Dark Hero; A Gothic Romance (Reluctant Heroes) (45 page)

Sure enough, when he reached the stone terrace he found
Elizabeth sitting beyond it in the grass outcropping beneath the gnarled old
tree. She was sitting cross-legged, shredding blades of grass between her
fingers as she stared violently out at the sea.

She looked so forlorn he didn’t have the heart to chide her
for her excursion outdoors alone. Donovan maneuvered past the crumbling wall,
making a mental note to have it fixed. Carefully, with arms balanced and his
steps precise, he went to where she was sitting so precariously on the sloping
grass mound overlooking the sea. He sat behind her and placed a light hand on
her arm.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” She asked, anger seeping into her
voice.

“I should have.” Donovan conceded. “Your grandfather made me
promise not to.”

 “How long does he have?”

“It’s hard to predict.” He admitted. “A few months at most.
He came here to die, Elizabeth. The voyage was difficult. He endured the hardship
because he wanted Michael to be safe with us when he died so there would be no
chance of your stepfather interfering in the months it would take for us to
arrive in England after news of your grandfather’s death reached us here. James
made me Michael’s legal guardian from this point forward. That was before he
knew about Kieran. I’m sorry, Lizzie.”

“Where are my brothers?” Her voice was wet. He could tell
she wanted to cry, but refused to allow herself to do so. That was his Lizzie,
defiant to the last.

“I left them in the salon. They were getting to know each
other.”

“And Grandfather?”

“Upstairs, in bed. It was a severe shock for him.” He rubbed
his hand along her spine.

Donovan was of two minds on the subject now that it was over
and done. He intended to wait for a few weeks, allow Wentworth time to recover
from his arduous journey as much as possible before springing the news on him.
Elizabeth had the blindness and invincibility of youth on her side as she
rushed boldly into the fray. She didn’t stop to consider the old man’s age or
health, any more than Donovan would have at her age. Given Wentworth’s
precarious condition, had they waited the old man might have died without
knowing his eldest grandson was still alive.

 “I recommend limited visits from the three of you in the
coming days. Half hour increments, no more.”

She nodded, and sniffled. “I’m sorry. I just wanted them
to--“

“I know.” Donovan wrapped his arms around her. He pulled her
back to lean against his frame. They sat together like spoons with his long
legs bracketing her hips as she reclined in the shelter of his arms. The only
sound was the wind and the waves as they crashed over the rocks below. He
didn’t like her sitting on this small outcropping. The thick grass provided some
traction, but even so, if it were wet or her shoe slipped, she could fall to
her death on the jagged rocks. “We should go in. The lads will want to know
you’re alright.”

 “Oh, Donovan!” She cried out, “It doesn’t work.”

He pressed his cheek to hers from behind. “What doesn’t
work, my love?”

“My gift. Kieran says it doesn’t always work with immediate blood
kin. I didn’t know. I didn’t know Grandfather was so ill.” She wilted in his
arms, turning toward him for comfort. She wept bitterly, for her grandfather,
and because she was angry with herself for not being able to see the outcome of
her impetuous scheme.

*******

It was past midnight, two days after O’Flaherty returned
from Basseterre.

As the candles burned low in the salon, the only sound was
the steady thwacking of the cards as Michael shuffled and dealt the next hand.

Gareth picked up the cards the lad dealt and studied them
before making his opening bid.

Marceau, the boy’s tutor, had a definite tell, his lips
warped into a twisted grimace.

Michael showed no outward sign as to the contents of his
hand. The boy was a natural when it came to cards, yet he confided to Gareth
that he’s never played them until the voyage here as his sister frowned on it.
Michael asked him not to let his sister know of their nocturnal activities, so
they waited until Elizabeth retired each night before breaking out the card deck
in the salon. O’Flaherty turned down the invitation of cards for the past few
nights, but Gareth didn’t mind overmuch. That one was far too serious for his
liking, a bit of a spook.

“I pass.” Marceau informed them, setting his cards face down
on the table.

“Five.” Michael opened the bid.

“Ah, confident, are we?” Gareth teased, pleased to see a
smile break through the melancholy that seemed to envelope the lad of late.
“Lead out.”

Michael led the first hand and won.

