Cates, Kimberly (37 page)

There was something wild and a little frightening behind the pawnbroker's eyes, like the flickering of a tiny black flame. "I'm sorry for your pain," Juliet said softly. "You have been a good friend. But all has worked out for the best."

"The best? Slade has turned you into one of those filthy creatures of the flesh who have infested this house. They've tainted you with their poison just as I always feared they would! I should have killed him the first night I saw him at the inn!"

Juliet's spine stiffened. "It was my choice to make love with Adam. And I pray I'll have a lifetime in his arms. I love him."

"Love him?" The cry wrenched from Rutledge's throat. Juliet's fingers tightened on the golden lilies, her gaze flicking to the mare cropping grass in the farthest corner of the garden. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to get back to Glenlyon House." Juliet started toward the horse, suddenly eager to get away from the garden and the condemnation in Rutledge's eyes.

She'd barely taken a step when a hand flashed out, grasping her arm with surprising strength.

"Mr. Rutledge, release me at once. I've nothing more to say."

"You think I will just stand back and let you plunge yourself into Satan's arms? No! I failed once. I will not be so faint of heart again!"

Juliet stared into Rutledge's face, and it was as if she were staring into the eyes of a stranger. Dark things, ugly things, frightening things lurked within those sunken depths, things she had never glimpsed there before.

An image burned into her mind—her fingers pressing a key to the garden gate into the pawnbroker's hand, telling him to gather whatever herbs he wished from the garden.

"The fire!" she gasped. "It was you. How else—" She choked off the words, something akin to panic lodging at the back of her throat.
How else could Rutledge have seen her with Adam in the garden house?

"I—I mean, your hand—" She fought to cover her blunder desperately, "you must've burned it when you were helping the others fight the fire." But she could see in the curl of his lips that he knew she was lying. She knew the truth.

"Come now, Juliet. You know I never came here to help the night of the fire." Terrifyingly gentle, his words rasped against Juliet's nerves, leaving cold horror in their wake.

"No. I—I'm certain—"

"I was too busy tending the burn on my hand. When you ran into me—"

"You're mistaken! I—"

"You left me no choice!" Rutledge mourned. "Refused to heed my warnings. I had to take drastic measures to wrench you from the influence of those harlots. Save your innocence."

She was in danger, terrible danger. Juliet could see the hot coals of fanaticism in his gaze, the terrible belief that God's vengeance was his to mete out. She had to get away, find some way to distract him so she could escape.

"You seemed a saint to me," Rutledge's voice cracked. "How was I to know what Slade had already made you? A vile creature of the flesh! A whore like my own mother was!"

"Your mother?" Juliet edged toward the gate. If she could break free, reach the street, she might have a chance. But who would help her? The neighbors who had delighted in the destruction of Angel's Fall?

"I was to be a vicar," Rutledge said. "Rain, fire, and brimstone down upon sinners from the pulpit, terrify them into saving their worthless souls! I read myself blind, clawed and struggled until I was offered the vicarage at Millberry. But my rival discovered the truth about my past. My mother had been a whore. My father any one of a hundred men. I wasn't fit to take my place in the pulpit."

Juliet shuddered, hearing in Rutledge's voice the hatred, the intolerance that her father had always grieved over, man indulging in his own petty loathing and cruelty and attributing it to God.

Dots of foam flecked the corners of Rutledge's mouth, his eyes sunken pits touched with madness. "But Slade shan't have you! I'll not be thwarted again by such filth! I'll find a way to defeat him." He hesitated, a smile creeping across his lips. "There is only one thing to do. Yes. I know how to save you."

"Let me go! Mr. Rutledge—"

"Oh, I'll let you go. You needn't fear, lovely Juliet. But before I do, I'll see to it that Adam Slade will never be able to look upon your face again with anything but horror."

God in heaven, what was he threatening to do? Juliet fought to tear away from him, but he held her as if each of his thin muscles were strips of iron. "Let me go! Stop this before—"

"Don't be afraid, my sweet," Rutledge said with fiendish tenderness. "I will save you from him. And from yourself." She started to scream, to fight, willing Adam to ride through the gates. Adam... oh, God, he was her only chance. But if Rutledge dragged her away from here, how could Adam ever find her?

