by Heather Snow
“When it was all over, I lay there still. Trapped beneath the rotting corpses of friends and enemies alike. The air was heavy with death and the sun so hot. It had rained the night before the battle, so everything was moist and steamy. I thought I would die of thirst, and then . . . then I prayed for death as the days went by, until finally, I lost consciousness.”
“You were there three days,” she whispered, remembering what he’d said the nurse at the hospital had told him.
“Yes.”
She wanted to hold him. To pull him to her bosom and assure him that nothing so horrible would ever happen to him again. That he would never be trapped and helpless, ever. But if they lost at his lunacy commission, he would be. No, not beneath bodies on a battlefield, but trapped just the same, helpless in the decisions made for his own welfare. For his very life.
They simply had to succeed. And to do that, they needed to reach London without having caught an ague.
“Come. Let’s get out of this rain,” she said, tugging him back toward the carriage. He got in with hardly a hesitation, though he still tensed like steel. But he let her hold him as he dropped off into an exhausted sleep, and they remained that way until they reached the next coaching inn.
Penelope made the decision that they would stay the night. They both needed dry clothes and time to recover from that ordeal. She hadn’t been able to stop crying for the past hour. No wonder, she thought. No wonder his battle fatigue had manifested itself in mania, what with horrid, horrid memories like that bottled up in his mind.
As she watched him sleep, she prayed they had reached the bottom of the well now, and that from this day forward, the only things that would bubble up inside of him would be clean and fresh.
She prayed he was finally healed.
* * *
It was dusk on the third day when they rolled into London. It was still raining, just a light mist now, but even the moist air couldn’t mask the distinctive smell of the city.
After three days’ hard travel, not to mention the emotional wringer they had both been through, when the carriage approached his columned town house just off Grosvenor Square, neither of them was at their best. Yes, they were in fresh clothes—travel worn, but clean. That wasn’t what she meant, however.
Penelope watched Gabriel with concern. He’d been quiet most of the day. He’d made it into the carriage this morning with barely a hitch, at which point she had breathed a sigh of relief. And while he was still on edge, the day’s ride hadn’t seemed nearly as awful for him.
He’d been kind when she engaged him, even smiled at some story she’d told. But he also seemed . . . fragile. More vulnerable to her. Was it the wounded quality around his eyes when he stared out of the window? Was he worried, as she was, about the trial just two days hence? Or was she simply making up excuses for his withdrawn silence?
She wished she knew.
The carriage was met by servants in the blue and silver livery of the Devereaux family. Gabriel stepped out of the carriage first, handing her down himself. He placed her hand upon his arm and started up the front stairs. Before they were greeted by the rather dour-looking butler who’d just opened the door, Gabriel leaned down and whispered, “In two nights’ time, you will be entering this house as its mistress, you know. It will be the happiest day of my life, and not because we’ve prevailed. Simply because you will be my wife.”
A melting warmth drizzled down her middle, coating her sudden case of nerves with pleasantness.
A woman appeared behind the butler, her dark skirts limned in the light spilling from the doorway, giving the oddest illusion that the butler was wearing a dress. When the servant stepped aside to grant them entry, Penelope saw it was the marchioness. Soon to be the dowager marchioness, though the woman did not know it yet. She allowed herself a small smile.
“Lady Bromwich,” she said with a curtsy. Seeing Gabriel’s mother gave her a surreal jolt. She hadn’t given any thought to the strange reality that her future mother-in-law was the identical twin of her former. In truth, she hadn’t given her upcoming marriage to Gabriel much thought at all.
It wasn’t how she’d intended to pursue love again. She’d intended to take her time, to select a nice, quiet man. One with no drama in his life.
But then he wouldn’t have been Gabriel.
Her soon-to-be husband was dutifully kissing his mother’s cheek. “It is good to have you home, Gabriel,” the marchioness said, her voice suspiciously gruff.
