Passion's Joy (39 page)

Ram moved easily through the dark garden, he might have owned the place. With little effort, he found the right balcony. He jumped up, pulled himself up and grabbing on to the ornate baluster, he vaulted that. With a dagger already in hand, he tapped the glass pane of the locked French doors. It shattered with a light rain of glass. A gloved hand reached through to unlock and open the door.

Lord Barrington stepped silently into the dark chambers of his peer Lord Guiness's bedroom. His gaze immediately came upon the huge four poster bed where the lord and lady of the house slept, only heads showing from beneath the piles of satin quilts. The lord looked ridiculously small and harmless, and yet, he was one of the prime players who reaped hell into Ram's life.

With a deadly calm, Ram stepped over to the bed and placed the point of his dagger at Lord Guiness's throat. "Wake up, my lordship," he beckoned in a low whisper, “‘Tis your worst nightmare come to haunt you."

With a slight start, Lord Guiness's eyes opened on command. To say that Lord Barrington, leaning over his bed with a dagger at his throat in the dark dead of night as he slept, was his worst nightmare was an understatement. There might indeed be something more frightening in hell, but Lord Guiness had not yet imagined it.

"My God—"

"Aye, prayers are appropriate at this point." Ram applied some pressure to the knife. "But quiet now, we will not wake the lady for this."

Stark terror engulfed him as he tried to swallow, stopped by the point of the shiny blade, gleaming in the night. "In God's name what do you want?"

"What do I want?" Ram's chuckle was low and mean, somehow more ominously frightening than the dagger at his throat. "Only this. I come bearing news I happen to know of great import to you. My wife has bore me a son. A bright healthy and bonny lad he be; the announcement will be in the morning's paper. I've come also to extend a personal invitation to his christening. You will be there, my lord; I’ll insist. Is that understood?"

Prodded by a hard jab of the knife, Lord Guiness managed to nod through his shock of the news, his fear for his life.

"Oh, by and away," Ram added as an afterthought. "Should anything, natural or not, happen to my boy, you will not live past the night—just so that I might count on your prayers for his continued good health. Hmmm?" He smiled. "Is that, too, understood?"

Rage began to rise over the naked terror gripping Lord Guiness, but an impotent rage, and the nod came with no prodding whatsoever.

Ram recognized his enemy's defeat. "Good, now I’ll leave you, my lord. Yet I fear not in

peace."

Ram's arm raised with the dagger. Terror choked the lord's face. With all his great strength,

Ram forced the dagger to its mark. By the time Lord Guiness opened his eyes with the startling revelation he was not dead, that the dagger was stuck in the pillow inches from his head, Lord Barrington was gone, vanished into the dark dead of the night.

Lord Guiness bolted up in bed, staring in shock at the darkness of the room.

A son! Who could have guessed? No doubt if Lord Barrington had one son, a man like that would have ten following. Oh, how he tried to warn the others that Barrington was not to be trifled

with! It had all started so innocently, too, the whole plot to get the Barrington fortune growing and burgeoning before anyone really saw—saw what? The wrongness? The evil?

Abruptly, Lord Guiness started praying, and a good part of his prayers were taken up with the fervent hope for a young lordship's continued good health.

By the time Joy Claret finished her song, little Sean's enormous amber eyes closed and he fell asleep. At last! She placed him carefully in the bassinet on the carriage floor, turning from the two ladies across from her to look out the open shutter at the lovely English countryside.

Frequent rain washed the English country side in dazzling emerald green colors--there was no prettier land. The sun hung in a bright blue sky broken by cotton-white clouds arranged as though for an easel. Yet it was past noon, they had been traveling since dawn and she felt restless within the small confines of the closed carriage. The footman had said Barrington Hall was only an hour away at last. Ram and his men rode well behind the entourage. Laughter and bits and pieces of their banter reached her from the distance, traveling over four other carriages, two carts and so many horses. It was Bart, she knew, who held Libertine on rein.

Apparently ladies do not ride, except in specified, exact circumstances, circumstances characterized by the word rare. "Oh, 'tisn't done, my lady," Susan, her maid, had said aghast, glancing quickly at the older woman at her side, the glance a deferment. Susan had thin red hair and a pale completion, but a pretty round face and bright brown eyes.

