Temptation & Twilight

by Charlotte Featherstone

  “What a remarkable nose you have, Lizzy.” He squeezed her hand. “But let us not dally here. My senses tell me that someone might be on their way back to this spot, and we do not want to be discovered.” He led her away from the tools Jack had found. Their progression was slow, and Julian’s gait was funny.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  “Covering our tracks. We don’t want anyone following our path.”

  Shivering, Lizzy whispered, “I feel like someone has just walked over my grave.” Ominous. Disturbing. And so very, very real.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  “YOU WILL SEND WORD around if you need anything? Anything at all.”

  Elizabeth felt herself smiling faintly at the urgency she heard in Black’s voice. He was determined to win, and she was just as determined that he wouldn’t, despite the fact she was weary tonight. It had been a long day, what with the morning at Temple Church and the afternoon with Adrian and Lucy. Lizzy had been distracted during the wedding, thinking of those strange moments in the crypt when she had felt another there with them…watching. Waiting. Her thoughts had travelled back and forth, from the strange notion that someone had been digging in the crypt, to Julian’s kiss and the confession she had made.

  She had not expected herself to admit the truth to either Julian or herself about her feelings. She most certainly had not thought that Iain Sinclair owned anything of hers anymore, least of all her heart. But that realization had come swiftly, a most unwelcome one. She knew that Iain did still have her heart. If he didn’t, if he truly meant nothing to her, as she professed, then what he did, what he had offered in her bedchamber when he had held her in his arms, would not have tempted her so much, or haunted her. If she felt nothing for Iain, Julian’s kiss would have affected her much more profoundly.

  Yes. It was the truth. Despite his actions, his appall- ing behaviour, his abandonment, the devil still owned her heart, and most likely her soul. It was a realization that at once astounded her and terrified her. One thing that had come out of her long contemplation was that Iain must never learn the truth. He must never know, or have that power over her.

  “Lizzy?”

  The deep voice pulled her from her worries. “Yes, yes of course, I will. You know I will let you know if I need you, Black.”

  “Have a care, Elizabeth, and make certain the servants double-check that all the windows are locked, and all the doors. We cannot be too careful.”

  “I will. You may rest easy about leaving me tonight.” Black released a long sigh. “I really wish you would reconsider our offer, and come stay with Bella and me.”

  “I will be fine here. This is my home. Really, there is no need for worry.”

  “You’re all alone.”

  “I have two dozen servants to share this house with!” she said with a laugh.

  “I don’t like this, Elizabeth. You should be coming home with us. Really, I should demand it.” Elizabeth heard the crinkle of Isabella’s taffeta gown brushing against the marble floor. “My love, don’t be a pest,” she chastised her husband. “Lizzy will be perfectly safe here. Besides, we will be calling on each other daily, won’t we, Elizabeth?”

  “Indeed we shall. See now, Lord Black, I will be perfectly fine. I’ve never been ill at ease with my own company, and rather relish the idea of having the house to myself.”

  There was a low grumble from the earl, followed by a little laugh from his wife. “Come now, off we go,” Isa- bella murmured, ushering him out. “Do sleep well, Lizzy, and expect me tomorrow afternoon. I wish to go to the new bookseller, and the confectioner’s. I have been wanting more of that chocolate he sells.”

  “Of course, tomorrow afternoon it is. Until then. Good night.”

  When the door closed behind them, Lizzy felt herself sag just a bit.

  “Looks like snow, my lady,” Charles murmured as he reached for her hand and placed her fingers on his forearm. “Grey as slate the sky is.”

  “Is it?” She thought of how she had told Julian it would snow. She wondered if he remembered, and if he was even now looking out at the sky, marvelling at her abilities.

  “Skies like that don’t bode well. Me mum says she can feel the snow coming, that her bones ache with it.

  And the rain, too.”

  “How interesting. I could smell the coming snow in the air yesterday. Your mother and I could be weather forecasters,” Lizzy teased.

  Charles laughed at her jest, then turned her and together they walked slowly down the hall to the salon.

