Etiquette With The Devil

by Rebecca Paula

  Fireworks continued to go off outside and the music had resumed below in the ballroom. Through the opened windows, Clara heard the awed reactions of their guests at the bright lights piecing the sky.

  She approached the nursery, holding her breath when she spotted the door swaying. She stepped inside, her hand snapping up to cover the scream clawing up her throat.

  She was too late.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Molly lay unconscious on the floor besides Rhys’s empty crib.

  Clara ran to Molly, shaking the woman awake and wiping the blood from her brow. “Where did they take him Molly? Where is he?”

  Molly’s dull brown eyes fluttered open, wincing as she moved her mouth to say, “He’s safe.”

  Clara fell to her knees. “What happened?”

  “I hid him before they came and…they struck me and I blacked out. He’s in the closet in the schoolroom. The one with the sticky door.”

  “Thank you,” Clara said, squeezing the woman tighter. “I will be right back. Can you sit up?” Molly wavered slightly, but leaned forward and nodded.

  Rhys was asleep soundly on the floor of the closet, just as Molly had claimed, oblivious to the danger around him. She wrapped him tightly in her arms and collected Molly, bringing to the two to stay with the others.

  “Remember our story, James?” Clara asked, giving Rhys another kiss over his forehead.

  “Yes,” the boy whispered.

  “I want you to whisper it to the others like a good boy.”

  Molly’s hand squeezed hers as she closed the cupboard door again and crept down the main foyer, then quickly secured a pistol Bly kept stored away in his desk drawer.

  She slipped out the French doors of the music room, out into the shadows of the garden and hedges as lights continued to flash in the night sky above. She whistled, running through the maze of gardens in hopes of hearing an answering beacon.

  In the dark, everything seemed urgent. She stumbled and tripped as she ran, her lungs full of pins, her throat burning as she approached the tower in the garden. A harsh string of words filled the air, something foreign-sounding. Clara slowed her pace as she approached. A bonfire burned where once her favorite roses grew, and just beyond, a slumped figured was tied up by the tower.

  Bly.

  Clara fought back against rushing forward as three strangers walked into view, dressed in black. One pulled forward, kicking a groan out of Bly.

  Her hand tightened its grip around the pistol.

  Whatever language they spoke, she had never heard anything like it before. They barked at Bly, grabbing his hair to lift his head. A rag was stuffed into his mouth and his hands and feet were bound.

  She flattened against the grass and looked at the pistol in her shaking hand. Wielding a pistol was never covered in her etiquette books.

  One of the men ripped the rag out of Bly’s mouth. He spoke back in the same language, spitting out blood between labored breaths. Whatever he said was not appreciated, because a knife was held to his throat next. A large knife.

  “Kill me then,” he said in English. Bly groaned as they kicked him again. He muttered something once again in their native tongue, edged with steel.

  On one long inhale, she raised the pistol, squeezing one eye shut.

  “Wait,” Isaac urged in a whisper behind her. “Put the gun—”

  Clara pulled the trigger.

  *

  He had failed.

  No matter the precautions, the bouts of paranoia—the rumors had been true. He was a hunted man, or had been. They had found him now, trussing him up like a freshly killed stag. They would gut him next with the dagger at his throat and feast on what Bly left behind.

  Clara and the children, his guests, they relied on him to keep them safe and he had failed every last one of them.

  “Then kill me,” he replied in Farsi. He would have laughed at their threats a few years ago, daring them to make the worst true. Now, he only thought of keeping the others safe.

  The sound of a pistol rang in his ears as the pebbled path bit into the bloody gash across his face.

  The first whistling explosion shot across the garden in bright white light. Then another, this time red, blossomed into a violent sparking shower, the smell of gunpowder filling the air.

  Clara’s sweet voice caressed his ear in the darkness. “Stay still and I will cut you free.” She reached into his boot and pulled his knife free, making quick work of cutting away the knotted rope as fireworks whizzed by and exploded overhead in deafening bursts.

