Addicted (11 page)

“Lead on, Raeburn,” Wallingford said, following in Lindsay’s wake. “And if we are so fortunate to make it home alive, the
first to enter the stables may buy the other a warm pint of cider and a hot woman.”

Lindsay gained the stallion’s saddle and took up the reins, turning the Arabian in the other direction. Through the snow, he ran the animal as safely as he could while ignoring the biting wind. On instinct, Lindsay guided the horse down a path he had followed countless times in his lifetime.

As the familiar sites came into view, Lindsay slowed the stallion as it pranced along the icy path that overlooked the town of Bewdley nestled snugly in the vale below them. Ice pallets floated aimlessly atop the black waters of the Severn River, reminding Lindsay of the paintings he had once seen of the remnants of an iceberg after it had crumbled into the sea.

Tossing its sleek black head, the Arabian’s billowing breaths misted gray and evaporated amongst the snowflakes that were circling about them. Tightening the reins, Lindsay settled the rearing animal before casting his gaze to the roof of St. Ann’s Church that dominated the view of the town.

Below the ridge lay the sleepy village he had called home since birth. But tonight, the quiet little village of Bewdley was coming alive. Its residents were strolling down the cobbled streets, candles in hand as they made their pilgrimage to church. To the west of the town center, huddled in the valley where a small tributary broke away from the Severn and formed a creek, lay the first of four prominent estates that anchored Bewdley’s aristocratic society. Wallingford’s family estate bordered the forest. Broughton’s was to the east and only minutes down the ridge. His own home, Eden Park, rested on the other side of the
bridge. And directly below him lay Anais’s home, which he had not seen in nearly a year.

Scouring the Jacobean-style mansion from high above the valley, Lindsay blinked back the snowflakes that landed on his eyelashes. The earthy, acrid smell of wood burning in the cold air drifted up to meet him and he inhaled the scent, so familiar to him, yet so long since he’d been home to smell its aroma.

It was Christmas Eve and the coal was replaced in the hearths of the faithful with a Yule log that would burn throughout the holiday. Lindsay watched the smoke billow out of the three large chimneys that loomed above the peaked roof. The calming scent took him back to the time when he was young and carefree. A time when he once sat beside the hearth and ate plum pudding and custard with Anais after the Christmas Eve service.

His gaze immediately focused on the last window on the right side of the house. A gentle glow from a lone candle flickered lazily. He could almost imagine Anais sitting on her window bench staring out at the sky with her chin propped in her hand. She adored winter. They had sat side by side so many times watching the snow falling gently to the ground. No, that wasn’t entirely the truth.
She
had watched the snow, he had watched her; and he had fallen more in love with her than he had ever thought possible.

He slid his gaze from her window and allowed it to roam over the land where the verdant green fields were now covered in a thick white blanket that shimmered like crystals in the silver moonlight; where the hawthorn and holly hedgerows that marked each farm were weighted with snow. Only the occa
sional red bunch of holly berries could be seen peeking out beneath its white winter blanket.

Again the wind began its low moan through the branches of the forest behind them, and Lindsay brought the collar of his greatcoat around his chin, staving off the cold and the chilling wail of the wind. It was a melancholy sound that somehow resonated deep within him.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Wallingford asked, reigning in his mount to stand beside his. “The wilds of nature are unparalleled here, are they not? Nowhere can you appreciate her more than in the Wyre Forest. I shall have to paint this view when I get home,” he said, scanning the grounds below them. “I’ve never seen the vale looking so desolate and untamed, yet so hauntingly beautiful.”

“Spoken like a true artist,” Lindsay drawled, unable to keep his eye on the hedgerows. Unfortunately, he kept stealing glances at the lone candle in the window, wishing Anais would appear; hoping the dreams he had of her were not the omen his soul believed them to be.

“When shall you call upon her?” Wallingford asked quietly after noting the direction of Lindsay’s gaze.

“I don’t know.”

“When we left Constantinople you were hell-bent on finding her. For the three months it’s taken us to arrive in England you’ve been having nightmares about her. You’ve feared the worst. Now you lack the conviction to see for yourself if your vision was real or merely a deception of the sultan’s hookah?”

