An Unmistakable Rogue (5 page)

Chastity turned to regard him, tugging her hair from his hands in the process. “What do you mean?”

“Stand still. Now I have to start over.” He feigned exasperation, because, heaven help him, he liked what he was doing ... to a nun.

“Reed? What do you mean?”

“When I was five, my drunk old man—well, I thought he was mine—said that they had been stuck with me since the day I was born.”

“Oh, Reed.”

There was a world of caring in those two words, words that nudged a heart Reed thought stone-hard. He should fear the power in that nudge. He should run, and fast. But, God help him, he could not. Not yet. “For a while, after I found out, I thought my real parents would come for me. By the time I was ten, I knew better.”

He brushed his cheek with a hank of Chastity’s hair, as if by accident, to see if it felt as good against his face as it did in his hands. It felt better, like corn silk, but softer, better than newborn kittens, better than anything Reed could remember.

Something so deep stirred in him, he dropped the braid as if it burst into flames. “It’s impossible. Put it back up.”

Chastity pulled the hank forward and examined the half- braid. “This is perfect. Finish it, Reed. Please?”

Against his better judgment, Reed complied. When he was done—and his body had risen gloriously to the occasion—Chastity took an empty grain sack, tore off a strip and fastened it around the end of the braid. “I like it.” She slapped his arm with the thick, silken rope. “Thank you.”

In a bid for modesty—and self-preservation—he turned away. “Enough nonsense; we have work to do. Good, an old cheese press, still usable.” He spotted some sacks and moved a barrow with such force, Chastity jumped, and guilt filled him as he slit a sack open. “Beans.” He sifted them through his fingers. “Dry and edible.”

She touched his shoulder. “I do not know who my parents are either.”

Reed looked up, his heart—despite his resistance—warming with the new nudge. “Leave it be Chastity.”

“You and I, the children, we were all abandoned—”

“Listen!” he snapped, though she had no choice. “I do not want to connect with you or those children—no shared pasts, no common ground.” He did not want her heart to speak to his. He would not listen, if it did. He did not want to nurture children. He did not want to ... want.

He gave the second bag a vicious slit and peas poured into the dirt. He swore, stopped the flow with his hands as he pulled the bag together, and hefted it to the barrow. “Let us see what else we can find.” He walked along a shelf, opening and slamming wooden bins. “Seeds for spring planting. We should think about that. Ah, the old caretaker did not like parsnips.” He wiggled a wilted bunch. “Know how to make soup?”

Chastity raised her chin. “Certainly.”

“Certainly not.”  

She scowled. “It cannot be difficult. I made gruel.”

“Was it luck?”

“Not entirely. I watched the Sisters, sometimes.”

“The Sisters?”

“The nuns who raised me.”

“They
raised
you?” Blast. He did not want to know about her childhood. “Ever watch ‘em make soup?”

She shook her head in reluctant denial.

“As with gruel, you put a pot of water on to boil and throw in everything we found.”

“Oats and apples too?”

“Damn. Just put in what we found out, here, and some herbs from the kitchen garden, with a pinch of salt.”

“I can do that.” Her smile filled the empty places inside him in the way that sunrise and birdsong filled him with hope for a new day, a sensation he lapped up like treacle, for too long, before he realized the danger in falling under her spell. When he did realize it, he frowned and returned firmly to the problems at hand. “What about milk for those children? Did you think of that?”

“Well, no, but—”

“You can see their bones beneath their skin, Chastity. They need to eat vegetables, bread, and meat. You need to find their parents. You cannot provide for them.”

“Yes, I can.”

God she was stubborn, and beautiful, and if he stayed, that bucket load of naïve self-assurance she carried around just might convince him she could. “Write to the Missionary Society, Chastity.”

“The children need me. I can love them.”

“Their parents will love them.”

“And so will I ... until their parents return.”

“Then you
will
write that letter?”

Chastity could not answer; she was too disappointed. She supposed that Reed’s dislike of children did not make him bad, just dangerous. She watched him push the barrow from the shed. “Zeke will like the parsnip tips,” she said, finding the silence awkward.

“Throw the tips in the soup as well, Chastity. We cannot afford to waste them. Put Zeke out to eat clover.”

“He’ll run away.”

“With his bad foot, he could not go far, though he would do best in a pot.”

“What?” Chastity stopped dead.

Reed nearly mowed her down with the barrow. “The children need him in their bellies.”

