The Wicked One (30 page)

In one frighteningly vital one.

"Help me . . ."  She raised her face to the wind, the sleet that was now turning to sifting, whirling snow.  "Oh, dear God . . . help me . . ."

But she knew, even as she clung to the outcropping of rock, even as the pain became a thousand knives impaling her belly, that it was too late.

Too late to for her.

Too late for the baby.

And too late — far too late — to go back.

She tipped her forehead against the icy stone and, as the tears came, surrendered to the darkness.

Chapter 25

By the time Lucien finished the bottle of brandy, the tinkling sound of sleet against the windows had stopped.  Now, only snow whispered against the cold panes.

He sat sprawled in a chair, damp shirt clinging to his back, his eyelids heavy, his brain refusing to shut down as he had tried so hard to get it to do.  Another bottle, then.  Yes, that was what he needed.  Setting his glass down, he pulled himself to his feet.  Immediately his legs folded beneath him, and he narrowly missed clipping his chin on the edge of a table as he went down.  He lay there on the carpet for a moment, fighting dizziness, realizing, with a sense of stupefied wonder, that he was drunk.

Drunk.
  He had never been drunk in his life.  He had never been willing to relinquish control of his mind, his body, to something outside of his own will, and the sensation of finally having done so filled him with horrified amazement, curious self-disgust. 
Drunk
.  And why?

Because of a woman.

A woman who had stripped him of all control, all sense of self, all identity . . . and left him lying here on the floor, helplessly afloat on a sea of brandy.

At least he was warm.  Comfortable.  Filled with a sense of lassitude that managed — only just — to blanket the emotions that still churned his heart.  He pulled himself up and, careening off a table, managed to retrieve another bottle from the cabinet.  With a curiously unsteady hand, he splashed some into his glass and sank back down into the chair, contemplating its color, its clarity, with flat, unseeing eyes.

Yes, he was warm.  Comfortable.  He took a sip of the liquor.  But what about her?  Was
she
warm and comfortable out there in the winter darkness?  How could she be?

She — out there in the winter darkness.

Lucien frowned.  Something wasn't right here.  She was his wife.  His duchess.  She shouldn't be out there in the sleet and snow while he sat here in a sleepy, stuporous fog.

Look at what she has reduced you to.

Indeed.

Look at you, lying here in your own misery.  Why don't you go after her?  Bring her home where she belongs?  It is your duty.

Duty, duty, duty.  Always, duty.  But damn it all, that was his first obligation.  Duty.  And his wife.

He got to his feet, feeling as though he were swimming, clawing through fumes of brandy.  The house was silent.  Not a servant was in sight.  Thank God for furniture, which aided his precarious balance.  Thank God for brandy.  He staggered out into the hall, remembering how
she
had confronted him here an hour . . . two? . . . three? . . . before.  Agony sliced through him.  He might still be able to catch her.  She would be at the inn.  He would go get her, bring her back home.

He pulled open the door, using it for balance, and tottered down the stairs out into the night.  It was only as he slipped and fell just outside, ice cutting his hand, that he realized he had forgotten his greatcoat.  The devil, it was snowing. 
Snowing.
  He looked back up at the steps down which he had all but fallen, decided they were too much for him to negotiate, and, pulling himself back to his feet, headed down the drive, slipping and sliding all the way, a lonely figure in the snowy darkness.

From some distant part of himself, he felt the cold against his skin, scarcely protected by his thin wet shirt.  Dampness came up through the soles of his shoes.  Snow melted against his face.  But the brandy kept the sensations at bay.  He bent his head and, mustering all his concentration, focused on putting one foot in front of the other, one step, another, one step, another, as he lurched with a strange, disjointed purpose down the dark, lonely road toward the village.

Eva, Eva.  Didn't she know, didn't she care, how besotted he was over her, how wretched she had made him?  One step, another, one step, another.  Steadier steps, now; the air, the exercise, the cold, the concentration . . . the fog that obliterated his mind was parting, and through it, patches of clarity were showing.

Patches of clarity that brought only pain.