Lindsay recalled the crippling fear that had lanced through him as he awoke from his startling dream. “It was real.”

“The hookah is a magical thing,” Wallingford said, watching
him curiously. “It makes us see ghosts in the vapors. It makes us feel things that are not there and the things that are there no longer matter. It is so easy to run from our ghosts with the hookah as I think you discovered.”

“It is never easy to run. I shall never outrun this ghost.”

Wallingford pursed his lips tightly together and studied him, his expression growing somber. “This particular ghost has an otherworldly hold on you, Raeburn. I’m afraid she always will. She is going to destroy you.”

“I already am. I brought about my own demise when I foolishly allowed myself to be weak. I should have resisted the lure that bitch Rebecca offered me. Had I resisted temptation instead of pursuing it, Anais would have been my wife by now. I would not be standing here on Christmas Eve, longing for her, wishing I could find a way to magically erase the past.”

“What did you see?” Wallingford asked. “What was so terrible that you had to race back here to the woman who would not even allow you to defend yourself? A woman whose love is so fleeting that she cannot allow you an ounce of forgiveness?”

In the vision, Anais arose amidst a veil of gossamer smoke, her beauty unveiled amidst curling tendrils that cloaked the air. Her softly rounded body and her rose, taut nipples were clearly visible beneath the pale pink gown that hugged her body. Her long blond curls were unbound and her arms outstretched, beckoning him to come to her, and like a slavish disciple he had gone to her. In that moment, she had taken him in her arms, whispering absolution.

He had lowered her onto the silk pillows that were scattered about the floor of his room. He could smell her—the scent of
her petal-soft skin—despite the heavy and sensual cloud of incense that hung like a haze above the divan.

She had felt warm and alive in his arms until suddenly she grew stiff and cold. Her beautiful, sparkling, cornflower-blue eyes grew dim and distant as she stared unseeing at him. And then he saw the crimson liquid that slowly began to engulf them. It glistened in the candlelight from the lanterns that hung above them as it began to cover her pale skin. And she kept looking at him with those cold, lifeless eyes. He could not bear it, could not stand to watch her taken from him. As he pushed himself away from her, her lips parted and she softly said the words that haunted him for months. “You did this to me, Lindsay, you have killed me.”

He had awakened, shaken by the vision, terrified that it had been a sign that something was wrong—a sign that he had to come back to her and make amends. A sign he could not ignore.

“Raeburn, look,” Wallingford commanded, drawing him from the horror of his mind. “There are flames coming from the side of the house.”

Snapping to attention, Lindsay focused his gaze on the level below Anais’s window. From his position above the house he saw the brilliant orange flicker that was reflected by the glass.

“That is Darnby’s study,” he said, setting the stallion into motion. “And the hearth is next to that window. Come, Wallingford,” he yelled, racing down the path that led to the vale.

Lindsay wondered, as he blinked back the snow from his eyes, if this was not the reason he had felt compelled to come back home.

Jumping off his horse, Lindsay ran up the manor stairs and threw open the doors. The house was in a state of chaos with servants rushing here and there, screaming and running wild and frightened with buckets of water. He watched as two burly footmen emerged from a thick cloud of smoke, dragging a coughing and sputtering Lord Darnby from his study.

“Oh, Lord Raeburn,” Anais’s lady’s maid gasped when she saw him through the smoke. “You’ve come back.”

“Where is your mistress, Louisa?”

“Trapped upstairs. Roger and William have gone to fetch her, but they canna see or breathe for the smoke.”

“See to Darnby,” Lindsay ordered Wallingford who had followed him inside. “Bring him to Eden Park. I shall meet back up with you there.”

Lindsay could see the blood running in rivulets down Darnby’s balding head. “He’s injured,” Wallingford called. “He’ll need a physician.”

“Then do it, man,” he barked, shrugging out of his greatcoat. “I shall find Anais.”

“What the bloody hell is going on?”

Lindsay whirled around and came face-to-face with Broughton. The last time he had looked into his friend’s face, he had been standing before him with a brace of dueling pistols in his hands.

