you mean?”

  Jared knew his grandfather understood him, but he motioned his hand up and down his body. “Why do you look like that?”

  Caleb took his time in answering. “On the twenty-third of June I’m going to leave this earth.”

  It took Jared a moment to understand what his grandfather was saying. “Leave?” he whispered. “As in die?” For all that Jared often made cracks about his grandfather finally leaving the earth, he couldn’t imagine a life without him. “I … I …” Jared began but couldn’t go on.

  “You’ll be all right,” Caleb said gently. “You have a family now.”

  “Of course I’ll be okay.” Jared was doing his best to recover from the shock. “And you’ll be … be happier.”

  “Depends on where they send me.” Caleb’s eyes were twinkling.

  Jared didn’t smile. “Why on Izzy’s wedding date?” Jared’s head came up. “Or did you make her set it then?”

  “Yes, I did. I seem to be able to do more … things than I could. And I know considerably more. Something is going to happen. It’s …” He trailed off.

  “What?!” Jared half yelled.

  “I don’t know. It’s just that I can feel things changing. Every day I get stronger.” He held out his hand. “I can see my own body. Yesterday I saw myself in a mirror. I’d forgotten how handsome I am.”

  Jared still didn’t smile. “What is going to happen?”

  “I told you that I don’t know, but I feel … a sense of anticipation. I just know that my life … your life … the lives of all of us are going to change soon. You need to tell Alix what you and Ken have been plotting. You can build it in time for the wedding.”

  “I’m not sure,” Jared said. “There’s not enough time.”

  “You need to do it!” Caleb said, his voice adamant, fierce. “You know where her chapel goes, don’t you?”

  “On the old house site.”

  “Yes, you have it right.” Caleb listened. “Alix has the bathtub full. Go to her.” Caleb’s body was beginning to fade away. Not disappear in an instant as usual, but more like the sun beginning to set. “You need to find—”

  “I know!” Jared said impatiently. “I’m supposed to find out what happened to Valentina.”

  Caleb’s body was little more than a shadow. “I think that before you can find her, you should look for Parthenia.” He was gone.

  Jared stood there a moment staring into the dim length of the attic. “Who the hell is Parthenia?” he muttered.

  Shaking his head, he pulled the light string and went down the stairs. When he got to the bathroom, Alix was already in a tub full of hot water, six-inch-deep bubbles across the surface, her head just peeping above. She gave Jared a smile of invitation, but when he didn’t seem to notice, she sat up straighter in the tub. “What happened?”

  Distracted, Jared removed his cold, wet clothing and put a leg into the water. “Damn! But this water is hot.”

  “I think you need it. You’re white as a glacier.” As soon as he was in the tub she moved between his legs, her back to his front. “Tell me what’s bothering you. And don’t even think of saying that nothing is.”

  Jared took a while before he spoke. Even though his life had been one of secrets and keeping things to himself, right now he wanted to tell Alix what his grandfather had told him. On Izzy’s wedding day, Captain Caleb Jared Kingsley, who’d died over two hundred years ago, was at last departing this earth. It would not be a joyous day for Jared.

  He couldn’t tell Alix that. But what he could tell her was what he and her father had been secretly working on for the last two weeks.

  “I think we can build your chapel,” he said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Ken and I’ve been working on this in secret and he should get building approval very soon. It hasn’t been easy.”

  Alix was silent as she listened to Jared tell what they had accomplished. Her father had taken measurements from Alix’s sketches and her model, and he’d spent an all-nighter drawing a floor plan and elevations.

  “Then he sent them to New York to be made into blueprints. Stanley rushed it all through.”

  “Your assistant,” Alix said.

  “Sometimes I think Stanley is the boss.”

  She turned to look up at him. “Now, why do I doubt that?”

  He kissed her and
she turned back around. Her heart was pounding. She was going to see one of her own designs built? She couldn’t really believe it.

  “Of course Ken knew we had to make two designs.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “Committees never accept the original proposal, so the first time around your dad turned in a caricature of your design, and with Dilys’s help—”

  “What does she have to do with this?”

