by Jane Feather
“Look here, m’lord major, just look here!”
“What happened?”
“She wouldn’t listen. Never saw a lady with such a passion.”
Temple lifted a brow and smiled. “Indeed?”
“It’s Miss Peabody.”
The smile vanished. “Be careful of your language, Fidkin.”
Fidkin rubbed his red nose and began to commiserate with himself. “Won’t you feed my spaniel for me, she says. Dear Mr. Fidkin, she says. I must place this baby robin back in his nest, she says, and I don’t want Puck to miss his dinner.” Fidkin groaned and cradled his injured hand as though it were a terrible war wound. “How was I to know he don’t like nobody petting him while he’s at his dinner?”
“You petted that dog while he was eating? Fidkin, you’re addled. Let me see your hand.”
Temple unwrapped the thick wad of bandages, expecting to encounter blood. Layer after layer was removed without a spot of red on it. Finally, Temple revealed the wound. Fidkin had squeezed his eyes shut and turned his head away.
“Will I lose me hand?”
Regarding the small scrapes and nicks, Temple thrust Fidkin’s hand away. “You coward. He only nipped you.”
“I was bleeding! Miss Peabody had to take care o’ me herself. She give me a recipe for a poultice and—”
“Damn you! She goes about taking care of helpless creatures, and you take advantage of her sympathy. You’re not to exploit her too-soft heart. Do you hear me?”
Shaking his head, Temple turned his attention to his horse. The morning was fine. Just the sort of day Miss Peabody would like, excellent for hunting wounded or lost animals.
The day she arrived he’d sent word to Dr. Peabody, but the doctor had left for London. Then he’d sent to London, to the respectable hotel at which Dr. Peabody was to have stayed, only to receive word that his message had just missed its intended recipient. He had sent a servant to London, hoping that the doctor had merely changed hotels. Now all he could do was wait and endure the confusion wrought upon him by Miss Peabody.
How could he find himself growing attached to this—this disturber of tranquillity? Finding her in the Well Tower had brought unexpected pleasure. Not simply because he’d suddenly found her desirable, but because he learned that in her company, his waking nightmares lost their power. True, that little beast Echo was an irritant, but putting up with her had brought the reward of glimpsing an escape from his misery. He owed it to Miss Peabody. But after she’d run away, he’d fled, unwilling to face what Alberta had just forced him to acknowledge. His world of order and tranquillity had been invaded by a contentious little whirlwind and her noisy, troublemaking pets, and he had conceived an attachment.
It was like growing fond of hemlock. Miss Peabody was death to his peace, and he still desired her. Why? All these months since he’d come home seemed a drugged nightmare from which May had jolted him awake. With May defying him, forcing him to care about things, refusing to be bound by anything but her greathearted love of her family and animals, he was beginning to love life again.
Temple reached down and stroked his horse’s neck as he envisioned May’s startled reaction to him at the ruins. Now he was as frightened as she had been. He’d never felt like this, never found a woman invading his dreams, possessing his thoughts, challenging him, commanding his admiration for her courage and gentle heart.
She had responded to him. She was attracted to him; he’d assured himself of that, almost out of habit. He’d done that to many women and released them, but this time, he didn’t want to let her go. Kicking his horse into a trot, a canter, and then a gallop, Temple raced toward Stirling Hall. He had to find Mélisande. He’d need all his persuasive skills to soothe her anger at his behavior at the castle.
Upon reaching home, he asked Breedlebane where Miss Peabody was and was told she’d gone to visit Cuthbert Finch in the library. Cuthbert, however, was alone when Temple found him. He wanted to continue his search for Mélisande, but Cuthbert was insistent upon giving him news that made the old man quiver with excitement.
“Look, my lord. This was between the pages of the family’s copy of the Domesday Book” Cuthbert pointed to a yellowed sheet of parchment that lay on his desk. “It’s a drawing of the old keep that Castle Darent replaced.”
“Very nice, Finch old fellow. Did Miss Peabody say where she was going?”