Madame Bouvia had nodded, before explaining, "A lady doesn't descend on her new household mounted. It would appear most un—"

"But I'm wearing a riding habit," she interrupted, glancing at the dark midnight blue velvet folds of a perfectly fitted gown. A cumbersome outfit this, she thought, feeling like an overdone Christmas package.

"One I'm sure my lady would hate to have soiled or worse"—the older lady's glove encased hand withdrew a delicate lace kerchief from her reticule, which she placed over her nose. "Smelling of a beast!"

Joy sighed, turning back toward the window. How she loved the scent of horses! And truthfully, she wouldn't give a hoot if her fine and expensive gown was cut into squares to be used as dust rags.

She heard the fine sound of Ram's and Sean’s laughter, and she tensed with a mean pang of jealousy. They were having a fine time of it, leaving her alone with the company of—

"Please do draw away from that window, my lady," Madame Bouvia presently said. "The breeze threatens your hair."

Joy turned to confront Madame Bouvia and Susan, and had they been Joshua, Ram or anyone who knew her, they would have realized the sudden spark of rebellion.

Madame Bouvia sensed something though. "Is something amiss, my lady?" "Yes! I am not your lady. I am not his lady! I will not be put in a glass cage!"

Susan gasped, unable to make sense out of this sudden outburst, while Madame Bouvia grew pale as though to faint. Fainting was very fashionable, and Madame Bouvia held everything fashionable in her esteem. Joy didn't care; she didn't care a whit,

"What in heaven's name are you doing, my lady?" "I'm removing these boots. They pinch my feet."

Joy unlaced the new shiny boots, working frantically before removing her stockings. Off went the pretty jacket and matching vest. She unbuttoned the top pearl buttons of her blouse so that she might breathe. Then she rolled up her sleeves to her elbows. She felt better already. Finally, she pulled out the pins holding her hair dressing in place. Hair had been the only point of interest Ram had shown in her predicament; passing her dressing room just as the deed was to be done, he forbad so much as an inch of her hair being shorn to Susan and Madame Bouvia's intense disappointment.

The long locks swung free, and Joy rubbed her scalp to loosen it more. Ignoring the aghast stares, she leaned out the window to shout to a footman to stop the carriage. Instantly, the carriage stopped, the rest of the entourage following like dominoes. A footman jumped to quickly open the door, only to see Lady Barrington put bare feet to the ground.

"You win,” Sean said, grinning at the sight. “She lasted less than a month.''

Joy Claret marched toward them in all the glory of her bare feet and disheveled appearance. They had a wager going on how long Joy would maintain her docile pretense of being fine and one with Lady Barrington and her trappings.

Leaning forward on his horse, watching, amused, Ram sighed, "Actually I'm surprised it took this long."

Joy ignored everything and everyone, determined steps taking her directly to Bart. "Give me my horse, please. And where's my saddle?"

"My lady, you can't be thinking of riding now—" "I'm not thinking of it; I'm going to do it."

"I tell you, my lady—"

"If I hear 'My Lady' one more time, I'll scream, and if you don't get my saddle, I'll mount astride and bareback." She locked her eyes to his. "I swear I will."

"Bart," Ram called out, and had she the courage to turn to him, his amusement would have been the permission she swore she didn’t need. "I'm sure you remember Joy is perfectly capable of carrying out that threat." He motioned to the waiting footman. "Find the lady's saddle."

Madame Bouvia and Susan had stepped out of the carriage, their faces expressions in shock. The saddle appeared in a groom's hands, and surprising everyone watching, perhaps more than any other part of the scene being played, Joy insisted on saddling Libertine herself.

Ram came round on his mount, taking Libertine's reins as she pulled the cinch tight. She had no idea of the sight she created. Anger put color to her cheeks, the thick mass of light brown hair cascading down her back, the round full thrusts of her breasts against the white silk of the blouse, lines tapering to that small waist—a waist bearing no mark now from the birth of his son. The thing most disturbing to him, however, was that the wild young girl who had captured his heart had emerged once again.

Ram's battle raged every moment he was in her presence and often when he was not.

