Will dove for the pair of leather straps that cinched her tapestry bag, heaved it chest high and announced proudly, “I’ll be carryin’ it for you!”
Before anyone could stop him, Will turned on his heel and ran up the steps, disappearing through the massive double doors that stood open in anticipation of Isabelle’s arrival. Cook watched with dismay, shaking her head. “What will we do with that boy?”
“He means no harm, Miss.” Nellie stressed her h’s this time in a self conscious effort. She tapped a finger against her temple. “He’s tetched.”
Old Joe turned toward the entrance, following everyone else’s gaze. “’Twere the fire done it.”
Isabelle noticed another silent exchange between Nellie and Roger. “I’ll stable the horses,” he said, turning toward the carriage.
As if by some prearranged signal, the other servants moved toward the house. Isabelle started to follow them, then paused, momentarily overwhelmed by the sense that her life would never be the same once she crossed the threshold.
With a sigh, she continued, only to stop again after a few steps. A tickle of awareness rippled down the back of her neck and was gone, as if someone had lightly run a finger from her nape to her shoulder. Without reasoning why, she looked up toward a second story window in time to see a panel of heavy drapery fall gently back against its mate.
* * *
Jonathan stood before the window, staring at the sliver of light that showed through the curtains. Richard had betrayed him.
He cursed aloud, but the exercise only proved a tonic for his anger. The fact of his easy capitulation to Richard’s arguments left him with an aching fury for which there was no balm.
He hated Richard for persuading him to allow this stranger into his home. He hated himself for his ready surrender. Most of all, he hated her, for more reasons than he could name, not the least of which was his need of her help. His need only served to remind him of his many inadequacies.
A woman. It had never occurred to him that Richard would hire a woman to be his secretary. What would she think of the monster she was meant to serve? If she caught the merest glimpse of him, she would run from the house screaming. Fleeing—as beauty always must—the ugly, the malformed, the grotesque.
Of course, he had no way of knowing she was beautiful. Her hat had blocked the view of her face as he looked down from above. Yet had she been Medusa, whose hideous visage turned men to stone, she would be beautiful compared to him.
With an admirable instinct for self preservation, she must have sensed his presence. But when she turned to look up at the window where he stood, he had hidden behind the curtains, sacrificing the satisfaction of his curiosity for anonymity.
Coward. He was nothing but a coward. Were it not better to stand his ground, to let her confront the monster? Not to do so seemed a terrible deception.
He buried his face in his hands. Unbidden, the memory returned, one forever seared into the fabric of his mind. The moment against which his life was measured. Before. After.
As it had so many times, the terror of that night played out before him in vivid detail. The heavy linens slowing his frantic scrabble off the bed. The horrible knowledge that he could not escape. The flaming canopy, the bedpost crashing down on him. The hungry tongues of fire licking up his back, his arms, the half of his face not pinned against the bed.
The fire consumed his flesh, leaving in its wake a raw, screaming agony that paradoxically healed to form scars incapable of sensation. But his palms and the underside of his fingers had been spared, as had—how fortunate—one eye that could still shed tears.
A single teardrop fell against his palm. Jonathan held his hand in front of his face, watching in fascination as the tear forged a damp trail toward his wrist. He had thought he’d exhausted his tears long ago. Experimentally, he touched his tongue to his skin to taste the salt, as though one sense alone was not evidence enough to convince him of his self pity.
He couldn’t remember crying since his mother’s death. What was wrong with him?
Nothing. Everything.
He wished he had never been born.
Chapter Five
“This way, Miss. This here’s your room.”
Will motioned Isabelle toward the open door at the end of the passage, then darted inside when he saw she was following him. By the time she entered the room, he had already dropped her valise in the middle of the floor and was on his way out.
Isabelle gaped at her surroundings. There had to be a mistake.
“Wait.” She put a hand out to stop him, but it was too late. The boy had already vanished.
