“It isn’t funny!” Byran shouted, sending a bottle of wine swaying. Only the remaining liquid and heavy bottom kept it upright.
“Please, it is the first woman who has denied you anything. That is all that has your goat: that she won’t fall for you with nary a word. Besides that, she is like all the others.” Derrick laughed and waved it away.
Byran looked out the window at the moonlight on the water, his features oddly empty compared to the tantrum a moment before. He reset a chair on its legs. Sitting, Byran faced his friend, running a weary hand across his eyes and through his hair. The coal-black curls sprang back from his passing fingers.
“No, she is different,” Byran said, meeting Derrick’s eyes soberly.
Derrick stopped laughing.
“She said she would never betray her husband.” Byran snorted as he said it, as if he couldn’t believe such a notion. He picked up his forgotten glass of wine before adding,“and even if that weren’t so, what had I ever done to ‘recommend myself to her.’“ On that, his voice trembled.
Byran’s hazel brown eyes were haunted as he gazed at his friend. He downed the wine in one shot then rolled the empty glass on its base, round and round in a miniature version of his wild pacing.
Derrick considered his friend, whose greatest assets were wealth, a political family that had guaranteed him a job and position, and his Spanish good looks. Derrick tried to think of what to say.
“What have I done?” Derrick repeated the phrase from his memory, his voice trailing off as he looked out the window of the salon in Kesmere.
His glass still twirled slowly in his fingers. He could see Byran’s pale reflection in the storm-darkened pane. Hair as dark as the night outside, Byran’s broody eyes stared unseeing out from where he sat at a desk under the windows.
It evoked a second memory a few years after the first. The war had just begun though at the time it had felt like it surely had to end soon. The war had been known as World War III in the beginning when there were still news channels and TV. Though in the end, it had been known as the Greatest War. Now, it was simply called the War for no other before it had even come close to its vastness and destruction.
The sun was dim on the horizon, shadows still claiming what was left of Europe. The old rambling manor house was yet another headquarters in this time of moving fronts and shifting targets. Derrick could not even recall what former country it had been in. Byran sat hunched in the window seat, his fingers laced through his hair. His eyes rested against the palms of his hands as if he could block the world from his sight.
“She is gone. She left without saying a word,” he said, his voice thick and nearly unrecognizable.
Again, Derrick felt late in getting the details.
“What happened?”
Byran looked up. Derrick had never seen his eyes so bloodshot and lost, before or since.
“Her husband was with the Grey Guard, the division that flew and fought over Kiev yesterday. None of them survived,” Byran choked out the last unnecessarily. The bombs that had torn Kiev apart had left nothing alive or standing for miles.
“I found her in the hallway. She cried. She cried so hard I thought it would tear her apart,” Byran said quietly.“We ... I found her a place to sleep. I left to find breakfast this morning, but when I returned,she was gone.” Byran looked at him with anguish.“If I hadn’t married Isabella, if we weren’t expecting Santi so soon after Cerilla was born ...” There had been no words for those what ifs.
“She was the one. The one you went on about in Porto Banus and again in ... whatever hellhole that was after Kiev?”
Coming fully to the present, Derrick stated it more than asked. He wasn’t sure why he had never questioned who at the time, who could have won over Byran so fully, but he was certain of the answer now. Still, he glanced over to see Byran’s confirming nod. Derrick swallowed another sip of port. It hit his throat tasting of vinegar. His mind whirled.
“You could have told me it was her.” This time the statement was made with an accusing look.
“Hah, like that would have helped. If I had told you that the woman I loved was also the person you’ve come to detest the most, you would have changed your mind?” Byran snorted into his port glass before taking a swig.
Derrick paused,unsure.“It wouldn’t have hurt,” he said finally. He tried a smile to lighten the mood.
Byran half smiled back, his eyes still lost to the past. “I tried to tell you once,” Byran said. The comment dropped the room from under Derrick’s feet for the second time that night.
“When?” he choked, unable to recall any conversation including Arinna’s name.
