Frovtunes’ Kiss (8 page)

C
ongratulations, Freddy, on having made a firstrate ass of yourself.”

As Graham spoke, the footman who had helped his brother to the terrace moments ago backed discreetly into the house. Graham lifted the silver coffeepot and filled Freddy's cup with the steaming brew made extra strong according to his orders.

Movement inside his coat pocket—fitted with a stiff, starched linen sleeve to prevent it collapsing—signaled Isis's awakening from her midday slumber. Graham set the pot down and carefully slipped his hand into his pocket. Once his Egyptian-born pet made her way onto his wrist, he extended his arm to the streaming sunshine. She rose up on eight bristling legs, basking in the heat.

“I dread to think what iniquities you might have committed last night, little brother,” he said. “You didn't get married or anything to that effect, did you?”

Sitting opposite, Shaun snickered at the suggestion. Freddy slouched with elbows propped on the table, head anchored in splayed fingers. Suddenly, from that miserable huddle, a yelp emerged.

“Good God, Graham, don't move.” Freddy's head swung upward, mouth agape. One hand inched toward his napkin. “Hold completely still, and I'll swat it away.”

Graham's free hand shot up, creating a protective barrier between his pet and Freddy's improvised weapon. “Don't you dare harm a hair on Isis's, ah, legs.”

Freddy's jaw dropped. “Isis?”

“Quite. She's an African sun spider.” Graham brought the arachnid close to his face and stared into numerous bulging black eyes. “And what a lovely sun spider she is. Want to hold her?”

Freddy lurched away, nearly losing his balance and toppling his chair. He gripped the table's edge for purchase. “Keep that disgusting creature away from me.”

“Disgusting? That's no way to talk about a lady.”

With a sickened expression—though whether from drink or Isis's presence, Graham couldn't say—Freddy watched the spider's hairy-legged trek along Graham's coat sleeve. She stopped at his elbow and raised her burnished brown back to the sun, twitching her pedipalps to taste the air. Freddy grimaced, shut his bloodshot eyes, and cradled his forehead in his palm.

“She's really quite harmless.” Graham leaned toward his brother, bringing Isis with him. Though in his younger days he'd consumed enough brandy to sympathize with Freddy's present condition, he couldn't resist teasing. “I think she likes you.”

“Looks as though she wants a kiss,” Shaun added with a wicked grin. Yet the direction in which he leaned and the wary narrowing of his eyes declared Shaun's relief that Isis's regard centered on Freddy and not himself.

Muttered oaths too garbled for comprehension streamed from his brother's lips, though Graham distinctly heard his name mentioned more than once.

“Would you mind leaving us?” he said to Shaun. “There's something I need to discuss with my brother.”

“Right you are.” Looking a bit disappointed, Shaun pushed to his feet.

Graham slipped Isis into his coat pocket; she scuttled into a corner and settled in. He didn't immediately speak, but stared out over the small but formal gardens he had the damnedest time thinking of as his. Fruit trees and box hedges bordered fastidious flower beds; marble benches, birdbaths, and statues graced several winding paths. Set near the rear wall, a miniature Grecian pavilion dominated the scene.

Such perfect, symmetrical artistry seemed to exemplify the well-ordered ideal of a gentleman's life—the elegance, the refinement, the ease. On the other hand, his brother, fast degenerating into hiccups, expressed the reality so often lurking beneath.

Hypocrisy. It was what had sent Graham seeking adventures in far-off places years ago. It was what convinced him of the importance of self-reliance. It made him wonder now if he shouldn't simply get up from the table, set his feet in motion, and see how far he got by the end of the day. Hadn't he learned, in the harshest terms possible, that the concept of family—especially his family—constituted the greatest hypocrisy of all?

“Why are you doing this, Freddy?” he asked quietly, eyes fixed on the swaying tops of the pear trees flanking the pavilion.

“Doing—
hic
—what?” His brother eyed him up and down. “Where'd that thing go?”

“My pocket. You're safe for the moment, so do me the favor of satisfying my curiosity. Why do you seem hell-bent on destroying your life?”

“That's overstating it just a bit, wouldn't you say? And do you really
—hic
—think you're at all qualified to judge my actions?”

“No, not to judge. But I'm worried about you.” The truth of that statement startled him, but there it was. For all his claims to the contrary, he cared. Very much.

“Ha.” Another hiccup claimed Freddy's laugh, making it an ugly, clipped bark. “You're not permitted to worry about me. You relinquished that right years ago.”

“I'm still your brother.”

Freddy laughed again, a strident sound filled with scorn. “Who are you to point fingers? As I recall—
hic
—you didn't leave England in a burst of triumph. Or did you? Perhaps cheating at one of the most—
hic—
prestigious universities in Europe would be considered quite a coup in certain circles.”

Graham lifted a weary gaze to his brother's face. “Do you believe that, Freddy?”

“Why shouldn't I?”

“Because it isn't true.”

“Then why did you leave?”

“I seem to remember a certain letter signed by both you and Letty, informing me in no uncertain terms I'd done the right thing in leaving.” The missive had caught up with him on the Iberian Peninsula, days before crossing the Strait of Gibraltar into Morocco. Until those bitter words had spread their poison through his veins, he had considered retracing his steps…

“We were children when we wrote that.” Freddy's fist struck the table, sending his coffee cup toppling from its saucer. He seemed oblivious to the liquid soaking his sleeve as he gripped the edges of the table and hissed, “Why didn't you come back when Father died?”

Freddy's vehemence momentarily knocked Graham breathless. “I didn't return because I was angry. Damned angry. I'd been accused of an offense I didn't commit. My future, the future I'd been working so hard to achieve, crumbled before my eyes and no one—not Father, Mother, or anyone else—stood by me. So I left. I left England, with its sanctimonious rules and shallow standards, and washed my hands of the whole damned lot.”

