Evernight Publishing
www.evernightpublishing.com
Copyright© 2011 Jayne Fresina
ISBN: 978-1-926950-35-8
Cover Artist: LF Designs
Editor: Kimberly Bowman
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
WARNING: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
DEDICATION
To Sam
ENGRAVED
A Private Collection
Jayne Fresina
Copyright © 2011
Prologue
Eighteen minutes past the hour of one in the afternoon, August 30, 1882
This was the moment he saw Lina for the first time. He would never forget the exact time and date. It was engraved in his memory. As it happened, he’d just glanced up at the church tower clock on the other side of the common. While in the midst of a boxing match outside the village tavern, heavily wagered on by his elder brothers, he probably shouldn’t have taken that hasty check on the time, but it was something of a habit, even back then. He certainly shouldn’t have followed it up with a glance to his left, for then it was all over.
A tall, female figure moved slowly across the common; a graceful, long-limbed, fragile doe, her fine-boned profile lined by late summer gold.
She wore a straw bonnet, her dark hair piled under it. Her dress was plain, a dull color hovering between pigeon grey and mud brown, but it couldn’t hide her well-made figure, the evident length of her legs, or the elegance of her motion. She looked thoughtful, composed, in her own world. And she might as well be, he thought instantly; for she was different, more refined, more beautiful than any other person in that village. He’d never seen anything like her. And he knew he never would again.
She kept her gaze on the path ahead, her lips curved in a faint smile, strangely unaware, it seemed, of the rowdy fight taking place across the common. Why had he never seen her before? His blood was hot, racing through his veins. He squinted through the cider-tinted sunlight as sweat dripped from his brow. Tiny prisms caught on his eyelashes, blurring his sight, until he blinked them away.
Adam Blackwood had just seen something he simply had to have. Something that, for once, didn’t already belong to his brothers. He was also, although he didn’t know it yet, looking at a woman who would resist his charms. Another first.
All this had happened in a matter of seconds. When his opponent’s punch hit him in the head, he was still watching the woman in the straw bonnet and his hands weren’t even raised to defend himself. The shouts of the crowd ringing in his ears, blood in his nose and mouth, he dropped, face down in a cloud of hot dust. His brothers teased him later that he went down like a felled tree.
But it wasn’t a punch that swept Adam Blackwood off his feet.
It was her. It was Lina. And from that moment on there could never be anyone else.
Chapter One
April, 1888
It was a bright, dewy, spring day when she watched Randolph Blackwood die and saw Hell freeze over. Like any vision worth its salt, it took her by surprise.
Evangeline Phillips didn’t believe in fairy tales, pixies, witches, or ghosts. She was, in fact, a very level-headed woman, practical and never burdened by too many wistful ideas. It was, therefore, often a great irritation to her when she saw something that wasn’t there or hadn’t happened yet.
Whoever gave her this talent never bothered to leave instructions on what she should do with it, so most of the time she simply ignored the visions. Unless they told her which horse was about to win the three o’clock at Newmarket, of course. That was self-explanatory.
But the visions weren’t always convenient or useful. More often than not, they were trouble. This particular one pushing its way into her mind on an innocent Monday morning was surely a warning. In her garden flinging damp linens over the washing line, she was thinking about nothing in particular, generally minding her own business. And then she saw it happen.
Randolph was in a favorite old chair by his library fire, a book spread over his knee. Beside him a small table held a glass of port, a half-eaten slice of pork pie, a wedge of waxy cheese, and a dollop of his housekeeper’s pickle. The curtains were drawn and the gas lamps on as if he’d sat there since the night before. His head leaned against the scarred leather, his fine mane of pure white hair blowing very gently in a sly breeze through the open window. His lashes twitched, his lips cracked open to expel one last breath and then his long fingers, splayed over the arm of his chair, tightened into a claw, nails digging in as if they had one last task to fulfill. A task for his sons, no doubt. Everything he did was for them, he’d told her once. Intensely proud of all three sons, he never showed it, fearing it would make them weak.
Now it was too late. A new, deeper stillness settled over his face, only those snowy curls occasionally dancing against the leather chair back. The gas lamps puttered quietly and a coal fell in the hearth, tumbling with a soft crackle among the cinders of last night’s fire. Above it, a glass-domed skeleton clock with spinning brass balls whipped time onward, with no one to watch it, no one in the room to need it anymore. As she watched, a strange frost sparkled on the smooth glass dome. It sprouted sharp fingers that stretched across the face of the clock. The air in the room grew colder and thinner by the second.
The body of Randolph Blackwood wouldn’t be discovered for another few hours, but he was gone. Evangeline Phillips, with her eyes closed, felt the naughty little devil leave.
On his mantle, the glass dome cracked and ice spread through his walls.
The vision cleared and she was back in her garden, new grass rustling at her feet. Jade green shoots pierced the rich, dark earth; sprouting buds peppered every tree and bush, so pleased with themselves they couldn’t wait to burst open and show off. The air was fresh and vital, not yet too warm, but slightly heavy with damp and the sickly sweet perfume of blossom. It was a good day to learn of an old friend’s passing. Had it been rainy or overcast, it might have depressed her, but on this day, with rebirth all around, she didn’t mourn for Randolph.
