by Danice Allen
Alex smiled back. “A delicious thought, prompted, no doubt, by our mutual affinity for water.” They still lay atop the red silk counterpane, naked. Late afternoon shadows stretched across the room, dark and elongated. Alex’s hand moved from her shoulder, down her arm, and around to her breast. He cupped it and flicked the nipple softly, teasingly.
Beth gasped and closed her eyes. She never stopped marveling at how easily Alex excited her. “The time.”
“Hmmm?” His voice was lazily seductive.
“What time is it? Soon the house will be abuzz with people again. I ought to return to my room.”
She heard him sigh. “You’re right.” He removed his hand and pushed himself to a sitting position, peering across the shadowy room toward the mantel clock. “It’s nearly five o’clock. I wouldn’t be surprised if Sadie’s back, and Stibbs will be about the house by now. Dress quickly, love. I’ll dress, too, and before you leave, I’ll walk down to the end of the gallery to watch for people who might be coming up the stairs or down the hall.” He caught her chin between his thumb and forefinger, then kissed her lightly on the lips. “When I indicate that it’s safe, you may leave this room, but not before.”
“Of course, Alex,” she answered demurely. “I always do as you bid me, don’t I?”
He made a scoffing noise with a soft hiss of breath, swung his legs over the side of the bed, and stood up. For a minute Beth was unwilling to rise and scoop her own clothes off the floor to get dressed. It was too pleasurable watching Alex. Did he have the slightest notion how finely made he was? she wondered. His back was to her. He pulled his pantaloons up and over his slim flanks, then buttoned the waistband.
He looked over his shoulder, one brow raised, an amused, aroused tilt at the corner of his sensuous mouth. “Don’t look at me like that. You know we haven’t the time, or the privacy, anymore. Get dressed, Beth. I’m going to tell Zach about us tonight. There’ll be no more sneaking about the house for us, I promise you.”
“Well, I hope not,” Beth mumbled, scooting to the edge of the bed and dangling her feet above the dais. “I feel like a criminal. But I’d do it again, you know,” she finished bluntly.
“Yes, I do know it,” Alex answered wryly, buttoning his shirt. “All the more reason to come to the point with Zach.” Alex frowned. “How I wish he didn’t love you. How I wish I didn’t love him as I do!”
“And as / do,” Beth agreed with a shake of her head. Then she stood up and walked to the pile of clothes she’d heaped on the floor. She stooped to retrieve her shift and petticoat while Alex walked past her to the door.
“Look out into the hall in a minute or two and watch for my signal that all is clear, but do it carefully,” he said as he inserted the key in the lock and turned the knob. He opened the door just far enough to see through to the gallery beyond. Beth was directly behind him, in a straight visual line with the door. She and Alex saw Zach at the same moment. A glimpse of golden hair, a blue jacket, and curved fingers poised to rap on the door.
“Alex, I need to talk to you,” she heard him say, the tone of his voice indicating that he was very upset. Beth clutched her petticoat against her chest. Between the door casing and Alex’s jaw she had a narrow view of one of Zach’s eyes. It shifted slightly and fixed on her.
Time stood still. Beth knew the scene would be seared into her memory forever. Zach’s eye pinned her to the spot, paralyzing her, the very blood in her veins coagulating to the sluggish consistency of thick mud. Alex stood just as motionless, his broad, white-shirted back held rigid, his hand grasping the doorknob with taut-knuckled strength. The golden eye continued to stare, unblinking for what seemed an eternity but was probably a matter of seconds in actual passage of time. Then it narrowed and flashed with fiery emotion.
The door burst open, sending Alex staggering backwards. The door slammed against the wall and swung back, nearly closing again, but Zach had already stepped into the room. He shoved the door closed behind him with a tap of his heel and stood with his arms crossed and his legs spread. He and Alex were separated by perhaps three feet. Zach’s gaze slid back and forth between the two of them, then settled on Beth with her mussed hair, her nakedness barely concealed behind the flimsy wad of fabric she held against her.
