Not Always a Saint

by Mary Jo Putney

  “In other words, today you are impersonating your brother, who married Jessie while impersonating you,” Daniel said acerbically.

  Trevane glowered. “Yes, damn you!”

  Jessie frowned. “He never said anything about his family. I thought he was alone, like me. Why didn’t he invite you to the wedding if you were so close?”

  “I had traveled to the Indies on a matter of business. It was months until I returned home. I found a letter from Rupert saying he’d married a diamond of the first water and he’d bring Lisbet to Dorset for Christmas if I was home by then.” Trevane’s mouth flattened to a deadly line. “I was going to travel up to Bristol to meet you when the news arrived that Rupert was dead, and his beautiful young wife had killed him and disappeared.”

  “Did he mention that he married me claiming he was you?” Jessie asked. “He also claimed that he owned the Bristol house and that he had an estate down around here!”

  “Both belonged to me as the elder son, but I let him stay in the Bristol house because he found the estate a flat bore.” Trevane frowned. “He liked pranks and sometimes he did pretend to be me, but surely he didn’t allow you to think that when he married you.”

  “Oh, he did!” Voice shaking, Jessie continued. “So what was the reason for this mad charade of yours? Did you intend to murder me to avenge your brother?”

  Trevane’s eyes blazed. “I wouldn’t have killed you or your husband. I planned to keep you a day or two and then release you.”

  “And then what?” Daniel exclaimed with amazement. “You’d just let us go and expect there would be no consequences for your kidnapping and assault?”

  “Every magistrate and other important person in this area is related to me,” Trevane explained with a smirk. “They’d understand why I wanted to do this before I had you charged and arrested for my brother’s murder.” His voice broke. “ I wanted you to suffer! I wanted you to know some of the pain I felt when you murdered my closest kin!”

  In a cold rage, Daniel said, “So he was a charming, prankish young fellow and you miss him still?”

  “Always,” was the whispered reply. Ivo’s eyes were haunted.

  “Perhaps Jessie can share some of her memories of your brother with you,” Daniel said in a voice that cut like a whip. “She can tell you what a vicious brute he was when he was drunk. So vicious that she locked herself in her bedroom nights when she knew he’d come home drunk.”

  Trevane lifted his head, his eyes furious. “You’re lying!”

  “Oh?” Jessie spat out. “I was there! You were not! Yes, he was charming when he was sober, but he was a monster when he drank!”

  “Let me tell you about the night I met her,” Daniel said inexorably. “It was the night she killed him. When she appeared in my infirmary that night, her face was so bruised her own mother wouldn’t have recognized her. Luckily your dear brother didn’t destroy either of her eyes, but it was a near run thing.

  “And then there were the bruises around her neck, where he almost strangled her to death. Big, purple bruises that show how her breathing was choked off. Imagine how she felt when she was blacking out from the lack of air, struggling frantically as he threatened to slash her face so no one would ever think her pretty again.”

  As Ivo stared in shock, Daniel continued, his words slashing like scalpels. “Maybe his intention was merely to mutilate her, but as an experienced doctor, I think it more likely he would have killed her accidentally, then wept bitter tears when he sobered up, because after all, he didn’t mean it, which makes it all right, doesn’t it? Because he was such a good fellow he’d never kill his wife deliberately.”

  “No,” Trevane whispered hoarsely, not wanting to believe. “He wouldn’t have done anything like that!”

  “But he did,” Jessie said in a hard voice. “I managed to break free and was running for the door when he stabbed me in the back. The scar is so distinctive that Daniel recognized it on our wedding night even though he hadn’t recognized my battered, bleeding face.” Her voice began to shake. “If not for the kindness of Daniel and his sister, I don’t know what would have become of me. I might have died in the streets. Instead, Daniel fixed me up and gave me money and I was able to run away. Because I was a murderess, you know, I had to run for my life.”

  She turned and yanked the left shoulder of her gown down as far as she could. “See that scar? It runs all the way to my waist. Shall I show you all of it?”

  “No,” Trevane said in an agonized voice. “No!”