Her wide eyes narrowed to dart points. “How dare you suggest such a heartless, cruel— The children love Zeke.”

“If they starve, love will hardly matter.”

“Do you have no feelings? Did you never have a pet when you were a child?”

No feelings, no pets. “On a farm, animals are for work, selling at market, slaughtering to provide necessities, like clothing and blankets.  And they are for eating. We could not afford the luxury of pets and neither can you.”

“Go to the devil, Reed Gilbride.”

“That, I will, Sister Chastity. That, I surely will.”

CHAPTER FIVE

No doubt about it, Sister Chastity was still furious. Even from the library, Reed could hear her slamming pans, and he guessed that Zeke stew was out of the question.

He gazed about the cherry-paneled reading room. He could not search, of course, not yet. They’d made a pact, after all, he and Chastity, but he liked to read—no harm in reading.

Hundreds of books taunted him with centuries of secrets. Reed swore, chose two, and sat behind a mahogany knee-hole desk in the center of the once-treasured but well-used room, a sense of connection, of ... belonging, filling him for the first time, since ... since welcomed by
the rogues
into Wellington’s army.

Sinking against the soft buttery leather, Reed marveled at the anticipation filling him. Here, he might find what he had craved his whole life—knowledge of his past, except that he had promised not to search.

“To the devil with promises.” He cursed. He should be looking through family histories. He did not have time to work a farm or care for a hoyden nun and her band of marauding vagabonds. The woman stole children for heaven’s sakes. So what if she had a honey-warm voice and a heart to match? So what if she needed him, and they needed him? Somebody always needed him, but damned if the needing had ever warmed his stone-cold heart before.

Why did Mark’s haunted look haunt him? And Rebekah’s wail? Sure, he would like to throw Luke’s horn in a tarn, but he, at least, was open and trusting. Luke made him smile.

Reed sat forward. Blast it, no one made him smile, especially not someone of the stripling variety. He slapped the first book shut, and opened the next. Children who make you smile; now there was a dangerous thought. He slammed the second book as well.

“Why are you mad all the time?” Mark asked, catching Reed mid-scowl.

“Who are you to talk?” Reed countered. “Why are you mad all the time?”

Mark folded his arms. “I asked you first.”

Matt came in and stopped beside Mark.

Reed regarded them earnestly. “Life is like that. Something happens to make you mad, and if you can, you do something about it. If you cannot, you learn to live with it.” Reed did not like one bit that his words seemed to cause Matt some painful inner struggle. Neither was he pleased to recognize it.

“What if it happened, like, last year?” Matt asked, worry etching his young features. “And you cannot change it.”

Reed sighed. “Sometimes, all you can do is go on and make the best of the situation, of yourself, and of life.” Reed scowled. Damn, he sounded like a preacher, worse, a father, God help him.

“I always feel better when Kitty hugs me,” Luke told Reed, as he came from the corner of the room, book in hand. “Maybe she should hug you too.”

“Anybody ever tell you that you’re a smart boy?”

Luke grinned. “All the time.”

Mark snorted and left; Matt followed.

Reed suspected that he had not given Mark or Matt the right answers, and he regretted that, but blast if he knew what the answers were. He wished to the devil that he understood the questions.

Luke sat on the floor beside him and opened a book.

Reed chose another and did the same.

“What is a B-A-S-T-A-R-D?” Luke spelled, breaking the silence with a vengeance.

“What the devil?” Reed extended his open palm for the book. “What are you reading?”

Luke rolled his eyes and reluctantly placed the book in his hand.

Reed caressed the well-worn cover of a book whose match once gave him hours of rare pleasure. “The Life and Inventions of Leonardo DaVinci. Of all the books in the Squire’s library, this was my favorite. Judging by the look of this one, some St. Yves held a similar fondness.”

Luke’s smile acknowledged this shared bond of theirs, and Reed felt another tug at the granite center of his chest. He cleared his throat. “Here, forget his life and take a look at his inventions. Can you read?”

Luke nodded. “Me ‘n Matt ‘n Mark, but not Bekah. Ma taught us, but she said I was best.”

“Congratulations.” Reed stifled an urge to ruffle the lad’s hair. “I made a catapult like this once.” Reed tapped the drawing. “One of the boys used it to shoot a goose into the pigsty.” Luke laughed while Reed remembered the old man strapping him for putting ideas into the lad’s head. He handed the book back, with less regret for his rotten childhood than for Luke’s churning in his gut. “But my favorites of DaVinci’s inventions were his flying machines.”