Alex moved slightly, placing himself between Zach and Beth. “Don’t blame her, Zach. I—”
“Don’t try to explain,” Zach interrupted, much too calmly. Beth had imagined how he would look, what he’d say when he found out that she loved Alex and he loved her. But she had never imagined that his eyes could look like cold coins, hard and copper-colored, yet as dull as dross. “It’s perfectly obvious what’s been going on here.”
“There’s certainly more to it than you see, Zach,” Alex began in a reasoning tone.
“Undoubtedly,” Zach replied coolly. “Yet I suppose you require privacy for the ‘more’ that you refer to!”
“That’s not what I meant,” growled Alex. “I love her.”
Zach’s mouth twisted into a sneer. “How wonderful for you. When may I wish you happy?” He turned his chilling glare on Beth. “Were you going to wait to tell me on our wedding day, Beth, so that Alex could simply take my place at the altar? So much easier than canceling one wedding, then planning yet another! We don’t want to confuse our guests, do we? I can just hear them. ‘Now, which brother is it she’s marrying? Bloody hell, I just don’t know!’”
Beth felt her knees weakening. She backed away to the bed and sat down, pulling the silk counterpane about her, curling up like a wounded animal.
Alex watched her, his expression tortured, apologetic. Then he turned back to Zach. He raised his hands, palms up, in a supplicating gesture. “Cruel sarcasm is unnecessary, brother. Both Beth and I tried to resist the growing affection between us. We didn’t want to hurt you. We just—”
“I see how bloody much you tried to resist!” Zach spat, the dull copper of his eyes kindling to a fiery bronze. “And don’t call me brother again!” He raked a hand through his hair and took two quick steps to the side and back again. He flung out his arm and pointed at Alex. “As for trying not to hurt me, that’s goddamn decent of you. If you really didn’t want to hurt me, you’d damn well not have bedded my fiancée!”
“Zach, you mustn’t blame Alex.” Beth’s plea sounded as feeble as she felt. Then, deploring her henheartedness at a time when Alex most needed her support, she gathered all her courage. “I came to Alex’s room of my own accord. He did not ask me to come here. He did not want to make love, but I … coaxed him.”
For the first time, Zach’s hard-edged facade of control slipped. Betrayal and pain showed plainly on his strained features. He dropped his head into his hands and Beth’s heart ached for him. “I can’t help how I feel about Alex, Zach. I never meant to hurt you. I’m so sorry.”
Zach’s head reared up. “Don’t feel sorry for me. I ought to thank the infamous Wicked Wickham for coming to our dull little corner of England to expose you for what you are, Beth. A trollop!” Beth flinched. “Nothing but a trollop! And despite what I said before, if you think he’s got the slightest notion of marrying you, you’ve been pathetically misled.”
Alex stepped up to Zach and faced him squarely. In an even and icy tone, he said, “Apologize to Beth right now, Zachary, or I’ll—”
“What will you do?” Zach interrupted, glaring back at him and speaking just as icily. “Whatever it is, you might as well do it now because I’d sooner go to hell than apologize to her.”
Alex hit him. Zach seemed completely unprepared. The hard blow to his jaw sent him reeling backwards against the door and falling to the floor with an “Oomph!”
Beth was horrified. She pressed one hand against her mouth to keep from screaming. Zach sat there a moment, breathing hard, rubbing his jaw, the expression in his eyes fulminating with anger. Alex stood, stony and implacable, waiting. Zach twisted sideways and slid his shoulder up the wall as he slowly stood up.
There was a sof
t rap at the door. “Lord Roth? Lord Roth? Is everything all right?” It was Stibbs.
The intense glare between Alex and Zach never wavered. “Everything is just fine, Stibbs,” Alex called back in a perfectly ordinary voice. “Go away.”
“But, my lord—”
“Do not, under any inducement, open that door, Stibbs!” Alex warned him.
There was no response, and Beth could well imagine Stibbs’s irritated and unbelieving grimace as he hesitated on the other side of the door. The several other servants who might have gathered there as well would be all agog. She cared nothing about the resultant gossip if she should be discovered in Alex’s room in the middle of a brawl between two brothers, but she cared very much that neither of them get seriously hurt. She sent a desperate prayer heavenward that Zach would not try to avenge himself.