She struck at Rutledge's face with her fist, the petals of the golden lilies cutting into her palm until she felt the warmth of her own blood.

The lilies...

Something hard collided with the back of her head. Lights exploded behind her eyelids and she crumpled to the ground. She forced her fingers to open, saw the golden lilies tumble to the earth.

Such a tiny clue, such a faint hope. Adam would never find her before it was too late.

"Adam
..." Juliet squeezed his name through her parched throat as Rutledge scooped her into his arms.

The last sight she saw was Barnabas's eyes glowing down at her like portals to some private hell, as the world drowned in darkness.

A demon was pounding her skull with a spiked mallet, cracking it into the back of her head again and again until she feared she would retch.

Thick webs of blackness suffocated her, yet they couldn't completely conceal the diamond-hard lump of terror lodged in her breast.

Adam...
she clung to that name as if it were a sword, knowing she had to fight, had to remember where she was, what had happened. Yet each time she tried to open her eyes, her head seemed ready to split.

Slowly, she attempted it again, lifting eyelids that seemed weighted by lead. A small room swung dizzily about her as she fought to pull it into focus. Rusted muskets, pots and pans, tarnished silver, an elegant music box, and a mounted set of antlers wove into a macabre pattern, creating a world that made no sense, nightmarish, unreal.

"You're waking up, are you?"

That voice, so solicitous, should have soothed her. Why did it strike raw terror in her heart. It was familiar... familiar...

A figure materialized before her, wavering like a phantom. Barnabas Rutledge...

"Help me," she croaked, but her throat was hoarse, her hands bound, helpless, behind her.

"I will help you, my dear," Rutledge said in soothing accents that chilled her blood. "I've done my best to watch over you ever since you came to this sinful place. Even kept vigil outside the earl's townhouse night after night, praying for your soul. I'll take care of you now. You needn't worry any longer."

With all her will, Juliet forced back the veil of unconsciousness, tried to grasp fragments of what had happened. She'd been in the garden, waiting for Adam, and Rutledge had come to give her the golden lilies....

In her mind's eye she saw the bits of gold tumbling from her bruised fingers, felt the terror, the hopelessness. The horrifying truth cascaded into her consciousness, the realization she was in danger, Rutledge's dark threats, her helplessness against him.

She tried to stand up, stagger toward the door, but ropes bit into her flesh, binding her hands and feet, lashing her to what looked to be a chair.

"You mustn't struggle so, my dear," Rutledge said, a harsh rhythmic scraping sound raking at her nerves. "You'll bruise your wrists. Just rest. It will be complete soon."

"Complete? What will be complete?"

"Your salvation. The knife is almost sharp enough."

Juliet felt as if he'd slipped the blade beneath her skin, cold and relentless. Merciful heaven, what was he going to do to her?

"This must be done delicately. Delicately. We don't want you to suffer any unnecessary pain. I just have to heat it over the coals until it's nice and hot."

"What—what are you talking about? Please, what are you going to do?"

Rutledge went to scoop out a shovelful of hot coals from the fire. Juliet winced as he jabbed the blade into the glowing orange center. "I am going to alter your face, my dear, so it will no longer be such a carnal temptation to men like Slade. Nor any man. If the blade is hot, it will cauterize the slash at the same time I cut you. You see, I can be merciful."

Merciful? Juliet reeled, bile rising in her throat. "You can't mean to do this."

"Of course, I would rather turn away from this deed. But it is necessary.
'If your eye offends thee, pluck it out.'"

"But the Lord also said blessed are the merciful. There was no violence, no cruelty in Him, only love and understanding."

"But I do this out of love for Him, Juliet, and for you. If your papa, the vicar, were alive today, he would applaud my efforts to save you."

"My papa was a man of peace and love, a man who sought to heal, not destroy."

"And I shall heal you. You needn't fear for your future, my dear. I am not a man bound by beauty of the flesh. I will take care of you, help you repent your sin in the years to come. You will always have a home here with me."

"I'd sooner die in the streets!"