  He flipped onto his back, watching as colored lights shook the darkness and washed over Clara as if she were an avenging angel. In the middle of bedlam, everything became clearer. Why he never told her before now, he never knew, but he had wasted too much time because he was a coward.

  Everything ached, his vision still blurry from the beatings, and he was sure he looked a poor sight, but none of that stopped him from pulling her close and kissing her as if he were about to draw his last breath.

  “Why are you here, Clara? Why are you here? It’s too dangerous,” he yelled into her ear. She shook her head as another explosion shot past. “Why?” he yelled, pulling her tighter. He had to protect her. “Why would you do that?” he said between another hurried kiss.

  “I won’t let them hurt you,” she answered, her eyes filled with worry. “And I won’t let Graham tear our family apart. Not any longer.”

  Bly tried to sit up even as his ribs ached so badly that his breath rushed out of him in a painful blow. Still, he pulled her tighter, too afraid to let go as gunfire broke out. “I love you so much,” he said, showering her face in kisses. “Why?” He ran his thumbs over the plane of her cheekbones, taking in the sight of her washed in rainbow light. “I can’t keep you safe here.”

  Her face was smeared with dirt and blood, and the tears fell down her cheeks, but he was afraid that if he looked away, she would only be a dream.

  She tried to help him stand. “Come on, we have to leave.” Clara helped him to his feet. Unsteady as he was, he would find a way to run miles if it meant her safety. “Leave it to us to have the house ransacked during our first proper ball.”

  He gripped her hand tighter, taking the pistol and checking the trigger guard. So, she had fired the first shot. He smiled as her face went slack and drained of color.

  “Behind—”

  Thick smoke clouded the ground and the fighting phantoms beyond, but his instinct trumped the poor conditions. He whirled around, landing a pointed elbow into the masked man’s throat, stunning him as Bly connected a fist with the face behind the mask. The man staggered backward. A quick kick to the stomach and a blow with the butt of the pistol brought their assailant to the ground.

  Graham stepped out from behind the tower, his pistol pointed at Clara. “I warned you, Ravensdale. I told you to stay away and yet you came back to her. You’ve returned and now a few of your enemies have hunted you down. There are many more, I assure you, that are willing to pay me a big price to know your whereabouts.”

  Bly stepped in front of Clara, the pistol clasped in his hand.

  “Ah, don’t move.” Graham pulled back the hammer. “Be a good boy, and do as I say now. Step away from that murdering wife of yours. Come on,” he urged.

  Her life rested upon the pull of his mentor’s finger. His, too. He moved aside, giving Graham a clear shot. Clara shook, her eyes wide with fear.

  “Good, now drop your gun.”

  “What do you want, Graham? Why is it that you can never be satisfied? Why are you such a selfish cad?” Bly held onto the gun, baiting Graham.

  Graham rushed forward, pointing the barrel at Clara’s forehead. “I said put the gun down.”

  Bly did, his hands too shaky to hold onto it anyway. “You’re never going to be happy until you ruin me, are you?” He spotted a few sticks of dynamite stuck into Graham’s waistband. Bly wouldn’t put it past Graham to use it to drive home his greedy madness.
r />   Clara shivered beside him. He wished nothing more than to see her safe. His thoughts raced ahead, searching for some way to see her out to safety, some way to finally end this madness with Graham.

  “I trained you, I taught you what you know. And yet everyone forgot that. Everyone wanted you to do the dirty work and I was taken out of the field. I was pushed aside because you had a death wish. And now you returned to England a bloody hero, and what do I have?”

  “Nothing, Mr. Graham. You have nothing besides money,” replied Clara. “And apparently hypocrisy as well, if you shoot me. Although I acted in self-defense.”

  Graham lifted the gun into the air and fired a warning shot. Clara jumped back, but Bly steadied himself, his muscles tense.

  “Does she know what you’ve done?” Graham stepped closer to them both. Another firework ruptured into the sky, lighting up the sweat that soaked his loosened dress shirt. “The men you’ve killed? What you’ve stolen? How corrupted you are?”