  “She’s on the board. My name can’t be on the plan because she’s my cousin, but she and Ken aren’t related, even if they once were …”

  “Were what?” Alix asked, then held up her hand. “Don’t tell me. I can guess. So what did she do?”

  “Raised a ruckus, said the plan was horrible, and threw it out. Then the next week Ken put on his meek face and presented the real one. Dilys led the group in saying the new one was much better.”

  “And it passed?” She held her breath.

  “Yes, but to get it through so fast there are strings attached.”

  “Oh,” Alix said, deflated.

  “It’s to be an accessory building, meaning that it has no kitchen or bath, no plumbing at all. It can’t be seen from any public road or path but that’s not a problem. Later we can …” He trailed off. He’d been about to say that later they could build a house there. A rental maybe. Or … He hardly let himself think this, but maybe it would be a house for the Eighth and his family to live in.

  “Where exactly on the land would it be built?”

  “On the old house site,” Jared said quickly.

  “You think that’s a good idea? It might be like building on a Native American burial ground.”

  Jared thought that was probably exactly why his grandfather wanted it built there, but he didn’t say so. When they started digging, he’d make sure Alix wasn’t there. If his guess was right, they might find a centuries-old body there, and he didn’t want Alix seeing it. “Maybe we’ll find some artifacts and donate them to the NHS.”

  The only word Alix heard of that was “we.” “Do you actually think this could be done in time for the wedding? That Izzy could get married in a chapel?”

  “In your building?” Jared said. He was finally beginning to recover from what his grandfather had told him, but it did cross his mind that Caleb was leaving the earth because Jared had found Alix.

  He kissed her cheek as his hands began to move over her body. “Excited?”

  “Of course.”

  He took her shoulders and turned her to face him. “How do you feel about your own creation going from paper to something you can see and feel? That you can walk inside of? Be surrounded by?”

  “It feels … wonderful!” she said, her head back. She turned to put her legs around his waist. “It feels like I’ve climbed the highest mountain, leaped toward the stars, that I’ve gone from the moon to the sun. It’s like I’m tripping across rays of sunshine.”

  “Speaking of mountains …” Jared said as he kissed her neck and set her down before him, letting her feel how much he desired her. “I’ll go off-island.” He kissed her throat. “And get the materials and bring them back in a truck.”

  “What kind of bricks will you get?” she whispered.

  “Handmade.”

  “Oooooh,” she said. “You certainly do know how to turn a girl on.”

  His lips went lower. “I know a blacksmith in Vermont who can make door hinges like the ones you drew. Celtic meets thirteenth-century Scotland.”

  “You’re driving me mad with desire. What else?”

  “A bell.”

  She pulled away to look at him. “A bell?” she whispered.

  “Hand-cast. I have a warehouse full of things I’ve collected. I always knew that someday I’d need a bell.” He was kissing her breasts.

  “The door!” she whispered urgently. “What about the door?”

  “Seasoned oak. Three inches thick.”

  “I can’t stand any more. Take me. I’m yours.”

  His hands began exploring her body, the smoothness of the soapy water making each touch a caress. He roamed over her thighs, always moving upward, his hands going to the center of her. Alix put her head back, her neck on his shoulder, and his lips touched her cheek.

  “You are beautiful,” he whispered. “All pale, golden skin. Sometimes, I feel as though I’ve known you forever.”

  Alix liked his words, but she sensed that there was more involved in his words. For the first time, she felt that the great and powerful Montgomery needed her. Turning, she put her arms around his neck, her bare chest against his. “I’m here,” she said as she kissed his chin. “I’m not planning to leave.” She kissed his mouth, her tongue just touching his lower lip. “Soft and succulent,” she whispered.

  He pulled away from her. “What did you say?”

  “Luscious and firm.” She pulled his lower lip between her teeth. “Beguiling, enticing, calling to me.” She ran her tongue over his whiskers, feeling the stiff prickles of them. “A Siren’s song, Pied Piper’s flute.” She kissed his mouth, then moved her lips to his lower one. “I dream of it asleep, awake. To touch it, caress it, kiss it.” She put her lips to his. “The tip of my tongue,” she whispered and followed the words with action. “Breaths mingling.” For a moment she opened her mouth under his, then pulled his lip into the warm cavity of her mouth. “To draw it in, to caress it, to feel it against my own. Ah,” she said in a throaty whisper. “Jared’s lower lip.”