“Thank you, madame,” he said, straightening. “I expect it shall become the norm shortly.”
He led Penelope into the foyer as he conversed with his mother, not relinquishing her hand.
“—sister is here,” the marchioness was saying as they pressed farther into the house.
A smile lit Gabriel’s face at that news, but it dimmed a bit when she added, “And, of course, your brother and Amelia. There is something else you should know—”
Gabriel stopped short just at the base of the grand staircase, his arm tightening beneath her hands. Penelope glanced up and saw immediately why. Her stomach knotted. Mr. Allen.
“Good evening, my lord. Lady Bromwich, Lady Manton.” The director’s overly solicitous tone oozed like oil paint over her skin. “I am happy to have the chance to thank you for your hospitality on behalf of myself and my staff.”
Penelope turned her head to the parlor, where indeed, Carter and Dunnings stood conversing with another man she did not know. The two attendants were dressed not in the linen uniforms of their profession, but dark suits, making their presence seem even stranger to her.
“What the devil are they doing here?” Gabriel demanded. Penelope frowned. It wasn’t like him to be so sharp, but she could understand why he was. He’d just been through three days of hell, was facing the terrifying prospect of losing everything in his life and then, when he arrives home, the very people who wished to take it all from him were drinking brandy in his parlor.
He was likely furious. At the very least, his nerves had to be on edge.
Only to be made worse when his sister-in-law came forward and said, “They are guests, of course. They’ve graciously come to Town to testify on behalf of the family. Surely you didn’t expect them to stay in rented lodgings.” Lady Devereaux turned her gaze to Penelope with a disdainful flick. “What is she doing here?”
“She is testifying on the behalf of the head of this family,” Gabriel growled.
“Enough!” Lady Bromwich’s voice cut in.
The unease that had settled in Penelope’s middle since seeing Mr. Allen and his attendants grew. After all that Gabriel had been through during the carriage ride to London, he needed to recuperate in a place of peace and quiet, to prepare himself for the ordeal to come.
“Please, Gabriel,” she said low enough that only he could hear. “Let us decamp to Stratford House.”
He squeezed her arm and said sotto voce, “I will not be driven from my own home, Pen. And neither will you.”
She pursed her lips, worry mixing with irritation. Stubborn man. And rotten, rotten in-laws.
“Now,” he said, taking her hand from his arm and brushing it lightly with his lips, “I should like a quick word with my brother and then I will show you to your room.”
She wished he would show her to her room now, and stay with her, but he’d already headed for where his brother stood in the far corner of the parlor.
“Edward tells me that Gabriel has not had an episode in nearly two months now.” Penelope turned her head to see the marchioness standing near, her eyes on Gabriel much the same way Penelope’s own were. The older woman watched her elder son with the same worry and hope she did.
“Yes,” Penelope said quietly. “None since the first day I arrived at Vickering Place.”
Penelope looked at Gabriel now. How far he’d come. She could tell he was angry with his brother, not because he gave it away by expression but because of the large gulp he took from the brandy he’d just accepte
d from a passing maid. She’d seen him drink only when he was upset. But he was keeping everything together.
“Hmmm,” the marchioness replied. “So you really think he’s cured, then, do you?”
“I do,” she said, looking back at Gabriel’s mother. She spent a few minutes detailing what she thought had caused Gabriel’s problems and the progress they’d made—not sharing any of his most personal things, but enough so that the marchioness might understand. “So you see, while he will always carry the mental scars, I do believe the worst is over.”
She glanced at him then—more and more, her eyes automatically sought him in a room. At this rate, she’d be staring at him several hours a day in a year or two. She perused his handsome face and froze upon it. Something was amiss.
He was holding his lips in a way that he never did. She frowned at the odd expression. When he brought a hand up to scratch at his shoulder, alarm screamed through her.
“I am glad to hear that,” the marchioness was saying beside her. “It is a terrible thing to see one son trying to wrest power from another. Almost as terrible as thinking one has lost his mind.”