Gareth managed to steal the second from him, lowering the
boy’s chances of winning his bid, unless the boy had some very good cards
tucked away. He was about to lead out the next play, when a noise on the stairs
distracted him. It was too late for servants to be traipsing about. Someone was
mumbling at the top of the stairs. He’d spent a great deal of time listening in
the shadows as a boy. As a result, Gareth had developed a good ear.

“Lead out, or are you afraid you can’t meet the challenge!”
Michael teased.

“Shhh!” Gareth hissed, setting his cards aside and lifting a
hand.

“No—stop it--” A high pitched, girlish voice insisted from
the stairs.

Gareth was on his feet and out the door instantly. Michael
and Marceau were at his heels. He stopped dead at the foot of the stairs in the
foyer. Elizabeth was teetering on the top step. Dressed in her night rail,
barefoot, with a distant expression on her face, he realized she was sleepwalking.
Donovan had mentioned it a couple of times.

She didn’t notice the men at the foot of the stairs as she
spoke to someone in her dream. “I’ll tell them the truth, you did it. I saw
you—”

“She’s dreaming.” Michael said. “Elizabeth--“

“No.” Gareth commanded, grabbing the boy’s arm. “You’ll
startle her, she’ll fall.”

A white mist appeared, hovering on the stairs before them.
The mist moved, floating up the stairs. A female shape materialized. A dark
haired woman paused at mid flight. Her angelic face became distorted and
skeletal, and then she disappeared.

The hackles on Gareth’s neck rose. The woman reappeared
behind Elizabeth at the top of the stairs. The devious eyes tipped him off as
the spirit glowered at him from behind her victim.

“No!” He shrieked, vaulting up the steps to Elizabeth. The
quick blur of ivory limbs coupled with the alarmed shouts of the men behind him
spurred Gareth on.

Sudden horror on Elizabeth’s face told him she’d awakened in
the fall.

Halfway up the stairs he dropped to his knees and grabbed
the railing with one hand and pressed his other palm to the wall to form a
barrier to stop her perilous descent. Her body jerked to a stop in mid flight.
She’d managed to grasp a vertical rail. Elizabeth’s bare heel slammed into his
shoulder. The knee of her other leg clouted his head.

He heard a snapping noise, followed by a cry of pain.

Elizabeth was a crumpled, moaning form four steps above him.
Her arm was caught at an odd angle between the stair railings.

“Liz, are you trying to kill yourself?” Michael tromped up
the stairs toward them.

“Wait.” Gareth cautioned, putting an arm out in front of the
youth to prevent his passing. “Go into the salon and get a pillow, now Michael.
Bring a pillow to cradle your sister’s wrist.”

The lad didn’t argue. Gareth crept up the few stairs to
Elizabeth on his hands and knees, trying to remain calm in the face of what he
expected to become full blown hysterics from the girl before him. “Easy, now,
my dear. Uncle Gareth is here.”

Her response was a muted whimper. She was staring at her
mangled arm, transfixed by the sight of her hand bending back at a bizarre
angle. It wasn’t a view one could become accustomed to, except mayhap for a
physician. A doctor—Yes--Donovan!

“Marceau—get the count.” Gareth instructed.

The tutor hurried up the steps. He stopped near Gareth,
turning his wide girth sideways to maneuver around Gareth and Elizabeth. His
boots echoed like thunder as he tromped down the hall to the master chamber.

“My lady?” The feminine voice intruded. Gareth glanced up to
see his petite-amour at the top of the stairs, clad in a cotton bed-gown with
her dark hair forming a luxurious mantle over her snowy gown. She glided down
the stairs on nude graceful feet and sat behind Elizabeth on the step above her.
Relief came at her presence. He wasn’t any good at comforting hysterical
females. Chloe was Elizabeth’s friend; she’d know how to comfort her.

“What have you done to your arm, my lady?” Chloe asked in
her exotic Caribbean voice.

*******

Elizabeth looked up, unable to explain why she was crouched
on the stairs in the middle of the night with her arm wrenched between the
rails. “I don’t know.”

Light footfalls were heard above them once more. “What
happened?” Kieran appeared shirtless at the top of the stairs. He jaunted down
to the step she was crouched on. His dismay as he took in her mangled limb
added to the panic she’d been trying to hold in check.

“It appears I’m stuck.” Elizabeth replied. She meant it to
be humorous, something Michael would say to ease the tension if he were in a
situation like this. It didn’t sound half as smart as it would have if Michael
said it.

