“Do you think someone saw us last night?” Daisy asked, her belly clenching and cramping in protest.
He shook his head. “I cannot say for sure, but though we were a bit… scandalous, it wasn't a sin.” He rattled around the kitchen, gathering cups and distracting himself as he talked in a thoughtful, detached way. “Besides, whoever did this had to find Stormcloud, butcher him, wash away and preserve the blood, and throw it. This was not an impulse based on our liaison last night. It required weeks of planning.”
“That's even more confusing,” Daisy protested. “What sin have we ever committed to warrant such a…a…”
“I know,” Colin agreed. “Words fail. I've been too damned busy to get into any trouble in years, and this seems harsh for the few curse words I might have said.”
“Maybe it was meant for me?” Daisy suggested. “I've brought some Pagan ideas. I know not everyone approved.” She thought for a minute, chasing a forgotten crumb over the wood of the table with her fingertip. “No, that doesn't make sense. No one from here would have had the time or opportunity to go back to my village and find your horse and…” She trailed off.
Colin poured the tea into cups and carried them, altogether forgetting saucers, to the table, handing one to Daisy.
She drew a deep, tea-scented lungful of air. “It might have been my father, or John Orville, or both of them. They'd think me a sinner for thwarting their plans.”
Colin sank to a seat beside Daisy and let the warmth from his teacup wash up over his face. “That's possible. It makes more sense than anything else, I suppose. They were there. Your father saw the horse. Housed him. They must have discovered where my estate was—who I am—and made their way here. That might explain why they didn't attack immediately.”
“And Orville enjoys throwing things. He always has loved sport.” She shuddered.
“Do you mean to say,” Colin demanded, thunderstruck, “that you think he's the rock-throwing bastard we've been hunting all summer?”
“It fits,” Daisy admitted. “It also makes sense why so much time goes by between incidents. He can't just loiter in the woods for weeks on end, can he? He has to go home so people don't notice. But, Colin, isn't that obvious? How could two lunatics be hovering around us?”
“It's the shock, Daisy. We're neither of us thinking straight.” Colin sipped his tea and winced. “Ugh, that's strong.” Colin's hand began shaking so hard the poorly brewed tea sloshed onto the table. Daisy tugged the cup away and set it down before any damage could be done. Then she hauled her husband into her arms. “Poor old boy. That's not what I wanted for him.” His voice shook as hard as his hand.
“I know, love,” Daisy whispered. “It's vile. Poor old Stormcloud.”
“He didn't deserve it. He worked hard for us for so long.”
“I know, love. I know.” She ran her hand up and down his back. “I'm so sorry. Sometimes, I wonder if you don't regret ever meeting me. Look at the mess, and it's most likely someone from my past.”
“No!” Colin lifted his head from her chest and met her eyes squarely. “Nothing could make me regret you, Daisy. I had forgotten how to live. How to want things for myself. I had forgotten love. I was only existing, had been for years. Now, with you here, I feel alive again. Whoever did this to my poor horse will pay, but I'm not a fool. I know it wasn't you. I love you.” He kissed her hard. His lips compressed hers again and again.
Daisy clung to him, revulsion and fear making her feel vulnerable.
Colin, it seemed, felt the same. He trembled in Daisy's arms.
And why not? He's already in the habit of holding himself accountable for everyone's wellbeing. This poor creature was in his care, and now it's… Her mind veered away, just as a loud pounding sounded at the opposite door.
Daisy screeched in surprise, a startled yip, and covered her mouth with one hand.
Colin tugged her to her feet. “Stay behind me.”
The knock sounded again, louder than before. Daisy's heart began slamming against her chest with equal force. “Who could it be?”
“I don't know,” Colin replied, his voice grim. He hesitated before opening the door a crack and peeked out… and then threw the door wide. “Good morning, Bullock.”
“Good morning, my lord. Sorry to intrude, but… something has happened.”
“Something more?” Daisy squeaked. Though she hated sounding so foolish, she couldn't control her voice.