Byran waved a hand. “It doesn’t matter.”
Derrick took a breath, then let it go. The expression on Byran’s face told him now wasn’t the time to push.“Have you talked since?” he asked, instead.
Byran nodded in answer, which quieted some of Derrick’s unease.
“Mostly letters, but we’ve seen each other peripherally at events,of course.”
Derrick knew what his friend wasn’t saying, that they hadn’t really talked about their past at all. He rubbed a dull ache between his brows with a finger.
“It’s been what, eight years since then?” The time would not add up in his mind. The events of the war, moments he did his best not to think about, seemed unconnected.
“Six and a half, Santi is six.”
That said it all to Derrick. Byran was not close to forgetting Arinna.
Derrick could hear horses pulling up to the main entrance to unload passengers under the shelter of the overhanging porch. He took the last of his port in one gulp. Straightening, he walked over to set his glass on the table, squeezing Byran’s shoulder as he walked by.
Byran tried to smile, but his eyes were still shadowed and belied the action. Derrick wondered suddenly what he’d begun inviting the Lady Grey into the refuge he’d made of Kesmere. Derrick pushed concerns aside and went to greet his guests.
Chapter 3
BARON VASQUEZ
INTRODUCTIONS
A woman’s laugh tore Byran from his thoughts. It wasn’t Arinna’s, though. The feel of her in his arms still tingled on his skin. Arinna was here, granting Byran the opportunity to warn her that had driven him from his home in Spain. But the shock of seeing her again when he hadn’t expected it had scattered his thoughts as if they were rain in the storm. Feelings he thought dormant beyond resurrection surfaced.
There wasn’t time to collect himself. Derrick’s guests were there, and a plan that had seemed so simple until he’d been confronted with the reality of seeing Arinna again threatened to toss him off balance. Byran left the room before his tangled thoughts dragged him under.
In the entrance hall, Derrick stood between two lovely young women. “My good friend, Baron Vasquez is here as well,” Derrick said with a nod toward Byran.
A brunette with high cheekbones set under golden eyes turned to him. Her face was sweet enough that Byran barely needed to sweep down the curves of her burgundy dress, only a shade lighter than her lips, to appreciate her youthful beauty. The nearly antique style of her dress with a bit of lace along the oval neckline and half sleeves suited the young woman’s classic beauty.
“Byran, this is Dame Corianne Heylor and her cousin, Tatiana Grekov.”
It was only at Derrick’s introduction that Corianne turned away from him, and slowly at that. Byran hid amusement with a bow that let his gaze skim over Corianne’s teal silk dress whose cut hinted at the daring of youth, especially unattached and ambitious youth. Thin shoulder straps plunged low to reveal her cleavage, and the fabric of the skirt clung to her hips and thighs. Her face was attractive with a slight chubbiness to her cheeks where they were framed by blonde wisps of hair. Byran judged her as not quite out of her teenage years and the younger of the two women.
Derrick’s guests would have been a wonderful diversion on almost any other occasion. But with the memory of Arinna in his a
rms from an hour before and head too full of thoughts, they barely caught his attention.
The next arrivals offered no interest whatsoever. Lord and Lady Bemby were old enough that Byran wondered if Derrick’s father would have even found them tolerable. Derrick greeted them like old friends, though, which they might have been. Derrick’s move four years before to the estate he’d inherited from his late uncle had surprised Byran. Coming on the heel of Byran discovering Derrick’s engagement to Danielle le Marc, Byran had been at a loss to understand the sudden transformation in his childhood friend. Despite frequent visits and Byran strong-arming Derrick to remain a senator in the combined parliament that oversaw Europe, a part of Derrick remained altered with no explanation. But Byran kept trying, hoping to break through to him.
They’d barely assembled in the front salon when Derrick announced with a nod toward the doorway, “And I do have one other guest this evening.”
