The Reckless One

by Connie Brockway

  He was not wrong. He’d seduced many women. Yet all evening she’d put herself in his way. How to account for that, except with Pala’s explanation, that the girl was directed by Janet’s spirit.

  He’d had his doubts after the scarf incident but her pursuit of him had been so persistent, having such an element of compulsion, nay, desperation, in it that he’d begun to believe Pala. Besides, the girl did not even know her body housed another tenant.

  So he’d acquiesced and here they were, standing before one of Titian’s conceits. He’d invested much of his wealth in artwork, jewels, and manuscripts.

  “I like the color blue. Particularly peacock blue,” Favor said, glancing sideways at him. Dark eyes, he noted, overly dilated and nearly black. Like her hair. Fetching but odd.

  “A lovely shade,” he allowed.

  During the course of their walk here, she’d made several such random comments. She liked shellfish. She found violin music stirring. She announced that she’d read Jonathan Swift and Henry Fielding and clearly expected him to be scandalized. He told her he’d never read either and that he found reading tiresome. Clearly disconcerted, she fell into a lengthy silence from which she roused herself only to make more sporadic, disconnected comments.

  The girl could not have so little—or such inane—conversation. Earlier, he’d overhead her talking easily and rather wittily to Tunbridge. Perhaps what he was seeing was Janet’s unseen influence and these burbles of erupting nonsense were the result of being possessed.

  They stood staring up at Titian’s masterpiece some minutes before he grew bored. “Shall we continue?”

  He led her by a deplorably murky Flemish painting to something he truly enjoyed, a landscape of near mathematical precision by Poussin, entitled Dionysus at the City Gates. The Greek theme appealed to him no less than the analytical purity of the composition. He’d always admired Greek architecture and, to some extent, the Greeks. Not as much as the Romans, of course.

  “Lovely,” Favor murmured.

  “Not only lovely but precise,” he instructed. “See these buildings in the background. They are all structures represented in their correct location in Athens.”

  “Really? I do not read Greek. Nor Latin. I have some French. Less German.”

  Carr barely heard her. He would have made a fine Greek aristocrat. Or perhaps a Greek philosopher. Or a Greek politician. He would have orated just … there.

  “See, m’dear? There is the Acropolis and there, just so, the Parthenon.”

  She replied under her breath. He turned, his gaze sharpening. Her expression was both distant and tender. Her mouth held the promise of a smile yet to be born and her eyes were soft.

  “What did you say?” he asked, dipping his head to be certain he heard her correctly. “What did you say?”

  “Part of None,” she murmured, as though recalling something foolish and sweet.

  His breath caught; a painful hammering began beating in his chest. He hadn’t really believed it. Not really. Not until now.

  Janet had returned.

  “I bid you good even’, Miss Donne.”

  “Lord Carr.” She smiled, entered her room and shut the door behind her. Her eyes squeezed shut as she listened for the sound of his leaving. A full five minutes passed before she finally heard his footsteps retreating down the hall.

  With a sob, she slumped against the door; her shoulders hit the panel with a thud. She shoved her knuckles against her mouth, trying to compose herself, failing miserably.

  She’d done it. She’d secured Lord Carr’s interest. More than secured it. He’d fixated on her. Somewhere in that long, dismal picture gallery he’d become convinced that Janet McClairen’s spirit lived within her.

  He’d touched her. Stroked her cheek with the back of his hand. God! Her legs began trembling, her joints felt watery. She sank to the floor, upbraiding herself for such childish histrionics.

  Of course he touched her! If all went as they’d planned, he’d do much more than touch her. That had been her goal and purpose from the start. For Carr to marry her. It still was.

  Tears fell from her eyes. More of them followed and more still, a torrent of tears impossible to check. They coursed down her cheeks and lips, dripping from her chin and jaw, soaking the delicate lace edging her bodice. Treacherous tears, betraying tears, tears impervious to plans and goals and purposes and intentions.

  If only, she thought helplessly, Rafe hadn’t touched her first.

  Chapter 18

  “Not many of us here yet, are there?” Lady Fia smiled at Favor, a sweet smile that did all the right things to her lovely face and yet managed to make a mockery of its own gentleness.