“More than what, my lady?” Bullock demanded. “We came to see if Lord Gelroy was going to be joining us in the field, and there's…” He shuddered and broke off.
“An unholy mess on the step?” Colin suggested. “Yes, we saw.” He swallowed so hard, Daisy could feel it.
“Was that Stormcloud, my lord?”
Colin nodded. “I think so. Are the other animals well? Is Pesadilla safe?”
“I haven't noticed anything wrong with any of the herd, and the geese are honking away. Pesadilla is kicking up a terrible fuss in the pasture, but I didn't see any sign of injuries on him.”
“He must sense something is wrong,” Colin said.
“My lord, I really think we ought to invest in a guard dog. Whoever did this has been creeping around the estate for months, and we can't find him. It's not safe for us or the children or the animals.”
“I agree,” Colin replied. “We'll do it as soon as possible. Today, if we can. Meanwhile, we need to tend to the animals and then search the woods again. Dog or no dog, I want to find this beast and eject him from the estate.”
“Wait!” Daisy protested from behind Colin. “What am I going to do? This person has approached the house twice. I won't feel safe in here alone.”
“Good point. Um, love, you're in your nightdress. Could you…”
“No,” Daisy said firmly. “I apologize for my appearance, Mr. Bullock, but I will not go back into the house alone. Not today.”
“Understood, my lady.” Bullock turned his gaze to the shrubbery outside the door and studied it with more interest than it warranted.
“We do need to think of a way to keep the women and children safe,” Colin agreed.
“My lady, if you wanted to come to my home, you'd be welcome. Yours is still a bit bigger, but I can understand why you'd feel unsafe.”
“But that's no better,” Daisy protested. “If I go to your home, whoever is after me will be drawn to your wife and children.”
“Jones can stay with you all. He was in the army before he came home to the farm, and he's a crack shot. Give the lad a rifle and you'll be safe enough.”
Daisy nodded. “I hope you gentlemen can spare my husband another few minutes so I can dress and gather my wallpaper materials.”
“Good idea,” Colin agreed. “It will give the lot of you something more pleasant to think about. Taking precautions is all well and good, but there's no need to ruminate.”
Daisy shuddered. “I hope I'll be able.”
Colin squeezed her hand. “Bullock, please send Jones to your house and inform him of what's happening. I'll be along shortly.”
“Very good, my lord,” Bullock replied.
“Come along, love,” Colin said, turning to Daisy. “Let's get you into a presentable condition and gather up your supplies.”
“I'm afraid,” she admitted. “This person terrifies me. What if it really is Orville? He must think himself a jilted suitor, even though I never accepted his suit. And he's always been violent and unstable.”
“I agree he's the most likely suspect, and he's trying to make you afraid. Make both of us afraid, actually. Try not to fret, darling. If I catch him on my property, he'll learn a lesson he won't soon forget about who belongs to whom. His rocks won't help him then.”
They entered the bedroom, and the sight of the unmade bed, rumpled after a long night of passion, clashed terribly with the morning's troubles. Daisy shook her head. “How can we ever relax enough to enjoy ourselves again?”
“We will,” Colin vowed. “I promise
we'll find a way. Besides, I don't plan to let Orville—or whoever it is—lurk on the estate forever. Just as Bullock suggested, we'll be getting a guard dog, and with its help, we'll be sure to find his hiding place in no time. Be strong, Daisy. A few days at most, and we'll send this miscreant running. He won't return.”
“No offense, darling, but… you said that before, and instead of running, he escalated.”
“I cannot deny it,” Colin replied honestly. “I have never seen someone so determined to cause mischief.”
She paused, turning away from the wardrobe to level a sour look at her husband.
“Cause terror and pain,” he corrected himself.
She nodded, tugging a fresh pair of bloomers over her hips.
Colin had become distracted, staring at her bare breasts.
“Is this really the moment?” she asked, dragging out a chemise and covering herself.
He groaned. “Can I help it if I desire you? You've worked hard enough at ensuring it. I'm not going to tumble you to the bed, love, but I won't apologize for looking.”
