“We came here with a task in mind. Are you trying to distract me?”
“That’s very possible. You are tense, and we need to approach this with a clear mind.”
“I find it difficult to wait here casually when so many things can go wrong tomorrow.”
“I plan on visiting Brother John today,” he said, which was news to her. “We didn’t come here to spend our time in leisure, but I do want some time alone with you before I leave.”
Amelia took off her bonnet and set it on the writing table by the window. She looked down at the courtyard. Huxley leaned against the wall at the front gate, hat tipped low over his brow, while he smoked a cigar. He would act as the first point of contact. As a guard to her if she left the inn.
“We already agreed I would attend the cabin with you. You cannot change the plan now that we are here.”
“That doesn’t mean I won’t try to convince you to stay behind. The thought of any danger coming to you pains me.”
“Brother John is no threat to me.”
“But Shauley is. And it is possible he is staying somewhere near that cabin. If he shows up again, he’ll likely be less forgiving, and if he wants to hurt me, he’ll go after you.”
“One worry at a time, love. We can’t assume the worst. Not yet. Because it’s like we are living in fear, allowing that man to rule our every action.”
Nick walked toward her—more like prowled and ready to pounce.
Amelia backed up. The back of her legs hit the desk, stalling any further escape.
“You have that look in your eyes,” she said, breathless from a mere glance. She wanted to pinch herself for being so easily distracted.
“What look is that?”
“The one telling me you want me in bed.”
He grinned and cocked an eyebrow. “It will prove to be a great distraction. It’ll take our minds off the more pressing issues occupying our thoughts.”
He came closer. She had nowhere to go, so she put her hand out to stall him, but all that did was draw him harder into her touch. She spread her hand over the firmness of his chest; her palm rested over his heartbeat.
“As long as you don’t use this as a distraction to leave me behind. I’ll never forgive you if you do.”
Nick pulled one of her gloves off and let it fall between them. “I wouldn’t think of it,” he said before sealing his mouth over hers.
True to his word, Amelia accompanied Nick to the cabin, though he did grumble about it for a while, hoping she would change her mind. When he realized her mind was made, he gave in to her request, and Huxley argued that she should stay behind until she firmly told him it wasn’t his choice.
His wife, a woman of her own mind, would not be deterred.
They’d taken their usual mounts from the stable hand, saddled, and rode off just after they’d had an early dinner. Huxley followed unobtrusively behind them as they rode deeper into the forest.
“Are you nervous?” Amelia asked him.
“No.” He was so close to finally facing his nightmares that he could taste it. And it tasted like victory.
Amelia was right; while revenge had been the only thing on his mind since the Murray lands had come up for sale, there was more happening here than that. He wasn’t an optimistic person, but Amelia made him want to adopt the positive outlook she had on everything.
His leg bumped into hers every now and again, reminding him that there were more important things than revenge. Like Amelia. Her love. Her beauty that shone so bright on the outside it dulled the image of every other women he’d ever known. It also dulled the ugliness that had always been a part of his life.
“Have I told you how much I love you?” he asked.
She gave him a shy smile and looked at him through lowered lashes.
“You can never say it too often. I love you more than I can ever put in words, which means I’ll just have to show you all the ways I love you every day,” she responded.
He stood in his stirrups and leaned toward her to kiss her on the lips. “If we were out riding for our own purpose, I’d haul you off that horse right now and take you on the ground.”
Her face flamed. “You can’t say such things. Huxley is close behind.”
“That’s the other reason I won’t do exactly that.”
“Nick.” She pointed toward a grouping of trees.
“You, there! Halt!” Nick sat hard in his saddle and shouted after Brother John. He dug his heels into his mount, speeding up his horse, so the old man didn’t try his disappearing act again.
He could hear the hooves of Amelia’s horse not far behind him.
“Mr. Riley.” John set his basket down on a tree stump raised out of the ground. “Ah, Mrs. Riley. It’s a pleasure to have your company again.”
“I’m not buying your act of contrition, old man,” Nick said before Amelia could respond.
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
“I asked you before, but you didn’t answer honestly. Do you remember me?”
Brother John looked at Amelia.
“She’s not going anywhere, monk. What you have to say can be said in her presence.”
A look of sadness washed over the old man’s expression. “I remember them all, don’t I?”
“Who are them all?” Nick asked.
“The boys. All of you.” His gaze glazed over and grew unfocused.
“Why do you still live here?”
John suddenly became attentive as he contemplated his answer. “The vicar’s the last one.”
“The last what?” Nick asked, confused.
“The last of the old parish. The last of those who used God’s name for evil.”
That was not the answer Nick had expected. “Where is he?”
“The vicar?”
Nick nodded; Amelia stayed silent at his side. “And Shauley,” he said.
“Shauley? You mean Michael? I haven’t seen him for some time. He used to sit with the vicar for hours at a time.”
“For what purpose?” Nick swung his leg over the horse and jumped off the animal. He wanted to be on even ground as he looked Brother John in the eye.
