The Light in the Darkness (41 page)

He had not realized, even then, how badly twisted Christopher was.

“I had to,” Christopher said sullenly. “It was your fault.” Grey bit back an angry retort. There was no use in arguing
with someone so demented. His eyes rested briefly on the knife that rested against Jennifer’s throat, then moved up. Jennifer’s gaze met his own. She looked frightened, as any sane person would, but the blank hopelessness he’d seen earlier was gone. He was relieved by the spirit he saw shimmering in her eyes.

The submissive tavern wench was gone forever. She would not submit tamely to her fate.

“Tell me,” he said slowly, trying to keep Christopher talking, playing for time. As long as the man was talking, he wasn’t killing. Also, he was mindful of Carey, still hidden in the brush, and hoped he might manage to get a clear shot off at Lightfoot. Unfortunately, Lightfoot was not very tall, and Jennifer provided a good shield. “If you’ve planned to kill Jennifer all this time, why haven’t you killed her before now? Surely you’ve had the opportunity. She walks in the woods by herself quite often.”

“There was no point in killing her until she meant something to you,” Christopher said. “I wasn’t certain that you cared anything for her at all, but I see now that you do. You can’t keep your eyes off my knife, no matter how hard you try. You care for her, and for the babe she carries.” He moved the knife slowly, and a thin line of blood appeared, black in the moonlight. Grey blanched despite himself.

“At any rate,” Christopher added carelessly, “I wanted you to see her death. Just as you saw Diana’s.”

Grey’s head snapped up in surprise, and he stared in shock at the other man. “You knew I was there?”

“Of course. You were drunk. You moved like an ox through the trees. Diana thought a large animal was following her, but I knew better. And then I saw you leaning against a tree, watching us. You saw everything, everything I did to her, but you were too drunk to stop me. You poor drunken sot.”

It was my fault. All my fault.

Oh, God, I killed her.

With an enormous mental effort, Grey pushed back the horror and the sickening feeling of helplessness that threatened to overwhelm him. He had been too drunk to save his first wife from a horrible death at the hands of this man, and he had punished himself endlessly for his mistake. But he was not drunk this time. He was not going to fail Jennifer the way he had failed Diana. Somehow, he was going to get her out of Christopher’s clutches. He toyed with the notion of charging them, but discarded it. Jennifer’s throat might be slashed if he so much as moved. And Christopher’s arm was very firmly around her waist.

“Why didn’t you kill me afterwards?” he asked in a reasonable tone. “After all, as a witness I might have been able to have you hanged.”

Christopher gave a ghastly smile. “I was willing to risk it. I wanted to punish you for everything you’d done to me. I wanted you to live with the memories.”

And he had. For eight long years he had lived with the memory of Diana’s battered body, and with the memories of her death that he had repressed so completely.

He could not bear to live with Jennifer’s death as well.

“Of course,” Christopher added, “I didn’t know you’d be here tonight. I hoped I could get Jennifer to become my mistress if I told her the rumors about you. Eventually, I knew, you would find out she was my mistress. And then you would follow her into the woods when she came to meet me, and I would—”

As he rambled on, his arm around Jennifer’s waist loosened slightly. Seeing her opportunity, Jennifer suddenly brought her foot down with all her strength onto Lightfoot’s toes. He yelped and cursed as she twisted away from his suddenly loosened grasp and fell to her knees on the ground. Without pausing to realize that Carey now had a clear shot at Christopher, Grey charged the other man, striking him in the chest with a massive shoulder, and they struck the ground in a tumbling heap.

Grey’s fists were everywhere, beating his opponent into
a bloody pulp. He fought viciously, savagely, the image of the knife at Jennifer’s throat still haunting him. So enraged was he that he barely noticed the other man’s blows.

And in his fury, he had entirely forgotten Christopher’s knife.

With a sudden, violent effort, Christopher shoved him, hard. Grey tumbled backward, striking his head painfully against the ground. He lay momentarily stunned, temporarily unable to struggle to his feet. Christopher knelt next to him and raised his knife.

At that moment a shot rang out.

Christopher fell to the ground, dead.