  The sky flamed red and Bly dove, knocking Graham down. Rocks began to rain down from the tower. They wrestled, until Bly gained the advantage and secured the pistol, holding it against his mentor’s chest.

  “Don’t make me shoot, Graham. Don’t make me the villain.”

  Graham laughed, his eyes lit with greed. “You already are, Ravensdale. You fucking—”

  Bly reached back and punched Graham. Graham’s head snapped back, and he stilled. Bly aimed the pistol and fired two more shots.

  Barnes ran out from the shadows. “I have him. And we’re in luck, there’s a constable here who’s learned of someone’s innocence and the guilt of this man.” He kicked Graham in the gut.

  “We have to go.” Bly grabbed Clara’s hand. “Are you well?” He dragged her forward, not waiting for her answer. The passed under the archway, then followed the back side of the tower. “We need—”

  “Christ, the dynamite!” Barnes shouted from behind the tower. “Graham, you son-of-a-bitch—”

  An explosion rattled the garden as a high-pitched whistle pierced his ears, precluding the darkness that pulled him from this world into a black void.

  *

  Orange light blossomed overhead as Bly dropped to his knees in a heap, pulling Clara back as she tried to run forward. The fiery showers rained down, singing Clara’s shoulder as she stared at the ground at her fallen husband. The air was thick with the smell of sulfur and gunpowder.

  The tower began to crumble, as stones of all sizes rained down in a terrifying rumble in between bursts of fireworks. Bly did not move from the awkward fall, nor did he speak, he just remained motionless on the ground as the world around her suddenly paused and faded to black.

  She sank to her knees, the bones of her corset digging into her skin as she bent over her husband. “Bly?” She lifted his head, horrified as warm liquid pooled into her palm from his wound.

  Her lips against his did not wake him. Her forehead pressed against his, her tears washing away the blood on his face as she took another shuddering breath. “I love you too, and you can’t leave me,” she whispered.

  It was too dangerous to stay by the tower as stones continued to crumble and fall. She wrapped her arm around his neck, but he was too heavy to lift. Clara kissed the tip of his nose as she pushed to her feet and grabbed his hand, watching as he head lolled back as she attempted to drag him forward. His head bobbed over the ground in an unnatural way, causing a sour taste to turn in her mouth until she thought she would be ill.

  “Barnes,” she yelled in dread. Clara grabbed the pistol from Bly’s hand and aimed it blindly into the sulfur cloud. “Isaac!” The sound of gunfire had turned to pointed yelling, drowned under the fireworks hurtling through the summer night.

  “Someone help,” she screamed, a sob escaping her throat. She paced around Bly’s body, squinting between the bright intervals of light for sign of any movement. “Someone,” she coughed, the thick air burning her throat.

  She dropped to the ground, her orange skirts billowing over the grass like flames of a spreading fire. Her hands shook as she ripped at her petticoats, wadding up the fine silk to pad the wound on the back of his head.

  “Help me.” Another explosion sounded, the force of it pushing against Clara’s body, stealing away another shouted plea. She gasped for air to scream again, as a voice said, “Let me.”

  Clara whirled around and pointed the pistol at the source of the voice, ready to pull the trigger.

  With another flash, Isaac neatly dodged an explosion overhead, as another low rumble shook the base of the tower. “Help me lift him,” Barnes yelled over the noise.

  They carried Bly away from the tower, just as it crumbled to the ground in a heap of ancient stone. The fireworks quieted as the fire burning in the garden glowed, casting a dim light over the long grass below the garden. Applause from the house drifted over the park.

  “He suffered a bad blow to the head. He’ll come around, Clara,” Barnes said as she cradled Bly’s head in her lap. She nodded, sniffing back the tears, her ears still ringing from the noise.

  Isaac lowered to his haunches and reached into his coat pocket, the silver of his flask sparking and catching Clara’s eye. He uncapped it and poured the liquid over Bly’s face, first a few drops before emptying the bottle as Bly’s eyes opened on a gasping breath.

  “Works every time.” Barnes rubbed Clara’s arm. “I told you, he can’t die. You’re stuck with him, my dear.”