The man actually looked hurt. "You think you'll go back to Slade? That a man like him can love your soul enough to be blind to your ruined face? He'll despise you, be repulsed by you when your face is as flawed as your virtue."

"Adam will kill you for this! He's an expert swordsman. You could never defeat him!"

"It was never my intention to fight him. Although, if he should come here, I'll put a pistol-ball in his chest. I've given the matter great consideration, trying to think of a just price for his interference. It came to me as I carried you from the garden. His punishment will be the image he'll carry of you once this ugly business is finished. Slashed and scarred, branded like some vile harpy. He'll dream of you and wake up screaming."

Horror sluiced through Juliet. Horror at the image of Adam finding her, witnessing Rutledge's fiendish marring of her face. No physical wound Rutledge could inflict on Adam would be deeper, more devastating than seeing her thus.

Adam was a man who already had too many dark nightmares, too many chains of guilt and regret hidden beneath his laughter.

The blade was growing brighter, and Rutledge scooped it from the coals, holding it up into the light. It glowed, the metal hot, the blade hungry.

"It is time." Rutledge paced toward her, the blade glowing. He poised it so near her cheek she could feel the heat on her skin, anticipate the bite of the blade as it found flesh. "The question is where to begin."

Chapter 20

Fury and frustration pulsed through Adam's veins, battle instincts scratching claws of dread against his nerves. He leaned low over the neck of his horse, driving it to faster speeds, his heart hammering.

Blast, had Gavin been out of his mind, allowing Juliet to return to Angel's Fall alone? Yet Gavin had believed Adam was confronting Juliet's enemy. He'd believed she was safe. Otherwise Adam knew his brother would never have let her ride off.

Adam had believed she was safe, too, as he'd tightened the noose about Isabelle. But he'd been wrong. Dangerously wrong. And now Juliet could be in peril.

Bloody hell, he felt so damned helpless. He did not have a clue where to begin searching again for the monster who had hurt Juliet. But he would turn the earth inside out if he had to—to flush out whatever beast had been stalking her.

With every bit of his will, Adam fought to calm himself. He would find her in the garden, safe, mourning her foxglove and her heart's ease, or sitting in the garden house, trying to piece together the broken bits of her dream.

There was no more reason for anyone to attack her now, was there? They'd burned her out, and no one except Gavin and Juliet's angels knew that the haven would rise from the ashes.

He guided his horse around the corner, his gaze falling on the blackened hulk that had been Juliet's home. It still made his breath clutch in his throat, the thought of how easily she might have died that night, the knowledge that someone was twisted enough to unleash that kind of vengeance upon her.

He'd spend the rest of his life keeping her safe.

Adam reined his mount into the garden, glimpsed the mare Juliet had ridden cropping sprigs of grass in the corner of the garden. Relief jolted through him. She was here somewhere.

Adam flung himself from his horse, bellowing her name, his eyes sweeping the trampled garden. Nothing.

He glimpsed the garden house, charged toward it, images playing through his mind. The alabaster curve of her breast as he'd kissed it, the catch of her breath as he suckled her. The wide wonder in her eyes as he pierced her maidenhead, aware he'd just been given the most precious gift imaginable.

Love. The love of a woman he didn't deserve. A woman of quiet courage, of fierce conviction, a woman who believed in justice and the triumph of good over evil. And was willing to fight as valiantly as any soldier ever born for people she barely knew.

Adam charged up to the garden house, flung open the door. He could feel the points of his temper jabbing the way they always did when he was afraid. Knew that once he found Juliet, he was going to kiss her until her knees melted, then bellow at her until her eardrums crumbled.

"Juliet?" he called. "Blast it, Juliet, answer me." But there was no sound but echoing silence.

The mounds of pillows that had made their bed were still tumbled, his discarded neckcloth lying on the floor. Soft lace shadows were pooling in the deepening twilight. But Juliet was nowhere to be seen.

His muscles knotted, his nerves on a blade-edge of awareness. She'd come to Angel's Fall, just as Elise told him she had. The mare was still here. Where could she have gone?

Adam stalked out of the garden house, his gaze sweeping the grounds. What the devil had she been doing here? Poking about?