  The house was very quiet, and Lizzy wondered how she would survive weeks of solitude, when she had become used to the bustle of the house in the past month or more.

  “I’ve prepared the hearth in the yellow salon, if that suits my lady.”

  “That will do very well, Charles. And tea, will you see that a tray is brought in?”

  “Indeed I shall.”

  She felt as if she needed something to revive her.

  Strange how she felt so out of sorts. It was Adrian’s wedding day and she should be happy for him. She was happy, in fact. Still, something didn’t feel quite right. It went beyond Sheldon’s kiss, and the discovery in the crypt. It was a restlessness, an inability to calm her thoughts, or even focus them. Perhaps it was the secret knowledge that she had thought that business with Iain all those years ago over and done with, only to learn that she had never forgotten him, or taken her heart back.

  “Here we go, miss. Shall I walk you to the settee?”

  “I can manage from here. Thank you, Charles.”

  “I’ll send Miss Maggie to you, then, shall I?”

  “No, don’t disturb her. Let her have a few more hours to herself. I will be quite happy here until I am ready to retire.”

  “Very good, miss.”

  The click of the door echoed in the quiet, and although Elizabeth could not see, she still closed her eyes and listened to the gentle crackle of the logs in the hearth, and the howl of the wind outside. Rubbing her arms, she listened to the sounds of life outside her window, the carriages rolling past, the clopping of horses’ hooves. The distant crow of blackbirds roosting in the leafless trees.

  A sense of calm seemed to settle over the house.

  Adrian and Lucy had been gone for hours now. Hopefully, they had already stopped at an inn and were warm and cozy, on this their wedding night. She also hoped that Lucy would soon realize, as Lizzy did, how perfect she and Adrian were together. She prayed they were not spending their wedding night apart, their pride ruling their actions. When they returned from Yorkshire, she expected to see two people very much in love, and very happy with one another. That had been her wish, that they soon realize how much they loved each other, as she pulled the wishing well charm, secured with its white string, from their wedding cake. Iain had pulled the heart, and she found herself wondering what he had wished for.

  It was just a silly custom, as old as time. The charms were a medieval amusement and did not really carry any special powers, or deliverance of wishes. And yet she knew that Iain had studied the charm, had closed his eyes and made his wish, and carefully wrapped the string around the heart and deposited the charm for safekeeping deep in his pocket.

  She had both Lucy and Isabella to thank for that visual, which they had very eagerly whispered to her.

  “You’ll miss them, won’t you?”

  Elizabeth jumped at the intrusion into her thoughts, and she found herself whirling in the direction of the voice. She did not need sight to know who stood before her.

  “Iain? But you left. Hours ago.”

  “I did. And now I am back.”

  “How?” Lizzy found herself frowning. “How in the world did you get in?” She knew for certain that he had not come in through the common route—the front door.

  “Ah, you forget I have had special training, thanks to the tutelage of my father.”

  Lizzy couldn’t help but arch her brows in annoyance.

  “It is not likely
Brethren Guardian training that assisted you in breaching my home, and more likely years of scal-ing walls to avoid irate husbands.” He chuckled, the sound dark and devilish to her ears.

  “You think me an unconscionable sinner?”

  “I don’t think you to be. I know you to be.” Folding her arms beneath her breasts, she glared. Whether it was in his direction or not, she did not particularly care. Her heart was beating far too fast for her comfort. It wel- comed him, the lure of his presence. It wanted him here.

  Traitorous organ. “What do you want?” There was a beat of silence, followed by the quiet movement of his footsteps across the room. “I thought we might share the evening together.”

  “Out of the question.”

  His voice was soft as a sensual whisper. “I wasn’t asking, Beth. I was informing you.”

  “What right have you to do such a thing?” she gasped.

  She was annoyed. Perturbed. Excited.

  The sound of his boots on the floorboards told her he was making his way slowly toward her, and her pulse skipped a beat.