Jennifer, kneeling on the ground with her knife at the ready, looked around in surprise and relief as Carey stepped from the brush. He grinned at her, as casually as if nothing at all out of the ordinary had happened, and offered Grey a hand, helping him up as Grey had helped him to his feet half an hour before.

“About bloody time you fired that thing,” Grey grumbled, becoming painfully aware of his bloodied lip and several other bruises he was sporting.

“I couldn’t very well take a chance on hitting you or Jennifer, could I? At any rate,” Carey said, still grinning, “you were doing all right by yourself.”

Grey shrugged. He knew very well that the other man’s timely intervention had saved his life. Then his eyes fell upon Jennifer, and he saw the knife she was clutching as she stumbled to her feet. An overpowering wave of love broke over him. If Carey had not saved him, he was certain Jennifer would have.

“Are you all right?” he asked her.

Jennifer nodded, eyeing him uncertainly. There were yards of distance separating them, and he did not seem at all inclined to sweep her into his arms and kiss her. She glanced down self-consciously at her excessively low-cut gown, realizing exactly what was probably going through Grey’s mind. “You may be wondering,” she began tentatively,
“exactly why I met Christopher out here, dressed this way. It’s not—”

“It’s not what I think, I suppose.”

“No. It’s not.”

“Are you certain?”

Beneath his impassive expression she could have sworn she saw a hint of laughter. “I don’t know,” she said suspiciously. “What do you think?”

Grey quirked an eyebrow. “I think,” he said softly, “that you are an amazing, brave, extraordinary, and beautiful young woman.”

“Oh,” Jennifer said in confusion.

“Did I leave anything out?”

“I think that about covers it,” Carey said. “Except perhaps ‘foolish.’ Jenny, why did you risk confronting Lightfoot by yourself? Are you mad?”

Grey gave him a dire look, recalling that just last night this man had been asking Jennifer to be his mistress. “Go back to the house,” he commanded shortly. “We’ll be up in a few minutes.”

His shoulders shaking with laughter at Grey’s all too obvious jealousy, Carey started up the hill, only to be nearly bowled over by Catherine, who was hobbling down the lawn as quickly as she was able. She grasped his arms and stared up at him anxiously, her normal hauteur entirely evaporated. “My God! Carey, what happened? I heard—”

“I’ll explain everything,” Carey said gently, taking her arm and helping her back toward the house.

When they had gone, Jennifer walked slowly over to Christopher’s body and stood staring down at him. “Poor Melissa,” she whispered. “She really loved him, you know.”

Grey found it odd that her first thoughts were for his erstwhile mistress. She certainly had a forgiving nature. “I know,” he replied. His thoughts toward Melissa were not as charitable. He now realized she had known about Diana’s affair with Christopher. All these years she had been bedding
Grey in a futile effort to avenge herself on her husband. She had known that Diana had been having an affair, and she had never told him. He felt oddly disappointed in her.

The more fool he, to have expected honesty from his mistress.

Worried by his long silence, Jennifer put a tentative hand on Grey’s arm. “Edward,” she whispered, “I’m so sorry about—”

“Shh,” Grey interrupted, putting a finger on her lips. “We’re not going to concern ourselves with what happened in the past anymore. We’re starting over, Jennifer. From now on, nothing matters but the future.” He stared down at her, his face very solemn as he realized he could have lost her forever. “And if you ever risk your life in this way again,” he murmured gently, “I’ll lock you away in your chamber forever.”

Putting his arms around her, he held her close. Jennifer buried her face against his chest. “Edward,” she murmured. “I love you”

His arms tightened around her. But he said nothing.

Nothing at all.

“Are you busy?”

Grey looked up from the papers on his desk to see Jennifer standing in the doorway to his study, looking uncomfortable. He smiled. “No. Come in.”

“I wanted to show you something.” She waved him over to the window. Quizzically, he stared out through the wavy glass.

Carey and Catherine were walking together through the sun-drenched formal garden, engaged in an animated conversation. Her hand rested on his arm, and she looked up at him with an admiring expression.

“Well, well,” Grey said softly. “Look at that. At long last, she has a suitor.”

“I hope so,” Jennifer said sincerely.