“I want to build a flying machine,” Luke said.

“Yes, well, if you do, please do not tell Chastity where you got the idea.” Reed returned to his own book, to hide a grin, of all things. Half a page later, a bit of foot shuffling distracted him. Again.

On the other side of the desk stood Matt. Beside Matt, barely cresting the desktop, Reed saw a tiny pert nose, wide, solemn azure eyes, and a thatch of curly blonde hair. ‘Twas none other than the wild she-child, who now raised Luke’s horn like a declaration of war.

“Do not blow that infernal thing,” Reed said.

“When can we?” Luke asked.

“When I find what I’m looking for, you can blow it.”

“How will I know when that is?”

“I’ll tell you.”

Reed regarded his book but he did not bother to read, as another imminent interruption seemed inevitable.

When it did not come, he regarded the enemy with suspicion. This was worse than the interminable wait for the first cannon shot at Waterloo. Matt and Bekah stood there, in sight, unmoving—feisty little urchins feigning innocence, but Reed knew better. “Did you want something?”

Two blonde heads shook, two pairs of blue eyes watched. Luke continued reading, and Reed swallowed an urge to tell them all to get lost. Besides, if he gave into the impulse, they would take him up on his suggestion, and Chastity would strangle him.

Mark returned, his demeanor militant as he took his place beside Matt and Bekah. “You’re to fix that door this instant or there will be no soup for you!”

Look at the brigands, wearing his shirts, because their provoking protector could not clothe them. Who the devil did she think she was, giving him orders? “If not for me, there would be no soup, and you can tell Sister High and Holy that,” he all but shouted.

Rebekah wailed and ran, Matt followed. Reed was shaken by the look of disappointment Luke threw his way before he left as well. Mark remained, staring him down.

Reed remembered giving just such a look, as if it were yesterday. He could feel the pain that went with it. He should say something. Something. But what? Before he could figure it out, Mark left too.

Reed slumped into his chair, hating himself as much for not helping Mark, as he used to for being in the same place as Mark—angry at everyone for not loving him, while understanding exactly why no one could.

Matt, Reed suspected, had a serious problem; Mark, he knew, was in deep soul-searing pain; the she-devil uttered not a word; and if those three had not gotten to him, then Luke, with his trusting smile and infectious giggle, sure as hell had. Reed fled his chair to look for a family bible. To the devil with pacts; he wanted them out of here, fast, and the only way to accomplish that was to find the proof he sought.

In due course, he found a family history, bound and dusty, recounting who built, re-built, and destroyed what portions of Sunnyledge, and when. The book also gave a brief overview of the family’s titles, which were impressive, but he found nothing remotely resembling a clue to his past. “And if finding the answer was as simple as looking in a book,” he said to himself, “would it have gone nineteen and three-quarter years with no heir?” What a fool he was, aye, and a cad, too, for he had made a pact that he expected Chastity to keep, and so must he.

Damnation! Would he never know?

Reed gave up his clandestine search and found himself wandering toward the kitchen, seeking out—horror of horrors—the brigands and their warder.

As he approached the doorway, he saw Chastity place a bowl of soup on the table. Mark and Luke played with a tin regiment of dragoon guards on the floor, while Matt held a forgotten cavalryman in his hand as he stared off into space. Rebekah silently spun a toy top into a kaleidoscopic blur beside them.

Chastity looked up and saw him lingering in the doorway, and when their eyes met, a frisson of something resembling joy seemed to pass between them. Reed saw it in her eyes, only because he knew it for a reflection of his own amazing reaction to the sight of her. She recognized it as well, he suspected, but with a bit of silent communication, they agreed not to acknowledge it, thank goodness.

Chastity looked away first, her neck and cheeks the pink of the lady slippers that grew wild on the downs. “Children, put the toys in the bottom drawer while we eat,” she said. “If you do not take care of them, there will be no more.”

Surprisingly, the brigands did as she bid.

“I followed the unusual aroma,” Reed said, his voice emerging as a gruff croak. He cleared his throat. “Soup?” he asked as he sat at the table, the children following his example.

“Of course, soup. You said to make soup.” Chastity bristled then she bowed her head. “Thank you, Lord, for another wonderful meal.” She raised a victorious brow his way and he saluted her with his spoon.