Her prayers went unheeded this time. Zach lunged forward, grabbing Alex about the waist and sending them both plummeting to the floor. Zach straddled Alex and lifted his fist in the air, ready to strike. Alex caught Zach’s arm midway and held it there. Zach grunted with frustration and grabbed Alex around the throat with his other hand.
Beth could hear Alex making little gasping chokes. He was pulling at Zach’s hand, trying to pry loose the strangling fingers. She rose up with the intention of throwing herself on Zach’s back to pull him off Alex, but just then Alex ripped Zach’s hand away. He rolled up from the floor and pushed Zach backwards, sending him in a tumble against the chiffonier. The porcelain figures shook and toppled, one of them clipping Zach’s ear on its descent to the floor where it crashed into small powdery pieces. Zach growled and reared up again, lurching toward Alex.
“Stop it!” Beth cried, unable to contain her terror any longer. “You’re going to hurt each other! Please stop!”
Beth’s cry must have given Stibbs the excuse he desired to enter the room. He came in, followed by Sadie. Two footmen stood gawking in at the door.
“Saints preserve us!” shrieked Sadie, plastering herself against the wall as the two brothers collided with the force of charging bulls. Stibbs stood back, too, apparently feeling unequal to putting an end to the quarrel. Beth could not blame him. The two men were large, strong, and very angry, though it was obvious to Beth that Alex was merely staving off Zach’s blows and not trying to execute any hits himself. Zach was wild, thrashing and struggling like a mad dog. It was evident, too, that Alex was the stronger man. She thanked God for that, because it seemed as though Zach did want to kill his older brother, and it would not have boded well for the outcome if he’d been the stronger of the two. Beth could only trust in Alex to end the fight before mortal wounds could be inflicted.
The men continued to struggle, their grunts and hissing oaths, the scrape of heavy furniture against the wood floor, and the smack and thud of flesh against flesh in desperate battle creating a terrifying cacophony that filled the room. It seemed endless. Beth pushed back a strand of hair that had fallen forward into her eyes and she realized that her cheeks were wet with tears. The sobs that added to the general discord were hers.
She had done this. She had brought about this dreadful fight because she could not stay away from Alex. Zach would have been angry and hurt when Alex told him about their affection for each other, but finding them together after they’d made love had infuriated him. He seemed so vicious and violent that she thought he must have been troubled already when he came to the door. She remembered his tone of voice. He had been upset about something even before he’d found them out.
Suddenly Dudley appeared at the door, and Beth had never been so relieved to see anyone in her life. Though Dudley was not a well-muscled man, he had influence with both brothers, and Beth thought he might be able to bring an end to the fight. His horrified gaze took in the scene with a sweeping glance.
Dudley looked at Beth, bundled up to the neck in the crimson counterpane, then at the two sweating men, clawing and staggering about the room, and came to the only logical conclusion: Zachary had caught Alex with Beth in a most compromising situation. It was inevitable, he supposed, that it would come to this.
Too bad, however, that Zach’s discovery of Beth’s and Alex’s love for each other had come so speedily on the heels of his interview with Tessy, and in such a cruelly obvious manner. Apparently the meeting with his pregnant mistress had not gone well. Otherwise Zach would not have returned so swiftly to Pencarrow in this blasted heat, actually arriving before Dudley, who’d had a bit of a head start. Subduing a twist of sympathy for poor Tessy, Dudley threw himself into the fray, seeing to the most pressing problem first.
“Stop it, both of you!” he yelled, keeping pace with them as they stumbled about the room, but taking care to avoid their flaying arms and jutting elbows. Neither of the men seemed to notice his presence.
Dudley took a deep breath and used the one weapon he hoped would be effective. “What would your mother say, I wonder? She would have given anything to have seen the two of you together through the past weeks, just as brothers should be. Now look at you! By God, Zachary, do you mean to kill him?”
The struggling stopped, but not all at once. Zachary just seemed to run down like a clock in need of winding. Then they stood together in the middle of the room, Zach’s fists full of Alex’s shirtfront, Alex’s hands braced against Zach’s forearms, both of them sucking in painful gulps of air.
