“I shall tell you what I think,” Felicity said, trying to banish the tension between them. “I believe Mister Landrigan is playing games with us. Games that have gone too far. When he left the other morning, he told Binata to contact him immediately should we have any episodes. How would he have known there were to be any episodes lest he planned them himself? He’s toying with us. And you need to accept that. You have your sister making up stories about the Raven now.”
“Of course you would be concerned for Lia. All she need do is invent another imaginary playmate and you analyze her every move. But you never listen to me.” Aislinn sat up, the sheets tugging against Felicity’s torso with the movement. “Every night when you pray with us, you never mention Father.”
Felicity’s lips pressed tight at the accusation.
Aislinn scowled fiercely. “It doesn’t matter. I do. In my private prayers. And now they’ve been answered. I’ve tried to tell you for months. I think I have found a way to bring him back to us. You ignored me. So I took care of it on my own.”
Balancing her weight on her elbow, Felicity grasped her niece’s hand. “What do you mean by that, Aislinn? Have you been visiting the turret again? You know you aren’t to go there without me or Clooney accompanying you.” She searched the girl’s face for any hint of emotion.
“You accompany me? You never visit. Other than wearing your black all the time, it’s as if you’ve forgotten he ever existed.” Aislinn’s porcelain complexion stretched pale over features as regal and deadened as a statue’s. She shrugged. “I’m tired.” She pulled free and laid back, tucking the bedclothes around her once more.
Felicity’s heartbeat bounced like a pounded drum, echoing between guilt and annoyance. She’d had enough of this talk of the supernatural. Landrigan knew how much Aislinn missed her father. The girl spoke of Jasper constantly to Binata. It made sense the pig had overheard, considering he always dug his snout into things that didn’t concern him. Landrigan used Aislinn’s grief, just as he did Lianna’s penchant for bribes and Felicity’s own fear of losing the girls. Nothing was sacred to him. He would exploit anything he could in order to acquire this estate.
Tears edged Felicity’s lashes. Was she truly going to have to marry him, just to protect everything she loved? Had it come to that? He seemed to suddenly be holding all the cards.
Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad … she had already been married once to a man that spurned her, a man she hated with equal venom. She’d endured through silence. Although that was only for a few days. How would she survive a lifetime of such quiet agony?
Wiping moisture from her face, Felicity shoved the excruciating possibility aside. Right now, in this moment, she needed to be Aislinn’s guardian. And that entailed more than protecting her physically. Felicity needed to address the subject of the stable hand with her niece. She herself had taken the path of sensual awakening at a young age—however unwilling it might have been—and stumbled into a tangle of emotional briars. She wouldn’t stand by and watch Aislinn make the same mistakes, watch her future fall away to shreds.
She chewed the inside of her lip, unsure how to broach the subject. “Tobias seemed quite concerned about you earlier.”
A blush blossomed on Aislinn’s porcelain cheeks. “Wasn’t everyone?”
“Certainly.” Felicity tightened the sheet around her stomach, trying to staunch its nervous upset. “But he seemed … unduly concerned. For a servant. Fennigan helped carry you in on the stretcher as well, but his actions were methodical. Whatever was necessary and nothing more. Tobias waited by the playroom door until you were settled in. He was—”
“Tobias is a friend. He has been assisting me in my study of the fungus. A girl must make friends where she can. You allow me no other recourse than the servants. Who else is there close to my age?”
“It is my experience that friendships between young men and maidens rarely remain … chaste.”
“Please. You’ve already apprised me of the origins of babies. I’m not so stupid as to go bumbling about and get with child.”
Aislinn’s words hit too close to Felicity’s truths. Truths Aislinn didn’t know—could never know. She’d once accidentally seen Felicity’s scar. But Felicity claimed the carriage accident that left her and Jasper orphans was responsible. Aislinn could never know of the wretched life she’d lived before Ireland, or the results of her mistakes.
Felicity and her niece stared at one another in the soft echoes of light which radiated from the dying fire.
