Cates, Kimberly (32 page)

Adam gritted his teeth as his brother strode out. God, how he wanted to take care of Juliet. Such a simple wish— one as old as the first man who had loved a woman. But the best way he could take care of Juliet was to get as far away from her as possible as soon as possible, so she could forget him.

Yet the thought of life without Juliet left him with the kind of barrenness in his soul that drove men to fling themselves to certain death upon the battlefield, welcoming the dark abyss that was the only force that could extinguish such soul-deep pain.

He turned to see her sink down on the bed, looking forlorn, a tattered angel far from heaven. She stared down at her filthy hands as if they held the broken pieces of her spirit, and she knew the instant she opened her fingers, they'd drift away like fairy-dust or moonbeams and leave her in darkness.

He wanted to cross to where she sat and kneel down, cupping her hands in his own battered ones. He wanted to mend what was broken inside her. But Sabrehawk's hands were made to wield a sword, to fight in battle, to slam into tables or walls in fits of temper. They weren't hands that could soothe away fear and failure. In that instant, he would gladly have severed his rough sword-toughened hands if he could have exchanged them for his brother's gentle ones.

"Your brother is a remarkable man," she said quietly.

Adam ground his teeth, but couldn't deny it. "Gavin is everything I can never be." The admission was exquisitely painful. "Juliet, I—"

"I'm grateful for all you've done—finding us a place to stay. Offering clothes."

I'd put the moon into your hands if it were mine to give,
a voice inside Adam whispered. "I failed to protect you. It's the least I could do."

She angled her face away from him, fragile golden curls trailing across one pale cheek. "I'm very tired, Adam."

"Hell, yes, you must be exhausted. What can I do for you?"

"I just... need to be alone." Her lips trembled. "It's time I got used to it."

Adam winced. She'd not only witnessed the destruction of her dreams, but of the makeshift family she'd fought so hard to build with her own hands, gathering the lonely, the abandoned into her generous heart.

He wanted to say something wise. He wanted to reach out to her. He turned and walked away. For the first time in his life, the dread warrior Sabrehawk knew what it felt like to be a coward.

Adam had suffered through month-long sieges that had been less exhausting, but at last the invasion of Glenlyon House was finally complete. Every chamber was bursting with ladies of the night. Enough bath water had been hauled up and down the stairs to drain the river Thames. The few garments Rachel had left behind had nearly incited a melee among the women as they fought over elegant ball gowns and exquisite
robes d'anglaise.
The losers in the fray had been reduced to wearing what clothes the women servants could spare—a situation that had Gavin's maids nearly quivering with indignation.

It had caused quite a sensation among the earl's servants. The footmen kept crashing into walls, their eyes on the house's newest guests. The maids—not of his lordship's philanthropic bent—were torn between curiosity and righteous indignation.

Juliet's angels weren't making the transition any easier. Isabelle sashayed about as if she were lady of the manor; the simpler girls, awed by the grandeur, blustered like banty hens to hide their unease. Yet no amount of bravado could conceal the truth from Adam's eyes.

Juliet's angels were as confused and rudderless as a troop of soldiers whose general had fallen. She hadn't emerged from her room since Adam had left her there.

There hadn't been time to think, let alone chase after her while settling the women into their new lodgings. But now, with the house so quiet, everyone from the bootboy to Isabelle asleep, there was nothing to drive away the images he knew would haunt him forever—not the fire, nor even the hatred that had shone in Juliet's eyes. Rather, the sight of Juliet's hands idle for the first time since he'd seen her. No seam to stitch or buns to bake, no ink-smudges on her fingers as she taught little Felicity how to shape her letters.

Those images had driven Adam to Gavin's library to get roaring drunk, but for the first time in his misbegotten life, he doubted he had the stomach for it. He was sickened by the memory of Juliet's soot-smudged face, her star-fire eyes lifeless and empty.

The last thing he needed was an altercation with a young Irish hothead, whose features were suddenly hard and older, hero-worship driven from the raw-boned planes of his face. But Fletcher had tracked him down with the single-mindedness of his infernal race, burning with outrage.