Standing in place, she turned a slow circle, taking it all in. This was a room fit for royalty, not hired help. Isabelle looked toward the door, expecting any moment for one of the others to appear and tell her where she was really meant to be.
Despite her misgivings, she ventured another step into the room, then another. Once, she had taken a cleaning job in one of the wealthy neighborhoods. Their father had disappeared on another of his binges and she and Jenny needed money for food and rent. She remembered how the lady of the house went on about taking care not to break any of her valuable bric a brac. Ahb zhay R, she had pretentiously called them, affecting a French accent. But this room . . . nothing in that lady’s house could compare.
Isabelle took another step forward, then looked down at her feet, worried she might be leaving dusty tracks on the carpet. It was thickly piled, woven in delicate shades of pink and green and buff, much nicer than any of the carpets she had seen in the wealthy lady’s house. In fact, she was beginning to grasp an entirely new understanding of what it meant to be wealthy.
But oh, the bed.
The bed was something a fairy tale princess might envy. A dusty rose pink damask covered the canopy. The rails were hung with matching bed curtains, yards and yards of the sumptuous fabric lavished on their manufacture with no apparent regard to cost. Moving closer, Isabelle saw the curtains were lined in red satin shot through with gold thread. The two colors should have clashed but were reconciled by the counterpane, which subtly echoed the color combination in extravagant drifts of embroidered roses.
Isabelle removed a glove and tentatively ran her palm over the satin counterpane. The soft feel of the cloth beneath her hand sent a shiver down her spine. Such indulgence—the sheer sensuality of it—seemed wanton and somehow sinful. She was tempted to lie across the bed and pretend herself a princess.
Such an outrageous thought. Isabelle glanced over her shoulder. What if someone came in now and saw her? The drab brown muslin of her dress sleeve against the costly bed covering mocked her boldness, putting her in her place as effectively as the wealthy woman’s orders had done. She lifted her hand, half expecting to see she’d left a dirty mark on the pristine bed covering.
Isabelle abruptly turned to face the door, expecting to see someone standing there, watching her. But she was still alone. No one had yet realized Will’s mistake.
Her faded valise sat in the center of the floor where Will had left it, conspicuously shabby amid the room’s elegant furnishings. The contrast shamed Isabelle, reminding her of the home she had left behind. Before, it had seemed merely humble. But now? Compared to this mansion, her family’s home was no better than a hovel.
Isabelle shoved the valise against the wall where it was less noticeable and set off in search of Nellie and Cook. They would show her to the servants’ quarters where she belonged. Isabelle retraced her steps to the foyer, then stopped, suddenly overwhelmed by the vastness of the place. She had no idea which direction to take.
She started walking, thinking it might be possible to lose her way entirely and wander lost for hours on end. The sound of voices soon reached her, however, and following her ear, Isabelle found the kitchen. Nellie and Cook were there, chatting pleasantly as Cook chopped vegetables and Nellie cleared dishes from a silver tray. They both stopped what they were doing when she entered the room.
“Getti
ng settled?” Cook asked.
Isabelle blushed, though why she should be embarrassed by Will’s mistake, she didn’t know. “About my room—”
“Hello, ladies. Need some help?” Roger came in through the garden door, doffing his cap as he did so. He turned to Isabelle with an explanation. “We all have to help each other out, Miss. There’s not enough of us to go around.”
Isabelle realized to her discomfort that she must have revealed her surprise at a man offering to help in the kitchen. Being new was bad enough in such a small and obviously tight knit group. Now they probably thought her a prig.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” Isabelle asked hopefully, trying to make amends.
Cook’s mouth turned down at the corners. She appeared displeased at Isabelle’s offer.
When Cook didn’t answer, Nellie spoke up. “You can help me set Mr. Nashe’s dinner tray.”
Cook returned to scrubbing potatoes, visibly relieved at not having to delegate duties to the new arrival. “You can fetch some more wood and stoke the stove, Roger,” she said.
