Bewitched (33 page)

He nodded and stepped back. “Mirabella, may I present Miss Bourne’s uncle. Mr. Bourne, Lady Rawdon.”

“We have already met, Sebastian,” Bella said softly. “When Mr. Bourne came to collect Amy.”

Fox gripped the banister so hard that his knuckles shone white through his skin. He felt an utter heel.

Bourne cleared his throat. “My lady, I hope you will forgive this intrusion, I—”

“Oh, Mr. Bourne, think nothing of it!” she stopped him, laying an impulsive hand on his arm. “We were all truly sorry to hear dear Amy has not improved at all, and we will do our utmost to help you find a cure for her.” She looked from one man to the other. “Do you know what ails her? Is it…” Her voice faltered a little. “Magical?” she finally whispered.

“I am afraid it is, my lady,” Bourne answered gravely.

“Oh.”

“It is worse than that,” Fox added in a grim voice. “It is here in Rawdon Park. They hid something else.”

Confusion registered on her face. Her fine, black brows drew together. “Something else?”

“It was not just the lake, Bella.”

“Oh, my goodness.” Her hand covered her mouth. “And who—?”

Once more, anger boiled up inside Fox. He gritted his teeth. “Isabella Bentham,” he growled.

“Ha!” Bella exclaimed. “I
knew
there was something wrong with that girl! That little snake!” She shook her head, then touched Fox’s arm. “You must tell us all about it over dinner. And what needs to be done to help Amelia.” She glanced at Bourne. “But for now, there will be rooms prepared for you and hot baths. I’ll tell my husband’s valet to go and see what can be done about a change of dry clothes for you, Mr. Bourne.”

Amy’s uncle bowed his head. “Thank you, my lady. I am most obliged.”

“Not at all, Mr. Bourne, not at all.” She gave him a sad smile. “It is we who are deeply indebted to you. Without your niece.. Who knows what would have happened if Amy had not been here.”

Yes, they all had known it, seen it, except for Fox. Once more regret and self-recriminations sliced him deep.
Dear God
, he prayed,
don’t let it be too late
.

When they were finally warm and dry again, Fox and Bourne told the family and Admiral Pickering over dinner what they had learned about the cause of Amy’s illness.

“And you believe that if this plant is destroyed, Miss Bourne will recuperate?” Richard asked.

Amy’s uncle hesitated with the answer, and all at once Fox remembered Bourne’s reaction when Bentham told him of the plant: plain and unadulterated shock. Fox’s stomach tightened. Suddenly the meal on the plate before him lost all its appeal.

“I don’t know,” Bourne finally said. “I just don’t know.”

Fox reached for his glass of wine and took a deep gulp. Was it not better to know the whole truth? “It is worse, is it not?” he finally asked, his voice hoarse. “Because it is a plant.”

Once again, Amy’s uncle hesitated before he formed a reply. “Plants thrust their roots deep into the earth. And if they have grown from seeds of evil…” He shrugged, clearly uncomfortable. “They saturate the earth with that same evil.” His expression turned solemn. “This plant will have had plenty of time for its roots to grow thick and deep.”

The dowager countess leaned forward. “So you are saying there is a chance that destroying the plant will not help Amelia.”

No!
Fox stared at his plate. A deep humming filled his ears. Surely everything could not have been in vain in the end? Surely not.

He was aware that his mother’s eyes flickered toward him, but he could not look up. His fingers curled around the edge of the table, crumbling the heavy damask of the cream-colored tablecloth. Through the buzzing in his ears, he heard Bourne clear his throat.

“This is indeed a possibility.”

“And what will you do if…” Bella’s voice trailed away.

There was a sound very much like a sob. Whether it had come from himself or somebody else, Fox didn’t know. All he cared about was this terrible, terrible pain blossoming in his chest, such a great pain that eventually it would engulf his whole body. And he knew, knew without a shadow of a doubt, that if Amy died, a part of himself would, too.

I see a lily on thy brow

With anguish moist and fever dew,

And on thy cheek a fading rose

Fast withereth too.

“Well,” the admiral’s resolute voice cut into his reverie, “let us cross this bridge when we get to it. For now we should concentrate on finding that plant. Perhaps your footmen and gardeners will help with the search, Rawdon?”