In any case, residency in this world was temporary and she’d always suspected his spirit was an unwelcome squatter. That somehow he’d slipped into the world with one intention—to create havoc. He got away with as much as he could, before he was found out and sent back where he belonged.
Turning slowly, empty basket under one arm, she walked back across the lawn and then stopped, remembering.
The painting. What would happen to it now? A little spark of panic burned in her belly.
She was young and nervous when she posed for Randolph in nothing but her stockings and a hair wreath of orange blossoms, but she needed money and he had plenty of it. Mysterious wealth, gained, as many claimed, through illicit means. And Randolph could charm the bloomers off a nun.
She laughed. Slapping a hand over her mouth, she worried one of her neighbors might hear her amusing herself like a fool on a Monday morning washday. Giddy merriment certainly wasn’t something to which she often succumbed. Her first husband used to complain her American manners were too casual, too unguarded, and she laughed too much. Well, he soon broke her of the habit. In two years she went from her father’s pampered daughter and society belle to a penniless ghost, an unhappy wife, abandoned in a foreign country, all her youthful illusions shattered. She supposed, in some
ways, he did her a favor, shook her out of her silly, romantic imaginings and made her grow up.
Her second husband, Dr. Eustace Phillips, was a somber fellow who married her, she suspected, because his mother had died and he couldn’t find a good housekeeper. Once again, laughter, if it ever came accidentally to her lips, was out of place, not wanted. As he would say in his grave, dreary tone, seeing so many sick and dying in his lifetime took the urge to jest out of him. Then she felt guilty for finding any amusement when he couldn’t partake of it. Her second husband could make her wilt with one disapproving glance until she no longer wanted to experience the smallest uplift of joy, in case it might prove her to be, in his eyes, a selfish wanton.
Today when she laughed her first instinct was to swallow it down, deny it. Then she remembered neither husband was there to chide her. She was alone and could do as she pleased.
Almost.
These days she maintained appearances not for a husband, but for the villagers. She tried hard to blend in. But a woman living alone, an American no less, with two dead husbands to her credit and a talent for palm-reading was an easy target for gossip and speculation.
Now Randolph, her one remaining true friend, was gone. His sons would descend like vultures to pick over their father’s belongings for anything of value.
Oh! She touched her warm cheek with a cold hand.
Adam.
He would see the painting, inevitably, and draw his own bitter conclusions. This was not good for her, not at all.
Randolph promised her that the portrait was for his private collection only, but what would happen now? His sons would have the house cleaned out in a matter of days. And if she went there to ask for one of their father’s paintings, they would want to know why. She couldn’t afford to buy it from them, which meant she must rely on their charity.
Charity? From one of Randolph’s self-centered, hard-hearted sons? She was kidding herself. Might as well stand in the way of a wild herd of stallions with the scent of blood in their nostrils.
And she couldn’t go there because then she would see Adam, the last man she ever wanted to see again.
Boy, she corrected herself hastily, not man, boy. After all she’d been through, she knew the difference. Once, she was young and merry and thought the world was her oyster. But that all ended the day she married a man she thought was in love with her, a man who wooed her with roses and lies, because he wanted her father’s money. Then reality slapped her hard in the face and knocked the mist out of her eyes.
If reality had not yet slapped Adam Blackwood, he was lucky. He’d been spoiled, but sooner or later he’d learn a person couldn’t have everything that caught his eye, every pretty thing he wanted. In any case, pretty things were deceptive. The box might be tied up with a satin bow and seem full of promise, but once opened held only worms and dirt.
Sometimes it was best to leave the pretty box on the shelf and admire it from a distance, saving oneself from disappointment and hurt.
Perhaps he wouldn’t recognize her in the portrait. After all, it was painted more than ten years ago and she hadn’t seen Adam in more than five.
She studied her lily-pale face in the window and watched a lock of her dark hair slyly unwinding from its respectable, braided knot.
Again, when she closed her eyes, she saw the threads of gleaming frost take possession of the glass clock dome on Randolph’s mantle, spread a glistening claw and shatter it.
Oh yes, it was a warning.
Lips set firm, she walked quickly into the cottage, her heartbeat so uneven she was almost dizzy. Inside it was cooler, the light dim. She set her basket down and made her way along the flagged stone passage to the parlor where a pack of Tarot cards waited face-down on the embroidered tablecloth. Somewhere a clock was ticking, but it couldn’t have been in her house for she hated the sound and never kept one near.
She stole a calming breath and spread the fingers of one hand.
Fate was irreversible. No one knew that better than she did. There was nothing she could do to stop it. She simply wasn’t sure she wanted to know what was coming.
Finally she picked up the cards and dealt them carefully.
“It’ll be a cold day in Hell, Adam Blackwood, when I let you into my bed.”
And the conceited young cub had looked at her over one shoulder, his eyes very dark. “I daresay we’ll soon warm it up again.”