  Favor, standing beside Fia as they awaited the rest of the company, paid the girl little heed. Rafe would wonder where she’d gone. Why she hadn’t brought the clothes he’d made her promise to bring him. Perhaps he would curse her and rant against her.

  Perhaps he would miss her.

  She blinked, amazed by her absurdity. She must force away such thoughts. She’d best find the means to smile before Carr arrived to lead the company to their déjeuner alfresco.

  The late-October day had been born bright and unseasonably warm. Overnight, the wind had shifted and now meandered up from the south, amiable and unhurried as a maid on a Sunday stroll.

  Lady Fia, ever chimerical, had arranged a picnic. Early this morning she’d issued invitations. Even now the more jaded habitués of Wanton’s Blush slept, their invitations unread. But most of Fia’s devoted retinue—having instructed their servants that any communiqué from Lady Fia was to be brought immediately to their attention—had sent their acceptance.

  Favor was one of the few guests who hadn’t been sleeping when the invitation arrived, for the simple expedient that she hadn’t slept. She had accepted reluctantly, knowing that by doing so she sentenced herself to the day in Carr’s company when she could have been on a treasure hunt with Rafe.

  But avoiding Carr only meant delaying what she must do. So now she awaited Carr’s arrival, Carr’s interest, and ultimately Carr’s suit. And her thoughts were as dull and leaden as this fine day was sweet and clear.

  “Miss Donne,” Lady Fia exclaimed. “’Struth you look unwell. Perhaps you’d best remain at Wanton’s Blush?”

  “No.”

  Lady Fia smiled obliquely. “If you choose to quit our party, I guarantee you won’t suffer any lost opportunity for your absence.”

  “Lady Fia?” Favor queried, finally awakened to the subtle derision in the girl’s voice.

  “My father, Miss Donne, does not ride.”

  Favor was immediately alert, shedding her emotional somnambulism as one would a sodden winter cloak. That Lady Fia had noted Favor’s attention in her father mattered less than the fact that he would not be among their number today.

  “Lord Carr won’t be going with us?”

  “No,” Lady Fia said, studying her. “He seldom rises before noon.”

  She leaned closer, smiling with falsely conspiratorial glee. “There, a bit of useful information for you. Of course, I could give you even better advice, but then, I doubt you’d take it, would you?”

  Before Favor could reply, masculine voices hailed them. Fia twirled to return the greeting. Dozens of determined merrymakers surrounded them, sweeping the young women out of the castle’s front doors, Favor still bemused by the news of her unexpected reprieve.

  An entire day free. Free of Muira’s badgering, of Carr’s obsessive ardency, and even free of Rafe’s troubling magnetism. Her sense of release was nearly palpable. She smiled at Tunbridge, returned another swain’s sally, and chatted with the older woman next to her.

  They arrived at the stables to find dozens of horses dancing on the end of their leads, tricked into fresh spirits by the springlike weather. The stable master stood among them, gauging the ability of the various riders and matching them with appropriate mounts.

  Favor glimpsed Jamie Craigg’s gigantic figure lumberi
ng toward her, leading a docile-looking mare. Her spirits sank at this reminder of Muira’s far-reaching influence and far-ranging eye. She’d nearly forgotten Jamie’s masquerade as Thomas’s driver. He looked out of place here on land, the sea seeming to be a more natural element for him. Not for the first time, Favor wondered whether the others whose lives Muira had orchestrated and overturned ever resented her manipulations.

  Jamie halted before her, his expression closed. Perhaps, if she asked he wouldn’t tell Muira she’d played truant for a day. “Jamie, please—”

  “Don’t worry none, Miss Donne.” Jamie broke in warningly, his gaze fixed over her shoulder. “I put a kinder bit in ’er mouth.”

  She turned her head. Lord Tunbridge was close behind.

  “Of course. Thank you, Jamie. You may tell my aunt …”

  “Ach, Miss! Yer aunt is bound to be sleepin’ until yer return. I’ll send a maid to wake her if ye insist but, beggin’ me pardon fer me presumption, I’d let the grand lady remain innocent of yer doin’s.” He gave her a quick, furtive wink. Bless him! He approved. She returned his wink with a gay smile, her spirits fully restored.

