The Rake and the Recluse REDUX (a time travel romance) (2 page)

Today is the first day of my future. Today is the first day of my future,
she chanted. It was the culmination of years of hard work, so why was she questioning it? Her academic accomplishments had pushed her into an internship with an international firm, and that had led to a much sought-after—albeit temporary—position. She intended to make it permanent today. She was doing what everyone expected of her, on a track bound for certain glory: a high paying position, a big house in Cherry Hills, followed by—she mentally ticked off her fingers—husband, dog, children, fish, and happiness.

Going back to her dresser, she picked up the old family portrait that had been taken just a month before the accident. Her thumb rubbed over the glass. Her mom had been so pretty, so sure of herself. So happy taking care of her family and her home.

“I hope I make you proud today, Momma,” she said quietly. When her parents were killed—and she was left a ward—the court had liquidated their assets to make her moveable life more manageable. Her only tangible legacy from her parents—beyond her blonde locks—was the trust fund that followed her from foster home to foster home, her father’s thesis study journals—which weren’t making much sense—and a miniature of a girl that looked like her, save for the hair and costume. Francine put the picture down and picked up the miniature. “Madeleine Adelais,” she said, running her thumb over the engraving on the silver frame.

She sighed heavily and her shoulders fell.
How can I not know, at this point, that what I have been working for is what I want?
Mother-number-four had always told her that she needed to work hard in school and get a business degree so she could make enough money to have the happiness she wanted. But she’d done those things, and still she felt…nothing.

She was still constantly struggling for something: a little more composure, a little more concentration, a little more time. There was so much missing from her past that the pieces of who she was floundered about, impossibly fractured and incapable of coexisting.

She glanced at the clock and her heart skipped. “Crap!” She scowled as she grabbed her cell phone, ebook reader, and the last journal in her father’s set and headed for the door. She passed a bookshelf full of the same classics that were on her reader and looked back to the mirror in the hallway one last time, bright from the reflection of all the white, barren walls, then grunted as she grabbed her briefcase and left.

She nodded at G.W. as he held the front door to the old building. He always stood tall and
always
had a smile. She loved that he seemed to be here only because he liked it.

“Good morning, Miss Larrabee,” he said.

“Good morning, G.W.,” she replied with a smile, juggling her accessories.

“You look lovely today.”

“Why thank you, G.W.”  

“Of course, miss. I’ve a taxi waiting,” he said, then turned to open the car door.

“You’ve saved me once again.” She ducked into the back seat.

He winked. “Good luck today.”

She appreciated the way G.W. always thought ahead, paid attention to what she enjoyed and needed, and always knew when she was running late. He was the perfect replacement for a boyfriend: all the care and attention and none of the drama.
Maybe I could add him to the list,
she thought.
Husband, children, dog, fish—and G.W.
She smiled.

Francine gave directions to the driver, then was tossed across the backseat, dropping her reader, the journal, and the miniature on the seat as they sped away from the curb, the door not yet fully closed.
Shit.
She should have left that home.

She picked up the portrait carefully, inspecting the girl who gazed out from the frame. She looked so confident. There was something innately familiar about her, like she could see into her soul. “What is it you have to tell me, Madeleine?” she whispered.

The taxi darted through traffic and Francine swayed, throwing her arm out to steady herself. She shook off the reverie and called her assistant. “Julia, I forgot the meeting with my father’s thesis advisor about this notebook. Could you call him to reschedule? I need to speak with him. The assumptions appear to be based in fact, but—well, you saw how preposterous they are.” She paused, listening.

The journals detailed a time-shift within an unnamed lineage. It developed a theory that certain people within the family were born at the wrong time, and the universe was endeavoring to return them to the age when they should have lived. Or, more precisely, to whom they should have lived with. She’d grown up thinking her father was a brilliant anthropologist, but the journals made him sound like a loon.

Francine had shared them with her assistant at the firm since she was the closest Francine had to a friend. She laughed at her assistant’s snarky response. “Thank you, really, like what we need to do here is make fun of the dead.” She ran a thumb over the miniature again. “No doubt my father is living in the shoes of some ancestor in the middle ages. It was his favorite era for research, after all.” She smiled. “Yes, yes, I’m on my way, I just—well you know. Please call the professor and—”  

The taxi lurched to the left around a corner, then was brought to a screeching halt before it could crash into an overturned delivery van. Francine jolted forward against the safety glass, her phone dropping to the floor as she was thrown back on the seat like a rag doll.

As she shook off the confusion she could feel hands on her body, but she couldn’t see. She strained to open her eyes, but they wouldn’t cooperate. There were sounds of fabric tearing and people screaming. She tried to touch her face, but someone grabbed her hand and yelled for someone else to hold her down. She struggled and her head flew back, hitting the ground hard. Then everything went dark.