Adam took a gulp of his brother's finest brandy, wondering why everything tasted like ashes.

"Well, boy, you're damned well perishing to say something. Might as well spit it out before you explode."

"Late last night, before the fire, Elise came up to my chamber in the attic. She told me what you did—how all of you banded together and mocked Miss Juliet, made her feel foolish and naive, as if Angel's Fall was nothing but a brainless child's game."

Adam swallowed hard. He'd hurt Juliet on purpose then, hoping to save her even greater pain, hoping to shelter her from the evil that had stalked her for so long. He hadn't known then that even greater pain was to come.

"I respected you, Sabrehawk. But now, I know the truth. Any decent man would fight for Miss Juliet, shed his last drop of blood before he'd abandon her."

"I never said I was a
decent man."
The boy's scorn shouldn't hurt so much. Damnation, Adam hadn't asked for the hero-worship that had shone in Fletcher's gaze. He'd tried time and again to force the lad to see him as he really was—hopelessly flawed, fighting his way through life with his sword because he didn't know anything but battles and blood, championing other men's quests for hard coin because he had no dreams of his own.

"I did what I had to do," Adam ground out. It was a miserable excuse. One that knotted in Adam's gut.

Fletcher snorted in disgust. "Those are the words of a coward. I understand everything now. You never gave a damn about me. Only endured my bumblings for pay. You betrayed the women in Angel's Fall. Were willing to turn them all out onto the street because it wasn't
convenient
for you to stand by Juliet and fight for what you know is right."

"Damn it, the women went along with the scheme to drive Juliet away from here."

"It was the only thing they
could
do to keep her safe. But you—you're strong enough, skilled enough to defend her. Defend them all from anyone who would try to hurt them."

"Blast it, boy—"

"But you turned your back on them. God forbid you bestir yourself to guard them. It might have taken some effort. It might have taken some
heart.
Something you don't have."

Bloody hell, if he didn't have a heart why was his chest burning like fire? "Fletcher—"

"Don't! You sicken me! I know you think me a reckless fool, but I'll tell you something, Sabrehawk. I'd rather die in a good cause before I turn twenty than to become what you are." It was the voice of a boy suddenly tempered into the steel of a man.

Adam's hand clenched on the snifter of brandy. "You're already a hundred times the man I could ever be, Fletcher. My brother—I'll speak to him. I'm certain he can see to your future as I never could."

Fletcher turned, started to stalk away. Adam waited for the silence. Instead, the youth paused at the door, his voice suddenly low, rough. "I never knew my father. But when I was a boy, I tried a hundred times to imagine what he'd been like. When I met you, I hoped... I wanted to believe my father had been like you. Now—I'm ashamed to have ridden at your side."

Adam stood, silent, still, alone. For over a year, Fletcher had been his cross to bear. Adam had been dogged by the young Irish fool, the clomp of Fletcher's eager footsteps trailing behind him as common as the sound of his own breathing.

He'd imagined the blissful quiet once Fletcher was disposed of. Anticipated riding the countryside alone, as he had for so long. All that time, Adam couldn't wait to be rid of his troublesome young charge. But now...

Adam drove his fingers back through the tangled waves of his ebony mane. Blast and damn. This was a hell of a time to realize just how much he'd miss the lad when he was gone.

Candle in hand, Adam wandered the hallway of the townhouse where he'd never belonged, stalked by ghosts of the boy he had been and the man he had been destined to become before he took his first breath, his first step.

A man without even an honorable name. A man not worthy to kiss the sole of Juliet's slipper.

He flattened his palm on the door of his father's study, and entered the room he'd avoided for so many years. It was filled with books about wars other men had fought, lined with weapons the old earl had wielded only in practice for battles he'd never fight, littered with pictures of heroic charges other men had led.

It had always felt like a tomb to Adam, only one image within it not a testament to the old earl's unrealized dreams. The portrait that hung above the mantel visible from the desk where the earl had spent so many hours.

Adam held up the taper until its glow spilled on the gold-framed image. Adam's mother perched on a swing, a gown of sky-blue satin billowing about her, her flame-hued hair woven with lush Stuart roses. Barely sixteen, her eyes brimmed with girlish hopes, her lips curved in a smile of indescribable beauty, as if she held the sweetest of secrets in her heart.