“Miss Peabody seems as interested in the castle as you are, my lord. She wanted to know all about the Well Tower. A well-read lady, is Miss Peabody. Did you know that her father educated her? She has read the classics.”
This distracted Temple. “She has? Well, I knew she was intelligent.” The absent-minded Cuthbert had returned to examining his find. Temple placed his hand over the parchment. “Finch, damn you, where did Miss Peabody go?”
“She said she was going to join her aunt in the Blue Drawing Room, my lord.”
Temple hurried out of the library. When he reached the landing above the hall he saw Mélisande and her aunt donning mantles in preparation for a walk. That monster-dog with the earsplitting bark was yapping madly at them while the spaniel lay watching in calm silence. Temple grinned at the picture before him.
“Miss Peabody,” he called.
Mélisande turned to look up at him. He held her gaze, put a hand on the banister, and descended the stairs. He was concentrating on binding her to him with his eyes or he would have seen the cat.
Isis was lurking between the support posts beneath the banister in search of amusement. As he passed, her paw darted out, and she clawed his trouser leg. Her claws stuck in the material. His leg dragged, and he tripped over the cat. Falling, he managed to slow his momentum by grabbing a post and rolling on his side. As he landed near the bottom of the steps, he heard Aunt Violet scream.
“Hell!”
Suddenly Mélisande was bending over him. Her hands fastened on his shoulders as he began to feel the pain in his back and legs.
“Are you all right?”
His spirits lifted; she was afraid for him. He was tempted to kiss her, but suddenly his body let him know he’d banged it against something hard, several times. “Hell! No, I’m not all right, woman.” He sat up. “Where is that bloody cat?”
Mélisande released his shoulders, turned, and scooped up Isis. As Temple got to his feet, she hurried back down the stairs. He came after her, limping a bit.
“Give me that cat,” he growled.
She rounded on him, the cat held tightly in her arms.
“No.”
“I’m going to—”
He stopped because Mélisande suddenly thrust Isis at Aunt Violet and faced him. She seemed to grow to double her height. Her eyes glittered and she took an aggressive step toward him, raised her arm, and pointed at him. Her voice boomed around the hall.
“You stop!”
The plaster on the walls should have cracked. Temple felt his jaw loosen and come adrift. Mélisande’s roar dwarfed any he’d imagined could come from that small body.
“You hurt my cat, and I’ll pull your spine out your throat and make you eat it.” She planted her hands on her hips and marched up to him. “She’s only an animal. She didn’t understand what would happen.”
This was too much. He was the injured one.
“Didn’t understand? That bloody cat knew exactly what she was doing. She tripped Breedlebane like that yesterday. She enjoys lurking about and ambushing people. The day before that I saw her hurtling in a circle around the hall and saloon like some crazed miniature racehorse. She broke three antique vases and a statuette. I should have skinned her right then!”
That was a mistake. He knew it as the words left his mouth. Mélisande’s color faded. Her brows drew together, and she looked at him as if he were the Inquisition’s most enthusiastic torturer.
“My lord, I can no longer remain under obligation to you for your hospitality. My disgust with your character forbids it.”
“Disgust, is it, Miss Noble
Heart? I’d like to hear your comments if that bloody cat had nearly broken your neck. I’m quite weary of being accused of possessing bloodier appetites than Caligula, and I’ve some news to impart to you.” He waved a hand over her head. “You see? There’s no halo there, so kindly refrain from acting as if your sainthood has been ordered and is expected any day.”
He backed up, his wrath spent, satisfied that he’d put Mélisande in her place. Then he saw her eyes, those bourbon-colored eyes. They’d turned glassy from unshed tears. Two bright crimson spots burned in her cheeks. She said nothing to him. Taking Isis from her aunt, Mélisande walked in a wide arc around him and up the stairs.
Echo bounded after her, and Puck rose quietly to follow without giving him so much as a sniff. He watched her vanish, and then Aunt Violet paused beside him on her way upstairs.