Wearing a silver-grey dress that shimmered in the light, it was impossible to tell Arinna had arrived looking like a stable boy who had been thrown in the muck less than an hour before. Her short hair, more red than deep brown now that it was dry, framed her pixyish features. Byran had a difficult time imaging her as the leader of the Grey Guard and a heroine of the war. He remembered her instead as he first saw her: a new US embassy staffer in Madrid lost in her role and switch from military life.
“May I present the Lady Grey.”
Derrick’s aversion to Arinna was well-known. Corianne winced. Byran coughed a smirk into his wine glass. In the political world Derrick and Byran lived, new alliances were forged overnight. In the small county Derrick and Arinna resided, it had only been a matter of time before the Earl of Kesmere and the Lady Grey would have to learn to live as neighbors since her arrival half a year ago. Corianne’s naiveté and honest confusion were charming though she wouldn’t fair well in the sphere she was hoping to achieve if her hand on Derrick’s arm was any indication.
“I say, my dear, it is good to see you,” old Lord Bemby said as he offered his hand. Arinna clasped his worn fingers, leaning forward so that he could kiss her cheek like an affectionate father.“Good addition, my lord earl. Good addition,” he said as he eased sideways, allowing his wife to take his place in greeting Arinna.
As host, Derrick walked the two cousins across the room.“May I introduce Dame Corianne Heylor and her cousin Tatiana Grekov.”
“Dame?” Arinna asked. “Either you were my youngest soldier or your mother or father fought in the Guard.”
Corianne blushed. “My father. He died just before the war ended. I was knighted in his stead,” she answered, a trace of haughtiness in her tone as if the inherited title demarcated more than service recognized.
“Tatiana, your family is from old Russia then?”
“My brother and I came to stay with my cousins during the war. We still have family back there,” Tatiana answered without her cousin’s aloofness. “Has there been any contact with old Russia?”
“No,” Arinna answered, voice kind to soften the reply. “The wasteland outside of Europe’s borders makes contact with Asia difficult. Perhaps as power and transportation are restored.”
Tatiana turned away, ignoring the miffed glare of her cousin. There was only one other person to introduce to Arinna. Byran swallowed nerves he didn’t realize had risen and crossed the room.
“And,of course, Baron Vasquez, whom you know,” Derrick finished.
Byran bowed low, caught in the old ache that filled him. He kissed Arinna’s proffered hand lightly, torn between the warmth of her skin and the white line of a faint scar across her knuckles.
“As always, it is good to see you again,” she said with a hint of laughter.
He couldn’t find his voice for fear he’d ask her why she’d left without a word beyond a scribbled note over six years before. Byran backed off, telling himself it was not why he had come. Well, not the motive behind it. But it had been old feelings, older than his marriage, which had spurred him.
Surprisingly it was the formalities of dinner that gave Byran the chance to steady himself. Derrick had placed Arinna at his right as only fitting for her status as the recognized leader of the Grey Guard, even if, in truth, she held no military rank. It meant she was opposite Byran, but before he found himself asking the wrong question, the Bembys claimed Arinna’s attention with topics of the local countryside that were far from Byran’s interest. Which left him the two young women to entertain, something, Byran realized as his mind settled, had been Derrick’s original intent before Arinna disrupted the table’s balance. Now the Bembys spoke to Arinna instead of Derrick. Plus, Corianne spent every moment with her attention riveted on Derrick. The amusement of that broke through the last of the thicket of memories in Byran’s mind.
As far as Byran was concerned, Derrick held the blame on Corianne’s obvious interest. Derrick’s engagement was distant at best while Corianne was in the same county. Byran offered no sympathy or help requested in the occasional pointed glances Derrick tossed his way. Though it was a shame really that she was only interested in Derrick, or at least the connections he could provide her. Corianne made an attractive package and Byran hazarded that with the right offer she would be easy to win over. And he’d only been wrong once in his assessment of a woman. On that thought, his gaze drifted to Arinna.