  His eyes closed and his face twisted as tears leaked from between his lids. After a long, long moment, he opened his eyes. Devastated acceptance was written on every line of his face. “How . . . did he die?”

  “When I was struggling to get away, I shoved at his hand with the knife. It swerved into his throat. Right in the place where you don’t have a scar.” She drew a ragged breath. “So I really did kill him. When I thought you were he, still alive, I was relieved. I never wanted to hurt anyone.”

  When she stopped speaking, there was no sound except the endless waves. Mouth tight, Daniel used the cravat to bind Trevane’s ankle. Then he poked among the pieces of driftwood and found a branch that was long enough and close enough to straight to serve as a staff.

  “Let’s get out of here. I don’t know how much longer the path is to the beach, but the tide is coming in and I really do not want to spend a night in the same cave with you, Mr. Trevane.”

  Trevane pushed himself to a sitting position. His face was haggard and he looked like a different man. Well, he was a different man now that he was no longer playing the role of his dead brother. “I . . . I’m deeply sorry, Lady Romayne, for what my brother did to you, and what I did to you and your husband,” he said unsteadily. “Rupert’s death drove me to the edge of madness, and that madness took hold of my mind and better judgment.”

  “There’s a reason why God is reported as saying that vengeance is His,” Daniel said acerbically. “He’s the only one who knows the whole truth.” He put his arm under Trevane’s shoulders and hauled him to his feet. “I’ll support you with your arm over my shoulders and you can use the staff with your other hand if your arm doesn’t hurt too much. How much farther is it to the beach?”

  “Not far.” Trevane managed to lurch forward with Daniel supporting most of his weight. “The path isn’t quite so treacherous the rest of the way. This whole area is old smugglers’ quarters. There’s a tunnel that leads up to the Castle Romayne dungeons, which was how I got you two there. Our ancestors, Romaynes and Trevanes, did quite a profitable line of business in free trade.”

  “Do you still?” Daniel asked.

  “No, I’m the boring brother.” His mouth twisted humorlessly. “I don’t ask my people questions I don’t want to know the answers to.”

  As they moved from the cave to the path, Jessie asked, “Mr. Trevane, how did you know who I was? You and I have never met, and I’ve hidden from my past rather effectively. Daniel and I only arrived here yesterday. How did you realize who I was and put this nasty little plan of yours into effect?”

  “I went to school with a nephew of yours, Frederick Kelham,” Trevane explained. “He was suspicious of his uncle’s death, wondering if you might have poisoned your elderly husband to get rid of him. Somehow he learned that you’d lived in Bristol and he decided to do some investigating of your past. He’d met my brother a time or two and he knew me, so he thought it his duty to tell me who the murderer was.”

  “Frederick!” Jessie said with loathing. “There is no end to the amount of trouble he wants to make for me and my daughter! But you believed him because he was a man.”

  “That and the fact that we both went to Harrow,” Trevane said apologetically. “He always was a slippery fellow, but when he told me you’d killed my brother—well, I lost a lot of my sanity.”

  “Losing your sanity seems to be a trait you shared with your brother,” Daniel said tartly. The going was indeed easier on this stre
tch of path, but he’d be very, very glad when they got back to the sand. Then he could put Trevane down and go up to the house and enlist others to finish the job.

  “Frederick is a vile beast who threatened the lives of me and my daughter. Of course you believed him!” Jessie snapped.

  “Mea culpa, Lady Romayne,” Trevane said with a sigh. “You seem to have chosen a better husband this time.”

  “I became much better at choosing husbands after Ivo.” She smiled at Daniel with a warmth that almost made up for the rest of the day.

  “The end of the trail!” she said with relief as she turned another corner. “Shall I head up to the new house for help while you settle Mr. Trevane on the sand? Someone else can get him up the cliff.”

  “Exactly what I was thinking.” Daniel steered Trevane through the dangerous jumble of rocks mixed with sand that marked the transition from cliff to beach. The sun was setting, a blood-red ball of fire.