When she came around she was gasping desperately for air. She heard rushing footsteps and a rather loud stomping. Women screamed, men commanded and—horses?
We weren’t close to the 16th Street Mall, were we?
She clutched her hands instinctively, but both the miniature and her phone were gone. Francine tried again to focus her eyes, but they deceived her. Instead of the city, she saw a picturesque countryside, a pair of horses rearing, and a man with bright green eyes and thick, dark hair spilling into his face as he leaned over her.

“No!” he yelled.

She heard fabric tearing and felt an intense pressure around her ribs, then suddenly air rushed to her lungs and she was arching into him with a powerful breath. “What the hell is this?” she asked, her voice rasping with pain. She frowned and reached up to her throat; the sound had barely come out.

He shook his head. “Gentry! Smyth!” The man’s baritone rumbled deeply as he shouted. Her eyes went wide when he lifted her against his hard chest, and she latched onto his lapels as her vision spun against the thundering in her temple. She tried to stay lucid but lost the battle as she felt, more than heard, the man’s voice commanding those around him.

His Grace Gideon Alrick Trumbull, the tenth Duke of Roxleigh, held a countenance both foreboding and powerful. His ability to terrify people with his demeanor only helped his business dealings, creating a sense of either security or terror—depending on which side of the table one was seated—and tonight he clearly seated himself on the wrong side of his own table.

He had nearly killed a girl. If he’d been paying more attention he was sure he’d have taken note of her sooner, but his mind was on the railroad plans. Now he paced nervously in the sitting room outside the guest bedchamber, raking his hands through his hair with a growl so deep in his chest it was nearly inaudible.

When his household manager Mrs. Weston emerged, he turned on her. She stood before him, her face stricken and pale, wringing her stout fingers together. She was a short but sturdy woman with graying, mahogany brown hair gathered in a knot above the nape of her neck. She had a muddled accent that belied her history; based in cockney, then thickening in Glasgow and finishing in the service of a blue blood. She’d attended the Trumbull household for most of her life after she met and lost her husband, helping to raise the children. In all the years Roxleigh had presented Mrs. Weston with the challenges of his adventurous youth she’d not generally been taken to fits of unease when faced with an injury, and that fact alone served to worry him further.

“Your Grace,” she started, trembling. “Pardon, Your Grace,” she said again.

Roxleigh slowly curled his outstretched hands into claws while she continued wringing hers. She peered around him, as if looking for someone to save her. He clenched his jaw.

“What is it, woman?” he bellowed.

“Beg pardon, Your Grace. I am not sure what to say.”

“Well,” he began, “let us start with something simple.” He straightened, clasping his hands behind his back and squaring his shoulders.

Mrs. Weston squeaked.

“Is she alive?” he asked calmly.

“Well yes, Your Grace, she—she is that.”

“Good.” he responded, then waited. “How about this,” he said a moment later, rather sardonically, “Is she speaking?”

Mrs. Weston shifted her eyes. “Oh well, that she is, Your Grace. Yes…quite.” Her eyes grew as round as saucers. “She goes on and on about where she is, and where she should be and what year it is—and she thinks we have absconded with her! She wants us to
call
her office, and notify—”

Roxleigh cut the woman off with a drastic exhale, deflating his chest as though the world needed the air worse than he.

“Fine then, Mrs. Weston, she is alive and she is speaking.” He paused. “Did you say ‘what year it is?’”

Mrs. Weston nodded slowly and he paced again, then stopped, waving the statement off. “Indeed, and beyond that what exactly seems to be the difficulty?” He opened his arms. “I know she lost no limbs and seemed to be—”

He was interrupted by the loud crash of something hitting the wall directly behind Mrs. Weston, who jumped forward into his outstretched arms. They both glanced over her shoulder at the spot on the wall, then he caught her gaze with a silent, pointed question.

Mrs. Weston realized herself and pushed away from him, casting her eyes downward. “That is just it, Your Grace. You see, she is a bit upset. I mean—she is not quite herself. Well, we do not know who she is, so it is difficult to say that, exactly. But she does seem to be a bit—” She hesitated. “Cross.”

“I see.”

Mrs. Weston shook her head. “That is to say, she does not act quite as a lady should, of course, assuming that she is a lady. She is not very ladylike, certainly. There is something about her, the way she speaks, Your Grace. She is just not quite right. We have tried, Your Grace, truly, we have tried, but we cannot pacify—”

He placed his hands on her quivering shoulders in a last attempt to calm her.

“Oh, Your Grace, I cannot—I simply have never seen anything so—”

“Well then.” Roxleigh halted her meandering. “I will just have to see what
I
can make of it.” He straightened and moved her aside. He opened the door to the bedchamber and nudged the silver tray on the floor with the toe of his boot, scowling as he looked back at his wall and spied the splintered panel where it had hit.

He scanned the room. The barefoot girl was pacing in front of the windows at the far wall of the bedchamber, explaining in a raspy voice—to no one in particular—that she didn’t appreciate the assumptions being made. She had naught on but a thin, sleeveless chemise and ankle-length drawers, and her long brown hair was tangled with leaves and fodder.