It wasn’t the years that had changed her though age had barely touched her features. It was Kiev and the war. Without the glaze of memories, Byran could see she wasn’t the young embassy staffer anymore. She was as polite and civil as Derrick, offering a public face without flaw. He wondered the last occasion she’d really laughed, or loved. Byran shifted uncomfortably in his chair.
And then the improbability settled on him as if he’d woken from a dream. Even the embassy staffer that Arinna had been would not have gotten caught unprepared in a storm. As the leader of the Guard ... he didn’t believe it. The war might be over, but she wouldn’t have gotten so complacent. Trim and suave now despite her mud-splattered arrival, she didn’t look to have lost her edge. The quiet rumor that had sent him across a continent buzzed in his head. He’d come to warn her. What if he didn’t need to?
Derrick addressed a comment from Arinna, including the Bembys with an air of animated interest. It was all show. Had to be. So much of the person Derrick pretended to did not align with the person who had been Byran’s childhood friend, reckless with a knack for surviving close calls. And that was the second worry. That Derrick would invite Arinna to dinner was just as unlikely as Arinna being caught in the rain-swept night. As far as Byran could tell, Derrick really did hate her. The thought soured his dinner enough, he put down his fork.
With or without his involvement, the dinner wore on in tiring precision. It was late evening, and after an interlude in the music room where Corianne displayed prowess on the piano when, finally, the Bembys excused themselves. In the bustle of their departure, propriety required Corianne and Tatiana to offer gratitude for the invitation and leave as well, Corianne eyeing the obviously staying Arinna with hurt curiosity.
As the door clicked shut, Arinna paused in the entranceway as if unsure what to do next. “I shall turn in as well,” she said into the awkward silence. “It has been a long day though a very pleasant evening. Thank you again for your kindness, Lord Earl.” Arinna hesitated, gaze coming to rest on Byran. “Good night,” she said simply to him, seeming at a loss for other words.
Derrick half bowed an acknowledgment as if she were any worthy houseguest. Byran watched her go, the doubts and questions mixing with old feelings that were not as forgotten as he’d thought. Byran paced to the stairs wanting to talk to her, then turned and headed to the dining room, suddenly wanting his wine as he feared her answers. He stopped in between, running his fingers through his hair.
Derrick watched him without a word or change to his stone-faced expression. Which fueled Byran’s uncertainty. He cared little what Derrick would think if he followed Arinna to her chamb
er to speak to her before she slept. Derrick had watched him follow enough women. But why Derrick had invited her ate at him. Potential plots and subplots clouded Byran’s mind until he shoved it all aside. He didn’t believe the worst of what he imagined of either of his friends, no matter their hidden secrets. Which left him simply not knowing what was going on and too tired to find out.
“There is nothing for it then. I’m going to turn in myself,” Byran said.
He felt Derrick’s eye on him as he walked up the stairs and turned in the opposite direction Arinna had taken, heading toward his long granted chambers in Kesmere.
“Sleep well, my friend.”
Derrick’s words echoed off the vaulted ceiling of the foyer, the emphasis falling on sleep. Byran lifted a hand in a brief wave of acknowledgement, not pausing his stride. He fell asleep dreaming of Arinna in his arms, and not entirely certain why he’d not gone to her room.
He woke knowing Arinna meant to leave again. As she had so many years before when the Grey Guard fell. It was his only thought, and he fought with his pants and shirt while heading out of his bedchamber door, uncaring about decorum or discretion. His wild race down the stairs halted abruptly when he saw movement in the front salon.
Arinna sat curled on a settee under a series of windows. Byran’s heart skipped a beat. The doubts of the night before disappeared. No matter he didn’t know her motivations, she wouldn’t have stayed if she’d something to hide.
For a moment, they stared at the other. Then Arinna shifted her feet to make room for Byran next to her. For all of his rush, Byran walked across the room to join her feeling as if time were infinite. He took her hand as he sat down.
“You stayed,” he said, voice roughened by more than morning disuse.
After the War: Military Dystopian Thriller (Friends of my Enemy Book 2) Page 2