One step, another, one step, another.  Damnation, it was cold.  Should have brought the greatcoat after all.  Why hadn't he?  Ah, yes, the steps.  Steps.  One step, another.  One step, another.  He watched his shoes scuffing through the falling snow.  Felt the terrain beneath the crusted ground changing, and realized he was no longer on the road.  Ah, yes.  The bridge that spanned the little inlet.  He reached out, grabbed the handrail for support, and skidded back down the other side.

A strange sound was coming from his mouth.  His teeth, chattering with cold.  He wrapped his arms about himself and continued on, following the road toward the sea.  The wind had stilled, though he could hear the distant roar of the ocean now, the eerie silence of the vast and lonely night.

He trudged on.  From far behind him, back along the road, he heard hoofbeats, and men shouting to each other.  Oddly familiar, those voices.  Ah, hell.  Keep going.  He couldn't go back to the house and play host until he had his wife back.

And then silence, deep, brooding, still, closed about him once more, the only sound, that of his feet crunching along the frozen ground.

Time lost all meaning.  He pressed on, head bent against the snow, his breath frosting the air.  He was near the sea now.  He could smell it.  Taste it.  Hear it.  Ah, yes.  There it was, cold and black, stretching into forever beyond the cliffs.

He kept going, and then something made him stop and look up.  There, melting out of the darkness far ahead, was a figure, leading a pair of horses.

Lucien stood there, frowning.  A sense of anxiety pressed down upon him, but he could not identify its source; desperately, he tried to gather his wits, but they eluded him.

"Your Grace!"

The voice was all but obliterated by distance and lingering gusts of wind, but Lucien recognized it.

Rothwell.

Inebriation beat a retreat behind alarm.

Panic.

"Your Grace!"  The figure was running toward him now, slipping and sliding on snow-glazed ice, the horses trotting to keep up.  Lucien shook the cobwebs from his head and hurried forward to meet the solitary figure.  Rothwell.  The coach.  Eva.  It was all becoming clear to him now —

"Your Grace, there's been an accident . . . I tried to help her, but I couldn't —"

Immediately Lucien was sober.  More sober than he had ever been in his life.  Dread paralyzed him — than he was running toward the groom, his heart pounding, a thousand awful thoughts racing through his suddenly alert mind.

"Where is she?  What happened?"

"Coach overturned," the groom panted.  "She tried to jump out . . . fell . . . down the cliff —"

"
Down the cliff?
"

Lucien staggered back, unable, for a moment, to see past the suddenly blackness that nearly wiped out his vision.

"I was just coming to get you, Your Grace . . . figured you'd know what to do . . .   She's lying partway down the slope just after Taverton Bend — I tried to reach her, but she —"  The man's voice choked on a sob.  "She wasn't answering."

Lucien gripped the servant's shoulders.  "Listen to me.  The duchess's life may well depend upon it!  Return to the house at once and call out the staff.  Bring as many as you can find back with you, along with blankets, additional horses, and the other coach.  Send someone into the village for the doctor, and be quick about it.  Move, man!"

Oh, dear God. 
Dear God
!  Lucien broke into a run, heading down the path from which Rothwell had just come.  Taverton Bend.  Oh, dear God, if she'd fallen there —

He refused to think about it.  Refused to think about the sifting snow, the low whine of the wind, his own rising panic.  He pounded on across the treacherous terrain, every cold breath searing his lungs, every thought that entered his mind causing him to find more speed, more stamina, as he charged across the frozen landscape.  Eva.  Oh, dear Lord, he must reach Eva . . .

There, just ahead, was the bend, meandering dangerously close to the cliffs.  From out of the darkness, Lucien saw the coach, still on its side, the snow already collecting atop its still-open door, the harnesses lying in a twisted, broken heap nearby.  He ran to the edge of the cliff —

And stopped.

There she was.  She lay some twenty feet down, a small, broken doll pinned against a wedge of rock, the snow already covering her body like the first earth thrown onto a new grave.

The blood rushed to his head and he tipped it back, fists clenched, eyes squeezed shut, feeling such agony rising up from his soul that it was all he could do not to give way to the howl of pure animal anguish that threatened to consume him.

"Eva!  Eva, answer me!"