Broughton had called him out the next day, after the debacle with Rebecca. The duel had not been about avenging Rebecca’s honor, or Garrett’s. No, Broughton had called him out to defend Anais, and Lindsay had agreed to it, hoping to gain some measure of his own honor back. Only they had not been able
to go through with it. Putting a bullet in each other would never satisfy, could never wash away the pain that Lindsay had brought to everyone he had ever cared about.

They had both fired their shots in the air, then turned their backs on each other.

“What the devil are you doing in here?”

Lindsay did not miss how Broughton’s face went white as his gaze furiously raced back and forth between the burning staircase and him.

“Anais is trapped up there. I’m going to get her.”

Garrett glared at him, “You cannot possibly manage the task on those stairs, Raeburn. It’s unsafe. If you don’t get yourself killed first, then you’ll hurt her on the way down. No, the only way is from outside.”

“No,” Lindsay barked, already racing for the stairs. “It’s thirty feet at least to the ground. She cannot possibly lower herself out the window from that height.”

“The stairs will be gone by the time you find her. It will be the only way down.”

Ignoring Broughton, he rushed up the stairs and saw that the flames were already licking their way up the door of Anais’s chamber. “Anais,” he shouted through cupped hands. But there was no sound save for the cracking and splintering of wood and the roar of the flames.

Shouldering through the door, he saw that he was in Anais’s dressing room. Running over to the door that connected to her bedroom, he prayed he would find it unlocked. He was not so fortunate. By the time he was able to thrust it open with his shoulder, she was dangling outside the window, the gigot sleeve
of her muslin wrapper caught on a wire hook in the curtain she had used to make her escape.

“It’s all right, angel,” he said, fear eating at him as he saw the delicate fabric begin to give way beneath her weight. Her fingers, blue and trembling, would not be able to sustain their hold on the curtain rope much longer. Her eyes were round as saucers as she slipped farther. There was no recognition in those familiar blue eyes, just terror, he realized as she looked blankly up at him.

“My wrapper…I’m pinned,” she gasped, choking as the smoke filled the chamber.

“Don’t look down, Anais. Here, reach for my hand. Trust me, love. I’ll save you, Anais. Have faith in me.”

She looked down at Garrett who was standing below, his arms outstretched. Lindsay knew what thoughts were running through her mind. Garrett could be trusted to catch her. Lindsay feared that he was just a specter she saw through the growing smoke. The distrust he saw in her eyes, the hurt and pain made him realize the depth of the destruction he had caused. Never before had she chosen Garrett over him, but it was clear to Lindsay that Anais was going to put her trust—and her life—in Garrett’s waiting arms.

“Damn you, reach for my hand,” he ordered, leaning out of the window as his shirtsleeves billowed in the wind. Terror was ruling him now. There was no way that Broughton could catch her from this height. His arms would not bear the weight or the force of her fall. She would be crushed and broken, and Lindsay could not stand to think that he would bear witness to it.

“Anais, reach for my hand. Do it,” he commanded.
“Do it now!”

And then he saw the delicate muslin cuff give way. Saw her eyes go round and her pale mouth part on a silent sound. “No!” he roared, heaving himself forward in a desperate bid to reach her, but she slipped through his fingers, and he was forced to watch her fall backward, her arms stretched out to him. Her hair, loose from its pins, floated about her. Her name was ripped from his soul as he saw his vision being born before his eyes.

He watched her, helpless, frozen in time as his gaze stayed locked on her wide, frightened eyes, and he swore he could almost hear her say,
“You’ve done this to me, Lindsay. You’ve killed me.”

6

Racing out of the chamber, heart pounding, Lindsay lunged for the stairs, heedless of the flames that were busy devouring the wooden banister. Reaching the main level, he ran outside and froze on the step, his breathing coming in hard gasping pants. Before him, Broughton stood with legs braced wide and Anais draped in his arms, her long golden curls cascading over the sleeve of Garrett’s black greatcoat.

For what felt like minutes Lindsay could say nothing as his gaze stayed riveted on Anais, waiting for some sign that she had made it through the ordeal unscathed. When he saw her chest rise and fall, he fought the urge to sink to his knees in relief. At that moment, he didn’t care that it was Broughton she had chosen.