Brother John lifted his basket. “Walk an old man home, Mr. Riley. I think we have a lot to discuss.”
Nick held his horse’s reins up to Amelia, which she took without comment.
“I’ll humor you, but you better have the answers I need. I won’t play your games. Not another goddamn day of games from you and your followers.” Nick arched his arm in the direction from which he and Amelia had come. “I have men in the wood, ready to step in if something untoward should come about.”
“I will cause you and your wife no harm, Mr. Riley. On that you have my word.”
“Your word isn’t worth anything, Brother John. We both know what kind of man you are, what you participated in.”
“Do we?”
For the first time in years, that small comment had the ability to make Nick question himself and his motives. He shook the feeling off.
The old man picked up his basket and walked on, not waiting for Nick; he must have assumed Nick wasn’t far behind. They made it to the cabin in less than ten minutes. Amelia dismounted and let the horses graze.
“There’s a table around the back. Chairs too. Come, sit with me a while.” John approached Nick, coming close to whisper something. It took everything in Nick to stand still, to not recoil from the vileness this man represented in Nick’s nightmares. “You may not want your wife to hear what I have to say.”
“I will make that call if I have to; it’s not your decision to make.”
“As you wish.”
At the rustic wooden table, John pulled out the contents from his basket and picked through the berries, choosing which were good and bad. The bad he tossed toward his vegetable patch.
“Why didn’t you stop them that day they beat me?”
“Some wounds never heal, do they?” John’s blue gaze, while cloudy, seemed startlingly cle
ar for his age. And in the old man, Nick saw something of himself.
That couldn’t be right.
“I will not play guessing games with you.”
The monk held out his hand, motioning to the chair folded and leaning against the table. Nick opened it and settled himself into the seat.
“I was the same age you were when I first attended the vicarage school.”
“Do you want my sympathy?”
“We wear the same scars, Mr. Riley.”
“Do we? To which scars do you refer? Because I carry more than one kind.”
“We all do. But I’m referring to the ones across your back.”
Nick tensed.
“I see disbelief in your expression. Mrs. Riley,” John said in a louder voice, drawing Amelia’s attention, “would you mind walking around the front of the house for a few minutes? I have something of a personal nature to show your husband.”
She hesitated.
“Give us three minutes,” Nick said, and after she nodded her agreement and turned around as asked, he continued. “What is it you have to show me, Brother John?”
As nimble as a man much younger than the age he wore on his face, John pulled his habit straight over his head and turned around. Nick’s jaw cracked, but he made no other sound to give away what he was feeling. Hell, he didn’t know what he felt, other than a strange kinship that seemed wrong.
The scars on John’s back were similar to his own. But that did not make their hardships the same.
“You can cover yourself,” Nick said, looking away from the sight that was so familiar to him. John pulled his habit back on and tied the rope around his waist. “If you were a student like me, why did you allow the others to degrade the boys? To act the way they did without taking action against it?”
“I tried. On more than one occasion. It was no use. Their treatment escalated into something far more depraved. So instead, I focused on dividing the rectory, destroying it from within. It took years, but I accomplished it with the help of the other student with whom you attended.”
Shauley. That was the last thing Nick expected to hear, and he was sure his face showed that astonishment. “If Shauley is the good guy, why is he hiding in the background, doing all sorts of misdeeds to get his point across and to achieve his revenge in whatever form it is he seeks?”
“I can only tell you what I know of his character from the school.”
“What does he speak of with the vicar?”
“That I do not know. Their conversations are private, and it is not my place to pry.”
“Can you tell me why you live here with the vicar?”
“I have taken away all his luxuries. Removed him from the comforts of the life to which he’d grown accustomed. I have forced him to live by the hand of God. It should be no burden to a man of his faith, but every day he struggles. Every day he atones in self-hatred.”
“None of this excuses you from the fact that you failed to protect the young men who entered that school. You should have tried harder.”
“It does not. But I have prayed every day that they have all found their way in life, that they have pulled themselves up and made something important of their lives.”
“I want to see the vicar.”
“Of course.”
Brother John led him around the house and opened the door to the cabin. It was dark and musty inside. Nick looked at Amelia. She came toward him and took his hand in hers.
“Do you want me to go inside with you?” she asked.
“I need to do this myself.”
“I’ll be out here with Huxley.” Huxley leaned against the fence that surrounded the vegetable patch. Close enough to assist, far enough to give them privacy.
Nick kissed his wife on the mouth and left her in the front of the cabin.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Faced with the devil himself, Nick found he was at a loss for words. The man he had built up into a grand monster and whom he feared most of his life had been reduced to a husk of a human being over the years.
Looking at the old man in front of him, Nick saw what happened to a man who was full of bitterness.
Nick turned and looked at Brother John. “Can he hear me?”
“I can hear just fine,” the vicar said distastefully and rather obnoxiously. So his hearing wasn’t perfect, but he could make out Nick’s words well enough. “What is it you want?”