Eye to eye, heart to heart, they stood, sweating, bleeding, staring, agonizing, repenting together. Zach’s eyes slid away, his fists uncurled, and his arms fell limp to his sides. Without a backward glance, he moved haltingly to the door, bumping against the frame and walking through the servants as if they weren’t even there.
After an awkward pause of deathly stillness, the observers of the shocking ordeal seemed to gather their wits about them and try to carry on in the manner expected of them. Sadie scolded the gawking servants and shut the door in their faces. Then she hurried to Beth and sat beside her on the bed, one arm thrown around her trembling shoulders.
Stibbs cleared his throat, announced that he would presently send a maid up to put the room in order, looked daggers at Alex, let his embarrassed gaze skitter past Beth, and left the room with as much offended dignity as he could muster. Dudley poured a glass of brandy for Alex and made him sit in a chair before allowing him to drink it.
“I’ll be askin’ ye to leave fer a few minutes, m’lord,” Sadie said after a moment, waiting just long enough for Alex to drink his brandy. “Miss Elizabeth needs to dress, and while I can’t help what went on before nor what will happen on the morrow, as long as I’m here, I’ll see that things is done proper like.”
Alex had been resting his forehead in his hand, his elbow propped on the arm of the chair. He lifted his head and fixed Sadie with a bone-weary gaze. A small trickle of blood oozed down his chin from a split lip, and one eye appeared to be forming a swelling bruise. “Of course, Sadie. I wouldn’t have it any other way.” Then his gaze shifted to Beth, and Dudley could see the pain and love reflected there in equal portions. “I’ll see you later, Beth. Don’t fret, my dear. All will be well in the end, I promise you.”
Despite Alex’s physical and spiritual depletion of energy, a fervor that made one believe that he meant exactly what he said underlay his words to Beth. It certainly engendered at least some hope and faith in Dudley’s doubting heart. He was worried about Zach now. Where had he gone? He looked toward the window that faced the back of the house and the road to St. Teath. He perceived a distant rider on a white horse—a woman, it appeared—but no Zachary. He turned and followed Alex from the room.
Sadie cluck-clucked and crooned in a soothing undertone as she helped Beth into her clothes, but Beth could not be comforted. While she’d sat on the bed, safe the whole time, it seemed as though she’d felt every blow and strangling grip that occurred during the fight. She was bloodied and bruised, not on the outside, but on the inside. Outwardly she was numb.
When Beth was finally dressed and her hair brushe
d into a respectable knot atop her head, Sadie seemed in a frantic hurry to get her out of Alex’s bedchamber, almost as though the room itself had some sort of defiling effect upon what was left of Beth’s virtue. In the hall they came upon Stibbs, who had been waiting with two maids in possession of brooms and mops for the room to be vacant. Beth stopped and addressed him. “Stibbs, where is Lord Roth?”
Stibbs’s upper lip lifted slightly. He stared at a point just beyond Beth’s left ear. “I believe Mr. Dudley took him directly to the stillroom to dress his injuries, miss.”
“And … Master Wickham?”
“He was seen mounting his horse and leaving through the southerly gate, miss.”
Beth sighed. It was like Zachary to run away. He had been avoiding responsibility all of his life. She had thought that his recent experience dealing with the tin mine incident had cured him of the habit of ignoring what he considered drudging or unpleasant or … painful. But then, she knew she ought not to judge too harshly. It must have been a dreadful blow to find her in Alex’s bedchamber.
“I think you’d best lie down fer a while, miss,” Sadie advised her, nudging her elbow as if trying to urge her on. Apparently Beth had been standing in the hall, staring at the wallpaper in a rather vacant way.
Beth straightened her shoulders from their despondent slump and made herself smile at Sadie. “I’m all right. I’m not tired. I’m going to the stillroom to check on Lord Roth.”
Sadie frowned. “Had ye ought to be hangin’ about that man, miss?”
Beth sobered. “You mustn’t think he did anything wrong, Sadie. Lord Roth and I are …” She knew not how to finish the sentence. She couldn’t say they were betrothed, because he hadn’t asked her. “He didn’t do anything that I didn’t fully encourage him to do,” she finished.
Sadie clamped her mouth shut tight, causing her lips to disappear into a prim horizontal line. “Shall I send fer yer mother, miss?”