“I do not wish for you to spend time with Tobias alone anymore,” Felicity finally spoke over Lianna’s heavy breathing. “You must always have a chaperone. Be it Binata, or Clooney. Even Lia. Just not alone.”
Aislinn rippled the feather bed with her shift in position, scooting to the furthest edge. “You fear I’ll tell him your secrets,” she hissed.
The fire sputtered its last breath and the room grew dim.
Felicity slipped from the bed, knowing Binata would be coming in to sleep with the girls soon. Nutmeg hopped back up on the mattress, curling into the warm indention where Felicity had been laying. Dinah rubbed Felicity’s shins, purring.
Shrouded in shadows, Felicity kissed Lia’s drowsing eyelids and squeezed her eldest niece’s hand. “Understand, Aislinn. These restrictions are not for me. They are for your heart’s protection.”
Aislinn surprised her by squeezing her fingers back. “One does not protect her heart by building a wall around it. Our hearts are like flowers … they must be fed with love and light to survive. Yours is withering away, Auntie. You have so many secrets, you fear letting anything penetrate them. I shan’t allow that to happen to mine.”
Felicity was taken aback by the words. Her thirteen-year-old niece was no longer a child at all. Just like Nick said, she’d become a young woman with romantic thoughts and ideals. Ideals that Felicity had once shared … which the world would one day crush beneath its merciless feet.
In that fragile instant, something passed between them—an opportunity that Felicity almost grasped but waited a moment too long. Once Aislinn released her and turned over into her pillow, the connection had severed.
It didn’t matter. It would’ve done little good to explain for the hundredth time that Lianna was too young to understand the secret of Felicity’s true age, and that’s why she kept it from her. Aislinn hated withholding things from her little sister. And this secret was nothing compared to the other one Felicity had forced Aislinn to keep.
The one about Jasper’s death.
Regret roiled through Felicity’s veins. No wonder Aislinn despised her. Felicity’s entire identity was a lie. Other than Binata and Clooney, none of the servants knew the truth about her age. When Felicity walked the corridors at night, she always wore a veil or stayed to the shadows.
It had been this way since her arrival in Ireland that first year. She had justified it then. She couldn’t have come here and claimed this estate after the Earl’s death in London looking the part of a young, damaged courtesan. The servants would never have honored her … they would’ve suspected foul play. Clooney had come with her—her physician and confidante—to help her heal physically and uphold the charade of her age so none of her domestics would stumble upon her true identity.
All along, the ruse had been easily justified. It had freed her to live this new life devoid of any repercussions from her past; it had freed her to love and care for the girls without anyone’s intervention. But with each passing day, this masquerade came to feel more like a restraint than a liberty, for everyone involved.
Aislinn was right. Felicity had forgotten how to trust. Covering the truth came too easily now, second nature. What was she doing to her nieces by hiding them in a fortress of secrets? Nick’s incrimination in the greenhouse had stung with honesty; perhaps that’s why she’d reacted with such venom. It unsettled her that he could see into the core of her conscience. But this insight was only natural since he battled his own demons … live
d in his own prison.
She’d heard that laudanum could chain itself to a man for life; and then there was the loss of his bride. Perhaps that’s why he stole things. To fill those empty spaces. Nick was obviously no stranger to guilt and loss. It was this shared baggage that enabled him to read her, and in turn made her feel so drawn to him.
Birds of a feather…butterflies of a wing.
A knock on Felicity’s bedchamber door brought her back to the present. She wiped tears from her cheeks and rushed to unlatch the lock, expecting to see Clooney. Her heartbeat gave a flutter, wondering if he might have something to report about his nightly excursion to the turret’s broken stairs.
When she opened the door, her heart took on an entirely different rhythm, for it was her handsome thief’s face staring down at her instead.
Chapter Twelve
Felicity swallowed her shock. “Master Nicolas.”
An annoyed frown met her greeting. “Nick,” he corrected.