~*~

When they parted for the night, they were all hopeful—all except for Fox. Misery weighed him down, and even worse, the overpowering feeling of guilt. If only he had come earlier to Amy’s family. If only he had not been so proud, so pigheaded, so determined to cloak himself in self-righteousness. How he loathed himself!

Miserable, he stared at his reflection in the dark window. As if this were a mirror of his soul, his mind’s eye conjured up another face for him: sweet and round checked, a mischievous smile playing around the lips. The teasing glint in the pansy blue eyes challenged him, heart and mind. It had done so from the first. But arrogant fool that he was, he had been affronted by it and had sought the less complicated joys to be found with Madame Suzette’s girls.

Shallow cad.

He closed his eyes. It seemed to him he could hear her laughter, her rich, full chuckles-cheeky and naughty when they had stood in the British Museum and looked at the naked glory of the Elgin Marbles; and later so full of delight as she had hugged him to her for the first time, during those first precious moments of their engagement. And even more delight, sweaty and sultry delight, when she had first lain beneath him with his flesh embedded deep inside her—so deep that the boundaries between their bodies had blurred until their hearts had beaten as one. He remembered the shiny ecstasy on her face and the half-smothered laugh of discovery she had snorted against his shoulder afterwards.
“Again,”
she had demanded, and bit lightly into his sweaty flesh. “Again!” she had laughed, still breathless.
“Again! Again! Again!”
And she had hugged him wildly, exuberantly, with arms and legs, had pressed him into her softness, while bubbling over with joy and delight.

Suddenly Fox knew that he would not be able to spend this night in his cold and empty bed. He opened his eyes and reached for his robe. He slipped into it, took the candle, and left his room. Down the long corridors he went until he reached that door he knew so well. He pushed it open. The light of his candle flickered over the interior of the Rose Bedroom.

Of course, the bed linens had been changed since they had last lain there together. None of her sweet, fresh scent remained. Lily of the valley. But still, he could imagine, could he not? Could remember and hope.

He lit the candelabra which stood on the chest of drawers. As the mellow light filled the dark corners of the room, he started to rummage in the drawers, the closet, the writing desk. If he could find … Perhaps there was something left of hers, something wedged into a tight corner and thus missed when they had packed her things. “Anything,” he whispered. “Oh please…”

A knock sounded on the door.

Frowning, Fox went to open it.

“I knew I would find you here.” His mother stood on the threshold, smiling sadly. “May I come in?”

After a moment he gave a silent nod, then stepped aside to let her in. A soft, misty smile curved her lips. “The last time I saw you clad only in your robe, you were still a small boy.” With a small sigh, the dowager countess brushed past him. “Sometimes it seems as if it were only yesterday that I brought my fox cub home to live among the hounds. But then I turn and you’re already a man grown…” She stepped to the window and peered out at the dark and silent gardens. When she turned, he thought he saw tears glittering in her eyes. “A stubborn, complicated man, perhaps, but one dearly loved by his family. You know that, don’t you, Sebastian?” She looked at him intently.

Fox swallowed. “How did you know that you would find me here?”

She sat down on the chair at the window and scanned the room. “Oh, my dear… Was this not Amelia’s room?” Her gaze came to rest on him.

“Yes.” All at once, all strength seeped out of him. He sank down on the bed and leaned forward to bury his face in his hands. “
Yes
.” Muffled against his palms, his voice sounded choked. His cheeks and hands became wet.

“And this is where you spent the night with her, is it not?” Sybilla asked gently.

Surprise cut through his misery. He looked up, not caring that thereby he revealed his ravaged face to her. “How do you—? Has Richard—?”

Another soft, sad smile. “No, not Richard. One of the upstairs maids saw you slipping out of her room. She went to the housekeeper, and Mrs. Dibbler decided to come and see me about the matter rather than Mirabella.” A note of soft reproach entered her voice. “It was a naughty, irresponsible thing to do, Sebastian. But we came to the conclusion that I would not berate you about it since the two of you were already engaged—and so obviously in love with each other.”

Fox felt his face crumple. He sucked in a breath. “She truly loved me, Mama,” he choked out. “Despite the potion, even after she had found out… she still loved me. Truly and deeply.” He sucked in another breath, feeling battered and bruised and more desperate than ever before in his life.