  She lifted her skirts and waited for Jamie to assist her but before he had taken a step, thin, hard fingers encircled her waist.

  “Miss Donne.” Tunbridge’s breath fanned her ear a second before he smoothly tossed her into the saddle.

  She cast a startled glance down into the man’s pale, upturned face. “Thank you, Lord Tunbridge.”

  Tunbridge’s thin mouth formed an admiring smile. “May I be so bold as to remark on your rare good looks this day, Miss Donne?”

  Perhaps he wasn’t so terrible, Favor decided and, remembering his painful infatuation with Lady Fia and that lady’s mockery of it, Favor smiled at him. “Thank you, sir.”

  Without glancing in Jamie’s direction, Tunbridge dug a coin from his purse and flipped it in the giant’s direction. Mumbling thanks and bobbing his massive head in a fair imitation of humble gratitude, Jamie backed away.

  Tunbridge’s gaze remained locked on Favor. “You’re every bit as lovely as she,” she thought she heard Tunbridge mutter beneath his breath, “Damned, if you aren’t.”

  The sound of a boy’s voice raised in panic finally severed his regard. “Damn. You’ll excuse me, Miss Donne,” Tunbridge said. “One of the stable boys is having rather a time with my stallion. Bad-tempered brute. Nasty habit of biting those who cinch his girth. I suppose I best see that he doesn’t kill the brat. Put a bit of a pall on the luncheon.”

  Favor’s momentary favor with Tunbridge evaporated. “You’re truly a humanitarian, milord.”

  He smirked and moved away and shortly Favor’s pleasure in the day returned. A little while later the others finished mounting and Lady Fia raised her gloved hand.

  “Follow me, now!” she called out. “Riders, follow me!”

  * * *

  “Miss Donne rides out with Fia and the rest of her raucous crowd,” Carr said, looking down from the tower window as forty riders came milling around the corner of the castle. With an imperious gesture, Fia raised her lace kerchief above her head and whipped it in a circle. As one the group broke, the riders sending the frantic cattle from standstill to full gallop, as though they were beginning a steeplechase and not a jaunt to a picnic site.

  “Lud.” Carr expelled a gusty sigh. “No one ever rides at a leisurely pace anymore.” Carr let the draperies fall back down, giving his attention to Pala. “Will Miss Donne ever recall more of her life as my wife?”

  Pala cringed where she stood. She’d better cringe.

  It had taken two days to ferret the old crone out. One of his men had finally found her trudging along the cliff path picking her vile weeds and such. How dare she vanish when he’d things he wanted to know?

  He tamped down his irritation. “I will assume that you didn’t hear me. Now, once more, will Miss Donne ever remember specific incidents as Janet McClairen?”

  Pala rubbed the red welt on her cheek. “I don’t know.”

  Carr picked up his riding crop and bounced it in his hand. “Guess.” He smiled mildly. “But guess correctly.”

  The hag flinched. “Please, my lord. I guess … no. These things she feels, she … feels. She doesn’t know why.”

  “Hm.” It made a certain sense.

  “You not like my guess. I sorry. I sorry!” Pala whimpered, ducking her head.

  “I’m not.” It would make things even more difficult if Janet—Miss Donne—damnation, but this was a coil!—recalled the events of her last day on earth. But then, whose last day on earth had it actually been? Certainly not Miss Donne’s and apparently not Janet’s. The conundrum fascinated him.

  Janet. They could be together, here at Wanton’s Blush where it had all begun. He could set things right. If only he could persuade Miss Donne …

  “In some respects Janet’s lack of—what shall we say? presence?—creates a bit of a problem.”

  Pala flashed him a look of fearful inquiry. Her gray hair hung in filthy ropes on either side of sallow sunken cheeks. “What is that, Lord Carr? What can Pala do? How can she help her most generous Lord Carr?”

  She crept closer, the strands of shells and odd bright stones clicking around her throat, her heavy skirts leaving a leaf-strewn trail on the otherwise clean floor. “What is Lord Carr’s desire?”