But Penelope was hardly listening. Instead she started moving toward Gabriel as if in a daze. Oh no, she thought wildly as he started tugging at his cravat. No. No. No. No.
When he started shedding his jacket, his brother frowned. “I say, Gabriel. Are you well?”
At that, Mr. Allen’s head perked up and his eyes narrowed on Gabriel. Carter and Dunnings started paying attention, too, particularly when Allen discreetly waved them toward the corner where Gabriel was now tipping back the empty brandy glass as if it offered more to quench his thirst.
He growled with frustration and smashed the snifter on the floor.
Behind her, the marchioness gasped.
This couldn’t be happening. It couldn’t. She had to get to him. If she could just get to him, perhaps she could stop this before it got out of hand.
But Mr. Allen’s men reached him first. Carter tried to grasp Gabriel’s arm, but the move seemed to enrage him. “Get off of me!” he roared, shoving the attendant away. Dunnings tried next, grabbing for Gabriel’s feet, but he kicked the man’s hands away.
“Don’t!” Penelope yelled.
Somewhere, Lady Amelia shrieked. “I knew it! I told you he was a lunatic!” Penelope wanted to slap her.
In the corner, Carter had managed to get behind Gabriel and was about to grasp him around the shoulders when Gabriel saw him and turned to defend himself—which put his own back to Penelope.
She’d reached him at last. She touched his shoulder. “Gabriel—”
“I said get off!” His arm shot out behind him, catching her with a force that knocked her at least a yard and slammed her into a small table. She caught her forehead on the corner as bursts of white exploded behind her eyes and hot liquid started to run down her face.
“He’s gone mad!” she heard Gabriel’s brother shout. “He’s just hit a lady.”
“No,” Penelope said, wincing against the pain. She pressed her palm hard against her aching brow, hopefully stanching the blood in the process. She struggled to rise even as her head spun, making it only to her knees. “No, he thought I was one of the attendants. He didn’t mean to hurt me. It was my own fault. I shouldn’t have touched him.”
But no one paid her any mind. Through the one eye she could partially see through, she watched Mr. Allen join his men and the three of them subdue Gabriel. His howls of protest ripped through her, joining with the anguish already tearing her apart. What had happened? And how had it happened so fast?
“Are you all right, m’lady?” A young maid knelt in front of her and pressed a square of linen against Penelope’s bleeding head.
“I’m fine,” she answered, trying to look around the girl to see what they were doing to Gabriel. “I just need to—”
“Take him upstairs and lock him in his room,” Edward Devereaux ordered. “Post guards outside of both exits.”
“No!” Penelope shouted, trying now to use the kneeling maid as leverage to get to her feet as the attendants dragged a fighting Gabriel from the room. “Gabriel!”
His face jerked around when he heard his name, but the eyes that looked at her were not golden brown. Nor did the round, black irises flicker with any recognition at all.
Her Gabriel was gone, replaced by a madman.
Chapter Nineteen
Gabriel sat with his head in his hands, squeezing against the throbbing pressure at his temples.
He sat upon the bed in the marquess chambers, where he’d been confined for two nights and a day now—most of which he had no memory of. A blessing, he was told. The last episode had come on faster and was more intense than any he’d ever had, they’d said. And he believed it. The pounding in his head, the nausea and the jittery feeling in his limbs that usually came after was so much worse than before.
I hurt Penelope.
A swift ache sliced through his chest, laying him open.
He’d never once imagined he would be saying this, but thank God he’d had the episode when he had. Had it happened tomorrow or the next day or next week or next year, for that matter, Penelope would have been bound to him, trapped in a marriage with a madman.
If there was anything good that would come out of this mess, it was that she had escaped that fate.
His heart ached again, a fierce, sharp pain, one he knew would never truly go away. It would forever hover over his heart, threatening like an executioner’s blade—waiting to slice him open whenever he thought of her . . . whenever he missed her, as he would every day of his life.