“You should be looking at the window,” Daisy pointed out. She tugged on a simple black dress and ran her fingers through her tousled golden hair. “I had hoped to bathe. Now, I will smell like a campfire—and you—for who knows how long. I hope the Bullocks don't get upset.”
“Upset? Unlikely. Bullock and his wife are no fools. They'll understand. They'll tease, but they'll understand.”
Daisy felt her face growing hot, first with embarrassment, and then with anger. “This beast. After all you've struggled through. All we've overcome… as a community, to insert himself and cause trouble, just when we were all starting to feel happy and hopeful… it makes me so angry!” Daisy's voice cracked.
Colin crossed the room in three long-legged strides and dragged her into his arms. His embrace shattered her, and a ragged sob broke from her throat. He didn't speak, merely ran his hand up and down her back. A subtle movement revealed him buttoning up the back of her dress.
“We'll find that happiness again, love. Somehow, we will banish this interloper and continue making a normal life for ourselves. I promise.”
Daisy nodded against Colin's shoulder.
“Wash your face, love. We have a busy day ahead.”
* * *
“What's that you're painting, my lady?” Jones asked, peering over Daisy's shoulder at the table-sized sheet of wallpaper she was stenciling.
“It's a flower,” she replied, leaning aside so the young man could see the stylized arrangement of petals she was dabbing over and over with blue paint. The pale blue background complimented the shade, creating a subtle pattern that would look lovely in a nursery. “It's wallpaper,” she added, noticing he still looked puzzled.
“How do you hang that?”
“With glue,” she replied.
“In small sheets? Isn't that a lot of seams?”
Daisy set her brush in a cup and turned to look at Jones, noticing that while his hair had grown into a wild, overlong mess of curls, it looked healthier, shinier, and he'd put on weight since their first meeting. “It is,” she agreed. “How do you know so much about wallpaper and seams?”
“I helped hang some. Back before I came home to work on the estate in my father's stead, I tried my hand as a footman in London. They needed someone strong with good balance to help with the task, so I did. I didn't care for the smell of the glue, though. Made me dizzy.”
“Some of them are very harsh,” Daisy agreed, glad for the idle conversation that distracted her from cloaked figures who threw rocks at people for sport and butchered helpless old horses. It must be Orville. Who else would care? Who else would have the vindictiveness and lack of moral fiber to do such things? The horse part does seem beyond his creative abilities, though.
“Wouldn't a bigger sheet need fewer seams?” Jones suggested. “Maybe so you only need two to reach from floor to ceiling in a regular-sized room?”
“That would be better in many ways,” Daisy agreed, shaking herself back to reality, “but I cannot handle a frame that large. I would also need a huge table to lay the paper out on.”
“Both a frame and paper could be handled by someone else,” he pointed out.
“Are you offering?”
“If there's any profit in it,” he replied. “I don't mind plowing and planting, but all these geese are… well… they're geese, if you know what I mean, ma'am.”
“I do indeed.” Daisy turned back to her work, dabbing more blue paint through the stencil onto the homemade paper. “In the town where I grew up, one family trained a goose to be extra aggressive. She was better than a dog for protecting the family property. Not an amusing animal to live near.”
“Most assuredly not,” Jones replied. “You know, these flowers would look nicer with yellow centers. Do you mind?”
“No, that's fine,” Daisy replied, stepping away from where the young man had claimed a small brush, absconded with the yellow paint from Katie's spot on the floor of her family's home and begun to dab a tiny, brilliant dot in the center of each forget-me-not.
Moving toward Katie, Daisy saw that she had created a pattern of foxes running and playing among thick rows of green shrubbery.
“Beautiful,” she said. “I love that.”
Katie looked up and grinned.
“If these sell as well as I think they will, we'll be able to hire you a tutor before you know it. Do you fancy being a famous artist now that you've had time to think about it?”
Katie blushed. “I would like that,” she whispered.
Daisy grinned. There's so much opportunity to do good here. As if I'd ever want to leave. These are my people now too.
“Lunch!” Mrs. Bullock announced, entering the space with a hot pot gripped with two towels. “Can we set that wallpaper aside so we can eat?”