  “Your brother gave me the right when he requested that I watch over you while he’s journeying on his honeymoon. I gave him my word I would protect you with my life. In the past, I haven’t been very good about honouring my word, Beth. But in this, I mean it. With every ounce of my being.”

  “You would pick this moment to turn honourable,” she grumbled. She was livid with Adrian for doing such a thing, and behind her back. But she could not condemn him for it. He was merely seeing to her safety. He was her brother, her loving brother. She knew that Adrian would have felt it his duty to set a plan in place for her well-being. And he would not have wanted to request it of Black, who had a new wife.

  The fates, it seemed, were conspiring to keep her in the presence of Alynwick.

  “Very well, you have seen to my safety. I am safe, as you can see. You may leave.”

  She was too addled to notice she could not smell him.

  He was standing right before her, a shadow of darkness, and she should have noticed his scent immediately. When he reached out and glided his fingers along her jaw, she jumped, surprised she had not realized just how close he was to her.

  “I’ll not leave you, not yet. I sense you do not really wish for solitude tonight.”

  “You’re wrong.”

  “I see it in your eyes. You miss them already, your brother, and Rosie.”

  Quickly, she glanced away. She did not want him looking at her blind eyes. And she wished he had not said Rosie’s name, for her eyes immediately began to well.

  She had not been without her pet for years, and knowing that Rosie was going to have her puppies without her own love and assistance tore at Lizzy’s heart. Rosie was more than a guide dog and a companion. She was a friend. A treasured friend. And a confidante. Elizabeth would be desolate during the nights without her.

  “Already you feel bereft, do you not?”

  “I would have liked to keep her here, but how…” She swallowed, tried to smother her feelings. “I can’t care for her in her time of need the way Adrian can—and he will see her well tended and comforted. I know that. It’s just that… Well, it was the only thing to be done.”

  “It’s never easy to do what is right by the one you love, is it?”

  His statement evoked so many feelings inside her; frightening, tumultuous feelings she didn’t dare give thought or voice to.

  “Ah, Beth,” he murmured as he wiped a traitorous tear from the corner of her eye. “No, you will not be alone tonight.”

  He brushed against her, reached for her hand and pulled her to the window that overlooked Grosvenor Square. Carefully, he placed her palm against the glass.

  It was frigid, the chill stinging her skin as he pressed his large hand overtop hers.

  “Let me take your mind off your worries, Beth. Just one night, let me stay.”

  “To talk,” she murmured. To stave off the loneliness…

  “Yes,” he replied, his voice deeply masculine, “to talk.”

  Oh, what a fool she was to allow such a thing. He was a dangerous man, always had been. Yet she could no more resist him now than she had all those years ago.

  “Night has blanketed the city, and with it, snow has begun to fall.”

  “Has it?” she asked in wonder. “I can hear the wind whipping itself into a howling frenzy, but the snow… I didn’t know.”

  “Would you care to see it, Beth?”

  “You know I can’t.”

  “I could show you a way.”

  Intrigued, she could not help but turn to him, to the sound of his voice in the quiet room. “How?” Reaching for her hand, he entwined his fingers with hers and led her from the room. In silence they made their way to the hall, where Hastings, the butler, awaited them.

  “Your coat, my lord. Lady Elizabeth, allow me to aid you with your cloak.”

  It was a matter of seconds and she was dressed warmly, her hair covered in a bonnet, the ribbons of which Iain had insisted upon tying himself. Then he was leading her through the kitchen, and the garden door, where only days ago the deceased body of Anastasia Lockwood had been found.

  “Hold on to my hand,” he ordered, and Elizabeth realized he did not wear any gloves. But he had taken care to help her put on hers. The knowledge made a warmth grow deep in her belly.

  “It’s slippery, Elizabeth. Your hand.” She had no choice but to obey him.

  Clutching his fingers tightly, Elizabeth followed him outside, gasping as a gust of wind caught at her bonnet, surprising her with its biting chill. The wind brought the first few flakes of snow against her cheeks, and she lifted her face, allowing the flakes to settle over her, and onto her eyelashes. She knew—could feel Iain’s gaze upon her, watching her with his dark blue eyes.