Brother John nodded and motioned for Nick to continue. Nick turned to stare in shock at the aged man before him. He was no longer the monster Nick had built him up to be, only a man broken by the life he led, by the hatred that made his soul as black as tar.
The vicar coughed, the sound like that of a dog with a broken voice. From his lap, he lifted a ragged handkerchief to cover his mouth. The yellow, threadbare linen came away bloody.
“Get on with it,” he said when his coughing fit subsided. “It’s too late in the day for visitors. I need to rest.” He made a shooing motion with his hands. Nick stood firmly planted to the dirt floor.
Nick studied the interior with new eyes. Indeed, this was back to God, living from what the land provided. No amenities, no luxuries that new houses provided. The bare necessities of life were all that existed here.
“I’ve hated you most of my life,” Nick said, stepping farther into the room.
The vicar turned his head up and glared at him. The man that had frightened Nick as a boy still lurked in that cloudy gaze.
“Who in hell are you?” he said, coughing again.
Nick shook his head, more for himself than for the benefit of the vicar. “I want to say I’m too late, but really, I’m just glad to see you reduced to this half life and pitiful existence.”
“Do I know you? Where’s Michael? Michael!” the vicar shouted.
“He’s not here to help you. And when I do get my hands on him, he’ll be hanged. I once thought it would give me great pleasure to turn you over to the authorities, to have you arrested for sodomy. For the indecencies and your depravity. But now . . . now I want you to live out your life. Or what’s left of it. It looks to be a painful end for you, old man.”
The vicar grunted. Nick looked around the small cabin again, saying good-bye to his hatred, his need for retribution. None of it mattered anymore in the face of death. He shook his head and laughed quietly to himself before turning his back on his past and stepping out into the light, where Amelia waited for him, twisting her gloved hands together.
She didn’t say anything and a look of puzzlement robbed her expression when she saw his smile. “Is everything all right?” she asked.
“Yes.” He pulled Amelia into his arms and held on to her for dear life, squeezing the breath out of her as he did so.
“Nick, what is this?”
“This is the close of one chapter in my old life and the opening of a new one into ours.”
Amelia pressed her elbows into his chest and leaned back to look at him. “The vicar?”
“Is nothing and no one to hold sway over me for a moment longer. He is someone I created to be larger than life. A boy’s nightmare that grew into something alive. I realize now that while my hate was fruitless, it made me into the man I am. Had I not become this person you see before you, our paths might never have crossed.”
“Oh, Nick.” Amelia’s eyes filled with tears. “What about the things he did to you and the other boys?”
“We forgive, and we move on. Is that what you told me? If we don’t”—he motioned to the tiny clearing around the cabin—“we become this. The vicar is short for this life, and when he goes, I like to believe Lucifer himself will collect the vicar’s soul for eternal damnation.”
Nick rubbed his thumb along her cheek, catching the first fall of tears. All the hate and need for revenge was gone. Miraculously gone. The only thing he felt right now was his love for her. And that truly was all that mattered.
The pounding of horses’ hooves reached their ears long before anyone could see who rode
toward them.
Nick set Amelia behind him; Huxley lifted the back of his jacket and pulled out a pistol he had hidden there. Nick was too far from his saddlebags to pull out his weapon, but he reached into his boot and pulled out a steel folding knife he had carried when he was popular in the fighting rings. The thugs that would come after him . . . they were no match against his brute strength and his precise aim; the same went for the rider coming in on them fast.
At this point, his presence should have been no surprise.
Shauley.
“Shit,” Nick muttered under his breath. Nick didn’t think it was a coincidence that Shauley happened to show up on the day Nick arrived in Highgate. He turned to Brother John. “How did you send word to him we were here?”
“I have no way of contacting Mr. Shauley. He likely followed you from London.”
Nick couldn’t fault the monk on what might very well be the truth. Damn it. Shauley had been at their backs this whole time.
Huxley spit on the ground and shrugged his shoulders. The man was a born and bred fighter and the chance of Shauley’s putting one over on either Huxley or Nick was unlikely. The shot to Nick’s shoulder was a fluke and because Nick had least expected that kind of reaction from Shauley.
This time, he was prepared for anything.
Shauley’s horse skidded to a stop, legs dancing as it kicked up dust.
“I always knew you could never trust the word of a woman,” Shauley said. “A shame you didn’t listen, Mrs. Riley.”
Amelia didn’t respond, for which Nick was thankful. The less either of them said to set off Shauley the better they would all fare. While Nick was armed and ready to fight, Shauley had come prepared with his pistol again.
“I should have aimed better, Nick. You’re up and about far too soon for the injury I caused you.”
“Why did you want to keep me from here?”
“Can’t you guess?”
“The vicar is an old man. What purpose do you have for seeing to his needs, for visiting him at all?”
“He is the only person who sees me exactly as I am.”
“And what of your employer?”
“A means to keep connected to this part of the country. You took that away from me. You took everything away from me.”
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