Years ago, she had told Adam that the portrait had been started on the day the earl's son had first said he loved her. A glorious betrothal ring, a magnificent wedding, and a passion like those whispered in legends were forever possible in that frozen moment in time. Before greed and weakness had stripped it away and left Lydia Slade only a terrible choice. A life of shame, or one without the man she loved.

From the time Adam had been old enough to understand the heartbreak that blossom-cheeked girl would face, the sight of the portrait had closed like a fist about his heart.

What on earth had induced him to come here now?

"It's easy to see why he loved her." The voice from the corridor should have startled him, but it didn't. Gavin had always had a positive genius for tracking anything wounded to its lair, intending to heal it. Adam cast a glare over his shoulder, saw his half-brother standing there, peering up at Lydia Slade's face with affection and understanding. "There was such a vibrancy about her, so much laughter. I remember as a boy I couldn't take my eyes off of her whenever she entered the room. Father said it was always that way. The first time she swept into a ballroom—"

"Did father tell you what she looked like the
last
time she swept into a ballroom?" Adam said bitterly. "The last time she was welcomed into polite society? Or how about the last time her mother spoke to her before pretending that she was dead."

"She loved father. Was willing to sacrifice—"

"And what was he willing to sacrifice for her, Gavin? He didn't have the courage to defy his father, nor the decency to let her go, perhaps find another man who would give her his name. And then, after your mother was finally out of the way—" Adam swore, sickened by himself. "Damn, I didn't mean it that way, Gav. Forgive me."

"I know," Gavin said, no censure in his eyes, only the shadow of an old pain.

"It's just that, when she died, I thought... I was certain... I know she had to be as well..." Bloody hell, how could it hurt so much even now, years later? Hurt so much he couldn't even form it into words.

"Certain of what?" Gavin prodded.

"That father would wed her. Make her his wife. He loved her. She'd borne seven children for him. With your mother dead, there was no impediment in his way."

"I wondered about that myself. Maybe by that time they didn't need any vows to bind their love. They'd already said them in their hearts."

"Blast it, still spouting your romantic rubbish." Adam grimaced. "Do you know why he didn't marry her? Because of what he'd made her when he took her to his bed. A courtesan. A mistress. From that moment she could never be a fit bride for an earl. God forbid that he dishonor the Carstareses' name. Of course, my mother—she'd sacrificed her honor, her life, everything out of love for him."

"That was her choice, Adam. It's not for us to judge."

"How can I judge him when I was the most reprehensible of all?" Adam's chest felt torn open, wide.

"What could you possibly have done that was so terrible? You were father's pride. He loved you above all the rest of us."

"And that love was so damned important to me that I dared not risk losing it. No, I couldn't confront the selfish son of a bitch, demand that he marry my mother, that he stop tormenting you."

"Adam, don't blame—"

"I didn't blame him. No, that would have been honest. Brave. I rode off to play soldier, to fulfill his dream for me, his wish. That's what I told myself. Do you want to know the truth, Gav, after all this time?"

"If you want to tell me."

"I ran away from Strawberry Grove so I wouldn't have to look at my mother's face, see the hurt she tried to hide. I fled so I wouldn't have to see my sisters grow up."

"They're beautiful. All of them," Gavin said, pain and pride mingling bittersweet in his voice. "You should go home, Adam, see them—"

"I can't." Adam squeezed the words past the lump in his throat. "When I left, they had the same look in their eyes as mother did when the portrait was done—as if a thousand glorious possibilities danced just within their grasp. They'd been raised like princesses, their tiniest wish fulfilled from the time they were laid in the cradle. But it was all a lie, a cruel charade. There were no ballrooms for them to conquer, no admirers who would flock to the door with betrothal rings tucked in their sweaty palms."

He glanced at Gavin, saw the sorrow shading his features, knew that his brother felt the same helplessness to aid the sisters they both adored. "In time, they'll find a man worthy of their love. Someone who won't care about the circumstances of their birth."