A carriage passed in the lane outside, hooves clipping smartly along, leather harness creaking, wheels rattling. As a whip cracked overhead, the hooves picked up speed, the bulky carriage rushed by, churning up mud and little stones to sting the legs of anyone walking on the verge. Reckless speed. Someone in haste to get somewhere, get something over with.
The carriage shot away through the village and now the lane was quiet again, as if those black, snorting, sweating horses were entirely in her mind. And for now they were. In three days time she would hear that sound for real. Today it was merely a tickle of the nerve endings. She never called them premonitions, it sounded too ominous.
Now she felt his forefinger—yes, she knew it was his; who else would be this bold?—stroke her cheek and lift her earring. Her skin rippled with tiny bumps. His damp lips disturbed the little hairs straying from her neatly pinned arrangement of curls. Like that of his eager horses, his energy was barely contained, resentful of commands, white hot and dangerous if one’s hands weren’t strong or skilled enough to rein him in.
Rapid and well-practiced, ghostly fingers worked at the tiny pearl buttons down the back of her gown. He unpeeled her like a fruit but he didn’t wait to eat. His tongue already tasted the nape of her neck.
Ah, the callow fearlessness of youth.
Well, he could stop that, this minute. Evangeline Phillips didn’t need any trouble. The young cub needed his wrists slapped. She knew what he was, even if he didn’t. She’d seen it in the father and in all the sons. They weren’t the sort of men a woman like her who was intent on leading a quiet, untroubled, obscure life should ever encourage. Blackwoods were bad news. They indulged their passions to excess, whereas Evangeline had learned to deny all hers until she no longer knew whether they even existed inside her anymore.
But she felt him already, his strong thighs rocking her, pushing her against the table as he unfastened his hunting cords with one fumbling hand. She didn’t stop him.
“Lina,” he whispered.
When she opened her eyes, he was gone, her buttons neatly in place, not a hair askew, but her nipples were hard and aching, the heaviness of thwarted lust holding her against the table. Every pore on her body, every hair on her head, was alive with the glory of spring.
This temptation, this distraction, was just what she didn’t need in her life. Years ago she gave young Adam Blackwood a few cuts with her sharp tongue–all for his own good–and he fled away to lick his wounds and sulk. Now he thought he could try again? Arrogant chit!
Even though she was married to another man at the time, he’d looked at her as if she owed him something, expecting her to capitulate the moment he beckoned. Blackwood males were hazardous. They lived by their own rules and cared nothing for propriety or honor.
She’d made the mistake of removing her clothes for one Blackwood already. But at least Randolph had the grace to pretend his interest was artistic, that he wanted only to paint her. His son had no such capability of artifice. Adam’s intent was exoteric, and he thought he could treat her like every other poor woman he used. She’d heard about his reputation long before she saw him. Randolph Blackwood’s sons provided plenty of grist for the rumor mill. Men could cultivate such a reputation with very little rebuke. For women it was different. Adam’s feckless attitude chaffed on her the first day they met. In her eyes, he was a symbol of everything wrong with the world, the bias against women and the callous, destructive, selfish behavior of certain men who thought they could get away with anything.
It’ll be a cold day in Hell, Adam Blackwood.
Angry now, she flipped open the top Tarot card.
The Fool.
But was that for her or for him?
Now the imaginary figure was there again behind her, forceful and unrelenting, his hot, iron-hard thighs pushing against the back of her legs. Leaning over the table, her palms flat to the cloth, her halting breaths almost hiccups shooting out of her with every quake, she let him fill her. His trousers were around his knees, her skirts and petticoats tossed up over her waist. Skin to skin, he took his pleasure with greedy, shameless passion. But she welcomed it. In fact, he gave as much as he took and she received gladly, despite everything, knowing it was all wrong.
So which of them was The Fool?
He was the very sort of man she didn’t need. He would do absolutely nothing to aid her in this strife for peace and respectability.
A sudden draft blew in down the parlor chimney, extinguishing the fire with one breath.
He was coming back and this time she had no husband, no excuse to fend him off. Adam Blackwood was coming home.
And Hell had just frozen over.
Chapter Two
Three days later, Adam’s carriage, having raced at lethal speed through the village of East Lofton, slowed abruptly and lurched down a narrow, winding drive. Sunlight dappled the carriage interior, fluttering between the yew trees that were once trimmed into fat cones, but now prickled with straggling branches and strayed rebelliously out of their neat forms. Under the crunching wheels, the gravel also showed neglect. Speckled with pert dandelions and angry thistles, it no longer led the way with surety and grandeur, but seemed only to suggest their meandering course as if it really mattered little whether anyone found their way or not. Through the trees, he sighted fields of knee-high grasses that were once rolling lawns. He’d heard that his father, in a peevish fit, had dismissed all the ground staff except for his gamekeeper. An under-gardener, apparently, had inadvertently cut down his favorite old tree, or some such nonsense, and he took out his wrath on the entire staff.
Engraved (A Private Collection) Page 1