The weight that had settled over him when he’d awoken yesterday grew heavier. His life. It was over as he knew it. All of the hopes and plans he’d made gone along with his freedom. Now all that was left was to wait for the madness to eventually overtake him, locked away. Alone. Perhaps he could have borne it better a few weeks ago, before he’d allowed himself to dream so high. Before . . .
His chest squeezed and twisted like a bathing cloth being wrung, flinging moisture to the back of his eyes and clogging his throat.
If a lonely descent into madness was what awaited him, did he even wish to go on at all?
The dark question circled him, whispering that he didn’t have to feel this pain if he didn’t want to. Murmuring that he had control over himself in this moment, that he had a choice. That he could end it all before the choice was taken from him.
Voices rose in the hallway, drawing his head up. He listened, but didn’t recognize the speaker. Nor could he hear the man’s muffled words. Then he heard Edward. “—might as well be. The hearing is tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow is not today,” said another voice that sounded very like the Earl of Stratford. “Now, open the bloody door.”
Gabriel came to his feet, wincing as blood rushed to his aching head. Why had Stratford come here? Surely Penelope had explained all that had happened.
The lock gave way with a rusty click, and the door swung open.
His heart leapt as Penelope swept into the room. She slowed only when she reached him and then just long enough to slip her arms under his to wrap around him. “Gabriel,” she said against his chest, and her voice was the sweetest sound he’d ever heard.
He couldn’t help himself from returning her embrace, from dropping his face to her hair and breathing her in. He closed his eyes and breathed again, trying to store up enough of her sweet scent to last him a lifetime.
Too soon, she pulled back and looked up at him.
He felt gut punched when he saw her face. An angry gash, more than an inch long, streaked red across her forehead. It was thin and shallow, but it would leave a mark. Christ, he’d marred her precious face.
“I was so afraid I wouldn’t see you again,” she said, her face lined with both worry and relief. “I tried all day yesterday, but your rotten brother refused to allow me into the house.”
Bile had risen into his throat at the thought
that he had done that to her. How could she be here, talking to him as if she cared for him, when he was responsible for injuring her so?
“But I’m here now,” she went on, reaching out to take his hand. “And I am taking you away with me.”
“What?” He pulled his hand from hers and eyed her warily. She had the same intent look on her face now that she’d had when she’d demanded he get into that damned black carriage on the road behind Vickering Place so many weeks ago.
His throat closed with emotion. He was glad he’d gone with her. He wouldn’t give up the past two months with Penelope for even his sanity. But he would not go with her again, no matter how much his heart cried out for him to. “Pen, you can’t just kidnap me out of this,” he said gently.
Her chin jutted forward. “It is not kidnapping this time. I’ve gone to rather a lot of trouble to get you out of here, legally,” she said. “I convinced Geoffrey to persuade a solicitor of the Court of the Chancery that it was unlawful for your family to hold you against your will until you were proven non compos. We then had to bring the man here and force our way inside. Now, come along. We must hurry. There is much to be done before tomorrow’s hearing, and we haven’t much time.”
A small part of him exalted. Pen must care for him to have gone to such lengths. He would lock that truth in his heart, taking it out when he needed a kindness.
But the rest of him stayed rooted in reality. “You don’t seriously think we stand a chance of proving me competent now, do you?”
Her brows dipped, shading her eyes. But she didn’t lie to him. “No. No, after what happened in the parlor, I think it is safe to say the commission will find against you for certain.”
Even though he’d known that would be her answer, hearing the words aloud hurt worse that he’d have thought. “As they should. I am mad.”
“I don’t believe that.”
Anger flushed his cheeks at her stubbornness. “Damn it all, Pen. When are you going to face facts?” His gaze found the mark on her forehead. The cut had already started to heal, but the surrounding skin bloomed purple, and the sight lashed him with guilt.