“I can see that.” Kieran replied. He sat down next to her on
the step and leaned close, trying to get a closer look at her distorted limb.

Voices came from above, a cacophony of servants chattering
excitedly as they emerged from the third floor in various stages of undress.
Had she screamed? She didn’t remember it.

“Here we are.” Michael vaulted up the stairs with the
cushion Gareth requested.

Gareth was kneeling on the step below her while Chloe sat
behind her on the stair above. Kieran sat next to her with his arm about her
shoulder. Carefully, the three of them maneuvered Elizabeth’s mangled wrist
from the rail and lowered it to the cushioned support Gareth held.

A loud clatter of military boots ricocheted off the walls as
someone came down the hallway at a run. Military boots. How she hated that gut
wrenching sound. Fletcher’s boots echoed on the bare plank servant’s stairs
when he chased her, screaming promises to deliver fresh pain whenever he caught
her. Elizabeth dropped her head to her knees and covered it with her good arm
as she fought the bitter memories of life in the Mayfair Townhouse.

“I’m here, darlin’.” Donovan’s hand draped over her neck.
Elizabeth lifted her head from her knees, relieved by his steadying presence as
he took Kieran’s place beside her. He’d pulled on his breeches in his haste,
arriving at her side with his torso bared, the pitted scars unveiled for all to
see. And he was barefoot? Did she image that awful noise of Papa’s boots on the
stairs?

She looked up at the throng gathered above. The sound came
from the second floor hall. Mr. Marceau moved forward as she watched and paused
at the top of the stairs, his meaty hand on the banister and one Hessian boot
poised to descend and lend her further assistance.

“Elizabeth!” That flesh chilling voice sliced through her.

She turned to look at the bottom of the stairs. Mama stood
there, glaring up at her and pointing to the black and white tile floor beneath
her dainty shoes.

“No—go away--leave me alone!” Elizabeth shrieked.

“Shhh! You were dreaming, love.” Donovan’s arms grew firm
around her as he pulled her against his scarred chest. “Shock.” He whispered to
those beside him.

In defiance of his logic, Mama’s ghost remained a solid form
at the bottom of the stairs.

“What is your purpose here?” Kieran inquired, startling
everyone with his brusque commanding tone. “Leave this house. You have no
business here.”

Gareth, Chloe, Donovan and Michael turned to gape at Kieran.
He ignored their baffled looks as he glowered at their mother. His anger melted
into horror as he continued to stare at the bottom of the staircase.

Elizabeth turned to see what he found so disturbing. She
screamed.

Blood slowly rose from the crack between the tiles, pooling
before a pair of satin feet. Mama’s face was grey and her blue lips were formed
into an accusing snarl. She kept pointing ominously to the pool of blood
blooming at her feet.

“No.” Elizabeth buried her face in Donovan’s neck.

“El Diablo!” Chloe’s voice quivered behind Elizabeth.

She lifted her head from Donovan’s chest. Chloe was staring
at the bottom of the stairs.

Gareth turned and looked down and then gasped, as if he, too,
could see the pool of dark crimson shimmering in the low candlelight at Mama’s
feet.

“Stop it.” Kieran shouted. “Stop trying to scare her. Leave
this place.”

Donovan frowned at Kieran. “What the devil is going on?”

“Blood. Don’t you see it?” Gareth gestured to the pool at
the bottom of the stairs.

“No.” Donovan snapped, refusing to look where Gareth
indicated. He cupped Elizabeth’s cheek, directing her gaze away from the ghost
to look at his face. The anxiety she saw there was mirrored in his voice. “She
isn’t bleeding. I can set this. It takes six weeks for bone to heal—“

“--You cannot see the blood?” Chloe’s high screech
interrupted Donovan’s determined mumbling. “On the floor, my lord, below us!”
She pointed to the bottom of the stairs.

“No.” Donovan’s panicked eyes darted to the crimson pool
below and then he fixed his gaze determinedly on Elizabeth’s face. “You’re
going to be fine, Love, I promise.”

“Get out of here!” Kieran went rushing down the stairs, his
right arm outstretched and his hand splayed in a commanding gesture as he
started speaking in a language Elizabeth hadn’t heard for some time: Gaelic.