Chastity grinned. Silly that his approval, however mocking, should warm her, she thought, chiding herself for such foolishness. “I found bed-linens in a cupboard on the second floor,” she said, taking charge of her wayward self. “I made the beds and left the windows open to air the bedchambers. They need a good cleaning, which we will do tomorrow.”

“How many bedchambers are there?” Reed asked.

“I prepared three. Bekah and I will share one. The boys will take one, and you shall have a bedchamber all your own. Bekah and I will be quiet as mice. But I thought the boys might be noisy, so I put you and them on opposite sides of us.” An image of Reed in his bed, dressed—or undressed—as she had seen him at dawn, brought more heat to Chastity’s face. To hide the telltale warmth, she looked down at her bowl of soup.

Reed cleared his throat. Did he sense her confusion? “I never ate soup flavored with—he took another spoonful—spearmint?”

“What? Oh.” Chastity took a taste. “Is that what it is? I wondered.”

Reed shook his head. “Different herbs go with different foods, Chastity. Some blend better with certain tastes than with others. Now, beans, peas, parsnips, and mint are perhaps not the best combination. Basil, bay leaf, or even sage might have—”

Chastity put down her spoon with a vehement thud. “I strongly dislike this tendency in you, Mr. Gilbride, to point out my errors. You said, ‘use some herbs.’ You were not specific as to which I should choose. How should I know one from the other? If you knew which herbs to choose, why did you not—”

Luke slurped. “Bestest soup I ever ate.”

“More,” Matt said, raising his bowl, as did Bekah and Mark.

As Chastity collected their bowls, she kissed each head. “Thank you, you sweet things.”

“I only said that it was unusual.” Reed took seconds as well. “I’ll help you collect cooking herbs from now on.”

“I would appreciate that.”

Luke gazed at Reed with speculation. “If you say her soup is the bestest ever, she might kiss you, too.”

Reed looked at her with such single-minded speculation, Chastity’s cheeks caught fire. “I think you might be right,” he said, finally, and Chastity thought she might go up in flames.

* * *

Grinning, the Vindicator hid in the dumbwaiter and waited while caressing the proof she had found that the St. Yves line had not ended, and she resolved to end it, herself.

The sins of the father would
finally
be avenged.

One of the puppets stood no more than a few short steps away.

They called him Reed, though his voice was not quite right, but where was the other, and who were the woman and children? The Vindicator hoped they were not St. Yves as well, or things could get messy.

With rapt attention, like a child at a Punch and Judy show—though lacking the ability to view the performance—the vindicator waited for the perfect time to spring the trap.

Events should fall into place of their own accord, but a prod now and again could be entertaining. The sport would truly begin, however, when the second puppet arrived, and the two fought to the death for the prize.

Though fate had never intended Edward to witness this performance, she wished he could know of her due revenge. When all was said and done, events would always go as fate decreed.

One could, nevertheless, hurry destiny along.

* * *

The children slept, finally, and even the old house seemed to breathe a soft sigh of relief. For all that she wanted the care of children, Chastity found herself more tired than she ever remembered. Despite her fatigue, however, she felt a sense of exhilarated accomplishment, as she followed the shaft of light spilling into the hall behind the stairs, compelled to stop and regard the man in the kitchen, unobserved.

The sight filled her with a, heretofore, unknown contentment. Did it flow from the warmth of the fire in the stove? Or was it this stranger who had invaded their sanctum—who brought such inner peace?

Candlelight cast a welcoming glow and lent a hazy perfection to everything it touched, even the nicked and lackluster pots hanging from a center beam. The huge black cook-stove stood like an age-old retainer, as if on guard, and the scarred worktable held a silver candle-branch, no less tarnished than the pans above.

In the way the moon gilds an indigo sea, the light stroked a spill of rich violet brocade heaped atop the table.

Chastity’s heart expanded. Sunnyledge felt like home—her first and only home—the place she was meant to be, with these children and this man.

This man? He had rolled up his sleeves to fill a huge copper slipper bath with hot water. The muscles in his arms, thick and taut, corded when he lifted the kettle from the stove, and in the rising steam, a dark spiral of hair had fallen to his brow.

All that potent masculinity both uplifted and frightened Chastity, yet the wild sensations flowed as much from her as because of him. That Reed Gilbride might be a missing piece of the puzzle of her life, she found daunting. But she supposed she should not be surprised that he caused emotions to churn within her. She had already shared two of the most amazing events of her life with him—yesterday, saving the children, and this morning, her first kiss. Memorable events. Dangerous.