He looked tired—dark circles carved beneath the shadow of his long lashes, his blonde hair tousled and his beard scruffed up. Somehow the disorder of his appearance made him even more charming. Afraid he might get a glimpse of her in the glow of the corridor’s sconces, she drew back, shrinking the door’s opening until only a small gap remained.
He’d already seen her once tonight as the wrinkles were fading. If he got a good look now, when she had barely a trace of them, he might start to remember her from his past. Any spark of recognition could shatter this fragile illusion she had built her present and future upon.
“Did your ghost visit you?” The comment came out more caustic than she’d intended.
“No.” His eyes narrowed. “You’re the only one haunting me at the moment.”
His response took her aback. She studied his mouth in the gap of space between them, remembering those lips pressed to hers, soft and hot on her skin, casting her awash in sensation. The hungry intensity of his touch had surprised her. She assumed him a rake by their risqué exchanges. Considering Rachel’s constant attentions, he didn’t appear to be a man that would have any trouble bedding his choice of ladies.
But that kiss had felt desperate … raw. He’d been reaching out to her … just as she had to him. She knew why she wanted him, how she craved the protection he’d given her once before. Still, logic begged the question: what could she possibly offer him that he couldn’t get from some lustful toffer at a rookery? Or her maid, for that matter.
What, but perhaps a portal to the netherworld, to the wife he’d lost and sought. He was using her. Just like every man she’d ever had dealings with other than Clooney and her brother.
Hearing the clock’s tick, she started to close the door. “It is late.”
He jutted his foot between the door and its frame, holding the slight opening. “All I ask is one moment of your time.”
“I believe you’ve already used more than one.”
Unfazed, his foot shoved harder against the door. “Might I come in … or you come out here? Tis rather awkward speaking through a crack in the wall.”
“I am in my sleeping attire. It would be—”
“Unseemly.” Nick propped his wrist on the door frame outside and pressed his forehead to the back of his fist, peering into her dimly lit room.
Felicity considered the irony of upholding social strictures after what they’d shared in the greenhouse. Her companion no doubt had the same thought but proved himself the gentleman and removed his toes from between the door and its frame, allowing her the choice to shut him out or hear him out.
She chose the latter, hoping she wouldn’t regret it. “Please, be quick.”
He grated a knuckle against the wall. “You told me something about your childhood tonight, so I wish to reciprocate.”
“I’m sure it can wait till morning. I just took a sleeping draft and—”
“I was never a good son,” he blurted, startling her lie to silence with the unexpected confession. “Even as a child, I used to break my parents’ hearts, often. I stole from their guests, pulled pranks to ruin their fancy galas, anything to shame them. I suppose I wanted them to pay more attention to me than my perfect twin or their darling baby girl. But one time I went too far and ruined a hat my mother had made for a patron. The customer accused her of not understanding their instructions, their requests. They blamed her deafness, then stormed out. My mother was a strong woman, but I heard her crying later that day in the sitting room.” He shook his head. “She’d put so much work into that piece, weeks and weeks of effort. I wanted to apologize but was too much of a coward. So, I crept into the garden and picked some flowers called mouse’s ears. They’re colloquially known as forget-me-nots, but I chose them for the ear reference. I was trying to give her what she’d never had. I laid them behind her on the floor. I hid and watched, hoping she’d find them. She walked over them instead, crushing the petals beneath her shoes before she realized they were there. When she bent to pick up the mess, I slipped out without telling her I’d left them. To this day, she doesn’t know why the flowers were there. And she’ll never know how much I’ve always regretted breaking her masterpiece, and how I would’ve given anything to put it together once more.”
Shamed to silence for her earlier terse remark, Felicity clutched the gown over her scar as the longcase clock began to strike eleven.
“I know I was harsh in the greenhouse,” Nick spoke over the gongs. “And now I find myself standing here with a deplorable lack of flowers. But damned if I’ll be a coward again.” He swallowed. “I’m here to say I’m sorr—well, that I’m an insensitive lout. Perhaps you might open the door a bit … just enough I can see for myself that you’re no longer broken.”