  “Can you feel them, Beth? The snowflakes?” She nodded, bit her lip at the pure enjoyment of such a childlike indulgence. “They’re melting on my lashes,” she said, smiling at the feeling.

  “How could they not?” he murmured as he brushed the wetness from her eyelashes. “Such an enticing place to flutter to, lie upon and melt.” She turned her head, averting her face. After last night in her room, she was much too weak, much too in danger of capitulating to a desire that he had awakened. Like a sleeping dragon, he had poked and prodded, and awakened the hungry beast inside her. She must keep her desire carefully tethered. She must.

  “Shall we walk to the bench? It’s beneath the trees, which may or may not protect us from the wind. But we could try it.”

  She should not be out here with him, but the lure was far too enticing. She relished the cold air, the feel of the snow. To know that night blanketed them, and that his world was almost— almost—as dark as hers.

  Iain helped her to sit on the bench. The snow was falling heavier now. She could smell it, circling, the wind carrying not only the flakes, but the scent of a winter storm. This was not going to be a light sprinkling of snow, but a blizzard that would blanket the earth in a white carpet. It would be the kind of storm that made one burrow beneath the bedcovers at night and listen to the howling winds in the darkness.

  “You always did love a good storm,” Iain said beside her. “A marvellous clapping thunderstorm, with streaks of angry lightning, or a terrifying blizzard.”

  “Yes.” And he used to sit with her, in the years before their affair and during it, and watch the storms with her.

  It had started to rain moments after he had left her lying in the grass upon his plaid blanket that afternoon years ago. She had lain there for what seemed like hours, her tears blending with the raindrops that soaked her prone form. She recalled the rumbling of thunder, the fierce flashes of lightning that forked over the rolling sea. She remembered how much hotter her tears were than the late-August raindrops.

  “I always loved to watch a storm blow in, too,” Iain mused. “Angry, volatile, Mother Nature unleashing her fury. So many times I would watch the sky and feel a kindred spirit
to her. Inside me, the same tempest brewed.

  The rolling darkness, the howling winds. You used to say that my expression could turn as black as a thun-dercloud.”

  Indeed, it could. He had been as wild and wicked and volatile as Mother Nature in a tempest. It had frightened many girls off, made many young men give him a wide berth. But not her. Somehow his volatile nature had only drawn her in. Once she realized that volatility led to other fierce passions, well, she had been consumed by the par-adox of him. She had wanted to save him, she thought, mentally laughing at the absurdity of it. A mere mortal did not hold off the storms, but succumbed to them. And Iain had succumbed to his.

  She knew they were storms created by his parents. He had talked of them, of the years of growing up cold and alone. She understood what living a solitary life could do to people. It changed them. Her life after Iain had been solitary. And most certainly, it had changed her.

  But they had never been solitary with one another. It had only ever been Iain that she had allowed to glimpse deep inside her. Only Iain she had talked to with open ease, and unguarded honesty. Despite what had happened between them, Elizabeth knew it had been the same for him. Iain had discovered how easy it was to share himself with her, and as a consequence, they had spent nearly as much time talking as they had making love. There had been more to them than the physical aspects of their relationship —much, much more. And that was why his betrayal had hurt so much. Why it had destroyed her. Had it been only sexual, she could have borne it, but it had become much more than that. It had become a union of friendship, and need, and kindred spirits.

  “This reminds me of sitting on the cliffs,” Iain said, drawing her to the present. “Watching a summer storm come in from the North Sea, you beside me, your hair blowing in the wind. I remember looking down at you, thinking you the most beautiful creature in the world.

  Your eyes were alive and sparkling, your skin flushed with the aftereffects of my lovemaking. I wanted you again, to slake the impending storm inside me. Only you, Beth, calmed the storms. The rage inside me. You still do. Even now there is peace stealing over me. Just sitting beside you, I can feel it, breathe easier. Think clearer.