She fanned her face with a handkerchief. “I’m afraid you’ve done it, my child. I don’t know what can be done now, I’m sorry to say. Too bad. Too bad. She was enthralled, you know. I’ve never seen her like that. A pity. Such a great generous heart to give, and the only time she entrusted it, to a man that is … Oh dear, oh dear.”
Temple found himself alone in the hall, staring up at the landing. He rubbed a sore spot on his arm, winced, and stopped. A great generous heart, entrusted to him.
“Hell.”
He was prevented from going after Mélisande by the appearance of Breedlebane and Fidkin.
“My lord, a word if you please,” said the butler.
“Not now.”
“Beg your pardon, m’lord major, but there be something you got to see.”
“I said, not now.” He mounted the bottom stair.
“It concerns Miss Peabody,” Fidkin said.
They took him to the stableyard, where he found a caravan of six wagons and carts arriving. Each was stuffed with yelping, baying, squawking animals. A giant hopped down from the first wagon, pulled his cap from his head, and introduced himself as Small Tom.
“I brung Miss May’s critters.”
“You’ve brung—brought Miss Peabody’s—these are all Miss Peabody’s animals?” Temple heard his voice climb almost an octave.
“Yes, my lord.”
He saw a cow with pelvic bones sticking out like fence posts, a donkey that appeared blind, and cages. Cages full of hedgehogs, ferrets, cats, dogs, more cats. There was an ailing coach dog nestled in a large basket full of blankets. This privileged creature rested its chin on the edge of the basket and flopped its tail back and forth in contentment. In a separate cart he saw parrots, larks, sparrows, robins, budgies, and every last one of the animals was barking, braying, squawking, yowling, or racing around its cage as if lightning were chasing it.
“Dear God,” he whispered. Then he looked closer at one of the cages, at an animal that seemed part cat, part dog, and had ears so large the creature could have used them for umbrellas. He raised his voice so that it could be heard over the din. “What is that?”
“Fennec, my lord,” said Small Tom. “Miss May rescued it from some daft old besom what bought it off a gentleman who’d been in Arab parts. It’s a fox, she says. Miss May wants to find someone to take it back home.”
Without warning, the ancient cow kicked the donkey. The donkey kicked back, and the dogs renewed their furious barking. Temple watched the fennec burrow under its bed of straw. He went to the wagon and lifted its cage. As he brought it out, a giant parrot sitting in the cage beside the fox let out a screech that shot like shrapnel through his head.
Temple cried out, and was hurled into the midst of battle.
Shells screamed around him. His friends exploded, and he rode over the remains of their bodies before he could turn his horse. Then something soft and cool touched his cheek, and a voice like sunbeams shining through mist called him back to the present. He opened his eyes to find Mélisande in front of him, his face in her hands. He was kneeling beside the wagon. His arms clutched the fennec’s cage.
Mélisande gently took the cage and handed it to Fidkin. Then she clasped his hands in hers, holding them tightly. He was half in the vision and half out until she pulled him nearer and said his name. It was the first time she’d used his given name. He latched on to her summer-meadow voice.
“Temple, you’re safe. Temple, you’re at home now. There’s no danger.”
Using her voice as a shimmering tether, he dragged himself back from the nightmare. He opened his eyes to find her kneeling beside him, his hands in hers. He tightened his grip and almost whispered something to her, something pitiful. He stopped himself in time, but could not endure the thought of how exposed and weak he must appear to her. And someone had told her of his condition!
She must have seen his discomfort, because she released him and asked how he did.
“I’m fine,” he said. He glanced around to find that Breedlebane, Fidkin, and Small Tom were all looming over him. He scowled at them, stood, and helped Mélisande up. “I’m fine, damn you, Fidkin. Help the grooms see to these animals.” Then he turned to Mélisande. “Small Tom tells me that these are more of your blasted animals, Miss Peabody. T want to speak to you, in private.”
May looked at him and widened her eyes. “I tried to tell you about them.”
“Now, Miss Peabody.” He came toward her.
She began to retreat. “I did! Several times, but you were so rude.”
She edged her way down the path that led from the stables to the house with him matching her steps.