  “Well …” Carr murmured, examining his nails, “as hard as it is to believe, I have come to the conclusion that Miss Donne dislikes me. I see that you are shocked. I read it in your face. I empathize with your astonishment.”

  “Y-y-yes, milord!”

  “’Tis, nonetheless, true. Miss Donne has an aversion to my person.”

  As testament to her incredulity, Pala’s head had sprung straight up on the meager stalk of her neck. She met his gaze with her own wide, amazed one. “But how … I mean, you tell me she seeks you out. She puts herself in your way! Maybe you only seeing a young girl’s shyness and thinking it dislike?”

  He gave her a dry smile. “I believe I have ample enough experience to be able to distinguish virginal coyness from antipathy.”

  “But …! I no understand. Why she seek you if she not like you?”

  Carr seated himself on the room’s only chair, carefully making sure not to rumple the skirts of his new coat. “You, Pala, are but a primitive Gypsy. How could you understand? Still, while explaining a philosophical nicety to such as you may well prove impossible, I have never refused an intellectual challenge. So, attend, Pala, and I shall endeavor to explain.”

  The old woman nodded eagerly.

  “Janet’s spirit has survived buried within Miss Donne’s body rather like a wharf rat that secretes itself aboard a ship, unsuspected and unwilling to make itself known. Yet from this vantage Janet somehow causes Miss Donne to react to me, again rather like that rat might infect the crew with fleas of the ship upon which he hides. Miss Donne is infected with Janet’s feelings for me, feelings so deep and intense Miss Donne finds them frightening.

  “Thus, Miss Donne desires me—thanks to my former wife—yet has an aversion to me.” He held up his hand, forestalling Pala’s certain objection. “Hard to believe, isn’t it?”

  Pala, apparently not conversant with etiquette, merely stared at him dumbly rather than murmuring the expected assent. He sighed forlornly. People were such a disappointment to him.

  “If I know my Janet, she is issuing Miss Donne her … emotional directives in a most forceful manner.” He leaned forward confidingly. “Such passion as Janet had for me might very well overwhelm the delicate sensibilities of a gently raised young girl. How can Miss Donne help but be frightened, directed by what she must consider carnal impulses? Thus, she reacts by stubbornly resisting Janet’s directives and forming an aversion to the man who engenders these feelings. N’est-ce pas?”

  Beneath its coat of grime, Pala’s face was utterly blank.

  Pearls before swine, Carr thought. Ah well, she was, after all, little more
than an animal. But, as many animals, she had her uses. He’d wasted enough time.

  “You don’t understand, do you? Thankfully, you don’t need to understand. All you need do, Pala, is one thing.”

  “What be that, Lord Carr?” Pala choked out, her voice thick with awe.

  Probably still trying to digest that bit about Miss Donne disliking him. ’Struth it was rather incredible.

  “You must make me a love potion.”

  Muira shoved the footstool into the bright midday light coming through the stable door and plopped down on it. She held out her hand in an imperious manner and Jamie placed a mirror in it. She angled her face to better see herself.

  “Curse the man!” The pain Carr’s blow had caused her was incidental. The mark his crop had left on her face was much harder to bear. It meant a delay in plans and just when things were coursing along so very, very well.

  “Damn the man! Damn his black soul to hell!”

  “I thought that was yer aim and goal, Muira,” Jamie said. “Damning his soul to hell.”

  Abruptly Muira giggled, an unnerving sound, particularly so hard on the heels of her rage. “Aye, Jamie Craigg. ’Tis. And soon now, soon.”

  The giant tucked his thumbs into the waistband of his breeches, looming over the small old woman. “Is it, now?” he said. “And here we’ve all been thinkin’ that the plan had more to do with returning to the clan what was stolen from us than yer own personal cravin’ for revenge.”

  Muira shot him a venomous glare. “If I can achieve both, why are you suddenly so reluctant?”

  “Because ye haven’t told the girl what it is ye plan to do.”

  Muira’s gaze grew flat. She reached beneath her multiple layers of dirty skirts and tore a piece of flounce loose, using it to wipe her face. “She knows.”