Isabelle smiled gratefully at Nellie and moved beside her, waiting for instructions. “When does Mr. Nashe take his evening meal?”
“I wouldn’t call them proper meals,” Cook grumbled, with her back to them.
Roger chucked a piece of wood onto the fire, then shut the stove door. Coming up behind Cook, he rested his hands on her shoulders and planted a resounding kiss on her cheek.
“This is the lady who knows all about proper meals.” He looked up and winked at Nellie. “Proper everything else, I reckon.”
“Pshaw!” Cook swatted him away, unable to hide a pleased smile.
Nellie pretended not to notice Roger’s teasing. “I take him his tray at half seven.”
“Tray?” Isabelle asked. Hearing the word a second time, she realized the significance of what Nellie had said. “Is Mr. Nashe bed ridden?”
Cook twisted halfway round to look at her. “He likes his privacy, Miss. See you remember that if you want to be staying on here.”
Isabelle wasn’t certain if Cook had issued a warning or a reprimand. Mercifully, Old Joe entered the room just in time to spare her the necessity of answering.
“Won’t let nobody set eyes on him, if ’n he can help it,” Joe said.
Cook glared at him. “He’s a right.”
Will came up behind Joe, pushing ahead of him in order to get everyone’s attention. He hunched over, bugging his eyes out comically. “He’s the bogey man, Miss.” Will contorted his fingers and clawed at the air. “Rowrrr.”
Cook grabbed an empty skillet from its hook above the stove and swatted Will’s backside before he had a chance to dodge the blow. “Have some respect, young man!”
“Ow!” Will danced around, clutching at the seat of his pants.
“Get out of here,” Cook scolded. She waved the skillet in the air. “Make yourself useful before I take a mind to give you a real thrashing.”
Roger took Will’s arm and steered him out of harm’s way. “Come on, Will. Let’s fetch some more wood.”
“That boy will be the death of me.” Cook stood shaking her head, watching as Roger escorted Will out of the room.
In an obvious effort to restore the peace, Nellie changed the subject. “Tomorrow being Sunday, Roger drives us to the village church in the morning,” she told Isabelle. “Will you be coming with us?”
Isabelle thought of the last time she’d gone to church. It had been years ago. The pastor preached about the sins of the flesh, staring at her during the entire sermon. She still remembered the groups of girls who tittered as she walked by them, and their mothers, whispering behind her back just loud enough to be heard. Harlot and slut were two of the kinder epithets she had suffered.
“Not this week.” Isabelle floundered for an excuse. The last thing she wanted was to make a bad impression. “I’d like to have time to get used to my new surroundings before I start work on Monday.”
From his seat in the corner of the kitchen, Old Joe laughed out loud at her words. Isabelle was beginning to think he was demented.
Nellie ignored Joe. “Suit yourself.” She shrugged, then frowned and added sternly, “Just don’t go poking around upstairs. Mr. Nashe keeps the second floor to himself.”
Isabelle nodded. “I understand.”
But the truth of the matter was, she didn’t. Not at all.
Chapter Six
Isabelle sat up in bed with a gasp. The nightmare again. Or not so much a nightmare as a memory that came to her in her sleep, demanding to be let in, waking her with the sort of terror that sucked the breath from her lungs.
She lay staring into the darkness, afraid to close her eyes. Afraid to sleep. Afraid to dream. How many times had she relived the horror? The eyes behind the screen, watching her. The pain. Always, the pain. And the blood.
Over the past eight years, the nightmare came less and less frequently, until she had begun to hope that, eventually, she might be rid of it altogether. But it had become a nightly occurrence now, from the time she accepted the position as Mr. Nashe’s secretary. Her new fears had revived the old ones.
She told herself that once her surroundings grew more familiar, once she met her employer and learned the extent of her duties, then she would regain her peace of mind. The uncertainty frayed her nerves, that and the constant effort it required to conceal her distress. But if she had succeeded in hiding her feelings from Jenny all these years, she could surely hide them from these strangers for a few more days.