Dozens of pictures taken from the long voyage back to England came unwillingly to his mind: Joy teasing, playing, singing to his son, Joy asleep in his bed, Joy with her gown parted so seductively after nursing, Joy taking a bath with little Sean in his ship's huge brass tub, Joy sitting in a chair as she furiously tried to get the tangles from her hair, Joy, the night Sean got her drunk on but a half cup of rum and she amused them both with a solo performance of Romeo and Juliet before passing out with girlish giggles in his arms…

A hundred other pictures were etched in his memory.

Yet, now with rebellion in her eyes and the determined lift of her chin, it would not be a battle but rather a war. A war, he knew he could not win for long, and yet he had to be with her for two more months at least. Two bloody months...

Before any of the footmen could step forward, Joy sat in the saddle. She could not fathom the depth of emotion in Ram's gaze as he handed her the reins, but by so doing, he handed her freedom. She embraced the freedom instantly, and with a nudge of her feet, she was off.

"My lady forgot her hat," was all Madame Bouvia could think to say as she and Susan turned at last from the shocking sight.

All of Ram's men nodded, grinned with approval. This was the Joy Claret they knew and

loved.

One of the grooms finally smiled, the others followed as they watched Joy ride in the

distance. "I fear our lady is not a conventional type.''

“Indeed!" Ram's laughter was the loudest. "Whatever Lady Barrington is to become, I think it assuredly will not be conventional."

They waited as Joy circled back, racing Libertine to a quick stop before the large group, "Oh my, it's so good to be riding her again!" Not one man there doubted the words, for the truth of her assertion appeared in her sudden happiness and smile, the exhilaration of freedom. "How far is the place?”

"A mile farther, then three down the first turn."

"A goodly distance for a race, is it not?" she asked, looking at Ram. "A race to the end; winner take all!"

Instantly cheers went up, Sean's war cry the loudest, and there came a sudden scrambling for mounts, at least from those who had them. Ram did not want to consider what winner take all meant, though he nonetheless tapped his stallion. She was already galloping in the far distance, never so much as glancing back to see the dozen or so men in chase. For she was the wind.

Libertine had not felt her mistress's weight in nearly a year, and she rewarded the long awaited rider by giving the run all she had. This left everyone else in dust.

Joy should have been awed by the marble archway marking the entrance to the property, the brass enclave bearing the Barrington arms; but Libertine cut the turn sharp and at a dizzying speed. The thrill of keeping to the saddle took precedence over what for years had been ogled by sightseers. There was no excitement like racing; she felt happy and alive, at one with her horse galloping over the well-kept road.

The landscape flew past, nothing but green grass-covered hills broken by clusters of birch trees and bush. Libertine raced down an incline, disappearing into a thick forest. Horse and rider thundered across a well-made wooden bridge that arched over a stream. The road straightened and turned in cycles, until finally, they emerged at the other side of the forest and greeted with the greenery of the hills again.

Still she flew with the wind, safer now as Libertine raced up a slight incline. At the top of the incline, the world spread below to a vast flat land, and there, as though brought by a wave of a wand from the worldly place of dreams, Barrington Hall was set before her. She reined Libertine to a quick halt on the hill, and breathless, she just stared.

Her heart pounded wildly but not from the rigors of the race. Ahead, the road split in the distance to start a large square, each side splitting again to form a pattern through well-manicured lawns, flowerbeds, and sculptured gardens, at least a square mile of green upon green. Directly in the center of the squares, a fountain rose prominently, one made of three circles with their circumferences touching. The fountain itself seemed big enough to swim in.

The largest house she had ever seen in America could fit in a corner of Barrington Hall. It was three stories high and made of marble, washed gold by the weather of many, many years. The front formed a perfect rectangle, but the great manor formed a massive square, with three separate wings surrounding a courtyard. The stables and the servants' quarters, a half mile away, were of the size she imagined the house might be.

The riders at last caught up with her and upon seeing her stopped on the hill, they knew she stared at Barrington Hall. Ram signaled the others back before letting his horse prance to her side. A gloved hand caught Libertine's reins to stop her agitation, and as he looked at Joy, he remembered a young girl dressed in boy's breeches and perched in a tree aiming a pistol at him. He remembered her wild rides through the night, the dozens of slaves she risked her live saving, the quickness of her passion and fury, and all of that temerity contrasted sharply to the timidity so plain now.