  “Bastard,” Bly said in a soft rumble, laughing until he turned his head to spit up blood. He tried to sit up, but Clara pushed him back down, her hand cradling his cheek, her eyes taking in the sight of his again.

  “I have Graham. Well, the constable does, which is bloody convenient. I will write and tell you of any news.”

  “Wait,” Clara said as Isaac stood. “You have to leave now?”

  “I do, my spotted goose, but you will be fine. He’ll be able to walk in a few minutes.” He bent down to Clara, leaning in close. “I know you will keep him well,” he whispered into her ear, stealing a kiss on the cheek before rising and fading into the night.

  It was unsettling to be left alone with Bly in the aftermath of such a scene, alone in the thick air and silence. “The children are safe with Molly,” Clara said, anticipating his question.

  “You?” His voice was coarse; for once not hiding that he was in pain.

  She brushed back her hair, a dry laugh escaping her. She could not answer. How could she possibly begin to describe the relief washing over her now that he was awake once more. She settled next to him instead, nestling into the crook of his shoulder.

  So many words raced through Clara’s mind, but only three slipped out of her lips as he took a shaky breath and pushed a hardened kiss to her forehead.

  “I love you,” she said again, this time for him to hear. Bly drew her in closer as she lost herself to the starry sky above, soaking up the light, no longer afraid of the darkness.

  EPILOGUE

  Jaipur, India

  1890

  The air was hot, laced with the heavy perfume of jasmine, as laugher drifted into her room from the pond below. Clara rolled onto her back, refusing to end her nap, even as the mattress sank with another’s weight.

  Bly’s body, still dripping from his swim, levered over hers, cooling her warm skin. She gave a satisfied sigh as his hair dripped over her face like a soft spring shower over the moors. His lips slanted over hers and she lost herself to the kiss, still half-asleep, certain she was dreaming.

  “Hello,” he whispered, his hands tenderly framing her face. “How are you?”

  She took a deep breath before opening her eyes, bracing herself for the vivid colors of another world. India was just as he had always described. No saffron yellow, teal, or magenta awaited her, only the familiar hazel that made her heart squeeze.

  Clara ran her fingers through his wet hair, the water drops running down her arms in rivulets. “Better now. Kiss me again,” she said with a coquett
ish smile, her voice still rough from sleep.

  When he teased her lips apart with a wicked sweep of his tongue, she knew it was not a dream. Time lost its meaning as he kissed her, one caress melting into another, until her lips were swollen and the carved ceiling overhead spun from his languid assault.

  Bly traveled his hands down her body, covering her curves and dips as if he were reading a well-studied map, continuing his path even as she stirred beneath him, an impious lament escaping her lips. His thumbs hooked under the hem of her chemise before his hands journeyed back up her torso, exposing her growing stomach.

  “And how are you?” he asked, pressing a trail of kisses over the rounded flesh. The baby gave an answering kick to his touch in her womb. Clara smiled to herself, listening to Bly tell their unborn child of how Rhys tamed an elephant that afternoon, while she had slept off the worst of the afternoon heat.

  “I hope you aren’t letting him bring that creature home.”

  Bly pushed back, resting on his knees as he gave her a roguish wink. The warm breeze stirred the netting around their bed, billowing as if they were floating in the clouds.

  “I could be persuaded to change my mind.”

  She laughed, shifting up to her elbows, drinking in the sight of her wet, half-naked husband. “Devil,” she breathed, as he bent back down and pushed her chemise up further. In one delicious stroke of his tongue, he traced the script etched into her fair skin, curving over her ribcage under her left breast. Jaaneman. Soul of me.

  “I was sent to fetch you,” he whispered into her ear. As if she hadn’t suffered enough from his touch, Bly tugged at her earlobe before his lips moved down the line of her neck and settled at the freckle at the hollow of her throat. “I believe it’s time for cake.”

  “How is the birthday boy?”

  A chorus of shrieks floated through the open room, and then the ripple of laughter. “Bloody hell, this is high,” a boy’s voice yelled. A splash followed.