“Come here, Miss Peabody.”
Eyeing him, she shook her head. “Don’t touch me. It’s all your fault. I was trying to tell you about my orphans at the castle, but you behaved like a—a …”
“Lover?”
May gasped and blurted out, “Madman!” Then she ran.
Temple swore and launched himself after her. She was small, but quick, and she vanished into a glade of trees. Luckily, he could hear her footsteps on the dead leaves that carpeted the ground. He chased the sound and saw her break out of the trees. He closed the distance between them as she sped down a grassy slope beside the lake. Then she made the mistake of looking back and tripped over her skirt.
May went down, and he nearly ran over her. Dodging to the side, he sprinted after her as she rolled down the slope. He managed to get ahead of her and stopped her by blocking her with his body. They collided with a jolt, and he fell on top of her. After a moment, a small hand pounded his ribs. He sat up. She sucked in a deep breath and let it out.
“You nearly crushed me,” she said while she panted.
“Don’t snap at me, you little beast. I saved you from a broken neck.”
“And then you nearly crushed me. I’m going in.”
She stood, but Temple simply grabbed a handful of skirt and yanked. Mélisande toppled to her knees, hissing and trying to pull herself free. He tugged hard, and she fell on her back. Before she could get up, he put a knee on either side of her legs and pinned her skirts to the ground. He watched her eyes widen in alarm as he slowly lowered himself on top of her.
“Miss Peabody,” he said when their lips almost touched. “I would like a word with you in private.”
MAY WAS struggling with two urges, to pull Temple’s mouth down to hers, or to spit at him. This man had aroused the most wondrous feelings in her only to suddenly thrust her away and shout at her. Why had he barked at her to go away from him? That was the question she’d been asking herself since their encounter at the castle. What tormented her was that she already knew the answer. He had been willing to kiss her, but he’d stopped himself for fear of the consequences. Temple Stirling might entertain himself with her, but he didn’t want to commit to her. Hadn’t he already made himself clear? Why had she been so stupid as to forget?
Because he’s the first man who ever paid attention to you in that way. Because he turns your body into one big searing flame. Because you’ve fallen in love with him. You, an old silly spinster.
She’d seen his pain. Indeed, he’d
seen so much blood and suffering that his family and Mr. Fidkin had feared he’d never recover. Just now, he’d been thrust into some terrible memory. She had wanted to take away the pain.
But now he was acting like a wretch, tempting her when she knew he would never risk committing himself to her. May turned her face aside so that he couldn’t kiss her. She planted her hands on his chest and shoved. He didn’t move an inch. She was never going to escape by using her strength, so she would use the truth.
Turning to look at him, she tried not to let those emerald eyes distract her. “You may as well let me up, my lord, for I know you won’t risk having to marry me by seducing me.”
“What?” He went still and gaped at her.
“Temple! Get off that girl at once.”
May looked over his shoulder to find the dowager countess and Mr. Radwinter standing over them. She heard Temple sigh. He rolled off her, stood, and helped her up.
“Hello, Mother.”
“Humph. I’ll speak to you later. Miss Peabody, my entire household is in an uproar. Your aunt is beside herself and cannot be calmed. She keeps bleating about someone with the odd name of Isis. She says Isis is lost. Please return and settle your aunt.”
AUNT VIOLET was in the Blue Drawing Room on a sofa, moaning and sniffing her scent bottle. With Temple, the countess, and Mr. Radwinter standing by, May managed to get her to make sense.
“I can’t find Isis anywhere. The servants have looked and looked. Oh, dear. We can’t leave without Isis. Oh, dear.”
“Now, Aunt, you know how she is. She goes her own way, but never for long.”
She felt a warm hand envelop hers and looked up in surprise to find Temple smiling at her. “Rather like her mistress, wouldn’t you say?”
She met his gaze, and almost forgot to breathe. Then she furrowed her brow and said in an accusing tone, “You aren’t angry.”
He bent down and placed his lips close to her ear. “I didn’t say I was, Mélisande.”