  Despite her fatigue, Jessie speeded up as she headed toward the stairway up the cliff. She had to be as anxious for this to be over as Daniel was.

  A man was charging down the steps to the beach. Daniel squinted, wondering if it was a Romayne servant coming to help.

  Frederick Kelham. He was wild eyed and red with rage. “Damn you, Trevane!” he shouted. “You were supposed to take care of that murderess! You promised me you’d see that justice was done!”

  Trevane halted, weaving in his tracks. “You can’t have thought I’d just murder her out of hand!” he sputtered, aghast. “I wanted to see her humiliated and hanged.”

  “Why not murder her?” Kelham snarled. “That’s what she did to your brother.”

  Trevane tried to straighten his battered body. “I found out there was more to the story than you told me. No further justice was required.”

  Jessie, who was halfway between Frederick and Daniel, said sharply, “You’ve spread enough lies about me, Frederick! How would your fashionable friends feel if they knew what a disgusting, greedy liar you are? If you ever threaten me or mine again, I’ll find some way to take you to court and into bankruptcy!”

  “You bitch!” Face contorted with rage, Frederick pulled a pistol from his coat and cocked it, holding the hilt in both hands as he aimed at Jessie at point-blank range.

  Her jaw dropped as if even now, she couldn’t think such a thing of Philip’s nephew. “You really are mad!”

  Daniel abandoned Trevane to his own devices and sprinted toward Frederick, knowing he wouldn’t be able to reach the bastard before he fired.

  Jessie tried to dodge away, but the barrel of Kelham’s pistol followed her. Oh, God, he was squeezing the trigger. . . .

  A shot exploded through the twilight, echoing from the cliffs and driving a flock of gulls screaming into the sky.

  No, no, noooooooo! A primal howl started in Daniel’s heart and rose to the heavens, threatening to shatter him into anguished pieces.

  But it was Frederick who crumpled to the ground, not Jessie. Frederick’s blood that stained the sand. Someone else had fired.

  Heart pounding, Daniel halted and scanned his surroundings. Salvation was a man with pale blond hair who was now racing down the stairs three steps at a time. A rifle angled down at his side with a wisp of smoke trailing from the barrel.

  Gordon. Praise be to all the saints, Gordon!

  Daniel reached Jessie and she hurled herself into his arms, shaking as if she’d break into pieces herself. He enveloped her in an all-encompassing embrace, scarcely able to believe that she was here and alive.

  Slowing his pace, Gordon crossed the sand toward them, as travel stained as when they’d last seen him at Milton Manor.

  Holding Jessie tight, Daniel said, “I approve of your timely arrival, but how?”

  “I was lucky. I’d almost finished my interview with the butler at Trevane’s house in Bristol when I asked the right question and increased my bribe. He immediately told me that it was a younger brother who died, one who liked to pretend he was the heir,” Gordon explained. “I also learned that someone had been asking the same questions I was a few days earlier. I thought you should know, but I didn’t expect the situation to have become so dangerous so quickly.”

  “Neither of us would have guessed,” Jessie said in a thin voice. “Thank God you arrived when you did!”

  Gordon knelt by Frederick Kelham’s body and did a quick check for signs of life. Rising to his feet, he said, “That’s one villain who won’t be bothering you again, Lady Romayne.” His gaze moved to Daniel. “I charge more for saving client’s lives.”

  Daniel almost laughed. “Send me an invoice. I won’t quibble about the price.”

  Gordon returned a faint smile. “You get your wife up to the house. I’ll take care of matters here.” He turned to Trevane, who had managed to limp along and join the group. “Are you the real Ivo Trevane?”

  “For my sins, yes.” Trevane’s voice was a croak.

  Gordon said, “Send down every male servant in the house, Romayne. Then I trust that very efficient butler of yours will find me a bed and tomorrow morning you can tell me what the devil’s been going on here!”

  “I can give you a start on that,” Trevane said as he folded wearily onto the sand.

  More than happy to leave Gordon in charge, Daniel guided Jessie toward the staircase. “I’m glad you’re my wife again. I was contemplating whether you could get a Scottish divorce from Trevane. And if so, would you marry me again?”