His sweet apology softened to a caress, so kind and heartfelt Felicity ached to open the door so she could invite him in—into her room and her arms. She wanted to tell him thank you for sharing such a beautiful memory, and that she suspected his mother knew it was him all along. However, in lieu of the clock’s gongs, all the things she wished to say lay stillborn on her tongue. For her wrinkles had worn off, and she was the coward now.
She couldn’t tell him the truth. That there was no fixing the parts of her that were broken. If she dared even one word, every defense would come tumbling down. She’d confess everything … all her lies, all her secrets. Clenching her eyes shut, she slammed the door in his face instead, locking it upon the eleventh strike.
In the morning Nick awoke late and in a foul mood.
Lianna’s bed was decidedly too short. His ankles and calves had hung off the end all night. Each time he’d moved, the bloody frame creaked as if it would split beneath his weight.
Soft sunlight streamed beneath the edges of the floral drapes, casting the chamber in a pinkish hue. As if it wasn’t feminine enough already.
He slapped off the lace and satin covers, flattening his feet on the peach rug which ran like a plush path from the door to the bed and warmed the white tiles underneath. Through bleary eyes, he glanced at a vase of fresh-cut flowers on the nightstand next to him. He rubbed his eyelids, inhaling deeply. The heady fragrances branded his senses, reminding him of Felicity’s intoxicating scent when she had answered the bedchamber door last night: hair hanging like satin all about her shoulders, aglow in a crisp white gown, and fresh from a bath.
Damn. He’d wanted to run his lips and hands over her damp skin. When she’d backed into that dark room, it had taken all of his restraint not to bust the door down, enfold her in his arms, and kiss her breathless. Instead, he’d tried to be a friend. To be sincere.
Next time, he would push his way in; he knew by her response in the greenhouse that she wanted—needed—so much more than a typical companion.
He wove his fingers through his hair, regrouping his thoughts. What was he thinking? Next time?
No. There would be no next time. He would play the fool only once. And that he had. Spilling that ridiculous memory about the forget-me-nots. Telling her his j
uvenile name for the flowers. He doubted she could even recall the details this morning. He doubted she’d even listened. She believed him nothing but a petty thief, after all. To think he let down his defenses just so she could slam the door in his face without even a goodnight tossed his direction. She’d claimed she’d taken a sleeping draught but didn’t seem the least bit drowsy when she’d shut him out so abruptly.
Well enough. Let her self-righteousness comfort her on cold nights. Let a pristine conscience be her lover. Better he realize now what an unforgiving shrew she was, before he invested anymore restless dreams in her behalf. She should marry Donal, the Irish beefwit. Both of them were cut of the same cloth—cold and self-absorbed.
Nick was done with this madness. The sooner he left, the better. But he wasn’t giving up what he’d come for. He would be taking a few Heliconious butterflies with him so he could contact Mina on his own. His reason for coming had seemed to fade somewhat over the past few days, replaced by the drama with Felicity and her family. He wasn’t sure if he liked her ability to dominate his thoughts to that degree. Small matter. He now knew the nightly routines well enough to find the perfect moment to sneak into the greenhouse before leaving.
Nick’s gut cramped. Once again, he would shame his family; this time by stealing from a widowed countess. Yet he knew himself well enough to know it wouldn’t stop him. He’d turn his back on his sins as he always did; turn his back and walk away, as soon as Johnny Boy was well enough to travel.
Nick’s ponderings stalled at the thought of the pit bull.
He glanced around the bed. The dog wasn’t there. Nick rolled to the other side to assure his canine companion hadn’t fallen off in the night. He leaned down, hanging over the edge. Blood rushed to his head and his hair swept across the floor as he gazed under the frame. He knew the stable hands hadn’t come to take Johnny; Nick would’ve awakened at such a disruption.
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