“And yet you stayed away for so long,” Sybilla said.

“I didn’t know…” He ran an unsteady hand through his hair. “I didn’t know it was all real in spite of everything. I didn’t know that I—” His voice broke.

She shook her head at him. “Stubborn and complicated. And much too proud for his own good.”

A vise constricted around his heart, squeezed all breath from his lungs. And then it burst out of him, with all glibness and sophistication erased as if they had never been. “I love her, Mama. With all my heart and all my soul, I love her. If she… if something happens to her…” He tried to draw breath, to keep a lid on his emotions after all. Yet the sobs already rose from his chest and wracked his body. “I wouldn’t be able to bear it,” he forced out.

“Oh, my dear boy.” His tears obscured the expression on his mother’s face, but he saw her open her arms wide. “Come here.”

And then he was on his knees before her, his head buried in her lap. He felt her stroking his hair. “Hush now, hush,” she whispered to him. “Have a little faith in your love.”

“I didn’t know…” He raised his head. Desperation sliced his heart into a thousand ribbons. “Before… I didn’t know.”

“Hush.” His mother wiped the tears from his cheeks. “But now you know, don’t you? So have faith in your love, my son.”

He shook his head. “But—”

She cupped his face between her hands and looked at him intently. “Amelia had faith enough in her love to believe it would keep us all safe. Now it is your turn.”

Faith? How should that help against the evil that threatened her life? “But—”

“No buts.” The dowager countess gave him a wry smile. “Don’t you think, Sebastian, that in a world where a girl can heal a wound in her lover’s flesh with the touch of her hand, anything might be possible?”

He stared at her, speechless.

She chuckled a little, then pressed a kiss onto his forehead. “So have faith, my son. Have faith in your love.” And with that she rose and left him alone in his beloved’s room.

Chapter Nineteen

The wind blew icy cold the next morning when Richard assembled his men in the forecourt: gardeners, footmen, stablehands—Rawdon Park’s small army. But would they be enough? Fox’s heart tightened painfully.

His brother, though, seemed to know no such worries. Hands on his hips, Richard stood on the front steps and listened as Bourne detailed what exactly they were looking for.

Yet what they knew was pitifully little: a plant that looked out of the ordinary, probably prospering even in winter, or perhaps it might appear blackened and dead. The estate workers looked at each other and scratched their heads. Wouldn’t they have noticed anything out of the ordinary before?

“It has most likely been planted in a hidden corner of the estate,” Bourne continued, his voice controlled and easily carrying across the forecourt.

Would they recognize it even under all the snow? the head gardener inquired.

Oh yes, they would. Bourne was sure. “When you see it, you will know it for what it is.”

It sounded ominous enough to make Fox shiver.

He looked back over his shoulder into the entrance hall, where his mother stood with Mirabella. Sybilla gave him a smile.
Have a little faith
, he half-heard her voice whisper. But it was difficult to have faith when it all seemed like a wild goose chase.

Just as they were about to split in twos and depart for the gardens, Dickie and Pip came clumping down the main stairs. “Wait!” Dick hollered. “Wait!”

Their mother reached out and grabbed the cuffs of the boys’ thick coats. “And what do you think you are doing?”

Her oldest tried to wriggle free. “Helping search!”

More noisy steps on the stairs announced the arrival of the tutor, who apparently had managed to escape the wilderness of Scotland. Breathless, he halted in front of Bella. “I apologize, my lady. Shall I escort the young masters back upstairs?”

Dick stared at him like a belligerent terrier. “We won’t go!” he growled.

His brother tried a different tack. “We know the gardens so well. And we’re small: we can look under the bushes.”

Frowning, Richard turned. “You will go back upstairs pronto, young men.”

“But—”

“Now!” Richard hollered, loud enough to make everybody from the potboy to his countess jump. Round eyed, his sons gaped at him.

And no wonder, since the Earl of Rawdon was not known as one who raised his voice. It was then that it dawned on Fox that his brother might be as worried and as nervous as himself. His solid, well-grounded brother was seriously rattled and not nearly as calm and confident as he wanted others to believe. It was indeed a most surprising revelation.