The snow swirled around her; she did not move, did not raise her head, did not make a sound.  She was dead.  She had to be.

His heart constricted.  The back of his throat closed up.  Lucien set his jaw and mustered every shred of his formidable self-control.  He turned back toward the overturned coach, the mangled harnesses, and it was only as he bent down and began working with the automatic motions of the driven that he realized the dampness running down his cheeks was tears.

I've killed her.
  His raw, frozen fingers worked to unfasten a buckle, another. 
I've killed her, and the child with her.  She was right.  I did not learn my lesson; in seeking to control others I have lost the love of my sister, and now the life of my wife.
  He fastened two strips of leather together, unbuckled another section, fastened it to the first, the frozen line growing as fast as the tears that leaked, uncontrollably, from his eyes. 
I've killed her . . .  Oh, Eva, you are free of me at last.  Free, forever.

He furiously wiped a hand across his eyes, but the tears would not stop.  The harnesses lay in pieces now, stiff beneath his numb fingers; one by one, he shook them out, buckled them together, and at last had a sizeable length of leather.  He carried it back toward the cliff's edge, steeling himself for the grim task he must perform, this last husbandly duty to his duchess — to bring her body home.

He looped one end of the line around the base of a rock, wrapped the other around his wrist, and began the treacherous descent.

He allowed no feeling to penetrate his wall of icy resolve.  No thought, beyond reaching the snow-covered figure wedged down there against the rocks, to penetrate his brain.  He had no fear, though he knew that one slip, one misstep, would mean his own death.  He had killed her.  Life was not worth living without her.  He had nothing to fear.

Slowly, he picked his way down the slope, testing each outcropping to be sure it was solid, checking each tentatively placed step to be sure his footing was secure.  The wind howled around him; far below, the sea thrashed, boiling and breaking white against the rocks.

He was almost there.  Stones and chunks of ice, loosened by his progress, skittered down the slope, some of them bouncing off the still, cloaked figure crumpled beneath him before arcing out into space on their journey toward the sea.  Lucien winced with each one that struck her, though he knew she was beyond feeling.

Eight more feet and he would have her.

Six more —

And then his foot slipped, pain blazed up his leg, and for a moment he hung suspended by the leather line, heart hammering; then the wind slammed him back against the cliffside.

He looked down and saw what the fall had cost him.  His calf was ripped open, his stocking awash in blood.  Lucien deadened his mind against the pain.  It was only physical.  Nothing like the wound that had torn apart his heart.

He continued down, cursing, for his ankle would no longer support him.  He must have sprained it.  Maybe broken it.  He no longer cared.  All that mattered was reaching his Eva.

On one leg now, he descended the last few feet, gingerly testing the ledge upon which she rested to be sure it would take his weight.  Then, and only then, did he take a deep, bracing breath and, his face expressionless, reach for the cold, stiff body of his dead wife.

His free arm slid beneath her body, so frail, so tiny in death — and pulled it up against him.  Her head fell against his shoulder.  The wind blew her hair against his face, twisting the wet strands around his neck, wrapping him in its sweet smell. 
Eva.  Oh, Eva . . .
  For a long moment he held her against him, squeezing his eyes shut against the pain, the tears that threatened to overwhelm him, the urge to just let go of the leather line and give up, for he had nothing left to lose; he had lost it already.

Lost it because of his own arrogance.

He took a deep, bracing breath and raised his face to the falling snow, willing strength back into his will.  He could not take the easy way out.  He had to bring her home.  She was a duchess of Blackheath.  She deserved more — he swallowed the ache in his throat — so much more . . .

Buckling the harness around her body to secure her to himself, Lucien began the slow, dangerous climb back to the road.  Wind pummelled his back.  His fingers went numb, snow and ice hindered his progress, and his injured leg would not take his weight.  He used his knee instead, pressing it against rock in place of his useless foot, letting his good leg do most of the work.  Snow sifted against his neck, his face; his frozen hands were raw and bleeding.  He paused to catch his breath, letting his cheek rest against ice.  Continued on.  Stopped to rest once more.  At last, he reached the top of the cliff and hauled himself and his precious burden over its edge.