Isabelle’s stomach cramped with a sudden, burning twist of pain that doubled her over. She slid out of bed, nearly collapsing when her bare feet touched the floor. The pain wrung her guts again, coming in waves.
With one arm flung across her lower abdomen, she held the other out, groping her way through the dark room and down the hall to the water closet, where she shut herself inside, locking the bolt in place. A wan early morning light entered through the small square of frosted glass set in the outer wall. Isabelle looked down. Her nightdress was stained with blood.
The room spun wildly, as if she were the unmoving center around which the earth revolved. And hidden deep inside her, heavy as a stone, was the immovable shame that never left her. She closed her eyes. It took several minutes before the sensation subsided and she could open them again.
Isabelle lifted her nightdress and watched the thin rivulet of blood trailing down her inner thigh. Her monthly courses had begun, nothing more. But, for a moment, the sight brought it all back to her. The terror of that night, the pain, the blood.
Isabelle dropped to her knees, bent over the toilet basin, and vomited.
Chapter Seven
Jonathan got up from his desk and nervously paced the length of the room. It was well past mid morning and he had yet to have a coherent thought. Beneath the scar tissue, his back felt as if he wore a hair shirt, like those adopted by medieval penitents who counted their suffering for piety. Only his invisible garment rested directly against raw flesh, rendering an exquisite torture that the self castigating fanatics would have envied.
Residual memory, Richard had said, like the ghost limbs of amputees that register pain nonetheless. Brought on by fatigue or overwrought emotions, he said.
After the fire, they had excised the necrotic tissue left by the burns, down to the raw flesh. As his body regenerated, the healing introduced him to new levels of torment. The intense itching proved as bad as the pain of his injuries, nearly driving him to madness. Lest he forget, the sensation revisited him from time to time, and with it the longing, his desire for the only lover he had ever known.
Jonathan stopped in front of the locked cabinet and reached out to touch it, letting his fingers follow the grain of the wood in a tender caress. The contents of the glass vial hidden behind the door sang its siren melody: laudanum. The very name was music. Laudanum. Sweet freedom. Oblivion. Release.
He knew the siren’s promises. Knew them, too, for half
truths that promised comfort without warning of the price to be paid. At first, credit was freely extended, while the debt slowly accrued. But the day always came when the bill was called in and the addict was forced to pay, and pay again.
Knowing this, he still longed to rush into the siren’s arms whenever she called to him.
He turned away and paced the length of the room again. It had taken months—no, years to rid himself of the habit. And yet there were days, days like today, when the need came on him, the unbearable urge to succumb to the drug and let it take him beyond cares and memories.
Damn it. He had watched the others leave that morning. The group had been notable for her absence. She was here, in the house, and the knowledge ate at him, as maddening as the imaginary hair shirt digging at his flesh.
Richard did not understand. No one could understand what he feared. It was and would always be the same when someone saw him for the first time. The initial shock, the drawing back in disgust, eyes filled with revulsion, even hatred. Richard didn’t understand that if he avoided the rest of humanity, if he avoided their disgust, then at least theoretically, in an abstract sense, he was able to keep from hating all of mankind.
Theoretically.
He went to the window and stared out across the garden. It looked unseasonably warm for late March. How would it feel, he wondered, to walk freely in the bright sunlight without fear of being seen?
As if in answer to his question, she strolled into view. His heartbeat quickened. He almost drew back until he saw she appeared completely absorbed in her own thoughts. There was little chance she would sense his gaze on her, or look in his direction.
This time he indulged his curiosity and boldly studied her. She moved with a delicate grace that intrigued him, as though she sought to leave the least possible impression on the earth beneath her feet.
She changed direction, veering to her right toward the yew hedge that enclosed the rose garden. He caught a brief glimpse of her profile as she turned, before she disappeared around the corner of the hedge and once more thwarted his curiosity.
A Bed of Thorns and Roses Page 4