  “Of course I would! Would a Scottish divorce have been possible? I find that retrospectively comforting.”

  “I’m not sure, but I certainly would have found out.” Arm in arm, they tiredly began climbing the steps. He gave exhausted thanks that there were railings on both sides, since they were useful in hauling tired bodies upward.

  “I’m so sorry, Daniel. My sordid past could have got you killed tonight,” Jessie said in a constricted voice. Her head was bent and her hair falling every which way, obscuring her face.

  “Is this the end of it?” he asked with weary humor. “No more resurrected parents or husbands or murders or murderous relatives?”

  She gave him a tired smile. “Not that I know of. But I certainly didn’t expect this, either!”

  Panting, they reached the top of the stairs. By unspoken agreement, they headed for the gazebo and folded onto the wide, comfortable wooden bench inside. The gazebo was an elegant structure with a wall to act as a wind break on the side facing the new house. Daniel sat and pulled Jessie into his lap. Limp as a silk scarf, she cuddled against him, her head on his shoulder and her arms around him.

  For long moments, they simply breathed together, regaining their strength and appreciating the fact that they were alive and well. Daniel finally broke the silence when he summoned the courage to ask, “Did you mean it when you said you loved me?”

  She tilted her head back and caught his gaze, her aquamarine eyes transparent with truth. “With all my heart and soul,” she said quietly. “With you, I’ve found more passion than with my first husband, as much trust and kindness as with my second, and those qualities are allied with a warmth and intelligence that is all your own. I love you, Dr. Daniel, in all your aspects.”

  Warmth flowered deep inside him, dissolving all the doubts and pessimism he’d felt when they first met. “I thought that I could never love with as much power and passion as when I was a youth,” he said equally quietly. “I love you, Jezebel Elizabeth Braxton Trevane Kelham Herbert. I must have had a premonition of this when I first saw you across a crowded room. I just wasn’t wise enough to realize that I could love again.”

  In the red glow of sunset, Jessie was the most beautiful creature he’d ever seen. An earthy goddess with endless resources of passion and loyalty. He kissed her with all the love and tenderness he’d discovered.

  Coming up for air, Jessie said breathlessly, “It’s perfectly obvious why I would fall in love with you! Julia and Mariah were quite firm on that point. But with my tarnish
ed past, what do you see in me?”

  “All the difficulties you’ve survived have made you who you are. A woman of strength and wisdom.” He brushed back her hair. “You bring me passion and joy, Jessie. Both qualities were sadly lacking in my life. I can imagine no greater gift.”

  She pressed her cheek into his stroking hand. “You already had those qualities. I’m glad if I helped you find them.”

  Realizing that it was time for an overdue revelation, he said, “You’re the first woman I’ve ever lain with, Jessie. Rose and I had discovered each other’s bodies with all the passion of youth, but only to a point. After she died, I buried that part of myself. I couldn’t imagine loving again, nor could I use a woman without love. I thought I’d live the rest of my life celibate as a medieval monk.”

  “That would have been an appalling waste!” Her eyes shot open like a startled kitten’s. “I would not have guessed that from your lovemaking. Though knowing the honor in your soul, perhaps I should have known you would not take mistresses casually.”

  “As a doctor, I know quite a lot about bodies, and how to touch them,” he explained with a wry smile. “It was a great delight to experience the pleasures as well as the pains.” He leaned forward for another kiss that swiftly turned scorchingly intense.

  She melted against him as the kiss went on and on and on, accompanied by whispers of laughter and passion. When it finally became too cold to linger any longer, Daniel reluctantly set her feet on the marble floor of the gazebo and stood. “Time to go into the house and tell Pendry that help is needed below.”

  She nodded and linked her arm in his and they ambled toward the new house. He asked teasingly, “Does this mean I’ll be able to see that red dress again?”

  Laughing, she said, “You will, sir. But there will be nothing so complicated as that tonight!”

  So he kissed her again. Who needed a stunning red gown when he was married to the most beautiful woman in the world?

  Epilogue

  Spring 1814