  When he looked at her, his eyes were dark with lust. That blue fire she’d come to love. In the next second he stood up in the tub, lifting her with him, his arm tight around her as he took her out of the tub and carried her into the bedroom. He stood over her, nude, and looked down at her warm, wet body, and the smile he gave her made her grow even warmer.

  “There are parts of your body that I especially like too,” he said as he stretched out beside her.

  “Such as?” she asked as he began kissing her neck, his hand at her waist.

  “I’m better with action than words.”

  “Are you?” she whispered. “Then perhaps you should show me.”

  “I would love to.” He began to move down her body, his mouth following his hands.

  Chapter Eighteen

  “You’re sure you’ll be all right without me?” Jared asked Alix for what had to be the twelfth time. It was seven A.M. on a Wednesday and they were at Downyflake awaiting their breakfast. The very pretty Linda had waited on them and the always cheerful Rosie had stopped by to chat. It was the fifth or sixth time they’d been to the restaurant and Alix had run into a few acquaintances that Jared didn’t know. Knowing people separately from him made her feel like she was beginning to belong on the island.

  “I’ll be fine,” she told him again as she moved her hand across the table to touch his fingers. She was still in a daze after the night before. They’d made love for hours, taking their time with each other. Even though Alix knew that something had happened, she couldn’t get him to tell her what it was, but all last night and this morning he’d acted as though Alix might walk out the door and never come back. She was concerned about him and didn’t want him to worry. “Dad will be here, and Lexie and Toby. What are you so afraid of?”

  He wanted to say, “My grandfather and your mother,” but didn’t. This afternoon he was going to board JetBlue and fly to New York to begin making arrangements for the purchase and shipment of the materials to build Alix’s chapel. “Sure you don’t want to go with me?” he asked.

  “I’m not sure at all, but …” She didn’t really understand why she felt that she had to stay on Nantucket but she did, and she went with her instinct. “I’m going to learn what I can about Valentina. And who was the other woman you asked me about?”

  “Parthenia.”

  “And you don’t know her last name?”

  “With a first name like that she doesn’t need another one.” He looked down at his coffee and thought that it was his grandfather
who’d put this idea of remaining behind and working on the papers into Alix’s mind. If it was, Jared knew why he was doing it. One month from today Captain Caleb Kingsley would depart from this world forever. The last close attachment of Jared’s life was going away. Forever.

  Alix reached across the table to put her hand over his. “I wish you’d tell me what’s bothering you.”

  “I would if I could.” He gave her a half smile. “What have you heard from your mother?”

  “She’s finished her book tour and is back home now. The last time we spoke, I started to let her know just what I thought about her lying to me all these years.”

  Jared genuinely grinned. “How hard did she laugh?”

  Alix groaned. “I hate that you know both my parents so well. Mom said it was all done for art and therefore was permissible.”

  “Did you tell her I was going off-island?”

  “I did, actually.”

  Jared took a drink of his coffee. “Then she’ll be here within twenty-four hours after I leave.”

  Alix started to speak but paused when Linda appeared and put their food before them. When they were alone, Alix leaned toward Jared and said softly, “Why would my mother need to wait until you left before she came here? What other secrets do you two have?”

  “You mean like sex on the chamber pot staircase, like you and I had last night?” he asked, eyebrows raised. “My back still hurts.” Alix didn’t like his joke.

  Jared realized his bond with Alix was much more important than any loyalty to her mother. “Victoria wants the last of the Kingsley women’s journals, specifically Aunt Addy’s, so she can make a novel out of them.”

  Alix ate a few bites of her breakfast quesadilla as she thought about what he’d said and how it fit so well into what she already knew. “Then it wasn’t Aunt Addy’s storytelling—there are journals.”

  “Yes. Lots of them.”

  “Is this one of your two secrets?” she asked. “It is.”

  “And the other one is that you’ve seen Captain Caleb as a ghost?”