“Let's!” Bobby shouted, struggling to his feet and carrying his sheet of paper to the window. He looked out. “My lady, your husband is coming this way!”
Daisy rose slowly. Her body felt a bit weak and sore, whether from the strain or from the intemperate way she and Colin had been exploring their sexuality, she didn't know. Perhaps all of it. Or perhaps the confused mixture of the two. What a painful contrast—to fall in love with my perfect match while in fear of an ill-intentioned intruder.
A moment later, Bullock strode through the door into his home, Colin on his heels. Daisy ran to him but then, she paused, feeling shy. Colin took hold of her arm in a proper, public manner and looped it around his, gently squeezing to add affection to the touch.
“What did you find?” she asked.
Bullock shook his head. “Nothing, my lady. I don't know where this fool is holing up, but there's nothing more useful in the woods than footprints and a few displaced leaves. No camp. No trails. It's like… like he's a ghost.”
“Ghosts might pop up and look scary,” Daisy said darkly, “but they haven't the wherewithal to throw rocks, let alone…” She shot her husband a glance. “Let alone butcher a whole horse.”
Colin closed his eyes briefly before continuing with the practical. “Somehow, this fellow has found a hiding place, near enough to creep in and harass us, but not actually on the estate.”
“The village?” Daisy suggested, referring to the small settlement a couple of miles down the road.
“Seems as good a guess as any,” Colin replied. “We'll be heading that way after lunch to see if anyone has a dog to help us guard the animals.”
“May I go with you?” Daisy asked. “I need ink to outline my design, and we need some sewing fabric. Your trousers are too ragged to patch.”
“We need ammunition for our rifles as well,” Colin added grimly. “I never thought we'd be fighting in our own home.”
Shame pricked at Daisy's conscience again. They were well on their way to recovery without me, but if I hadn't come, would all this be happening? She swallowed hard against a lump in her throat.
Ignoring custom, Colin
dragged Daisy into his arms, hugging her. “It's not your fault. Anyone who would take the loss of someone who didn't like them and had repeatedly refused their suit with such violent rancor has clearly gone mad. If you had stayed, been assaulted and forced into an unwanted marriage, do you really think that would be better?”
“For you,” she mumbled.
Colin tucked a knuckle under her chin and lifted her head. Their eyes met. “Not a chance, love. Not a single chance. I regret poor old Stormcloud's end. He didn't deserve that, but you didn't do it. You didn't ask for it. You didn't promise that man anything. If he made himself insane with disappointment because he couldn't control you, that's his fault, as are the consequences for the mad actions he's taken since then.”
“Don't forget,” Bullock cut in, “that we don't know for certain if it even is your former suiter, my lady. There is evidence to point in that direction, yes, but no proof. We won't know for sure until we find this man. And as Lord Gelroy said, even if it is he, you didn't cause it. We like having you here, Lady Gelroy.”
Daisy smiled a watery smile.
“Stay for lunch, my lord,” Mrs. Bullock suggested. “Afterwards, you and your wife can head to town.”
“That's a very kind offer, Mrs. Bullock,” Colin replied. “Are you sure there's enough, though? I would hate for anyone to go hungry on my account.”
“We will be fine,” Mrs. Bullock insisted. “It's mostly beans, and I needed to use them up in preparation for this year's crop. The vegetable gardens are doing so nicely, there will be plenty for winter.” She beamed. “Children, clear away the painting supplies and let's eat.”
The Bullock children jumped to obey, laying out their wallpaper squares around the floor to dry and capping the paint and ink bottles. Viscountess or no, Daisy helped set the table. Mrs. Bullock looked at her long and hard, and then shrugged and dipped a ladle into the soup. When the men stepped out of earshot to wash their hands, she whispered to Daisy, “Don't ever blame yourself, my lady. Some men are just stupid when it comes to women they think they own. What you've brought to us all is worth so much more. You're one of us now, and we love you.”
Colin's Conundrum: A Steamy 19th Century Romance (The Victorians Book 3) Page 19