Grey grinned down at her. “So do I.I much prefer that he court my sister rather than my wife.”

“Grey” she began chidingly.

“I am only joking” he assured her. “He’s a good man. I like him.”

“You really do, don’t you?”

Grey nodded. “There’s more of his father in him than I thought.”

“I’m glad. He was so kind to me at the ordinary. Even though he had an ulterior motive, I still think of him as a friend. He means a lot to me.” She smiled out the window, seeing Carey laugh at something Catherine had said. “It would mean a great deal to me if he was part of the family.”

“We’ll see,” Grey said. He hadn’t seen Catherine smile so much in a long time. He added, “Carey and I will be riding to Williamsburg tomorrow. We need to visit Trev Lancaster and tell him what really happened to Diana.”

As he said the words he realized how fortunate he was. He had been planning to go to Williamsburg to turn himself in. He would have been in gaol until he was tried, and then he would have dangled at the end of a rope. Now, thanks to Jennifer, he was a free man, and at long last he knew he was not a murderer. Thanks to Jennifer, and her stubborn belief in his innocence.

At his words, Jennifer had turned slightly and glanced toward the portrait of Diana. He saw the shock on her face as she realized the portrait was gone.

“I took it down yesterday,” he said by way of explanation.

Jennifer looked stunned. “You must have felt very disillusioned when you realized she’d loved another man,” she said softly.

“I did,” Grey admitted, “but that wasn’t the reason I took it down. I don’t hate Diana for what she did. She was only human, as capable of making mistakes as anyone, and God knows she paid a horrible price for her infidelity. No, I took it down because I finally realized it was time to stop living in the past. Diana is no longer part of my life, Jennifer.” He paused. “You are my life now.”

“You built Greyhaven for her,” Jennifer whispered.

“Does that bother you? If you prefer, we can live on
another one of my quarters. I could build another house. I will, if you like.”

Jennifer stared thoughtfully out the window, seeing the boxwood hedges lining the oyster-shell-strewn paths in the formal garden, the wide lawn, and the blue waters of the James River. “I don’t think so,” she said at last. “I like it here.”

“So do I,” Grey admitted. “There are a great many bad memories here for me—but there are a great many good ones as well.” He smiled, remembering the day he had brought her to Greyhaven, the day he had brought her into his life, never imagining that the dust-covered tavern wench would become a lady. No doubt that day, when Jennifer fell from her horse and sat forlornly in the dust, was not something she liked to recall—but it was one of his most cherished memories.

“Jennifer,” he said slowly. “I think I should tell you …”

His wife glanced around. “Yes?”

He saw the hope in her eyes. Last night, he had taken her to his bed, and they had made love for hours. She had whispered to him of her love, and he had held her close.

She was going to bear his child, and she meant everything to him. But he had not been able to tell her he loved her. The words simply would not come.

“Never mind,” he said. “It wasn’t important.”

Jennifer lifted her chin slightly. “I see,” she said chillingly. “In that case, I will leave you alone now.” She started to walk from the chamber, then turned and looked back over her shoulder. “If you
do
think of anything you want to tell me,” she said in her most regal voice, “I shall be in the garden.”

It seemed quiet once she had left the house. It
was
quiet; Catherine, Carey, and Jennifer were in the garden, and the other O’Neills were still in Williamsburg. Grey was alone. In the long habit of years, he found himself picking up a goblet and a decanter of Madeira. He stared at them thoughtfully.

He knew why he had been unable to tell Jennifer that he loved her.

He might not be a murderer, but he was not worthy of her love.

He wanted her love, but he wanted her respect and admiration as well, and he could not hope to win them as he was—a self-absorbed drunkard. In the cold sunlight streaming in through the window, he at last saw himself as others saw him, and he despised what he saw.

He had been hiding here in his study for far too long.

His eyes drifted back down to the decanter in his hands. “Damn it, no,” he whispered, and hurled it away from himself. It exploded against the wall in a spray of dark amber liquid and shattered glass.

He smiled then, and thought,
My life is not over yet.

On the contrary, his life had just begun. Feeling in control of his own destiny for the first time in too many years, he strode from the study to find Jennifer and tell her how much he loved her.

He walked out into the sunshine.