“And—
hic
—of me.” The venom injected into those words stung no less for the hiccup.

A gulp of air lodged like a stone in Graham's lungs. “No, Freddy, not you. I believed you wanted me gone, yes, but that only garnered my regret, not my anger.”

“No?” The younger Foster raised eyes burning from drink, and from a pain Graham realized he had put there. “I bore the brunt of it. Me and Letty both. While you were off hunting for trinkets, we lost our father. You're our elder brother. You should have become head of the household.” His voice dropped to a caustic whisper. “You should have been here.”

“Freddy, I'm sorry. I didn't realize…”

“Don't bother.” His brother turned his face away and squinted into the gardens. “You think you can waltz back into our lives after a decade and express your disappointment in the way we turned out? The devil—
hic
—with you.”

Freddy shoved backward and gained his feet, overturning his chair with a crash. A footman appeared in the doorway, but Graham gestured him away. A sound of disgust grated in Freddy's throat as he pivoted with a precarious stagger, caught his balance, and headed for the house.

“Where are you going?”

“To—
hic
—pack my things.”

“You're in no condition to—”

From inside the house, a shriek blared—long, keening, outraged—taken up by frantic cries of
Help! Help!

“What the blazes?” Graham jumped up from his seat.

“That's Letty.” Freddy took off running. A clunk resounded when the toe of his shoe caught against the step-up into the Gold Saloon. He went down hard across the threshold, chin mercifully landing on the plush rug inside. He lay there stunned, blinking, then rose tentatively on his elbows and shook his head to clear it. Continued cries of “Help, thief!” roused him to his feet. Graham followed at a run.

“Oh, do stop yelling. I can explain. Really. Please just shush!” Backed to the study's bay window, Moira wanted to clap her hand over Miss Foster's mouth to stop her from raising the alarm.

On second thought, that mouth was presently opened so wide she doubted one hand or even two could effectively seal it.

Poised at the center of the room, arms flapping and ringlets flailing like a raging Medusa, the girl shouted on and on until Moira's ears throbbed. She had been caught red-handed as they say, with desk drawers yawning, cabinets gaping, and a dozen or more books akimbo, pages fluttering in the breeze of the young woman's tirade.

“This isn't what you think,” Moira tried again, raising her voice to be heard. Miss Foster's face, already an ominous scarlet, flamed hotter still, precipitating another hasty step backward on Moira's part. She found herself flush against the windowpanes and tangled in the curtain.

“I—I must have misunderstood Mrs. Higgensworth's instructions…” Even to her desperate ears, that explanation rang with idiocy. She might have done better had the clatter of approaching footsteps not sent the panic rising to her throat.

Several men burst in at once, a small but vigorous onslaught of trampling feet and booming voices. Their sheer ferociousness drove Moira tighter against the panes. Their entrance also silenced Miss Foster, thank heavens for that at least. An instant later Graham Foster, his brother, houseguest, and several footmen went silent, their fierceness fading to puzzlement as they took in the scene.

Frederick Foster was the first roused from bewilderment. “Letty, for pity's sake.” His words were slurred and breathless. “Are you hurt?”

“I caught
her
ransacking the place.” Miss Letitia jabbed a forefinger in Moira's direction. “She's a
thief.”

“Blazing hell.” Graham Foster tugged his neck cloth and scowled. With a backward wave, he dismissed the footmen. “Letty, we thought someone had a knife to your throat.”

“Look what she's
done.”
Miss Foster swept her arm in an arc that encompassed the disheveled room. “We must have her arrested at
once.”

“For untidiness?”

“For thievery!”

“Good grief, there's nothing in this room to steal,” Graham said. “I doubt she's loaded her apron with books and writing paper.”

Letitia Foster hoisted her chin. “Then what on earth
is
she doing?”

Oh, dear. All gazes turned to Moira, huddled and shaking in the window recess. In that instant she understood the discomfiture of the fox held pinioned to a tree by barking, salivating hounds. She swore then and there she'd never join a hunt again, not even for the exercise.

Ah, but they were waiting for an answer.

“Yes, well, I…you see, I was in the process of…” She glanced at each expectant face in turn: Miss Letitia, Mr. Frederick, the houseguest, and, finally, Graham Foster. Her mouth ran dry. It was the way he peered back at her. Since entering the room he'd barely spared her a glance, focusing his annoyance on his sister. Now his scrutiny caressed her up and down and deepened with the inescapable dawning of recognition.

“Moira Hughes.” His mouth curved with the familiar impudence, raising the hairs on her nape. “Moira, Moira. What a delightful surprise.” He lengthened the syllables of her name, pronouncing each with evident pleasure as though savoring a spoonful of honey. “Or are you Mary Houser today?”

“The former, my lord,” she returned as flames leapt to the tips of her ears.

“You
know
this creature?” His sister flashed an incredulous look that turned speculative in the next instant. “Moira Hughes? Isn't that our…”

Miss Foster's question died on lips gone suddenly and alarmingly chalky. Her hand clawed at her throat as her mouth widened in terror.

Moira clapped her hands over her ears as Letitia Foster let loose a fresh round of screams that far outdid her earlier ones. The room once more dissolved into a confusion of voices and movement. The younger Mr. Foster scrambled away while their houseguest raised his voice in an explanation no one could hear.

To her own indescribable horror, Moira discovered the source of the uproar. It was…good heavens…the most hideous thing she'd ever seen in all her life. A spider, but bigger, thicker, uglier than any she'd ever imagined, a monstrosity from deepest, darkest nightmare, with fearsome clawlike pincers and furry brown legs that bent and stretched with a leisurely grace that made it all the more grotesque.